Bad Girls (24 page)

Dr Raf turned his arm, glancing down at his watch, and Amber’s gaze was drawn like iron to a magnet at the sight of his hand, the extra inch of skin she could see as he popped his shirt cuff. His hand was elegant, long-fingered, the skin smooth and as Mediterranean-olive as his face, but she could see dark hairs at his wrist, one curling around the stainless steel of the wristband. The shirt cuff sliding slightly up his arm felt extraordinarily intimate, erotic, as if he were baring his flesh for Amber’s eyes alone. She swallowed hard.

‘It’s almost noon,’ he said, and she immediately looked up at his mouth, watching his full lips move as he spoke, noticing, too, that there was colour in his cheeks again as he realized how intently she was watching him.

I’m embarrassing him, she thought miserably. I have to stop.

But she knew she couldn’t.

‘You slept for a very long time,’ Dr Raf observed, not meeting her eyes now. ‘That’s excellent.’

‘My mother gave me stuff on the plane,’ Amber admitted. ‘That’s probably why.’

‘
Really
?’ He swung round to Daniyel, who was leaning against the bathroom door, the phone in her hands.‘Did we know that?’ he was asking urgently.

‘Absolutely not,’ Daniyel said, frowning. ‘I checked with Mom myself. She said the hospital in London didn’t give Amber anything, and she certainly didn’t mention any pills on the plane. As far as we knew, Amber was clean when she came in.’

‘Damn.’ Dr Raf sighed. ‘That’s not good news. Amber, do you know what she gave you?’

Amber shook her head. ‘My mother probably won’t know either,’ she admitted. ‘She just pulls stuff out of her bag and takes it without looking at the labels. Vicodin, or Xanax, probably. I was really wound up. I thought I was . . . I thought I was going somewhere bad. I was crying and freaking out. Honestly, I was really upset and she just wanted to calm me down,’ she added, not wanting them to think badly of Slava.

‘Uh-huh,’ Dr Raf said, standing up. ‘Well, I’d better give her a call right away. Amber, you should eat something. Daniyel will sort something out for you. And unless you feel significantly worse in the next few hours, I’ll see you at group this afternoon.’

‘Why would I feel worse?’ Amber said nervously. ‘I feel pretty awful already – my head hurts really badly.’

He nodded. A dark ringlet fell onto his forehead; she wanted to reach up and twist her finger through it, wind herself tightly into his curls.

‘We’ll get you some meds for the headache. Basically –’ he hesitated – ‘the bad news is that if your mother gave you what you think she did on the plane, you still have full opiate withdrawal to go through.’ He looked grave, his deep brown eyes so serious that the expression melted Amber completely. ‘Withdrawal can be quite unpleasant. But we’ll be with you all the way, Amber.’

Wordlessly, she reached out a hand to him. He looked completely taken aback.

And then he leaned down and took her hand in his.

It was like joining two live wires. Amber’s blood fizzed like sherbet at the shock of it, the warmth flooding into her, the strength of his hand around hers. She stared at their hands, connected, her fingers twining around his the way she wanted her entire body to wrap around him. His nails were smooth, pale pink ovals. Every detail about him was utterly fascinating to her; she could have looked at him for hours, till she had memorized every line on his knuckles, every tiny mole on his skin, every bone in his body.

From miles away across the room, the door swung open, knocking against the wall.

‘Oh, sorry! I didn’t realize you were still in here.’

It was the blonde girl from before, the girl who’d come in when Amber had knocked the magazines over.

‘That’s fine, Skye, we were just finishing up,’ Dr Raf said hastily, letting go of Amber’s hand. ‘Amber . . . um, Daniyel will show you round and make sure you have what you need. I’ll see both of you in group.’

He nodded to Skye and was gone; Amber’s eyes followed him out of the door, not turning back to look at the girl called Skye until he was long gone.

‘Amber, this is your roommate, Skye. You remember her from last night at all?’ Daniyel said briskly.

Amber shook her head.

‘You were pretty dopey,’ Skye said, smiling at her.

‘Amber, you OK to walk?’ Daniyel asked. ‘I could take you through to the kitchen if you think you can manage it. Fix you some toast, maybe. Or a bowl of cereal. We should get something in your stomach.’

‘I can do that,’ Skye said cheerfully.

She’s really pretty, Amber thought, and she couldn’t help but be jealous: Skye’s blonde, blue-eyed good looks were so perfect, so exactly what men generally wanted. Too small to model, too busty for fashion, but the Barbie blueprint of the ideal girlfriend, adorable and dainty-featured. With her wide eyes and slightly up-tilted nose, she resembled a cute Pekinese.

Swinging her legs out of bed, standing up cautiously, Amber, who was nearly five foot ten, towered over her roommate.

‘I’m bored out of my mind, honestly,’ Skye was assuring Daniyel. ‘It’ll give me something to do, showing Amber round.’

But Amber had just caught sight of herself in the mirror and let out a little scream. Bird’s nest hair, no makeup at all, and a dent in her cheek where she must have lain on a corner of the pillow. Her skin was dull, and there were bags under her eyes.

Oh no – the first time I meet Dr Raf, and that’s what I look like. No wonder he was staring at me – he must have been shocked at how awful I looked
. . .

‘I need to shower first,’ she said firmly. ‘And blow-dry my hair, and do my makeup. God, I hope my mother packed my straighteners! And my tongs!’

When he sees me again, she told herself, I’m going to look
fantastic
. I’m going to look like I just stepped out of that
Sports Illustrated
shoot. I’m going to smell wonderful and – shit, did
Matka
pack me any perfume at all?

She was down on her knees, rummaging through her suitcase frantically. Skye cracked a grin. ‘Well, we’ve definitely got
something
in common!’ she said. ‘And look, hon, you can always borrow my straighteners, OK? I know how important they are to a girl . . .’

Skye’s straighteners weren’t the GHD to which Amber was addicted – Slava hadn’t thought to pack either those or the tongs that Amber used to flip the ends of her hair. Still, Amber had over a decade’s experience of grooming herself to the kind of high-gloss shine expected from a top model, and when you were travelling all round the world, you didn’t always have your favourite tools to work with. An hour later, she emerged from the ensuite bathroom so transformed that Skye, lying on her bed reading
InStyle
, gaped when she saw her roommate.

‘Wow,’ she said. ‘You clean up nice.’

‘Thanks,’ Amber said a little warily. She wasn’t used to girls paying her compliments and meaning them; the isolation of her life with Slava, combined with the vicious competitiveness of the modelling world, had made her cautious about trusting anyone. Especially a girl as pretty as Skye.

Still, Skye wasn’t lying. Amber surveyed herself in the bedroom mirror. Citizens of Humanity jeans clung to her slender legs, the slight bootcut making them seem impossibly endless. Her fitted tank top was emerald green to match her eyes, while the pale grey, feather-light oversized silk cashmere cardigan hung off her shoulders, its wrap front dangling down elegantly, the translucent fabric part-showing off, part-veiling the curves of her body as she moved.

She was in a cloud of perfume: lilac, white cedar and peony. Thank goodness, Slava had packed her favourite daytime scent, Éclat d’Arpège. Her hair was a silky, tawny mane, her eyebrows perfectly plucked and pencilled, her long lashes mascaraed dark brown, her cheeks and lips stained lightly with the same dark rose. Amber had gone as natural as she dared; instinct told her that Dr Raf preferred women without too much obvious artifice.

‘You hungry?’ Skye asked, putting down the magazine.

It was a question Amber never knew how to answer truthfully. She was always hungry, but that had been her normal state for so long that she barely noticed it any longer.

‘I suppose I should eat something,’ she said. ‘Cereal sounded nice.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Skye said wryly. ‘They’ve got skim milk here.’

Amber was in a haze the whole time Skye showed her round the clinic. Her near-obsession with Dr Raf made it almost impossible for her to take in anything Skye was telling her; the garden, the kitchen, the gym, the communal lounge area, the people Skye introduced her to, passed in a blur. She spooned up the Cheerios Skye had poured into a bowl for her without tasting them – they might have been made of cardboard for all she knew. All she was aware of was that in a short while, she would see Dr Raf again, hear his voice. It was extraordinary, and unprecedented; she’d had crushes on men before, of course, but never had she felt anything this strong, this all-encompassing.

By the time Skye, checking the time, announced that it was time for afternoon group therapy, Amber’s impatience was almost unbearable. Not that you could read any of that on her face. She was so used to presenting a beautiful, impassive mask to the world that all Skye, or anyone, could see was an exquisite, poised model, dressed and made-up so perfectly that she could be ready for a shoot at any moment.

‘Don’t get too freaked about the group,’ Skye said, leading Amber into a large, sun-filled room. ‘Everyone’s cool. And you just go at your own pace, you know? I mean, you don’t have to talk about stuff you really don’t want to.’

A semicircle of square, red armchairs was arranged facing another, single, red armchair. Apart from the chair setup, the room was decorated like an ideal living room in a show flat for an upmarket development, from the circular, orange-striped rug on the floor, to the abstract prints on the walls, to the wooden shelves in staggered lines, which held ornamental glass vases in shades of gold and silver. The floor-to-ceiling windows looked out onto the garden, but thick hibiscus shrubs clustering close to the glass provided reassuring privacy.

Amber glanced over at Skye as they sat down in chairs next to each other, her curiosity finally stirred.

‘So what are you here for?’ she asked.

Normally, Amber would never have asked something that direct. But something about passing out in London and waking up in Los Angeles, in an environment where everything was unfamiliar, away from every reassurance and security she knew, was making her strangely unlike herself.

And Skye didn’t seem to mind. Flashing a beautiful smile, she said easily: ‘Sex addiction.’ She tilted her head to one side. ‘I’m an exotic dancer. Or I was. One of my clients got this huge crush on me. Didn’t like that I was screwing around – you know how it is.’

Amber found herself nodding in agreement.

‘So he’s stumped up for me to come here to get cured,’ Skye concluded. ‘Then I guess he thinks he’ll put me on his white horse and ride off into the sunset.’ She rolled her big blue eyes.

Great story, huh? Skye thought smugly. And I came up with that all by myself – Kevin didn’t help out. I’m turning out to be a pretty good actress.

‘Hey, baby,’ drawled a man’s voice.

Amber turned in her chair, recognizing the voice. And when she saw him, she was sure she’d met him before; it took a good ten seconds for the penny to drop.

Wow, Joe Jeffreys. He’s just as handsome in person. And he’s really into Skye – look how he’s grinning at her.

‘Hey back atcha,’ Skye was saying, flipping her long blonde hair over one shoulder, arching her back to show off her firm round breasts, smiling bewitchingly at Joe Jeffreys as he took a seat across the semicircle from the two of them, stretching his long, long legs out in front of him, his frame a little too large for the chair, which looked insubstantial by comparison with his big, strongly muscled body.

So he can get a good view of Skye
.

‘Hey, a newbie!’ Joe said, taking in Amber’s presence. ‘I’m Joe.’ He leaned forward, tilting over the axis of his legs, to shake her hand. ‘You look kind of familiar. You act, sweetie?’

‘I used to model,’ Amber said, surprising herself with the past tense.

‘Oh, right.’ He looked her up and down, his eyes full of appreciation. ‘Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you.’

Beside her, Amber heard Skye stir in her chair. But just then, a bustle of movement signalled other arrivals: a skinny, unhappy-looking young man with two nose rings, an older guy in chinos and a button-down shirt, and a girl barely out of her teens with a flaming-yellow bob of hair, a lot of dark makeup smeared around her eyes, and a sulky pout to her mouth. She flung herself into the chair closest to the door, scowling furiously as she wrapped herself into a cocoon with the plaid blanket she’d brought with her.

‘Hey, Petal,’ Joe said to her.

‘Fuck off,’ the girl called Petal snapped back at him.

‘Nice to see you too,’ Joe said, not a whit fazed, leaning back and crossing his legs at the ankles. He exchanged a brief, amused look with Skye, who wiggled her eyebrows at him in response.

The door shut.

‘Good afternoon, everyone,’ said Dr Raf, and Amber’s heart leaped into her throat; for a long moment she couldn’t breathe.

‘I’m just going to pull out a second chair,’ he said, ‘because Dr Lucy Tennant is joining us today. Some of you have already met Dr Lucy, I know.’

‘Hi, everyone,’ said Dr Lucy, striding into view around the edge of the semicircle, her jaw pegged at a high angle, her hands in the pockets of the white coat hanging loose over her fitted shirt and flat-fronted beige trousers.

I hate her, Amber thought instantly. She looks like the kind of woman who thinks she’s always right and everyone else is always wrong. And why is she wearing that coat? To show us she’s a doctor? I mean, Dr Raf doesn’t need to wear a white coat to be authoritative . . .

But then Amber realized that Dr Raf’s shirtsleeves were rolled up, showing off his forearms, and she completely lost her train of thought as she stared at him, watching him lift the armchair as easily as if it weighed nothing at all, swinging it round and placing it next to his, gesturing courteously at Dr Lucy to sit down before he did.