49 Elena
Elena
Rain taps at the windows, like it would prefer to be let in.
As if in defiance, the lights have been turned up to industrial-level brightness.
A glance over her left shoulder reveals Cal clinking away in the kitchen.
Elena is drained. They’ve been working for two hours already.
She read through her lines, changed her inflection, read through them again.
They went through it several times, using the entire length of the room as their set.
The real scene will involve a horse—standing next to one, not riding one, thank god.
It’s not a major part, and she had it down pat an hour ago, but Cal suggested they run through again and again so he could rehearse his own lines.
She was glad they did. It will be different on set tomorrow morning, of course, but for now she thinks she’s got it.
She hid a smile when he told her she elevated the scene.
Her delivery is apparently much more convincing, more emotional, than the “bee-stung” actress who quit.
This is the start of something; she knows it in her bones.
Rain taps persistently at the windows as Cal stirs with a long spoon and ice clinks against glass. The flurry of texts from her agent this morning told her she’s not wrong to be prepared for more opportunities after this. Finally, she thinks. Finally.
Since being here, though, she still hasn’t felt her phone vibrate with a message back from Joey, even though she’s kept it in her pocket the whole time.
Sophie’s theory about Tanner is still pinging around in her head, and she wonders why Joey hasn’t responded.
She feels, deep down, that Tanner could be their guy.
He was dating and eventually married the daughter of the police chief.
A police chief who somehow failed to report seven stab wounds on Quinn’s deceased body.
Clearly, this whole thing has been a cover-up for Tanner.
She pulls out her phone to tap out a follow-up message. We need to talk, she types quickly. Meet at the bar later?
She hits Send and watches the text fail to send just as Cal comes up behind her.
“Tequila mule,” he says, holding a glass out to her. She pockets her phone and takes a sip.
“So good,” she says, and she means it. She can tell that he, too, is riding the high of a successful day of rehearsal. They’ve run through their lines and exhausted their opinions on technique and style and delivery, and now it’s time to relax.
He touches the rim of his glass to hers. “Thank you for doing this. I’m going to annoy my casting director until she hires you again. I know she has a cool sci-fi adaptation on the horizon, and I have a good feeling about you.”
The fizzy drink crackles inside her mouth. “Thank you,” she says. “Looking forward to tomorrow.”
In a few minutes, she pulls out her phone again while Cal goes to the bathroom.
Nothing from Joey or Sophie. She can feel a little tingle at the tips of her fingers.
Something doesn’t feel right. Sophie is constantly on her phone texting her wife for updates of the little one, and Joey is a woman with a secret boyfriend, so she’s tied to her phone as much as either of them.
Sure she’s overreacting, Elena decides to let it go.
Ten minutes is not a long time to wait for a response, and she almost laughs aloud at her lack of patience.
Ironic when you consider that, before Monday, she hadn’t really spoken to either of them in fifteen years.
Antsy, she walks over to the bookshelf. She remembers seeing it the last time she was here.
The books are still neatly aligned, most of them old, a few untitled.
One book is tipped over and looks about to fall off the shelf, which is something Elena would normally never notice, except everything in this house is intentional and pristine.
She’s surprised at the flaw. She rights the tipped book and realizes there’s something missing.
She looks around because she remembers what else was on this shelf the last time she was here.
That gorgeous sculpture of the mountain peaks.
Elena spins around at a sound. Cal is back from the bathroom, leaning against the window wall, watching her with an amused expression.
“Whose place is this anyway?” she asks, uneasy but trying to make conversation. “I never asked.”
He looks around as if seeing it for the first time. “That depends. Do you hate it?”
“I love it,” she lies. She takes a sip of her drink.
“Well then, I’ll tell you the truth. It’s mine.”
“Oh,” she says with genuine surprise. She thought this was a rental property. Why on earth would Cal Pierce want to own a home in Whisper Ridge? It feels strange, and even stranger that he didn’t say something sooner. “How often do you come here?” she asks.
“It was my mother’s. I only come every few years.”
She nods, noticing that he’s moved closer to her. She doesn’t know why, but she glances behind her to see how near she is to the wall. “So you knew about Whisper Ridge before the film then?” she asks.
He smiles and crunches ice between his teeth. “It was my idea to shoot here.”
She doesn’t know what to say to this. She’d thought this was a Phillip Granger film, but Cal seems to have much more of a hand in things than she thought.
“So what’s with the…?” She gestures to all the massive window walls.
He laughs. “For the view.”
Elena nods. His voice has grown quieter, and she realizes that he’s only a couple of feet from her.
Her cocktail is perched on the slate table next to his, so she doesn’t have anything to do with her hands.
She needs to pick something up, to fidget.
She thinks about plugging her hand into her pocket to feel for her phone, but she stands stock-still.
The energy in the room has shifted. She sees, now, that he is holding her in a dark, intense stare.
She knows that look.
He wants her.