Mick pulled his car into the driveway of his daughter’s house. He handed his keys over without even looking at the valet’s face.
He stood in the driveway, gazing up at the full scope of Nina’s home, and fixed the knot of his tie.
Mick was surprised by the sheer size of the house. Nina’s husband must have bought it. Brandon something. The tennis player. He felt his hackles go up.
“Are you …” Eliza Nakamura said to Mick as he walked past her, toward the front door.
Mick looked at her. She was good-looking. If it had been the right time, he might have given her his signature smolder, lifted the edges of his famous lips to give her a grin. But Mick had learned nearly twenty-five years ago that his gravitational pull was such that he had to repel anyone he did not wish to actively attract.
“Not now,” he said to the young woman.
Eliza turned away from him, annoyed, and moved on. She would tell people for the rest of her life that she’d met Mick Riva once and he was a dickhead.
Mick did not care if people thought he was an asshole as long as they left him alone when he did not want them and flocked to him when he did. He ignored each and every person in the front yard who stared at him as he walked by them and headed straight over the threshold of his daughter’s mansion.
There was an audible gasp from one of the cocktail waitresses when she saw him. That made the two bartenders over by the record players look up toward the door and they both did double takes.
Seeing the bartenders out of the corner of his eye, Greg Robinson, still rippin’ it up, moved his eye to the door and saw a legend he once knew years before standing there. His hand slipped and the record scratched.
Then everyone in the living room looked up at the door—a house full of stars all staring at the biggest star in the room.
The gasps and whispers started and within approximately forty-five seconds of Mick placing his foot in the house, the entire party knew he was there.
The entire party except for Casey Greens, who was hiding upstairs in the master bedroom, and Kit, who was with Ricky Esposito in her sister’s outdoor shower, and Jay, who was outside looking for Hud, and Hud, who was down at the beach, and Nina, who had locked herself in the pantry.
Hud spotted Jay out of the corner of his eye as he was making his way up the stairs with Ashley. The moment he saw him, his heart dropped. It was clear that Jay already knew what he’d resolved to tell him. Jay had the gait and the fury of a man recently made aware.
Hud turned back to Ashley briefly as they came up the path. He looked at her with warning and apology, and in his glance she knew what he was trying to tell her. This is going to get worse before it gets better.
Hud put his feet on the grass at the edge of the lawn and Ashley followed him and then stepped aside, out of the line of fire.
Jay was in Hud’s face in no time. “You are a real piece of shit,” Jay said. “You know that?”
“I know,” Hud said. He did not ask how much Jay knew or how Jay knew. He understood those questions would only serve to make things worse.
Jay shook his head, trying to speak but finding himself dumbfounded. What on earth could he possibly say that would come close to conveying his rage?
“Ashley and I are together,” Hud said. Ashley watched his face as he spoke, stunned at the forthrightness of his words, the evenness of his voice. “I fucked up in how I handled it. I lied to you and I went behind your back and I am sorry. But I love her.”
Hud caught Ashley’s eye for a brief second. “And she loves me.”
“Are you kidding me?” Jay screamed, losing control of his voice as he continued to speak, its volume rising higher and higher with every second. “That’s your defense?”
Hud stepped closer to his brother and had a moment of sharp clarity. He would see this thing through, he would face every moment of it. And he would come out the other side with a brother and a wife and a child.
“I’m an asshole,” Hud said. “I admit it.”
“That doesn’t even begin to—”
“No, it doesn’t. You’re right. But I need you to understand something. I’m not going to stop seeing her,” Hud said. “And I’m not going to let you stop speaking to me.”
A crowd had started to form and Jay was conscious of it—of the fact that every single person who became privy to this conversation was aware of his humiliation.
“So tell me what you need from me in order to put this behind us.”
“What I need from you?” Jay said. “What I need from you is to stop sleeping with my ex-girlfriend!”
“No,” Hud said, shaking his head. “My answer is no.”
When Jay lunged for Hud, it was not graceful. It was sloppy and scrappy and ugly. But it was effective. Before Hud even realized that his brother was aiming for him, his back was slammed down onto the lawn.
Jay swung with reckless abandon but Hud did not fight back. Hud’s upper-arm strength alone could have crushed his brother’s windpipe, shattered a rib. The lone joy of being the stocky one was that you were the stronger one. Jay on top of Hud—punching and elbowing and grabbing for whatever limbs he could—was like a whippet on a pit bull. But Hud would not further shame his brother.
Jay and Hud had borne witness to the full scope of each other’s lives. They had lived in the same rooms, wished on the same stars, breathed the same air, been taught and reared by the same mother and teachers. Been abandoned by the same father.
They had traveled the same beaches, trespassed in the same oceans, surfed the same waves, stood on the same boards. Made love to the same woman.
But they were not the same men. They were not haunted by the same demons, they were fighting for different things.
Ashley screamed as Jay’s fist made a crack against Hud’s nose.
“Fuuuuuuck!” someone screamed from the crowd that had gathered. Others gasped as the blood started to trickle down.
“Oh my God,” one of the women said over and over. “Someone do something!”
“Punch him again!” a man called from the back.
Some people started cheering for Jay. Others yelled at Hud to fight back. Ashley wept. And the two brothers—aching and bruised and bleeding—continued on.
Nina decided it was time to leave the pantry if only because the air was getting stale. But also because if this party wasn’t going to end anytime soon, she was at least going to try to enjoy it.
“All right,” she said, standing up. “Let’s go join the land of the living.”
“You do not have to,” Tarine said.
“I want to,” Nina said, holding her hand out for Tarine to lift herself up.
“I suppose I should check on Greg anyway,” Tarine said.
Nina opened the pantry door to see three girls standing by the breakfast nook, looking at her strangely. “It’s my pantry,” she said. “I can hide in it if I want to.”
She could hear a commotion out in the backyard but decided to ignore it. Instead, she walked toward the entryway and then stopped dead in place at what she saw.
Dad?
He was standing with his back to her but Nina recognized him instantly. His back was broad and sturdy and his shoulders were wide enough that, even with a jacket on, you could make out the perfect triangle they formed with his waist. His hair was grayer now, but the back of his head still looked exactly the way it had when she used to watch him watching television or running along the sand.
She felt both intense familiarity and staggering strangeness as she looked at him—this man she knew so well, this man she barely knew at all. The combination made Nina feel dizzy.
She pulled herself back behind the corner. “What the fuck is my dad doing here?” Nina asked. It was a rhetorical question, though she would have welcomed an answer.
“Your father?” Tarine said, truly shocked.
Tarine couldn’t help but peek around the corner to see for herself. “Wow,” she said, stunned. “Mick Riva. My God.”
Nina pulled her back. “Why on earth would he be here?”
“I assure you, I have no clue,” Tarine said, peeking again.
Nina searched for any reason that might explain it. “Maybe he needs a kidney or something.”
Tarine looked at Nina to see if she was kidding. Nina was dead serious. “I suppose that is possible,” Tarine said.
“Does he look sick?”
Tarine leaned over to get another look. Mick had turned around and Tarine could see his face. It was rugged and tan, all smiles. “No,” Tarine said. “Actually, he looks quite handsome.”
Nina was surprised at the pride she took in this fact. “Old?” she asked.
Tarine looked again. “He looks just like he does in the magazines.”
This Nina found to be the most helpful piece of information. If her father looked like he did in the magazines, then, in some way, Nina did know her father. Even if it was barely more than most Americans.
When she could hear her father’s voice booming around the corner, Nina decided that she did not want to see him or talk to him or find out what he wanted. At least not at the moment.
“OK,” Nina said. “I don’t have to deal with this right now if I don’t want to.”
“Yes, that is exactly right,” Tarine said.
Nina spotted a plate of cheese on the kitchen counter. “I’m going to eat this,” she said. She threw a hunk of cheddar into her mouth. Hello, old friend. Then she set her sights on the Brie.
Nina breathed in deep and then picked up the entire tray of cheese, ready to carry it with her. She set out to alert her siblings that their father was there, like she was a surfer girl Paul Revere. Mick is coming.
She did not immediately spot her brothers or her sister. And so, her first stop would be upstairs, to talk to the only person at this party who had actually been looking for Mick Riva.
2:00 A.M.
Vaughn Donovan walked in the front door already quite drunk. He was accompanied by an entourage that included his agent, his business manager, and four of his friends. As had become common for him, the women in the room all took note within a few minutes of his entrance. He threw an upward nod to say hi to a few of them, and then flashed his million-dollar smile. It felt good to be a movie star.
Back in high school in Dayton, Ohio, Robert Vaughn Donovan III did not make the football or the baseball team. But the moment he stepped into the school auditorium, he had found a home. With his quick wit and charmingly exasperated delivery of almost every line, he had the drama kids in stitches.
His dad’s college roommate was a Hollywood agent and by the time he was twenty, Robby had booked his second audition, started going by Vaughn, and swiftly made a career of starring in movies as the cute and nonthreatening boy next door who finally gets the girl.
Vaughn was now twenty-five years old and a bona fide star. But, while he would never admit it to anyone, he still sometimes felt like he needed to sleep with as many beautiful women as possible, go to as many Hollywood parties as possible, make as many movies as possible, as if someone was going to hit a buzzer and send him back to Dayton at any moment.
Vaughn rolled up the sleeves of his blazer and stepped farther into the foyer just as Nina rounded the corner and started up the stairs.
“Whoa,” he said as he saw her. “The actual Nina Riva is here in front of me this very second. Everyone’s dream girl.”
“Vaughn,” Nina said, holding the cheese plate with one hand and putting the other out to shake. “Hi.”
He was even more handsome up close. His boyish blue eyes were bright and clear. His shaggy brown hair was perfectly contained under his porkpie hat. His jawline was sharp but his skin was soft and pristine. Most people, Nina knew, lost some of their luster when you met them in the flesh. But Vaughn Donovan was gorgeous.
Vaughn took her hand and shook it. “I’m a big fan of yours,” he said. “Big fan.”
“Why, thank you,” Nina said, nodding. “I loved your last movie. Wild Night. It was great.”
“Thanks,” Vaughn said, smiling. “We’re thinking about doing a sequel. Maybe you can be in it.”
“Oh, that’s so nice of you,” Nina said. “Um, listen, I have to run real quick but I’ll be back down soon and we should talk.”
Vaughn nodded. And then as Nina turned away, he grabbed her arm. He took his other hand and brushed the edge of her shirt, just at the top of her rib cage. “This one isn’t as soft to the touch as I was hoping,” he said with a smile, then he winked at her.
Nina stared at him. She cycled through two breaths. “All right, Vaughn. I’ll be seeing ya,” she said and walked, briskly, up the stairs.
Just then, Vaughn’s business manager came out from the kitchen with four beers. He punched a hole in the bottom of one of the cans with a pen and put it to Vaughn’s mouth.
Vaughn cheerily popped the tab and shotgunned it. When he was done, he threw the can on the floor and shook his head. “Woooot!” he said. “Let’s get fucked up!”
A blond waitress walked by with coke and Vaughn smiled at her and took a line. She batted her eyes at him.
Bridger Miller came around the corner. “Whoa, man!” Bridger said, giving Vaughn a high five. They had not ever met before but fame is a secret club; everyone knows of one another.
“Bridger! Big fan, man!” Vaughn said. “I saw you in Race Against Time. The scene where you scale that building was unreal.”
“Thanks, thanks,” Bridger said, nodding. “I didn’t see your new one yet but my agent said it’s funny as hell.”
Vaughn smiled, pleased. “One day, maybe I’ll do the action thing.”
Bridger laughed. “Better than me trying to do comedy, I’ll tell you that.”
One of Vaughn’s friends, who happened to be standing by the china cabinet, said, “Hey, Vaughn! Weren’t you saying earlier that you wanted to play Frisbee?”
Before Vaughn could respond, his buddy took a plate out of the cabinet and flung it across the room to the opposite wall. It smashed into chunks and shards before its pieces even hit the floor.
Everyone turned to look at the cause of the commotion. But when Bridger chuckled, so did everyone else.
“Fuckin’ A, man,” Vaughn said, laughing. He strode over to the cabinet, picked a plate up himself, and threw it at the wall.
Bridger grabbed two more and flung them in quick succession. The two high-fived.
“All right!” Vaughn said.
Bridger grabbed another plate. “Everybody, let’s do this!”
Nina walked into her bedroom and locked the door behind her.
“Cheese?” she said to Casey, offering her the tray.
“I’m good,” Casey said. She felt sort of embarrassed to still be up there, in Nina’s bedroom. “Sorry, I didn’t know where else to go,” Casey added, by way of explanation.
“Don’t worry about it,” Nina said. “But, listen, Mick is downstairs.”
Casey looked shocked. If Nina had wondered whether Mick being here had anything to do with Casey, the expression on Casey’s face cleared it up.
“What do you mean Mick’s here? Like right now?” Casey said.
“Yeah,” Nina said as she walked into her closet. She kept the door open so she could continue to talk. There, she took off her gauzy shirt and her tight skirt and her oxygen-depriving tights and her torturous high heels. She stood in a bra and thong and then took both of those off, too. She grabbed a pair of white cotton underwear and pulled them up her legs and then put on a jock bra. She put on a pair of heather gray sweatpants, elastic at both the waist and the ankles. And a faded neon blue T-shirt that said O’NEILL across the chest.
Men were bullshit—people were bullshit—and Nina was not going to live through bullshit while wearing high heels a single second longer.
“I don’t know why he’s here,” Nina said. “But he’s here.”
Casey felt a rush of anxiety. She wasn’t even sure she wanted to meet Mick Riva yet, let alone
figure out what to say to him.
Nina threw herself onto her bed and lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. “I suppose you could go downstairs right now and ask him if he’s your dad,” Nina said. But even as she said it, she felt a twinge. It bothered Nina, the idea that Casey might manage to have more of a direct relationship with Mick than she did, that Casey might be unafraid to do the very thing Nina was avoiding. Saying hello.
Nina watched as Casey sat down on the bed next to her. “What is he like?” Casey asked.
Nina continued to stare up at the ceiling and answered as best she could. “I think he’s an asshole. But I can’t be sure. I don’t actually know him well enough to say.”
Casey watched as Nina continued to stare at the ceiling and breathe deeply, her chest rising high and falling.
“He sounds like a real winner,” Casey said as she lay down on her back next to Nina, staring up at the ceiling, too.
Nina turned to Casey. “Listen, I’m not sure … I mean, if you’re looking for family, there might be better ones to pick.”
Casey turned to Nina and smiled gently. “That’s not exactly how family works, is it?”
“No,” Nina said, shaking her head. “No, I guess it’s not.”
Mick reached the sliding glass door to the lawn and looked out at the crowd. He could tell someone was beating the shit out of someone else. But it wasn’t until he made his way to the edge of the circle that had formed around them that he suspected it might be his sons.
As he looked at the two men grappling on the ground, he had to admit an ugly truth to himself: It was not so easy, to recognize your own children after twenty years away.
He knew Jay from the magazines, much the same way he knew Nina. He wasn’t one hundred percent sure that the one on the ground was Hud. But, Mick reasoned, you probably don’t go to these lengths to beat the shit out of someone unless they are close enough to have really gotten under your skin. So he made an educated guess.
Malibu Rising: A Novel Page 26
