Exposing Alix Read Online Free PDF Page A

snapped.
    “And?”
    “He looked like he was having sex with a stranger.”
    “Exactly my point. He thinks love is a fantasy someone
dreamed up to sell greeting cards. He’s a damn fine director, and most of the
film is beautifully shot, but the love scenes…well, they’re terrible. None of
the emotion I want to see is there. You, on the other hand, make sex look like
a ballet. Women wept when they saw Through the Window . I want them to
feel that way about Salva’s Revenge . I want the members of the Academy
to feel that way. I want my Oscar.”
    “I’ve never consulted on a movie before. I wouldn’t know
what to do.”
    “It’s simple. You’ll give him your opinion, and he’ll take
it because he’ll realize you’re right. He’s a smart man, and he wants that
Oscar almost as much as I do. You may be hopeless with men, but you’ve never
been a wallflower when it comes to your movies.”
    “I’m not hopeless with men,” she muttered. “I just don’t
like dating them.”
    “Some people might argue that dating is an essential
prerequisite to a relationship.”
    “Some might argue that men in LA don’t do relationships,
so what’s the point of dating?”
    “You haven’t lived in LA for three years,” he reminded
her. “And you moved from LA to a god-forsaken town with exactly two eligible
bachelors, both of whom you have soundly rejected. Some might argue—”
    “He told me it would only take a month,” she interrupted,
to stem the fruitless argument. “I don’t want to be gone longer than a month.”
    “Fine, set whatever limits you want. But come to LA. Bring
your puppy with you if you must, but get out of that house. Even if you didn’t
need the money, Alix, I’d tell you to come. It isn’t healthy for you to lock
yourself away from people. I know you like to think you’re a tortured artist
who needs her privacy, but darling, you need to get out.”
    “I do get out,” she protested. “I came to visit you at
Christmas.”
    “Yes, and that was six months ago. You never stopped
working the whole time you were here, and you only had dinner with me twice.
And one of those times was Christmas Eve.”
    The conversation was becoming too familiar to continue.
“Gunther, I appreciate your concern, but I’m fine. Let’s just drop it, okay?
I’ll go to LA and help your little movie star, but then I’m coming straight
home. I’m finishing the book this year. It’s going to happen.”
    “And then what? What’s going to happen when you finish
it?”
    The question sent a zing right to the pit of her stomach.
“Okay, I guess it’s time to go now,” Alix said cheerily. “I’ll give Ryker a
call and let him know I’m coming.”
    There was a brief pause. “Alix, the book isn’t going to
change anything. You know that, don’t you?”
    “Great, so I’ll talk to you later. Good-bye!” Alix ended
the call and stared at the screen.
    Sometimes, she hated the book.
    When she’d started it, she and Gunther had both loved the
idea: Alix would use her photographs to show how love transformed the act of
sex. Gunther thought it would appeal to a broad audience. They could
simultaneously attract women, who were looking for love, and men, who were
looking for sex. But he thought the project should take only a few months. He
thought Alix could interview a few couples, write some cheesy narrative to run
under the pictures, and send it to press. He never really understood what she
was trying to do.
    The book was about real love, not infatuation or
attraction. When she was making films, Alix had worked with fantastic actors,
people who were professional and, in most cases, genuinely liked each other.
They brought emotion and realism to her scenes that was beautiful to watch. But
she didn’t want to make stories about fake love. She wanted the real thing.
    That was why she was making the book. The couples she’d
photographed truly loved each other, and they radiated that feeling throughout
their