Picture Perfect Read online

  "It won't be that bad," I said lightly. "It'll be over before you know it." I put down the mascara wand and walked into the bedroom in my underwear and slip, coming to stand in front of Alex. I unknotted his tie and redid it, straightening the half-Windsor and then smoothing down the tails. I leaned up to kiss his cheek. "Thank you," I said.

  Alex's hands ran up and down my arms. "Oh, it won't be as bad as I'm expecting," he said. "That's my trick. If I imagine the absolute worst, I can't help but be pleasantly surprised." He walked to my closet and picked out one of the outfits that had magically appeared within days of my arrival in L.A., a slinky red dress like nothing I'd ever owned before. In fact, most of my clothing was like nothing I'd ever owned before. But Alex knew more about these things--where I would be going and what I would need--so I simply deferred to his judgment.

  "It's a Thursday night," he rationalized, watching me step into the dress and then coming around to zip the back for me. "So no one from the industry will be around. There aren't any premieres going on, and the reporters should be calling it a day." He spun me around by my shoulders and smiled down at me. "All in all, if we're lucky, it'll be dead tonight."

  I almost said what sprang to mind:Ophelia will be so upset . She was down the hall in a guest suite, borrowing one of my new dresses and a pair of shoes. When Alex had made the reservation at Nicky Blair's, a swank celebrity hangout, Ophelia couldn't sit still in her chair. It was nice to see her thinking of Alex as an ally instead of an enemy, but I wondered if she'd been swayed to apologize because she really missed me, or because she'd recognized the connections Alex could offer her.

  I shook the thought away. Of course she'd come for me; she didn't evenknow Alex yet. And we'd had a terrific afternoon. I'd shown her around the house, laughing at her comments about bathtubs big enough to hold a cast party and whether or not Elizabeth sold Alex's dirty sheets to the die-hard fans clustered at the gate. A little after four we had raided the refrigerator and carried a bag of chocolate chips and some leftover sesame chicken into the maze, where we'd lain on our backs and let the sun slanting through the hedge speckle our stomachs and our thighs. And just like when I had lived in Westwood, we talked about sex--except this time, I wasn't the one simply listening.

  It had never been easy for me to talk about that, and Ophelia would have laughed me off if I'd said what I really wanted to. So instead I told her about the exotic places we'd done it: the excavation pit in Tanzania, the last pew of the Catholic church in Kenya, the laundry room closet while Elizabeth was just outside folding clothes. I told her how beautiful Alex's body was, how many times we came together at night.

  I did not tell her that he was so gentle he sometimes made me cry. I did not tell her that afterward, he would hold me so tightly the breath was driven from my lungs, as if he were afraid I'd disappear. I did not tell her that every now and then, as he prayed to me with his hands and his heart and his mouth, I felt as cherished and as blessed as a saint.

  I did not tell Ophelia these things, but that didn't keep her from seeing them in me. "Jesus," she had said, shaking her head. "You're honest-to-God in love." I had nodded; I didn't think there were words, really, to explain the connections and dependency Alex and I had between us. Ophelia had smiled. "No communicable diseases, four times a night, and he hasn't cheated on you yet. As far as I can tell, the man has only one flaw."

  I had leaned up on my elbow. "And that is?"

  "He picked you instead of me."

  Alex's voice startled me back to the present. He had gone to get Ophelia, and now the two of them stood at the threshold of the door, watching me. Ophelia was wearing a dress of mine that I hadn't even seen in the closet yet, something green that swirled around her and caught the flashes in her eyes. Her feet were practically dancing in anticipation of a night out at an exclusive restaurant. As she held on to Alex's arm, they looked every inch the couple.

  Ophelia's glance swept me from head to toe. "My God," she said, "you look beautiful."

  I twisted my hands in front of me; I did not yet know what to do with these kinds of compliments. "So do you," I said.

  Ophelia smirked and turned toward Alex. "Which one of us?"

  I laughed. "Both of you," I said.

  John was waiting for us at the front door, and he offered Ophelia his arm down the stairs as if he hadn't been the one to apprehend her for trespassing hours before. He opened the rear door of the Range Rover and handed Ophelia inside, then helped me up. "Tell me," Ophelia murmured, "does he take you to the bathroom if you have to go?"

  Alex hopped up beside us. "Well, ladies," he said, "I hope you've already had something to eat."

  I glanced at Ophelia, but she just raised her eyebrows. "I thought we were going out to dinner," I said.

  "We are," Alex agreed. "But that doesn't mean you'll have a chance to eat anything." He turned to Ophelia, as if to warn her about what she'd gotten herself into. "Unfortunately, you've invited me, and when I'm at a table dinner tends to be less a meal than an event."

  Ophelia tipped up her chin and gave Alex a dazzling grin. "That," she said, "is exactly what I'm counting on."

  TO ALEX'S SURPRISE AND PLEASURE, HE MADE IT THROUGH HIS APPETIZER before someone came by to congratulate him on our marriage. "Thanks, Pete," he said. "Let me introduce you to Cassie, my wife"--he laid a hand on my shoulder here--"and her friend, Ophelia Fox. Ophelia's breaking into the business." Alex paused for a beat. "And Pete is one of the honchos at Touchstone."

  Under the table I squeezed Alex's leg, letting him know how much it meant to me that he'd go out of his way to help Ophelia after all she'd done. He leaned toward me and kissed my neck. "Don't start what you can't finish in public," he whispered.

  Ophelia kept up a running monologue on which celebrities had entered the restaurant and who had ordered what for dessert. "I'll tell you," she mused. "If I'm going to get discovered, I ought to just glue myself to a chair here and let everyone come and go."

  Alex ate the three shrimp I had left on my plate. "Not to burst your bubble," he said, "but this is about the quietest I've ever seen Nicky Blair's." As if this were his fault, he smiled apologetically at Ophelia. "We'll come back here some other time," he promised.

  Every time Ophelia steered the conversation to Hollywood politics or pointed out another studio executive, Alex worked the thread of the discussion back to me. He mentioned how impressed he'd been with my technical knowledge on the set, to which Ophelia just raised an eyebrow and asked, "Technical knowledge aboutwhat , exactly?" He told Ophelia I'd been made an associate professor, something that I'd told her three days before but that she apparently hadn't heard. Now, she jumped out of her chair and threw her arms around my neck, calling to a waiter for a second bottle of champagne.

  Maybe it was the genuine interest she showed in my promotion; maybe it was simply that dinner had turned out to be much less of a media blitz than Alex had anticipated. But to my relief, by the time the meal was over, Alex and Ophelia were trading the latest Quayle jokes, slapping each other on the back, doing impressions of legendary executive assholes in the movie industry. Alex insisted on paying the bill, which I had known all along he would do, and which--I think--Ophelia knew all along too. She stood up and braced her hand on the back of her chair. "Whew," she said. "That second bottle goes straight to the head."

  It wasn't a surprise to me that Ophelia was tipsy--I had barely had two glasses of the Cristal, and Alex had drunk only water. Alex slipped an arm around her waist to support her, and then smiled at me and wove his fingers through mine.

  When he pushed out the front door, his arm was around one stunning woman, and he was pulling me slightly behind him. Which was why, for a second, I didn't notice the gaggle of photographers, the bright black spots the flashbulbs left behind.

  "Goddamn ," Alex muttered, snapping my arm close to his side so that I was forced into the light, unable to shrink away as my natural instinct had been. He dropped his hand from Ophelia's waist, but his image ha
d already been captured on film, his arm tight around a woman who was not his wife.

  "This isjust the kind of crap I didn't want," he said to no one in particular. I knew what he was thinking, what every gossip column in the country would have to say about this little menage a trois. I knew what this could do to his polished, pristine image.

  THE HONEYMOON'S OVER. ALEX RIVERS'S SECRET LOVE LIFE. TWO FOR THE PRICE OF ONE. Headlines crowded my mind, and I pressed my fingers against my eyes, trying to block out the flashes from the cameras and the fact that my name was going to be dragged through the mud only three weeks after my wedding. I could feel Alex's arm tense beneath my fingers, and I stroked his wrist.It was only an accident , I wanted to say.Nobody could have seen this coming .

  Belatedly I remembered Ophelia, who a minute ago had been too woozy to stand by herself. I looked down at the floor, half expecting her to be passed out, but she was at Alex's side, tall and straight and smiling beautifully, clutching his arm even as he tried to throw her off.

  And that's how I knew she had planned the whole thing.

  I had forgiven Ophelia the time she wore my pearls to a premiere and lost them in the back seat of a director's limo. I had forgiven her when she left me stranded at the dentist after a root canal because of a casting call for a part she didn't even get. I had forgiven her for using the rent money to enroll in a transcendental yoga class for stress management, for telling me I wasn't trendy enough to come club hopping with some of her actor friends, for forgetting my birthday almost every year we'd lived together. But as I watched Alex seething, shielding me with one arm from an inevitable accusation, I knew that I would never forgive her for this.

  Alex murmured something about finding John and the car, and as he moved away I grabbed Ophelia from behind, spinning her around. Even as she turned, she was watching the reporters who were still tracking Alex, her photo opportunity. "Howcould you?" I said.

  Ophelia lifted her eyebrows. "How could I what?"

  I narrowed my eyes. In the ten years I had known Ophelia, I had always been her fall guy, and I had never once complained. But that was before she set out to intentionally hurt me, to hurt my husband. "You told them we were coming here. You set Alex up."

  Ophelia's mouth tightened. "Isn't that what you've been telling me to do, Cassie?"

  Her words stopped my flood of anger.Yes, but , I wanted to say,you weren't supposed to go about it that way. You weren't supposed to trick him. You weren't supposed to use me . "He was starting to like you," I said quietly.

  Ophelia rolled her eyes. "If the positions were reversed, he would have done exactly the same thing. He probablyhas ."

  "No," I said firmly. "He has not."

  I turned my head to see Alex storming back. He grabbed my wrist, and without sparing Ophelia even a look, pulled me away from the restaurant.

  I let Alex open my car door, and then I leaned my head back, watching the stars wink while he settled down beside me and told John we were ready. "Well," he said carefully, "by tomorrow morning I will have been branded as a two-timing son of a bitch, and the more careful bloodhounds will notice the perversity of me screwing my wife's best friend." He stared out the window, away from me. "You realize that from the camera angle, you probably won't be in the picture. Your hand maybe, but that will be airbrushed out. Of course, as planned, your friend Ophelia will feature prominently, with my arm around her waist."

  I touched his leg lightly. "I'm sorry, Alex," I said. "I didn't know she was going to do anything. Ophelia's not usually like that."

  "You're nearly as good an actress as she is," Alex said. "I can almost believe you." He turned to me, his eyes dark. "I'm only going to tell you this once," he said, "so please keep it in mind. I don't like being paraded around like a circus animal. It's bad enough that I have to think twice before I walk outside in the middle of the day, that just because I'm good at what I do I have to live in a fishbowl. But I won't be used, Cassie, not even by you."

  This whole fiasco was indirectly my fault, and because of that, I let him take his anger out on me. "I understand," I whispered, and I focused on the shadows of the rolling night.

  IT WAS WELL AFTER THREE IN THE MORNING WHEN I WOKE UP AND realized Alex hadn't come to bed. We had come home, and after saying goodnight to John, Alex had walked into the library, shutting the door behind him and making it perfectly clear he didn't want me around. I had walked up the stairs and into the bedroom, letting the carpet sink under my feet. I stripped to my skin, still hoping. I lay in bed and told myself we were bound to have an argument at some point. I fell asleep imagining his hands running down my sides.

  When his half of the bed was still empty in the middle of the night, I began to panic. I pulled a thin white silk wrapper from the closet, something that had been in Alex's bedroom before I even arrived. I didn't think he would have driven away without telling me; I didn't want to believe he was with somebody else. Tiptoeing down the hall, I opened the doors to the guest suites, breathing a sigh of relief when each bed was smooth and made.

  He wasn't in the library either, or the kitchen, or the study. Hesitant, I opened the heavy front door of the house, leaving it ajar in case it would lock behind me, and I made my way down the marble steps.

  The grounds were well lit for the sake of the hidden security cameras, so it was no trouble to find the path that wound behind the house, between the outbuildings, toward the boxwood maze. I was halfway to the gardens when I heard the rhythmic splashing from the pool.

  Over the pungent strains of chlorine, I could smell the bourbon, and I did not know if it was because Alex had drunk an exorbitant amount, or because I was naturally attuned to the scent by the memory of my mother. The sweet, strong odor hit me right behind the eyes, just like it used to, and took me back twenty years.

  Once, when I was thirteen and I had come to hate the smell of bourbon that seemed to be steeped into the wallpaper of our house and funneled through its air vents, I had emptied every last bottle down the sink. My mother, when she found out, went into a rage. She tore at my shirt, ripping it across the sleeve, and backhanded me across the face before she broke down in my arms, crying like a child.If you loved me , she said,you wouldn't do this to me . And because I did not know the opposite was true, I swore I wouldn't do it again. I sat at the kitchen table watching her drink a tiny bottle of Cointreau she kept for cooking. As her hands stopped shaking she glanced up at me, smiling, as if to say,You see ? And for the first time I noticed how very much I was growing up to look like her.

  Now a bottle of bourbon lay on its side, dripping into a puddle that ran into the shallow end of the pool. Alex held a second bottle by the neck. He was sitting on the smooth stone bench that lined one underwater side of the pool, and when he saw me step into the spotlight he toasted me. "You want a drink,chere ?" he drawled, and when I shook my head he laughed. "C'mon now,pichouette . You an' I know it's in the blood."

  I stood up as straight as I could. "Come to bed, Alex," I said, trying to keep the shiver out of my voice.

  "I don't think so," he said. "I got some swimming to do yet."

  He stood up, and he was completely naked. Under the pale blue glow of the outside lights, he could have been a Greek god. Every muscle in his chest was neatly sculpted, and water dripped down between his legs and over his thighs to create the illusion that he'd been carved of fluid marble. He held his arms away from his body, palms up. "You like what you see,chere ?" he said. "Everyone else seems to."

  He stepped out of the pool, stalking me. My breath caught as he suddenly stood inches away, soaking the hem of the white gown. He hauled me up against him, wrapping one arm around my waist and gripping my chin with his other hand. He was holding my jaw so tight that the skin stretched, beginning to sting.

  His eyes had gone nearly black and I couldn't move my mouth enough to speak and it was getting harder and harder to breathe. He was twice as big as me, and drunk, and I couldn't be sure he knew exactly who I was. A cold curl of fear unravele
d at the base of my stomach, and that was when I felt Alex start to shake.

  It wasn't just the chill of night on his wet body; it was something that came from the marrow of his bones. It worked its way upward from his knees to his hips to his arms, and I knew he couldn't control it, because suddenly he seemed as terrified as I was. He locked his eyes onto mine, as if I would know what to do.

  Without thinking, I wedged my hands between us to the tie of my robe and pulled it free. I pressed myself against Alex, my skin heating his, selflessly absorbing his cold until my body was racked by shudders, while Alex's became calm and warm.

  He let go of my jaw, and I rubbed my face from side to side against his chest, feeling the blood rush to my cheeks. When he pulled away from me, his eyes were silver and shot with awareness. Sighing, I relaxed. I knew this stage.

  Alex let me take the bottle of bourbon from his fist, and he didn't say a thing as I poured it over the grass near our feet. He watched it steam up and hiss, and then he took the empty glass from my hand and stared at it as if he had no idea how it had ever gotten there.

  It was so easy to see him as a little boy when his defenses came tumbling down. I thought of the childhood friends he'd told me about, conjured from books and drawn in the richest colors, taking him on adventures that made him forget where he was. I pictured him hauling up traps of crawfish his father was too drunk to retrieve; wearing a white shirt two sizes too small to an uncle's funeral because his mother hadn't bothered to replace the one he'd outgrown. I gently pulled him down to the green striped chaise we'd been sitting on earlier that afternoon, and I brushed the wet spikes of his hair away from his eyes. He swayed forward a little, unconsciously craving a gesture that should have come years before.