Heartthrob (7 page)

“I had no problems at all during a movie called
Mean Time
that I finished shooting about two months ago,” Jed told her. “It’s not as if
The Promise
would be my first project after five years away. If you want, I can give you the name and number of the director.”

“Stan Grogan,” Kate said. “I’ve already spoken to him.”

“What did he say?”

“That the total budget for
Mean Time
was under a half million dollars. It’s a glorified student film, and there’s virtually no use comparing it to this production.”

Jed fought another flare of anger. “Except for the fact that I showed up on time and gave my best performance to date.”

Kate pulled a file from a drawer and placed it on the desk in front of her. “I hired private investigators to speak to the cast and crew of
Mean Time.
Apparently you spent most of your downtime in a bar called The Aardvark Club?”

Private investigators. Jesus. “I hung out there, mostly
with two of the grips—Rhino and T.S. But I didn’t drink.” He kept his voice completely calm.

“The bartender said you always had a shot of …” She opened the file and glanced through the papers. “Jack Daniel’s?”

Shit. There was no way she could possibly understand. “I didn’t drink it. I just … liked to look at it. Smell it. Sit there with it in front of me.”

“Doesn’t that strike you as particularly dangerous behavior for an alcoholic?”

He could only be honest. There was no other way to win this fight. “Yes. But I … generally don’t hang out in bars. It’s just … we were on location, there was nowhere else to go.” He’d been hiding from Chaslyn. Particularly toward the end of the shoot, when she’d begun to start sentences with phrases like, “After the movie is finished shooting.”

“There was one incident I’m curious about,” she said. “It happened during the production wrap party. Nobody seemed to know the full story, but apparently you got into a dispute with the cinematographer …” Another glance into the file. “Austin Franz? Would you care to explain what that was about?”

She was sitting there, on the other side of that enormous desk, one cool, elegant eyebrow slightly raised, and he knew that no matter what he said, she wouldn’t understand. She didn’t want to understand.

“It was over a woman,” he told her. “Chaslyn Ross, my costar in the movie. The disagreement had no basis in reality. She’d already left for London—she didn’t want either one of us.”

“And Chaslyn’s the actress you’d been having an affair with for the previous … what was it? Five weeks?”

Damn, that was annoying. She was asking things that were no doubt already written in her file. “It wasn’t serious. It was just one of those things that happens sometimes between
costars.” He leaned forward conspiratorially, ready to see how tough she really was—if the softness of her voice was an attempt to make feminine her balls of steel, or if the steel balls were an attempt to even up her natural softness. “We were rehearsing a love scene, and all of a sudden she had me pinned to the bed. She started going down on me, and for about three seconds I was thinking, wait a minute,
that’s
not in the script.” He smiled. “But I only thought that for about three seconds.”

Kate was blushing. Her cheeks had actually turned pink.

Again, she’d surprised him. It didn’t seem possible that someone who had taken off all her clothes and simulated such believably kinky sex on film could still be capable of blushing, but she was definitely doing just that. He’d embarrassed her.

And the fact that she was blushing embarrassed her even further. She cleared her throat, looking down at the file in front of her before she glanced up at him. “Thank you for sharing that with me. I’m sure it was very special.”

Jed had to fight to keep from laughing. Maybe she had a sense of humor, after all.

“My point is that it wasn’t special,” he told her. “We both just got caught up in the moment. Our relationship may have lasted five weeks, but it really wasn’t anything to talk about. Like I said, it happens sometimes, you know, when you’ve got costars trying to create sexual tension.”

“Your costar in
The Promise
is only fifteen years old,” Kate stated. “If something ‘just happened’ with her, you’d be facing criminal charges.”

“Trust me, I prefer women who are old enough at least to have
parents
who were born before the Beatles broke up.”

“I have more questions about this incident with Austin Franz. There’s more than one interview with crew members who claim that Franz challenged you to some kind of drinking game? And you accepted?”

She was looking at him as if she’d asked whether or not he bit the heads off small rodents for fun. He opted against shrugging it off, chosing a remorseful wince instead.

“I thought I could win.”

“But you lost.” She looked through her file. “Both Herman Rizinski and Terry Wimbers left the bar because they didn’t want to see you drink that shot of whiskey. Austin Franz refused to speak to the investigator, and no one else was paying attention—at least not at that point.”

“In other words, no one witnessed the fact that I didn’t drink it.”

“Didn’t you?”

She looked up at him, and he ditched remorseful and went for flat-out honesty.

“No. I have to tell you—I almost did. Franz told me that I didn’t have to drink—but if I didn’t, he’d make sure I never worked with him or Stan Grogan ever again. I picked up that glass and …” He’d wanted to drink that whiskey more than he’d wanted damn near anything, but he wasn’t about to tell Kate that. There was a limit to just how honest he could be. “I looked up, and Franz was watching me, just waiting for me to throw five years of sobriety away. And I knew I hadn’t lost. Not yet. Not everything. I’d lost the game, sure. But if I didn’t drink that shot, then Franz wouldn’t really win. So I put the glass back down, and I walked out of the bar.”

Kate was silent for several moments. But then she laughed. “That was good,” she said. “That was very good. Whether it’s true or
not
, you definitely get points for sincere delivery.”

His frustration level rose another notch. She didn’t laugh at his jokes, but when he was dead serious, that was when she thought he was funny. “It’s true.”

She took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh. “Mr. Beaumont, you’re an actor. An exceptionally good actor. Your
job is to say things and make other people believe they’re true.” She sighed again. “Are you currently in good health?”

“Yes. I work out every day and—”

“When was the last time you had a complete physical exam?”

Jed resisted the urge to ask why, did she want to play doctor? “It wasn’t even a year ago—right before I signed on to
Mean Time.
”

Kate nodded, making a note in her file. “Have your agent send copies of that to me.”

Jed’s pulse kicked into high gear, and he tried to douse his excitement. Still, he had to work to keep his voice even. “Are you offering me Laramie?”

She looked up at him, her eyes carefully bland, her face clear of expression. “I’m sorry, I should have been more clear. I should have said,
if we cast you
, have your agent send copies to me. There are quite a few terms and conditions you’ve got to agree to before we start talking about signing a contract.”

He nodded, each beat of his heart sending blood coursing all the way down to his fingers and toes. He got it. He
got
it. “You might as well get the contract out, because I’ve already discussed terms of payment with Vic—”

“These conditions don’t have anything to do with payment.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Before you sign a contract, I want assurances that you won’t jeopardize this project in any way. I want a guarantee that you’ll remain alcohol and drug free during the entire course of preproduction, production, and even during postproduction, when we’d be sending you out on the talk-show circuit.”

Jed nodded. “I’ll give you my word. I’m clean now, and I have every intention of staying clean. I’ll go to AA meetings three times a week if I have to—”

“You’ll have to,” she interrupted. “And, I’m sorry, but as nice as it would be to guarantee a verbal agreement with a handshake, I’m afraid that won’t satisfy our financial backers.” She opened the file folder again. “So I’ve taken the liberty of having my lawyer draw up a document—an addendum to the standard Screen Actor’s Guild contract—outlining the terms and conditions of your employment.”

Jed took the document she held out to him. Damn, it was heavy. There had to be a dozen pieces of legal-sized paper stapled together. The triumphant tom-tom of his pulse skipped a beat.

“You’ll want to read that carefully, of course,” Kate told him briskly.

“What is this?”

Her blue eyes were expressionless. “Our guarantee that you stay clean, as you so aptly put it. As I said, this document outlines the terms and conditions—”

He still didn’t understand. “Such as?”

She opened the file again and took out a second copy of the same agreement, running her finger down the page past all the opening legal mumbo jumbo defining Jericho Beaumont as the party hereafter to be called “the Actor.” “The first point, I believe, deals with … yes, here it is. Daily urine testing for drugs.”

The accelerated dance rhythm of his pulse jerked nearly to a stop, and the euphoria was replaced by nausea.

Jed stared at the packet of paper he held in his hands. Urine tests. This document required him to submit to drug tests—daily. And that was only the first condition. He quickly flipped to the back of the document. Seven. There were six additional conditions he would have to agree to, if he wanted this job. Seven humiliations—of which daily urine testing was only the first.

“The second enables us to conduct unannounced Breathalyzer tests for alcohol. Third, you’ll be required to
attend AA meetings at least twice a week during the course of the shoot. Fourth, you’ll agree to supervision—24/7. O’Laughlin Productions will select your supervisor—”

24/7—twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. This document, these demands were so outrageous, Jed didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. “Don’t you mean baby-sitter? Or maybe jail warden?”

Kate pretended not to hear. “… and round-the-clock supervision will begin from the moment you step onto the set until the date you’re released from production. During preproduction and postproduction you’ll be on your own, but if you screw up and embarrass us during postproduction publicity events, you’ll lose your right to percentages, providing there are any. If you screw up during the weeks before the shoot begins, you’ll lose the job.”

Kate flipped another page, scared to death he was going to call her bluff and scared to death he wasn’t. “Point five, you’ll have two separate trailers on the set. One for sleeping, the other for your use while waiting between shots. According to this agreement, your sleeping trailer will be kept absolutely free and clear of any belongings.”

“So I can’t smuggle drugs in, inside the cutout pages of a book and use ’em at night when the warden is sleeping, right?” He laughed, but there was no humor in it. “This is outrageous.”

She glanced up from the document, praying he couldn’t tell she was way over her head. “You can keep personal items in the other trailer, but that trailer will be searched twice daily—more often if deemed necessary. Oh, and your sleeping trailer will be kept locked at night. Your supervisor will have a key, you will not.”

“Locked,” Jericho echoed, his movie star charm gone. “What you’re saying is that I’ll be
locked in
at night?”

Kate knew that if she could get him to sign this agreement, her movie would get made with the least possible
risks. But it wouldn’t be without a price. Jericho Beaumont wasn’t going to be her best friend after this, that was certain. She felt the teeniest twinge of regret and quickly quashed it. “Points six and seven deal with the specifics of the percentages deal—the legal working specifying which of your actions would result in what we’d consider a breach of contract.”

“Locked in.” He couldn’t get past point five. “Sweet Jesus, what you’re telling me is that I have to agree to be treated like a prisoner in jail for two and a half goddamned months?”

She didn’t blink. “I guess you’ve got to decide how badly you want this part.” She stood up, crossing the room and opening her office door as if ready to show him out. “You’re welcome to turn it down, of course.”

Jed knew what she was doing. She was trying to push him away. She wanted him to walk from this deal. She didn’t want him in her movie—she’d said that from the first. He took a deep breath, and somehow his voice was steady and calm. “Okay. All right. I’ll agree to the daily drug tests and the AA meetings, but the 24/7 supervision and the locked trailer is completely unacceptable.”

“This agreement is not negotiable, Mr. Beaumont. It’s all or nothing. I’ve already spoken to your agent about it. I’ve faxed him a copy, and he understands that we’re willing to take the risk and cast you—but only under the terms and conditions that I’ve just listed.”

Jed sat there. His fingers tingled and his legs felt odd, almost numb. It was as if he were having an out-of-body experience. It was like some kind of bad dream. He could play the part he’d been waiting his entire life to play—provided he subjected himself to this outlined humiliation.

Anger churned through him, and he fought to push it down. “May I …” He cleared his throat. “May I please use your phone?”

Kate came back to her desk and slid her telephone within his reach. “Would you like some privacy?”

Jed laughed. “You’re kidding, right?” He tossed the legal agreement down onto her desk. “You’ve worked your ass off to draw up this contract addendum that makes sure I have absolutely no privacy. Why start thinking about things like that now?”

He picked up the phone, but his hands were shaking. For a minute he sat there blankly, unable to remember his agent’s name, let alone his phone number. He took a deep breath, and then another. Ron Stapleton. And his number … He punched it in.

It was a direct line, and Ron scooped it up after only one ring. “Stapleton.”