Chapter 13
Nothing was too hard or too dirty for him to attempt.
—Gertrude Chandler Warner, The Boxcar Children
Still feeling raw, Dancy unloaded her purchases and parked the Range Rover in the garage, where it was still the only vehicle.
On her way back to the caboose, a red Ferrari squealed to a stop in the driveway. Roth jumped out in one of his quick Cole
Legend moves. If it had been a convertible, he’d have vaulted over the door.
“Where have you been? I’ve been trying to call you all morning.” His too-dark hair flopped over his forehead in a way that
everyone but her found charming.
“My phone died. I’m recharging it now.”
“If you’re going to take this project seriously, I have to be able to reach you.”
She needed to know. “What exactly do you mean by taking it seriously? What do you have in mind?”
“Get your script. Then we can talk.”
Your script? Her heart hammered. She wanted to press him, but not while they were standing in the driveway and he could drive
away in an instant. “I’ll meet you on the boathouse roof.”
“The house is more comfortable.”
She wouldn’t go in the house, and she didn’t want Roth in the caboose. “It’s too nice a day to be inside. The fresh air will
do us good.”
“Hurry up then. I don’t like leaving Bisa for long. My new assistant found a private house nearby, and we’re renting it for
a couple of days so we can have our own space.”
“You’re staying?”
“I told you. This project is important to me. And being around you makes Bisa nervous.” He narrowed his eyes. “You were out
of line last night.”
“Brush up on prenatal care. Then you can thank me.” She stopped herself before she said more and hurried to the caboose to
grab the script. Your script, he’d said. Tiny threads of hope unspooled inside her.
Fortunately, it was a clear day with little wind, and Roth was waiting on the boathouse roof. He stared at Watch, who darted
ahead of her on the stairs. “What’s with you and that dog? If you were getting a pet, you should have at least bought a decent
one.”
She—and maybe Clint—were permitted to comment on Watch’s shortcomings, but no one else. “He happens to be a very rare breed,”
she improvised. “A petite clumber shepherd pointer hound.”
“He looks like a mutt.”
“Shows what you know. These dogs were bred for hunting by Ptolemy the Fourteenth. But we’re not here to talk about my dog. Are you dyeing your hair?”
“Unlike you, I believe in taking care of myself.” His eyes swept over her, from T-shirt to shorts to slides. “You’re not looking
good. If you want to hang on to Clint Garrett, you’d better step up your game.”
“Thanks for your concern,” she drawled, then quickly moved on to what she really wanted to know. “Is the script green-lit?”
“Of course it is, I’m producing and starring. Do you really believe any studio in town would turn me down?”
“Not if they’re smart. And it’s a wonderful script. I haven’t read a woman’s part this interesting in years.”
“It was made for you. Tell me what you think about Tom.”
“You’ve been looking for a role exactly like this.” She suspected even his agent didn’t know how much Roth wanted to be taken
seriously as an actor, although Valerie Evers, his producing partner, knew.
He’d set his script on a small table positioned between a pair of woven chairs where a forest green umbrella would keep them
in the shade. “Let’s read. How about it? Just like old times, right?”
“It was the best part of our marriage.”
They both knew that was true. They began reading the first scene where Lucinda and Tom are unpacking boxes in their new apartment,
a place they couldn’t afford but had convinced themselves they needed to have. Roth’s reading of Tom was flat, and all Dancy
managed to convey about Lucinda was her bitchiness. They moved to the next scene, and she began experimenting with different
interpretations, trying to find Lucinda’s vulnerability.
Roth stayed locked into his original interpretation, and she finally stopped them. This was where she knew more than he did. “Let’s go again from the beginning. I want to try something different with Lucinda, and you’re distancing yourself.”
“What do you mean?”
“Cole Legend has crept in.”
“Shit. You’re right. From the top.”
They’d turned back the clock to what had always worked for them. Dissecting a script together brought out their best—analyzing
the characters, creating backstories, and looking for the beat changes in a scene—those small shifts where a character makes
some kind of change. Roth had criticized everything about her except the way she approached a script. He knew she always made
him better.
TOM
You had a good time getting cozy with Ethan at the party last night.
LUCINDA
He had a good time getting cozy with me.
(pulling out a box of baseball cards)
I thought you were getting rid of these.
TOM
I am.
LUCINDA
When?
TOM
When you tell Ethan to keep his hands off you.
LUCINDA
(laughing)
You love it when other men come on to me.
TOM
(taking the baseball cards away and kissing her)
I feed on their envy.
“Hold on.” Dancy stopped them again. “You’re missing a beat.”
“Where? I don’t see it.”
“The baseball cards. When he says, ‘I am.’ Those are loaded words. He’s held on to the cards for a reason. They’re significant
to him.”
“I see what you mean.” He scribbled a note in the margin of his script. “Okay, let’s try it again.”
The work was intense, and after two hours they’d barely made it through the first half when Roth announced he needed to get
back to Bisa.
“Tell me more about the project,” Dancy said. “Who’s directing?”
He smiled. “All I’m saying now is that you’ll be happy.”
She had the part. She wanted to dance across the deck. Instead, she smiled back at him. “Thanks, Roth. Thanks for this.”
“Thank you.” As he gathered up his script, they made plans to meet the next day. “I’ll text you the rental address.” With a cocky salute,
he was off.
She hugged herself. Roth had dropped the opportunity of a lifetime in her lap.
She understood him well enough to know he wasn’t casting her out of altruism.
He had a selfish streak a mile wide, and regardless of how confident he seemed, he’d be playing against type, so this film was a major risk for him.
But he was comfortable with her as an acting partner, and he understood marketing.
Casting the two of them in a marital drama guaranteed big press for the film.
That was fine with her. All she wanted was the chance to do good work.
She returned to the caboose and stepped over the Persian rug she’d left rolled on the platform. Instead of unpacking what
she’d bought, she took the children’s drawing pad from the cupboard, found a pen, and with her script in hand, climbed into
the cupola, where she could study the notes she’d made and begin the serious task of developing a character.
The work invigorated her, and if Watch hadn’t eventually demanded her attention, she would have stayed there for hours. She
made a sandwich for herself and took him on a long walk. When they returned, she checked the garage. Only the Range Rover
was inside. Clint’s truck was still missing.
It was an eight-hour trip to Nashville, and Clint was tired by the time the condo door opened. Mick Watkins hadn’t stayed
in Minnesota, maybe because he had two ex-wives there.
“Garrett!” Mick looked like a mangy golden retriever ready to drool all over him. “Great to see you! Fuck, man, you should
have told me you were in town. I’d have cleaned this place up. Come on in.”
Clint looked around at a bachelor pad gone bad.
Three of the walls were painted black. The fourth was mirrored with glass shelving holding a sizeable liquor collection.
A foosball table sat beneath a giant-screen TV, and a bulky coffee table rested on a zebra print rug.
The most offensive object in the room was the large painting hanging above a white leather couch—a semi-abstract of a pigtailed little girl tugging her panties down.
Even after Clint peeled his eyes away, the image was acid-etched on his eyeballs.
Mick had kept his hair, but he’d grown a paunch and still wore too much cologne. In his high school days, it had been an overdose
of Paco Rabanne. Now it was something too heavy on musk. “What are you drinking these days? I’ve got it all. Macallan, Glenlivet,
Johnnie Walker Blue. Pick your poison.”
“I’m not staying that long.”
“You can’t run off. Have a drink, and then we’ll head over to the best steak house in Nashville so we can catch up.” Mick
sprawled on the couch between a pair of floor lamps made of industrial pipe. “Take a seat, man. How’s that ankle? You got
pretty banged up last season.”
Clint didn’t move. “The ankle’s doing fine.”
“That’s good.” With Clint still standing, Mick began to look uncomfortable. “I’m in broadcasting now. Calling pro soccer games
for a couple of the streamers.”
“I heard.” Clint wandered over to investigate a wooden shelf near the front door and saw Mick’s high school trophies on full
display.
“The pay’s okay,” Mick went on, “but it’s not like calling games for ESPN or the networks, and you know me—ambitious.” Mick
slung his arm over the back of the couch, regaining his cocky confidence. “This is confidential, but there’s a big announcement
coming next week.”
Clint turned away from the trophy shelf. “Yeah, I heard you got a network offer.”
“A damn good offer.” Mick’s smile was smug. “Hard work pays off. How’d you hear?”
“I have friends.” Clint wandered to the foosball table, then angled his head toward the piece of kiddy porn hanging over the
couch. “Your taste in art is shit.”
Mick’s smile faded. “That painting cost me three grand.”
“It’s shit.” Clint picked up the ball from the foosball table and ran it between his fingers. “Like you.”
Mick sprang to his feet. “What’s your problem, man?”
“Me? I’m fine. You’re the one who has a problem.” Clint flicked the foosball from one hand into the other. “I ran into Dancy
Flynn. She told me quite a story about you.”
Mick tugged on the neck of his polo shirt as if it were choking him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you do.” The nervous tic Mick suddenly developed confirmed Dancy’s story, not that Clint needed confirmation. He continued
to toss the ball. “April. Senior year. The night you raped her.”
“Dude, I never raped her!”
“That’s not the way she tells it.”
His jaw jutted. “She was into me! Everybody knew that!”
“Really?” Clint palmed the ball and rolled it in his fingers. Acting on instinct, he called an audible. “Were all of them
into you?”
Mick’s face engorged with animosity. “Whatever Dancy told you . . . whatever any of those other girls said. They’re all liars.”
So there were others, just as Clint had figured.
“Bad news, Mick.” He set the ball carefully back on the table.
“The network job you’re so happy about fell through.
I called a couple of my buddies, and it turns out that none of the networks want a rapist working for them.
Too much hassle. The same goes for ESPN.
” He shrugged. “I haven’t talked to the streamers yet, but I’ll get around to it next week. ”
Mick’s eyes bulged as his face grew florid. “You can’t do that! You can’t do that to me!”
“I already did.” Clint headed for the door but stopped at the high school trophy shelf. “I guess you keep these around to
impress the teenage girls?” He picked up the nearest trophy and, with one clean sweep of his arm, hurled it at the offensive
painting. As the canvas ripped, he picked up a second trophy and launched it across the room where it shattered the mirrored
wall, sending liquor bottles and glass shelving crashing to the floor.
Mick shrieked. Clint let the door crash against the wall as he walked out. Mick hurled himself into the open doorway, his
face contorted with rage, spit flying. “I’m calling the cops!”
“You do that. I look forward to talking to them.”
“What do you care?” he screamed. “They were sluts! All of them!”
“Damn . . .” Clint muttered, “I wasn’t going to do this.”
He took the steps in a single stride. Mick backed away, fear in his eyes. Clint’s first punch landed in Mick’s gut. The second
was an upcut to his jaw. Howling in pain, Mick sprawled to the porch stoop.
Clint looked down at him. “Consider that a message from Dancy. And all the others.”
He walked back to his truck rubbing his knuckles. Nothing he’d done could erase the pain those women had gone through, but
he felt better.
As he climbed behind the wheel of his truck, his eyes were gritty with fatigue. He hadn’t slept much last night, and he’d left the house early. It would be dark soon, and he wasn’t in any shape to drive back tonight, but if he didn’t leave now . . .
He shoved his sore hand through his hair. Five days ago, he’d told Dancy she could only stay for a week. Tomorrow was day
six. What if she took him at his word and decided to leave early?
He pulled away from the curb and headed north.