“I’m making a new Caliber picture,” he said. “Bird Dog goes blind, so I have to learn to use the Colts by sound.” He rubbed his shoulder as he stood. “Since when did you turn into such a chickenshit?”
“Since I saw a man who looks like a serial killer coming out from behind a sand dune.”
“If I have a black eye…”
“Here’s hoping.”
“Damn it, Fleur…”
None of this was playing out as she’d imagined. She’d wanted to be cool and aloof, to act as if she barely remembered him. “So you’re making a new Caliber movie. How many women do you slap around in this one?”
“Bird Dog’s getting more sensitive.”
“That’s gotta be a real stretch for you.”
“Don’t be a bitch, okay?”
Fireworks went off in her head, and she was once again standing in the rain on the front lawn of Johnny Guy Kelly’s house finishing a conversation that had barely gotten started. She spit out her words through a rigid jaw. “You used me to get your picture finished. I was a stupid, naïve kid who didn’t want to take her clothes off, but Mr. Big Shot’s love machine made short work of that. You made me happy to take everything off. Did you think about me when they handed you your Oscar?”
She wanted to see guilt. Instead he launched a counterattack. “You were your mother’s victim, not mine—at least not much. Take it up with her. And while you’re doing that, remember you weren’t the only one who got screwed. I’ve lost more than you can imagine.”
Her fury ignited. “You! Are you seriously trying to paint yourself as the injured party?” Her hand flew back of its own volition. She hadn’t planned to hit him again, but her arm had a will of its own.
He caught it before she made contact. “Don’t you dare.”
“I think you’d better take your hands off her.” A familiar voice drifted toward them from the dunes. Both of them turned to see Michel standing there. He looked like a boy who’d accidentally wandered into the company of giants.
Jake loosened his grip on her arm but didn’t let her go. “This is a private party, pal, so how about minding your own business?”
Michel came closer. He was dressed in a madras blazer and yellow net-T-shirt, with wisps of blond hair blowing across his delicately carved cheek. “Let’s go back to the house, Fleur.”
She stared at her brother and realized he’d somehow appointed himself her protector. It was laughable. He stood half a head shorter than she did, and yet here he was challenging Jake Koranda, a man with quicksilver reflexes and an outlaw’s squint.
Jake’s lip curled. “This is between her and me, so unless you want your ass kicked, leave us alone.”
It sounded like a line from a Caliber movie, and she almost stopped the confrontation right then. She could have stopped it…but she didn’t. Michel, her protector. Would he really stay here and defend her?
“I’ll be happy to leave,” Michel said softly. “But Fleur goes with me.”
“Don’t count on it,” Jake retorted.
Michel slipped his hands in the pockets of his shorts and held his ground. He knew he couldn’t physically remove her from Jake, so he’d decided to wait him out.
Bird Dog wasn’t used to confronting a soft-spoken opponent with wispy blond hair and a delicate physique. His eyes dropped to half mast as he turned to her. “A friend of yours?”
“He’s…” She swallowed hard. “This is my brother, Michael An—”
“I’m Michel Savagar.”
Jake studied them both, then stepped back, the corner of his mouth twisting. “You should have told me that right away. I make it a rule never to be in the same place with more than one Savagar at a time. See you around, Fleur.” He strode off down the beach.
Fleur studied the sand, then lifted her head and gazed at her brother. “He could have broken you in two.”
Michel shrugged.
“Why did you do it?” she asked softly.
He looked past her to study the ocean. “You’re my sister,” he said. “It’s my responsibility as a man.” He headed toward the house.
“Wait.” She moved automatically. The sand tugged at her feet like old hurts, but she pulled herself free. Images of the beautiful gowns she’d seen in his shop window flashed through her head. Who was he?
He waited for her to reach his side, but when she got there, she didn’t know what to say. She cleared her throat. “Do you…want to go someplace and talk?”
Several seconds ticked by. “All right.”
They didn’t speak as he drove his ancient MG to a roadhouse in Hampton Bays where Willie Nelson sang on the jukebox and the waitress brought them clams, french fries, and a pitcher of beer. Fleur began, haltingly, to tell him about growing up at the couvent.
He told her about his schooling and his love for his grandmother. She learned that Solange had left him the money that was supporting his business. An hour slipped by and then another. She explained how it felt to be an outcast, and he talked about his terror when he’d realized he was gay. As the neon sign outside the roadhouse window flashed blue across his hair, she leaned against the back of the scarred wooden booth and told him about Flynn and Belinda.
His eyes grew dark and bitter. “It explains so much.”
They spoke of Alexi and understood each other perfectly. The roadhouse began to close up for the night. “I was so jealous of you,” she finally said. “I thought you had everything I’d been denied.”
“And I wanted to be you,” he said. “Away from them both.”
Dishes clattered in the kitchen, and the waitress glared at them. Fleur saw that Michel had something more he wanted to say, but he was having trouble forming the words.
“Tell me.”
He gazed down at the battered tabletop. “I want to design for you,” he said. “I always have.”
The next morning she pulled on a tangerine bikini, fastened her hair into a loose top knot, and slipped into a short white cover-up. The living room was deserted, but through the windows she saw Charlie and Michel lounging on the deck with the Sunday papers. She smiled as she took in Michel’s outfit for the day, a pair of Bermuda shorts and an emerald-green shirt with “One Day Dry Cleaning” emblazoned across the back. After so many years of misdirected hatred, she’d been given the unexpected gift of a brother. She could hardly take it in.
She went into the kitchen and poured herself a cup of coffee. “How about making that two cups?”
She spun around and saw Jake standing in the doorway. His long hair was damp from his shower. He wore a gray T-shirt and a pair of faded swim trunks that looked like the same ones he’d worn six years ago when Belinda had invited him for a backyard barbecue. She’d already figured out that last night’s encounter hadn’t been accidental. He was one of Charlie’s party guests, he’d known she was here, and he’d gone out looking for her.
She turned away. “Get your own damned coffee.”
“I didn’t mean to scare you last night.” His arm brushed hers as he reached for the coffeepot. She smelled Dial soap and mint toothpaste. “I wasn’t completely sober. I’m sorry, Flower.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m sorry, too. That I didn’t split your head open.”
He leaned back against the counter and took a sip of his coffee. “You did okay in Eclipse. Better than I expected.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Go for a walk on the beach with me?”
She started to refuse, only to hear one of Charlie’s houseguests coming downstairs. This was as good an opportunity as any to say what she needed to. “After you.”
They slipped out the side door, avoiding the group on the deck. Fleur pulled off her espadrilles and tossed them aside. The wind tugged at Jake’s Wild West hair. Neither of them spoke until they got near the water. “I talked to your brother for a while this morning,” he said. “Michael’s a nice guy.”
Did he really think he could melt away the years so easily? “A ni
ce guy for a dress designer, you mean.”
“You’re not provoking me, no matter how hard you try.”
She’d see about that.
He flopped down on the sand. “Okay, Flower, let’s have it out.”
The acid words churned inside her, all the rage and bitterness ready to spill out. But as she watched a father and son fly a Chinese kite with a blue and yellow tail, she realized she couldn’t say any of it, not if she wanted to hold on to even a shred of her pride. “No lasting scars,” she said. “You weren’t that important.” She made herself settle next to him in the sand. “And you’re the one who’s had to live with what you did.”
He squinted against the sun. “If it wasn’t that important, why did you give up a career that was earning you a fortune? And why haven’t I been able to write anything since Sunday Morning Eclipse?”
“You’re not writing at all?” She felt a stab of satisfaction.
“You haven’t seen any new plays running around with my name on them, have you? I’ve got a frigging case of concrete writer’s block.”
“Too bad.”
He threw a shell toward the water. “Funniest thing. I was writing just dandy before you and Mama came along.”
“Hold on. You’re blaming me?”
“No.” He sighed. “I’m just being a prick.”
“Finally something you’re good at.”
He looked her square in the eyes. “What happened between us that weekend didn’t have anything to do with Eclipse.”
“Come off it.” Despite her determination, the words spilled out. “That picture meant everything to you, and I was ruining your big opportunity. A nineteen-year-old kid with an absurdly misdirected case of puppy love. You were a grown man, and you knew better.”
“I was twenty-eight. And, believe me, you didn’t look like a kid that night.”
“My mother was your lover!”
“If it’s any consolation, we never did the dirty deed.”
“I don’t want to hear.”
“All I can say in my defense is that I was a lousy judge of character.”
Fleur knew her mother well enough to believe Belinda had made it easy for him, but she didn’t care. “So if you were Mr. Innocent, why haven’t you been able to write since then? I can’t pretend to see into the murky depths of your psyche, but there must be some connection between your writing block and what you did to that stupid nineteen-year-old kid.”
He came to his feet, spraying her with sand. “Since when did I get nominated for sainthood? Nineteen and looking the way you did wasn’t a kid.” He pulled off his T-shirt and ran down to the water, where he dived under a wave, then swam out. His form was as lousy as ever. Big he-man movie star. Bastard. She wanted to retaliate, and when he finally emerged, she unfastened her beach robe and let it drop. Underneath was the tiny tangerine bikini Kissy had bought her, and she made sure he got a front-row view as she performed a perfect runway walk to the water, planting one foot directly in front of the other so that her hips swayed. At the edge, she lifted her arms to fasten a tendril of hair that had come loose from the pins, casually stretching as she did it to make her legs look even longer.
She stole a glance out of the corner of her eye to see if he was watching. He was. Good. Let him eat his shriveled little heart out.
She plunged into the water and swam for a while, then came out and walked back to where he was sitting. He held her beach robe on his lap, and as she leaned down to pick it up, he moved it just out of her reach. “Give a guy a break. I’ve been working with horses for three months, and this is a nice change of scenery.”
She straightened, then walked away. Jake Koranda was as dead to her as the grandmother she’d never known.
Jake watched Fleur until she disappeared into the beach house. The beautiful nineteen-year-old who’d sent him into a tailspin couldn’t hold a candle to this woman. She’d become every man’s fantasy. Was it his imagination, or did that pert little butt sit higher than ever on those knockout legs? He should have given her back the robe so he didn’t have to torture himself watching her body in that ridiculous tangerine bikini tied together with those little bits of string. He could eat that bikini off her in three good bites.
He headed for the water to cool off. The guy flying the kite with his kid had spotted Flower as soon as she came over the dunes, and now he was backing into the water to get a better view. It had always been that way—men stumbling over themselves while she sailed past, oblivious to the stir she’d created. She was the ugly duckling who wouldn’t look into a mirror long enough to see that she’d changed into a swan.
He swam for a while, then went back to the beach. Fleur’s cover-up lay in the sand. As he picked it up, he caught the same light floral scent he’d smelled the night before when she was struggling in his arms. He’d been a real prick, and she’d stood up to him. She always had, in one way or another.
He dug his heels into the sand. The music started playing in his head. Otis Redding. Creedence Clearwater. She’d brought back all the sounds of Vietnam. He’d never forget kneeling on Johnny Guy’s lawn with her wet and sobbing in his arms. She’d ripped a hole through the wall he’d built inside him—a wall he’d thought was secure—and he hadn’t been able to write a word since then for fear he’d bring the whole damned thing crashing down. Writing was the only way he’d ever been able to express himself, and without it, he felt as though he was living half a life.
As he gazed toward the beach house, he wondered if the woman she’d become could hold the key to unlocking this prison he’d fallen into.
Chapter 20
Dark, erotic dreams invaded Fleur’s sleep after she got back to the city. She wondered if their wrestling match on the beach had recharged some kind of internal sexual battery. Wouldn’t that be ironic? She was hungry for the touch of a man, but she was too tightly strung right now to think about looking for a lover.
Two weeks after the beach party, she sat on a straight-backed chair in Michel’s boutique while he locked up for the evening. At first they’d invented excuses to talk to each other. He called to see if she’d gotten stuck in traffic on her way back from Long Island. She called to ask his advice about an outfit she wanted to buy Kissy for her birthday. Finally they abandoned subterfuge and openly enjoyed each other’s company.
“I went over your books last night.” She’d brushed some sawdust from her jeans. “Bottom line…Your finances are a mess.”
He flipped off the store’s front lights. “I’m an artist, not a businessman. That’s why I hired you.”
“My newest client.” She smiled. “It never occurred to me to represent a designer, but I’m excited about it. Your gowns and dresses are the most innovative work this city has seen in years. All I have to do is make people want them.” She waved her hands over an imaginary crystal ball. “I see fame, fortune, and brilliant management in your future.” As an afterthought, she added, “I also see a new lover.”
He stepped behind her and pulled the rubber band from her ponytail. She’d spent all day with the carpenters at the townhouse, and she was a mess. “Stick with fame and fortune and leave my lovers alone,” he said. “I know you didn’t like Damon, but—”
“He’s a whiny twit.” Damon was the dark-haired dancer who had been with Michel the night of Charlie’s beach party. “Your choice of men is worse than Kissy’s. Her hunks are only dumb. Yours is snide, too.”
“Only because you intimidated him. Hand me your hairbrush. You look like bad Bette Davis. And those jeans are making me bilious. Really, Fleur, I don’t think I can stand these clothes of yours much longer. I’ve shown you the designs—”
She snatched the brush from her purse. “Hurry up and finish my hair. I have to meet Kissy, and I only stopped by to tell you that you’re a financial screw-up. You also know zip about merchandising. Still, I forgive you. Come to dinner with Kissy and me tomorrow night at the townhouse.”
“Aren’t you missing a few necessities for thr
owing a dinner party? Like walls and furniture?”
“It’s informal.” She hopped up, gave him a kiss, and left. As she stepped out onto West Fifty-fifth Street, she wondered if he’d sensed how nervous she was about the announcement she intended to make at her improvised dinner party.
She’d leased the red brick townhouse on the Upper West Side with an option to buy. Because the house’s four stories had been awkwardly divided—horizontally instead of vertically—she’d gotten a good price, and she’d been able to adapt the unusual arrangement to her advantage. She intended to live in the smaller rear section of the house and use the larger front section for office space. If all went well, she’d be able to move in by mid-August, a month from now.
“No one’s going to confuse this with La Grenouille,” Michel said as he gingerly lowered himself into a folding chair she’d set in front of the table fashioned from two sawhorses and some sheets of plywood in what would soon be her office.
Kissy looked pointedly at Michel’s white clam diggers and Greek peasant shirt. “They wouldn’t let you in La Grenouille, so stop complaining.”
“I heard you were there, though,” he said. “With a certain Mr. Kincannon.”
“And a group of his nerdy friends.” Kissy wrinkled her nose. Even though she saw Charlie Kincannon frequently, she barely mentioned him, which didn’t bode well for his plan to win her heart.
Fleur began ladling out lemon chicken and spicy Szechuan shrimp from carryout cartons. “I wish you’d move in with me, Kissy. The attic is finished, so you’d have plenty of privacy, not to mention twice as much room as our apartment. There’s a kitchen up there, the plumbing works, and you’ll even have a separate entrance off the front hallway so I won’t be able to cluck my tongue over your playmates.”