Perfect (Second Opportunities 2)

He gave her a disgusted look that mocked her assumption and said nothing.

Dirty Dancing had always been a favorite of Julie's. She loved the music and the dancing and the refreshing simplicity of the love story; she was just starting to enjoy all that when Zack drawled, "I think they used axle grease on Swayze's hair."

"Zack—" she said in a warning tone, "if you are going to start ripping this movie apart, I'm turning it off."

"I won't say another word. I'll just sit here."

"Good."

"And watch bad editing, bad directing, and bad dialogue."

"That does it—"

"Sit still," Zack said when she moved to get up. Thoroughly disgusted with himself for behaving like a jealous adolescent and denigrating actors who'd been his friends as well as criticizing a movie that was very good in its category, he laid his hand on her arm and promised, "I won't say another thing unless it's complimentary." In keeping with that promise, Zack did not utter another word until Swayze was dancing with the girl who played his dancing partner in the movie, and then he said, "At least she can dance. Nice casting there."

The blonde on the screen was beautiful and talented with a gorgeous figure. Julie would have cut off a limb to look exactly like her, and she felt an absurd stab of jealousy that was harder to hide when confronted with Zack's unprecedented moodiness. Added to that, she thought his deliberate omission of Patrick Swayze's dancing talent was unjust. She was on the verge of remarking on the fact that the women in the films all seemed to please him when it hit her that he might have been feeling the same way when she raved about his competition. Gaping at his stony profile, she blurted, "Are you jealous of him?"

He slanted her a look of withering scorn. "How could I possibly be jealous of Patrick Swayze!"

Obviously he did like watching beautiful women, Julie thought, and it hurt her even though she knew she had absolutely no right to feel that way. He also hated this movie and it was obvious. Keeping her face scrupulously polite, she reached for the stack of videotapes on the table and said quietly, "Let's watch Dances with Wolves instead. Kevin Costner was wonderful in that, and it's a story that would appeal to a man."

"I saw it in prison."

He'd seen most of the others there too, he'd said earlier today, so she didn't see what that had to do with anything. "Did you like it?"

"I thought it dragged in the middle."

"Really," she shot back, realizing now that none of the movies except his own was going to meet his approval and that she was going to have to suffer through it or else endure his mood. "How did you like the end?"

"Kevin changed it from the book. He should have left it alone." Without a word, Zack got up and headed for the kitchen to make some coffee, trying to get control of himself. He was so furious with his irrational and unjust remarks over both films that he mismeasured the amount of ground coffee twice and had to start over. Patrick Swayze had done a very nice job in the first film; Kevin had not only been a friend, but Dances with Wolves had earned him the acclaim he richly deserved, and Zack had been glad to see it happen.

He was so lost in his own thoughts that he didn't realize that Julie had switched movies until he was halfway across the living room with two cups of coffee. His steps faltered, and for a moment he stared in blank shock, then uneasiness at what she'd done. She'd not only switched movies and put in one of Zack's, she'd fast-forwarded it to a love scene in the middle of it and was watching it without sound. Of all the love scenes he'd ever played, this one in Intimate Strangers, released over seven years ago, was the most blatantly sexual. And in the moments he stood there, adjusting to the unreality of watching himself in bed with Glenn Close, in a movie he hadn't seen since it was released, Zack felt uncomfortable for the first time in his life over something he'd done in a picture. No, not what he'd done, he realized, but that Julie was watching him do it and with a stony blank look on her face that did not escape him. Nor did the fact that although she'd pretended not to be familiar with any of his films in the cabinet, she actually knew them well enough to know exactly where to find certain scenes in them. All in all, when he considered that cool look on her face along with the scene she'd deliberately chosen to watch, he had the distinct sensation of having been better of ten minutes ago when all he had to cope with was his own nonsensical jealousy. He put the coffee cups on the table and straightened, not certain exactly why she was suddenly so angry. "What's the idea, Julie?"

"What do you mean?" she asked with sham innocence, turning up the volume on the remote controller, her gaze riveted on the television screen.

"Why are you watching that?"

"Watching what?" Julie asked with an indifference that completely belied the twisting ache in her stomach at the sight of Zack's hands on Glenn Close's body, his mouth on hers in a torrid kiss like the ones he gave Julie, his tanned torso gleaming against the stark white of a sheet that barely covered his hip.

"You know exactly what I mean. First you acted like you'd never seen a movie of mine in that cabinet and didn't care to, and when you do decide to watch one, you go directly to a scene like this."

"I've seen all your movies," she informed him, watching the television set and refusing to look at him when he sat down beside her. "I have most of them, including this one, on videotape, I've watched this particular one at least a half-dozen times." She nodded toward the picture. "How's the lighting there?"

Zack pulled his gaze from her rigid features and flicked a glance at the television screen. "Not bad."

"What about the acting?"

"Not bad."

"Yes, but do you think you did a good enough job with that kiss? I mean, could you have kissed her deeper or harder just then? Probably not," she answered herself bitterly. "Your tongue was in her mouth already."

She was making her point eloquently, and now that he understood what was eating her, he regretted everything he'd said that had ultimately caused her to do this. He'd never imagined it would upset her to watch him do anything in what was, to him, simply a movie, a performance given in the presence of dozens of people on a sound stage.

"How did you feel when she was kissing you back like that?"

"Hot," he said. When she flinched at the word he used, he clarified quickly, "The lights were hot—too bright—I could tell they were, and I was worried about it."