Lovers and Gamblers

by Collins, Jackie

  * * *

  Kiki and Chuck were very kind. Too kind. They chatted about all sorts of unimportant subjects as they drove back to Beverly Hills.

  Dallas wanted to scream, ‘I don’t care! I don’t mind! Al can have who he wants, it doesn’t bother me!’ But she knew they were only trying to pretend they hadn’t noticed the fact that Mr. King had done the fastest walk-out on her on record.

  ‘That Rush woman is really creepy-looking,’ Kiki gushed. ‘Did you see the make-up? Three inches of white base.’

  ‘To cover her famous spots,’ Chuck joined in.

  ‘Yeah,’ Kiki continued. ‘Do you know she never even appears at the studio without her make-up – I swear to God – six a.m. she marches in fully made-up – then she throws out the makeup guy – locks herself in his room – takes off all her “going to the studio” make-up – and does a whole new job on herself! Martha Scott told me – she did her hair on her last picture. Now the hair is another story…’

  Dallas tuned out whilst Kiki droned on. She couldn’t care less about Karmen Rush. It could have been anyone. She had known about Al’s reputation up front – that’s why she had held back. And thank God she had. At least this way she could walk away from it feeling no pain. If she had slept with him… If she had liked it…

  Well, she hadn’t. It had taken extreme self-control, but she hadn’t.

  What a laugh that a man like Al King could turn her on where all others had failed. A superstud. A type of sexist pig that she should really loathe. Maybe he would have struck out too. Maybe if she had gone to bed with him it would have been as distasteful as it was with everyone else.

  Oh, well… No use wondering about that. Forget him. Concentrate on work. Concentrate on becoming a star. Concentrate on herself.

  ‘Isn’t that Cody’s car?’ Kiki was saying.

  Dallas glanced out of the window. It was indeed Cody’s Mustang parked neatly beside Linda’s rented Mercury. What was he doing there? Fortunately she couldn’t spot a white Ferrari, so Linda must have changed her mind about Julio. ‘Coming in for a drink?’

  ‘Sure…’ began Chuck.

  ‘No,’ interrupted Kiki hurriedly. ‘I’m beat, I really am. We’ll see you tomorrow.’

  Dallas knew what she wanted. She wanted to see her back together with Cody.

  They said their goodbyes and Dallas walked into the house.

  Cody jumped up when he saw her. His face was white.

  ‘What happened between you and Lew Margolis?’ he snapped. ‘Because whatever it was Lew wants you out – off the series. What was it, Dallas? For Christ’s sake, what was it?’

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  ‘I can’t,’ insisted Cristina.

  ‘Why not?’ replied Nino, lazily.

  They lay on the beach, hands entwined.

  ‘I keep on explaining to you why not.’

  ‘Because it’s your house. Because it’s your mother’s jewels. If you really think about it, then you would say – yes, Nino, I’ll tell you when it is a good time, Nino – I’ll tell you where the safe is… how to open it.’

  Cristina pulled her hand away and sighed. ‘You ask me too much. First the Von Cougats, then the Bogatos – now you want to rob my house – my parents’ house.’

  Teasingly Nino threw sand over her stomach. ‘So. It is fine to rob other people’s houses. But when it comes to you…’

  Cristina blushed. ‘It’s not just that. You stole from the Von Cougats – the money your organization gets for the jewellery goes to help the poor. No one was hurt. They are insured. As you said, no one will even miss it.’

  ‘Yes.’ His hand massaged the sand lightly into her stomach.

  ‘So I told you about the Bogatos. I made it possible for you to rob them.’

  ‘You were very helpful.’

  ‘Yes, Nino,’ her eyes filled with tears, ‘but you didn’t tell me that you and your friends would have to kill the dog…’

  ‘It attacked us…’

  ‘And wreck the house. Cover the walls with slogans, rip up priceless paintings.’ She started to cry. ‘I wasn’t going to mention it – I felt too sick to mention it. But now – what you are asking me… it’s impossible.’

  His hand moved slowly down her stomach, his fingers hooked into the thin knot of cord holding the bottom half of her tanga together. ‘I think we should go home,’ he whispered.

  She stopped crying and shivered slightly. He had her under some kind of unbreakable spell. ‘It’s early,’ she protested weakly. ‘I thought we were going to surf.’

  He laughed. ‘Who wants to surf when we have better things to do?’ He stood up and offered his hands to pull her off the sand.

  They walked slowly back to his apartment. Her body was tingling with the anticipation of what he would do to her.

  ‘Ah, Cristina, Cristina,’ he sighed when they were in his room, ‘what a baby you are, what a little innocent.’ He was undressing her as he spoke.

  ‘Do you love me?’ she blurted out, unable to hold back any longer.

  ‘I love you as I love the stars, the sky, the beach, the ocean.’

  It was no real answer, but she was satisfied. It was more than he had said before.

  ‘I love you,’ she crooned. ‘Oh how I love you, Nino.’

  He did not reply. He silenced her with his mouth.

  Later, when Cristina had left, he lay on his bed and stared at the ceiling. The paint was cracking and peeling, sometimes little flakes would fall down onto him whilst he slept. He never slept well. He was always restless. His dreams were always full of nightmares. He craved for some action. He craved for his organization to start its reign of terror. The preparatory work was boring – at least the work he was stuck with was. ‘You’re the good-looking one, Nino,’ his leaders had told him. ‘You’re the one who will be able to captivate the ladies – the rich ladies.’

  Fund-raising was his job – whilst the others were out buying arms, making stockpiles of bombs – and compiling lists of victims for Operation Kidnap – he was satisfying women in bed. It was not a job he enjoyed. He had a girlfriend – Talia – a tough, intelligent twenty-three-year-old, who worked in the smuggling side of the operation. For the last few months he had hardly seen her at all. It was a most unsatisfactory situation. When he made love to Cristina he shut his eyes and tried to pretend it was Talia. It never worked. Talia was a woman of fire, whilst Cristina was just a silly little rich girl.

  Cristina Maraco. Just how useful could she be? Her father was a very rich man… Blackmail or kidnap had been discussed, unless she could be used in some other way. Her mother’s jewellery would be a help. Perhaps she would be able to supply more information on families such as the Von Cougats and the Bogatos. ‘String her along some more’ were Nino’s instructions. At least she was better than the Americans. He shuddered at the thought of the American women he had serviced. Big women with big demands. ‘Do this, Nino, baby.’ ‘Do that, Nino, sweetheart.’ ‘Just there, don’t stop.’ ‘One more time, Nino.’ Ugh! How he hated them. Capitalist pigs from the worst capitalistic country of all.

  His eyes were closing. Sleep was coming. The nightmares were coming. No use fighting it. He succumbed.

  * * *

  ‘Where have you been all day, Cristina?’

  Wide-eyed and innocent. ‘Just to the beach, Mama. I told you I was going to the beach.’

  ‘You look so… flushed.’

  ‘I have a headache, Mama, I think I will go and lie down.’

  Evita nodded. She didn’t know what it was, but she just had a feeling that Cristina was up to something. When Jorge returned home late in the evening she tried to explain her feelings to him.

  ‘Up to what?’ He laughed.

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t explain.’ She paused thoughtfully. ‘I think she has a boyfriend.’

  Jorge grimaced. ‘According to her, she has a lot of new friends. And after what Louis tried on I don’t blame her.’

  ‘I think,’ Ev
ita said hesitantly, ‘that she is sleeping with someone.’

  ‘Impossible!’ Jorge shouted, his complexion turning a dull red. ‘How can you say such a thing?’

  Evita shrugged. ‘It’s just a feeling I have.’

  ‘You’re wrong. She’s a good girl, that much I know about my own daughter.’

  ‘We’ve allowed her too much freedom. How do we know what sort of people her new friends are? At least with Louis we knew his family. Do you know that she never even has time to see Maria Therese – her best friend.’

  Jorge frowned. ‘On Sunday I will tell her to bring some of her new friends to lunch. We will meet them and make our own judgement.’

  Evita nodded. ‘Yes, I think that would be a good idea. You ask her, she will only find some excuse for me.’

  Jorge kissed his beautiful wife lightly on the lips. ‘Problems, problems, as if I don’t have enough all day! But you are wrong, my darling, I know you are wrong. Cristina is a good girl. I would bet my life on that!’

  * * *

  Evita took one look at Nino and saw immediately the favelas in his eyes. She knew without doubt that here was a boy who came from exactly the same background as she did.

  He was good-looking, marvellous-looking in fact, with his wild curly hair, and intense jet eyes. Evita could certainly see what attracted her daughter physically. But he was obviously a boy who lived on his wits. His clothes were the standard dress of the young – a uniform almost. The tight faded jeans, a collarless shirt, old tennis shoes. But round his neck hung an expensive gold chain with some sort of religious medallion, and Evita couldn’t help thinking it was a present from a rich female. His kind always had rich women – she had seen so many boys like him who would sell their bodies to the tourists for whatever they could get out of it.

  All these thoughts were churning quickly through her head as Cristina introduced him. Jorge had requested that Cristina bring her new friends home – but she had turned up with only one – this boy – and Evita could understand why. Her daughter was in love. It was quite obvious as she gazed at Nino with naked admiration shining from her eyes.

  Jorge shook Nino firmly by the hand. ‘Do you two youngsters want to swim before lunch?’ he asked.

  Cristina looked quickly at Nino, questioning him with her eyes.

  Nino nodded, glancing around at his luxurious surroundings with a mixture of contempt and envy.

  ‘Go ahead,’ offered Jorge. ‘Cristina, show your friend to the changing room.’

  ‘Not necessary,’ said Nino, unzipping his jeans and fixing Evita with a sudden moody stare.

  ‘Don’t do that here,’ Cristina said quickly. ‘Poppa doesn’t like a mess of clothes round the pool – come on, I’ll show you where to change.’

  Nino zipped his jeans up again. ‘Sure,’ he said, still staring at Evita.

  She returned his stare with a polite smile. She hated him on sight. He represented a certain type of male she loathed. Arrogant. Mean. Conceited. A sexual aggressor. Young as he was, his character was quite clear to her.

  Cristina grabbed Nino by the hand and led him off down the gardens towards the changing rooms.

  Jorge turned to his wife, a complacent smile suffusing his face. ‘You see,’ he said triumphantly. ‘He seems like a nice enough boy.’

  ‘Don’t be a fool,’ snapped Evita in reply. ‘You haven’t said two words to him. Who is he? Where does he come from? What does he do?’

  Jorge frowned. ‘Give me time. I can’t start questioning him the moment he walks in our house.’

  ‘He’s from the favelas.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘It’s in his eyes, it’s in his smell.’

  ‘Evita. Don’t condemn him before we even know him. He’s Cristina’s friend, she likes him.’

  ‘She more than likes him.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Your daughter is a woman – she likes this boy as a woman would like him. Did you see the way she looks at him?’

  ‘No, I didn’t,’ replied Jorge irritably. ‘I wish you wouldn’t always jump to conclusions and make hasty decisions about people.’

  ‘I have an instinct for knowing things. This boy is no good.’

  Jorge turned away from his wife. Sometimes she could be very annoying with her ‘instincts’. A year previously he had been forced to terminate a lucrative business deal because Evita didn’t like the man he was dealing with.

  ‘You will be fair,’ Jorge insisted. ‘You will not judge this boy on two minutes – you will judge him after we have spent the day in his company. I am sure if he is a friend of Cristina’s he will turn out to be nice, polite and respectful.’

  * * *

  ‘Hold this,’ urged Nino.

  ‘I can’t, not here!’

  ‘Hold it. Stroke it.’

  ‘Nino. My parents are just down the garden. They’ll wonder what we are doing in here.’

  ‘Put it in your mouth.’

  ‘Nino!’

  ‘Do it. I command you. Get down on your knees and put it in your mouth.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘If you love me, you will.’

  Her eyes were filling with tears. They stood in the changing room close together. She in her tanga. He with his jeans around his ankles, his brief swim suit around his knees, and his penis swollen and distended.

  ‘If you loved me, you wouldn’t ask,’ said Cristina miserably.

  ‘I have to ask. I can’t go out like this. It’s your fault I’m like this.’

  Reluctantly she sunk to her knees. ‘But if they come looking for us…’

  He grabbed her head and guided himself into her mouth. ‘Ah!’ he sighed. ‘That’s good, that’s very good.’ Slowly he rocked back and forth. It was the first time she had allowed him into her mouth, although she wasn’t averse to the feel of his tongue.

  He was excited because of the woman. The beautiful woman with the glacial features and white-blond hair. She was the kind of woman he had always dreamed of having. A madonna in a white bathing suit, with the body of a lush peasant girl. The combination was irresistible.

  The joke was that she was Cristina’s mother. A woman Cristina had called a bitch and a hag, and God knows what he had expected – some sort of old, jewel-ridden bag! The joke was on him. Cristina’s mother was cool, ladylike, and so young.

  ‘Aaach!’ He climaxed quickly, pushing himself deep into Cristina’s mouth. She gagged and tried to push away. He wouldn’t allow her to until he was finished. Then he withdrew, satisfied – doubly satisfied because of where the event had taken place.

  Evita watched the young couple emerge from the changing rooms, and turn towards the pool. She had known he would wear the smallest of swimsuits. She had known his body would be deeply suntanned, finely muscled and hard. After all he probably lived by his body, therefore it had to be in perfect condition.

  What did he want with Cristina? Did he want to marry her? Was he foolish enough to believe that they would allow it?

  Cristina was no great beauty. Oh, she was pretty enough, attractive, but she was not the sort of girl that would have a boy like that running around after her unless there was something in it for him – something more than just sleeping with her, because as she watched them cavorting in the pool, she was sure that he was indeed sleeping with Cristina. When you started life living in a shack amidst a sea of other shacks, you developed an antenna for sexual knowledge. Evita knew at a glance.

  She sipped slowly the glass of chilled white wine Jorge had poured for her. How lucky she had been to meet him. What a miraculous escape it had been for her. If not for Jorge…

  ‘So this is how my little rich girl lives,’ breathed Nino, surfacing behind Cristina and grabbing her round the waist. ‘Your own swimming pool, all the luxuries. I never even knew what a bath looked like until I was fourteen years old.’

  ‘That’s not my fault,’ objected Cristina, wriggling free and striking off down the pool.

  He
swam after her, keeping his voice low so that her parents couldn’t hear him.

  ‘Do you think it’s fair? Do you?’

  ‘You know I don’t, but there’s nothing I can do about it.’

  ‘But there is.’

  ‘Please don’t let’s discuss it here.’

  He placed his leg between hers under the water.

  ‘Don’t!’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘You know why not. Please behave yourself, Nino.’

  ‘And if I do, will you promise to do something for me?’

  ‘I thought I just did!’

  ‘Not that. Something important. Something that will help the organization.’

  ‘If I can… You know I’ll help if I can…’

  Jorge was clapping his hands together beside the pool to attract their attention.

  ‘Have you two had enough yet? Lunch is ready and I am hungry.’ He glanced quickly at his watch. He had a schedule to adhere to. He didn’t want to miss his afternoon siesta with his wife. It was all very well Evita wanting to meet Cristina’s friends, but if it was going to interfere with his schedule…

  Cristina swam to the edge of the pool and hauled herself out. ‘I’ll have to change, Poppa, I’ll be as quick as I can.’ She threw Nino a towel, ‘You can use the changing room, I’m just going into the house.’

  Nino caught the towel, smiled politely at Jorge, and glanced covertly at Evita. She wasn’t kidding him with that glacial expression, she had noticed his body, she had noticed how great it was. Young, hard, virile. He strolled with deliberate slowness to the changing room.

  Cristina ran into the house and up to her room. She had not wanted to tell Nino, but the thing he had made her do to him before they swam had made her feel sick. She rushed into her bathroom and rinsed her mouth out with strong mouthwash, then she cleaned her teeth. It had been mean of him to force her to do that. Especially in the changing room, within earshot of her parents. He had known she would not dare to object too strongly. He was so wonderful, and yet at times he could be so mean. He teased her a lot. He said her legs were too short – her breasts too flat – her ass too low. Then, just when she would be near to tears, he would kiss her, and laugh, and insist that he wouldn’t want her any other way.