Picture Perfect Read online

  "It won't be that bad," I said lightly. "It'll be over before you know it." I put down the mascara wand and walked into the bedroom in my underwear and slip, coming to stand in front of Alex. I unknotted his tie and redid it, straightening the half-Windsor and then smoothing down the tails. I leaned up to kiss his cheek. "Thank you," I said.

  Alex's hands ran up and down my arms. "Oh, it won't be as bad as I'm expecting," he said. "That's my trick. If I imagine the absolute worst, I can't help but be pleasantly surprised." He walked to my closet and picked out one of the outfits that had magically appeared within days of my arrival in L.A., a slinky red dress like nothing I'd ever owned before. In fact, most of my clothing was like nothing I'd ever owned before. But Alex knew more about these things--where I would be going and what I would need--so I simply deferred to his judgment.

  "It's a Thursday night," he rationalized, watching me step into the dress and then coming around to zip the back for me. "So no one from the industry will be around. There aren't any premieres going on, and the reporters should be calling it a day." He spun me around by my shoulders and smiled down at me. "All in all, if we're lucky, it'll be dead tonight."

  I almost said what sprang to mind:Ophelia will be so upset . She was down the hall in a guest suite, borrowing one of my new dresses and a pair of shoes. When Alex had made the reservation at Nicky Blair's, a swank celebrity hangout, Ophelia couldn't sit still in her chair. It was nice to see her thinking of Alex as an ally instead of an enemy, but I wondered if she'd been swayed to apologize because she really missed me, or because she'd recognized the connections Alex could offer her.

  I shook the thought away. Of course she'd come for me; she didn't evenknow Alex yet. And we'd had a terrific afternoon. I'd shown her around the house, laughing at her comments about bathtubs big enough to hold a cast party and whether or not Elizabeth sold Alex's dirty sheets to the die-hard fans clustered at the gate. A little after four we had raided the refrigerator and carried a bag of chocolate chips and some leftover sesame chicken into the maze, where we'd lain on our backs and let the sun slanting through the hedge speckle our stomachs and our thighs. And just like when I had lived in Westwood, we talked about sex--except this time, I wasn't the one simply listening.

  It had never been easy for me to talk about that, and Ophelia would have laughed me off if I'd said what I really wanted to. So instead I told her about the exotic places we'd done it: the excavation pit in Tanzania, the last pew of the Catholic church in Kenya, the laundry room closet while Elizabeth was just outside folding clothes. I told her how beautiful Alex's body was, how many times we came together at night.

  I did not tell her that he was so gentle he sometimes made me cry. I did not tell her that afterward, he would hold me so tightly the breath was driven from my lungs, as if he were afraid I'd disappear. I did not tell her that every now and then, as he prayed to me with his hands and his heart and his mouth, I felt as cherished and as blessed as a saint.

  I did not tell Ophelia these things, but that didn't keep her from seeing them in me. "Jesus," she had said, shaking her head. "You're honest-to-God in love." I had nodded; I didn't think there were words, really, to explain the connections and dependency Alex and I had between us. Ophelia had smiled. "No communicable diseases, four times a night, and he hasn't cheated on you yet. As far as I can tell, the man has only one flaw."

  I had leaned up on my elbow. "And that is?"

  "He picked you instead of me."

  Alex's voice startled me back to the present. He had gone to get Ophelia, and now the two of them stood at the threshold of the door, watching me. Ophelia was wearing a dress of mine that I hadn't even seen in the closet yet, something green that swirled around her and caught the flashes in her eyes. Her feet were practically dancing in anticipation of a night out at an exclusive restaurant. As she held on to Alex's arm, they looked every inch the couple.

  Ophelia's glance swept me from head to toe. "My God," she said, "you look beautiful."

  I twisted my hands in front of me; I did not yet know what to do with these kinds of compliments. "So do you," I said.

  Ophelia smirked and turned toward Alex. "Which one of us?"

  I laughed. "Both of you," I said.

  John was waiting for us at the front door, and he offered Ophelia his arm down the stairs as if he hadn't been the one to apprehend her for trespassing hours before. He opened the rear door of the Range Rover and handed Ophelia inside, then helped me up. "Tell me," Ophelia murmured, "does he take you to the bathroom if you have to go?"

  Alex hopped up beside us. "Well, ladies," he said, "I hope you've already had something to eat."

  I glanced at Ophelia, but she just raised her eyebrows. "I thought we were going out to dinner," I said.

  "We are," Alex agreed. "But that doesn't mean you'll have a chance to eat anything." He turned to Ophelia, as if to warn her about what she'd gotten herself into. "Unfortunately, you've invited me, and when I'm at a table dinner tends to be less a meal than an event."

  Ophelia tipped up her chin and gave Alex a dazzling grin. "That," she said, "is exactly what I'm counting on."

  TO ALEX'S SURPRISE AND PLEASURE, HE MADE IT THROUGH HIS APPETIZER before someone came by to congratulate him on our marriage. "Thanks, Pete," he said. "Let me introduce you to Cassie, my wife"--he laid a hand on my shoulder here--"and her friend, Ophelia Fox. Ophelia's breaking into the business." Alex paused for a beat. "And Pete is one of the honchos at Touchstone."

  Under the table I squeezed Alex's leg, letting him know how much it meant to me that he'd go out of his way to help Ophelia after all she'd done. He leaned toward me and kissed my neck. "Don't start what you can't finish in public," he whispered.

  Ophelia kept up a running monologue on which celebrities had entered the restaurant and who had ordered what for dessert. "I'll tell you," she mused. "If I'm going to get discovered, I ought to just glue myself to a chair here and let everyone come and go."

  Alex ate the three shrimp I had left on my plate. "Not to burst your bubble," he said, "but this is about the quietest I've ever seen Nicky Blair's." As if this were his fault, he smiled apologetically at Ophelia. "We'll come back here some other time," he promised.

  Every time Ophelia steered the conversation to Hollywood politics or pointed out another studio executive, Alex worked the thread of the discussion back to me. He mentioned how impressed he'd been with my technical knowledge on the set, to which Ophelia just raised an eyebrow and asked, "Technical knowledge aboutwhat , exactly?" He told Ophelia I'd been made an associate professor, something that I'd told her three days before but that she apparently hadn't heard. Now, she jumped out of her chair and threw her arms around my neck, calling to a waiter for a second bottle of champagne.

  Maybe it was the genuine interest she showed in my promotion; maybe it was simply that dinner had turned out to be much less of a media blitz than Alex had anticipated. But to my relief, by the time the meal was over, Alex and Ophelia were trading the latest Quayle jokes, slapping each other on the back, doing impressions of legendary executive assholes in the movie industry. Alex insisted on paying the bill, which I had known all along he would do, and which--I think--Ophelia knew all along too. She stood up and braced her hand on the back of her chair. "Whew," she said. "That second bottle goes straight to the head."

  It wasn't a surprise to me that Ophelia was tipsy--I had barely had two glasses of the Cristal, and Alex had drunk only water. Alex slipped an arm around her waist to support her, and then smiled at me and wove his fingers through mine.

  When he pushed out the front door, his arm was around one stunning woman, and he was pulling me slightly behind him. Which was why, for a second, I didn't notice the gaggle of photographers, the bright black spots the flashbulbs left behind.

  "Goddamn ," Alex muttered, snapping my arm close to his side so that I was forced into the light, unable to shrink away as my natural instinct had been. He dropped his hand from Ophelia's waist, but his image ha