“It’s not okay,” Cassie said against Will’s shoulder. “It’s never been okay.Iought to be sitting in the second row there.Iought to be the one whose face comes into the viewfinder every time the camera runs across his row.”
“Look at the bright side,” Will said. “You’d probably be fast asleep by now.”
“But I’d be fast asleepthere,” Cassie said. “It’s the most important night of his life and I’m a thousand miles away.”
But you’re not, Will wanted to say.You’re here with me. He looked at her so intently that she stopped crying and simply stared back.
And then they announced the nominations for Best Actor.
As easily as she would step out of the front seat of a car, Cassie disengaged herself from Will. She shrugged off his arm and leaned her elbows on the table, inches closer to her husband. When the television replayed a short scene fromThe Story of His Life, Alex’s reflection shimmered in a pool of condensation caught on the table between Cassie’s flattened palms.
And the Oscar for Best Actor goes to. . .
Cassie stopped breathing. The televised light bathed her face, making its planes and angles shine.
Alex Rivers.
Cassie’s eyes gleamed, and with a palpable hunger she watched Alex walk up the aisle to the podium to accept the little statue. Will wondered if she realized that she was reaching toward the television with her right hand, as if she’d be able to touch him.
He didn’t give a damn about Alex Rivers’s Oscar, but he could not tear his gaze from Cassie. He’d thought she looked good when he first brought the truck around at his grandparents’, but before his eyes she had turned into a creature of grace and glow. When Alex was on that screen, she came alive.
Will had never been so angry in his life.
Four weeks ago when Cassie had shown up on his doorstep, he had seen the evidence of the illustrious Alex Rivers’s rage; he had understood the burden she’d been left with. But until now, Will had had no idea just how much of Cassie herself Alex had taken away.
Alex’s golden hair was brighter than the Oscar, and Cassie watched his hands flex around the statuette’s body. He was looking right at her.
“I’d like to thank Herb Silver, and Warner Brothers, and Jack Green and . . .” Cassie tuned out his actual words, watching instead the lines of his mouth, pink and sculpted, and imagining it coming over hers.
“But this award is for my wife, Cassie, who found me the script and convinced me that it was something the public would want to see, as well as something I needed to do. She’s with her father tonight because he’s ill, and when I spoke to her a few hours ago, she was upset that she couldn’t make it back here. Well, I was a little nervous, so I didn’t get to say everything I needed to before I hung up the phone. What I wanted to tell her is this:You could be halfway around the world, Cassie, and you’d still be with me.” He cleared his vision, now looking at the sea of faces staring up at him. “Thank you,” he said, and all too quickly, he was gone.
Cassie watched him accept his two other Oscars. It was clearly Alex’s night, and yet he never failed to mention her. The second time, he told the world he loved her. The third time, he whispered, “Hurry home,” so softly Cassie wondered if anyone else watching had even heard.
When Will pulled her up and propelled her out the door of the bar, she tried to picture what her night might have otherwise been like. She would have worn a froth of a gown—Alex would have seen to that—and every time his name was called he would have turned to her and lifted her out of her seat in his embrace. She could feel his strong arm, the itch of his tuxedo jacket under her fingertips, as she moved through Spago and The Gate with him, circulating the post-Oscar parties. She would hold two statues, still warm from where Alex’s hands had wrung their naked necks. Then she would go home and drop the awards onto the carpet and Alex would pour himself into her, hot, frantic, the very essence of success.
But instead Cassie walked into the cold March night, dizzied by the rash display of stars, and remembered her life for what she’d made of it.
Will watched her mouth turn down at the corners. She’d been moping through the whole broadcast, in spite of the fact that slick Alex had told the twenty million people watching that his entire life revolved around his wife. Hell, he’d even admitted she was out of town, although he’d candy-coated the circumstances. He was no fool, he knew she’d be watching. Will would have peevishly said the whole speech was calculated, if he hadn’t noticed with his own eyes that Alex had managed to put into words the exact way Cassie had been staring at that television screen.
Alex probably did love her, for whatever that was worth, and Cassie seemed to believe it carried considerable value. But Will thought it might kill him to actually see them together again. She’d probably cling to Alex as if her knees didn’t work and Alex would look at her like, well, like Will had been looking at her all night.
“That was something,” Will said noncommittally, unlocking the passenger door of the truck.
“Mmm,” Cassie said. She looked miserable.
“Your husband just cleaned out the Oscars,” Will muttered. “It would make sense for you to show a little emotion.” He grabbed Cassie’s shoulders, shaking her lightly. “He misses you. He’s crazy about you.
What thehellis your problem?”
Cassie shrugged, a delicate tremor that worked its way under Will’s palms. “I guess I still wish I had been there,” she admitted.
Will exploded. “Four weeks ago you couldn’t think of anything but getting away. You showed me the places where he’d kicked you in the ribs and hit you across the neck. Or have you forgotten about that side of your charming husband, just like he probably was hoping you would when you watched tonight, so you’d come crawling back?” He glared at Cassie, who was standing mute, her mouth slightly parted. “Believe me,” he said, “I know better than anyone. You can’t have the best of both worlds.”
She stared at him as if she’d never seen him before, and tried to take a step back. But Will would not let go of her. He wanted her to realize that he was right. He wanted Cassie to be able to slice away all the pretty packaging Alex had handed her tonight across the airwaves and see him for what he really was. He wanted her to look at him—Will—
the way she had looked at Alex.
Will tightened his grip on Cassie’s shoulders and pressed his lips against hers. Frustrated, his mouth ground into hers, his tongue forcing his way until, with the gentleness of a saint, she yielded under his touch.
