Taking Chances (42 page)

He grabbed her to him, taking her lips with his own and holding her so close it was as though they were one. He was still solid inside her, and could feel the pulsing beat of her climax as it tugged and clenched with a life of its own.

‘Michael,’ she murmured again, and again he was kissing her, emptying his heart through the movement of his body.

‘I love you,’ he whispered.

‘I love you too. Oh Michael, don’t let me go.’

His embrace tightened, and as he began kissing her again he felt the seed rushing from him, filling her, soaking her and shooting deep, deep inside her. Her moans of pleasure vibrated through his lips, her legs entwined his and her hands pressed him even more closely to her.

They lay that way for a long, long time, neither wanting to let go, dreading the moment their bodies would part. They could feel the quieting throb of each other’s hearts, the stickiness of their sweat, the pull of their limbs. It was as though they were shielding themselves from the world, wanting to close out
encroaching
reality as they were shutting out the air between them.

In the end Ellen was the first to move, pulling her head back to look into his face.

He kissed her softly on the mouth, and as her eyes closed she felt her heart fill up with hope. She wasn’t sure if she could speak, if she dared to ask the questions in her heart, but then she heard herself saying, ‘Please, Michael, tell me it’s going to be all right. Say we can get past this.’

She looked into his eyes, waiting and willing, until finally he looked away and her breath stopped coming.

‘Would it help,’ she said, panic forcing the words from her lips, ‘if I told you the baby was yours?’

Though he didn’t move, she felt the effect of her words ripple through him. She hadn’t intended to tell him like this, but the words had just come, so she watched his face and wished desperately that she could read his mind. The minutes ticked by and when still he didn’t speak the chill of instinct began warning her that she wasn’t going to receive the response she had hoped for.

‘Even if you could tell me that now,’ he said finally, ‘I still can’t tell you it would change anything. I wish to God it could, because I love you, we both know that, I just don’t know if we can go back to where we were.’

‘But who’s talking about going back?’ she cried. ‘We need to go forward, to put it all behind us and build a life for our baby.’

His expression wasn’t one to encourage her.

‘Oh my God,’ she murmured, drawing away. ‘You do believe me, don’t you? Tell me you believe it’s yours.’

His eyes were steeped in anguish as he said, ‘God knows I want to believe it, I just don’t know if …’

‘Then do the math!’ she cried. ‘You can work it out for yourself. I’m five and a half months pregnant. Michael, please! You can talk to the doctor, she’ll tell you, the
baby’s
due in December, so it has to be yours.’

As he looked at her she could see how hard he was finding it to adjust, how afraid he was of accepting.

‘Michael! Why are you doing this? I don’t understand …’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘the last thing I want is to hurt you, but I can’t live a lie …’

‘Where’s the lie?’ she shouted. ‘The baby’s yours, I swear it …’

He was shaking his head.

‘Michael! Don’t do this!’ she cried. ‘Why won’t you believe it’s yours?’

‘Even if it is,’ he cried, ‘can you tell me honestly, in your heart, that you no longer want Tom?’

She looked at him in amazement. ‘Of course I don’t want Tom,’ she replied. ‘I love you. Why else do you think I’m here?’

He got up from the bed and going after him she spun him back to face her. ‘Michael, listen to me,’ she demanded. ‘What happened, happened. You made love to Michelle, I made love to Tom. We were both at fault, we made mistakes and now we’re paying. But for God’s sake, don’t make the baby pay too.’

‘Do you think that’s what I want?’ he replied.

‘No, I don’t. But it’s what’s going to happen if you won’t accept that I don’t want Tom any more than you want Michelle.’ She would have gone on, but the look that suddenly came into his eyes snatched the breath from her body.

‘Oh my God,’ she murmured, taking a step back, ‘tell me I’m not reading this right. Please, tell me you’re not using this as an excuse to go back to Michelle.’ She was too appalled, too stricken by fear to go on.

Again he was shaking his head. ‘This has got nothing to do with Michelle,’ he said. ‘It’s to do with you and what I saw today. I don’t know how many times you’ve slept with him, Ellen, and I don’t want to know …’

‘Michael, are you crazy? Didn’t what we just did tell you anything? You were there, you felt it too, so don’t you think it was the same for me? There’s no-one else I want,
no-one
, do you hear me?’ Tears were sliding down her face, but she was too distraught to feel them.

He started to speak, but suddenly her rage and frustration burst out of control. ‘No!’ she yelled. ‘I’m not taking any more of this. If you can’t deal with the fact that I slept with another man, if you can’t forgive me when I’m prepared to forgive you, then you just don’t deserve the way I feel about you.’

He watched as she picked up her clothes and began putting them on.

‘You’re a fool, Michael McCann,’ she told him. ‘You’re so afraid to trust that you’re screwing up both our lives and you don’t even care. So, OK, Michelle walked out on you once, and OK, she was pregnant when she went, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to happen again.’

‘It already is,’ he reminded her.

‘Because you’re making it happen!’ she almost screamed. ‘You won’t let me in, you keep shutting me out and telling me I want another man, when you’re not even listening to what I’m telling you. Well, I’ve had it, do you know that? I’m through with trying to make you listen. So let’s do this your way and see just how far we can really fuck this up.’

‘There’s always another option,’ he said as she reached the door.

She turned back, eyes bright with tears, cheeks flushed with anger.

‘Divorce,’ he said.

Despite the pain she came forward, advancing on him with such intent it was as though she would strike him. ‘If you really mean that,’ she said, ‘then you’re not the man I thought you were. And if you’re not the man I thought you were, then maybe we
should
get a divorce.’

After the door closed behind her he remained where
he
was, too shaken by the cruelty of their words and stunned by the force of his feelings to make himself move. A turmoil of anger, jealousy and confusion was swelling inside him, battling his desire to hurt her, and filling him with despair. This was the woman he loved, the woman he cared for and wanted more than any other alive, so how could he have treated her that way? What the hell was wrong with him that he couldn’t show the way he was feeling, couldn’t let her close enough to understand the fear and jealousy that had all but controlled him since the day she’d told him about Tom? He had to go after her and try to take back what he’d said, but the problem was he had no idea what he could say in its place.

Chapter 19

THERE WERE JUST
three days to go before principal photography was due to begin and Tom wasn’t liking the way things were looking one bit. Alan Day, his colleague in Bogotá, was calling regularly now, warning him that Galeano’s objections were becoming increasingly ominous. And it wasn’t only Alan Day he was hearing from, it was several other reporters who were based in Colombia, as well as some lowlife hoods who claimed to be working here in LA for the Tolima Cartel. They very probably were, but as he’d already pointed out to one of them, planning his hasty, or even drawn-out despatch wasn’t going to persuade anyone to stop the movie now. If anything, it would give the producers even more reason to make it. To his surprise the goon he was on the line to right now was agreeing with what he was saying, but as the man didn’t give a damn, personally, whether the movie got made, he insisted he was concerning himself only with trying to save Chambers’s skin.

‘And why would you want to do that?’ Chambers asked him.

‘Because I’m that sort of a guy,’ he was told. ‘I don’t want to see you getting blown away,
hombre
. I mean, I got nothing against you, so why would I? But I got my orders and right now I’m supposed to persuade you that it wouldn’t be in your interests to go on with this film.’

‘Well, thanks for the call,’ Chambers said. ‘Is there a number I can get back to you on?’

The voice chuckled. ‘Now do I look that dumb, Mr Chambers?’ he said.

‘How would I know? I’ve never seen you,’ Chambers replied. ‘And with any luck, I never will.’

‘I hope you don’t either,’ came the response. ‘But certain people you’re working with already have. I’m trying to do them the same favour I’m trying to do you. Seems they’re not listening either.’

The line went dead. Chambers hung up and immediately redialled. ‘Alan,’ he said, making a quick connection to Bogotá, ‘it’s Tom. Any news?’

‘Yeah. I put it on your e-mail,’ the journalist at the other end answered.

‘I didn’t go on-line yet today,’ Chambers said, feeling an unsteady rhythm starting in his chest. ‘Tell me.’

‘Well, we already know Galeano’s not happy,’ Day began. ‘Members of the cartel have been in and out of the jail like punks in a whorehouse these past couple of days, and I got a message this morning on my e-mail that goes “We have repeatedly alerted Señor Chambers to the fact that certain businessmen in Bogotá have objections to the making of his movie. The names he is intending to reveal are false, and it is our duty now to inform him that unless production is cancelled by the end of today action will be taken to ensure the co-operation requested.’”

Chambers’s mouth was drying up. ‘That it?’ he said.

‘You want more?’ came the reply.

‘So what do you reckon he’s planning?’

‘At a guess,’ Day responded, ‘it would entail measuring you up for a celestial suit.’ He took a breath, and by the sound of it a slurp of coffee. ‘This is serious, Tom,’ he said. ‘I don’t think anyone gives a shit about Molina, but the Zapata boys are Galeano’s flesh and blood – not to mention his insurance for life after Picota.

And, so rumour has it, they only did what Molina made them do.’

‘Oh, give me a break!’ Chambers spat in disgust. ‘You saw those pictures, did it look to you like anyone was being forced – apart from Rachel?’

‘I’m just passing on what I heard,’ Day told him. There was a sharp noise at the other end, then Day said, ‘Got the bastard. Damned bugs.’

It was a timely reminder to Chambers that in Bogotá all foreign journalists’ phones were bugged, and no-one was ever entirely sure by whom. Could be the police, could be the military, could even be the
traficantes
. What was certain, though, was the roaring trade that went on in phone-tapped information.

‘You know I can’t stop the movie,’ Chambers said, as much for the benefit of an eavesdropper as to state the truth. ‘It’s out of my hands. I mean, even if I wanted to, there’s nothing I can do now.’

‘The truth is, there was never anything you could do,’ Day commented, ‘not once the money started coming in. I know how Hollywood works. I bet you’ve got no more power now than a used-up dildo.’

‘Less,’ Chambers corrected. ‘But I told you that weeks ago. Maybe these fuckheads just don’t understand English. What do you say we try it in Spanish?’

‘I think we already did that, didn’t we, the last time we spoke?’

‘Yeah, I think we did,’ Chambers said. ‘So I guess what they’re telling us, with all these threats, is that the Zapata kids don’t have much of a defence, once they’ve got all that fame.’

If a grin were audible Chambers would have heard one then. ‘Can you get to a safe phone?’ he said.

‘Sure, no problem,’ Day responded. ‘I’ll call you back within the hour.’

Chambers hung up, paced the room, then went to fix himself a drink. The fact that someone else on the unit
could
have been approached, or was receiving calls from Tolima agents, and he hadn’t yet heard about it, was concerning and confusing him. He’d always assumed that it would be him the cartel would go after, because it just didn’t add up for people in LA to get threatened. All that would do was take the vendetta straight to the Feds, which definitely wasn’t a place Galeano would want it to be. Of course, it could be that the moron on the phone was bluffing, but that wasn’t a risk Chambers was prepared to take. Trouble was, he wasn’t too sure right now where to go with it, for there truly was nothing he could do to terminate the movie. A few months ago maybe, but definitely not now, when million-dollar pay or play contracts were signed, and Vic Warren and the crew were already down there in Mexico ready to start shooting.

Remembering the e-mail, he clicked on the modem and waited to be connected. It took only seconds before Day’s message was in front of him. As he read it the phone started to ring.

‘Tom?’ It was Alan Day.

‘Yep. I’m just looking at your e-mail. What about them going after someone else up here? Are you getting any vibes on that?’

Day was quiet for a moment, and Chambers could easily imagine the man’s large, sharp-featured face and shock of black hair, as he attempted to join Chambers’s new line of thinking. ‘You mean like they did with Rachel?’ he said finally.

Chambers’s blood ran cold. Not even he had gone as far as to make that connection. But whether he liked it or not Day had a point, and his mind went instantly to the two women who currently featured most prominently in his life: Sandy and Ellen. Of the two he considered Ellen the likelier target, if indeed that was the route they were going.

‘It’s very possible,’ Day continued. ‘Very possible
indeed
. And much more effective than threatening you. So why do you ask? Did you hear something?’

‘The
cabrón
who’s been calling me up was on the phone just now.’

‘You mean the one who’s claiming he doesn’t want to kill you?’

‘That’s him. He says he’s trying to do someone else the same favour.’