Free Fall (6 page)

"Yes, but it’s not really in your past is it? And if you’re going to put me in a situation where I have to be uncomfortable and humiliated, then yes, you do have to explain a little. Like, by the way, I’m connected to this actress in LA and so everyone at this film shoot that I’ve invited you to is going to look at you and think you’re my local piece of ass for the duration and isn’t that a big joke. How were you going to introduce me?"

"Jesus, Nina! Nobody cares. No one would think anything of it!"

"Well, I care!" Nina held back tears. How could she have deluded herself? Here he was, practically admitting that she meant nothing to him. It was fine before, when she could pretend he had feelings for her. But it was out in the open now. He had a girlfriend. There was no hope, never a chance for them and he knew it the whole time. She'd mistakenly believed that he felt the same way, but he'd played her, allowed her to think there was something more. He'd just taken her heart, dropped it on the ground and stomped on it. She struggled to regain her composure so he wouldn't see how badly hurt she was.

"Okay, you’re right. I’m sorry if I’m making a big deal out it. It was just a fun ride, but I’m ready to get off now." She arranged her features into a weak smile and tried to act nonchalant. She got up from the table, walked over to the door, opened it and looked pointedly at him. "This is your cue," she said, her eyes flashing.

Joseph gazed back at her with a look of alarm on his face."You’re kicking me out? Nina," he said nervously, "You don't mean that." He reached for her hand but Nina snatched it out of his grasp.

"It was fun!" she said, still holding the door open. "Nice meeting you!"

"I can't believe this," he whispered. He stood beside her for a moment and searched her face, apparently looking for the sweet, gullible woman of the past month. Then he walked out the door without another word.

Nina closed the door behind him and went to the window that overlooked the street. She saw Joseph appear from under the front awning and get into an SUV down below. She watched the car until it was out of sight. Miserably, she went to her bedroom, crawled into bed, buried her face into her pillow and wept.

Joseph felt awful. All Nina wanted was for him to tell her that he wouldn’t be with Karen anymore. That he wanted to be with her. That he would fly back and forth from LA to Seattle to see her. That he didn’t want to end it. That she made him happier than he’d ever been with a woman. He knew that was what she wanted to hear. But the truth was he didn’t know for sure. He couldn’t conjure Karen up in his mind, she had all but disappeared from existence this past month. But he had to know how he felt when he actually did see her again. Karen had landed back in LA a week ago and she called him constantly, wanting to know when he was returning. They had a history together and he felt an obligation towards her. He knew he had to let Nina go. But, did she have to be so mean about it? I hurt her, he realized. Completely botched it all to hell. He spent the entire ride back to his hotel in distress, brooding out the car window. He wanted to tell Trevor to turn around and go back. But he told himself he had responsibilities. His part was done in Seattle. He had to go home.

FOUR

JOSEPH'S
dream was extremely sexy. Nina was on top of him, riding him. Her hands were on his chest and her legs were spread wide, knees bent on either side of him. She made a little ‘uh’ sound with each thrust. Her head was thrown back and he had one hand around her throat, the other hand crushing her right breast. At the moment when he knew she was about to come, he awoke with a start and reached over to the other side of the bed. Instead of Nina he found Karen, her blonde hair spread over the pillow. She was sleeping deeply but Joseph rolled over and prodded her with his erection anyway, forcing her awake. Staying half asleep she turned on her back and opened her legs for him. Joseph pushed into her dryness and after five or six quick thrusts came inside her prematurely.

Well, that was par for the course, he thought and went to shower. He was going to have to end it with Karen. He knew it the minute he saw her at the airport when she threw her arms around him. She had kissed him passionately and it was all he could do not to wipe the greasy lipstick off his mouth. They had spent the last week together as if nothing was amiss. To her it was the same as usual between them. Joseph wondered if she was deliberately indifferent to his manner towards her, or if she really was dumber than a box of rocks. She looked more beautiful—tan, healthy, and even blonder from her weeks in the sun. But when he looked at her naked body, his brain wanted to rearrange the parts to be Nina’s. Nina’s skin and her breasts, her awesome, pile driving ass. His body responded reluctantly to Karen, but he felt disconnected when they had sex. Her breast implants no longer turned him on. They seemed to him these mildly comical attachments that swayed and puckered with gravity and manipulation. Plastic sacs filled with fluid that just happened to be surrounded by skin. Once, when they were having sex, they were sliding up and down across her chest and he had a vision that if they coasted right up into her neck, she would look like a bullfrog. He had to use all his will power to keep himself hard inside her. His mind just wasn’t with her.

Karen got on his nerves. Problem was breaking this news to Karen. He didn’t think she would mind too much, she had gotten a lot of attention lately and wouldn’t be lacking in male company. As he stood under the hot water he thought about what he would say to her. He had to make it clear that he didn’t want to see her again.

When he came into the kitchen, he smelled coffee and saw Karen talking on the phone. Would she ever get off that phone? It seemed the only time she wasn’t chattering non-stop was when she was asleep. Like she couldn’t bear to be silent. Maybe then she’d have to contemplate the fact that she really was a shallow, vain, attention sucking snob. She was all ‘Miss Popular’ now and taking advantage of every minute of it. Well, she could shine without him around.

"Can I talk to you a minute?"

She got off the phone and started to launch into what he knew would be an account of every word of the conversation she had just had. Joseph interrupted her, "This isn’t working out for me."

Karen stared at him, her blue eyes wide with confusion.

"What’s that supposed to mean?"

"It means that I don’t want to see you anymore," Joseph said.

"Joseph, baby!" She came around and knelt at the foot of the kitchen chair where he sat. Winningly, she smiled up at him. "You don’t mean that!" She placed her palm over the crotch of his jeans and started rubbing. "What can I do to make it better?"

The friction of her hand irritated him. "I do mean it, Karen. I don’t want to see you again." She unzipped his pants. "Christ!" He got up from the chair and zipped himself up. "How can I say it without being cruel? I’m not coming back."

"Well, I guess you just did say it, didn’t you?" Karen scrunched up her face like she was going to cry. She covered her face with her hands and let out a phony sob.

Joseph picked up his keys and headed for the door. "You’re acting. I can tell."

"So, now are you going back to your little piece of ass?"

Joseph stopped in his tracks.

"I heard about that woman in Seattle. Are you really going to go back to some little nobody that you met in a bar?"

"What I do now is no longer any of your business!" Joseph shouted, pissed off. How dare she bring up Nina! He went out the door, got into his car and drove to his house where he called a friend who invited him to a party. Tonight he’d forget about Karen, and he’d try to forget about Nina.

Karen sat unfazed at the table, thinking deeply. He thought she was stupid. Men were the ones that were so stupid and infantile! They couldn’t see that she played the dumb blonde. It helped her get her way. All she had to do was lead them around by their dicks. They were all so utterly predictable. Deep down inside she hated them all. She wanted to be a star and she would use and abuse, lie and cheat, and run over anyone who got in her way.

She knew about the woman in Seattle. She’d spent a lot of time and effort trying to network in this business and if networking meant she had to trade her body, so be it. She used men, no matter how low on the totem pole they were. Like Louis, a key grip who had worked on a lot of films for Fast Media pictures. She’d met Louis on her last film in which she’d played a hooker with only five lines. Not the choicest of parts but Harry Davis was in the lead role and she would have done anything in order to get close to the star of several action films, which had grossed millions at the box office. Unfortunately, her scenes weren’t with the handsome actor. Plus, his wife was on the set taking up every free moment between takes. Not even trying to hide her disappointment, she’d accepted Louis’s fumbling overtures. Twice she’d allowed him to grope her, never letting it go beyond a few awkward embraces and clumsy kisses. Her lip curled, remembering how he had slobbered all over her. She shrugged and reminded herself that Louis could be useful.

She’d called him when she got back from Spain about a week before Joseph finished the filming of Anne Greenfields new movie.

"Hey Louie! Are you in Washington? I heard you got that gig in Seattle. How’s the weather?"

"Yeah, guess what? It’s cold and raining! What’s it to you?" She heard him snuffle, and then blow his constantly runny nose.

"What’s wrong, hon? You don’t like me anymore?"

"Yeah, well you were supposed to meet me at the Lighthouse for dinner and you never showed up. I called you like, three times and you never answered your phone!"

"Louis! I’m so sorry!" Karen gasped, allowing surprise and regret to creep into her voice. "I got a call from my mother. My sister left treatment again; did I tell you my sister has a drug problem? Well, my mom is so broken up about it and I got all caught up on the phone with her. I had to talk to her for two hours before she calmed down. I just completely forgot! My sister is so messed up. She went through detox for the third time, then went back to the methadone clinic and then got a dirty UA the second week she was there! They kicked her out and she can’t go back until after sixty days. So, she was staying at my moms and ripped off my mom's emerald ring to sell for drugs! My mom was just hysterical!"

Everything she’d said was true. She did have a sister, Karla, who was addicted to heroin. Karla did go into treatment, then was kicked out of treatment and ended up stealing the ring from her mother’s jewelry box. Only thing was, it happened six months before and neither she nor her mother had heard from Karla since.

"Geez, Karen. I guess that’s okay, then." As she knew he would, Louis accepted this explanation. He was just pretending to be indignant. He wanted one thing from her, and though he might pretend to be annoyed, she still had all the power until he got what he wanted.

"Let me make it up to you. How about we meet for lunch when you get back? I promise to be a good girl," she added

"Well, alright then. That’s more like it!"

"I just want you to do me an itty bitty favor. While you’re there in Washington could you check on Joseph? I’ve been trying to call him and the guy’s not answering his phone! I just want to know if he’s, well you know, otherwise occupied. I really hate to be kept in the dark on these things."

"What? You mean is he screwing someone else?" Louis asked. "I heard something about a woman he's been seeing here in town."

"You have to give me a little more than that, sweetie! Could you find out who it is and how long he's been seeing her?" Karen felt a tiny, tentacle of anger creep up her spine. She knew it! Guys are all the same!

"Um, okay I can do that, I guess. What do I get if I do?" Already she could hear the excitement in his voice. What an idiot! She was going to have to give up something more than a couple of squeezes of her boobs when she saw him, if she could get out of seeing him at all.

"Well, first you have to give me more on the situation. You give me some good information and I’ll give you something good in return." There! That should get his motor running and make him follow through on her request.

"Okay! So, we meet for lunch right when I get back right? Where you wanna meet?"

"How about Armando’s? You let me know the minute you get back and we’ll set up a time."

"Fantastic! And hey, Karen? Wear that blue top again, man that thing is bangin’!"

"Sure, hon. I’ll see if I can find it." Karen disconnected the call. She had no idea which top he was talking about.

Louis had phoned in his report later. He’d overheard one of the drivers talking about taking Joseph to a bar in downtown Seattle. Louis had found out the name of the bar and gone there three nights in a row until he saw Joseph and the woman getting cozy at a table.

Karen was annoyed, but not overly concerned because Joseph was still behaving as if everything was fine when they spoke on the phone, though most of those calls were made and received while he was on the set. She hadn’t lost control yet, and in her scheming brain, control meant information. She wanted to know everything he was doing at all times. He had done this before and had always come back to her as if nothing happened.

Now that he seemed determined to break up with her, all she had to do was apply herself diligently to reacquaint him with her irresistible allure. Who wouldn’t want a gorgeous, sexy thing like her? He would soon realize that they were a good team. Besides, she needed him. He had a lot of experience and connections in the business and she wanted him by her side when her movie premiered.