Russell eased himself onto a stool at the bar of the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverley Hills. It was not the sort of place he particularly liked to booze in but they were used to celebrities and he would get less hassle there than at other places. He could do without any jumped up prick trying to get his name in the papers at his expense.

The waiter placed a beer down and he swivelled round on his stool to survey the room. It was an instinctive reaction, the sort of thing a guy always does in a bar, but it suddenly occurred to him that it probably looked pretentious for him to do so, like he wanted to be noticed. He sighed and turned back to the bar. As his eyes skimmed the doorway, he noticed a woman standing on the threshold looking about her, as if expecting someone.

He stopped in his tracks, as many men in the room did. This woman was quite a piece of work. She was a tall and slender red head, her thick tousled hair worn medium length, shining with health. She wore a pale cream dress of some almost not quite there material, silk or something; it was short and clinging, spilt at the front. His eyes went back to her hair. It was the sort of hair a man wants to rake his fingers through as he tilts back her head and kisses her white throat.... "Whoah," Russell thought to himself, "Where did that come from?"

He pulled a cigarette out and lit it, observing her through the smoke, his eyes crinkled. The woman seemed a little ill-at-ease but she walked across the lounge, head up, trying to look nonchalant, before settling down at a table in an armchair. She began to peruse the drinks card. Her long legs were crossed, one slender foot encased in a fine strappy stiletto tapping nervously on the table leg. Her knee length dress had ridden up and from where he was sitting he could almost see right up her skirt. Russell shifted on the stool as he instinctively reacted. "Down, boy, down. She's waiting for someone."

But his eyes returned to the woman like a moth drawn to a flame, or more like a wolf to a lamb. It was typical. He couldn't stop himself when the scent of the chase was in his nostrils. Calling to the waiter, he pointed at the woman. "Whatever she's drinking. On me."

He watched the waiter carry over her order, stop to discuss something with her and then point over to where he was sitting. She looked across, frowned, and then he saw the inevitable flash of recognition in her eyes. She shook her head and handed the drink back. The waiter returned it. "She won't accept it, Mr. Crowe."

Russell slid off the stool and carried the drink back, his own beer in the other hand.

"I don't drink margaritas. You might as well have it, honey."

"And I don't accept drinks from strange men, especially if I know who they are," she replied smoothly.

"Mind if I sit down?" Russell asked politely, a sweet grin on his face, the one he knew had an immediate effect.

"Yes, I do mind. I am waiting for my husband."

Russell shrugged. "I get the message. Fuck off, you wanker."

"Well, I wouldn't have quite put it like that but.... Excuse me, my phone..." She picked up her phone and took a call.

"What? You can't be serious? You promised. Jack, you are such a shit!" The woman slapped the phone shut and Russell watched her face. She was pissed and he knew it was the husband.

"Stood you up, eh, love?"

She shot him a look, her green eyes glinting. "Aren't you being just a little presumptuous, Mr. Crowe?"

"You have the advantage of me, love. I don't know your name."

She stared up at him. "Do you ever give up?"

"Takes a lot to put me off," he replied with another flashing grin.

"So I've heard."

"S'not all true."

"I thought you had a girlfriend now," the woman challenged.

"I thought you had a husband," he retorted.

"I'm not hitting on you, pal," she bit back.

"Touché! No harm in a drink though, is there?"

She sighed and then smiled for the first time. It was a devastating weapon. "OK. A drink. Jack deserves it. How pissed is he going to be if some paparazzo captures this?"

Russell sat down and the game began.

"So this Jack bloke. What does he do?"

"He's in shipping."

"Magnate?"

"Not quite your class, Mr. Crowe."

"Family?"

"One child," she replied.

"Special occasion?"

"My birthday."

"Today?"

"Last month - this is the third attempt to celebrate it."

"OK, let's celebrate it then. You got a table booked?"

 The woman nodded.

"Shame to waste it then. C'mon."

"I can't have lunch with you," she protested.

"Why not? I'm hungry, so are you. No point eating alone."

The woman paused and then she seemed to make up her mind. She extended her hand. "My name's Cheri. Actually it isn't but that will do. Let's eat."

Russell grinned and stood back to let her pass. He had a good look at her rear. Fuck, did she have a good figure. The light dress hugged her pert ass so sweet, kind of wrinkled a little around the curves. He swallowed hard and squirmed slightly. This was dangerous. Public place, bound to be seen. He was only eating. No harm there, surely? He looked again at her arse and down her long legs as he followed her to the restaurant. He imagined them wrapped around him and suddenly wondered if her bush was the same dark red colour as her hair. He saw the white thighs parting and...

'No fucking harm at all, mate,' he thought with a rueful grin.

Mark was standing by the door to the restaurant, a cagey look on his face. Their eyes met. Russell hunched his shoulders, trying for an innocent look but Mark still raised his eyes and looked annoyed.

"Since when you been my fucking keeper, mate?" Russell threw at him as he passed by.

"Actually that's my fucking job, you knob," he replied tartly. Russell merely laughed and followed his prey.

Settled at the table in a fairly obscure alcove, away from prying eyes, they ordered and chatted casually. They spoke of trivial things: food, wine, what had brought her to LA, a little of where they came from. She was from New York but had not been born there, said she was from somewhere East but didn't specify. He asked about her job. She was a fashion buyer for a New York store. She travelled some, her husband travelled more - it was difficult at times. Their son was often left with his nanny; it made her feel guilty. This trip to California was supposed to be a family occasion but Jack was always involved in some project or other.

"How long ya been together?" He asked.

Cheri glanced at him. "Long enough. Maybe too long." It was a significant moment. Was she trying to say something? Russell swallowed hard and laid his fork down.

"Not loving you enough, honey?"

She sipped her wine, her eyes blinking rapidly; he could see she was becoming emotional and he had embarrassed her.

"I... we... he's away a lot. You know how it is." She attempted a smile.

"You look like the kind of woman who needs a lot of serious loving." He knew he was pushing it but it was always his way and he guessed she was on the brink.

"Excuse me." She threw her napkin on her half finished plate of food and made as if to run off. There were bright fever spots burning on her pale cheeks and her eyes were moist.

"No. Wait!" he rested his hand on hers. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

She sank back down and looked at him. "Is it so obvious? He hasn't touched me in...so long. I'm not a fool. I think he has someone else."

"And you?"

"I've never been that kind of woman." She wiped back a tear that he saw pooling on her lower lashes. 

"He's the fool, honey. If you were mine, I could never keep my hands off you." As he spoke he smiled shyly, almost embarrassed, no longer full of bravado. Its effect was instantaneous.

"Until now..." Cheri whispered.

"Meaning?"

"I was never that kind of woman - until now."

Russell cleared his throat and licked the side of his mouth. "Cheri, are you implying something here? Because I would hate to read this wrong."

Cheri finished the last of her wine and picked up her clutch bag. "My real name is Sophie. You should know that before we... I have a suite upstairs. This is the key card. Follow me up in a while. If you want to, that is."

She swept away from the table and he was left clutching the room card. He watched her go, more aroused than ever at her open invitation. Snapping out of his semi- trance, he noticed that other diners were watching surreptitiously and he thought he saw the lens of a camera disappearing from an open window. He smiled. "I'm fucked then. Might as well be for a sheep as a lamb!" And he called the waiter, paid the bill and strolled across nonchalantly to the elevator doors, sexually charged already at the thought of what was ahead.

The door clicked and he pushed on the handle. It was shady inside the room, the blinds drawn against the afternoon sun. He closed the door, set down the card on the hall table and made his way across the lounge.

"You came then," a soft voice called from the room to his right. Sophie was standing there, leaning on the doorway, still in the dress but no longer wearing shoes.

He shrugged, looking sheepish. "Your husband? He won't...make a sudden appearance?" 

She shook her head. "He's out on a trip. Looking at some new boat, ship, whatever. Won't be back until tomorrow..."

Russell gave her a look, eyes dancing, and a smile playing on his lips.

"Looks like we're alone then. Now let's see what I can come up with."

He walked over to where she stood and tilted up her chin. For a long while he gazed at her, stroking back the dark red waves of her hair and then he touched her lips lightly with his own. He felt her sigh and an eager response. She was hungry and needy; it was plain on her lips. His tongue pressed gently against her teeth. Her lips parted and this time she moved on him, drawing on his tongue and raising her hands to run through his hair, pulling him closer to her. Her hands tore at the band that tied back his long blond locks and she freed them, parting the clumps of hair with her fingers and moaning, sweet and low.

Russell ran his hands down her back and pressed her against him; she ground herself against his hardness as his fingers slipped to unzip the flimsy pink sheath. It fell to the floor. He gasped. Beneath she was naked. He cupped her small firm buttocks and squeezed gently as she opened his shirt and slid her hands down his chest, playing on his nipples, stopping to smooth through his chest hair and then down to feel the thicker line of hair beneath his navel.

"You know what comes next, Sophie? You sure, baby?" He whispered throatily in her ear.

"Are you Satan sent to tempt me?  Because I can't stop now, you beautiful devil," she whispered back.

He pulled away and eased off his shirt.

"I always wanted to see you in close up! Never thought I would get to feel you though, " she muttered.

Hands resting lightly on her arms, he walked her back to the bed and laid her down, parting her legs slightly and grinning wickedly." Oh, yes...I am the devil and you are going straight to hell with me, beautiful lady," and he lowered his head to lick along her inner thigh, placing a kiss on that tender spot where leg meets groin on either side. Then, parting her dark red curls, he opened her up to his gaze. Blowing gently on her, cooling her hot desire, he saw the glistening moisture and drank in her fragrance. With a whimper, he tasted her; she jumped at his touch.

"Oh my God, Russell, Oh my God," she gasped as his tongue lapped and his face burrowed against her. "Oh, please, oh God, I can't stand it." She began to thrash about and he had to hold her hips to calm her. Gently he took one hand and inserted a finger into her and then another and massaged her wet inner walls, searching for that one spot that would drive her over the edge. She groaned deeply; he had found it.

"Your fingers! They are so big. Oh, God, I'm going to come on your hand..."

"Do that, honey. Come for me. Let me give you some more. Jesus, you taste so sweet..." he lapped at her engorged knot of nerves and she bucked once and then came, writhing and calling his name. It was a sight to see. Kicking off his boots and socks, ripping off his pants, he lay next to her and held her, rubbing his aching cock against her pale slender thigh.

"I want you, Sophie. I wanna fuck you. You OK with that? I need to use something?"

"No! Just let me look at you first." She slithered down and took his cock in her hand. "Oh God, you are so beautiful. I've never seen a cock like this. Oh man, Russ, fuck me. I can't wait. No! Let me taste you first..."

Once liberated, Sophie was like a child on Christmas morning, unsure where to go first. But once her lips contacted with the tip of his cock, her tongue lapping his ridge and her hands working the skin up and down, sucking hard on him with her warm wet mouth, she made it crystal clear that this is where she wanted to linger. He let her continue until he was in the danger zone, teeth gritted, neck muscles straining to keep control. With a lunge he pulled her away and grabbed his base to squeeze down hard, rocking a little with the sensation.

"Fuck. I'll come if you... Christ, Ash, no one does it like you..."

"WHAT?"

The woman shot up and knelt beside him. He groaned and put his hands to his face. She burst out laughing.

"Call yourself a bloody actor! I knew you couldn't stay in role!"

"Ash, you're fucking me! I'm not usually under such pressure. Anyway, it's easy for you. You can call me by my real name..."

"Oh yeah, and talk in a fake accent and put up with your shit chat up lines... 'I'm the devil and I am taking you straight to hell'? What was that about? Sounds like some soft porn movie. I'm so glad you normally have a scriptwriter!" She rolled back. "I knew I'd win. Right, that means I get to pick."

He pushed her down and pinned her to the bed. "Pick what?" as he nuzzled her neck and sucked on her white exposed throat.

"Position, length of time of foreplay and I get to do nothing but lie back and enjoy - they were the terms, mate!"

He knelt above her, his hands holding her shoulders and his legs securing hers.

"How you gonna force me, love? You're not strong enough." He bent her legs up against her body and rested her feet flat against his chest. Kneeling close he entered her; she wriggled and groaned and he hit base.

"Christ, that is so deep," he muttered. "Rub yourself, Ash, can't reach you like this."

"Call me Sophie." She panted.

"Sophie." He growled.

"Yes, Jack?" she smiled cheekily. He responded by thrusting hard into her. 

"I'll wager I'll give you a right sound rogering, milady," he said through gritted teeth.

She breathed heavily and began to touch herself, moaning quietly.

"Good boy, Russ, I mean Ja..."

"Hmm?" he murmured as he pumped faster and harder, shunting her up and down, holding her feet against his chest to secure her.

"Just what I wanted. Knew I'd get my own....oh...fuck...I'm com..."

As he shot into her and she arched back, they came, both shuddering with the sensation. She looked at him, his long hair wild and knotted falling around his face and shoulders, his eyes half closed and mouth gasping for air. He watched her through his narrowed vision, lying languidly, lips parted, tongue appearing, hair spread back on the pillow before him.

He dropped and rolled to lie at her side, burying his face into her neck. "I love you. I love you. God, Ash, I love you. And I love the hair. Amazing. I didn't think that's what you would do... your eyes, green contacts...and your bush...shit, I nearly died when I saw you'd dyed that too! Did they do that at the salon? Did they know who you were?"

Ash giggled, "They'll dye anything you want - as long as you pay for it.  I gave them a false name, so don't worry."

"Which was?" he muttered as he kissed her neck and stroked the dark red curls of her sex; he was clearly enjoying them.

"Sophie Aubrey. Wife of Jack - sea captain. Thought you might like one."

"Fucking better than Cheri. Made me think of Cheri Blair- what a turn off! By the way, your New York accent's crap."

"I wasn't born there."

"Where were you born?"

"East."

"East what?"

"East bloody Yorkshire. I don't fucking know. I don't get paid for this, you know!"

She turned over and hung off the edge of the bed searching in his pocket for his cigarettes. He slapped her bum.

"Get off!"

"Don't wave it in my face then."

She snatched the packet of cigarettes, sat up, lit one and had a drag. "Thought you didn't approve," he said taking the cigarette off her and smoking it himself.

"Sophie smokes. Jack doesn't know but she has to have one vice while he's away."

"Now she's got two," he sniggered.

"Those women must have been made of sterling stuff. I'd have been bonking the errand boy or something if I'd been a sea captain's wife." Ash said staring at the ceiling thoughtfully watching his smoke curl upwards.

"Maybe she was." Russ leant on his elbow, smoking and watching her pensively. " Or maybe she just tightened her corsets. And took plenty of laudanum," he replied.

Ash sat up with a surprised look on her face. "Someone's been doing his homework. Are you trying to give me a history lesson, Crowe?"

"Well, you know fuck- all about the eighteenth century, clever dick."

"Early nineteenth." Ash responded, quick as a flash.

"Fuck off, Know -all."

Ash grabbed the cigarette and wrestled it from him, having another drag. "Bored the pants off me all that Napoleonic stuff. I hate Whigs and Tories and the Industrial Revolution- let me out of there! Give me a Roman any day."

"You are very intolerant."

"No, I'm a historian. We decry any period but our own. However, I have to say I like a man in breeches. Although I prefer them out of them...she pulled on his dick and he backed off, grinning.

He returned to snuggle back to her. She played with the long sideburns, ruffling them up and smoothing them down

"Russ, do you think the press got it?"

"Yeah, but to make sure, let's hang out on the balcony. Have a snog or something."

"Starkers?"

"No, Ash. Get some clothes on. I have my limits."

"Not going to pee over the balcony then?"

He grinned. "That story was exaggerated."

"Oh yeah? Exactly how? You either did or you didn't. It's like saying you are a little bit pregnant. My money's on that you did. Just sounds like you after a skin full- you did it in that motel in New Zealand..."

"That was on the ground floor. I just peed out of the window."

"You are so disgusting." He simply looked very pleased with himself and retorted: "Anyway I'm not discussing it. My lips are sealed."

"Your bladder wasn't."

They burst out laughing and rolled over, wrestling each other until their mouths met and they kissed.

"Happy Birthday, Ash." Russ whispered.

"Happy Birthday, Russell," she replied.

Mystery red head in romantic clinch with Crowe.

It appears that the libidinous Mr. Crowe is up to his old tricks. Who is the delicious red haired lady seen lunching with the muscle bound former Gladiator and Nobel prize winner (and soon to be sea captain) at the Four Seasons Hotel and then later taking in the view from the balcony of a suite there? As the picture above shows, he seems to have lost his shirt; she seems to be wearing it. Is domestic bliss proving too difficult for Crowe to maintain?

Phone rings. "Hello."

"No."

"Yes."

"Dom'nic"

"Dom- give me the phone." Ash grabbed the receiver. "I'm sorry, who is that please?"

"Er, it's Debbie. Look Ash, I think we need to talk. Is he there?"

"Who? Russ?"

"Yes. You two still speaking?"

"Me and Russ?" She started giggling. "Look at the picture, Debs. Carefully."

There was a silence. "It can't be! Is it? You?"

"Yes, it's me. Good, if I fooled you then I will fool the rest of the bastards."

"You cut your hair? Dyed it red? But the story says that he picked up the woman in the bar of the Four Seasons. Went to her suite. She's called Sophie Aubrey or something."

"Debs, that's the name of Jack Aubrey's wife! In the film. We set it up. It was a game. Pretty sexy really. Our belated birthday present to each other."

"Oh my God! They'll be so mad at this."

"Why? Can't I change my hair, meet my fella for lunch and have bit of afternoon nookie with him? So we faked the name. He's a celeb - bound to use a false name now and again. No story at all. They just jumped to the wrong conclusion."

"But it says Mark and he had words about her."

"Yes, Mark was brilliant. Should give him an acting job. I think he kept it going better than Russ but then he wasn't having his dick...Oh, never mind," Ash grinned at the memory.

"So everything's OK? I can put out some shit about it being you."

"If you like. Take your time. Let the wires go to town for a while. Let the websites hum. I'm going to enjoy this one."

"They'll get you for it."

"Then we'll just fuck them back. See ya, Debs."

Ash sat and looked at the newspaper photos. Even her own mother wouldn't recognise her. Dominic had though. He had known straight away. He just said "New hair." And that was it. Fortunately his father was taking longer to adjust. And he had told the truth when he had said "If you were mine, I'd never keep my hands off you'. If she had known his penchant for red hair she would have done this years ago. Glancing over, she watched him dozing in a chair. Poor baby, he was quite worn out...