ALL THAT HE WANTS (Volume 1 The Billionaire's Seduction) (27 page)

When we left, Johnny fell in behind us.

“How was your dinner?” I asked him.

“Nobody got shot, so it was good,” he grumbled.

“You’re not going to let this go, are you,” Connor asked.

“Not until you’re safe back at the hotel.”

“Well, then, you’re going to have to wait awhile.”

As though he were psychic, Sebastian called exactly as we exited the restaurant.

“Hellooo!”
he said gaily over the speakerphone. And, I might add, rather gay-ly.

“Somebody’s happy,” I remarked.

“I’m catching a flight out tomorrow! Javier was thrilled – ”

“The hairdresser?”

“Yes, of course!”
Sebastian almost sang, then a note of worry crept into his voice.
“Are you sure it’s alright?”

“Sebastian, when was the last time you had a vacation?” Connor asked. “Other than Cabo, whenever that was.”

“I can’t recall.”

“Then it’s completely fine. Just don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

“Unless you have sex with dudes, I don’t think that’s the best advice,” I pointed out.

“Oh yeah,” Connor realized. “Good point. Okay, do everything I
wouldn’t
do, then.”

“No need to be crude,”
Sebastian said, though he sounded more like Julie Andrews in
The Sound Of Music
than his old snarky self.

I grinned. “You sound so
happy,
Sebastian.”

“I am!”

“You were only half-right,” I said to Connor. “He doesn’t even have to get laid, he just needs the
potential
of getting laid.”

“Someone didn’t get the memo about being crude,”
Sebastian snapped, sounding more like his old self now.

“So what’s in store for us this evening, courtesy of Javier the hairdresser?” Connor asked.

“The biggest party he knows of is being thrown by a producer, he did that movie last year everybody thought would win the Oscar for best picture but didn’t? Well, he’s working with the star again on his new picture, so it’s sure to be a humongous shindig. Not only that, but he produced three other movies starring everybody from Matt Damon to that little singer girl who’s trying to be an actress, and supposedly everybody’s going to be there.”

Connor looked over at me. “Sound good?”

I felt both elated and horribly nervous at the same time. “I guess…”

Connor knit his brows. “You
guess?”

“Are we going to fit in?” I asked nervously.

“Connor will. You won’t,”
Sebastian said matter-of-factly.

“Hey!” Connor barked.

But, strangely enough, the honesty was a bracing tonic. “What happened to the kinder, gentler Sebastian from earlier in the conversation?” I laughed.

“He’s still only got the POTENTIAL of getting laid,”
Sebastian said sassily.

“Hurry up and give us the address before the non-laid Sebastian comes back in full force,” Connor sighed.

I was buzzed from two glasses of wine as the limo headed into the Hollywood Hills. The lights of Los Angeles spread out below us as we twisted and curved up into the darkness, and I could see the Dubai standing taller than all the other buildings around it, outlined against the night sky.

The houses started off very expensive at the base of the hills, then moved into ‘extremely expensive’ range, and from there blasted off into the stratosphere. It was easy to tell when we were getting closer to the party: a long string of BMW’s, Mercedes, Aston Martins, Ferraris, and Porsches lined the narrow street as white-jacketed valets parked new cars at the base of the hill and then hustled back up to the main house.

It was an enormous mansion, very Mediterranean, like it had been airlifted in by a multi-millionaire from the coast of Greece. Johnny drove us up to the front, a valet opened the door and helped me out, and then Johnny grudgingly surrendered the car and followed us inside.

I stayed right up against Connor.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Just nervous.”

“Don’t worry, you’ve already slept with the hottest guy here, that gives you a certain amount of street cred.”

I poked him in the side. “You are so in love with yourself, aren’t you?”

“Unconditionally,” he grinned, and hugged me close with his arm draped around my body.

I might have been annoyed at his extreme self-confidence, but I was eternally thankful for how protective he was being.

We walked through the main front door into something out of a movie. Literally. I could have sworn I’d seen this foyer in one or two films over the years. It was a gigantic hall with a ceiling thirty feet overhead, with a sweeping marble staircase and dark red carpet. Handsome men and gorgeous women gathered in little clusters, holding champagne flutes and cocktail glasses, and laughing and talking their asses off. Everywhere I looked there was a famous face: an actor, an actress, the lead singer of a band with a current Top 10 hit, a rapper, a director…  not to mention lots of people who were basically famous for being famous. It was like God opened an US WEEKLY magazine, shook it real hard, and everybody just dropped out of the pages and landed in here.

I had always nurtured a secret pride that I wouldn’t be starstruck if I actually saw anybody famous. That I was immune to that sort of thing.

Turns out, not so much.

My jaw dropped open wider than a big-mouthed bass.

Although, in my defense, it could have just been the sheer
volume
of famous people in one place that got to me.

Yeah, that’s it. There was a critical mass of star power in the place, and it overwhelmed my normally worldly ways.

I like telling these little lies to myself to feel better afterwards.

Anyhow, I was gawking like a four-year-old at Disneyland.

Connor ribbed me gently. “Better close your mouth before something slips in there.”

I turned and narrowed my eyes at him. “Can’t you wait until we get back to the hotel room?”

He tipped back his head and laughed loudly.

Across the room, a little bald man in a tux and horn-rimmed glasses looked over – and
his
mouth dropped open once he saw Connor.

When I saw his reaction, I felt a little better about my own starstruck…ness.

The little bald man said something to the people he was with – which included an actor who had won an Academy Award a few years back – and hustled over to us.

“Oh my, this is a wonderful turn of events,” he beamed, and stuck out his hand to Connor. “Lewis Vonder. Welcome.”

I figured this must be the producer throwing the party. I didn’t know him or recognize him, but on the other hand, I didn’t know any producers except ones who were famous directors. Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, James Cameron…

They
weren’t anywhere to be seen, thank goodness, or my inner geek would have come out in a truly mortifying display.

Connor smiled tightly and shook his hand. “I’m Connor, and this is Lily – ”

“Oh, I know who you are, Mr. Templeton,” the man said slyly, then glanced at me with a cursory “Hello.”

Then he went back to Connor like he was drawn by a magnet. “If only I’d known you were in town, I would have invited you personally!”

“Javier beat you to it.”

The man frowned. “…Bardem?”

“The hairdresser,” I added helpfully.

“The… hairdresser?” the man asked, obviously lost.

“All the stars love him,” Connor said, as though
everybody
knew THAT.

Then he gently steered me around the producer.

Mr. Lewis Vonder wouldn’t give up, but trailed alongside us like a puppy dog. “Are you thinking of expanding into the movie business, Connor?”

“No, I’m just here for the free food,” Connor said as we walked through the hall towards the back of the house.

Lewis laughed like he had just heard the funniest     joke    EVER. “Hilarious! You’ll be a hit in Hollywood!”

Connor looked at him. “No, really… I’m just here for the free food. Javier said it was great.”

The producer frowned, like he wasn’t sure whether he was the butt of the joke or just talking to a cheap-ass, Howard Hughes-worthy eccentric. He
did
want to keep talking, though, and he pushed people out of the way as he tried to keep up. “Obviously you’re a busy man, so I’ll make this quick. I have a slate of three films, all with major stars attached – Cruise, Clooney, Pitt – and we’re looking for financing outside the studio system. We should talk, we could set up a meeting – ”

Connor pointed at him. “You know who you should talk to? Javier.”

“The hairdresser,” Lewis Vonder said glumly. He now realized beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was the butt of the joke, didn’t
like
being the butt of the joke, but was willing to put up with it for the sake of $400 million in financing.

“Yes, just give Javier the details and he’ll pass them on to me. Maybe after that we can ask him to do our hair.”

Connor looked up at Lewis’s bald head.

“…well…
my hair.
Nice to meet you, Lewis,” Connor smiled, and then he walked through a doorway, his shoulder right next to the doorframe, forcing Lewis into the wall. Sort of like in action movies where two cars are racing side by side towards a tunnel, and one edges the other one out, and it explodes against the concrete wall.

Exactly like that.

But with a short, bald producer instead of a sports car.

We continued into the next room as poor Lewis Vonder looked on from the hallway.

“Well played, sir,” I whispered. Ordinarily, I might have felt sorry for the producer if he weren’t so…
ugh.

“Thank you.”

“Is it like that everywhere you go?”

“You have no idea. Energy industry, finance, tech, entertainment, it doesn’t matter… they’re all a bunch of sharks, and I’m the chum in the water.”

“You’re not the least bit interested, though?”

“What, in playing a Hollywood big shot? So I can foot the bill and Lewis Vonder can skim $30 million off the top in fees for ‘arranging the financing,’ then tell me we never made any profits when we gross half a billion in theaters? And
that’s
if we don’t flop? No thanks. Do you know that Hollywood is the only major industry in America where the accounting isn’t regulated by federal law?”

“I did not know that.”

“They keep four sets of accounting ledgers – one for the IRS, one to show the investors, one that ‘proves’ the movie is still in the red in case you’re the writer or any other poor bastard who agreed to backend profits instead of upfront money… and then the real books, which they keep locked in a safe and which never see the light of day.”

“Sounds like you’ve done your homework.”

“I have. I thought about getting into it as a hobby a few years back.”

“A hobby,” I said with equal parts disbelief and amusement.

He shrugged. “I don’t play golf.”

“I guess the answer was no, huh?”

“If I wanted to get into a business where you try to fuck everybody else for a buck, I’d go into porn.”

“What about creating something artistic?”

“I wouldn’t be creating anything artistic, I’d be footing the bill.”

“Well, you could still be part of making something people love.”

He stared off into the distance as though seriously pondering that – and then shook his head like
Naaah
. “I’d still go into porn.”

I leaned in close. “You’d be good at it.”

He chuckled, and his hand slipped down to my rear end. “You could be my costar.”

I slapped it away playfully. “You’re not
in
porn, remember.”

“Not yet… but we could get a camera, and go back to the hotel, and – ”

“NO.”

He laughed and hugged me closer.

We entered another room where two bartenders were mixing drinks at a full bar. I suppose Connor had just been playing the odds when he made the crack about being there for the food, but there was indeed a spread that would have made the Dubai Hotel jealous. Mildly, anyway. Displays of exotic fruits and tiny pastries, more decadent desserts than I had ever seen in my life, and a small army of waiters walking around offering people bacon-wrapped scallops, chunks of seared ahi, bits of filet mignon, and the usual hors d’oeuvres and canapés.

“You were right about the free food,” I marveled. “We should have skipped dinner and eaten here.”

“I liked eating with the person I had dinner with.” While I beamed, Conner turned around. I followed his gaze to the corner of the room, where Lewis Vonder smiled widely and toasted us with a glass of champagne. Connor gave a fake smile back and muttered between his teeth, “Here, not so much.”

“You afraid it’s like fairyland?”

He looked over at me. “Huh?”

I realized I’d been thinking out loud. “Never mind, that was just… never mind.”

“No, what?”

“Well, in fairytales, if you went into fairyland and ate or drank something, you got trapped there.”

“Whereas here, you wind up having dinner with a greedy troll and having to hear about his three-picture deal,” Connor said. He scanned the room. “Hold on, I see somebody I should say hello to. I’ll be right back.”

I felt a combination of emotions – fear that he was leaving me, suspicion why he wasn’t taking me along, and embarrassment that maybe he didn’t want to introduce me to anyone he knew.

Connor must have read my mind, because he smirked at me. “I’m trying to save you from listening to the tribe of trolls surrounding him.”

I blushed, and tried to cover it up. “I’d like to meet your friends.”

“They’re not my friends.
He
barely qualifies – he just gave me some good advice about getting into the motion picture industry.”

“Which was…?”

“Stay far, far away.”

“Where is he?”

“Over there,” Connor said, and pointed to a thin guy in a suit surrounded by a bunch of not-very-attractive men who were all sipping glasses of amber liquid and laughing. “Entertainment lawyers at his firm. Nobody famous, all pretty boring.”