Chapter 16
Chapter 16
I’ve got a promotion, she wrote her parents, another postcard, where she could be brief. All is well. Better than ever, in fact, though as usual she left out every other detail of her life. It would only trouble them.
Paul helped her find an apartment on Highland, an Italianate-style building of beige stucco with arching windows. Her apartment was on the second floor, and she had a narrow balcony overlooking a tree that shoved its branches through her cast-iron railing and half blocked her view of the street below, which was nice, because most of the view was a row of storefronts and other apartments and the Lucky 8 tavern. A living room, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom—all small, but with tiled floors. It reminded her a little of Rome, and she wasn’t sure whether she loved that or was discomfited by it, so she tried not to think of it, though sometimes, on certain evenings, when the warm LA air eased through the windows, she couldn’t help remembering those sultry nights in Italy, and the life all around, the sounds of Vespas and talk and music from the cafés instead of the silence of LA’s empty side streets, and she felt abandoned and alone.
The apartment was also the first place that had belonged only to her. She wanted it to reflect who she was now, Lena Taylor, assistant costume designer to Flavio, but she couldn’t decide what that meant, and so she’d decided to decorate it classically and ended up with boring. Everything beige and off shades of brown and white.
Beige, it turned out, was her color, too, in that she wore it every day, following Flavio’s dictate that she should never compete with the stars. Beige was the perfect camouflage for an assistant trying to persuade an actress to look like a drab maid when she was supposed to be playing a drab maid but wanted to look glamorous doing so. Lena still designed her own clothes—if they had to be beige, at least they would be perfectly cut and made from the best fabrics she could afford.
The only time Lena did not wear beige was when she went out with Paul. She took him to Ciro’s and Mocambo. She introduced him to the producers she knew. She told people who asked that they were just friends. But it was true what Harvey and Charlie had told her. She was being watched, and there was speculation, even about the assistant to a costume head. “What up-and-coming costume designer is dating a new screenwriter? Lux costume designer Lena Taylor and screenwriter Paul Carbone—could this be love?” They avoided photographs—she told Paul she was camera shy, and used the excuse of not wanting to compete with the stars. She stayed in the background always. Wearing sunglasses and hats and sitting in the shadows. She never appeared in pictures in the paper except as a blur or hidden behind someone else or with her face camouflaged by her hair.
She tried not to be as in love with Paul as she knew she was. She tried not to want him, but the truth was she did, sometimes so badly she couldn’t think. This could go no further. There was no point in it. She told herself that over and over. She was not going to sleep with him. She would kiss him. She would maybe go a little further, but beyond that ... How could she go beyond that? Marriage could not be in their future. She didn’t dare find Walter for fear of whatever trouble he would bring, and her life was one constant, hovering sense of doom. She couldn’t involve Paul in what she didn’t understand herself.
She resigned herself to it. She knew she could be strong. She told Paul the truth when she could. When he asked when she’d come to LA, she simply said she’d come three years ago to study fashion and didn’t mention who’d brought her here. “There was nowhere to learn fashion design in Zanesville. Not on a pig farm.”
“A pig farm?”
“Didn’t I tell you? My dad was a pig farmer.”
“I think you skipped over that.”
“Well, it was embarrassing. The smell gets into your skin and your clothes. It never comes out, no matter how many times you wash.”
He leaned closer, sniffing. “You don’t smell like pig. You smell like—”
“L’Air du Temps.” It had not occurred to her until then that she still wore the perfume that Walter had chosen for her. “But I’m thinking of changing it.”
“Why?”
“I’m tired of it. Unless you like it.”
“Whatever you want,” he said. “You’d be yourself whatever you smelled like.”
She laughed. “How do you always know just the right thing to say?”
“I’m a writer. I think about these things.”
“You have them all planned out?”
“Sure.” He blew cigarette smoke out in a steady stream. “There’s narration going on in my head constantly.”
“I see. What is it saying now?”
“It’s saying: He puts out his cigarette and kisses her passionately.”
“Ah.” Lena smiled. “Not so fast. I want to know what brought you to LA.”
“Oh. Well. That’s easy. I was born here.”
“Paul! You never told me that. You mean your parents are still here?”
“No. My father died the year before I joined the army. My mother long before that. He was a painter, she was his model.”
“That sounds romantic.”
“It was, for them. They didn’t care about anyone else. I was mostly a nuisance.” His voice was wry. “There was never any money. My father ... he lied to everyone. If you listened to him, we had a hundred relatives, all of them sick and dying. That’s the reason he gave every debt collector when we couldn’t pay our bills. But we didn’t have any family at all, or if we did, they were back in the old country. Who knows? He never told the truth about anything.”
The anger in his voice made her pause.
“I don’t want to be like him. He had a kid the way he did everything, without giving a thought to how he’d manage it. My mom was no better, but at least she loved me—or I think she did.”
His words made her uncomfortable. His father had been a liar. She didn’t think he’d like knowing how much she hadn’t told him about her own past. He looked far away; he smoked as if he were taking everything out on the cigarette, frustration and bitter memories. Finally he turned to her, attempting a smile. “I don’t want a life of lies, Lena. Not for me, not for my children.”
How serious he looked, how ... that look ... Lena swallowed. “No, I don’t suppose you do.”
“You’re the first woman I’ve told that story to.”
She didn’t know what to say to that. She didn’t know what to do with the sinking, blooming combination of emotions she suddenly felt—regret and joy and fear and a flickering excitement and anticipation. He still didn’t know so much about her. There was Walter. There was Rome, and everything that had happened with Julia, and all the other things she could not say. She wished she could do what Harvey and Charlie had advised and pretend it had happened to someone else. She wished she could put her old self into a little box and store it away and never think of any of it again. She tried. But then she’d see the flash of a shadow behind her and turn in fear, or a chestnut-haired woman in a crowd and break out in a sweat of panic, or she’d come home to the sense that someone had been in her apartment before her, and she’d look at Paul and think He doesn’t know and feel as if she were somehow betraying him, and yet she knew she must keep these secrets. She could not take the risk of looking for Walter and bringing him back into her life, not now. He knew who she’d been. He would tell everyone that Elsie Gruner was back in LA, and the sacrifices she’d made and was even now making—keeping her distance from her closest friends—would be for naught. She had to stay hidden. Hollywood was ruthless in its search for communists or fellow travelers. She would be destroyed, and Paul with her. Walter was a secret she had to take to her grave.
It had been a hard week; the production censor had turned a nightclub scene with Bob and Mikey, Lux Pictures’ most popular comedy duo, into an extravaganza. The duo was popular overseas, and producers wanted to emphasize American abundance, and so a scene with a handful of musicians and a few dancers had morphed into a chase scene through an elaborate cabaret number with dancers in costumes with giant hats and huge fans and choreography. “Comedy gold!” the censor proclaimed it.
It had taken several days of staying late to redo the costumes, and Flavio and Lena were exhausted.
They had just finished the last fitting and Flavio lit one of his European cigarettes and said, “It’s a Saturday night. What are you doing here so late? Go out.”
She laughed. “We still have the cocktail waitresses to do.”
“I’ll throw them into something from Western Costume.” They often rented from the costume house for minor characters. “They’ll never notice. The girls are in the shot for half a second. Go. You’re young. Have fun. Call your man.”
So she did. It was a hot night, and she and Paul went to the Waikiki Inn and she was tired to the bone and maybe that’s why the place affected her the way it did. Maybe that’s why the memories came on so strong, and even though the place smelled of LA and sweat and Aqua Velva and Chanel No. 5 and spilled beer and pineapple juice and smoke, she smelled Italy. She felt Rome. She couldn’t hold the memories back, and something about the jazz the quartet played reminded her of the shining cobbled streets and the deep blue sky of night and the roar of motorcycles and Vespas. There was something about the way Paul held her, about the way they danced, close and slow, that threw her back to that night when Petra had sung “Nature Boy” and the whole world had seemed so good.
Then Paul murmured in her ear, “This place always reminds me of Rome. Isn’t that weird?” and at once Lena wanted it to go away, all of it, to bury it so deep that it could never escape. But before she could do anything about the feeling, the music stopped, and Paul pulled away, and she felt someone behind her, a nudge, a poke, against her back that threw her into shocked stillness—she was no longer in the Waikiki, but in the Cinquecento, with a gun in her back. Panic leaped through her, but then she saw Paul’s expression, bored tolerance, and she turned to see it wasn’t a man in a black coat at all, but Mike from Lux, and her relief was just as hot as her panic had been, until she saw the maliciousness in Mike’s eyes. They shouldn’t have come here. The Waikiki was a favorite of the costume department.
“Mike,” Paul acknowledged—of course they’d met.
Mike inclined his head in greeting, then said, “Hey, Lena, I have a friend who swears he knows you.”
“Is that so?” she asked.
“He’s over at the table. Come and say hello.”
There wasn’t any stranger in LA who said he knew her whom she wanted to see. Lena’s skin already prickled with warning, and she didn’t like the look on Mike’s face. His jealousy since she’d been elevated to Flavio’s assistant had made her forget that he’d ever been a friend. “They’re getting ready to start another song.”
“Come on. Just say hi. He’s a famous designer.”
No, she did not like Mike’s expression. She reached for Paul’s hand. “The only famous designer I know is Flavio.”
“Then you’ll meet another one.” Mike put his hand on her shoulder and lightly pushed her toward their table, and Paul, who of course saw no reason not to, started in that direction, and so Lena found herself going woodenly toward the table.
They were only a few feet away before the faces became clear in the glow of the tiny lights in the center of the table. There sat Joe and Billy, and Royal from Lux, and sitting between them, almost unrecognizable because of his different hairstyle and the very French scarf around his neck, was Jasper Rutledge from Chouinard.
It took all Lena’s self-control to keep her expression blank. He had gone to Milan to apprentice at an atelier there, she remembered, and then he planned to go to Paris, and it looked like he’d done just that. She knew she looked nothing like the brown-haired innocent he’d known at Chouinard. Charlie and Harvey had not recognized her, but maybe it wasn’t enough to fool Jasper.
She felt a sweep of rage. She would make it be enough. She had disliked Jasper Rutledge at Chouinard, and nothing about the smug way he looked at her now changed her mind. Not only that, but she had no intention of allowing this arrogant man to upend what she’d spent the last years building. She wondered if she could pull off what was sure to be one of the biggest acting challenges of her life.
“Lena Taylor, may I introduce Gaspard Renault,” Mike said with a little smile. “From the Parisian house Iconique. Perhaps you’ve heard of him.”
“I’m afraid I haven’t,” she said. “I’m happy to meet you, Mr. Renault. This is Paul Carbone.”
Jasper-Gaspard gave her a snooty purse of his mouth. “Have we met before, Miss Taylor? I was just telling Mike that you reminded me of someone.”
“I doubt it very much. I’ve never been to Paris.”
“Oh, I’m not from Paris.”
“Really? You have such a French name, I’m sure I would remember it if we’d met.”
She thought she saw him flinch and wondered if he would own up to changing it. He did not. “Yes, I know it’s unusual. But I’m from LA. I graduated from Chouinard. I wonder if that’s where I know you from?”
“I’m not from here.” She felt Paul’s hand flex in hers, a little impatience. Her own hand was moist with sweat that she hoped he didn’t notice.
“You’re sure you didn’t go to Chouinard?”
“I think I’d remember that too.”
“You’ve moved up quite rapidly at Lux. Where did you get your training?”
“At Lux,” she said. “With Flavio.”
Jasper-Gaspard frowned and glanced at Mike. “But ... Mike says you had an impressive portfolio.”
“Did he?” She smiled at Mike, who looked flustered to have been caught out complimenting her. “He was kind to say that. I’ve always liked to draw clothes, that’s all. Flavio saw that I could be trained.”
“I see.” So much confusion in Jasper’s eyes. “You seem so familiar.”
“I must have a doppelg?nger somewhere.” She wanted to run before it dawned on him where he’d seen her before, before he managed to blink away the blond hair and the fine tailoring and the poise and see through it all to the girl she’d been before. “It was nice to meet you, Mr. Renault, but we really must be going.” She squeezed Paul’s hand and rushed him from the Waikiki.
They were at the door before he said, “Were we done dancing?”
Her panic had left exhaustion in its wake and in that exhaustion was fury. She was furious with Mike for his stupid jealousy that had obviously made him think Jasper had some secret about her. It didn’t help that Jasper did, or that the reminder of Chouinard and the close call had left her undone. It was always going to be like this, she realized. So much hiding, so many secrets. Clubs like the Waikiki reminding her of Rome, threats from her past. “I didn’t realize how tired I was.”
That Paul sensed something was clear. He frowned, obviously confused. “Okay.” He took her back out to the car.
They were quiet as they drove to her apartment, and she felt his disappointment as he parked and walked her to her door.
“I guess I’ll see you later,” he said, bending to kiss her good night.
She put her arms around his neck and pulled him so hard into her that he stumbled. She opened her mouth to his. It was not a good night kiss. It was a don’t leave me kiss. It was a fill that place that Rome left in me kiss. She didn’t know what he knew or what he felt, only that he pulled away and looked at her in question.
“I want you to come in,” she said steadily, forgetting all her resolutions. She was Lena Taylor, and Lena Taylor did what she wanted. But more than that, Lena Taylor needed to exorcise her demons tonight, and she knew Paul could help her do it.
He didn’t misunderstand. Paul swallowed. “Look, I want to ... I really want to, but I can’t offer you ... I’m not in a position to ...”
“Let’s not talk about the future.” The relief of saying that, of knowing it was what he wanted too, was overwhelming. “We both have things to do first. Just ... don’t make me pregnant.”
His laugh was a whisper of sound. “No, I won’t.”
“I’m not a virgin,” she said quietly.
“I don’t care about your past.”
She didn’t quite believe that, but it was a reassurance she wanted for now, it absolved her from telling him what she didn’t want to tell him. So she led him inside, and his kiss reached down inside her and yanked hard, she was aware of wanting him more than she ever had, and that was saying something, because she had wanted him so fiercely before. She led him to the bedroom, and he pulled her close, as if reassuring himself that she was real, and the kiss that had been so passionate before turned her into someone she wasn’t sure she knew. She peeled away his shirt to bury her fingers in the hair on his chest as he slipped his hands up her bare arms, sliding down the sleeves of her dress to reveal her bra, and then that too was gone, and his mouth was on her breasts, his hands were all over her, and hers were on him, his shoulders, his back ... they fell onto the bed, and it was as if all the time they’d been waiting for this, and that waiting had exploded around them.
She twisted beneath him, gasping as his hands slid beneath the skirt, up her thighs, unsnapping her garters, easing up. That he had skill was undeniable—he had her out of her girdle before she knew it, and all she’d been aware of was his kiss, his touch. She arched beneath him. When he moaned and eased inside her, she wrapped her legs around his hips and moved with him, her whole body thrumming against his. She could not be still, she could not fight the rising sensation, the pleasure that spiraled, that did not stop until she was gasping and trembling and crying out, and she grabbed him to keep him close just as he too cried out and jerked away, keeping his promise, coming on her stomach, then sagging on top of her, their breathing ragged, sweating.
Lena closed her eyes. She rested her hand on the smooth skin of his back, then traced his spine.
He said nothing for a long time. She felt the steady rise and fall of his chest against hers, the prickle of his hair against her breasts, the faint itch of it. He was heavy but she did not want him to move. Walter had not been like this. She had never felt anything like this.
Finally, Paul raised his head to look at her. “I think you’d better start telling people we’re a couple,” he said.
“Yes,” she told him. “I think I’d better.”