Hollywood Sinners. Victoria Fox

      On cue Lana felt an arm slide round her waist, smooth as a snake. She turned to the man next to her, caught the familiar line of his profile and the gleam of his teeth, the charcoal-grey of his immaculate hair. Cole Steel. Her husband.

      Cameras flashed and sparked in throbs of light. He didn’t blink.

      ‘It feels great,’ she told the reporter with a friendly smile. ‘We’re very happy.’

      Paparazzi jostled for the best shot. ‘Cole! Lana, Cole, let’s see you together!’

      ‘Any plans to add to the family?’ The reporter was sweating now.

      ‘Watch this space,’ said Cole, with a startlingly white grin. He planted a dry kiss on Lana’s neck, just below her ear. The photographers went wild.

      ‘Let’s move on,’ he instructed, just loud enough for her to hear.

      Lana obliged. The smell of Cole’s skin lingered–sweet, slightly minty. When he took her hand it was cold.

      ‘Tell us about your new movie!’ the reporter babbled, craning the mike after her, knowing he’d already lost them. ‘Tell us about Eastern Sky!’

      Lana moved into her customary position on the carpet, a little in front of Cole, his hands at her waist, steering her forward. At twenty-seven she was Hollywood’s most desirable young actress. Regularly voted one of the world’s most beautiful women, she was, with her burnt-chestnut hair, wide green eyes and warm smile, a killer combination of sex siren and girl- next-door. Women wanted to be her friend. Boys wanted to take her home to their mothers. Men jacked off over her, torn between fantasies of white cotton panties and crimson-red lingerie–the fascination was that Lana Falcon could pull off either. And, boy, did they dream she did.

      ‘Cole, Lana, this way!’

      Cole guided his wife into a series of poses, his hands moving round her body with the precision and grace of a dancer.

      ‘Beautiful!’ came the approving clamour.

      Somebody shouted, ‘Could we get a kiss?’

      Cole laughed with the press like chums. Lana observed as he shot at them with pretend pistols, firing from the first two fingers of each hand.

      Lana followed direction. Tilting her chin to meet his, she saw her surroundings–the deep reds and pure, billowing whites; the rich, syrupy gold of the event’s majestic lions–taper sharply into her husband’s approaching features until her view was suffocated entirely by his face, and the sad rub of his lips.

      Cole Steel. Hollywood’s highest grossing actor and a giant of the American film industry. Cole Steel. At the top of his game after nearly thirty years and tipped here to take a Volpi Cup. Cole Steel. The husband with whom Lana Falcon lived, attended parties, posed for photographs, but had never, had never …

      All around, bulbs popped and flared. As Lana pulled away she searched her husband’s eyes. As a good actor he could fill them with every emotion a role required–he was at his most convincing when assuming a character. As a man, as himself, he was blank. Cole’s eyes were like a shark’s: flat and empty. When she looked into them, Lana saw nothing.

      ‘Let’s get on the line,’ said Katharine Elliot, Lana’s publicist, discreetly ushering her client forward. ‘They’re queuing for a word.’

      ‘We’re not done here yet,’ snapped Cole through gritted teeth. His smile didn’t move.

      Katharine stepped back. Cole was a man she did not want to piss off.

      Together he and Lana refreshed their poses, the jewel in the crown of megastars gracing the Venice carpet, floating like creatures from another world, delighting with a look or a smile.

      ‘Assholes,’ muttered Cole, clapping eyes on a young, handsome actor and his Mother Earth wife. Cole claimed not to like the man because he’d beaten him to a part last year, though Lana suspected it was more because the couple paraded a soccer team of children, a brood to which they were still adding. It was something she and Cole could never achieve.

      Beyond the press pit Lana caught sight of a young female fan, her desperate face streaked with tears as she was pushed and shoved amid the throng of people trying to catch a glimpse of the action. Lana took care to catch her eye, smiling warmly and giving her a wave.

      Toughen up she thought, remembering herself at that age. It’s the only way to survive. Trust me. She blinked against the memories. Too often they kept her awake at night.

      ‘It’s time,’ Cole told her, placing a small, pale hand on her back. The cameras followed every move. Together, husband and wife were the ultimate American love story. He, one of the greatest actors of his generation; she, the girl who had come from nothing, from tragedy, to having it all.

      Linking her arm with his, Lana walked alongside, nodding and smiling her way into the Palazzo del Cinema. She glanced at her wedding ring, a great cluster of diamonds that weighed heavy on her hand. In the frenzy of snapping bulbs it winked back, as if they shared a terrible secret.

      2

       Las Vegas

      Elisabeth Sabell, legs wrapped tight round her fiancé’S waist, examined with satisfaction the ten-carat antique engagement ring on her third finger.

      ‘Fuck me!’ she gasped, clasping his muscular shoulders. ‘Fuck me fuck me fuck me!’ The ring caught the light as they moved together, the sheets of their mammoth four-poster bed damp with sweat. As he pounded deeper, his rhythm quickening, the marvellous jewel came towards Elisabeth’s enraptured face in shuddering frames, a glorious, insistent reminder that she would, before long, be Mrs St Louis.

      ‘Tell me what you want, baby.’ The man grabbed her ass, pulling himself in further. ‘Tell me what you want.’

      ‘I want you to fuck me hard, Robert St Louis!’ she cried in abandon, raking livid-pink lines down his bronzed back, lifting her foot and trailing with her big toe the dip where his spine met his ass. ‘Fuck me like you’ve never fucked me before!’

      In one deft movement he hooked an arm beneath her, flipping them round, holding on for the ride. Elisabeth, on top, ran her hands across his broad chest, wondering at the strength of his arms, the gentle slope of his biceps and the hard muscle of his stomach. Tightening her grip, she pinned him beneath her.

      ‘Strap in, baby,’ she told him, throwing her head back to gaze at the trompe l’oeil ceiling. ‘This is as close to heaven as it gets.’

      Elisabeth began to rock, grabbing his hands, reaching higher, faster, like her life depended on it. Her golden mane fell in waves down her back, her pearl-white neck tilted to the ceiling. She could feel Robert’s hands on her tits, her waist, her thighs; on her throat, pressing those points beneath her ear lobes that made her knees go weak. She howled out, the pinnacle in sight.

      With a final thrust they both climaxed, their bodies slick with release. Elisabeth rode the swelling tide, blinking back stars, her chest rising and falling, the pulse within her a steady, exquisite, delicious beat.

      Robert St Louis moved on to his elbows and gave her a lopsided smile. He brought her face towards his and kissed her slowly, tasting her mouth.

      ‘You’re beautiful,’ he told her, planting a kiss on her chin, her nose, her forehead.

      Elisabeth kissed him back. Together, she knew they made a staggering couple. Robert St Louis had been the most eligible bachelor in America. Now, two years on, he was hers.

      Billionaire owner of two of the city’s most infamous hotels, the Orient and the Desert Jewel, he was the most handsome, and the most powerful, man in Vegas. With his dark hair, almost-black eyes, warm as melting bitter chocolate, and wicked, honest grin, he was the most devastating man she had ever laid eyes on.

      ‘I know,’ she told him, peeling herself off the bed and heading for their palatial en suite.