Lethal Seduction (14 page)

She'd never been to Joel's office, situated in the Blaine Building—a magnificent shimmering tower of glass and concrete owned by his father. Joel had confided he was all set to take over the business. “Leon's ready to retire,” he'd informed her. “So I'm the man.”

Rosarita was surprised to discover that Joel's office was on the thirty-fifth floor, because according to what she'd found out, the place to be was on the thirty-sixth floor, where Leon Blaine kept his suite of personal offices.

Joel's assistant, Jewel, a skinny black girl with four-inch talonlike nails painted green, a massive amount of cornrowed hair and a belligerent attitude, was sitting behind a pale wood reception desk. “Yes?” she said in an unfriendly fashion as Rosarita approached.

“I'm here to see Mr. Joel Blaine,” Rosarita said haughtily.

“And who might you be?”

“Mr. Blaine is expecting me,” Rosarita said.

“Then I guess you gotta have a name,” Jewel countered.

They locked eyeballs.

“Tell him Rosarita is here,” she said through clenched teeth, realizing—and not for the first time—that she'd been stuck with a Mexican hooker's name because she'd been conceived while her parents were lolling on a beach in Puerto Vallarta.

“Rosarita,” Jewel repeated, giving her name an evil twist. “I'll tell him. Take a seat, honey.”

Honey!
Now Rosarita was seriously pissed off. She sat down in the reception area, picked up a copy of
People
magazine and stared mindlessly at a picture of a half-naked Brad Pitt.

The girl with the green nails was now on the phone. A personal call. She was whispering and snickering, completely ignoring Rosarita's presence.

After ten minutes of this crap, Rosarita got up and approached the desk. “Does Mr. Blaine know I'm waiting?” she demanded in a shrill voice.

“Oh,” Jewel said, completely unconcerned. “He was on the phone when you got here. I'll check if he's free now.” She buzzed him, and said in a far too familiar fashion, “Joel, some
lady
called Rosarita's waitin' out here. You want I should send her in?” A pause. “Okay,” she said, giving Rosarita a long, insolent smirk, “you can go in now.”

Rosarita marched into Joel's office and was somewhat taken aback to find it was not the expansive suite of rooms she'd imagined. It was nice enough, with leather furniture, and a big
window overlooking the Avenue of the Americas, but it was hardly the luxury space she'd thought it would be.

Joel was sitting behind his desk, wearing a pink cashmere sweater and a welcoming smile. “Hi, babe,” he said. “Come on in, an' close the door behind you.”

She did as he asked. He stood up from behind his desk, walked around the side of it and came toward her. From the waist down he was totally bareassed naked.

“Joel!” she shrieked, half shocked and half amused. “I notice you're pleased to see me.”

“Thought I'd put a smile on your face,” he said, grinning.

She couldn't keep her eyes off his penis—it gave “big” a whole new meaning. Rich
and
well hung, what more could a girl ask for?

“You're a rude boy,” she scolded. “Rude and crude.”

“And you get off on it, don't you, babe?” He leered.

She glanced at the large expanse of window behind him. They were overlooked by another office building across the street. Naturally his window blinds were open.

This immediately excited her. She knew there must be people watching, which is exactly the way he wanted it. “How was your weekend?” she asked.

“Pretty laid back,” he said, casually touching himself.

“What did you do?” she asked, taking a deep breath.

“What
didn't
I do.”

Instinct warned her not to question him further.

“Why doncha get on your knees an' gimme one of your specials,” he suggested, planting himself in front of her.

“Shouldn't we lock the door?” she said, knowing full well what his answer would be.

“What for? Nobody's gonna come in unless they knock.” He turned slightly so that his profile was in a direct line with the window.

Rosarita got down on her knees, feeling naughty and dirty and incredibly turned-on.

He put his hands behind his head, shoving his johnson in her mouth without so much as touching her.

She attempted to grab his magnificent eight—plus.

“No hands,” he commanded. “Only your mouth, babe.”

A surge of excitement coursed through her veins.

“C'mon,” he urged. “Do me the way you know I like it.”

So she did.

After he'd climaxed, she waited for him to reciprocate.

He didn't. He strolled back behind his desk, picked up his pants and pulled them on.

“What about me?” she demanded, getting off her knees.

“Come back tomorrow,” he said casually. “I'm gonna spread you on my desk and eat you like I haven't had food in a week.”

She felt shudders of anticipation.

“Okay, babe,” he said, dismissing her with a wave of his hand. “I got business to conduct. Same time tomorrow.”

Rosarita had never been treated in such an offhand fashion. It was unbelievably exciting!

The girl at reception gave her a knowing look as she retreated from his office. Damn! She'd forgotten to complain about her.

No hurry. She'd do that tomorrow.

•

Across town, Dexter was having coffee with the star of
Dark Days,
Silver Anderson, a magnificent sixty-something-year-old woman who had ruled television for the last twenty years. Martha and Matt were also at the table, both of them completely in awe of the fabulous Silver.

“And so you see, darlings,” Silver said in her exaggerated pseudo-British accent. “I
adore
this business, and this business adores me. And when I get to work with young, upcoming actors like your son, it is pure pleasure. Observe the boy—isn't he a divine specimen of manhood?”

Dexter looked suitably modest.

“He certainly is,” Martha agreed, eyes shining.

Matt didn't say a word. He was mesmerized by this incredible woman, thinking back to the days when she was a huge movie star and he was a fourteen-year-old boy sitting in the back
row of the local movie theatre, jacking off over her image on the big screen. Silver Anderson hadn't changed much, she was still magnificent.

After coffee, Dexter put his parents in a cab and sent them back to the apartment. Then he returned to the set. Silver was in her dressing room.

“Thanks for doing that,” he said, popping his head around her door.

“Dexter, darling,” she drawled. “Any friend of yours is a friend of mine.”

“You don't know what a thrill it was for them to meet you. Especially when you agreed to have pictures taken with them.”

“Your father is
adorable,”
Silver said, peering at her reflection in her dressing table's mirror. “By the way, Dexter, where's that wife of yours? How come
she
never visits the set?”

“Rosarita's always busy,” he said quickly.

“Does she work?”

“No, she has other stuff to do.”

“What
stuff?”

“You know,” he said vaguely. “Hair, nails, waxing.”

Silver gave a throaty laugh. “She sounds like a Hollywood wife.”

“I'm trying to knock her up,” he confessed.

“Good idea,” Silver said, still studying her reflection. “Barefoot and slaving in the kitchen, that's the way to keep a woman under control. Especially if she's out there spending your money.”

“Fortunately she's got a rich dad,” he revealed.

“The
worst
kind of girls,” Silver sighed, picking up a brush. “Always running to Daddy with their problems. It
so
undermines your authority.”

Authority. Dexter liked that. He was Rosarita's husband. He had authority.

And the next time she brought up the subject of divorce, he was damn well going to hit her over the head with all the authority he could muster.

T
HE NEXT FEW DAYS
passed quickly, which pleased Madison because she had no desire to sit around thinking about all the things she had learned. After her meeting with Victor, she immediately got into researching Antonio “The Panther” Lopez. Only twenty-three and a real comer—he had never lost a match. Now he was all set to fight the champion in Vegas. It seemed he was quite a character, with an extremely colorful past for one so young.

Sitting in front of her computer, she decided it would be good for her to get out of town. Vegas was a crazy place. She hadn't been there in a couple of years, so it would be interesting to see how it had changed.

Wednesday night she had dinner with Jamie, Peter and Anton. They went to their favorite Chinese restaurant and ordered everything on the menu.

Anton was full of apologies. “My dear,” he said, waving his arms in the air. “I would
never
put Joel Blaine next to you at a dinner party. I would never
invite
Joel Blaine to a dinner party. It was
Leon
I invited. Joel simply took his place.”

“I should've guessed,” she said, taking a bite of her second duck pancake.

“Don't think I didn't phone his executive assistant to complain the next day,” Anton said fussily. “That boy is a joke, trading on his father's name whenever he can.”

“Don't worry about it,” she said, reaching for a honey-coated sparerib. “I survived.”

“You always do,” Jamie interjected.

“If you're in the game—you gotta learn to play it,” Madison said, grinning.

“That's what I admire about you, dear,” Anton said. “You do not hold a grudge.”

Halfway through the meal, Jamie got up to go to the ladies' room. Madison accompanied her.

“Guess what?” Madison said, when they reached the sanctuary of the small room.

“What?” Jamie said.

“I forgot to cancel your detective. She turned up Monday morning.”

“My
detective?”

“Well, you were the one who wanted Peter followed.”

“Shh . . .” Jamie said.

“Shush,
what?
There's nobody in here.”

“You never know who's lurking.”

“This is
not Ally McBeal.”

“Okay, okay,” Jamie said. “It's all my fault, so I'll pay. How much is it?”

“Who's worried about the money?” Madison said. “As it turns out she was an extremely interesting woman. A Native American. Oh, yes, and there's something she said you should do.”

“What?” said Jamie, staring in the mirror while applying a pale-pink gloss to her luscious lips.

“Check out Peter's wallet—see if he's got a condom stashed there.”

Jamie burst out laughing. “Why would Peter be carrying a
condom
in his wallet?”

“If everything's cool, he won't be,” Madison said. “Only Kimm seems to think that once a wife suspects, that nagging inner voice is never wrong.”

“Charming!” Jamie exclaimed. “I can assure you
I
was wrong. Peter has never been more loving.”

“So nothing lost if you take a look.”

“And what am I supposed to do if I find one?”

“Put a tiny mark on the corner of the package. Then look again in a week and see if the mark's still there. If it isn't, and there's a new condom there, then you'll know he's cheating.”

“What a scam!” Jamie scoffed. “And complicated too.”

“I think it's quite clever.”

“We don't use condoms,” Jamie pointed out.

“All the better. This way, if he's doing anything, you've got him busted. What can he say—that he was carrying it for a friend?”

“This is ridiculous,” Jamie said, brushing her short blond hair a touch too vigorously.

“If it's so ridiculous, nothing lost by giving it a try.”

“We'll see,” Jamie said, putting her brush back in her purse. “By the way, Peter met this guy at work he swears is exactly right for you.”

“What
guy?” Madison groaned.

“A hot guy,” Jamie answered, spraying herself with a purse-size atomizer of Angel.

“I am so fed up with people trying to fix me up,” Madison said, frowning. “If there's somebody out there who's right for me, I'll find him myself.”

“You're not doing a great job.”

“Thanks.”

“Well, it's true.”

“Anyway, Jake Sica called me.”

“Who's Jake Sica?”

“That guy I told you about—the one in L.A. who was lusting after some blond call girl—you know, the one who was busy getting involved with a total psycho.”

“Sounds like L.A.,” Jamie said crisply. “What was it you called your trip?”

“The Magical Mystery Psycho Tour,” Madison said, remembering how she'd befriended Salli T. Turner, the sexy TV actress, on the plane out to L.A., and the next day Salli had been
murdered. Madison had genuinely liked Salli—she'd possessed a sweetness and vulnerability that was irresistible to both men and women. The police had eventually caught the killer, who'd turned out to be TV talk-show host Bo Deacon.

Pure Hollywood tragedy.

“What did this Jake guy call and say?” Jamie persisted.

“That he's coming out here this week. Unfortunately, my machine cut off, so I didn't get to hear the end of his message.”

“I hate machines. We're getting voice mail.”

“I'd miss that blinking red light.”

“You're such an old-fashioned girl at heart.”

“Me?”

“So, are you going to get together with him?”