Demon Rumm (4 page)

He set up his favorite story about that particular actress while Alice grated cheese into a bowl. “So she walks over to the bed, as we had blocked it. I’ve got my back turned to her, see? I take off my shirt.”

“I remember that. It was a yummy love scene.”

“Thanks.
Finally
it came out that way. But on that particular take, just as I got my shirt off, she let go this bloodcurdling scream. I thought, ‘My God, has my back broken out with leprosy?’ But it seems that the crew thought it would be hilarious to put a Gila monster under the covers and—”

“No!” Alice exclaimed.

“Yes. When she whipped the covers back, there it was in all its horny, ugly glory.”

Alice was raptly attentive. “What did she do?”

“After that initial scream, nothing. She laughed and went along with the joke. But the next day she paid them all back.”

“How?” Alice asked, giggling.

Rylan popped a ripe olive into his mouth, sucking on it as he talked. “She got up early and while everyone was still sleeping sent her kids—they were on the set with her—around to steal their shoes. By breakfast, she had a pile of Reeboks and Adidas and Nikes, with all the shoelaces tied together. Ever try to sort out forty or so pair of sports shoes and stay on a tyrant director’s rigid schedule?”

“Who would ever have thought she could be such a cutup? She seems so elegant.” Alice glanced at something behind his shoulder and smiled. “Hi, there. Headache better?”

Rylan swiveled his head around to see Kirsten standing in the doorway. She avoided looking at him as she answered her housekeeper. “Yes, thank you.”

He had difficulty catching his breath. The afternoon had culminated in a fabulous sunset. As Kirsten moved between him and the view of it, he could see her slender body silhouetted against the gauzy sundress she was wearing. The bodice crisscrossed in front over her breasts and tied behind her neck, leaving her back bare. It would have been impossible to wear a bra with that dress. Only his preoccupation with her fluid figure prevented him from laughing out loud. She had worn the dress in defiance. He wanted to congratulate her on her gumption, but the sight of her left him momentarily mute.

“Dinner’s almost ready,” Alice said, turning her back to them to reach for something in the refrigerator.

Rylan used that opportunity to say, “Nice dress, Kirsten.”

“Thank you.”

He could tell from the way she looked through him that she didn’t approve of his dinner attire. The jeans he was wearing were clean, but in no better condition than the pair he’d arrived in. His white T-shirt had a blurred, laundry-faded image of the shark that Steven Spielberg had immortalized yawning from it. He had tied his bare feet into a sad pair of tennis shoes. Long ago, he’d begun dressing to please himself. He wasn’t averse to wearing a tuxedo if the occasion called for it, but his “casual” bordered on “sloppy.”

Kirsten glanced at him. “I’m going to have a drink on the terrace while Alice puts dinner on the table. Would you care to join me?”

He knew the invitation was issued purely out of politeness, but he accepted it. “Sure.”

“This way.”

She led him through the glass door to a lattice-covered part of the deck that provided a view of the swimming pool and the ocean. Built into a corner of it was a bar. “I’m having a white wine cooler.”

“Soda and lime is fine.”

He read her surprise in the quick look she gave him, but didn’t comment on it. “Thanks,” he said when she handed him his drink. “This is a beautiful place. Maybe I should invest in a home.”

“I thought you had one in Malibu.”

“If the tabloids are to be believed, I have one there, and a ranch in Arizona and . . . hell, I don’t know, an igloo in Alaska maybe.”

“You don’t?”

“I’ve got a one-bedroom apartment just off Sunset Boulevard.”

That disclosure stunned her. “Why?”

Shrugging, he dropped down onto the low wall where she was sitting. Only he straddled it, spreading his thighs wide and facing her. “That’s all I need.” He laughed at her expression of disbelief. “Don’t tell me you believed all that garbage about leopard-skin rugs, mirrored ceilings, and statues of pre-Columbian fertility goddesses.”

“I thought it was zebra skins and Egyptian sarcophagi filled with cocaine.”

She had a wonderful laugh, he decided. The sound of it was pleasurable in itself, but he enjoyed it even more, knowing that whatever anguish he’d caused her earlier was dissipating.

“I promise you that I don’t have the hide of any animal in my apartment,” he said. She lowered her eyes to the rim of her wineglass, which she was tracing with her index finger. “And none of the other either.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“Yes, you did.” He spoke so softly, his words were almost lost on the breeze that carried with it the ceaseless, swishing sound of the ocean. “With your eyes. Where are your glasses, by the way?”

Their conversation had dropped to an intimate pitch. Kirsten inclined away from him, cleared her throat, and spoke unnaturally loudly. “I only need them when I work. Eyestrain.”

He stared deeply into her eyes, as though searching for signs of fatigue or stress. She stared back, treating his eyes to the same penetrating attention.

After a long moment, she stood up. “Another drink?”

“Okay.”

She fixed them each a refill, pouring more wine than citrus juice into hers this time, he noticed. He eased himself off the wall and wandered around the gazebo, touching the blossoms of the scarlet hibiscus. They bobbed in the wind like cardinals nodding their heads in approval of a pontiff ’s decree. He slid the tip of his finger into the throat of one. It was an innocent gesture, but he was immediately suffused with a rush of sexual heat. Erotic thoughts of Kirsten’s body crowded his brain, pushing aside all others.

He turned suddenly, guiltily, and saw that she was watching his hand. Her gaze met his. The impact was physical, as though no distance separated them. Her cheeks were filled with color almost as vivid as that of the blooms. Rylan knew in that instant that her thoughts were running parallel to his.

However, he knew better than to press the advantage. Instead he asked, “What’s in there?” and tilted his head toward an enclosure.

“A sauna.”

“Sounds wonderful.”

“Feel free to use it any time. It’s never turned off.”

They resumed their previous positions on the low wall. His knee accidentally bumped hers. She didn’t move hers away. He left his where it was. He was finding it damned hard not to stare at her. He studied her over the rim of his glass as he sipped his soda.

“If you don’t want me to read your mind, you’d better wear your glasses all the time,” he remarked. “Your eyes are too expressive for your own good. And very, very blue.”

“What am I thinking?” she challenged.

“About me. You’re worried about what’s fact and what’s fiction.”

“It’s none of my business.”

“I’m living in your house. That makes it your business. Are you wondering if I’m going to whip out drug paraphernalia after supper?” She ducked her head, a silent admission. “I don’t do any drugs, Kirsten. Short of a few pot parties in high school and college, I never have.”

She looked for telltale signs of duplicity in his eyes. “No?”

He shook his head. “Do you?”

“No!”

“Then we don’t have a problem with that.” He sipped his soda. “Nor am I an alcoholic who’s trying to stay on the wagon.”

“You’re drinking plain soda.”

“Because I took a sinus capsule this afternoon. I have a bitch of a nasal septum.”

Despite his attempted humor, her expression remained serious. “There have been reports to the contrary. About the alcoholism.”

“False reports.”

“You’ve never denied them.”

“Denying them would be tantamount to giving them credence. Besides, I have better things to do.”

“Yes, I’ve read about those too,” she said with a faint smile.

“My sordid romantic escapades? Do you want to know about my love life?”

“No.”

“Does it matter?”

“No, as long as . . . as long as . . .”

“As long as I don’t practice anything too deviate under your roof.”

“I don’t think you would do that.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” he said sarcastically.

“Well, what do you expect people to believe?” she exclaimed. “You never grant interviews. If all these rumors are false, you could clear them up if you weren’t so secretive.”

“But those false rumors don’t bother me. Apparently they do you.”

“How can you stand for people to think bad things about you?”

“It goes with my job.”

“Still—”

Before he realized he’d done it, he clasped her hand to stop her arguments and to emphasize what he was about to say. “Look, if I went on ‘20/20’ and cleared up one set of rumors, by the next morning another set would have been started. It would be time-consuming and energy-draining to come along behind them like a poop-scooper and clean them up.” She laughed at his analogy. Smiling, he added, “As long as the people I love are protected, I don’t let what’s written in the gossip columns bother me.”

A shadow crossed her face, dimming her smile. “Uh-oh,” he said. “I see you’re still concerned about my love life. If you want to know my sexual preferences, why don’t you just ask?”

She withdrew her hand from his and mentally, if not physically, put space between them. “As I said, it’s none of my business.”

He drew a deep breath. “I have loved several men, Kirsten.” Her gaze swung up to his. “Relatives. A very few cherished friends. But I’ve never had a man for a lover.”

Somehow his hand was now curved around her elbow. He was stroking the inside of it with an idle thumb. He knew the caress contributed to the trance his lulling voice and steady gaze induced.

“If I were gay, would I have gotten so hard when I touched your breasts this afternoon?”

Her wineglass, slippery from condensation, slid from her grasp and shattered on the deck. At the same instant Alice called her name from the doorway.

The housekeeper was the first to respond to the accident, though for an instant the three of them were held spellbound in the charged atmosphere that immediately followed it. Alice rushed across the deck, avoiding the puddle of liquid that was spiked with ice cubes and shards of glass.

“Kirsten, I’m sorry,” Alice cried. “I was only calling you to dinner. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Kirsten seemed to have difficulty standing. It was as though her knees had forgotten how to do their job. Rylan encircled her waist with his hands and held her steady until she indicated with a slight twist of her body that his support was unnecessary . . . and unwanted.

“It was my fault, Alice,” she said shakily. “The glass was wet and I just . . . let it slip through my hand. Dinner’s ready?”

“Yes. On the table. You two go inside and I’ll clean this up.”

Rylan thought that eating in the dining room was like eating in a goldfish bowl. Three exterior walls of the room were glass. It was supported on a precipice that jutted over a steep rock cliff, which gave one a sense of being suspended in midair. The only furnishings were the dining chairs and a glass slab table resting on two brass rams’ heads, their horns curling backward to form the legs of the table. Crystal candlesticks held burning white candles that filled the room with the scent of frangipani. In the center of the table a bud vase held three stalks of lilies of the valley. It was simple and elegant.

“Smart decorator,” he said, holding Kirsten’s chair.

“I did it.”

“I like your taste.”

After directing a hard glance at him over her shoulder, she seemed to reach the conclusion that his words carried no double meaning and stiffly sat down.

“Thank you.”

She filled their plates with taco salad and their glasses with ice water. After folding her napkin in her lap and passing him a basket of crisp tortilla chips, she began eating. He watched her, knowing that her precise movements were an indication of tension.

“You seem upset. Are you?”

Her fork made a terrible racket as it clattered to her plate. “Yes, I’m upset!” she whispered fiercely, aware of Alice’s mindless humming in the kitchen as she worked. “I don’t want you to talk to me like that.”

“Like what? You mean the reference I made to—”

She held up both hands. “Don’t say it again. I haven’t encouraged you to say . . .
think
. . . like that about me.”

“No,” he said quietly, laying his own fork on his plate, “you haven’t.”

“Then why did you do it?”

For ponderous moments, he toyed with his water glass while he stared at her. “I’m attracted to you, Kirsten.”

She swallowed convulsively, though she didn’t move another muscle. Even her eyes remained unblinking. Finally she said, “Don’t pull this act with me. Don’t practice scenes.”

“I’m not.”

He could tell that she initially thought he was trying to lure her. But the longer they stared at each other, the surer she became that he was being honest with her. Revealing little gestures—a flicker of uneasiness in her eyes, a darting tongue that moistened her lips—gave her away.

“This is business,” she said.

He was heartened to hear an emotional gruffness in her voice. “Business is why I’m here, yes,” he said. “But my attraction to you has nothing to do with business.”

“You shouldn’t be attracted to me.”

“I didn’t plan on being.”

“Then don’t be,” she said miserably.

He reached for her hand. “I’m afraid it’s not something I can turn off and on at will, Kirsten.”

She pulled her hand free. “You’ll have to. Or live with it in silence. In any event, it won’t do you any good.”

“You’re saying no before I even make my pitch.”

“That’s right. I loved my husband.”

He moved his virtually untouched plate aside and leaned forward, propping his forearms on the table. “Your husband’s been dead for two years. I touched you today.”

“Which you shouldn’t have.”

“Perhaps not. But I did.” He moved even closer. “Believe me, Kirsten, you’re alive. And even if your mind is closed to the thought of another love affair, your body isn’t.”