Indiscretions (21 page)

With one hand holding the cat and the other held out in front of her, she made her way cautiously across the room, using the window as a guide. The opposite wall came sooner than she thought, and she banged her hand sharply on the wooden door. He might have told me it was a
very small
room, she grumbled, rubbing her knuckles. She ran her hand down the wall on the right and felt the cold metal plate of the light switch. There it was! Thankfully, India pressed the small button, flooding the room with light, grinning as she heard a faint cheer from Fabrizio outside.

She glanced at the cat, still clinging to her shoulder. He was as black as the night outside, his fur shiny and gleaming—unlike hers! She stared with horror at her sodden fox jacket. And her new “country tweeds,” bought especially for the occasion—nobody had told her that when tweed got wet it drooped!

Sighing, India put down the cat and opened the door. She couldn’t see a light switch, but there was sufficient glow from the open pantry door to negotiate the terracotta-tiled corridor. The cat skipped ahead of her, waiting while she struggled with the lock and lifted the heavy wooden bar that served as a bolt.

“Got it,” she announced triumphantly, flinging open the door.

The cat shot into the night as Fabrizio marched into the house, water dripping from his hair and his coat.

They stared at each other in silence for a minute, and despite herself India began to laugh again. “I’m sorry,
Fabrizio, but you look so funny—like someone who fell into a pond.”

“You should take a look at yourself,” he retorted with a grin. “You look like a drowned poodle. For God’s sake, take off that jacket.”

Clutching their wet coats they made their way back down the corridor and through a door at the far end.

“Wait here,” he called. “I’ll turn on the lights.”

The hall felt chilly as she waited, and India shivered. What wouldn’t she give for a hot bath right now! The room appeared first in a muted glow and then brighter as Fabrizio turned up the dimmers. India glanced up to the frescoed ceiling, where naked nymphs floated on fluffy clouds in a bright blue sky.

“Those nymphs must be freezing,” she called. “It feels below zero in here.”

“Wait a minute.” Fabrizio disappeared through a doorway, emerging a few moments later clutching a bottle of brandy and two glasses. “Come on,” he said, “we’re going upstairs.”

“How about a touch of central heating?” India’s teeth were chattering as she followed him up the broad curving staircase that at any other time she would have paused to admire.

“This is your central heating,” called Fabrizio, waving the bottle. “Don’t worry, you’ll soon be warm.”

“Here we are.” He flung open a door and pressed the switch that turned on the peach-shaded lamps.

It was, thought India, the most perfect cozy cave of a room. The walls were hung with some glowing amber-and-russet Florentine patterned fabric, there were warm coral rugs on the floor, and in the center an immense four-poster bed, curlicued and gilded and draped with soft golden gauze. A small sofa sat comfortably to one side of an old stone fireplace where logs waited in the grate ready to be lit.

“Thank God.” She sighed. “I was beginning to think we’d come to Dracula’s castle.”

“That would be no place to take a girl like you for a weekend.” Fabrizio wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. She could smell his familiar cologne and she put up her hand to brush back his wet curling hair.

“Poor girl, you’re frozen,” he murmured in her ear. “We’ll light the fire and drink some brandy, and I’ll have you warm in no time.”

The kindling crackled comfortingly and the well-dried logs caught at once, sending out a rosy glow that, while it wasn’t yet hot, made them feel warmer just by its flickering presence. India threw her bedraggled fox jacket on the floor to dry and accepted the brandy he offered her.

“Heaven,” she murmured, leaning against the mantel, sipping her brandy and toasting her toes over the fire.

“I told you it would be all right.” Fabrizio brought her a huge, fluffy towel from the bathroom. “Here, dry your hair,” he commanded.

India unbraided her hair, shaking and rubbing it vigorously with the towel until it stood up around her face in a spiky bronze halo. Her face was flushed from the brandy and the flames and, thought Fabrizio, she looked adorable.

“Let’s continue where we left off?” he suggested, unbuttoning her checkered country shirt.

“I’d like another drink.”

“Later.” He slid the damp shirt from her shoulders.

“What about dinner?” India thought longingly of
tagliatelle
steaming under a hot fresh tomato sauce flavored with basil.

Fabrizio unzipped her wet tweed skirt, kneeling to pull it down over her hips, tugging it gently past her thighs. India stepped out of her skirt.

“Tights,” he groaned, “are the enemy of man.”

He slid them off.

“How about a hot bath?” suggested India.

“Good idea,” he murmured, burying his face in the softness between her legs.

India laughed.

“I did, didn’t I?” she murmured.

“Did what?” His tongue sent ripples of pleasure through her.

“Come all this way just to get laid.”

The fire, fueled with fresh logs, cast a flickering glow over their retreat. India sat cross legged in front of the hearth wearing only a huge cashmere sweater she’d found in a drawer, munching on the slices of Parma ham that Fabrizio was carving from the side they’d discovered on their foray to the kitchen. With a crumbly mountain cheese, some biscuits, and a box of dried figs, it made a delicious dinner for two, washed down with a bottle of Amarone Riserva, filched from the wine cellar.

“Perhaps I’ll forgive them after all,” decided Fabrizio, cutting another slice of ham.

“Forgive who?” India leaned back, sipping her wine sleepily.

“The Brandinis—for messing up our arrangements.”

“Definitely,”—she yawned—“as long as tomorrow we can rent a car—or at least find these elusive servants.”

“Consider it done,” he said magnanimously. “Come on, you look tired. Let’s go to bed.”

India climbed into the gilded four-poster, feeling as though she were floating in a golden sea as Fabrizio closed the gauze curtains around them. It was rarely that they managed to spend a night together, and she watched as Fabrizio cast off the toweling robe he was wearing, admiring his muscular tapering body as he slid naked beside her.

“You know, don’t you, Fabrizio,” she murmured as she lay with his arm around her while the firelight flickered
on their curtains, “that this is just a golden never-never land.”

There was a shrill buzzing inside her head, and India wished it would go away. It was a familiar sound, like a siren. Why didn’t Fabrizio do something about it? She jolted awake as the bedroom door was flung open and the lights switched on.

“Oh, my God,” she cried as Fabrizio flung his arms about her protectively.

“Polizia!”
barked the man framed in the doorway, a hand on his gun. Two other policemen crowded behind him, and India hastily drew the blanket up beneath her chin.

“Police?” cried Fabrizio. “But what are you doing bursting in on us like this? What’s happened?”

“I might ask you the same question, signore.”

“I am a friend of the family—they lent me the house for the weekend.”

“I see.” The policeman’s eyes flickered disbelievingly over India. She cowered back, feeling very naked beneath the blanket. “And the signora, too, I suppose?”

“What is all this?” demanded Fabrizio angrily.

“You are both under arrest for breaking and entering this establishment. Do you deny that you broke the window and forced an entrance?”

“No, of course not, but I can explain—”

“You will do your explaining at the police headquarters and I warn you my men are searching the house for the rest of you.”

“The rest of us?” India glared at him. “You fool, there are no others. We’re spending a peaceful weekend at the house of friends. How dare you burst into my bedroom like this!” Her Italian had a very pronounced American accent when she was angry and the policeman looked at her with new interest.

“A foreigner, I see.… Well, I hope you have your passport, signora?”

“Oh, my God,” groaned Fabrizio, holding his head in his hands, visualizing the scandal. “This is ridiculous. Can you imagine what the papers will do to us?”

India stared at him in horror. It was only a few hours ago that she had been thinking that she was as indiscreet as her mother. This was getting worse and worse—she didn’t want her name spread through the press again, linked, as she knew it would be, to her mother and her mother’s indiscretions. She sank back against the pillows, frightened.

“But how did they know we were here?” she whispered to Fabrizio as the men inspected the room, making a note of the food and the wine on the table near the fireplace.

“The alarm, signora.” The captain missed nothing. “This whole house is wired—there are pressure pads beneath the carpets in every room. Normally, we would have been here immediately, but with such a storm, the roads were washed out. And now I must ask you to get your clothes and come with me.” He ushered his men outside the door. “We will wait outside for the signora to dress.”

The door closed behind the policemen. India and Fabrizio, sitting in bed, looked at each other.

“The window …” gasped India wildly.

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Fabrizio climbed out of bed and pulled on his shirt. “We’re in a lot of trouble, India. Oh, not from the charge, obviously it will be sorted out, but from the scandal. We’ve been caught. I’ve got to keep Marisa from knowing.”

“But how?” India sat on the edge of the bed contemplating the idea of an Italian jail cell and Marisa’s wrath and wondering which would be worse.

“I have the feeling,” replied Fabrizio, pulling on his pants, “that it’s going to cost a great deal of money.”

9

Rory was upset. Very upset. So upset he was muffing his lines—and as they only gave him a couple to say at a time, it really made him look bad. He sniffed impatiently as the makeup girl repowdered his forehead. Over in a corner the director, Dirk Bonner, was conferring with Shelly James, his female costar. Shelly was nodding her head, eyes downcast, listening intently to what Dirk was saying. Dirk was probably talking about him, putting him down, telling her
she
was the greatest!

Paranoia flared as Rory stomped back onto the location of
Chelsea’s Game
—a downtown L.A. jail, the real thing, complete with iron bars and padlocked doors. Unused now and empty, of course, but it still gave him a shudder just being there. Bill had probably got them to shoot here just to back up his threat and keep him in line. Fuck! As if the whole thing were his fault!

“Tell Dirk I’m in my dressing room—whenever he’s ready,” he said curtly.

As he laid down the neat line of coke, Rory pondered on his problem. He had really lucked out meeting Jenny
Haven at that party—at least that’s what he’d thought then! She was still lovely, still sexy, and being with her had been a real high in the beginning—before he really got into the coke. Jenny hadn’t liked it, and she’d liked it even less when he’d told her she was getting old, that she wasn’t moving with the times. Alcohol was the drug of
her
generation—though not Jenny, she was dead straight.
Too
straight! She didn’t like his habit and she didn’t like his friends. He’d kept it down, kept it quiet, kept her happy, while she burned up her energy in creating him—Rory. Her very own star. Of course, he was a quick learner, and he’d had the basics to begin with, but she’d given him that contemporary macho gloss, she’d gotten rid of his excess pounds, his brown hair, even his moustache in case they thought he was gay.

Then she’d started unloading her problems on him, telling him how she was managing her own business affairs. He’d helped her, given her some good advice, meanwhile just funneling off enough money to finance the coke she was against him taking. So? Where else was he to get the money? He wasn’t working yet. And that was another thing—she’d expected to costar with him when he got the television part. Was it his fault that the director wanted someone
young?
She’d started thinking about maybe directing a couple of episodes, but Dirk wasn’t letting go of his job to accommodate Jenny Haven—all Dirk needed was Jenny taking the credit for the success of
Chelsea’s Game!

Rory held the paper with the coke to his left nostril and sniffed noisily, then to his right. Jeez, that was better!

Anyway, she shouldn’t have let him take so much control—she should have organized her business matters herself, or gotten someone else to do it. Jenny was generous when it came to expensive clothes, dinners for two, and a bottle of champagne, but pocket money was hard to come by; he’d just had to find ways to put a little into
his own account. He’d started finding property “bargains” that he told her were so “hot” she’d make a killing; it was easy just to inflate the price and pocket the difference. She’d trusted him completely—after all, the man she was doing everything in her power to help was not going to screw her, was he? Rory grinned at the memory—sure he was, if he needed the money and she wasn’t gonna give it to him! It was the same on the stock market. He’d enjoyed playing it at first. He’d made a bit—then lost a chunk. That was her money, not his. When he won, it was his money. He’d tried commodities for bigger wins, lost a lot, pocketed the rest.