Free excerpt!

OK, you've read about my inspiration for writing "Scar Flowers." You've gone to http://www.lulu.com/content/4072766 and clicked the "preview this book" button to read the first chapter online. You've read the first reader review. And yet ... you want more.

Which is exactly why I like you so much ;-)

Here is a bonus excerpt--Chapter 2

When Paul reached the seventh floor, Simon and the girl were not in sight. It didn’t matter; where else could they have gone but his suite, next door to Nadia’s room? All the trouble he’d gone through to get her that room, and she’d hardly thanked him.

Nadia. Not a saint’s name.

Not her real name, either.

“When you come to the film festival, I’ll take you to the private parties, the best premieres. You can meet my nephew, and I can show you my house; it’s just over—”

“Paul, won’t your colleagues wonder who I am? They’ll want to know about us. How we met.”

He laughed, but she would not let the subject drop.

“Everyone will want to know who I am.” She looked at him with those eyes of hers, hazel ringed with gold and green. A green-eyed redhead—God help him. “Too bad I’m not someone from the industry. Someone who already has a relationship with you.”

“Well, there’s someone I used to date years ago. Nadia. She was a fight choreographer and did a few stunts, but she mostly worked in Europe. I don’t think anyone at the festival would know her.”

“Good. Call me Nadia, then. But remember: I’ll be your ex-girlfriend.”

“Did you see them?” he asked when she let him in. “Was I right?”

“That’s your concern. Is that all you have for me?” Despite the restored glamour of its public spaces and the suites that StarBorn rented for VIPs, the standard rooms contained plastic veneer furniture, framed prints bolted to the walls. She had switched all the lamps on to wash the room with smeared yellow light. His eyes strayed to the television—St. Sebastian, with Simon Mercer as screenwriter, director, and star. Onscreen Mercer stood tied to the black trunk of a tree with all its limbs cut off as Roman soldiers held back a jeering crowd. Paul had discovered the studio’s latest star director when he stumbled onto this picture—not that Fran recalled that, once she had signed Mercer. An ambi-tious, well-realized film despite the casting decision—you couldn’t tell if this Sebastian was Hispanic, Mediterranean, or just suntan-ned. Mercer himself was supposed to be an underground heart-throb, with his long-nosed collage of a face that looked pieced together from ancient statues and moody advertisements for designer jeans.

“Why’re you watching this again?” He set the magazine, with his book tucked inside, on the coffee table.

What was left of Mercer’s tunic hung in rags from his shoulders and waist. He looked up as his sentence was pronounced. The crowd murmured, and a Centurion with a bow and quiver raised his arm, narrowed one eye to take aim.

Paul wanted to look away, but there it was: the first arrow, with its brief flight and sharp thud of impact. The saint shuddered, as if it had knocked the breath out of him. Much better than a painting or woodcut. After a pause, a moment in which you wondered whether the damage could be overcome and saw from Sebastian’s face that it could not, realistic blood snaked down from the shaft. A mortal wound.

Agony. The agony of the saints. Holy, a pure chord of suffering and devotion, like sunlight hitting a retina. Agony meant passion, suffering, but most people today thought that it meant lust. Just like obsession, which was supposed to mean possession by evil. Now it was either a smug psychological diagnoses or a reference to sex. Where and how had the confusion crept in? The tarnishing of truth.

Tarnish could be stripped away with pain.

“Weren’t you the one who told me how brilliant this film was?” She picked up a skirt from the back of a chair, held it up in front of herself. Her hair, waved like a ‘40s movie star’s, draped and slid over her shoulders with each movement. “You said it was the most realistic representation of a saint you’d ever seen.”

Paul sat on the love seat, disturbing a stack of dresses. “You’re packing? We’ve got three more days. You haven’t even seen my place.” Something heavy hidden under the clothes caught his hand: books. The Art of Fight Choreography and Basics of Filmmaking. He cleared his throat. “About Mercer . . . I’ve hardly met him. He might be rude to you. You know how some of these artist types are.”

“Simon being rude isn’t what you’re worried about. It’s whether he’s too nice to me.” She held up a pantsuit and looked at herself in the mirror.

“He’s probably gay. Sebastian is their patron saint, after all.”

“‘Their’ saint?” She draped the suit over a chair. “You’re starting to sound obsessed.”

“Don’t use that word.”

“If you’re worried, tell him you invited me here to win me back.”

“I wasn’t implying—”

“Weren’t you? Tell me more about Nadia then. I want to make sure I get it right.”

“His panel is tomorrow. That’s what you’re getting ready for. You wouldn’t even go to the awards dinner with me.”

“Paul.” Her voice softened, and she sat across from him. “You hate yourself for whining and pleading with Fran, so why not practice being strong with me?” Her fingers found the cameo brooch at her throat. She saw him looking and smiled.

“You wore my Valentine’s Day present,” he said. “So you are here to be with me.”

Her mouth turned down. She unfastened the brooch and set it on the dresser. “Can I trust you?” she asked, her back to him. “I need to know that you hear what I say to you.”

“Leah, I heard you. Can you hear me?”

Leah. Not a saint’s name either. Leah, an Anglo-Saxon word meaning “clearing” or “glade.” In Hebrew, it meant “weary one.” She did look tired now. Tired of him.

“My name is Nadia here. And the point isn’t to make you feel bad. I didn’t come down here just for you, and you shouldn’t trust anyone who says something like that. Right?” She turned to look at him, brows raised, but he said nothing. She sighed. “Then get me a copy of the Babylon script. All I have is the synopsis.”

He stared.

“Just get it. Then you’ll be settled with me about this.”

“Why is Mercer so important? He’s a gimmick artist, not a director.”

“You’re right. He’s just like anyone else. In fact, he’s very much like you.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.”

Had he heard wrong? “Really? After your trick with the olive, I thought he was going to slap you.”

“I’ll prove it to you, since you’ve dared me. Which means I’ll need your help for a few more days.”

In Greek, Leah meant “glad tidings.” The thought almost made him laugh.

“It won’t take any longer than that,” she said. “I know you like setting challenges. Otherwise you wouldn’t have sent me St. Sebastian.” Paul’s face grew hot, but she only added, “Yes, I’m going to the panel tomorrow, and I’m going alone.”

They couldn’t fight here. The entire floor was rented to the studio’s guests.

He went to his room and returned with his copy of the shooting script, which she took and shut the door without a word.

He knocked again. “Leah?” He kept his voice low. The second hand on his watch crawled around the face four times before he heard a flutter and a clang from her room, as if she had thrown something against the blinds. A magazine, perhaps.

Or a script.

Go back to the Assyrians, and the name Leah meant “mistress” or “ruler.” Paul waited another minute, then returned to his room.