It was a ground-breaking film, but now Jennifer suppressed a shudder. It no longer looked clever and avant-garde, but slightly suspect. What kind of job had she been sucked in to doing—to have stooped so low as to replicate orgasm with her real-life husband while the cameras rolled?
And then—at last—the final line. The amplified sound of herself saying the words ‘Now she’s gone. And now we can begin all over again.’ The screen went black, the credits began to roll and there was a moment of stunned silence as the cinema audience erupted into applause.
The lights went up and Jennifer stared down at her hands to see that they were trembling violently.
‘Ah! Did the emotion of the film get to you?’ mocked the silken tones of Matteo, and she looked up to see that his eyes were on her fingers. ‘You’ve taken your wedding band off, I see?’
She nodded. ‘Yes. I threw it away, actually.’
His black eyes narrowed. ‘You’re kidding?’
‘Of course I’m not.’ Jennifer wouldn’t have been human if she hadn’t experienced a thrill of triumph at the look of shock on his handsome face. But any triumph was swiftly followed by anger. Did he think it a comparable shock to seeing those snatched long-range photos of him kissing Sophia in a New York park?
She turned her blue eyes on him. ‘What on earth does a woman do with a redundant wedding ring?’ she questioned in a low voice. ‘I don’t have a daughter to leave it to, and I’m too rich to need to pawn it. So what would you suggest, Matteo? That I melt it down and have it made into earrings—or else keep it in a box to remind me of what a sham your vows were?’
He bent his head towards her ear, presumably so that the movement of his lips could not be seen, but Jennifer felt dizzy as his particular scent washed over her senses.
‘How poisonous you can be, Jenny,’ he commented softly.
‘I learnt it at the hands of a grand master!’ she returned, as he straightened up and she met his cold smile with one of her own. ‘Oh, God,’ she breathed, their slanging match momentarily forgotten. ‘Here they come.’
Matteo shook himself back to reality, irritated to realise that he had been caught up with watching the movement of her lips and the way that the great sweep of her eyelashes cast feathery shadows over the pure porcelain of her skin. Insanely, he felt himself grow hard.
But he wouldn’t beat himself up about it. You didn’t have to be in love with a woman to want to…to…
Dignitaries were bearing down on them. He could see a cluster of executives and all the other acolytes that the film world spawned. His eyes narrowed and he turned to Jennifer.
‘You’re not going to the after-show party, I presume?’ he demanded.
‘Why not?’
‘Perhaps it bothers you that I will be there?’
‘Don’t be silly, Matteo,’ she chided. ‘You aren’t part of my life any more—why on earth should it bother me?’
His eyes hardened. ‘Then we might as well go there together. Si?’
That hadn’t been what she’d meant at all. Jennifer opened her mouth to protest, and then shut it again. Maybe this way was better. She would have Matteo by her side as they walked down the endless red carpet and into the waiting car. And while he might not have been faithful at least he had always protected her, and she missed that. Badly.
‘People will talk.’
‘Oh, Jenny.’ His laugh was tinged with bitterness. ‘People will talk anyway. Whatever we do.’
She met his eyes in a moment of shared understanding which was more painful than anything else he had said to her, for it hinted at a former intimacy so powerful that it had blown her away.
And suddenly Jennifer wanted to break down and weep for what they had lost. Or maybe for what they had never had.
‘Come on,’ said Matteo impatiently. ‘Let’s just go and get it over with.’
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_e476b1f0-dccb-57d5-9716-387de81ee5d1)
SOMEHOW THE LONG SCARLET flight of steps seemed safer this time around—and so did the legion of press waiting at the foot of them. As if Matteo had managed to throw the mantle of his steely strength over Jennifer’s shoulders and was protecting her and propelling her along by the sheer force of his formidable will.
Even the questions which were hurled at them about their relationship had somehow lost their impact to wound her. As if Matteo was deflecting them and bouncing them back with one hard, glittering look and a contemptuous curl of his lip which made women go ga-ga and photographers quake.
The party was in one of the glitziest hotels along the Croisette itself, but Jennifer found herself wishing that it was being held in one of the restaurants which lined the narrow, winding backstreets where Matteo had once taken her. The real Cannes—where such luminaries as Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton had eaten. But it didn’t really matter where the party was—she was going to stay only for as long as necessary and then she was leaving. That way she would save her face and save her pride.
They were in a room which was decorated entirely in gold—to echo the colour of the Festival’s most prestigious award, the Palme d’ Or. The walls were lined with heavy golden silk, like the inside of a Bedouin tent, and there were vases of gold-sprayed twigs laced with thousands of tiny glimmering lights. Beautiful young women dressed in belly-dancer outfits swayed around the room, carrying trayfuls of champagne.
But once she had accepted a drink Jennifer deliberately walked away from Matteo. She didn’t need him, and she was here to show him and the rest of the world just that. She was an independent woman—why would she need anyone? That was what her mother had always told her, and it seemed that her words had been scarily prophetic.
The party might have had a budget to rival that of a small republic, but it was a crush—and less hospitable than some of the student get-togethers Jennifer had gone to in her youth.
An aging but legendary agent was holding court. A nubile starlet was not only falling out of her dress but also falling over from too much wine, by the look of her. A raddled-looking rock star was looking around the room with a stupid grin on his well-known face and suspiciously bright eyes. And from out of the corner of her eye she saw Matteo being surrounded by a gaggle of glamorous women.
Welcome to the world of showbiz, thought Jennifer wryly. But inside she was hurting more than she could have imagined it was possible to hurt.
She dodged passes, questions, and having her glass refilled—managing instead to find a very famous and very gay British actor who was standing in the corner surveying the goings-on with the bemused expression of a spectator at the zoo. Jennifer had played Regan to his King Lear, and she walked up to him with a sigh of relief.
‘Thank heavens,’ she breathed. ‘A friendly face with no agenda!’
‘Hiding from the vultures?’ he questioned wryly. ‘Sort of. Congratulations on your knighthood by the way. What are you doing here?’
‘Same as you, I imagine. I may be an old queen—and a knight now, to boot—but I have to please my publicist like a good boy.’
‘Don’t we all?’
He surveyed her thoughtfully. ‘I see you arrived with that adorable man you married—does that mean you’re back together?’
In spite of the room’s heat, Jennifer trembled—but she was a good enough actress to inject just the right amount of lightness into her voice. ‘No. We’re just playing games with the press. The marriage is over.’
‘Sorry to hear that,’ he said carelessly. ‘Occupational hazard, I’m afraid. You’ll get over it, duckie—you’re young and you’re beautiful.’ He sighed, his eyes drifting to Matteo once more. ‘Mind you—so is he!’
Jennifer grimaced a smile. ‘Yes.’
‘Go home and forget him,’ he said gently. ‘And stay away from actors—they’re feckless and unfaithful and I should know! Marry a businessman next time.’
‘I’m not even divorced yet,’ she said solidly. ‘And even if I were, this thing has scarred me for life—I’m through with marriage. Anyway—better run. Lovely to see you, Charles.’
They exchanged two butterfly air-kisses and then Jennifer resolutely made her way towards the door and slipped away—not noticing that she was being followed by a Hollywood icon who had just gone through divorce number four.
Not until she was in a quiet corridor and he moved right up close behind her.
Jennifer jumped and turned round. ‘Oh, it’s you, Jack!’ she exclaimed nervously. ‘You startled me!’
He flashed his trademark smile. ‘Well, well, well,’ he drawled softly. ‘Maybe my luck has changed for the better. You look damned gorgeous.’ He crinkled his blue eyes and directed his gaze at her chest. ‘So, how’s life, Jennifer?’
Jennifer knew that his fame meant he got away with stuff that other men would be prosecuted for, and she should have been used to the predatory way that such men feasted their eyes on her breasts, but the truth was that she didn’t think she’d ever get used to it. ‘I’m fine, thanks,’ she said blandly.
