One Night With You (9 page)

"Or inappropriate," Desi quipped irrepressibly.

Eldin shot her a quelling glance. "Yes, well. In any case what I've been trying to say is that just because Jake has had a few indiscretions brought home to roost and was able to prove that they were not even
his
indiscretions, doesn't necessarily prove that he doesn't like children."

"No? Then what about the child he was supporting?"

"What about it?" Eldin was plainly surprised that she should care.

"Does Jake... Did he ever see it? It! Poor thing doesn't even have a sex or a name. Does Jake know or care about that?"

"Well, why should he? The child isn't his. That dratted woman finally admitted as much when she married."

"I suppose you're right—" Desi shook her head "—but I can't help feeling sorry for a child caught up in a mess like that. And I won't let it happen to Stephanie."

"Why should it? There's no doubt that she's Jake's daughter," he paused infinitesimally. "Is there? No, no, forget I said that. Of course she's Jake's daughter." He glanced over at the baby who still slept peacefully in her fading patch of sunlight, one small fist tucked under her chin. "You have only to look at her to know that."

"You can't tell by just looking at her, Eldin. You guessed because of a number of things, the least of which is the color of her eyes. Stephanie looks like me, and like my mother, and that's all anyone sees when they look at her."

"Surely Jake would see his own eyes staring back at him," Eldin protested, but the protest was feeble.

"Maybe yes. Maybe no. And even if he did, Eldin, he doesn't love the mother. Why should he love or want the daughter? No." She shook her head decisively. "He's never going to know she exists." Desi picked up the teapot. "More tea?" she asked, her eyes warning Eldin that the subject was closed.

"Couldn't you..." he began anyway, waving away the offer of more tea.

Desi put the pot down with exaggerated care. What she wanted to do was bang it on the table—hard. But Stephanie was asleep. "No, I couldn't. Whatever you were going to say, the answer is no. Listen to me carefully, my dearest friend. And you are my friend or I wouldn't be telling you this. Are you listening?"

Eldin nodded.

"As far as Jake Lancing is concerned, I am no different than Lisa Kendall. He was intimate with me at the appropriate time, although—" her voice faltered a little "—I probably couldn't even prove that. Stephanie was almost six weeks premature. In any case, all he would remember—if he remembers—would be that he picked me up in an airplane and we went to his hotel room. Period."

"Desiree," Eldin began. There was compassion in his face and a bit of something else. Shock, perhaps. He had not thought that Desi was the kind of woman who did that sort of thing. Go to hotel rooms with men she hardly knew. "I don't know what to say."

Desi patted his hand comfortingly. "I know you don't, Eldin. And I'm sorry to disillusion you, but I
had
to make you understand why I can't work on
Devil's Lady
. You do see, don't you?"

"I'm beginning to." He picked up his cup. "I'll take that tea now," he said.

"You English and your tea," Desi teased, trying to lighten the conversation. She filled his cup and then her own. "It's England's national cure-all, I think."

"Nonsense," he replied after a minute, "It just gives me something to do with my hands while I think."

"And what are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking," he said slowly, "that you should take this job."

Desi just stared at him, wide-eyed, over the rim of her teacup. Hadn't he heard a word she'd said?

"Now hear me out before you say no."

"I
have
said no." Desi's voice was firm.

Eldin ignored the interruption. "This is the biggest opportunity of your career, luv." He leaned forward to emphasize his point. "The biggest. And it has come years earlier than you could have reasonably expected.

"Yes, but—"

"Think for a minute," he said. "Think what it could mean to you. It's the chance to
head up
the makeup department of a major movie. It's recognition for your work. It's more money than you've ever made before. Desiree, my dear, it's what you've worked for all these years, handed to you on a silver platter. Are you really thinking of turning it down?"

"Please, Eldin. I know all that. Believe me, I do but..." She shrugged helplessly, unable to explain it any better than she already had. Nothing was as important to her as Stephanie. Not her career, not Jake, not anything. If she had to give up this chance to protect her baby, she would—gladly. There would be other chances. She tried again to explain some of her feelings to Eldin, but he cut her off brusquely.

"Protect Stephanie," he challenged her, "or yourself? How could Jake possibly harm Stephanie? He doesn't even know she exists and he won't know unless you tell him."

He leaned back on the couch, knowing by her shocked expression that he had finally said something that had gotten through to her.

"I think you're afraid to face him," he went on before she could make any reply. "You're afraid that he might not remember you and you're afraid, too, that he might. Am I wrong?"

"No," she admitted after a minute. "No, you're not wrong." She looked at him with soft, stricken eyes. "I'm
terrified
, Eldin. I wouldn't know how to act. What to say to him."

"Don't say anything," he advised.

"Don't say anything? I don't understand."

"Play it by ear, luv," Eldin explained. "Maybe you're right. I don't think you are, but maybe he won't remember you. In that case you won't remember either." He shrugged. "Problem solved."

"And if he does remember?" she asked.

"What will he remember? A lovely experience with a lovely woman. What harm could that do you?"

"Or a fling with a groupie?" Desi said crudely.

Eldin winced at her words but went on smoothly, "Or a fling with a groupie," he echoed. "Not something to be proud of, I admit, but not so unusual either. What I'm trying to say, Desi, luv, is to take your cue from him. Play it cool if he does. Pretend you've not given him another thought from that day to this, if you want. There's no need for him to ever know about Stephanie. You won't tell him, and I won't," he said, letting it lie there, letting her come to the obvious conclusion by herself.

She did.

"Let me go make some fresh tea, Eldin. This has gotten cold," she said, rising with the teapot in her hands. "And then you can tell me about how we're going to handle our part of
Devil's Lady
."

Chapter 5

Oh God, how had she let Eldin talk her into this!

It had seemed so easy, so sensible, sitting there in her cozy apartment, sipping tea, while Stephanie slept peacefully on her blanket.

"You're doing the right thing," Eldin had told her, "the wise thing." And she had nodded, finally agreeing with him. But
was
it the right thing?

All of a sudden it didn't seem like it. She wished fervently that she was back home in her apartment. Or at her parents'. Or being tortured by enemy agents. Anywhere, as long as it wasn't on a sound stage in Los Angeles, waiting for Jake to arrive.

He would be coming through that door any minute. She had heard his deep laugh just a second ago, responding to the teasing inflection of Dorothea Heller's voice. The other people in the cavernous studio had heard it, too. The cameramen, the people from wardrobe and makeup, the script girl, the other actors—they all stood around, making idle conversation, but all eyes were on that door, waiting for him to appear. The kick-off party couldn't start without him. Desi got the impression that most of the people here thought it wouldn't even
be
a party without him.

I can't do it
, she thought wildly.
I must have been out of my mind to think I could
.

Her hands were suddenly sweaty and her heart was beating erratically, fluttering like a caged bird against the wall of her chest. She wiped her palms nervously on the seat of her jeans and tried a few deep breaths. It didn't help.

"Eldin, get me out of here." She clutched his arm frantically. "I can't do it."

"Steady now, luv," he soothed, patting her hands comfortingly. He seemed not to notice how her fingers dug into the tweed material of his jacket. "The hardest part will be over in a minute. Just hold steady, luv—ah, there he is now."

Jake had come through the big studio door, making an entrance, as befitted his star status, with a woman on either arm. Dorothea Heller was on his right, looking aristocratic in a black Chanel suit, her snowy hair arranged in a regal-looking braid around her head and those huge gaudy rubies gleaming at her neck and wrists and on her gnarled hands. A brunet clung possessively to his other arm. A gorgeous brunet, Desi noted before she dropped Eldin's sleeve and whirled away, turning her back on Jake and his entourage as they slowly made their way around the room.

Maybe he wouldn't see her, she hoped, maybe he would just pass right on by. She fidgeted with the brushes and vials and tubes on the makeup table in front of her, moving them around so that they were lined up in neat, even rows. She shifted her stance a little, shielding her slim body behind the bulk of Eldin's, all the while trying to watch Jake's progress around the room without turning her head to follow him.

He looked magnificent, as always. Taller somehow, she thought, harder, thinner maybe, and broader through the shoulders. His hair was cut shorter than she remembered—for this new role, she supposed. But it was a shame that it no longer curled onto the back of his neck and over the tops of his ears. His face seemed harsher without the softening effect of the longer hair. His chiseled jaw seemed even more determined, the planes of his face seemed sharper. But his eyes...his eyes were the same meltingly sensuous brown she remembered.

Desi realized suddenly that she was staring into those eyes. Jake was standing right behind her, staring at her face in the makeup mirror.

Shocked recognition widened his eyes for a second, followed by a myriad of other emotions, coming so fast, one after the other, that Desi couldn't be sure what she saw. Joy, she thought, but maybe that was because she wanted to. Surprise, certainly. Pain. Anger. And then, consummate actor that he was, a shutter seemed to come down, and it was as if she were staring into the cold, unfriendly eyes of a stranger.

Follow his lead, Eldin had said. Pretend if he does.

Desi turned around to face him.

"And this is Desiree Weston, our head of makeup." Eldin was introducing her as if he didn't already know that she knew Jake far too well.

"My pleasure... Desiree, is it?" Jake's caressing voice held a polite question as if he hadn't quite caught the name.

"I prefer Desi, please," she said, and was amazed at the cool steadiness of her voice. The hand she held out to him was steady, too, and no longer damp with nervous perspiration.

Amazing
, she thought, as his big hand closed over hers,
it's almost as if we've never met. I am actually going to make it through this without falling apart
, she congratulated herself.

And then Jake leaned down and his lips brushed hers in a brief, casual kiss—the kind of kiss that movie people are always giving one another.

"Welcome to our little family," he said. His voice was casual, too, as casual as his kiss had been, but there was a sting behind the words. Had he stressed the word "family" just a bit? Did he know something? Could he possibly know anything?

Desi felt the blood suddenly begin to race through her body.
I will not blush
, she told herself fiercely.
I will not!
But the inevitable heat rose from her chest upward, staining first her throat and then her pale cheeks a fiery red.

Even then Jake might not have noticed, for she had half turned away as he moved to be introduced to someone else, but then the brunet clinging to his arm—the gorgeous brunet—spoke up.

"You've made her blush, darling," she said, and Desi couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic or not. "I didn't know there was anyone left in this wicked business who still blushed."

Jake turned back to look at her again, his dark eyes raking her flushed face, missing nothing of her suddenly tongue-tied embarrassment. A memory flashed between them, a memory of other blushes, for other reasons.

"I'm sorry," he said, but this time he didn't look sorry. "I didn't mean to embarrass you."

Didn't you?
her eyes challenged him, but he only stared back at her, an expression of bland innocence on his handsome face.

"Well, don't let it bother you," she managed to say at last. "We redheads tend to blush over the
least
little thing. It means nothing." She shrugged carelessly, hoping she didn't sound as hostile as she felt.

Apparently she did though, because when he smiled at her—a cool smile that didn't reach his eyes—she felt the force of
his
anger wash over her in waves.