Hooked Up: Book 2 (46 page)

The only place I could imagine Pearl being—unless she’d hightailed herself out of LA altogether—was at Alessandra Demarr’s house. Of course, Alessandra wasn’t picking up either, but I sped along Pacific Coast Highway, toward Topanga Canyon, hoping I’d find Pearl there.

What a fucking fiasco. I had never chased a woman like this before in my life. All that talk about letting women come to you like cats or children, and here I was flying along in this Mercedes in hot pursuit of a madwoman. A fucked-up, dysfunctional, neurotic nutter, just like every other female in my life.

The only difference was that this time I felt that my world was at stake. I needed Pearl and I couldn’t be without her. At least, I couldn’t be
happy
without her.

I
DROVE THE car over the creek very carefully, as frogs had gathered for their nighttime chitchat, and I didn’t want to run any over. The noise was impressive as they croaked in the pebbled rush of water amongst the bulrushes. Once I was safely out of sight from Alessandra’s lair, I pulled the car over at the end of the potholed driveway, killed the engine and turned on my cell.which had been switched off for hours.

There were six voicemail messages. I listened to the first.

“Pearl darling, we got cut off. As I said, I’m on my way to LA. I’ve organized a plane. Can you meet me at the Van Nuys Airport in . . . I don’t know, five hours or so?”

No mention of Sophie. As if he hadn’t heard a word I’d said.

Next voicemail: “Pearl, chérie, why aren’t you picking up? I’m about to take off. I’m gutted about what you told me. Hang on in there. We’ll talk about all this when I see you. It was not your fault, baby. We all have a past. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. And don’t think I won’t hunt those fuck-heads down for what they did to you. But first we have our marriage to attend to. I’ve organized it all and we’re going to Vegas tonight. Meet me at the Van Nuys Airport and I’ll pick you up there. The pilot will wait and we’ll fly to Las Vegas.”

Again, nothing about Sophie or separating the business.
This guy has not heard me.
He thinks we can just marry and that will be that . . . everything sorted, solution over! No, Alexandre, I will not just marry you in Vegas before you’ve dealt with HookedUp first! Especially now I know that Sophie has been screwing with me, and my movie deal, right from the beginning—she is Alessandra’s LOVER! A coincidence . . . I don’t think so!

Next voicemail, sent five hours later. “Landed, baby. Your cell is still switched off, what the fuck is going on? I’m really worried now.”

Finally, the penny is dropping.

Next voicemail: “Okay, baby, I get it; you’re really pissed off about Sophie. I swear I’ll deal with it but please, please trust me on this. I just want us to get married. We’ll be a team and we can sort it out together. Where are you? I’ve hired a car, I’m on my way to the hotel in Santa Monica.”

Next voicemail. His voice sounded as if he was almost in tears. “Baby, they say you checked out. I’m so worried, you alone in LA and stuff. The only thing I can think of, right now, is that you’re at Alessandra’s. But she’s not picking up her phone either. I’m on my way there now. Please don’t leave. Please, Pearl. I beg you. I need you. I’m coming to find you.”

Next voicemail . . . hang on, this wasn’t him. A woman’s voice. An English accent. Educated, softly spoken. “Pearl, you don’t know me. I’m sorry to bother you like this. I finally tracked down your number. My name is Laura. Alexandre’s ex . . . maybe you know who I am?”

My heart was pounding through my sweater, my hands bursting with a sheen of sweat, a prickly nausea enveloped my entire body. Why I felt so nervous I wasn’t sure . . . a premonition?

The urgent but friendly voice went on: “I’m calling to warn you. Sophie is really crazy. She could be out to hurt you. I’m sorry but . . . ” There was a long pause . . . “I had a terrible accident several years ago and could have died. It wasn’t an accident at all. Sophie tried to kill me.”

I pressed my ear closer to my phone. There was a slight pause and the voice continued:

“Why do you think I broke up with Alexandre? I had to keep well away. Stay away from her, too, Pearl. I know you love Alexandre, but your life is at stake. She’s powerful. She’s even more dangerous now than then. She knows people . . . she could have you topped off at the click of her fingers.
Do not go to Vegas
. It’s too dangerous for you there. She owns great chunks of it . . . hotels et cetera, corrupt police officers, officials all in her pocket, like little pawns doing whatever she asks. Sophie could do anything and will, believe me. I won’t bother you again but as one woman to another, I thought I owed you this. Goodbye, Pearl. Good luck.”

I felt sick—all this information flooding into my exhausted brain like sewerage.
Sophie tried to kill Laura
?
Then why does Laura still go to Alexandre’s house in Provence with her husband for vacations, knowing she might bump into Sophie? Alexandre told me they were friends and that Sophie thought “the sun shone out of Laura’s ass.” Unless . . . he was lying, sticking up for his sister, as usual. Painting her with a rose-tinted brush when in fact, Sophie still hates Laura. Jesus—Sophie tried to murder her
?
That nutcase will stop at nothing!

And that was just the tip of the iceberg. Sophie and Alessandra were a
couple?????
Or if not a couple, best friends/lesbian fuck buddies. Alessandra had lied to me, pretended she’d only ever spoken to Sophie, that she didn’t know her personally.
I was totally set up by Sophie.
It was all planned out!
Alessandra Demarr was suggested for the movie role by Sam Myers. Meanwhile, Sam Myers was in cahoots with Sophie from the word go. Clever. Really clever. Knowing I wanted a female lead for the role, Samuel Myers put the idea of Alessandra Demarr into my head—made it look like it was my choice all along. Or
had it been
it my choice? Now I couldn’t even remember our conversation.

Alessandra and Sophie . . . lovers? But Sophie was married! She had a stepdaughter. Alexandre had never mentioned anything about his sister being
gay.

Never before had I felt such a fool. So dumb. Summa cum laude? They’d gotten that wrong, alright. What a dense dumbass I’d been, congratulating myself on getting a gay female lead, who was not only Sophie’s lover, but who had also seduced me! No,
worse!
She didn’t even have to seduce me—I was up for it. Like putty in her hands. Acting like a little slut again.

I’d gotten snagged right into Sophie’s spider web. Tangled right in the middle of her Black Widow trap.

Laura was right, Vegas would be suicide.

I put the car into drive and moved off. Great, I’d told Alessandra where I was going. Sophie could have me tracked down in Kauai. But I guessed Sophie would find me anywhere in the world—she had the means, and with GPS as sophisticated as it was nowadays, hunting me down would be a piece of cake if she set her mind to it.
She wants me to back off from Alexandre. And I want
her
to back off. Who is going to win this duel
?

It depended on him. Who did he love more? His own flesh and blood? Or me? He’d once told me that the expression,
blood is
thicker than
water
didn’t exist in the French language. If so, he’d better prove it.

As I was moving off, a car pulled into Alessandra’s driveway, but I couldn’t see the face of the person behind the wheel. Alexandre? Jesus, maybe it was Sophie. Either way, I revved my engine and doubled my speed. I looked in my rear-view mirror and thought the driver hadn’t seen me, but I was wrong. The car screeched in a U-turn and came right after me. I hung a sharp left on PCH, in the direction of LAX, just getting the green light in time, and flattened my foot on the accelerator. If it was Sophie, I needed to outrun her. Alexandre, ditto. I knew him—he was so persuasive he’d have me on that plane, abducting me, and whisking me off to Vegas to tie the knot. He was used to getting what he wanted.

Well not this time, buddy
.

My foot was all the way down. I was cruising fast. This BMW was smooth and speedy—thank God I’d traded in the Cadillac. I was outrunning the driver, way ahead, but could see its headlights flashing at me. I felt as if I was in some car chase in a movie, and it gave me a wicked thrill as a surge of adrenaline spiked my veins. The driver was careening around corners with a determined, formula one style. Uh, oh, I recognized that technique—that easy panache, those gear changes. I saw what kind of car it was: a sleek, black Mercedes—yes, that was him: Alexandre. I didn’t stand a chance. We were both hell bent for leather, flying two times past the speed limit as if we were on a German autobahn. We’d both be arrested, for sure. He was catching up with me now, zooming between two other cars. He had overtaken me and I couldn’t do a U-turn.

I was busted. If I didn’t want us both killed I’d better pull over. I saw a safe spot up ahead and pulled into a restaurant parking lot. He did the same a little way ahead. My heart was pounding but I was secretly enjoying the attention. A twenty-five year-old sex-god, babe-magnet, the best looking man in the Universe tracking me down and wanting to take me to Vegas to marry him? Hello?
Am I dreaming?
He ran toward my car and I couldn’t help it; a huge grin spread right across my face. I buzzed down my window, trying so hard to stifle my beaming smile, biting the insides of my cheeks. But he had my number.

He leaned into the open window of my car. “Quite a madwoman, aren’t you? Trying to get us both killed?”

“I meant what I said, Alexandre,” I said, pursing my lips to stop myself laughing, my only ammunition against his drop-dead gorgeous smile—a smile that was giving me butterflies and turning my stomach inside-out. “I’m not going to Vegas with you; I’m going to visit my father in Kauai.”

He opened my door and leaned in, his apple-mint breath on my face. He said in a soft, low voice, his face touching mine, “Correction.
We
are going to Vegas. Now. I’m going to marry you tonight or,” he looked at his watch, “early tomorrow morning as it’s already ten-thirty. “Then
we
are going to Kauai for our honeymoon.”

“NO!” I shouted. But it was too late. He grabbed the keys out of the ignition and scooped me out of the driver’s seat, hauling me over his shoulders as if I was a weightless doll. He walked round to the trunk.

I was kicking and flailing about. “Put me down Alexandre!”

“No. You’re acting like a child, Pearl, and need to be treated like a child.” He opened the trunk and took out my suitcase—awkward, but he managed. His determination and strength had him holding the suitcase in one hand, and the other clamped around my rear in a tight vice. He locked the car with the remote, marched forward toward his rental car, his arm still clenched around me. Ouch, my sore, whipped butt hurt! I couldn’t escape; he had me in a firm hold. The fireman’s lift. Oh yes, he knew I loved this fireman thing, however much I was screaming and kicking.

“Let me down!” I cried, pummeling his back with my fists.

“No, Pearl. Stop behaving like a wayward teenager. You’re coming with me. I’m fed up with this nonsense.”

“I’m not marrying you, Alexandre Chevalier! Not until you sort—”

“Stop telling me what to do,” he barked, his gait strong as he strode toward his car. “You’re marrying me and that’s the end of it.”

I suddenly thought of something pertinent. “You can’t marry me, you don’t have my divorce papers. So there!”

“Oh no? I’ve had Suresh get them couriered over to the hotel we’re saying at in Vegas. All will be quite legal, I can assure you.”

We arrived at his car. With one hand he opened the trunk, chucked my case in and, keeping a tight grip on me with the other arm so I couldn’t escape, lowered me into the back seat and lay me inside as if I were a child not allowed in the front seat with her daddy. Then he locked the door. I tried to open it from inside, but it wouldn’t let me out. Child safety locks, no doubt. I pounded on the windows.

He came around to his side, opened his door and jumped in. “Not so fast, Pearl Robinson, soon to be Pearl Chevalier. You are
not
running out on me. You did that once in France and I won’t let it happen again.” He started the engine, put it into first and revved forward, Formula One style still.

“So I’m your prisoner?”

“Yes. And then you’ll be my wife.”

“Also in jail. Do not pass GO – DO NOT COLLECT $200.”

“There’ll be more than $200 to collect, of that you can be quite sure.”

“But still in jail.”

“Yes.” He smiled, and added, “A very pretty, gilded jail where you can have anything you want.”

“Except my freedom.”

“Believe me, you’ll be there of your own free will.”

“Like now? Trapped in the back of this Mercedes, being abducted into marriage?”

A gentle smirk edged his curvy, dark red lips. “I know what’s best for you, Pearl. Trust me. You need to marry me.”

The arrogance!
I would have laughed but it wasn’t funny. I began to cry, tears trailing down my cheeks. “You’re taking me to my death.”

He laughed out loud and changed smoothly into fourth.

“I’m not kidding, Alexandre. Laura called.”

T
HE GODS WERE on my side. I spotted Pearl exit Alessandra’s driveway, but because it wasn’t the same pale blue Cadillac, it took me a second to register. She’d changed her rental car and was now (I was pretty sure it was her) driving a BMW. I did a screeching U-turn and pursued the car. It sped up—a wild driver was at the wheel and I knew, by that point, it was definitely the mad and unconventional woman I was in love with. Our vehicles were careening along the highway as if we were in a Steve McQueen movie—I was racing to outrun her. The Mercedes and the BMW . . . always had been rivals on the road. I flashed my lights at Pearl, but it only made her go faster. It was insane; we’d get pulled over by a cop—worse, this was LA, we’d have guns held to our heads or flung on the ground and handcuffed.