Flawless (43 page)

He tried to tell himself that Flawless’s success was a good thing, and that he had a perfect right to his share in it. After all, the store had been his idea in the first place, and he’d played a very active role in getting the business started. But deep down, he knew that the runaway success of their first year was 99 percent attributable to Scarlett’s incredible talents as a designer. And he badly didn’t want to feel beholden to Scarlett for anything, least of all his livelihood.

That was the trouble with falling in love with a girl so patently out of your league. It was hard enough keeping your distance, trying to hold on to the upper hand in the relationship. Scarlett was so evidently his superior in looks, breeding, intelligence—basically any measurement you cared to count—the idea that she would soon be outearning him too was more than Jake’s ego could bear. With every glance at the figures, he could feel his dick shrinking. It wasn’t a good feeling.

“What the fuck?” The buzzing doorbell disturbed him from his gloomy reverie. At first he ignored it. It was bound to be some bloody hobo selling tea towels or a bunch of rosy-faced Girl Scouts trying to foist their disgusting boxes of cookies on him at extortionate “charidee” prices. But the buzzing soon became so insistent he was forced to get up and deal with it.

“Who is it?” he barked into the intercom.

“It’s me. Rachel.”

Jake gave his memory a perfunctory search but drew a blank.

“I’m sorry, Rachel who?”

“Rachel
who
?” An intensely irritating, tinkly laugh rang out through the speakerphone. Oh God. Rachel.

“Rachel
Kingman
, silly,” simpered the voice. “Aren’t you gonna buzz me up?”

She pronounced her last name “King-maaaairn,” in true valley-girl style. Jake felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. What the hell was she doing here?

There was no part of him that wanted to see Rachel again. The nineteen-year-old daughter of a local property mogul, she’d lured him into bed last year, hypnotizing him with her improbably enormous rack and a trust fund almost as big as her sense of entitlement. For months she’d kept him hanging, promising to spend a chunk of money on a diamond necklace for her mother. Of course, it never happened—some fucker of a trustee got wind of Rachel’s proposed generosity and cut off her funds faster than a gangrenous leg—after which Jake had struggled for months to get rid of the girl and her narcissistic posse of vacuous girlfriends.

“Actually, Rach, it’s not really a good time,” he blustered. “I’m sort of in the middle of something right now. Some business.”

There was a tense, ten-second silence, in which he could have sworn he heard her pout through the phone. Then valley-voice was back.

“This is business too. I have some money from my godfather. Cash,” she added meaningfully. Even coming from Rachel, this last syllable couldn’t help but warm Jake’s heart. “I wanna buy something, Jakey.”

“Something? Something like what?” asked Jake, whose mind was still half focused on the stomach-churning figures he’d been looking at.

“Jesus, I don’t know. Diamonds or some shit,” said Rachel, starting to sound irritated herself. She had her pride—not much of it, mind you, but enough to resent being given the brush-off so peremptorily or forced to conduct her conversations through a fucking doorbell. “Are you gonna let me in or what?”

Five minutes later, she was ensconced on his couch, crossing and uncrossing her long brown legs like a wannabe Sharon Stone and gazing at him with ill-concealed lust. In a minuscule plaid skirt and heels, her white shirt unbuttoned to reveal a cleavage to rival the Grand Canyon, and her blonde hair teased into two little-girlish pigtails, she looked like every red-blooded male’s schoolgirl fantasy. Unfortunately for her, Jake, who’d already
fucked her more times than he’d wanted to last year and found the whole experience depressingly underwhelming, felt nothing at all beyond a mild hope that he might at last be about to make a sale.

“So,” he smiled, pretending not to notice the flash of sheer pink panties she deliberately gave him as she repositioned herself for the third or fourth time. “Are you still thinking of something for your mom?”

“That bitch?” Rachel snarled. “Are you kidding me? She’s gross. I wouldn’t get a gift for that tightfisted fucking whore if she was dying of cancer. She’s the one who turned Daddy against me, siding with Richard fucking Mayhew.”

“Who’s Richard Mayhew?” asked Jake. He didn’t care, but felt he needed to show some sort of interest if he was to stand any chance of selling her a rock at long last.

“My trustee,” pouted Rachel, adding caustically, “She’s probably fucking the decrepit son of a bitch.”

“Fair enough,” said Jake. “So we’re not shopping for Mommy. So who were you thinking of surprising?”

But Rachel was apparently done with small talk. Vaulting athletically over to Jake’s side of the couch, she straddled him, spreading her legs so widely that her tiny skirt bunched up around her waist. “I don’t give a shit, OK?” she whispered hoarsely. “You can give the diamonds to the fucking homeless shelter for all I care. I miss you, Jakey. Let’s make love.”

Arching her back, she lunged toward him like a falcon diving in for the kill.

In fairness to Rachel, a couple of months ago Jake would probably have been a willing victim. Even now, he was unable to stop his dick from twitching in response, like a prehistoric snake emerging from the permafrost into a land of unexpected sunshine. But from the waist up he knew he did
not
want to screw Rachel Kingman. If he fucked things up with Scarlett—which he seriously hoped he didn’t—it’d better be over someone a good
deal more worthy than a spoiled, oversexed teen queen with all the class of Anna Nicole Smith on a Vicodin binge.

Just as Rachel’s tongue darted into his mouth, the doorbell rang for a second time.

It was bizarre. No one came by the condo. Ever. And yet tonight for some strange reason he was suddenly Mr. Popular.

“I’d better get that,” he said, wriggling out from under her with what he hoped came across as a disappointed shrug. “It might be important.”

Whoever was selling tea towels this time was in luck. If Rachel was about to part with as much cash as he thought, he’d buy the guy’s entire inventory and whack a nice little tip on top for his trouble.

“Hurry up,” said Rachel, straightening her skirt and hair, and perfecting her trademark pout while he ran to the door. She didn’t appreciate being interrupted mid-seduction. “I won’t wait forever, you know.”

Sure you will
, thought Jake. Danny had christened Rachel “Boomerang Girl” last year because she’d been so impossible to get rid of. Which was mean, but not as nasty as her other nickname on the LA party scene—The Cockie Monster. Jake chuckled quietly to himself as he remembered it.

“Hello?” he said, still laughing as he picked up the intercom. “Who is it?”

“It’s me.”

It was hard to tell whose face fell faster, Jake’s or Rachel’s, as Scarlett’s cut-glass English accent rang out through the hall.

“Listen, darling, I’m really sorry but I’m going to have to bail on tonight. Nancy’s boyfriend’s coming over to help me strategize some stuff for Trade Fair, and I completely forgot about it. Can you buzz me up?”

Panicked, Jake looked from Rachel to the intercom and back again, like a fox trapped between two baying packs of hounds.

“
Business
,” mouthed Rachel. “
Tied up
.”

“Er…I’m sort of tied up, er, right now,” stammered Jake, wincing at how insincere he sounded.

“What? Well, untie yourself,” said Scarlett briskly. “I’ve driven all the way down here to see you, so whatever hang-up you’ve got about letting me see your apartment, you’re going to have to get over it. I’m not leaving until you open this door.”

Jake looked at Rachel in desperation.

“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” she hissed, getting crossly to her feet. Her amorous mood seemed to have deserted her. “Just let her in. I know when I’m not wanted.”

There goes another sale
, thought Jake wistfully.

“Angel, don’t be like that,” he said, forgetting for a moment that he was still on speaker.

“
Angel
?” Scarlett’s voice sounded suddenly hollow. “Who are you talking to? Oh my God. Is someone with you up there?”

“Not anymore,” said Rachel, smiling maliciously as she pushed past Jake and spoke directly into the intercom. “I was just leaving. You’re welcome to him, honey.”

“You bitch,” said Jake, elbowing her aside. “Scar, are you there?”

But he was met by an echoing silence.

“Look, there’s nothing going on,” he pleaded into the emptiness. “Scarlett! Come up and see for yourself. Aw, shit.” Shoving Rachel unceremoniously through the door in front of him, he bolted down the stairs of the building two at a time, through the lobby doors, and out into the street. It was rush hour, cars and people everywhere, but he couldn’t see hide nor hair of Scarlett.

Spinning around, he turned his fury on Rachel.

“What the hell did you do that for?” he demanded. “Now she thinks I’m doing the dirty on her.”

Climbing into her Lamborghini with a look of supreme unconcern on her hard, spoiled little face, Rachel shrugged. “You will be, soon enough,” she said matter-of-factly. “I was just saving you both some time.”

And without a backward glance she sped off down Melrose, taking her godfather’s precious bundle of cash with her.

Too upset to go straight home—she couldn’t face Nancy and her I-told-you-so’s, not until she’d got her head together—Scarlett drove mindlessly over Laurel Canyon to Ventura. Once in the valley, she turned in to one of the hundreds of Wisteria Lane residential streets and pulled over, shaking and sweating like someone in the last stages of an acute fever.

“He’s cheating on me,” she said aloud. Watching her lips move in the rearview mirror, it was as if they were being spoken by an actor. As if this whole nightmare were some sort of farcical out-of-body experience. “He’s cheating on me. And it hasn’t even been a month.”

As soon as she’d heard the girl’s spiteful, taunting voice, she’d turned and run, bolting into her car as if she’d just been scalded and driving to nowhere in particular as fast as she could. But now she was regretting her impulsiveness and wished she’d hung around to find out more. Who was this chick? She wanted to see her face, see what kind of woman had got Jake to fall at the first fucking hurdle.
Bastard!

Just then her cell phone began jumping around on her lap, buzzing like an angry bee. She startled, then assuming it was Jake, picked up and yelled into the receiver.

“Don’t call me! Don’t you dare call me! I don’t want to hear it.”

“Er, OK,” said Nancy. “I’ll just go with the hot and sour shrimp then, I guess?”

“Oh, shit. Sorry. It’s you,” said Scarlett. “I thought you were someone else.”

“Yeah, well, I’m glad I’m not if that’s how you were gonna greet them. What’s happened? Are you all right?”

No
, thought Scarlett.
No, I’m not all right. Not remotely.
“Fine,” she said briskly, forcing herself to stop shaking through sheer effort of will. “I’m just a bit distracted, that’s all. Where are you?”

“Chin Chin,” said Nancy. “I’ll be home in five. Che Che’s right behind me.”

“Good,” said Scarlett, not entirely convincingly. “Great.”

“You
are
still on for this meeting, right?” asked Nancy. But it was more of a statement than a question.

“Sure,” said Scarlett. “Of course.”

Talking shop with two lovebirds was the last thing on God’s earth she felt like doing. But she couldn’t very well sit here all night, staring at the curb and fuming about Jake like a madwoman. Besides, a commitment was a commitment. Unlike some people she could mention, Scarlett knew how to keep her word.

“Scarlett?
Scarlett
?” Nancy waved a frustrated hand in front of her friend’s face. “Anybody home?”

“Hmm, I’m sorry?” said Scarlett, blinking. “What were you saying?”

“
I
wasn’t saying anything,” said Nancy patiently. “Che Che wanted to know whether Andy had pitched the program to anyone back in London.”