“Are you really so stupid as to think that matters? You always say Hollywood is a house of straw, and you’re right! One gust from the Big Bad Wolf, and you are gone. One little ember, and you are gone. One rainstorm, and you are gone. Don’t you see? No one can save you. No one can save either one of you. You must end this affair.”

“I won’t.”

She seemed to quiver with outrage. “All right, then I don’t want to see you again, or talk to you, until you are finished with him. You choose.”

Painfully I remembered giving Leon the ultimatum: Denise or me. Choose. I was firm with Irene, though not defiant. “I love him and I won’t give him up.”

“Fine. Then you’ve made your choice. Now get out of my car.”

•   •   •

I was wearing only a black satin slip late that night when I heard the Porsche rumble up behind the house. I stood in the open door looking at the moon, a low-lying gold coin melting into the sea. Terrence leapt up the stairs and pulled me against his body, his hands sliding over the satin, my hands loosening his tie, undoing his belt while we kissed and wove our way inside, kicking the door shut. His pants hit the bedroom floor and we fell on the bed together. I wrapped my leg around his and got his shirt unbuttoned and put my lips to his chest, licking, breathing in the scent of everything I loved about him. His hand stroked my bare leg to the place where I was dampest and he whispered, “What’s this, Little Liza?” And before I could answer he rolled underneath me, his hands guiding my thighs, and stroking my breasts, holding me firm till I cried out over and over again, and I flung my arms up high, my head back, like Galileo looking up at a whole new heaven.

Chapter Twenty-one

Losing Irene felt like one of those Malibu mudslides where a whole chunk of my life had dropped off. Splat. For years we always had lunch together on Friday afternoons, and I always relied on her cool wit, her sophisticated insight. Besides, she was my sister. Jonathan, when I told him what had happened, took pity on me, insisting that he and I go for a drink at Ciro’s on Friday afternoons to cheer me up. He liked to go to places where he might be recognized, and his eyes darted around the smoky bar while I bemoaned the loss of Irene.

“You know she’s right about Terrence,” he said without any special sympathy. He lit a cigarette and snapped the lighter shut. “You ought to break it off. He’s no good for you. You’re risking too much.”

“We’re in love.”