“I’d kill to look like you, Emerald,” said Kathy. “How do you stay so slim?”
“Nerves,” she said.
Kathy glanced at Simone, raised a discreet eyebrow.
Emerald emerged jingling from the closet, four or five cocktail dresses clutched in her frail, musical arms. “My assistant just left with a bunch of my old Cambria clothes. We’re donating them to a PETA auction, but it’s too bad because there were a lot more size fours in there, and—” She was interrupted by the theme from Suburban Indiscretions ringing out from the coffee table shrine. Simone was confused until she realized it was coming from a cell phone—as tiny and delicate as its owner—that had been placed behind the Buddha.
Emerald dropped the dresses on her couch, picked up the phone, and looked at her caller ID. Her eyes went hard. The cell phone was dotted with pink and green crystals. She threw it across the room, and it hit her closet and fell to the floor, some of the crystals flying off, the theme song still playing for several uncomfortable beats. Emerald stood there, stone quiet, her arms trembling.
“Telemarketer,” she said, finally. “Try that Dolce and Gabbana, Brittany. I think it would be perfect on you.”
The Dolce and Gabbana was a wisp of a slip dress in pale pink silk. It was not something you wanted to sweat in, even once, but it was amazing looking. Simone held it up to herself, admiring her reflection in Emerald’s full-length mirror before it hit her that, a couple of feet away, the cell phone still lay sprawled open on the floor. She stole a glimpse at the screen:One missed call. Keith.
Emerald said, “I’ve got some shoes that might work, too.”
Simone swallowed hard.
“Great!” said Kathy. “Isn’t that great, Brittany?”
“Yeah. I . . . I love shoes.” Simone closed her eyes for a few seconds and tried to shake the image out of her brain. The delicate silver straps, the stiletto heel crusted with blood. Nia Lawson’s blood. . . .
“Check these out,” Emerald said.
When Simone opened her eyes, the actress was standing in front of her holding a pair of white size seven Prada mules that looked as if they’d never been worn. The question filled her head: Why did you have Nia Lawson’s shoe? But she couldn’t ask it. Not unless she wanted Emerald to know she’d been through her trash. Simone’s mouth was dry. “My size,” she managed to say.
“You okay?” said Emerald.
“Sorry,” said Simone. “I’m just a little—”
“Starstruck.” Kathy said the word like a well-intentioned slap across the face.
Per Kathy and Emerald’s request, Simone slipped on the mules and walked the length of the trailer. The heels were practically two-dimensional, so she teetered a bit at first, but before long she had the hang of it. “You look like a model, sis,” said Kathy.
Simone glanced at Emerald. She was holding the cell phone, staring at the screen. “Either of you girls married? ” Emerald asked.
“Divorced,” said Kathy. Her gaze dropped to the floor.
Emerald nodded. “How long ago?”
“Three years.” Kathy’s voice went quiet. “He left me because . . . I . . . Wow. I can’t believe it’s still so hard to say.”
Emerald glanced at Simone, who tried her best to look as if she knew what Kathy was talking about.
“I used to have a coke problem,” Kathy said.
Whoa. Simone stared at her fellow reporter as she looked back up at Emerald, eyes watering slightly. “I . . . I’m sorry.”
“Nothing to be sorry for,” said Emerald.
“You know what? You’re right,” Kathy said. “I learned in rehab to stop acting like I’d screwed up on purpose. They didn’t even want me to call it a coke problem. Because it’s not a problem. It’s an illness. And you know what? It is really easy to catch. Cocaine . . . there’s something so . . . seductive about it.” She directed her soft, Disney princess gaze at Emerald’s face. “You know what I’m saying?”
Damn, she is good.
But Emerald did not take the bait. “How about you, Brittany? You live alone or what?”
Simone nodded.
“Good for you,” she said. “I intend to live alone until I’m at least thirty. You don’t really know yourself until you’re out of your twenties, and you sure as hell don’t know who to fall in love with. . . .” She ran a hand over her eyes and turned away. “Sorry. I don’t know how much longer I can socialize.”
“That’s okay,” said Kathy. “Listen, do you mind if my sister uses your bathroom to try on the dress? She’s a little shy.”
“Not at all.”
Simone said, “Why are you being so nice to us?”
“Because she’s a nice person, Brittany.”
Simone got it. The snap of the tone, the narrowed, cautionary eyes. Kathy was telling her to hurry up and snoop in the bathroom while she still had a chance. But there were times, times like this, when Simone’s curiosity truly burned. When her need to know answers trumped every other need, every other thought. “There was a whole group out there, and nobody else cared whether or not we got put in a scene,” she said. “You’ve obviously been having a crappy day.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“But you don’t know us from a crack in the wall. We could be stalkers. We could be—”
“Brittany has a kick-ass imagination. Our mom thinks she should write romantic suspense.”
“I helped you guys because I’ve got good intuition about people.” Emerald glanced at her cell phone. “Usually. ”
Simone turned her gaze back to the shrine.
Emerald looked at Kathy. “You know what?” she said. “I also thought it was great the way you stood up for Brittany. I always wished I had a big sister like you.”
“Are you an only child?” Kathy said.
“Sort of,” said Emerald. “I . . . had a brother.”
“Had?” Simone thought and said the word at the same time.
A deep pain crept into Emerald’s huge, glittering eyes; she closed them, almost as if to savor it. “Oz,” she said.
“Your brother’s name was Oz?”
“Emerald and Oz. My dad believed in magic. He still does.” When she opened her eyes, a tear had trickled down her cheek, but she didn’t wipe it away. “You’d better try that dress on, Brittany.”
Simone brought the dress into the bathroom. Through the door, she heard Emerald say, “I still wish I had a big sister.”
“Why?” said Kathy.
“Protection.”
It wasn’t until she slipped the dress over her head that Simone remembered she was supposed to look for evidence of a coke addiction, but there were no stray razor blades, no origami-like paper bundles, no tiny mirrors blurred with traces of powder.
Protection, she thought. From what—Keith’s cheating? The tabloids? That pain in her eyes?
“Come on out and show us the dress, Brittany,” Emerald called.
“Coming!” Simone made for the door, but stopped short when she noticed the sink. It was gleaming white, except for a pool of dark red liquid, just in front of the stopper. Blood.
THREE
Once they’d left Emerald’s trailer and were out of her earshot, Simone told Kathy about the blood in the sink. “Could be Santeria,” Kathy replied.
“Um ... what?”
“She’s obviously into alternative religions,” she said. “Maybe she sacrificed a mouse—bled it out, flushed the carcass down the toilet.”
Simone stared at her. The very fact that Kathy could utter a sentence like that, and in the same tone of voice someone might use to speculate about Botox usage . . . well, if nothing else, it spoke volumes about the fifteen years she’d spent working for a supermarket tabloid. “You honestly think—”
“All I know is, it doesn’t say she’s doing coke, which means we’ve got to go hit up the set-siders.” She spotted a group of Teamsters and batted her lush eyelashes.
“Wait, Kathy.”
Reluctantly, sh
e turned back to Simone.
“I don’t know if this has anything to do with the blood . . . I don’t know why it would, but . . .” She took a breath. “I found Nia Lawson’s shoe in Emerald’s trash.”
Kathy raised her eyebrows. “The other shoe? The Cinderella slipper?”
“Yes. Silver Jimmy Choo. . . . It even had blood on it—of course, Nigel thought it was wine sauce.”
“You showed it to Nigel?”
“Yeah, and he made me throw it out.”
Kathy shook her head. “I’m not surprised.”
“Why?”
“Let’s just say Nigel is not much of a Nia Lawson fan.”
Simone squinted at her. “What do you mean by that?”
“Never mind, it’s not important.” Kathy examined her face in her compact. “Word of advice, honey. When you’re infiltrating, try not to ask direct questions. It’s like . . . shooting off with no foreplay.”
“Okay. But . . . wait. Are you leaving me?”
“We’ll do better apart—attract less attention, come away with twice as much information.”
“But I’m not ready.”
“Sure you are,” Kathy said. “Remember, you’re young and cute. That’s powerful stuff in this business, so feel it. Work it.”
“Exactly what business do you mean?” said Simone.
She smiled. “See you later, hon. If you need me, call my cell.”
As she watched her coworker gliding toward the grinning Teamsters in the strapless size four she’d borrowed from Emerald, Simone whispered the question again: “Exactly what business do you mean?”
She felt a tap on her shoulder, and when she turned around she saw him—the authority figure with the unsettling blue stare. Oh, wonderful.
“Can I talk to you in private?”
“Uh . . . okay.” What else could she say? She followed him away from the trailers, over the long stretch of lawn to a large oak tree.
“How are you enjoying your experience as an extra?”
Avoiding the burning eyes, Simone examined the man. He wore a white oxford shirt and jeans. He was good-looking in an intense, sleepless kind of way and his dark hair was tousled—but not artfully so. Parts of it stood on end, as if he frequently dragged his hands through it in pure frustration. Director. That’s what he had to be. Maybe one of the writers. A writer being friendly. Welcoming an out-of-towner to the set. That made sense. “I’m liking it a lot. I’ve never done extra work before.”
“You want to act?” he said. “That why you’re visiting from Utah?”
“I’m just spending time with my sister. And . . . you know. I’m a really big fan of the show.”
He gave her a hard, withering look, and Simone remembered what Kathy had told Jeff: Her goal in life is to be on Suburban Indiscretions.
Damn. . . . “Actually, I’ve always . . . yes . . . yes, I do want to act. I was just shy to say it because Suburban Indiscretions is my all-time favorite show, and—”
“How would you like a speaking part? It’s an extra hundred and seventy-five bucks, and it’ll work toward getting your SAG card. It wouldn’t happen ’til late, though. You have plans for this afternoon . . . early evening?”
You mean besides the Emerald Deegan interview? “Well, I—”
“I thought so.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m on to you.”
“Excuse me?”
He smiled, but only with his mouth. “I know you work for a tabloid,” he said quietly. “I know your friend does too. So you have two choices. You can either take your friend, leave now, and no one finds out, or I tell the executive producer what I know, and you both get thrown off set. In front of everybody.”
He watched her face, waiting. But he didn’t need to wait long. The choice was an easy one.
“What did you say the name of that guy was who threw us out?” said Kathy. This was the third time in the past half hour she’d asked Simone this question; it had officially crossed the line from rhetorical to hostile.
“I never got his name, Kathy. I told you that.”
“Sorry. I just found it so hard to believe I had to ask again.”
They were sitting in the reporters’ room. Now that she was actually working in here, Simone saw what a scary, Orwellian place it was, with six identical desks lined up two by two, identical spotless computers placed squarely on top of all of them. There was nothing on the walls, nothing else in the room other than the TV, because Nigel believed personal touches—family photos, keepsakes, even pictures of favorite celebrities—revealed reporters’ weaknesses to potential spies. If Kathy were to display her autographed headshot of Justin Timberlake, for instance, and the night maid turned out to be an agent for the Interloper, she’d know exactly which front-row tickets might tempt Kathy Kinney into revealing the details of next week’s cover story. Nigel had explained all of this to Simone, and with a straight face. Obviously, he’d been in this business about ten years too long.
“So,” Kathy said, “just to be clear, you got us thrown off a TV set by someone whose name and credentials you never even bothered to get.”
A male voice said, “Take it easy on her, Kathy. It’s her first day.”
Kathy broke into an idiotic grin. And when Simone turned toward the sound of the voice, she could see why. In the reporters’ room doorway Nigel stood alongside the most breathtakingly gorgeous man Simone had ever seen. “Simone Glass, Matthew Varrick,” Nigel said. “He does most of our on-record interviews, as he can talk the knickers off a nun.”
“Hi, Simone,” said Matthew.
She sat there, gaping at those full, sensuous lips, the powerful arms encased in that enviable black T-shirt, the golden curls and glittering green eyes, thinking, Talk? He talks? Why would he ever need to talk?
If Simone was going to work with Matthew Varrick on a daily basis, she’d need to treat him like the sun and not look at him directly.
“You’ve got to remember, Kath,” Matthew said, “it takes a little while to get as savvy as you.”
“Sorry, Simone,” Kathy said.
“I understand,” she replied, both women looking down at their hands like chastised children.
As Nigel headed into his office, Matthew said, “I heard you guys met Emerald today. What’s she like?”
Kathy turned to Simone. “Matthew’s going to be doing the interview.”
“She’s definitely mad at Keith,” Simone said to her computer screen. “She had a brother who died a long time ago.”
“You see any rolled-up bills lying around her trailer? She touch her nose a lot? Take a phone call from someone who could have been a dealer?”
“None of the above,” said Kathy.
“Damn.”
Simone kept watching her screen, and then an image entered her mind and hovered there: the dark red pool just in front of the stopper—still glistening, still fresh. “There was some blood in her sink.”
“Really?” said Matthew. “A lot?”
“Enough. . . .” Simone thought about how confident Emerald had seemed when she first asked her and Kathy into her trailer. How happy . . . as if, for a short time, she’d relieved the pain that later brought those tears, that later made her say, I don’t know how much longer I can socialize. Then, again, Simone pictured that circle of blood—wet and telling in the pristine sink. “I mean . . . now that I think about it, just before she asked us into her trailer she could have been . . .”
“Injecting,” Matthew said.
“Yeah.”
Simone felt his glittering gaze lingering on her profile. “You’re just as sharp,” he said, “as you are cute.”
Her mouth twitched into a grin. One pair of knickers, coming right up.
“Jesus, you guys are right,” said Kathy. “Those bracelets. . . . She could be covering—”
“Track marks,” Simone said.
“I can’t believe I thought Santeria. What is wrong with me?”
“Track marks�
��fantastic,” said Matthew. “Now all I have to do with the questioning is find a way in.”
“Honey, if anybody can find a way in . . .”
“You make me blush, Kath.”
Simone recalled the shoe in Emerald’s garbage bag, the stain on the heel. So much blood around one small woman. “Can you ask Emerald if she knew Nia Lawson? ”
“Why?”
“Simone thinks she may have found the Cinderella slipper in Emerald’s trash,” Kathy said. “Nigel made her throw it out though.”
Matthew nodded. “Nigel is not much of a Nia fan.”
“I told her.”
He looked at Simone. “For you,” he said, “I will ask her.”
Before Simone was able to respond, the receptionist’s soothing voice piped up from the speaker phone: “Get ready, Matty!” and Nigel was back in the doorway, telling Kathy and Simone, “Please make yourselves scarce. Emerald Deegan and her PR are in reception.”
Kathy and Simone stood in the small office supply room as Matthew, Muzzy, and Emerald passed. Simone heard Emerald say, “Keith told me a year ago he was over the whole stripper thing.”
Matthew said, “If you don’t mind my saying, I don’t know why any guy who had you would ever even look at another—” Nigel’s door closed. Kathy opened the office supply room door and they headed back into the reporters’ room. “Matthew’s cute, huh?” she said.
“He’s okay, I guess,” said Simone. “I mean . . . if you like that Greek-god-meets-Michelangelo’s-David-only-better-looking type.” As quietly as she could, she moved toward Nigel’s closed door.
“You’ll get used to Matthew,” Kathy said. “It just takes a little . . . Hey, what are you doing?”
Simone brought a finger to her lips, pressed her ear against the door until she could make out voices . . . Matthew’s first: “How do you cope with it? Your lover of two years, your best friend in the world, cheating on you. . . .”
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