The Disappearing Act(59)
With an escape plan in place I dive into my script knowing that, come six o’clock, I’ll know who exactly is threatening me and I should be in a better position to protect myself with the help of Lucy.
I manage to get four hours of line learning done before my phone pings with a text. Nick wants to know if Sushi is okay? I stare at the message, confused, then remember the dinner plan we made last night for this evening. I had completely forgotten. He says he’s booked us into a new restaurant. It opened on Friday and, he jokes, it’s hard to get a booking there, let alone on Valentine’s. I check my phone’s locked screen, and he’s right, today is the fourteenth of February, Valentine’s Day. I don’t know how on earth he’s managed to book us in somewhere like this on one of the busiest nights of the year. In spite of everything that’s happening, I feel a little thrill of pleasure at the idea that he’s tried so hard to impress me. He says he’ll pick me up at five.
I start to compose a text to cancel the plan but stop. Lucy isn’t in until six p.m.; if I go out for an early dinner, I can be back here by seven. If the message I left her gets passed on, she might have had time to find the footage from last night by the time I get back. And God knows, it would be good to get out of this apartment.
Also, it crosses my mind that if I told Nick half of what was going on with me, he’d probably insist I stay over at his place tonight. And while I’m not sure I know him well enough for that just yet, the thought is reassuring.
I manage another four hours of script work before he arrives and I feel I’m in a very good place when he pulls up, bang on time, in the apartment’s porte cochere.
He gives me a beaming smile through the windscreen and I slip into the passenger seat beside him. His car is understatedly expensive, smelling of new car leather and his cologne. The hairs along my arms rise being suddenly so close to him.
“Hey, you!” He looks me up and down appreciatively. Clingy black silk dress, gold hoop earrings, and hair up. I thought I’d better at least try to fit in with the crowd I’m sure we’ll be seeing at this newly opened it-restaurant.
“I forgot, you do scrub up well,” he jibes.
“Ha-ha, very funny. Shame you came straight from work, though,” I volley back eyeing his clothes. It’s a cheap shot, he looks ridiculously good, but I see a reassuring flicker of hesitancy in his eyes before he realizes I’m joking.
“That’s the spirit,” he grins. “Oh, and lest we forget, happy Valentine’s Day.”
As we drive, conversation comes easily. Just being this close to him in the passenger seat is oddly intimate.
His scent is so different from George’s. Nick smells of soap, a clean woody orange fragrance. It reminds me that Nick has lived a whole life unknown to me up until now, the thrill of that unknown sending a fizzle of excitement through me. I’m going on an actual Valentine’s Day date. I don’t think I’ve ever actually been on a date before. I’m not sure British people do them.
I mean I’ve been to a bar, or the pub, with people or gone for drinks after work but I’ve never met a relative stranger for a dinner date and been picked up for it.
I haven’t been outside all day and to my surprise the light is already fading. It’s magic hour, and Los Angeles is beginning to make its slow transition into the twinkling dreamscape it becomes at night.
As darkness falls, we roll past the gargantuan billboards and flashing neon signs that make up Sunset Boulevard and West Hollywood, safe in our leather-clad cocoon.
NDA or not I tell Nick more about the screen test tomorrow and who I’ll be filming with in the morning. And to my utter delight he nods as if what I’d just told him was the most normal and natural thing I could have said.
“Yeah. You’re great casting for that role. Kathryn Mayer producing, right?”
I nod, masking my joy that he didn’t bat an eyelid at my name and my male co-star’s being in the same sentence.
“Yeah, she makes great decisions,” he continues as I watch his handsome features in profile. “That’s why the studio snapped her up, she was independent before, apparently her deal was a big back-and-forth, took a few months to persuade her to move. She’s got great taste. These are the kinds of casting decisions studios should be making instead of leaving it up to independents to introduce talent into the system. I mean if I had a dollar for every studio head who complained that established stars cost too much and have too much creative control, I’d sell up and buy an island.” His eyes flick to me in the tail-lit darkness, my expression dour. He clarifies. “Don’t get me wrong—I’m all for creative control for actors. I think it’s important. I just don’t want to be held hostage on my own movie. There’s a line between creative collaboration and fiefdom.”
“The actor being the fief in this analogy, right?” I say, making it clear in my tone that entertainment industry fiefdoms don’t historically tend to be ruled by actors, or actresses.
“Point taken,” he agrees. “But maybe the less said about abuses of power between producers and actors on a first date, the better?” he offers, jokingly. “Anyway, that guy is in prison somewhere in upstate New York. Most fiefdoms don’t tend to last long.”
It’s a joke, one in questionably poor taste, but he’s right: the last thing I want to talk about is sexual abuse. And tonight less than ever, given everything I heard yesterday. So I let the subject drop into a silence that only lasts a moment before Nick’s iPhone bursts to life through the car speaker system.