Taken By The Billionaire (11 page)

I rounded on the mention of that name. “Jenny says?” I interrupted. “What the fuck would you be doing talking to Jenny Clark?”

Alexandra flushed and crushed her cigarette butt into the remnants of my breakfast. She shrugged but I noticed she avoided my eyes. “I can be friendly with Jenny,” she said with a petulant pout.

“Sure you can,” I replied. Alexandra flinched when she heard the tone of my voice and saw my expression. “But I’m wondering why, Alex.” I started on her then, hitting her with questions, one after the other. I knew that if I kept up a constant barrage that she’d slip up at some stage. I hoped I was wrong; I hoped to hell Alexandra wasn’t guilty of what I suspected her to be, and if it turned out I was wrong then I’d feel like shit for putting her through it.

But I had to find out the truth.

“Did you know about Kylie’s fear of spiders?” I began. “Is that why you suggested the addition of that scene? Did Jenny tell you, Alex? Is that what went down?” Alexandra blinked and opened her mouth to speak, probably still only analyzing my second question as I started again. “Why were you half-naked yesterday when Kylie came round, Alex? What was that about? Why did you stay the night? Who put that story to the press? The one about Kylie?”

Then it came to me – an epiphany: “Who the fuck is it in that picture, Alex? Do you know?”

“It’s ME!” she screamed. “All right? It’s me. I did it. I knew about you and Kylie and I was fucking jealous. Don’t you know, Damien? Don’t you know I want you?”

She flung her arms in the air and let it all spill out while I sat there, numb at first until a slow burn of anger ignited into a flame of fury.

“Jenny told me about the spider thing. I wanted Kylie to humiliate herself and for you to throw her off the set. But you didn’t, you were so fucking good about it. Then, when Jenny saw the two of you at her dad’s house – Kylie giving you a blow-job right there in the lounge—”

“What?” I spluttered. “Jenny saw that?”

Alexandra nodded. “Her dad had called her up to try for some kind of reconciliation when you guys all had dinner there. A fucked up idea but Jenny went along with it to try to get between the two of you somehow. She was late for the dinner but walked right in on you two going at it so hard. Kylie had your cock in her mouth and neither of you noticed her. She said she couldn’t stay to see that and so came up with the tabloid idea as a way of splitting you up.”

“And you went along with it?” I gasped, unable to comprehend the scale of Alexandra’s betrayal. “What the fuck were you thinking?”

“I wanted you, Damien!” the loony tune shouted. She poked herself in the chest, her eyes flashing as she snarled like an animal. “I wanted you but that little fucking bitch got her claws into you. I was there every day, right in front of you and you didn’t even notice. She tricked me into letting her in to your office and then stole you away! I would’ve given you head, Damien. I’d do anything for you.”

Alexandra’s chest heaved with emotion, and for a brief moment I felt sorry for her. But what she’d done was beyond the pale.

The anger burst in my chest, white hot fury when I understood that she’d cost me Kylie.

“You know you’re so fucking fired,” I began.

“You can’t do that,” she gasped.

“I fucking can,” I hissed at her, fists clenching on the table top. “You can try to sue me, I don’t give a fuck, and if I see you near my studio or my set again, Alexandra, I swear I’ll fucking swing for you. You’re lucky you’re a woman or I’d be kicking your arse all down Mulholland right now. Get your clothes and get the fuck out of my house.”

“Please, Damien,” she sobbed. “I only wanted you to love me. Please.”

“GET the fuck OUT!” I yelled, the chair toppling behind me as I rose to my feet.

Alexandra fled. She ran out of the kitchen and I heard her crying and rummaging around upstairs until, finally, the front door slammed.

I dressed and drove to the studio. I’d hoped, by some miracle, Kylie would be there, but nobody had seen her and all I got were questions from the crew. They quite rightly wanted to know what was going on, but I didn’t have any answers for them.

“Kylie’s not feeling too good. Take the day off. Come in tomorrow and we’ll start up again from there.”

I got a few looks from the braver guys, people who have been with me for a long time. It was obvious they’d seen the papers or heard about it from somebody else, and since my affair with Kylie was an open secret – well, one that had been blown into the open by the article – they put two and two together and hit the magic number.

Feeling like shit for lying to some good people, loyal people, some were even friends, and with the hangover to contend with on top of all that, I looked all over town for Kylie.

Eventually there was only one more place to look, a place I’d avoided thinking about but where I’d known she’d be all along. It was just that I couldn’t look Roger Clark in the eye. The man must have thought I was a complete arsehole. I’d been sat in his front room with Kylie one night and the next day his daughter turns up distraught, again because of me. That was after upsetting her in Paris. I think if I’d have been Roger Clark I would’ve punched me in the throat as soon as I landed on his doorstep.

Instead Roger looked at me with such reproach, such disappointment, that I wished he’d gone for violence instead. It would have hurt less.

“I can’t let you in to see her, Damien,” he said, shaking his head sadly. “She’s my daughter and I can’t allow anyone to hurt her. Not anymore.”

Damn if that didn’t bring a lump to my throat. I could respect that. This quiet, unassuming man made me feel ashamed. I thought I’d grown since Stella, but Kylie’s father had me beat. He, I realized was what being a real man was all about.

“Please, Roger,” I said, surprised to hear the catch in my voice. “I know I’ve fu—, messed everything up. I know I’ve been a jerk, and I know I’ve upset your daughter again and again.”

It was when I started to cry that Roger looked uncomfortable. He glanced up and down the street and then sighed. “Come in,” he muttered, shaking his head. “You’re making a scene.”

He led me through into the kitchen and I saw him glance nervously up the stairs as we passed.

“I was such an idiot,” I said as I sat at Roger’s kitchen table while he made tea. “I let my own jealousies and insecurities cloud my judgment.” I told Roger about the newspaper article and how I’d gone ballistic. “I should have known Kylie wouldn’t have done it. I should have trusted her,” I lamented.

Roger sat opposite me and sipped tea. He nodded. “Yes, you should have. She was here all that night, Damien,” he said quietly. “Kylie was in this house. We talked after you left; we had a nightcap and she went up to bed. She was excited about the movie, Damien. Kylie was keen to do a good job for you. She wants … wanted to please you.”

“It was Jenny,” I said. “All of it. Kylie told you about the spider scene in the movie?” Roger nodded but said nothing. “Well that was my assistant’s idea. Jenny put her up to it.”

“Is that the same woman who Kylie saw half naked in your house at midday yesterday?” Roger questioned with an admonishing look.

I hung my head. “I know it looked bad,” I mumbled. “But Alexandra took her skirt off and unbuttoned her blouse when she heard Kylie at the door. She
wanted
Kylie to think something was going on. I swear to you, Roger; on my mother’s grave I swear nothing happened. Nothing.”

I went on, deciding I had nothing to lose except my dignity, and what was that worth next to losing Kylie?

I told Roger about how I’d never known my parents, about how I’d been brought up on a crap estate in London’s east end by my mother’s sister – a diamond of a woman who worked hard and did her best for me and her own three kids.

“I’m not going all Walt Disney on you, Roger,” I said as he made me a second cup of tea. I could have murdered for a fag right then, but I’d given up the cigarettes and doubted Roger would have wanted me to stink up his house anyway. I’d dropped the Hugh Grant rounded vowels by then and continued with, “It ain’t a sob story I’m giving you; I’m trying to explain how it is for me. I’ve never felt more at home with anyone in my life the way I do with Kylie.”

“Damien, please …” Roger began, seemingly embarrassed by me spilling my guts as though this was the Montel show.

“No, Roger,” I insisted, “I know I’ve got a lot to learn, but if you’ll help me I can get it together and make Kylie happy. If we can set aside our differences, put what’s gone on already behind us I can learn from you. I just need the chance. Hell, Roger, I love her.”

It all hung in the balance. I tried to read Roger’s face but all I saw was a nice bloke drinking tea. He looked at me and sighed.

“You know, Damien,” he began, “that was a hell of a story.” Roger paused, his mind working. “But I’m a man who has to think of his daughter. I have to think about what’s best for Kylie.”

My heart sank into my shoes. I’d blown it. I’d spilled my guts for nothing. All of it, the baring of my fucking soul hadn’t been enough.

OK, I could accept it. Roger was right after all. He did have a responsibility to Kylie. Why the hell would he trust me with her fragile heart?

“… I’ll tell you something, though; I admire your courage for coming here. I don’t know if I’d have been able to face a father under these circumstances.” Roger paused again and looked me in the eye. He even reached across the table and took my hand. “I’m going to give you a chance, Damien,” he said quietly. “I’ll go get her and try to get her to talk to you.  I’ll
tell
her she’s got to talk to you. That’s all I can do right now. If she comes down, and that’s a big if, just because I’m her dad doesn’t mean she’ll listen, but if she does come down, well then it’s up to you to convince her.”

8

My dad turned from the window. “It’s him,” he said.

It welled up inside me: Love for Damien; disappointment, bitter and corrosive because he’d believed a stupid tabloid article instead of me; fear that he’d convince me to try again.

I didn’t know if I could take any more.

“Don’t let him in, dad.” I went quickly to the stairs; I needed to be in my room where I felt safe, where I couldn’t see Damien or hear his voice or smell his familiar scent. “I don’t want to see him.”

At first I heard a mumble of voices at the door. Then, although I’d virtually begged my father not to let him in, I heard them move into the house. I felt a rush of panic when I thought that Damien was coming upstairs – What was my father thinking! But then I heard the rumble of their voices coming from the kitchen.

They were down there for
ever
. I wondered what Damien was saying that took so long. I imagined them down there under different circumstances, the two men I loved – my dad for being such a great father and Damien because I couldn’t help loving him. A little fantasy rolled through my head, one where Damien and my dad were downstairs arguing good-naturedly about soccer. I knew Damien would insist that the game he followed was called football, since the players weren’t allowed to handle the ball, and that he’d be trying to convert my dad into supporting the same team that Damien had watched since he was a kid – West Ham. I could see my dad gently teasing Damien, and Damien, being the man he is, wouldn’t recognize that he was having his leg pulled. He’d get all serious and a little sniffy, and it would be up to me to make some smartass comment that got everybody laughing.

I sighed – Why couldn’t it just
be
like that?

The knock at my bedroom door shocked me almost right out of my skin.