by Romy Sommer
He parked in his garage and pressed the remote to shut the door behind them. When the door sealed shut he turned to her. “We have to talk about what happened.”
“We had a quickie. It was fun. What more is there to talk about?”
He pressed his lips together. He suspected she wasn’t going to be so flippant a moment from now. “The condom broke.”
Her eyes widened as she stared at him, very rapidly sobering up.
“Are you on the pill?” he asked.
She shook her head.
Damn.
“I won’t be offended if you want to take a test,” he said.
She nodded. “I guess I should ask Wendy to pick up some contraceptives for me. And maybe the morning-after pill. It wouldn’t be the first time she’s had to fake something to get a prescription for me.” She bit her lip, as if realizing she’d revealed more than she should.
“What else has she had to fake?” he asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
Nina shrugged, opened her car door and hopped out. “Nothing serious, but I can hardly leave the house with a big red nose and coughing and spluttering all over the place, so she gets my flu meds for me when I’m sick.” She grinned. “And condoms, tampons, prune juice…all the products I can’t be seen shopping for.” She hopped out the car and hung on the door a moment. “Let’s not worry about this. If anything happens, then we’ll deal with it. What are the chances, anyway?”
She didn’t really want an answer to that, did she? Clearly not, since she strode towards the house, head high, as if she didn’t have a care in the world. He followed more slowly, and she was already in the shower when he’d locked up and headed upstairs.
When Nina woke Sunday morning, head thumping, Dom had already left the bed. He’d drawn the curtains shut and she was grateful. She hadn’t really had that much to drink, had she? She tried to remember, but the evening was a blur. The only thing she remembered clearly was sex in the supply closet. And Dom’s bombshell afterward.
What were the chances of her getting pregnant? With the constant adrenalin rushes and physical battering her body was experiencing at the moment, it had to be about a million to one.
She found Dom in the kitchen cooking up a massive breakfast. In nothing but baggy track pants. Eye candy for breakfast. Yum. And no calories.
She perched on a kitchen stool, her chin cupped in her hands, and enjoyed the view of his to-die-for eight pack. Even better than his abs were his arms. She’d always loved a man with strong shoulders and arms. There was a feeling that those arms could hold her safe and keep the world away. Which was stupid, because it was nothing more than an illusion. Nothing could keep the bad shit away.
The man knew his way around the kitchen, too. The food his sisters provided didn’t go to waste.
Dom slid a plate in front of her, and then an espresso, but it was only as he started to dish fried eggs and sizzling sausages onto the plate that she truly woke up.
“I can’t!” she protested, trying ineffectually to hold her hands over the plate.
“You will.” He captured both her hands in one of his big ones and held them still while he added syrupy flapjacks to her plate. “You should look in the mirror sometime. You’re expending a lot of calories every day. If you don’t eat more you’re going to be too gaunt to play Sonia.”
“Never. The camera adds at least ten pounds.”
He frowned. “You’re a beautiful woman with a beautiful body. Why are you so hard on yourself?”
She bit her lip. This wasn’t something she usually needed to explain. “I wasn’t always one of the pretty girls. Halfway through high school I got the chance to change schools and I used the fresh start to re-invent myself. It felt so good, being the girl every guy in school wanted to date. Suddenly all the popular girls wanted to be my friend. I got used to guys whistling at me or men turning in the street to look at me. Aside from the fact that it was sometimes a little creepy, I liked it. I felt beautiful.”
His crooked grin appeared. “I can just imagine. That short cheerleading skirt, the tight, low-cut top…” His hand wandered up the inside of her thigh towards the edge of her sleep shorts and she slapped it away.
“I’m being serious! That feeling didn’t last long after I arrived here in LA. It was confusing because I didn’t think there was anything wrong with me, but suddenly everyone was telling me I wasn’t good enough. The other actresses were thinner than me, more perfect than me. I went to auditions and never got a callback. Over and over again, I was told I needed to pluck my eyebrows and whiten my teeth and lose 20 pounds. So I did, but it’s not like waving a magic wand. Curves are in my genes and I’m still bigger than most other actresses. I have to work hard to stay thin enough to keep working. Diets, fitness trainers, and weekly sessions at the spa. Do you have any idea how exhausting it is trying to be pretty in this town? Do you have any idea how hard it is to feel pretty when you’re up for the same roles as Anna Kendrick or Emma Stone?”
He turned the stool she sat on so she faced him. “You’re not bigger than most actresses. You’re bigger than most anorexics. And unbelievably, there is a difference.” His hand slid up her thigh again, and this time she didn’t push it away. “And as far as I’m concerned, you’re also far prettier than either of those actresses.” His fingers brushed over the apex between her thighs. “And definitely sexier.”
His kiss almost had her a believer. There was no doubting what women saw in him when his kiss could make any women feel like a goddess.
He broke the kiss and stepped away, flashing her a quick grin. “In comparison with most women – even here in LA where people’s body images are skewed – you have a really terrific figure.” He winked. “Take it from an expert in women’s bodies.”
Okay, so that last comment deflated a little of the heady rush, but she was pretty sure she was still glowing as she ate up everything he’d dished on her plate. He thought she had a terrific figure? Not just good, not even great, but terrific?
She lifted a bite of flapjack to her mouth. And closed her eyes to savor the taste. When last had she tasted a flapjack? It made a wonderful change from her usual bran and fresh fruit.
Dom laughed, a throaty, seductive sound. “That’s how you looked on the beach at Point Dume. As if you were about to have an orgasm from eating a burger.”
“That was my first burger in over a year. It almost was as good as an orgasm.” At that time she hadn’t had an orgasm in over a year either. She’d lost count how many she’d had in this past week. She licked a drop of syrup from the corner of her mouth.
If only she could retain Dom as her personal trainer, maybe she could indulge like this more often.
Who was she kidding? He’d soon grow bored. Dom liked to stay active and on the move. There was no way he’d sit around waiting for her through the long hours she was on set. Dom needed new challenges like other people needed air to breathe.
If only she could keep him around as her boyfriend…
She shook her head so vehemently she nearly choked on the next piece of flapjack. Dom needed new challenges there, too. There was no way he’d stick with just one woman.
She thrust the half-full plate away, unable to eat another mouthful. The food suddenly tasted like charcoal in her mouth.
She moved to stack the dishwasher and start cleaning the kitchen. “So what are our plans for today? After Vicki has beaten me black and blue, that is?”
“Nothing special. You don’t have any friends you want to meet up with?”
She shook her head and didn’t look at him. She didn’t have friends. Her friends from before she was famous resented the attention she attracted and didn’t want to know her anymore. The people she’d met since… “No one I’d ring up on a Sunday morning and say ‘let’s hang out together’.”
“So what do you like to do in your spare time, then? Go out for a movie? Or I know a great pizzeria…”
“No more food! And movies aren’t an option unless it’s
a premiere or a private cinema. Besides, I don’t feel up to going out in public today.”
Fame was fun. It was a high unlike any other. But it was a double-edged sword. She could only face the outside world if she felt good about herself. And if she had the energy. The constant interruptions and being nice to everyone she met, the strain of filtering everything she said and did to ensure it fitted with her public image, required a level of mental stamina she didn’t possess today. She sighed. “But don’t let me hold you back if you want to go out. You must be bored stiff doing nothing but supervising my training and going to your local pub once a week.”
He took her hand. “I’m not bored. You’re very entertaining to have around.”
She raised a skeptical eyebrow.
Dom grinned. “I’m always wondering which personality you’ll be wearing today.”
“Are you suggesting I have a split personality?” She reached out to smack him playfully and he caught her hand, kissing her wrist.
“Multiple personality disorder might be more accurate. It’s one of the things I love about you.”
Her heart did a complete backward flip in her chest. He hadn’t really used the L word, had he? Because if he had, then this had to end. Now. And she wasn’t ready for it to end yet.
But he didn’t mean it. He’d said the word ‘love’ as flippantly as he’d said ‘flapjack’ or ‘movies’.
His lips had moved from her wrist to the palm of her hand when they heard the tentative knock at the door.
Nina wrenched her hand away and sat straighter. She was still dressed in her rumpled sleep shorts and shirt. She hadn’t even brushed her hair.
“Only me,” Juliet’s voice called through the kitchen door, and with a sigh Dom rose to unlock it. Nina scraped her fingers through her tangled hair and pricked her cheeks to sting color to them.
Juliet bounced into the room. “I’m so glad I caught you home. I wanted to check on my baby bro. And also to remind you that we’re having a barbecue at the folks’ place this afternoon and thought you might like to join us. For a change,” she added, with a pointed look at him. “We haven’t seen you in a while.”
Dom shrugged and looked away.
“Don’t stay home on my account,” Nina said. “Go have fun with your family. I’ll be quite happy to spend the afternoon curled up with a book.”
And after Vicki was through with her, that might be all she was able to do.
“You’re invited too, of course.” Juliet sounded offhand, but tension prickled through Nina. She’d heard that tone often enough. Was this a set-up? Was she going to be paraded before all their friends and family, like a giraffe in the zoo, the celebrity attraction? No thanks.
“It’ll just be family,” Dom said, his voice quiet. He was doing that reading-her-mind thing again. How did he do that when she’d been so careful to keep her expression neutral?
“Maybe she thinks we’re not good enough for her?” Juliet said, and the bite in her tone was now unmistakable.
“Jules…” Dom’s voice was heavy with warning.
“I’m sorry,” Juliet said. She even sounded sorry. But the look in her eyes was anything but.
Nina hadn’t seen that look in years. Not since she’d been a plump teenager in glasses and braces who’d been forced to make friends in a new town. She’d turned that look around. She’d reinvented herself, lost the glasses and the braces and a ton of weight. When the boys started swarming around her, like the proverbial flies, those same girls had practically begged her to try out for their precious cheerleading squad.
She’d turned it around then, and she’d turn it around now.
Nina’s chin rose in defiance, but her smile was sweet. “I’d love to come, and I’d love to meet your family. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an appointment to take a beating.” Holding her back straight and her head high, she exited the room.
Dom turned to his sister, eyes flashing. “What’s got into you, Jules? When did you turn into such a bitch?”
She had the decency to look ashamed. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what gets into me. She’s just so…uppity. As if she doesn’t trust anyone.”
“She doesn’t. It’s a defense mechanism and most famous people are like that. It’s nothing personal.”
He scrubbed his face. He needed to remember that too. No matter how intimate he and Nina got, no matter how many nights they slept in the same bed, it still felt like she wasn’t really there. As if there was a chasm between them. Like last night, when she’d left him in the supply closet and gone to party with his friends as if nothing had happened. The sting was still sharp.
What did he need to do to break through that wall, to earn Nina’s trust?
“Christian isn’t like that,” Jules said. “He doesn’t disappear whenever we come to visit.”
“Christian’s different. He loves the attention. Nina does too, but she’s been isolated by it.” He sighed. “She’s been a celebrity long enough to have been burned by people using her, but not long enough yet to learn to separate the people who only want to know her for what she does from the people who want to know her for who she is.”
Some celebrities never learned. They either became so distrusting they closed themselves off from everyone, or they became like Paul de Angelo – so sucked into their own hype that they believed themselves better than everyone else.
Paul. Just the name in his head made his fists clench. He was one of those who had used Nina and hurt her. He hadn’t cared to get to know Nina, had he? He’d wanted her only for what she could do for his image.
“Just give her a chance to get to know you, okay? Without being a bitch.”
Juliet leaned on the counter and helped herself to one of the sausages Nina had left untouched. “You like her. This is getting serious, isn’t it?”
Dom scowled. “Of course I like her. She’s a hard worker, very committed to everything she does, and she’s a nice person on top of that. But don’t make it more than what it is.” He turned away to feed the last of the leftover sausages to Sandy. “I need to get Nina to the dojo for her Krav Maga lesson with Vicki. You can show yourself out.”
Chapter Eleven
Dominic’s parents lived in a sprawling, modern single-storey ranch house in the Valley. Out back was a big yard with a swimming pool and camp chairs set in the shade of a wide-spreading elm. At first glance, the yard seemed full of people, most of them congregated around an oversized barbecue grill. It reminded Nina of her own childhood home. Different trees, different pool, but the same comfortable homeliness and happy voices.
She squashed the memory. It didn’t help to dwell on things that were gone.
There were kids splashing in the pool, at least four that Nina could count. Eric spotted her and grinned, and she waved back. She wished she could join them. Entertaining the kids would be infinitely easier than dealing with Dom’s phalanx of sisters. Sisters who didn’t seem to like her much. She’d almost forgotten how it felt not to be liked. These days most people pretended to be her best friends, even if they didn’t know her.
“Just be yourself,” Dom said, “and they’ll love you.”
She’d much rather channel the fearless Sonia than be herself. Sonia wouldn’t care what anyone thought of her.
She hung back as Dom hugged his sisters, then wrapped his arms around his mother and lifted her off the ground. She squealed.
“You must be Nina.” Dom’s father reached around them to extend a hand to her. The resemblance between father and son was overwhelming; the same laughing green eyes, the same rugged good looks. If this was Dom in another thirty years, he was still going to be fighting off adoring women.
“Hello,” Nina responded, shaking the outstretched hand.
“No need to be so formal with us,” his mother said, engulfing Nina in a hug. For a second, Nina froze, awkward. She couldn’t remember when last she’d hugged anyone – even her sister. In her world, people didn’t hug. They air-kissed or cheek-pressed for t
he cameras.
Dom’s mother’s eyes crinkled as she grinned, and now Nina knew where he’d inherited his smile. “After all, you’re the first girl Dom’s ever brought home.”
“Nina’s my boss, Mom,” he warned. “She’s hired me to train her.”
“If you say so.” With a wink at Nina, she turned away, and a little of the knot in Nina’s stomach unraveled. She liked Dom’s parents. They seemed like warm, genuine people.
Then Dom introduced her to the family she hadn’t yet met: Moira, his eldest sister, and Laura, with a baby on her hip. “My third,” she said proudly once Nina had done the obligatory cooing over the dribbling child.
Then Laura’s husband, who worked with his wife and Dom’s father in the family construction business.
“Would you like a beer?” Juliet asked, once the introductions were done. She held out a bottle misted with icy droplets to Nina. “Or would you prefer wine?”
The lack of barb in Juliet’s voice almost made Nina do a double-take. “Just water, thanks.” Nina glanced at Dom. “I’m in training.”
And on a diet, though that hardly needed to be said. She’d been on a diet since 2005.
“Nina very rarely drinks alcohol,” Dom said.
“That must be a novel experience for you.” Moira tangled her arm in her brother’s. “Aren’t most of the women you ‘date’ usually drunk when you meet them?”
“Low blow, Sis.” But he laughed, not denying it.
They sat beneath the shade of the large tree making conversation as they watched the children play in the pool. Dom’s mother and sisters plied her with so many questions it would have felt like an interrogation if they hadn’t been delivered with such friendly curiosity. Nina had done enough interviews to know how to play this. She answered them as if she were on a talk show, regaling them with fun anecdotes from her film shoots, drawing laughter, watching their eyes grow big as she mentioned some of the major names she’d worked with and met.