Ooh, La La!, page 24
“Woo-hoo!” Skye victoriously pumped her arm in the air, then grabbed Kate in a rib-crunching hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
“Zack’s the one you need to thank,” Kate said.
Skye turned and threw her arms around Zack. “Thanks a million—a bazillion! I promise I’ll do a really, really, really good job.”
Zack lifted her off her feet, then set her back down. “I’m sure you will.”
“Wait till I tell Grams!” Skye raced into the kitchen, leaving Kate alone in the living room with Zack.
She nervously smoothed her sleeveless black turtleneck over her jeans. “That was really nice of you.”
Zack lifted his shoulders. “I need the help.”
Kate shot him a dry grin. “You need a twelve-year-old assistant to the assistant’s assistant about as much as I need a jock strap.”
Zack smiled back. “I know you have exotic taste in underwear, but I thought your tastes ran to the lace variety.”
To her chagrin, Kate felt her face heat. “It was kind of you.”
He gazed at her intently for a moment. “You don’t look particularly happy about it.”
Kate strolled to the coffee table and picked up a handful of popcorn. “I have trouble dealing with you when you’re nice,” she admitted “I was more comfortable around you when I thought you were just a jerk.”
His mouth curved in an engaging grin. “I can regress, if you like.”
Kate grinned back. “I’d know you were faking it. I’m afraid it wouldn’t be the same.”
She was afraid that nothing would ever be the same. She was trying her best to fight it; but bit by bit, Zack Jackson was capturing her heart.
Chapter Eighteen
“Hey, Kate—you looked terrific on TV last night!”
“Thanks, Joe.” Kate smiled at the security guard as she stepped around one of the yellow barricades surrounding the house that served as the brothel interior.
“Great job on ‘Eye-To-Eye,’ ” called one of the photographic assistants as she closed the heavy beveled glass door.
“Thanks, Martin.”
From all reports, the TV segment had gone well. Kate had found it impossible to be objective. She’d hated watching herself on television, and she’d hated watching Zack watch her even more.
Zack and the others had cheered and whistled at the television. When the segment was finally over, they’d all gathered around and congratulated her.
“I hate to admit it, but Goldman was right,” Zack had said. “It was a brilliant angle. You were fantastic.”
“You were awesome!” Skye had exclaimed.
“You were gorgeous!” Ruth had said.
Kate had found a message from the university dean on her answering machine when she got home. “I just saw you on TV, and I had to call and congratulate you. You did a marvelous job. You’re a real credit to the university.”
So far, so good—but she hadn’t yet heard from Goldman. She was more than a little nervous about what his reaction would be.
The call came an hour later. “Whaddaya tryin’ to do, kiddo— give me a heart attack?”
Only one person in the world had a voice that sounded as if he gargled with broken glass. Kate’s fingers tightened on her cell phone. “Mr. Goldman—good morning.”
From across the elaborate parlor, Zack looked up.
“I swear, kiddo, when I saw you all dolled up like that, I nearly popped the caps off my teeth.” Goldman’s voice rasped in her ear.
A bead of sweat formed on Kate’s upper lip. Shifting the phone to her other hand, she turned her back, hoping to prevent Zack from hearing. “I can explain that, Mr. Goldman.”
“That wasn’t at all what I told that damn consultant I wanted. The little sonuvabitch defied my orders.”
“Well, the consultant didn’t actually…”
“Lucky for him, it worked,” Goldman continued. “Yessir, it was a stroke of genius, pure genius. You were terrific. Beauty and brains, with a genteel, Southern lady kinda thing goin’ there. Yessir, I gotta call that little twerp and thank him. It was brilliant.”
Kate grinned. As long as Goldman was happy, she was more than glad to let the consultant take the credit.
“The phones have been buzzin’ off the hook out here. ‘Special Edition,’ ‘Entertainment Tonight,’ ‘Hollywood Insider,’ even the History Channel—they’re all wantin’ to come do stories about Ooh, La La!”
“I'm glad to hear it, Mr. Goldman.”
“You and me both. You’re gonna be real busy the next few weeks.”
“Good.”
“My P.R. people will be in touch with you about all the details. Is Zack around?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Put him on.”
Kate crossed the room and handed the phone to Zack. “Mr. Goldman wants to talk to you.”
“What did you do to him? He never used to make phone calls, and now he’s a regular Chatty Cathy ” Zack put the phone to his ear. “Hi there, Marvin.” He paused. “Yeah, she was great.” He flashed a grin at Kate.
She smiled back and turned away, pretending to adjust an antique vase and decanter set while keeping an ear on the conversation.
“No, no way,” she heard Zack say. “Look—she’s a professor, not an actress. That kind of publicity is frowned on by universities.” A pause. “Forget it, Marvin. I’ll talk to you later."
Zack folded the phone and handed it back to her
Kate stared at him curiously. “What was that all about?”
“Oh, nothing.” Zack casually shrugged his shoulders. “He just wants us to pretend to have an affair, that’s all.”
“What?”
“He says the movie needs a big, gossipy romance so the tabloids will have something to write about. Unfortunately, Lena and George are both married.” He grinned at Kate. “Since you looked so good on TV last night and you’re going to have lots of TV exposure, he wants you and me to pretend to have a hot affair.”
“I can’t believe he’d suggest such a thing!”
“You don’t know Goldman. Anyway, it’s done all the time. Get a press agent to drop a hint, let the paparazzi see you out a time or two, and presto—a bunch of free pre-release publicity.”
Kate didn’t know if she was more surprised at the concept or that Goldman had paired her with Zack. “It sounded like you refused.”
“Damn right.” Flashing a wicked grin, he leaned close and spoke in a conspiratorial tone. “I wouldn’t dream of just pretending.”
“Very funny.” Kate tried to hide her fluttering nerves. “So, you’ve you done this sort of thing before?”
“Are you kidding? More than half the stories printed about me are publicity stunts, and the other half are exaggerations.”
For reasons that Kate didn’t want to explore, the information gladdened her.
Deb strode up and handed Zack a sheaf of papers. “The accountant needs you to sign off on the weekly report. And someone named Mrs. Bennett called.”
Kate’s eyebrows rose “Skye’s teacher?”
“She wants to know if ten o’clock tomorrow will be okay for the field trip,” Deb continued.
“Fine with me,” Zack said. “Check the schedule and let her know where we’re shooting.”
Kate stared at Zack as Deb hurried off. “You arranged for Skye’s class to come on a field trip?”
“Yeah. Skye said her homeroom teacher was interested, so I told her to call and we’d set it up.”
It was bad enough that Zack was playing all too large a role in her life. Now he was wielding too much influence in her daughter’s, as well. “You didn’t ask me about this.”
“Skye said she’d mentioned it to you.”
“She said something about it, but I didn’t know you were setting it up.”
Zack lifted his shoulders. “We do this kind of thing with schools all the time.”
“Not with my daughter’s school, you don’t.” Her tone came out sharper than she intended.
He looked at her quizzically. “If it’s a problem, we’ll cancel it.”
She was overreacting and she knew it. She just couldn’t stand the thought of Zack taking over any more of her and Skye’s lives than he already had. She didn’t want him entrenching himself in their routines, becoming an element of their happiness, taking up space in their hearts.
Because the more he took over, the bigger void he’d leave when he left.
Still, this was just a field trip. There was no point in making a scene. “It—it’s not a problem. It just surprised me, that’s all. I like to be kept in the loop where my daughter is concerned.”
“Sorry if you weren’t. It won’t happen again.”
At ten o’clock the next morning, twenty chattering adolescents in navy blue school uniforms piled out of a school bus and trouped through the cordoned-off section of the French Quarter where the film crew was preparing to shoot a scene. After an hour’s tour, they lined up behind a yellow barricade at the corner of St. Anne and Dauphine, behind the director’s chair and the wide angle camera.
“They’re all yours,” Deb said. “I took them through wardrobe and make-up, and gave them an overview of the business, just like you asked.”
Zack glanced at the slew of eager young faces craning toward him.
“Too bad Kate’s busy with the ‘Entertainment Tonight’ crew,” Deb said. “She would have made a better tour guide. I do better with animals than kids.”
“Well, thanks for stepping up to the plate.” Zack turned toward the group, which was being hushed by a stern-faced teacher.
Zack thrust his hands into his pockets and grinned. “As I’m sure Deb explained, we’re about to shoot a street scene that shows a part of New Orleans in the late eighteen hundreds. I need you to be very quiet during the filming. All right?”
The heads all bobbed.
“Now look closely and you’re likely to see someone you recognize in this scene.”
“Is it Lena?” a freckle-faced boy asked. “Man, she’s hot.”
“I hope it’s George!” said a girl with long blond hair.
“If it’s George, I’m gonna faint,” declared a girl with blue braces on her teeth.
“Well, if you faint, be sure you fall behind the barricade. And there’s to be no waving or distracting the actors. Does everyone understand?”
The crowd of heads bobbed again.
“Good.” Zack turned and started back toward the main camera. He gave a thumbs up to Skye, who was hidden from view behind a doorway, awaiting her cue Grinning broadly, she stuck up her thumb in return.
A twinge of apprehension shot through him. He should have gotten Kate’s permission to put Skye in this scene, but he hadn’t had a chance to ask. The thought had only occurred to him this morning, and Kate had been preoccupied with the media. Besides, she'd already said that Skye could be in the movie. They just hadn’t decided which scene she’d be in, that was all.
He didn’t know why he hadn’t thought of this earlier. What better way to make Skye look good in front of her peers than to turn her into a movie star right before their eyes?
When Skye had arrived with her class that morning, he’d taken her aside and asked if she was game. As if there was ever any question, he thought with amusement; Skye was always game for anything. She’d given him an excited hug, then dashed off to wardrobe and makeup like an Olympic sprinter.
An unexpected fondness had bloomed in Zack’s chest as he watched her go. Skye wasn’t just a breath of fresh air; she was a gale. He wondered how long she’d be able to hold on to her eagerness and enthusiasm. Maybe she’d be one of the rare ones who never lost her zest for life. He’d never known anyone so open, so genuine, so emotionally transparent. A person always knew where he stood with Skye.
If only he could say the same for Skye’s mother. Zack sank heavily into his director’s chair. The sexual tension between them was so thick it would take a chainsaw to cut through it, yet she claimed she didn’t want to get involved. Why couldn’t she see they already were involved? Hell, they were involved up to their eyeballs. The problem was, the relationship they were involved in was all in their heads.
* * * * *
“Looks like they’re about to start filming,” Kate said as she led the three-man crew from “Entertainment Tonight” to the French Quarter street corner. They stopped on the sidewalk in front of a two-story balconied building, about ten feet behind the camera.
“Can we tape this?” asked the producer, a tall man with thinning hair the color of his khakis.
“Sure,” Kate replied. “As long as you do it from here.”
The dapper reporter smoothed his dark hair and buttoned the jacket of his Armani suit. “What’s this scene about?”
“We’ve tried to re-create a little slice of Storyville. This scene shows the seedier side of it, a few blocks from the elaborate brothels.”
“Ready on the set,” Zack called, rising from his chair. “Everyone in their places.”
A dozen extras appeared on the street—men in working-class attire, a man in gentleman’s clothing with his shirttail hanging out, and several heavily rouged women dressed as prostitutes sitting in windows and lounging in doorways. Most of them wore plain, low-cut dresses. One wore a tattered ballgown, and one decidedly plump woman was squeezed into a grimy corset that made her breasts bulge over the top like over-leavened bread dough.
But the person who drew Kate’s eye was Zack. She watched him turn and pace, his arms folded, his face granitelike with intensity. He was wearing a headset and a red golf shirt, and he reminded Kate of a football coach calling the plays on the sidelines. He was in his element here, calling the shots, making it all come together. An unbidden shiver of attraction shimmied up Kate’s spine.
“Hey—there’s a class of kids back there,” the reporter said, looking behind him.
Kate turned around. Her heart sank at the sight of the familiar navy uniforms. “Actually, it’s my daughter’s class,” she said. “They’re here on a field trip.” She’d been so busy with the media lately that it had completely slipped her mind that it was scheduled for today.
“Oh, yeah?” The reporter craned his neck. “Which one is your daughter?”
“She’s tall, and she’s got long dark hair.” Kate scanned the class, but didn’t see her.
“Is this an appropriate scene for them to be watching?” the producer asked.
“I-I’m sure it will be fine,” Kate said, but she was sure of no such thing. What had Zack been thinking, scheduling the field trip on a day when he was filming prostitutes soliciting customers? Why couldn’t he have arranged it for a day when they were shooting the horse race or the fire or the scene at the banker’s home—anything except this?
“Ready, set…” Across the street, Zack dropped his arm like the starter at a car race.
“Hey, they’re about to start filming,” the field producer told the TV cameraman. “Let’s catch this.”
“Let’s roll!” Zack called.
Where the heck was Skye? Kate wondered as she turned to watch the scene. She must be running an errand for Deb or one of the assistant producers.
A young assistant held up a black-and-white clipboard. “Take one, Scene nineteen.”
Zack spoke into his headset. “And… action!”
A horse-drawn cart filled with four rowdy, disheveled men clattered down the street, which had been cleverly painted to look like cobblestone. The men whistled, waved whiskey bottles, and made loud catcalls to the women, who preened, posed, and called back. As the cart rolled by, a girl wrapped in a tattered red robe trimmed with molting white feathers pranced out of a doorway. To get the men’s attention, she did a series of Rockette-like high kicks, revealing gaudy red-and-black-striped stockings. The men hoo'ted and hollered.
Her back to the camera, the girl opened her robe and flashed the men. The hoots rose to shouts and whistles, and a shoving match ensued as the men all struggled to climb out of the cart. They rolled into the street in a heap, then broke into a brawl over who was going to get the girl.
The girl, meanwhile, tied her robe and sauntered back to lean against her doorway, where she inspected her fingernails with an air of boredom, ignoring the men who were fighting over her. When the winning man staggered after her, she looked up. For the first time, she turned and faced the camera and the crowd. The girl’s sad, resigned face was heartbreakingly young… and heart-stoppingly familiar. Kate’s breath froze in her lungs.
Oh, dear heavens—it was Skye!
Kate stared, unable to believe her own eyes, as Skye led the man through the battered doorway, acting for all the world like a seasoned hooker.
"Cut!” Zack called.
“Wow,” the “Entertainment Tonight” producer murmured.
Wow, indeed. Kate felt nauseated. Her baby, her beautiful, precious baby, was soliciting men on the street. Worst of all, she’d been good at it!
The kids behind them all talked at once. “That was Skye!” a young voice murmured excitedly. “Did you see her?”
“That was Skye?”
“Wow, I never knew she was so hot!”
“I thought she looked dumb.”
“They know that girl?”
It took Kate a moment to realize that the producer was talking to her. “Umm… yes. That was my…” She swallowed, trying to moisten her arid tongue. “My daughter.”
“How old is she?”
“N-nearly thirteen.”
“Awfully young to be playing a hooker, don’t you think?”
That was exactly what she thought. Outrage simmered in her chest, building like steam in a pressure cooker. What the hell had Zack been thinking? She couldn’t wait to give him a piece of her mind!
“Did girls that young really work in Storyville?” the reporter asked.
Calm. She had to stay calm and collected. The consultant had warned her that reporters would seize on any hint of controversy and make it the focus of their story.
“I’m afraid so,” Kate replied. “A girl who was orphaned or abandoned or whose reputation had been compromised had few, if any, alternatives.”
