Anything for the Picture

Jennifer Stevenson

Description

Connie Corda has always been the nicest woman in Hollywood. But when her beloved husband dies and their best friend mysteriously drops her, her lonely, widowed misery spills over into her work.Vince Davis doesn't mind; four women with tempers have married and divorced him so far. For twenty-five years, Connie and Sam were his only example of a happy couple. Now Sam's death confronts Vince with the uncomfortable truth that he wants Connie for himself ... and guilt sends him running in the opposite direction.But he can't run very far when they're co-starring in a buddy's movie. Their buddy the director schemes to bring them together. He asks Vince to turn up the heat on Connie "so her temper won't wreck the picture." Vince reluctantly says yes. "But she'll kill me if she finds out we set her up."Of course Connie knows she's being set up. And she intends to make her old friends pay. While concocting the perfect revenge, she comes back to life ... and finds herself, and new love.

Informations

• Publié par: Book View Cafe
• Date de parution: 12 juin 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781611387377
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

ANYTHING FOR THE PICTURE
a Liars In Love romantic comedy
Jennifer Stevenson
Dedicated especially to my babe, Rich

www.bookviewcafe.com
Copyright © 2018 Jennifer Stevenson
Chapter One
Costanza “Connie” Corda knew that somewhere inside her, feeble but not yet dead, was the nicest woman in Hollywood. And she was horrified at the things coming out of her mouth.
“This script is idiotic! I cannot look mindlessly adoring twelve hours a day. Not even at Studmuffin-of-the-West here.”
Her co-star, Vince Davis, let go of Connie’s hand. He watched her the way a rabbit watches a coiled rattlesnake. I would still be nice if it weren’t for you .
The reporter from Flick Peek took frantic notes.
At least we’ll get a few more lines of press coverage , thought the nicest woman in Hollywood gloomily. Her mouth opened again, and she cringed. But only deep inside.
“How am I supposed to look into his eyes with some rocket scientist flashing that light in my face?”
The mirror stopped flashing the New Mexico sun into her eyes. “Better?” came a voice from the left.
“Peachy,” she snarled. “While we’re fixing things, my collar itches.”
“Wardrobe!” Herbie yelled. Somebody scurried forward to fuss with the dress.
“Watch it with those pins!” Connie snapped.
Snapping at Wardrobe! Next thing, she’d crab at the poor downtrodden kids in Makeup. Only the lowest of pond scum crabbed at Wardrobe and Makeup. She hated herself.
“Is Miss Corda’s dress done?” Herbie’s voice came soothingly from off right. “Ready, Connie? Okay, let’s finish the page and then take lunch.”
Connie heard the patience in Herbie’s voice and felt doubly bad. They used to be such good buddies. This was their sixth picture together. If she didn’t get control of her mouth it would be their last. She tried to remember again why she had decided she wanted to live after Sam died.
Vince turned back toward her and she let him take her hand. He took a deep breath. “Dunno when Ah’m a’comin’ back, darlin’.”
She let her lip tremble. “Ah know. Jest remember, Monk, you’re ropin’ and ridin’ for me. Ah believe in yew.”
Connie looked deep into Vince’s big black eyes. He had his back to the camera, so he didn’t have to fake any feeling. He certainly wasn’t hiding the wariness in his face.
This. This man was the reason she was still alive. And the reason why she’d lost control of her suddenly rabid mouth.
They finished the page. Herbie yelled for the cut and they broke. Vince slid away.
Connie stomped off to the craft service tent for calories that wouldn’t get stuck in her teeth.
In line in the tent, she heard the whispers behind her. She kept her back stiff and her head high.
“She used to be such a good gal,” a man said.
“Yeah,” said another.
Connie stood stock still, looking down at steam tables loaded with chicken cacciatore, risotto, creamed spinach, and a noodle salad with sliced grilled portabello mushrooms. She couldn’t eat any of it. But she couldn’t move. The voices went on.
“I took this job to work with her. I didn’t know it would be like this.” That voice she recognized. It was her twenty-something bimbo of an assistant, Britni.
Shame stabbed Connie. She put a plain yogurt carton on her tray. She was a horrible bitch and everybody knew it. How had this happened to her?
“How long were they married?”
“Like Meryl Streep and whatsisname.”
“She’s lost without him.” Britni sighed. “I feel sorry for her.”
Well, big whoop. Thanks for the pity, Britni, and fuck you, too .
“You feel sorry for a nice person,” said the first man. “This ain’t a nice person. Not any more.”
Ears burning, Connie marched back to Wardrobe with her tray.
As she held her wrist out so the girl could cut the stitches off the cuff of her cornpone settler’s dress, Connie eyed Vince across thirty yards of lighting equipment.
He smoked nervously, aiming one shoulder at her the whole time.
This was all his fault.
He didn’t know that, of course.
Two weeks ago, she’d broken down and called Vince, and they had exchanged a few stilted words over the phone. Great to be working together again, yeah, can’t wait, see you soon . But he hadn’t called back.
What was his problem? He had a rough-hewn Southern gentleman routine that covered most of his feelings, and when that failed he fell back on scowling and growling. For twenty-five years she’d thought she knew him better than his four wives did.
One thing she knew for sure. He was still avoiding her.
And now she was committed, dammit, to Herbie’s picture.
She wasn’t in love with Vince or anything. Considering how dead and empty her heart had been the past eighteen months, she would give anything to be in love again. Hell, it would be worth having a disastrous affair, at this point.
So meet me halfway, Vince. Even if you’re gonna break my heart, will you at least do that? And not dance around me, ducking eye contact except when the director is watching? At that moment, thirty yards on the other side of the set, she caught his eye. He turned away furtively.
She needed rest. They had forty minutes left of the lunch break. Wrapped in a kimono, Connie left Wardrobe and headed for the bed in her trailer.
Her hand was actually on the door when she remembered there was a reporter inside, waiting to interview her. The young snot from Flick Peek . Who would ask snide questions about her temper tantrums on the set.
She couldn’t face him.
She slipped off around the back way. Her head pounded and her back hurt from these high-button boots. Where could she go?
Not back to craft service. Anything was better than listening to the whispers.
In terror, she stood still. If she couldn’t get twenty minutes or so of silence and darkness and solitude, she was going to do something unforgivably horrible. She felt hunted.
Desperate, she snuck into Herbie’s gigantic three-room office-and-living trailer and crawled into the bed. Herbie never napped. If he came in at all, he would be on the phone in the office, giving meetings. Reporters couldn’t find her here. She was safe.

As Herbie yelled for the cut, Vince Davis breathed a sigh of relief. His makeup itched, his cowboy britches itched, his wig itched, and his head ached from squinting into the afternoon sun.
But the most uncomfortable part was holding Connie’s hand.
Without a backward glance, Vince let go of her and headed for the smoking ghetto, where the sound boys and the grips hung out in a comforting blue haze of nicotine.
She was standing over there in Wardrobe right now, her red-gold hair shining under a hideous settler woman’s cap. She stared back at him with smoldering blue eyes.
Hastily, he turned away. When he peeked again, she was gone.
After that near-fatal brush with his libido, he needed food. His assistant brought him a protein drink and Vince sucked his lunch through a straw, so as not to muss his makeup.
He had about finished his shake when Herbie reached up to throw an arm over his shoulder. Herbie was half Vince’s size and sounded twice his age, though they were only a couple years apart. Vince trusted Herbie.
“Let’s pow-wow,” the boss said.
Inside Herbie’s trailer office, they raided the fridge for iced tea. Vince threw himself into a chair.
Herbie mopped his forehead and neck. “Whew. She’s on the rampage today.”
“Tell me about it,” Vince said.
“I blame Sam,” Herbie said.
Vince nodded. “The dumbhead. He must have known she couldn’t live without him. Goes and gets lung cancer,” he said severely, thinking with guilt of the cigar-case tucked into his back pocket right this minute.
“Irresponsible,” Herbie agreed, producing a cigar. “Gimme a light.”
“I’m trying to cut down,” Vince said. He handed Herbie his Ronson.
“So breathe my second-hand smoke. Taper off.” Herbie got his cigar drawing and blew a blue ring at the ceiling. “God, I needed that.” He passed a hand over his bald spot. “I can’t take a lot more of this.”
Vince eyed Herbie with concern. Surely he didn’t want Connie off the picture? “She’s not normally unprofessional.” He sniffed Herbie’s cigar smoke with longing. “Remember how she sailed through shooting when she was nursing the twins?”
“Mm-hm,” Herbie said. “Always sunny. God knows when she slept. I didn’t sleep on that picture myself, and I wasn’t doing two-a.m. feedings.”
“Sam took some.” Vince sighed. “He was a good guy.” He hadn’t played poker since they lost Sam.
“He was a prince,” Herbie said.
Vince set his teeth. What the hell. He opened his cigar case and lit up. “Fairy tale marriage,” he said, sucking gratefully on his own nicotine source.
Herbie broke ash. “That was the trouble. It was too perfect.”
“How do you figure?”
“Movies and marriage don’t go together. You know it, I know it. Nobody stays married. What are you up to, three divorces now?”
“Four.” Vince grimaced. He wasn’t in the mood to talk about Almira’s lawyer.
Herbie grunted. “Once was enough for me.”
Vince laughed shortly.
“If we could make movies without women.” Herbie drank iced tea. “And then a couple of saints like Sam and Connie come along and make us all look like jerks.”
“I’m worried about her,” Vince lied. Well, he was. He was worried she was turning into the kind of woman he was always getting married to.
Herbie licked the end of his cigar. “I’m worried about me. This fucking picture is going to kill me. I can’t yell at her. She’s Connie, for chrissake. Sweetest babe in Beverly Hills. But I don’t think I can face two more weeks of her like this.”
Vince blanched. “Jesus, no.”
Herbie narrowed his eyes and pointed his chin at Vince. “You were close to them. Closer than me.”
Vince looked away. “Sunday dinner and poker, every week.”
“Think you can get the old Connie back?”
Vince whipped his head around. “What?”
Herbie blew smoke at the ceiling. “Sweeten her a little. You know she’s always been soft on you.”
So this was why the pow-wow! “Herbie, I don’t think—”
“Josh her along. Cheer the old girl up.”
Vince’s blood froze. “What? You mean, come on to her?”