Hooked Up: Book 2 (32 page)

Sophie smoothed her manicured hand over her sleek, chignon. “No! You’re kidding me? Very talented actress Alessandra Demarr.”

The way she said that made me wonder if she knew about this already. Although I did remember telling her I wanted women for the lead roles, I didn’t remember anyone mentioning Alessandra Demarr. I wished Alexandre hadn’t let her in on my business, but answered simply, “Yes, I’m very pleased with the way things are going.”

“I’m sure you’ll be even more delighted as sings unravel zemselves to you,” she said ominously—although the ominous vibe could just be my imagination. She was French—the translation may have come out wrong, I thought . . . ‘things
unravel
themselves’ –
what
things?

Alexandre put his hand on mine. “Pearl’s going to do some re-writing of the script, aren’t you, darling? She always wanted to be a script writer and now’s her chance.”

Sophie’s hand enveloped both of ours, her eagle talons cupping us, her nails long and sharp. “Let’s have a look at your engagement ring. Beeeootiful,” she cooed, gawking at it, her eyes wide.

“Thank you.”

Alexandre looked pleased. “It belonged to a Russian princess, a lady in waiting, so to speak, to Catherine the Great.”

Sophie cackled. “Cazerine zee Great – isn’t she zee Empress who used to fuck horses?”

Elodie almost choked on her champagne. “Maman!”

“No, seriously, rumor has it zat zay had to lower zee horse on top of her as no man’s penis was big enough nor insatiable enough for her. Zay said she was a ‘beastite’ – I sink zat’s zee correct term. She died, in fact, trying to have sexual intercourse wiz a horse—she got crushed to death in zee act.”

Alexandre burst out laughing. “Nonsense. That was a myth, gossip spread by French aristocracy and her Polish enemies at the time to belittle her.”

“Well, she certainly had a voracious sexual appetite which contributed to her downfall.” Sophie turned to me and stared, her last sentence directed at me, for sure. I thought of the Freudian dream I’d had about a black horse, at the hotel in Cap d’Antibes, after Alexandre had been talking about getting me to “ride” him.
Could Sophie read my frigging dreams?
She knew that I couldn’t keep my hands off her brother. She knew my sexual appetite had been awakened. I looked down at my empty glass awkwardly. Alexandre didn’t seem to notice what she had said, and Elodie looked hazily at the
Tromp l’Oeil
of the dining room, settling her gaze onto the painted lake with swans and the fake view beyond that looked so disconcertingly real, obviously choosing not to follow the conversation.

“Well, I
love
your ring, Pearl,” Sophie continued with a syrupy smile. “But why didn’t you want a new piece of jewelry?”

“Pearl and I didn’t want a blood diamond,” Alexandre broke in.

“A blood diamond?”

“A conflict diamond,” I clarified. “A war diamond. A lot of top-grade diamonds are mined in war zones, particularly Africa. We didn’t want to contribute to that in any way, so Alexandre chose a vintage piece instead, and I’m glad he did.”

Elodie piped up, her pretty eyes wide, her interest piqued. “It’s true, Natalie Portman doesn’t wear real diamonds to Oscars or red carpet—she wears fake knock offs for five bucks, for same reason.”

I was marveling at Elodie’s colloquial English, using words like “knock-offs” and “bucks,” and added, “It used to be a pendant, and Alexandre had it made into a ring.”

Sophie let me know in a soft voice, “Well, I don’t sink wearing someone’s old jewelry is so lucky—bad Feng Shui, you know, could be bad vibe.”

For the first time Alexandre looked angry. His mouth tensed as he said quietly between his teeth, “Actually, Sophie, I had the ring cleansed by a priest. By two different priests in fact. Blessed with holy water. The ring is as pure as snow.”

I looked down at my achingly beautiful ring and wished Sophie hadn’t laid her hands on it. As if her touch could have polluted it in some way.

Swallowing a mouthful and then smiling sweetly she said, “These BLTs are so delicious, Pearl, you must tell me zee recipe.”

Recipe.
The recipe is in the
title of the sandwich
. BLT: bacon, lettuce and tomato. Of course, Sophie’s irony was not lost on me but did seem to go over Alexandre’s head. Men are so clueless when it comes to women’s sharp claws disguised in white kid gloves.

I told Sophie, “The secret is in the bacon itself, Sophie. It’s from a small farm Upstate, where the pigs roam free in fields and lead a happy life.”

Alexandre got up from the table to get another bottle of champagne, and Sophie whispered to me out of his earshot:

“Pearl, make sure you don’t wear zat pearl choker my bruzzer gave you on your wedding day itself. Pearls are unlucky for a bride, you know.” Then she added in a hoarse whisper, “I hope zat doesn’t make
you
unlucky, having Pearl as your name.”

I COULDN’T EVEN remember how we got there. I guess it was by his car . . . what
was
his name? Later, I blanked that name out. Later, when it was all too . . .
Late.

My friend Julia had somehow slipped out of the equation. I was left with both boys, lascivious, like hungry dogs drooling for their dinner. But I was lapping up the attention, thinking of Brad studying with his new
girlfriend
—well I too could have some fun: two guys at once. An erotically charged night . . . a threesome. A one-time pleasure adventure—just the once. Isn’t that every girl’s secret fantasy?

“Baby, what’s wrong?”

My breath was short, my back drenched with sweat. My eyes flew open and Alexandre was there beside me in bed. I heaved a sigh of relief.

“You were having a bad dream, Pearl.” He held me close to him and kissed the lids of my wet eyes. “It’s okay, everything’s okay, baby. You can go back to sleep.”

I
NOTICED THE change in Pearl after her first nightmare. She was crying out in her sleep, tossing and thrashing in the bed, the small of her back soaked with sweat.

“Get off me. You fuck!” she screamed.

I woke up with a start, thinking Rex had jumped on the bed, landing in a painful bound on her breasts (as dogs and cats tend to do), but her eyes were closed, and Rex wasn’t there; he had his own bed. I held her wrists to try and calm her, but it made her yowl even harder and sent her into a kicking frenzy. Her swim-toned legs were strong, crashing against my calves with all her might.
Jesus, what was the nightmare that had caused this?

“Pearl, chérie, wake up!”

Her eyes flew open. She was panting; beads of sweat gathered like raindrops on her brow, under her arms, behind her knees.

“Baby, what’s wrong? What the hell were you dreaming about?” I asked, holding her close. But she shoved me away, a sneer etched on her lips.

“I’m going to take a shower, I’m drenched.” She tried to smile at me but it was obvious I had done something terrible to her in her dream, and she hated me in that instant.

“Baby?” I tried again, taking her hand. But she shooed it away, wrestling herself free from the confines of my embrace.

“Please, Alexandre. I just need a shower, I’ll be fine.”

“What were you dreaming about?”

Her eyes flashed with fury. “Nothing. Really, I can’t even remember. I was being chased by a sort of scaly-fish monster or something. Just a typical bad dream, nothing more.”

Liar
.

MEANWHILE, SOPHIE had suddenly decided that Pearl was marvelous. She was almost obsessed with her, wondering why Pearl was spurning her friendship.

“Because,” I said, “you’ve been a bitch to her in the past and she doesn’t trust you an inch.” We were sitting at a bar in a restaurant in SoHo, waiting for our table, listening to
Lady
Grinning Soul
by David Bowie. It reminded me of Pearl.

“But I’m getting her a bloody Zang Toi wedding gown, it’s costing a fortune!”

“If there’s one thing you need to know about Pearl, Sophie, it’s that she doesn’t give a toss about money. She does appreciate the thought, though, but she’s suspicious of your motives, and I don’t blame her.”

“What, just because I called her a cougar?”

“You called her worse, if I remember. And when you came to dinner the other night you were being all bitchy. Pearl noticed, believe me.”

“That was not directed at Pearl but at you, dear brother . . . my jibe about the engagement ring. You could have had
our
diamond if you wanted it so badly, not buy that second-hand gem that belonged to some Russian royalty who fucked horses.”

I laughed. “You were guarding that silly Indian diamond like a phoenix, Sophie. And the vintage piece I bought for Pearl and had converted into that spectacular, eat-your-heart-out-Liz-Taylor ring, I would hardly describe as ‘second-hand.’ It belongs in a bloody museum.”

“Anyway, Pearl is an enigma. She makes me . . . I don’t know . . . I feel—”

I nearly spluttered my beer all over the bar. “Jesus, you don’t
fancy
her, do you? Lay off; Pearl’s
mine.”
This place made great Bloody Marys, but I’d be steering clear of
those
for a while, so I’d settled for an ice-cold beer.

Sophie cackled with laughter. “No, but I do have to say I think she really is very beautiful. She has an angelic face. Really, she looks like an angel in a Botticelli painting. There’s an innocent soulfulness about her eyes. There
is
something special about her. I just wish she wanted to be my friend.”

“Give it time, Sophie. Pearl’s like a cat. You have to let her come to you; not be pushy or she’ll run away.”

“By the way, speaking of felines, Claudine called me,” Sophie told me. “She says she’s left several messages and you haven’t gotten back to her. She’s very upset. I mean,
really
upset. Hurt feelings. You’d better get in touch.”

Oh no.
“What does she want?”

“Well, she split with her boyfriend recently.”

“Oh God.”

“She’s doing well, though. Just been offered a campaign by L’Oréal. You know, the glamorous older model, the over thirty type of thing. She looks amazing for her age. She’s quite a stunner.”

“If you’re into bones that look as if they can snap in two and skin paler than alabaster, yes, she’s a beauty.”

“Anyway, you’d better call her because she’s been really bugging me about seeing you. She says she misses you and wants to hang out. She sounded very depressed, very doomsday about everything despite her modeling success.”

I could feel my insides churn. Would there never be an end to this slew of exes battering at my door?

“I’m getting married, Sophie. I don’t want to see Claudine. Nor Indira, nor Laura. Nor any other beautiful ex that might pop out from under the fancy wood paneling.”

Sophie laughed again and said in English, “When it rains, it pours. I love that expression.”

I felt my lips tighten.
Bloody Claudine. I thought I was off the hook.
“I’m in love with Pearl,” I enunciated—to myself as much as to my sister.
I won’t be roped into a guilt trip noose about my neck again. Claudine needs to sort her own fucking issues out with men. There is no way I’ll partake in any more mercy fucks for Claudine.

Sophie dabbed her lips with a hint of gloss. “Alessandra will be all over her, I just know it.”

“Who?”

“Alessandra will be all over Pearl.”

“That’s right, you met Alessandra Demarr, that time backstage after we’d been to see her in that play. I’d forgotten about that. What’s she like?”

Sophie turned her face away from me and said, “Oh look, our table’s ready. I’m starving, aren’t you?”

At the time I didn’t put two and two together.

A
FTER MY NIGHTMARE, Alexandre brought me breakfast in bed the next morning. He set down the tray and poured me coffee, adding steaming hot milk—a change from just the usual black caffeine fix that I always drank at work. He believed the calcium was good for me. He knew just how I liked it, and it was always more delicious when he made it than when I did it for myself. In every way he was the most sensitive man to my needs and desires, except in one aspect: