Star Attraction Read online

  CHAPTER TWO

  Later in the privacy of her small office, as Zaira sipped her coffee, she recalled the amazing sensations her first meeting with Brad Clarke had produced. For one thing, even though she’d seen photos of him in every glossy magazine in the world, somehow in person he had seemed so ordinary, so genuine. He certainly hadn’t behaved like the arrogant beast she had been led to expect. His last remark had simply been a feeble attempt to restore some of his own wounded pride.

  Zaira could see why he had the reputation of being a womanizer; Brad Clarke had looks every woman would swoon over, she admitted reluctantly. But he had not been in the least predatory towards herself, though Zaira put that down to her prim and proper exterior in her university uniform, as she considered her tailored suits and spectacles to be.

  If the truth were told, Zaira was anything but conventional; however, for one so young to be lecturing at university, she had decided early on that she would not get anyone’s back up by trying to assert her own style, or stand out from the crowd. She had won every scholarship, award, and honor possible in her field by the time she was twenty-two due to her sheer hard work and determination. After a few years' study abroad, she had come back home to New York and to her old university to finish her Ph. D. Money was tight, so Zaira could not afford to alienate anyone until her studies were finished.

  Zaira was teaching all the hours in the day in an effort to pay for past mistakes she wished she could put behind her, and the role of prim professor suited her. She didn’t want anyone to recognize her at university, after the disgraceful fraud and bankruptcy case she had had to endure. It had been dire necessity rather than any burning desire to write a bestseller which had now put her in the path of Brad Clarke.

  Zaira had always been fascinated by history, and so it had been easy for her to dash off a light-weight historical novel about the life and times of Shakespeare and his famous love triangle with his patron, the Earl of Southampton, and “the Dark Lady.” Amazingly, it had not only been accepted for publication, but within a few weeks, it had soared to the top of the bestsellers list, and won several prestigious literary prizes.

  It was no small wonder then that her novel had come to the attention of Brad Clarke, who was famous for his box office successes with the most unlikely of subjects. His range of films had been very wide, but even Zaira had been amazed at his approach to her publisher. He had written from Hollywood saying that he would be in New York for a set of lectures, and wished to meet with Zaira to talk over a project he had in mind.

  Zaira had been very reluctant to even consider a film being made of her book, let alone a film by Brad Clarke. Zaira couldn’t find any logical objections, except that she disapproved of the way he wasted his obvious talent making B-grade horror films and war pictures, and was afraid he might turn her situations and characters into a sideshow.

  That Brad Clarke was a talented director Zaira was certain, for she was an avid film goer, and could see that he admired many of the great old films. But in her opinion, his fatal flaw he lacked the confidence to forge his own style.

  Maybe that was not so surprising. Brad was still young, under thirty, and he was the fourth generation of a Hollywood dynasty whose name had become synonymous with success both in front of and behind the camera.

  His great grandfather Declan had come over from Ireland and worked with Edison in the first film studios in New Jersey, his grandfather had a legendary actor and screenwriter, and his father Cormac Clarke was a famous actor, director and producer.

  So far as Zaira knew from the gossip columns, Cormac had grown increasingly estranged from his eldest son. Now that she had met him, Zaira suspected that rather than overwhelming arrogance, this too was symptomatic of Brad’s desire to prove his worth, to stop living in other men’s shadows.

  The telephone interrupted her thoughts, and she hastily picked up the receiver, painfully aware that she had spent too much time already sitting around doing nothing but thinking of the stunningly handsome man who had literally knocked her off her feet.

  She heard the cheerful voice of her publisher, Matt Wolf, say, “Well, tomorrow is the big day.”

  “Tomorrow! But we're doing the first rehearsal of Hamlet tomorrow for the amateur dramatics festival!”

  “No problem, he can see you in action.”

  “But he’s a Hollywood director! He’ll laugh himself silly. And besides, we still haven’t got a female lead, so I’ll have to read Ophelia as well until we find someone suitable who can get along with the temperamental Peter Duffy. How can I possibly meet with him tomorrow?” Zaira protested.

  “Look, I know it will be awkward, but money comes first here. I know you have your reservations, but this is a golden opportunity for you. As your friend as well as publisher, you have to put this first, no matter what you think of his films. We'll work in some clauses that stop him from taking too many liberties, and even if the critics hate it, enough people will go to see it just because his name is on it to make it well worth your while.

  "But Matt—"

  "No buts, honey. We need this. No author is bullet proof in this economy. But something like this, well, it will make you a hot property. If the worst happens, he’ll say no to our price. If the best happens, you'll rake in royalties and be able to pay off all the debts Jonathan left before he disappeared,” Matt advised.

  Zaira’s sharp intake of breath indicated to Matt that he had said the wrong thing, but rather than back off, he decided to use his blunder to convince her. “I know the book is still selling well, but there’s no guarantee that this will continue. If you want to clear his debts, and finish your degree, and get a bit of financial independence and security for the first time in your life, then go for it, and the hell with your principles.”

  “Damn you, Matt, you're one hell of a salesman,” Zaira grumbled. “Right, then, tell him to get down to the Loeb theatre for one o’clock. We’ll have finished everything by then, I think.”

  “Sure, Zaira, I’ll tell him,” Matt said, with rather too much merriment for her liking. “Dinner at One Fifth afterwards to tell all, ok?”

  She heaved a sigh, knowing she had been well and truly played. He was very fond of getting his own way, and she felt completely manoeuvred into a corner.

  “Right, Matt, but there may not be much to tell.”

  Glancing at her watch, she realized it was time to get ready for the first night of term party, a tradition she remembered from when she had been a student at New York University years before.

  She recalled her first alcoholic stupor at the NYU club only too well, for it was then she had met her first and only love Jonathan Waxman.

  Damn it, Zaira thought defiantly, I am not going to think about him now!

  She snatched up her bag and stormed down the corridor to the toilet, where she applied a small amount of make up to her pale face, and redid her chignon.

  Her specks she pushed firmly up the bridge of her nose, and hoped that the fearsome Brad Clarke, with his incredible emerald eyes, would not be there. She didn’t know how she would face him after what she had said today. Or what on earth she would say to him when they had to start haggling over the film rights to her book.

  But she wouldn't think about that now. She had to get ready, and she didn't want to ruin the evening. All the same, he was pretty unforgettable. And he was certainly going to remember her. Well, at least she had a whole night to think of an apology before she saw him again tomorrow!

  CHAPTER THREE

  When Zaira arrived at the New York University club, she ran into many of the students she had taught that afternoon, and made small talk and smiled until her face muscles positively ached with the effort.

  A tall figure with dark hair loomed up beside her, and for one horrified moment Zaira was convinced it was Brad Clarke coming to pounce on her. She smiled with relief when she realized it was only her Head of Department Raymond Ness, who remembered her well from her student days.

  “W
ell, Zaira, how were your new students today? Mine were overeager and under read, but then that’s typical, isn’t it?”

  “I’m a bit less cynical than you are, Ray, but then I’m new to the game.”

  Raymond had encouraged her throughout her university career, and was still fiercely protective of her. He proceeded to upbraid her for avoiding him and his charming wife recently.

  “Anna’s been asking if I’ve seen you, if there’s been any news about Jonathan.”

  Zaira shook her head, but she knew she was a rather poor liar. It had been a point of pride with her that when her husband Jonathan had abandoned her, Zaira had coped on her own. She had confided only in Matt Wolf, an old friend and literary agent with powerful contacts, about her predicament, and then only because she was so financially desperate.

  “No news, Ray. He’s still on the missing person’s list, but to be perfectly honest, in a way I hope they don’t find him. I really don’t want to know why he did what he did. Why he left. I’d just like to forget all about it. Put the past behind me.”

  “Just don’t be a stranger, that’s all I’m saying. We understand that you need time on your own, but please come to us if you want anything. Oh well,” he sighed, downing his drink in one gulp. “Time to mingle again.” He patted her on the hand and kissed her on the cheek before disappearing into the throng.

  Now was her chance, she decided. Zaira turned towards the door in an attempt to slip out of the party, when she again collided with the infuriatingly solid body of Brad Clarke.

  “We meet again, Zaira Darcy,” he said, grinning as he stared down at her with an odd light in his eyes.

  “Don’t you valley boys ever watch where you’re going, Brad Clarke?” she snapped, trying to push past him.

  He caught her arm and pulled her tightly to him. In the crush of the growing crowd in the narrow, oak-paneled room, she had little choice but to remain pinned to his chest.

  “This time I spotted you a mile off, but I thought it would be rude to break up the tete a tete between you and your—boyfriend?” he guessed. “Or husband? But then, you’re not wearing a ring, so my guess is boyfriend, though ‘boy’ would be a charitable description.”

  He smiled down at her as he took hold of her left hand and looked at it in a very obvious fashion. As the clean masculine scent filled her nostrils, and his warm strong fingers caressed hers intimately, Zaira felt herself go weak at the knees. His presence was so overwhelming that she could only stare up at him.

  Brad seemed to accept her silence as an indication that his last guess had been correct. “Since you are now free,” he declared with a smile, taking her other hand, and pulling her along into a dark alcove, “I shall get us several drinks, and we are going to settle our score with each other once and for all.”

  Zaira was astonished that he even remembered her, let alone knew her name and wished to speak to her. The fact that he had deliberately sought her out was even more surprising in view of the fact that as she watched him saunter towards the bar nearby, every eye in the room was upon him.

  Admittedly, she thought some of the men and women had to be fans, but most of the women gazed at him with open admiration for his incredible physique. He was wearing a dinner jacket and black silk bow tie, and his tan stood out against the stark white of his shirt. He looked exotic, foreign, a visitor from another world. She admitted that she was curious, nay, fascinated about what his life in Hollywood was like.

  Then she told herself that everyone probably gushed all over him and asked him trivial questions on that very subject. Maybe he just wanted to be treated like an ordinary person, with a whole life which had nothing to do with his job, and which really did involve a great deal of hard work, just like penning a novel. If he wanted to carry on their last conversation, she was going to be honest and sincere, even if it cost her the contract for the film rights to The Dark Lady.

  He returned with an ice-cold gin and tonic,.

  Zaira looked at him in surprise. “My favourite. How did you guess?”

  Brad shrugged. “It goes with the clothes, the accent,” he declared.

  For a moment Zaira was infuriated at his stereotyping her as the prim British schoolmistress-type simply because she dressed conventionally and had a rather precise way of speaking which she had picked up from her English grandfather and her years at Cambridge.

  But then Zaira reflected that she should not antagonize him any more than she already had done. So she decided to grin and bear it, and opened her mouth not to snipe again, but to sip the cool drink gratefully.

  “Now,” Brad said firmly, “I know you’re not stupid. The reception committee outside my room today must have told you exactly who I am. I want you to tell me why you don’t like my work. But before you make any falsely modest protests about not being an expert or anything, let me tell you two things. The first reason is that I always value informed opinions, and you seem to know a fair bit about films. And the second point is that you're obviously an English literature specialist, and know a lot about Shakespeare.”

  “What has my teaching got to do with this?” Zaira asked, puzzled.

  “Without giving any trade secrets away, I've come across the most fantastic book that I want to film more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life. The trouble is that the writer seems to have a lot of reservations about my work. Maybe you can show me where I’m going wrong, or what I can say to convince her that I really have no intention of turning it into a Tudor action film. I have to meet her tomorrow, and frankly I’m petrified that she’ll turn down my offer and I'll have missed the chance of a lifetime.”

  Zaira nearly laughed out loud at the request as soon as he had started to explain. Yet she couldn't mistake the earnestness in his eyes and tone. After all, he had no reason to lie to her. She realized that he was completely serious in his request for her help, and in his passionate desire to make a film with real substance, something she felt sure would be destined to become a classic one day, provided he also secured the right cast.

  She wondered for a moment whether she should tell him the truth, but held back for several reasons. The main one was that he was meeting her at university as a colleague, and she didn’t wish to have the two separate areas of her life linked together. By day she was Zaira Darcy, lecturer, and by night Zoe Dominick, author and amateur director and actress.

  Her second reason was more complicated. She didn’t wish to have an unpleasant confrontation with him, especially not in front of everyone at the NYU Club. Rather than getting directly down to business, which Zaira had not yet mentally prepared herself for, she determined that she could get to know a lot more about him, and perhaps put her fears to rest, if she chatted with him when he was not on his guard trying to give her the hard sell.

  “Right, then, if you're serious—"

  "I am."

  "And won't hold my honesty against me—"

  "It's been a refreshing change, actually," he said with a rueful laugh.

  "All right then," she said carefully, before making up her mind at last, and wading in. "I think my main objection is that you have so much talent which is going to waste, that I always end up feeling bitterly disappointed at your lack of artistic courage.”

  “What would you know about courage?” Brad snapped.

  She groaned inwardly. Terrific. She could see she’d hit several raw nerves and he was already fuming.

  He moved to stand up.

  Zaira astonished herself by reaching out her hand and pulling Brad back down onto the window seat.

  “Oh no you don’t! You asked for my opinion, and you’re going to get it. Stop acting like a petulant schoolboy. My whole point is that you don’t have the courage to be your own person, living in the shadow of the rest of the Clarke family, American royalty in the film industry. You have enormous talent in your own right, and you should use it to make first class films, not court box office success at the expense of artistic integrity,” Zaira explained.

&nbs
p; Brad let out a snort of derisive laughter, and asserted, “Artistic integrity would be expensive if I produced a half dozen flops!”

  “But the point is that you haven’t,” Zaira said soothingly. “They’ve all been highly successful bits of fluff or blow-em-up action films. Now you can afford to take risks, and do something which is really worthy of you.”

  Brad was still fuming, but he managed to say softly, “Such as?”

  “Something without the all-star glitzy cast, with beauty, a good script instead of mindless pulp.”

  “I think I’ve found it. The trouble is. how do I persuade Zoe Dominick that I'm sincere? That I don't want fluff and froth, but an enduring love story, something that speaks to the heart and mind, not just the masses' pointless quest for mindless entertainment."

  “Maybe by finding a decent screenwriter who won’t hack it to piece or commercialize it beyond recognition, and by avoiding certain actors and actresses who would kill to be in one of your films, no matter what the subject.”

  Brad nodded, and asked, “What else?”

  “Tell me what you liked about the book.”

  His long eyelashes swept down for a moment, almost as if it was too personal a question to answer.

  Now Zaira’s stomach churned at the fear of criticism, of her work being open to attack. But it wasn’t really the same for her, for her writing was not her whole life, merely a lucrative sideline she had been forced into out of necessity.

  “The passion, I suppose. The idea of finding happiness, in spite of mistakes from the past, and of a magnetism so powerful that the characters can’t tear themselves away from each other without doing themselves a mortal injury,” Brad said, his eyes once again blazing with a deep emerald fire which took her breath away.

  Zaira felt flattered that Brad had taken her novel so seriously. She also admitted he was correct in his assessment of the obsessional nature of the relationships depicted.