Beautiful Stranger (5 page)
“I’m absolutely just kidding.”
Caine threw his head back and laughed, then grinned wickedly. “That’s a good one. But really, it just clouds your judgment. Take it from someone who knows.”
“Ben goes to Princeton, and I’m going to Yale,” Anna pointed out. Her face still burned from her last ill-advised comment.
“So that means you have what in common exactly? The ability to get into an Ivy League school?” Caine took another long swallow of beer, then looked around for the waitress to order another one. “You’re an intellectual, Anna. Literature, history, great thoughts, all that. Ben? He’s a Beverly Hills kid. And that’s just not you.”
“You don’t really know me,” Anna pointed out coolly, thinking even as she said it that Caine knew her very well, indeed.
“Yeah, okay, point taken.” He smiled, raising his hands as if to pronounce that he was backing off. “So listen, how are we going to do this? Will it be the let’s-stay-friends thing, or the when we see each other in the movie line we ignore each other?” Caine spotted the waitress—a tall, thin redhead, and motioned toward his beer. She smiled to show that she understood he wanted another one.
“‘Let’s stay friends’ never works. But let’s try it anyway,” Anna suggested. “You can even buy me a friendly dinner, on one condition.”
Caine raised his dark eyebrows. “What’s that?”
“We don’t talk about Bernadette. Or Ben.”
“Deal.” He pulled her to him in a bear hug. It was friendly and it felt nice.
Down at the other end of the bar, Paul McCartney was seated at the piano again, but now his daughter was sitting next to him. He started a slow song that drew a round of applause from the bystanders. Then the bar hushed as the musician started to sing one of the great songs about the pain of love lost.
Wordlessly, Anna stood and offered Caine her hand. He took it and they went to the piano to listen. By the end of the song, they were singing softly along about yesterday, when all their troubles seemed far away. Just like friends would.
And she was fine with it, she really was. But his words about Ben were still ringing in her ears.
He’s a Beverly Hills kid. And that’s just not you.
W
hat does a girl wear to get dumped?
That had been the question that dogged Sam from the moment she awoke in her room—if you could call all fifteen-hundred square feet of her palaceworthy bedroom suite a “room”—on D-Day. Also known as Dump Day. Eduardo had asked—practically demanded—to meet her at noon for a walk on the Santa Monica Promenade. Sam was absolutely sure that he had chosen the promenade because it would be full of people, its usual eclectic mix of locals, tourists, and well-tolerated street people who called the outdoor mall home.
Yes, Eduardo was going to dump her in public, Sam figured, so that she couldn’t—or at least
wouldn’t
—make a scene. If she cried, she’d want to keep it under control, because you could bet on your Tiffany diamonds that at that exact moment a photographer from the
Galaxy
or some equally loathsome supermarket tabloid would be right there to snap her photo as she looked teary-eyed and bloated. They always picked the absolute worst angle so that the little people could gloat:
See? She might be rich and famous, but her ass is the size of a relief map of Texas!
And then there would be the headline:
DOUBLE DUMP!! JACKSON SHARPE DUMPED BY WIFE! DUMPY DAUGHTER DUMPED BY BOYFRIEND!
So. The all-important getting-dumped-in-public outfit. Sam spent fifteen minutes in her walk-in closet and settled on the understated look: a black-and-white polka-dot Beauty blouse, Chip & Pepper skinny jeans, and a dark Joluka denim jacket, all upgraded by the stunning white leather Jimmy Choo mules on her feet. In her Coach limited-edition gold-flecked oversize bag she stashed exactly three pink Puffs tissues. If there were to be tears—and she couldn’t guarantee that there wouldn’t be tears—she vowed to herself that there would be only three Puffs’ worth. Her recently redone eyelash extensions would be unaffected by tears, as long as she remembered not to actually wipe them with the tissue, but rather to blot carefully. And she didn’t have to wear mascara when she was wearing the extensions, hence no mascara could track down her tear-streaked face. That was even better.
At least it was a beautiful day to be dumped: impossibly blue skies, temperatures in the high seventies, and a steady west onshore breeze that made Santa Monica as smog-free as rural Montana. Even the traffic was cooperating—miraculously, there was none. It was almost as if the universe were egging her on, steering her to her destiny of Dumpdom. Sam made the twenty-five-minute drive from Bel Air to Santa Monica in less than nineteen minutes and didn’t even get caught by the lights at Sunset Boulevard and Bundy. Pulling up in front of the Monsoon Cafe, a restaurant that her father had once owned, back in the days when actors believed that restaurants were worth the aggravation, she handed the Hummer keys over to the black-jacketed valet along with a twenty and instructions to park it someplace where he could get to it quickly. When she was ready to leave, she wanted to be out of there.
Eduardo had suggested they meet at the promenade’s central fountain, about a ten-minute walk north from where she parked. In the movie version of her life, Sam realized that she would film this walk in slow motion. With each step she took, there’d be a flashback to some memorable moment in her time with Eduardo, complete with a soaring musical score guaranteed to evoke tears. One step: their first meeting at Las Casitas in Mexico, when he’d come across her skinny-dipping in the moonlight. Another step: their first real date, at the same resort, when they rode on horseback through the water to a small, deserted island a quarter mile off the coastline, where Eduardo had arranged for a romantic meal. Then the time when he’d acted so selflessly, so sweetly gone out of his way, agreeing to accompany Sam to her senior prom.
Quite honestly, her relationship with Eduardo had changed her. Sam knew she owed all of her fortunate L.A. status to her pedigree and her brains, because in the looks department, she simply could not compete. Oh sure, she would have been in the top third in say, Peoria—wherever the hell
that
was—but in Beverly Hills? Money could buy almost anything in the way of physical promotion, and girls in Beverly Hills had money to spare. Even with her sucked-in this and her altered that and blah, blah, blah, her ankles remained thick, her body pear-shaped. She did not turn heads on Rodeo Drive like Cammie did. Even petite Dee did. And Anna definitely did. But not Sam.
Eduardo—objectively gorgeous by anyone’s standards—saw her differently. He thought she was beautiful. It was as if he saw her through a different lens than the rest of the world. It had taken Sam a long time to believe him, but she finally did. Talk about winning a girl over. And now he was going to pull the metaphorical rug out from under her! Buh-bye. The end. It’s been fun. Let’s do lunch sometime. She even knew why he was breaking up with her—her name was Gisella, and she was an up-and-coming young fashion designer. Peruvian like Eduardo, and—again by objective standards—much better looking than Sam. She had the ability and the skills to design a dress that would make her own ass a Degas in comparison to J.Lo’s velvet painting. She spoke the same language. She knew the slang. They knew the same people back home in Lima. Though Eduardo tried to reassure her that he wanted her and not Gisella, Sam knew better.
How would he pull it off? Sam wondered as she made her way past a mime performing for a small crowd of tourists on her way to the fountain. He’d say they ought to make a clean break because he was going to go back to the Sorbonne in Paris in a few weeks, and she’d be starting film school at USC. It was the right thing to do.
The promenade was absolutely jammed. Street musicians weren’t just allowed, but encouraged, and she found herself going the long way around big circles of people watching a scruffily dressed blues guitarist who sounded very much like Robert Cray, a hip-hop dance trio from South Central who spun on a flattened cardboard box placed on the concrete, and then—irony of ironies—a quintet of South American musicians playing native songs on the same locally made instruments that Sam had seen on her visit to Peru with Eduardo right after graduation.
It gave her a lump in her throat as she stopped to listen. Why had she come, anyway? Just to torture herself?
Because you plan to grovel and beg him not to dump you and—
No. She might
want
to beg, but she wouldn’t.
She reached the fountain and glanced at her gold Hermès tank watch. Eduardo, who was always on time, was ten minutes late. Oh God. What if he was the one who didn’t show up? Maybe he’d hired one of those musicians to sing her a breakup song. Or maybe he’d sent her a text message but her Razr was off. She pulled it out of her bag. It was on. No text.
“Hi.”
There he was. He looked serious. More serious than she could recall. This was going to be so humiliating. She finished the thought this time. Then she echoed his greeting as the musicians started another song. This one was slow and mournful. Fuck. It was almost like he’d planned it.
“Been waiting long?”
“Not really.”
“It’s a nice day to be out.”
“Yeah,” she agreed, then swallowed hard. What the hell was going on? What were they, fucking strangers who’d just met at an industry cocktail party? Next he’d be asking her if he could give her a script to slip to her father.
Eduardo was, Sam noted, dressed for business, in a black custom-made Savile Row suit, crisp white shirt, and red tie, which meant he’d just come from his summer job at the Peruvian consulate. He hadn’t even kissed her hello. One quick humpty-dump and he’d be back at the office. He probably already had Gisella on speed dial.
To hell with this. She wasn’t about to wait around for the axe to fall.
“Eduardo?”
“Yes?”
“Whatever you want to say, can you please just get it over with? So then I can say whatever I’m going to say, and then the two of us can get on with our respective afternoons? I’m supposed to meet Cammie at the Ole Henriksen spa for hot stone massages. I’m hoping for a good story to tell while Olga buffs me into submission.”
“You know, I think you’re right,” Eduardo agreed, in a voice so low that Sam could barely hear it. The fact that the crowd was applauding the band’s last song didn’t make it any easier to hear. “I’ll be right back.”
What? She watched in astonishment as he pushed through the crowd and made his way over to the lead musician, a portly, mustachioed man in a magnificent Peruvian poncho who held a lute-like
charango
in his hands. The guy smiled as Eduardo approached, and the two of them engaged in a rapid-fire Spanish conversation. Then the bandleader turned to his group and gave them some quick instructions, and they started to play.
The tune was low and melodic, almost hypnotic. As Sam watched, Eduardo listened for a few moments, then nodded his head in approval.
What the hell was he doing?
“Ladies and gentlemen!” His voice boomed out louder than the pentatonic folk melody. “
Mujeres y caballeros!
In some villages in my country, in Peru, when a man has a special thing to tell a young woman, everyone assembles on the town square. Then the man takes the woman to a quiet place and says what needs to be said. Finally they return, either to the cheers or the consolation of the people of the village.”
Okay. This was how guys dumped girls in Peru? This was twisted. This was sick. Sam was not going to be a part of some ridiculous tribal ritual brought to life on the Third Street Promenade in front of an audience of strangers.
“I’m out of here, Eduardo!” She turned on the heels of her Jimmy Choos and started back down the promenade toward her Hummer. At least the valet would be able to get it quickly.
“Stop!
Por favor!
”
Eduardo’s voice was so plaintive that she did stop. A moment later, he was by her side, leading her to a side doorway of the Barnes & Noble superstore, which was shielded from the crowd. “I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I thought this would be fun.”
“My ass it’s fun,” she hissed. “This is humiliating, that’s what it is.”
“Be patient. It will be memorable, I believe.”
“I’ll need a hypnotist to erase it from my memory!” Sam was getting pissed, as much at herself as at Eduardo. Why was she just sticking around and letting this whole disaster unfold on his terms? Why wasn’t she being what she’d told Anna to be so many times: an active heroine, taking control of her life?
“I hope you won’t have to.” Eduardo lifted his right hand and held it with his fist balled, palm up. Then he opened his fist. In it was a small navy blue jewelry box. “For you.”
A kiss-off gift. This was the lowest of the low. Her father, back when he’d been known for hitting on the hottest starlets of all his movies—back before he’d married Poppy (and long before he’d wisely kicked her out of the house for cheating on him)—had been famous for kiss-off gifts. There was a jewelry store in the Beverly Center that specialized in them. They were expensive baubles so that the dumper could feel better about punting the dumpee. It was actually something of a Hollywood tradition.
Eduardo had just dropped another notch in her estimation. At least she wasn’t crying. She was too pissed for tears.
“Keep it,” she shot back. Up went one of her hands, in case he wanted to press the box on her.
“Goddammit, Sam. Why do you have to be so obstinate? No. Don’t answer that question. Just open it.”
For the first time all afternoon, Eduardo grinned. For the first time since the wrap party for her father’s movie, Sam felt the tiniest bit of hope for the future. Then, before she could open the box, Eduardo went down on one knee.
One knee. Hmmm. While it certainly was possible that Peruvian dump-your-girlfriend rituals differed from American dump-your-girlfriend rituals, Sam kind of doubted it involved the one-knee thing. The one-knee-thing meant …
But no. It couldn’t possibly mean that. Unless …