Bound To Him: Three Dates with a Billionaire (8 page)

We went to her room, because it was bigger than mine. Like a gentleman, I’d let her have the larger dressing room. Her costumes, peacock blues, pure whites and deep blacks were hung on an open rail, and the wigs she would wear were ranged along one long shelf, like the heads in Madame Tussaud’s in London’s Chamber of Horrors. The room reeked of femininity, perfume and makeup.

Once we were alone, she turned to me. “Do you think I should shave my head?” she said.

I almost choked on my coffee. “What the fuck are you talking about?” I put my coffee on the nearest flat surface.

“The ancient Egyptians shaved their heads. Since I’m wearing wigs it might be easier for me. And in the last scene, I can let it slip. The wig, that is.”

“You’d do that?”

She shrugged. “It grows back.” Finding a chair to sit on, she motioned me to the other, a rickety wooden affair covered in splatters of paint. “What is wrong with you?”

“Pardon me?” Now she was scaring me even more. Was she psychic or something?

“You were getting there, and now you’re as cold as yesterday’s pancakes. You even let your accent slip a few times, and you have one of the best English accents I’ve heard in an American.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled. Just my luck that the director had decided to play this piece straight. We were stuck with togas, wigs and British accents. I couldn’t see us lasting long. Only the cognoscenti would want to see this. “I’ll get the accent right.”

“Fuck the accent, darling. You’re acting like you have a stick up your arse. It might be a pretty arse, but the public are paying to see if you can pull it off. The play I mean,” she added as I burst into laughter.

“Thanks for the compliment. At least I think that’s what it was. But the rest of it...” I shrugged. I should have known I couldn’t hide anything from her. We’d spent the morning being passionately in love and plotting against Julius Caesar and Pompey. “I can’t get into the love scenes, I know. Do you mind if we just block them today?”

“I do mind. We’re opening in a week. You’re word perfect, but that’s about all. I’m having to act for two here.”

I decided to get some of my own back for the arse crack. So to speak. “You’re pregnant?”

“I might as well be.” She had a daughter in her late teens, so it was hardly likely. I’d only said it to rile her, and get her off my case. “I’d get better reaction from a baby. Look, Troy, you’re almost there. I don’t know what you want to do, but if you need to change a few things around to get into the part, I’ll help. Understand?”

I frowned. Was she hitting on me? When we’d been here for weeks and she hadn’t tried a thing? I didn’t flatter myself, sometimes acting love on stage found its way behind the scenes, but I wasn’t even feeling that. I folded my arms. “What are you talking about?”

“Something’s bothering you, isn’t it?”

“You might say that.” I pulled my phone from my pocket. I couldn’t stand it any longer, I needed to know. Had the news broken yet?

“So now you’re shutting me out?” she demanded. “You’re a box office draw. The public are salivating at the thought of us onstage together.” She put her hands on her slender hips. “Put that fucking thing away and concentrate.”

Ah fuck. The whole world would know soon enough, so I should really tell her. “Here it is., then. I fucked up last night. I mean really fucked up.”

She tilted her head to one side, her dark eyes gleaming. “Go on.”

“I took a girl back to my hotel. I know, I haven’t done it all the time I’ve been here, I swear. I’m not a complete idiot, I know what trouble I’m in. But she — Cassie — was sweet and gorgeous and she was in trouble. She was with an old lecher, a colleague of my father’s. My dad despises him, so I was ready for trouble. Cassie shouldn’t have been with him, and she was out of her depth. So I rescued her, claimed she was with me and took her to my hotel. I thought I’d get her a cab and send her home. My good deed for the day. But one thing led to another, you know?”

“It sounds like a great evening,” Sonya said. She leaned back and crossed her legs, the picture of classic elegance.

“It was, until I came out of the shower. Then I found her card. She was a fucking escort. I swear I had no idea. But now she’ll sell my story and I’ll be all over the place.”

With an alarmed glance at me, Sonya dragged her phone from her pants’ pocket and started swiping the screen. I hunted through the Internet, and checked my emails.

I looked up with a relieved sigh. “Nothing,” I said.

“Nope, I can’t find anything.” Sonya replaced her phone. “Like we British say, keep calm and carry on.”

I tried, I really did. That night I went to the apartment my PA had found for me. All my stuff was already there, because I have a kickass assistant who’d had it all packed up and moved from the hotel while I was working. I spent the evening channel-hopping and checking my laptop. No news. Absolutely nothing.

Cassie had said she needed money, so I didn’t doubt she’d earn it the easiest way she could. In a way I didn’t blame her. People had to look out for themselves, after all.

But I wanted to see her again. I tried to forget her but that image of her asleep in my bed, arm across her breasts, haunted me. I might as well have taken a picture of her, the vision remained so vividly in my mind. It never left me, not all that night and well into the next day.

*****

I
was no nearer getting sleep. I thought I’d cracked that particular problem when I stopped overindulging in drugs. I’d never been attracted by drinking, but drugs I could do. At one time I’d started along the route of uppers and downers, controlling my moods, and then my Dad had pointed out to me that Judy Garland had done the same. Then I got caught, and although I’d gotten away with a caution, since they’d only got me with weed, I’d stopped most of the shit.

That had been my first wake-up call. I’d been high on a sweet cocktail of ecstasy and some other stuff when I’d nearly killed somebody crossing the road. That shocked me so much that I stopped the naughty stuff. Some of my colleagues gave up because they realized they were fucking themselves up, but I did it because I’d nearly destroyed a person. Why should I drag somebody else into this mess? So I’d stopped, become a party pooper and stuck to what I could handle. Take it or leave it, that was my motto, and I tried to live by it.

But tonight, I paced my apartment and eyed the bottles of sleeping tablets in the cabinet. My fucking assistant had arranged them for me, thinking to be useful. I had a pharmacy’s worth. In a fit of temper, I emptied the bottles down the toilet and flushed them away. There were going to be some happy fish tonight. Or alligators, if the rumors were true about the drains in New York. I couldn’t get with the part and now I couldn’t sleep. We had dress rehearsals tomorrow, and I knew I was a barely adequate Antony. The only reason they hadn’t fired me was my box office draw, and that wouldn’t last long once the critics got hold of me.

I recalled the legend of Peter O’Toole. He’d played Macbeth once in London, so badly that the critics had torn him to shreds. The story was notorious in the biz, held up as an example to us poor slobs that even the best actors could blow it. Mind you, after the savaging, seat sales had gone up so much they had to continue the run.

I was no Peter O’Toole. We had the same eye color, but that was about it. I wouldn’t go the same way as him. Fuck knew I had enough examples of what not to do. My Dad made sure I saw them. And success stories, people who had turned their lives around after getting into trouble, just to nudge me the other way.

None of it helped. Memories of people I’d once known who’d died from overindulgence, of people my Dad had known who’d gone the same way didn’t haunt me as much as they once had. Because I was me, and I was going to make my own life. If it ever started.

I checked the clock. It was still only eleven. I’d tried for an early night because of the heavy day I had tomorrow. Maybe that was the problem. I paced some more, and stared out of the window at the lights of the cars going along Madison. My apartment was in a sidestreet, but it was high enough for me to see the signs of life outside. The night was just beginning for some people. Maybe I should just give up and join them. With my face I could get in anywhere I wanted.

The memory of that sweet face, and that luscious built-for-sin body haunted me. That was the trouble. I couldn’t get that image of Cassie out of my head, whatever I tried. It clung to me like a bad smell. Or a really, really good one.

Revelation came in the flash of lightning it sometimes was. I caught my breath. I was blaming her for something I did. That was it. Sure, I was mad when I found the card. I’d genuinely thought I’d found her for myself, that she was attracted to me. When I’d kissed her in the museum, I’d done it on impulse, urged on by the dirty pavement, and I wasn’t talking dust. Then, when I got a good look at her body, I was gone, and I honestly thought I’d discovered somebody special. That’s why it had hurt so much.

But I’d used prostitutes before. I was known for it, since the latest expose and that fucking bust. Because I wasn’t alone when they’d flagged me down, I’d had one of Hollywood’s most notorious call girls in the car with me, and I’d been looking forward to a long session with handcuffs.

Which they’d discovered, but they’d laughed off that part. I was still in trouble, though.

Maybe I should go with the flow. If Cassie was working for Madame X, then I could have her again. Not that Madame X ran a call-girl business. Perish the thought. But I knew of one high-ranking police officer who employed her. She was discreet and safe, as long as she was paid in time. For a madam, without the e, she ran a straight business. And she looked after her girls. Cassie could be in worse hands.

As an intern at the museum, she must be short of cash, especially in this town. So I’d put a little more her way. Better me than some filthy slob like Witley pawing her. I shuddered, and turned away from the view, heading for the bedroom and my phone. My mind was made up.

“Madame X? It’s Troy Cooper.” I disdained the use of pseudonyms. In any case, one look at me and they knew who I was, so there wasn’t much point.

“Ah, it’s good to hear from you! I heard about the fracas at the museum.”

I could do Cassie a solid here. “Witley was pawing Cassie and calling her a whore in front of everybody. I take it you don’t want that kind of publicity?”

She sighed heavily. “No, we don’t. We pride ourselves on our discretion. Reluctantly, I’ll put Witley on my blacklist. He won’t find any girls available when he calls again. He called me after the gala at the museum, ranting and raving. Said you had something to do with it?”

“I took Cassie away from an increasingly embarrassing situation.” That was putting it mildly.

“So you had a date with her?”

“Not one on agency time.” Madame X would have her ass if I let her. She’d got her fee from Witley, presumably, so that would have to be enough.

Madame sighed. “I guess. But thanks for the help. I owe you one.”

That was the opening he wanted. “Then you can repay it right now. Get me a date with Cassie for tomorrow night.”

A pause, then, “Consider it paid.”

“One more thing. Don’t tell her it’s me.”

“That good, eh?”

I chuckled. “Sure it was. I just want to talk to her. I’ll take her to dinner at Ravel’s. Nice and public.”

I could hear keys chattering. She was entering details as we spoke. “What time?” Her voice echoed. She’d put me on speaker. There’d better not be anybody else in that room with her.

“Nine.” Ravel’s was pretty much booked, but he knew the owners, and in any case, they’d fit him in. He was the celebrity everybody wanted to see right now for all the wrong reasons, but he might as well use his notoriety.

“I’ll get her there for you.”

“Thanks.” Only when I’d replaced the receiver did I realize that she’d put his name down on the books. Well, fuck that. If Madame wanted her tip, I’d pay it. If only I’d taken Cassie’s number from her phone when I saw it on my bedside table, I could’ve called her personally. I was about to eat humble pie, but I could do that real well. I’d rehearsed it in the past. The critics said I’d done one of the best grovel scenes in history when, as Foxman, I begged the heroine’s forgiveness before I died in her arms. To do her justice, Connie hadn’t giggled once when she was doing the reaction shots.

I wondered if she’d turn up. Would she have the nerve?

End of Part One

Read the next part of Cassie and Troy’s story in
Bound to Her