Free Three Weeks in Paris by Barbara Taylor Bradford

colleagues. She put it down, relieved.
    A sudden frown furrowed her brow, and she leaned closer to the coffee table, staring at the crystal goblet. It bore traces of lipstick on the rim. But it had obviously been a business meeting, of that she felt sure.
    Pages of his new script were scattered on the floor, along with a yellow legal pad on which innumerable notes had been scrawled. In his handwriting.
    Straightening, now focusing all of her attention on Gary, she studied him for a moment, and through dispassionate eyes. His salt-and-pepper hair was mussed, his face was gaunt and pale with dark smudges under his eyes. In sleep, his mouth had gone slack, was partially open, and in combination with his furrowed neck, it made him look curiously old, worn-out.
    Washed up, she thought, and felt a tinge of sadness.
    But no, he wasn’t that. At least, not yet.
    Gary was still a brilliant screenwriter, one of the best, if not
the
best, in the business, and his past was filled with tunes of glory. And Oscars.
    He had written many of the greatest screenplays ever put on celluloid and for some of the most talented stars, male stars especially. During his most celebrated career he had made, lost, and made several fortunes, married two famous movie stars, divorced them, and fathered a daughter with one who no longer spoke to him.
    And now, at the age of fifty-one, he was courting her and entreating her to marry him.
    When he was sober.
    Quite frequently these days he was drunk. And becauseof this addiction, which he refused to admit was an illness, she knew deep down she would never marry him. In her innermost soul she knew she would never be able to cope with an alcoholic on a long-term basis, and that was what he was on his way to becoming, if he wasn’t already there.
    Constantly Jessica begged him to go to AA, but he merely laughed at her, and somehow managed to charm her into believing he didn’t need Alcoholics Anonymous. In her quiet moments, when she was alone, she knew with absolute sureness that he did. Just as she knew she should break up with him.
    On two occasions Jessica had thrown him out; he had managed to charm his way back into her life. Well, he was charm personified, everyone knew that, and
the
master when it came to words. He had earned millions and millions from his words, hadn’t he?
    “Don’t forget, he’s a writer, he knows exactly what to say to press
your
buttons,” her friend Merle was always saying. Her retort to Merle never varied. “And don’t
you
forget that Jeremy’s an actor. He knows which role to play to punch
yours
. Once an actor always an actor, Merle.”
    Merle usually laughed, and so did she. They knew their men, that was a certainty. And they’re both wrong for us, Jessica thought; she turned swiftly on her high heels, went out of the den, and closed the door quietly behind her.
    She was still furious with Gary for being in this inebriated state when she got home, and the best thing was to let him sleep it off.
    Jessica had been in Santa Barbara for five days, supervising an installation at a client’s new house, and Gary had promised her dinner tête-à-tête at home tonight … no matter what time she arrived. A dinner he would cook. He was a great chef when he wanted to be, and a great lover when he was stone-cold sober.
    Yes, she loved him, with certain qualifications. Nonetheless, he made her madder than a wet hen at times. Like right then.
    When she reached the circular front hall with its glassy black granite floor and elegant curving staircase, Jessica picked up her hanging clothes bag and overnight carryall and headed upstairs to her dressing room next door to the bedroom.
    As she went into the octagonal-shaped room she caught sight of herself in one of the four mirrors, and after hanging up the clothes bag and putting the carryall in a corner, she turned and stared at herself in the nearest glass.
    Stepping closer, she moved her long blond hair back over her shoulder, then