The Sheikh's Irresistible Proposal

  didn’t look much better. He looked like he wanted to defy orders himself, until the camera fell on him. At that moment, his features suddenly exuded arrogance, like that one guy that’s the rich, evil, jerk in just about every movie.

  “Emma, you are absolutely gorgeous, but I need someone who isn’t afraid to be natural, and someone who’s more open to trying new things. Unfortunately, I have to say no.”

  The cameras turned to me expectantly, and I let my face fall. Matt put a comforting hand on my shoulder, and gave Kyle an impressive glare.

  “Emma, I am truly sorry,” Matt said consolingly. “Personally, I think Kyle’s a moron to pass up a woman as beautiful and intelligent as you are. But I don’t write the rules, so we have to send you home now.”

  “That’s alright,” I answered quietly, pretending to put up a brave front. “I had a wonderful time tonight.”

  “I’m glad to hear that, Emma, and I do hope you’ll come back and join us again. I’m Matt Summers, and I want to thank you for watching Date Roulette. Goodnight, everybody, and remember: everyone has a chance at love.”

  The cameras were turned off, and I headed back to wardrobe to turn in the dress they had given me. I collected my pay and made my way slowly out of the Merridoc. I denied it to myself, but I was looking for Kristos. He was nowhere to be found, and I reluctantly headed out to the parking lot.

  When I got to my car, I got a shock. Kristos was leaning against my Malibu with sort of a smug look on his face.

  “Um…can I help you?” I asked, trying to sound casual.

  “You’re a very intriguing woman, Emma,” he replied. “I’d like to get to know you better. I thought we could get a drink somewhere.”

  “I’ve already told you no twice tonight,” I curtly reminded him. “I didn’t let you have the parking space, and I didn’t pick you as you suggested.” I was perfectly fine with having a drink with him, but I saw no reason to make it obvious.

  “And that’s exactly why I’m here,” he returned. “I don’t like to take no for an answer. Besides, talking to you has been the highlight of my day.”

  “You should really leave the acting to me,” I joked, before we headed to a high-end bar two blocks down.

  FOUR

  The bar Kristos chose was called The Legendary, and it was sort of a landmark in the area. Apparently, it had originally been a speakeasy during Prohibition, and since the elite kept coming afterward, its owners had decided to go legitimate.

  We sat at one of the small, elegant, tables, and Kristos decided to start with a rum and coke. I opted for a Long Island iced tea, and my new Greek acquaintance opened the conversation.

  “So what brought you here?” he asked as I took a drink.

  “You did, remember?” I replied with a laugh.

  He gave me a look of plainly false scorn. “I mean, what brought you to California?”

  “I wanted to get into movies. I always have. When I was younger, I saw Interview with the Vampire. There’s a girl named Claudia who becomes a vampire as a child, and can never grow older. She’s tormented by it. The girl who played her put a ton of depth and devotion into the character. I thought that was an amazing thing, to be able to do that, and I wanted to give life to characters too, so I started getting into drama at school. When I got better, I wanted to start trying out in talent shows, but my parents thought the whole thing was a waste of time and money.”

  “I heard something similar growing up,” Kristos interjected sympathetically. “Did you manage to change their minds?”

  I laughed, shaking my head. “That’s sort of like trying to get an elephant to move when it doesn’t want to. Instead, I got a job, and paid for the fees and transport myself. The first few times, I didn’t even place, but after a while, I was hitting second or third. Sometimes, I got gigs in little community shows. I rarely got paid, but when I did, I put it into getting more recognition. But my family, especially my mother, tried to force me in another direction. ‘Nurses are more in demand than movie stars, Emma, and it’s far more likely to provide a stable life for you.’ Things came to a head when I turned sixteen, and won a scholarship to a theater camp in DC. I had pretty much killed myself to pull that off. Between school, practice, and a part-time job, getting that scholarship felt like climbing Mount Everest to me.”

  The waitress came back to check on us, and we ordered another round of drinks. They appeared a moment later, as if by magic.

  “And after you told them that, your parents still forbade you to go, didn’t they?” Kristos said, picking up our conversation. He sounded bitter.

  “They did, and so I ran away. I got a friend of mine to drive me to Washington. I had to chip in for gas, and we could only afford chips and other cheap snacks. But my friend had a cousin who lived in the city, and her parents agreed to house me for the three weeks I’d be there. To me, everything seemed perfect.”

  Kristos was impressed that I’d risked so much to follow my dream, and I told him how my parents had flown to DC and waited for me at the theater camp. I told him how I ran away again two years later, and struggled to support myself while I found an agent.

  We started talking about his early life. Apparently, his family had been in real estate for several generations. As he was telling me how he escaped taking up that mantle, I realized that he was starting to slur his words, just every now and then. Dully I realized that my head was swimming, and I tried to remember how many drinks I’d had. I lost count twice; not a good sign. I might have been concerned, but Kristos chose that moment to start telling production stories.

  One of his earlier shows had a shoot that was held up for twenty minutes because someone made the mistake of bringing their kid to work. The little brat saw the camera and, of course, leapt in front of it and started singing her favorite Our Rainbow Pony songs. The adults tried to catch her, but the little girl was fast. No matter where she ran, she kept coming back to the camera and singing. Kristos was drunkenly miming her actions, laughing voluminously as he did so. I could hardly breathe I was laughing so hard, and soon, we were falling all over each other.

  “This is not what I planned to do when I saw you again,” he said after a while. “I was planning to yell at you about something or other. This is better, though.” His head was on my shoulder, and I put my arms around him in sort of a sloppy hug.

  “What’cha wanna yell for,” I asked. “Ya need to let it go.” At that, I started to sing, but Kristos stopped me with a remark about how beautiful I’d looked in the green dress.

  “You shoulda picked me,” he said, pulling me close to him. “I really liked talking to you.”

  With a little bit of stumbling, he pulled himself up, and kissed me. A sharp heat ran up my spine, and I impulsively tightened my grip, matching his efforts.

  Eventually he pulled away and whispered something in my ear.

  “I don’t think I’m drunk enough to do that here,” I giggled.

  “Bartender! One more!” Kristos cried.

  Somehow, I got him to pay the check instead. We walked back out front, where Kristos’ chauffeur, a very sober man named Stanton, was waiting to take us anywhere we wanted.

  In the back of the car, we resumed the interrupted bout of kissing. I was distantly shocked at how readily I was responding to Kristos, who was already fondling me eagerly. I took my cue from him, and slipped a hand between his open shirt buttons. I caressed the taut muscles of his chest, and felt shivers of pleasure run through my body. The cologne he was wearing was becoming intoxicating, as was the hand running along my thigh.

  By the time we got to his place—a luxurious penthouse apartment that he said was only for weekdays—Kristos and I were on autopilot. My dress had been unzipped, and I’d accidentally popped two of his buttons. I don’t remember exactly how we got to the bedroom, but we collapsed on the bed in a knot of heat and lust. Kristos managed to disengage my bra with one hand, and I had his pants off in a flash. Within moments, we were writhing in fierce passion
, making the halls echo with our satisfied moans.

  FIVE

  I awoke the next morning to an angry buzzing noise that, for the first couple of minutes, I was sure was coming from my head. Eventually, the fog lifted enough for me to realize it was my smartphone. I groped around and found it on the nightstand. I didn’t even bother to see who it was before I picked up.

  “Hello,” I asked, in a voice that was heavy with sleep, and the voice of my agent answered me. I didn’t recognize it at first, because it was full of things I’d seldom heard there before. Like excitement. “Margaret? Is that you? What’s going on?” I asked groggily.

  “You are,” she replied, sounding highly pleased. “A number of industry insiders saw your performance yesterday. They seem to think that they could use a talent like yours. It’s only nine and I’ve already booked you for a good three weeks of auditions!”

  “You’re kidding…” I replied, perking up at once.

  “I don’t really have a sense of humor, Emma. You should know that by now. The first one audition’s at 3PM tomorrow, but I want to discuss some preliminaries with you later today.”

  “Sure!” I sputtered badly, still in shock. I was closer than I had ever been to the career I wanted. I was elated.

  I started to disentangle myself from the blanket, when I felt a light pressure about halfway down. Kristos had fallen asleep with his hand on my ass. I eased it off gently, not wanting to wake him. The conversation that follows a night like the one we had is always awkward and complicated, and was not a conversation I wanted to have right at that moment. Even if I did, there wasn’t time. I had to get home, clean up and change, pay the dragon lady her rent, and go and see Margaret.

  I searched for my panties, and found them hanging off one of my ankles. Slipping them on, I donned my bra, zipped up my dress, and headed out into the world. Stanton had been nice enough to fetch my car from the restaurant, so effecting my escape was easy.

  I pinched myself several times on the way home, but when I didn’t wake up, I started to believe that it wasn’t a dream. After struggling for nearly my entire life, it seemed like my moment in the sun had finally arrived. I drove slowly and carefully, despite my excitement. I’d already gotten one ticket yesterday. I didn’t need another.

  I stopped off at my bank and cashed the Date Roulette check at the ATM. Then I deposited everything I wouldn’t need for the rent, and drove back to my apartment, for the first time in a long time actually hoping to run into Mrs. Coleman.

  Sure enough, I found her easily. She was standing at front door, measuring it with a tape measure.

  “I think their bed will fit through here after all,” she said when she saw me.

  “No it won’t,” I replied, shoving the money in her face.

  She counted it in front of me. “It seems you did take care of it, dearie,” she said when she saw it was all there. “Congratulations. I’ll be back in a week for next month’s.” She might as well have cackled like the Wicked Witch of the West, and flown away on the broom in my kitchen.

  I gave the woman a surreptitious middle finger before darting inside my apartment and slamming the door as loudly as I dared. My anger evaporated almost instantly when I remembered the spate of auditions waiting for me; I would likely never have to worry about paying that woman late again. I got dressed quickly and decided to treat myself to breakfast at a nearby café to celebrate.

  SIX

  The next day found me at Laurel, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, by 10:45 precisely. I did not want a repeat of the other day. Not when things were finally beginning to look up. The preliminaries with Margaret had gone quite well. She’d been approachable and light-hearted, almost like I suddenly had a new agent. Once or twice, she had even smiled.

  Today she was introducing me to Richard Morris, a man who was famous for producing some of the better sitcoms of the seventies and eighties. He was working on a reboot of his newsroom drama Penny Lane, and I was being considered for the titular character’s best friend.

  “It’s an honor to meet you, Mr. Morris,” I said. And I meant it. I grew up watching his shows online, and the way they’d managed to tackle some of the toughest issues of the time in an entertaining, accessible way, had stuck with me.

  “Thank you,” he replied in a low voice. “My assistants tell me your performance the night before last was outstanding. I wonder if you might read a few lines of this,” he said, handing me a manuscript.

  I nodded, and approached one of the audition rooms. I spent an hour and a half with Richard Morris, and another four on the three auditions that came afterward. I had never been so tired, but I was happy. Any one of these tryouts could launch the career that I had been working for since high school. It was all within my reach and I appreciated that more than anyone knew.

  “Just a little bit more,” I told myself as I drove back toward my apartment, fantasies of sleep swelling in my mind. I could already see my bed, warm and inviting, calling to me to stop running around and relax. Those thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the last thing I was expecting to hear: the voice of my mother.