“I can pay you back, but I need to save the rest of my money.” Hovering by a case of silver neck torques, Jeremy spoke, quiet but insistent. “It’s not like I have calls rolling in for other jobs. And this one might well wreck my career before it even begins. I can’t waste the bankroll I have.”
Snapping his fingers, Kit called over a sales woman. All arrogance, he pointed to a nicely oxidized, thin platinum wrist cuff. “This one.”
The woman bent low to retrieve the cuff from the cabinet, and Jeremy elbowed Kit in the ribs.
Kit’s eyes narrowed, and he mouthed, “She didn’t even say hello.”
The woman crossed to the other side of the store, and Jeremy eyed her ashen complexion as she drew a strip of paper from a roll with shaking fingers.
“She’s so nervous she’s about to pass out, you imbecile,” Jeremy hissed, then crossed the room in long strides.
The woman looked up at him and turned a shade of green.
“Hey,” Jeremy said, smiling down at the petite blonde. “What’s your name?”
“Steph.” Fumbling, she sent the box and cuff sailing to the floor. “Shit.”
Bending, Jeremy scooped up the lid from the polished black tile near his feet. As he did so, he saw Kit’s reflection looming above him and stilled. So like a god, mortals quaked in his presence. Well, this time he needed to stoop a little.
“We’re going to get some dinner.” Jeremy stood and pushed the box lid across the counter. “Want to join us?”
Green eyes, upturned at the corners, widened as Steph glanced between himself and Kit. “Wow. Thank you. But I—I can’t. I have to work.”
Feeling Kit’s dumbfounded expression more than seeing it—because he refused to look—Jeremy pulled a sales slip from his wallet and wrote down the address of the studio along with his name. “There’s someone I want you to meet Monday. Can you come by round noon?”
Greg had been having trouble filling a part. While Jeremy had no clue if this woman would be interested in acting, most people in this town were, and something told him, given a little Goth makeup and pink hair, she’d be perfect for the part. Knowing he stepped out on a limb but wanting to spread around his own good fortune, he made the offer. If nothing else, he could show her around the studio. When they left the store, Steph still clutched the slip.
Reaching the car, Kit lightly smacked the back of Jeremy’s head.
Whirling, Jeremy growled, “Yank me, Fame Boy.”
“Just a word of warning.” Kit held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Rescue too many lost puppies and you’ll end up running around with a pooper scooper instead of advancing your career.”
“You could stand to do some time shit shoveling.” Jeremy slid into the back of the car and sincerely hoped they were headed for dinner. If his blood sugar went any lower, he might start chewing on Kit’s ass instead of just chewing it out. “The world doesn’t revolve around you, you know.”
“You thought it did a little while ago.”
In response to the smirk in Kit’s voice, Jeremy shoved himself to the opposite end of the seat and rested his back against the door.
“Like you said, that’s not for public consumption.” He threw Kit’s words back in his face as he glanced at the driver.
“Fair enough.” Splotches of color appeared at the high points of Kit’s cheekbones. “Tell me why you don’t have any other work coming in.”
“Huh?” The change of subject screeched Jeremy’s anger to a halt. “What are you talking about?”
“You said you’re worried about money.” Kit folded his arms over his torso. “I assume it’s why you haven’t leased an apartment, among other things. How come your agent isn’t working on getting you other work?”
“I don’t have an agent.”
Arms dropping, Kit gaped. “The first thing you should’ve done when you got this part was have an agent look over your contract. Negotiate for more money.” He looked beseechingly toward the roof of the car. “What is wrong with you, dude? Do you not have a lick of business sense?”
“Why would I waste money on an agent when I already had the part?” Knowing he sounded stupid, Jeremy asked the question anyway. As far as he saw it, he had gotten one part himself; he could get others if necessary.
“Why do you need an agent?” Kit’s voice cracked on the word agent. “Because the agent will get you other parts while you spend your time doing what you do best—acting. That fifteen percent would have bought you a lot of goodwill. Now you’re asking some poor bastard to work for you for free until you get another part.”
The weight of his ignorance weighed on Jeremy, further gnawing at his mood. Nobody had told him these things before. Nobody. He’d had to stumble through most of his life relying on luck and common sense. In this town of plastic smiles and false promises, however, he’d found his skills seriously inadequate in the latter department. For the millionth time that day, it seemed, Kit grabbed his phone and started to make a call on Jeremy’s behalf. This time, Jeremy stayed his hand. He had to clean up his own messes.
“Do you think if I gave them the fifteen percent retroactively, someone would rep me?” It hurt to contemplate the loss of forty-five grand, but really what choice did he have if he didn’t want to crash and burn his chances before they really got off the ground?
Kit eyed him. “It’d help.”
“I know you want to do me a favor, Kit. I think you’ve done enough, though, and I appreciate it.” Jeremy squeezed his fingers gently, and Kit glanced to the driver in the rearview. Jeremy let his hand fall. “I appreciate everything, but I’ll take it from here.”
“All right.” Pursing his lips, Kit seemed to mull something over. “But the clothes and stuff are from me. Along with this.”
Handing Jeremy the silver-wrapped box with the cuff in it, he said, “Welcome to Hollywood.”
A little awed, Jeremy touched the box. Nobody had ever given him something so intimate. Gaze lifting to Kit’s, he cleared his throat. “Thank you.”
The question of the clothes and personal services they could resolve later. Right now, he just wanted to enjoy this moment.
“Stay with me instead of Falkner this week?” Kit kept the question low.
“Yes.” The word fell from Jeremy’s lips. Spools and swaths of time with Kit unfurled in his mind’s eye—so much of the stuff it constituted an embarrassment of riches. The things he could do…that they could do. By the end of a week, they’d either have cemented this relationship or sent it crashing to the ground just in time for their trek to Connecticut.
Connecticut…
They pulled up to the curb, and Kit flicked a glance out the tinted window as if expecting and finding something. Following his stare, Jeremy saw the milling paparazzi and sucked in a breath.
“Fuck,” he said. “You tipped them off?”
Grinning, Kit swept him with an apprising stare. “You’re ready. Let’s do this thing.”
Squaring his shoulders, Jeremy shoved his shades on his face and emerged after Kit to the assaulting flashes and shouted questions. He had no illusions that the interest in their presence was entirely due to Kit. Still, using the thought like a shield, Jeremy allowed himself to practice the self-assured image he wanted to project.
“Is it true you’re Greg Falkner’s love child with stage actress Monica Corbin?”
“Dude?” Kit slid his shades down. “Are you on crack? Jeremy’s like six years younger than Falkner.”
Jeremy laughed out loud, and Kit gave him a shit-eating grin. The paparazzi ate up the exchange, their flashes going into a frenzy. Walking up the steps to the restaurant, Jeremy felt a sense of adventure. This time when he stepped in front of the cameras, he felt like part of the picture. Not some accessory to Kit Harris but his equal. A lover and a friend.
Chapter Sixteen
The whine of the airplane engines sounded muffled in first class. Leather seats and ample legroom afforded more than enough encouragement to sleep. Ha
rdly needing such an excuse, Jeremy relaxed backward and began to drift off. Lord knew he needed the sleep after the week he and Kit had spent—fifteen hours a day on set interspersed with more sexual activity than he’d imagined possible in one lifetime, never mind one day.
Kit sat in the front row and Jeremy in the back, Greg making it obvious with the seating arrangements that he didn’t like the close bond his two actors had recently developed. At first, Jeremy wondered if the man felt jealous. Then he realized he wanted to look after his investment. Lovers and enemies weren’t that far apart on the relationship spectrum, and the latter could spell disaster for the film.
Whump.
Jerking fully awake, Jeremy looked down at the object that had been dropped in his lap—a weekly entertainment magazine—then up at Greg, who stared at him over the rim of his reading glasses. Sure didn’t seem like the guy to slum it reading this trash. Thumbing the pages curiously, Jeremy made the mistake of letting the sarcastic thought spill from his mouth.
“I don’t.” Sliding a shoulder across his seat, Greg leaned in and flipped the pages roughly, searching for something. “My PR office gave it to me.”
Flip. Flip. Flip.
An article.
The title, “Kit Harris Gay Scandal,” screamed at Jeremy in twenty-point font while pictures of himself and Kit peppered the article. Stunned, Jeremy swept the pages with his eyes. With that title, even the most innocent photographs looked salacious. A shot of Kit whacking Jeremy on the back of the head looked like a caress. Then, the two of them tucked together on the motorcycle ride, bending over their burgers in the outdoor café, all appeared tinged with sexual innuendo.
As innocent as those moments had been, they had, in fact, been intimate to Jeremy. The headline, however, cheapened them for him precisely because they had been special. Strange emotions knifed through him. A desire to protect Kit. Anger at the people who’d exposed their relationship prematurely. The realization no place on earth could be considered private or safe. And a keen sense that Kit hadn’t heard about this yet, or he wouldn’t be sleeping peacefully several rows up.
“Those telephone interviews your publicist scheduled for next week?” Greg asked.
Jeremy looked up from the train wreck in his lap to search Greg’s face, needing advice on how to handle this new, stark reality.
“Don’t cancel them.”
“But—”
“You want to justify the rumors further?” Greg spoke low, close to Jeremy’s ear so none of the cast could hear his advice. “You cancel the interviews. Otherwise, dodge or deny. Unless, of course, you think Kit’s ready to come out?”
“I—He… I mean, we…” Oh fuck. “I’m not going to lie about who I am.”
Leaning forward, Greg lifted his wineglass between two fingers and seemed to consider the vibrating golden liquid. “Why not? Is it really anyone’s business?”
“No, but I don’t want to act like my sexuality is a dirty little secret. Because it’s not dirty. It’s just a preference.”
Sighing, the screenwriter set down the glass again and pushed his hand through the fall of his hair. “You’re in for a world of hurt, my idealistic friend. One I’m not sure even you, with your intimate knowledge of suffering, can understand.”
“Why did you write No Apologies, then? If it’s such a bad idea to come out?” Part of Jeremy asked the questions out of curiosity, another in annoyance at being lectured by the most closeted man in Hollywood. “Don’t you think people are going to ask you the same questions they’re going to ask me?”
“I don’t give interviews,” Greg said, as if that explained everything.
Shutting him out, Greg turned on his laptop and jammed noise-cancelling headphones over his ears. Even over the airplane engines, Jeremy could hear the echoing, repetitive guitar riff from some grunge song. Probably one of Nirvana’s.
Chances for sleep fractured, Jeremy folded the rag Greg had given him and stuffed it into his carryon. Knowing Kit stood a 100 percent chance of either seeing or being told about the article didn’t make him any more inclined to be the one to show it to him. That article—the first of Jeremy’s celebrity career—very likely spelled the end of his on-set romance.
“You look like shit,” Kit remarked.
The circles under Jeremy’s eyes, their bluish purple almost bordering on black, said he needed rest and plenty of it. “Sorry. Can’t sleep.”
For two days, he’d issued the same excuse about his quiet, morose mood. Every once in a while, Kit caught him looking at him with quiet longing, but when he approached, Jeremy made a vague excuse about needing to be somewhere else. To do something else. Some sort of invisible axe hung over their relationship. Kit had known this feeling before but usually fell on the delivering, not the receiving, end.
Feeling as isolated as the landscape, Kit stared out french doors at the barren rolling hills and skeletal trees. Everything here seemed gray or brown, and he longed for the sunshine and blue skies of home. They’d be filming a scene outside in the heated pool this evening, and the season apparently would pass as well for the supposed March landscape in the story as the November one outside.
Littered with cameras and cables, mammoth spotlights lighting the pool area, the pristine garden of Greg’s family home had been turned into a set for their next intimate scene. Built in the 1920s, the house itself looked like a macabre version of something out of The Great Gatsby. Gothic carvings and a dining room the size of half of Kit’s condo were nothing compared to the monstrous library with its thousands of books and dust-cloth-covered furniture. At night, the place grew so quiet, each creak and gasp of the old wood made him startle awake. Sirens he could take. Was used to. Things that went bump in the night? Not so much.
“Do you find it creepy?” Kit asked, needing at least a scrap of noise and human contact in the midst of this desolation.
“Huh?” Jeremy stared at him as if he existed in some unreachable place.
Frustrated with his inability to find a way to resolve the situation, Kit pushed his hands through his hair. Leaning in close so nobody else could overhear, he said, “I’m coming to you tonight, and you’re telling me what the hell is bothering you if I have to reach down your throat and rip the words out with my bare hands.”
The violence of his words surprised them both, and they stood blinking at one another for a long moment until Greg strode by and Jeremy stepped back. Three things happened, almost simultaneous, that seemed to Kit, in retrospect, to comprise a vortex of energy so turbulent and dark he’d forever remember the Falkner family home as an ugly, cursed place. Individually, none of them appeared so bad without the other. Together, however, they set in motion a chain of knowledge that would forever change Kit and his view of the world as a basically good and happy place.
“Are you on drugs?” Greg stopped to snarl in Jeremy’s face. “What the hell is the matter with your eyes? Go to makeup. Now!”
Flinching, Jeremy stepped back as the skies outside opened up and the front doorbell rang.
“Jesus Christ!” Tearing outside, Greg began to haul equipment under tarps as the rest of the crew did the same. Hollering over his shoulder to Kit and Jeremy, he said, “Don’t just stand there like useless jackasses. Help out!”
Kit and Jeremy ran outside and lifted heavy tarps over expensive lights and cameras. Everyone ignored the insistently ringing front doorbell.
“Did anyone bother to check the weather?” Greg bellowed.
No one answered as icy shards of sleet and rain pelted their faces and soaked through their clothes. The wind picked up, and tarps began to flap, threatening to topple the stands underneath, so they pushed and heaved the unwieldy equipment under the back arbor where it could be tied down.
With some cameras hauled inside and the other equipment safe, Greg directed the crew to set up a scene for the dining room. One where Jeremy’s character got the tar beaten out of him by his father. Jeremy sat on the bench behind Kit with a muted thud, going pal
e at what Kit knew was an unexpected requirement to do a very violent scene.
When Kit tried to go to Jeremy, however, Greg snarled, “Stop acting like a Hollywood starlet and get the goddamned door.”
Water still streaming in his eyes, Kit clenched Jeremy’s shoulder in a comforting gesture on his way by. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw Jeremy come inside. Heard him slosh up the stairs to wardrobe and makeup as Kit opened the front door.
A family of seven stood outside under the long portico. Dry and dressed in their best polyester blend, five kids stared back at him with dark, deep-set eyes. Just like Jeremy’s. Kit’s gaze rested on the ruddier features of the eldest man. His veined nose—bulbous and pockmarked from apparent years of drink—made Kit’s stomach roil. Especially as his eyes alighted on the hellish red glow of a cigar clamped between the man’s teeth.
Gaunt, with lank hair and hollow eyes, the only woman in the group stared past Kit at the opulent front entryway crammed with an Old World suit of armor and a family crest, among other dusty antiques. The kids were all boys, ranging in ages from six to sixteen. The older one looked mean. Hardened. The rest just looked bewildered and hungry.
As he stared, Kit came to the sickening realization that these people had cared for Jeremy as a child. Cared for. He gritted his teeth against visions of Jeremy cowering. Begging. Wanting to be loved but finding only violence and fear in the face of this sadistic man. Kit realized how lucky he’d been to have parents who’d ignored him. Even if they didn’t want him they hadn’t done anything worse.
Pushing, belly first, through the door, the sorry excuse for a sentient meat bag forced Kit to back up a step. Once he made it into the entry, the rest of the group seemed to pour through like molasses, streaming and thick, from an uncorked jug.
“Don’t move,” Kit said and went in search of Greg, knowing if the screenwriter threw these people out, the eviction would stick.
Bounding up the stairs, he made it to makeup, where Greg snapped instructions on prepping Jeremy’s back and his suit for the somewhat formal family dinner scene. Several shirts in various states of ripped destruction had been prepped. They’d change him into progressively more ruined clothing as the caning continued.
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