by Ella Carey
“I’ve offered so many times.” Nina rolled her eyes.
“We have to get going.” Eva picked up her bag. And right then, it struck her that she sounded exactly like her mom. She turned to Rita. “Thank you. But no. It’s a hopeless case.”
Nina moved to Eva’s dark wooden dressing table and inspected her own pretty face in the mirror. “Listen to me, you girls, Harry or no Harry, we are going to a grand old famous hotel in Hollywood. There’s a war on. We’ve just spent five months in the desert. I say we have fun.”
“Here’s to that, chickies,” Rita said.
Eva heaved a sigh and followed them out the door.
“I’ve heard the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel is somethin’ famous for movie-star sightings.” Rita’s face was all lit up. She stared out the bus window, entranced with her first sight of Hollywood Boulevard on a Saturday night. Women in silks and pearls strolled with fellas in tuxedos. There was certain to be a premiere happening somewhere in town.
“Oh my.” Rita pressed her hands against the window ledge. “I couldn’t feel more country girl if I tried! I’d trade all the movie stars in the world if Dan were here to enjoy this with us tonight.”
“Dan was so handsome he could have been a movie star himself,” Eva said. “He was a lovely man. Dan believed in you, and you’ll always have that memory of him.”
“I was privileged to know him, Eva.”
“We all were,” Nina said. She leaned her elbows on Eva and Rita’s seat from where she sat behind them.
The bus rolled past the Broadway Hollywood Building. “Wealthy women go in there to have coffee while models come out and show the fashion collections. It’s where they buy silk stockings and beautiful dresses.”
“Ohh . . .” Rita’s eyes were bigger than two round saucers. She squeezed Eva’s arm and turned back to the window. “My mom and I used to dream of silk stockings.”
“Oh, dreaming of silk stockings, I could write a song about that.” Nina leaned her head back on the seat.
“A girl has to have a bit of imagination if she is going to get through sometimes.” Rita’s tone was a little more serious now.
“And at Stromberg Jewelers, the owner has lists of all the film stars’ favorite jewels. So if you come in to buy something precious, he can tell you what they like.”
“Sounds swell.” Rita sighed.
Eva was pleased to see how Rita’s cheeks shone for the first time in ages.
The bus pulled up outside the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel. Elegant people strolled through the front entrance. The hotel still spoke of glamour and hinted at the magic of the movies, war or no war.
Eva wandered in behind Rita and Nina. She tried not to stare like a half-crazed person at the vast lobby, dotted with palm trees and discreet chesterfield sofas. This was about as far from their usual social life as anyone could get. Eva clipped in her high heels across the Spanish-mission-style terra-cotta floors. She felt a sprig of nerves at the sight of old-fashioned waiters hovering with silver trays of champagne and canapés. Avenger Field may as well have been on the moon.
Even Rita was silent.
“Eva, Nina!”
Eva startled at the sight of the girl who she’d dreamed might have decided she wasn’t in love with Harry after all. But here was Lucille, definitely present and oh so beautiful. Lucille leaned in to give Eva and Nina kisses scented with perfume that no girl from Burbank could hope to afford.
“Well, who is this?” Lucille’s gaze swept over Rita. “What an elegant girl you are!” Lucille placed her hands on her hips, accentuated by her cinch-waisted cherry-red silk dress. Then she ran her soft white fingers over her charming curled blond hair. She smiled a slow smile, her dark-red lips curving upward to show off a set of delicate white teeth. Eva fought the urge to hide her own calloused, unmanicured hands behind her back. There was no way Lucille would be seen dead out in Texas, flying airplanes in a size-forty-four zoot suit.
“Lucille, this is Rita.” Eva introduced the two girls.
Lucille reached out a hand and took Rita’s with the softest of touches.
“My, you have beautiful hands,” Rita said. “You’ll have to excuse us roughed-up flygirls. Not sure that you’ve been doing much hard work with those fingers of late.”
“Well, my, you are correct,” Lucille said. “We have people for doing work around here.”
Rita’s eyes narrowed into slits. “Well then, you are a very fortunate girl.”
“You’re interested in airplanes, like Eva and Nina here?” Lucille kept hold of Rita’s hand.
“I’ve just graduated as a WASP,” Rita said, sounding proud of her achievements.
Eva took a glance at Lucille under her eyelashes. Lucille looked to be of a mind to sum Rita up.
Nina took advantage of the momentary lull in the conversation, a conversation that could erupt. “We’ll go in and let you greet your guests, Lucille.”
“Straight through to the door on the left of the lobby.” Lucille almost sang the words. “The party’s in the ballroom.”
Eva swallowed and felt herself redden. “Is . . .” A bolt of panic flared through her. Why couldn’t she just play it cool?
“Harry here yet?” Nina finished.
“Why, of course!” Lucille said, sweet as a key lime pie. “He’s talking to Daddy,” she said. “They’re like a pair of perfectly cut gloves these days.”
“Thank you.” Eva swore she sounded like she was muttering to a schoolteacher.
“It’s so good to see you, Eva and Nina,” Lucille said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me . . .” She turned to greet some new guests.
Eva heaved out a sigh. They made their way toward the ballroom. Gentlemen sat at the bar smoking cigars, handsome in their black-and-white suits and bow ties.
“Shoot,” Rita mumbled. “She’s a piece of work.”
“And a determined one,” Nina said.
They entered through the gracious double doors to the party. A plaque said that this grand room had been the venue for the first-ever Oscars ceremony in 1929. Round tables were scattered like lily pads on a pond for Lucille’s party. Men in dinner suits lounged at tables decorated with ivy and red berries, and women in sparkling dresses, jewels glittering at their throats, floated under the mistletoe-bedecked chandeliers. A waiter appeared as if by magic and offered the girls champagne.
Eva scanned the room, a searchlight looking for its favorite target, until that old, familiar thwack in her chest hit her with a mighty thump. Even at the few feet that separated her from him, she could see that Harry’s cheeks were tanned a deep brown. He was talking to a handsome, blond middle-aged man in a suit so well cut that it looked to have been fresh from a tailor on Rodeo Drive.
She half made a step toward Harry, only to feel Rita clutching at her fingers, pulling her back. Three young men had appeared out of the ether and were trying to engage Nina and Rita in chitchat. Eva turned to them.
“Well,” one of them said. He was tall with white-blond hair and bright-blue eyes in a tanned face, which held a slightly surprised expression, like he’d just eaten a way-too-hot chili dog. “Where have you girls sprung from?”
He reached out to take Rita’s hand, the glint of his cuff link flickering under the lights. He raised Rita’s hand to his lips and dropped a gentle kiss on her fingers.
“Go say hello to Harry,” Nina said. “We can deal with these boys.”
The blond man leaned forward and murmured something in Rita’s ear, and Rita threw back her head and laughed.
“Not yet,” Eva murmured. “He’s all tied up with some guy over there, who I’m guessing is Lucille’s rich dad.”
“Well, aren’t you guys quite the dishes?” Rita placed her empty champagne glass back on a passing waiter’s silver tray.
The blond young man—Rita’s blond young man, Eva couldn’t help thinking—took a freshly filled glass, and Rita accepted it, taking a sip with another tinkling laugh.
Eva sipped at her own untouch
ed champagne, but the bubbles caught in the back of her throat.
“I’m Felix, and this is Jack.” Rita’s friend indicated toward the taller of the other two men.
The man he called Jack was mighty handsome. He had striking dark eyes and lashes . . . if only her heart were not as heavy as an unexploded bomb over seeing Lucille being so smug about Harry and her dad, she’d chat with him quite happily.
Perhaps, she should just do that . . .
“And this is Richard,” Felix went on.
The other man, Richard, nodded. He was short and stocky, and his expression was astute.
“We are charmed to meet you,” Rita said. “I’m Rita, and these are my friends Eva and Nina.”
Nina held out a hand to Richard, as if she were some society hostess, not a girl who’d just got off a four-million-hour-long train ride from the middle of the Texan plains. “Pleased to meet you, boys. Are you back from the war?”
There was a silence. Awkwardness flared among the men, and Felix coughed, pulling his hand up to cover his throat.
“Well, perhaps you’re all actors, then. I’m determined to meet an actor before I leave here tonight.” Rita smiled around at them.
“Well saved,” Richard murmured next to Eva.
“I’m an actor,” the dark and handsome one, Jack, said. He took a sip of champagne, but Eva noticed a flicker of annoyance cross his chiseled features, like a ripple on a perfect wave.
Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Lucille floating across the room to stand with Harry. Eva’s stomach tumbled at the sight of him running his hand across Lucille’s bare back and lingering on the curve of her waist.
Frowning, Eva switched back to Jack. He really was quite the dish. As good-looking as poor Dan had been. And his gaze was on her now.
She smiled, gave him a little encouragement. After all, they’d talked about Rita’s philosophies.
“Eva wasn’t it?” Jack’s voice was smooth and deep. “Beautiful,” he added.
Eva’s eyes widened, and she turned to look up at him, sharp. “Oh, I see,” she said, knowing she sounded coy. “Well, aren’t you the charmer?”
“Where you from, Eva?” He smiled down at her, those chocolate eyes crinkling with warmth.
“Oh, Los Angeles.” She waved her hand in the general direction of the ballroom doors. “You know.”
“Telling me you live downtown?”
Eva took a sip of her champagne and giggled. “Maybe I am. What if I do, Jack?”
He raised a brow. “Hmm.”
She squared up a bit, lifting her chin. “I live in the valley. I’m from Burbank.”
“How intriguing.”
“Intriguing?”
“Refreshing.”
“Why?”
He leaned a little closer. “Eva, I get to meet a lot of girls through my line of work. Let’s say I don’t take them seriously and they don’t take life seriously.”
“Why do you think I would be any different?”
“There’s something sweet in your expression. You look unsophisticated. You have no idea how rare that is to a guy like me.”
“Oh, so you see me as some unsophisticated girl from the country?” Eva drew out the last syllables with the best Southern accent she could.
He laughed. “Never. Tell me, how does a girl like you know Lucille?”
“I don’t.”
He raised a brow. “Oh, so you’ve just walked right in tonight.”
“Well, I do know her. But I’m friends with her boyfriend, Harry, you see.”
“Ah.” He shot a glance toward Harry, who was intent, still with Lucille’s dad.
“So where do you come from, Jack?” She enunciated his name with crystal-clear clarity, as if she’d had elocution lessons all her life.
“Hancock Park.”
Of course he did. It was old-money LA. But not an actors’ suburb. “And you act as a career?”
“Trying to.” He rubbed his hand across his perfect chin. “Are you interested in acting, Eva?” The expression on his face changed, as if he were willing her to answer in one way.
“Heck no.” She went with the truth.
“Thank goodness for that.” He stepped a little closer, leaned into her ear. The band had struck up a tune, and they had to shout a little louder to be heard. “What do you do, Eva? You look wonderful in that dress, by the way . . .”
“I just graduated as a female pilot—I’m a Women Airforce Service Pilot.”
Jack’s features sharpened. “You’ve trained, have you?”
“I have.”
“I’m impressed.”
Eva felt a smile play around her lips. “Thank you.”
“I can’t serve for medical reasons. I was rejected. All I’m useful for is acting.” He raised his glass and shrugged. But the grin he gave her was heaven sent. He sure was good-looking. Eva thought it didn’t take much imagination to see him as a matinee idol.
“Well then, now, more than ever, we need pictures to cheer us up, Jack.” She smiled right back at him.
“I’m glad you see it that way. And I’m glad that you are contributing. At least one of us is.”
Eva’s smile changed swiftly to a frown.
“Eva,” he said. “I hope this isn’t too forward, but . . .”
Across the room, Harry dropped a kiss on Lucille’s cheek. She beamed up at him, reaching to pat something imaginary from the stiff white collar of his shirt. The intimate gesture caused Eva to start.
“You’re distracted.” Jack’s voice startled her even more.
She turned back to him, feeling a rush to her cheeks. She shouldn’t have come here tonight. It was madness. Why would she want to hurt herself over again? “No, I—”
“Are you only on leave for a little while, Eva?”
“I am.”
“Well then. This might seem mighty forward of me, and I don’t want to monopolize you tonight, although, believe me, I am tempted . . .”
Harry led Lucille to the dance floor.
Eva swayed with sudden fatigue.
Lucille wrapped her arms around Harry’s neck, and he led her in a slow dance.
“Would you consider letting me take you out for dinner tomorrow night? To Musso and Frank? It’s a local place, and one my family’s frequented for years. It’s just a little way up along Hollywood Boulevard. If you’re on leave, you might like a treat. It’s a special restaurant.”
“Dinner?”
Lucille pulled away from Harry. He was off at the side of the room again, talking with another man.
Before Eva could respond to Jack, Lucille was right next to her, breathless, her red dress a whirl. Lucille kissed Jack, Richard, and Felix in turn.
“Oh, I see you girls have met my favorite boys. I’ve known them forever. We went to school together, you see. Jack here was the high school dish. And I do love his family.” Lucille laughed, turning to Eva and patting her on her bare arm. “I’m like Siamese twins with his mom. But Jack would never look at me for one minute. I was devastated by his rejection when I was twelve. Never got over it.”
“No way.” Jack put on a grin that would set the whole of Hollywood on fire. “Harry is perfect for you: he has looks, intelligence, and he’s hardworking. Can’t say I’m any of those things. You should stick with him.”
Lucille trilled like a peacock. She even did a little twirl. Her red dress spun out around her body, showing off her toned legs to perfection. “Harry is a darling. But don’t be ridiculous, Jack. You are quite the catch. Any girl would be lucky to have you on her arm. Including me.”
Jack chuckled softly.
Lucille twirled off again to another group of guests.
Harry still hadn’t seen Eva. She chewed on her lip. This was ridiculous. She’d have to go over and talk to him soon.
“Yes, then? Come out to dinner with me tomorrow night?” Jack’s voice bit into her thoughts.
Eva couldn’t tear her eyes away from Harry.
Jack to
ok her hand and touched her fingers with a featherlight kiss.
“Eight o’clock? How does that sound?”
Harry patted the man he was talking to on the back. The man looked like a wealthy, pompous man.
“Why not?” she said to Jack. “Sure, yes, why not.”
“I can’t wait.” His hand was on her back. “I’ll get your address before we leave tonight.”
Finally, she managed to catch Harry’s eye across the room. He startled. Harry excused himself from his conversation. He made his way to her. “Eva!” She saw him mouth her name.
“And Nina, forgive me,” he said, appearing in a swish of expensive aftershave and an equally sophisticated dinner suit. His eyes ran over Jack standing next to Eva. He frowned and leaned down to kiss Nina first.
“Hello there,” he said, holding out his hand to shake Jack’s. Harry pumped Jack’s hand a little harder than might be polite. “Harry Butler.”
“Jack Forrest.”
Harry turned to Eva, his eyes running over her face. “Dance with me, Evie,” he said, his voice dropping. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t certain if you’d be here tonight. Lucille wasn’t sure whether you’d come after all your traveling. I wasn’t looking out for you, and we need to catch up.”
Suddenly, all the irritation she’d felt toward Lucille evaporated. Here was Harry. It was the war. He’d survived his first few weeks so far. “I’d love to dance with you, Harry,” she said. “Excuse me a moment.” She smiled up at Jack.
The thing about war was that you couldn’t take any of your friends’ lives for granted. Just seeing him here, all her irritation evaporated.
Jack nodded in a formal way. “Of course.”
Harry took Eva’s hand and led her toward the dance floor. The band played Glenn Miller’s “That Old Black Magic,” and Harry drew her into his arms. He placed a hand around her waist. “Tell me what’s on your mind, kiddo. I can see something’s getting to you. And it’s wonderful to see you, by the way.”
Eva rested her chin on his shoulder. “My head’s been full to bursting these past months,” she said. “You know, about training.”
“I do. And I’m certain you’ll make a brilliant pilot. I would fly with you any day.”