by Lynn Patrick
Jayne nodded. “And better than an agent who doesn’t know that you exist. A friend of mine is saddled with a woman who wouldn’t even say hello at a party unless Rose walked right up to her and reminded her she’s a client.”
“Time to get a new agent.”
“Ugh. I’ve tried to tell her that for years.” The blonde shook her head. “She’s stuck in a rut.”
“Some people like ruts. They’re familiar, therefore safe.”
“Even if they’re bad for you,” she agreed.
“What’s bad for you?” Gabby asked as she appeared in the doorway, looking fresh and plaster-free, though she’d been gone an amazingly short time.
“Agents,” Kit said, pleased that she’d been so quick.
“Some agents,” Jayne amended. “Off to another hard day of rehearsal?”
“After Kit shows me some of the real Hollywood,” Gabby stated. “A reward for being so dedicated.”
Jayne waved them off. “Have fun, you two.”
“Will do.”
Kit encircled Gabby’s waist and headed her back through the house toward the front door. The ladder, which was still standing in the hallway, caught his eye as they exited.
“What in the world were you doing plastering, anyway?” he asked.
“Taking over where Chester left off after Neil got on his nerves, Lucille got on his case and his hands refused to cooperate,” Gabby told Kit as he helped her into his car. “Chester wants to feel useful in the worst way, but Lucille was right about his having no business on that ladder. Poor man. He could hardly get up and down the thing.”
Kit thought about that and, driving away from the Silver Stallion, said, “I wonder if that medication Lucille was talking about would really improve life for Chester.”
“It’ll be some time before we find out.”
“Unless…”
“Unless?” Gabby echoed.
“Unless I get Lucille to give me the name of Chester’s doctor. Maybe I could make arrangements to buy a supply of the stuff for him.”
“And then figure out a way to make Chester take it.”
“Guilt?”
“That might work.”
Kit felt Gabby’s eyes on him. “What?”
“I was just thinking you’re a pretty nice man, Christopher Garfield.”
Kit rode high on Gabby’s approval as he drove out of Beverly Hills and headed for Hollywood Boulevard. He wanted to show her the movie capital’s origins, some of which were still viable—and visible among the fast-food places, tattoo parlors and T-shirt shops.
“It’s a relief to have a few hours of breathing space,” Gabby said. “What about rehearsing at Cheek to Cheek?”
“Tomorrow,” Kit said. “I’ve been assured we can have the stage all afternoon and evening.”
“Do you think four days will be enough time to work the bugs out of the routine?” she asked.
Thinking of the sweeping stage and staircase area he couldn’t simulate at his beach house, Kit said, “It’ll have to do. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that we don’t run into problems with the light grid or sound system.”
He’d already met with the lighting and sound people. Technical rehearsal for the entire show would be held on Wednesday night and dress was scheduled for Thursday. As Kit began looking for a parking spot, he wondered if they weren’t crazy for taking any time off whatsoever, even for a few hours. But that was ridiculous. He was developing performance jitters. What was he worried about? This was a limited engagement. A few performances and he would be back to business as usual.
For some reason the thought wasn’t as appealing as it should be.
After he parked the car, he and Gabby walked hand in hand, stopping occasionally along the Walk of Fame—a pink-and-charcoal terrazzo sidewalk set with brass stars commemorating legends of the film, radio, television and recording industries. They made a quick tour of the Hollywood Museum with its exhibitions of rare costumes, props, set pieces and posters.
Things Kit had been familiar with his entire life sparkled more brightly as he saw them through Gabby’s starstruck eyes. She was filled with such enthusiasm, he found it impossible to resist her positive energy. Inevitably they found themselves in front of Mann’s Chinese Theater.
“I’ve always wanted to do this,” Gabby said as she placed her feet on top of Judy Garland’s smaller prints.
“Try on other people’s footprints? Or have a set of your own made?”
Stepping into another set, she laughed. “C’mon, I’m not exactly a movie star, now am I?”
But he heard a wistful note when she made the denial. “You wouldn’t turn down a Hollywood career, I take it.”
“If one was offered to me? I wouldn’t care if I was working in Hollywood instead of on Broadway, as long as I was able to perform.” Then, as if having admitted something she hadn’t meant to, Gabby pulled a face. “Why would anyone turn it down?”
“I can think of several good reasons.”
“You’re a strange one,” she said, staring at him in her forthright manner. “Both your parents spent their entire lives in show business and you won’t even fess up to being interested.”
“Maybe that’s because there’s nothing to fess up,” Kit argued.
“And maybe you never appeared in nightclubs using an alias.”
Pricked by the reminder, but not wanting to delve further into his youthful misguided venture, Kit said, “I’m in the mood for brunch. Why don’t we think about finding a restaurant?”
“Why don’t we think about changing the subject, you mean?”
“Are you going to pick on me just because I happen to be hungry?”
“I’m picking on you because you happen to be a liar.” Gabby tapped him square in the chest with an accusing finger. “You want our act to succeed just as much as I do, buddy, and not only for Lucille’s sake. Don’t you think it’s time you admitted how much this opportunity means to you personally?”
It was time to do no such thing, Kit thought stubbornly. While he might enjoy performing, relating to an audience, having a beautiful partner who seemed to have been made to dance with him, he was using the name Garfield, performing to Price’s old numbers. If they were a success, the audience would be cheering his father, not the son. How could there not be comparisons?
“Since you’re not arguing with me, I must have hit a sore spot, huh?” Gabby challenged him. “Why don’t you admit that you’re attracted to show business?”
“Maybe because I’m not.”
“And maybe you’re lying. Maybe you’re protecting yourself in case you couldn’t make it following your heart’s desire.”
Kit shook his head. She was incorrigible. “With a name like Garfield,” he said, “I’d probably be an overnight success.”
“Maybe that’s what you’re afraid of….” To Kit’s surprise, Gabby dropped the subject and skirted the forecourt of the theater, looking at one concrete slab after another. “So where do I find our parents’ footprints?”
Kit pointed. “Dad’s are right over there.”
Gabby crossed to the slab in question, then frowned as she checked the concrete rectangles on every side of Price Garfield’s. “But where are Mom’s?”
“Your mother’s footprints are here somewhere?” If so, Kit had never noticed.
Gabby gave him an annoyed look. “Of course. She and your father were a team, remember? They did them together after Tap Me on the Shoulder was such a big hit.”
Kit shifted uncomfortably as the truth of what might have happened dawned on him. He hurriedly looked around, checking the slabs she didn’t, hoping against hope he was wrong. But several minutes later, when they met in the middle of the forecourt, he sighed. “I’m afraid your mother’s slab was removed, Gabby.”
“What?”
The single word, uttered so softly, pierced his heart, but she had to know the truth. “The fate allotted to lesser legends to make room for new ones,” he explained as kindly as he could. “Th
ere’s limited space out here. I’ve heard the basement of the Chinese is literally loaded with concrete slabs of long-forgotten stars.”
She stared down at his father’s slab, then at him. Though her expression remained closed, her eyes filled with tears. Kit moved to touch her, to take her in his arms.
“Gabby, I’m sorry—”
“Forget it,” she said softly, brushing by him before he could comfort her. “What does an old slab of concrete prove, anyway? Let’s go get brunch.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
THANK GOODNESS Gabby would be at the club all day and night rehearsing with Kit, Anita thought as Price ordered coffee and dessert at Hollywood Café Legends Tuesday evening. She hated sneaking around behind her own daughter’s back, but after Gabby’s reaction to Price’s presence on Sunday, she dared not confide in the younger woman about her frustrating—and definitely ongoing—relationship with Price Garfield.
Anita stared up at the charcoal drawing of Jean Harlow hanging on the wall directly across from their table. A famous restaurant located near Paramount Studios, Hollywood Café Legends featured dozens of similar movie star portraits. She wondered if a likeness of Price was around here somewhere. Being his usual modest self, her companion wasn’t likely to mention it.
Anita sighed. She knew the man inside out and couldn’t forget him for a minute. She also couldn’t find it in her heart to forgive him. So what was she to do?
“Marry me,” Price said, as if reading her thoughts.
“What?” Shocked out of her reverie, Anita stared at the face that was as familiar to her as her own.
“Just testing.” Avoiding her eyes, Price gave a nervous little laugh. “I don’t want to get married again. I’ve proved I’m no good at it. I’m jinxed, actually.” He smiled crookedly. “Things would have been different if you had married me instead of running away all those years ago.”
“You chased me away.”
“Now don’t start telling me how overbearing I was.”
“Fine. I won’t.”
“But you’re thinking about it,” he insisted correctly. “I wouldn’t have been that way if I could have trusted your love.”
“I told you how I felt many times.”
“Whenever you weren’t being escorted around town by other men.”
Gritting her teeth at the familiar accusation—not to mention his jealous tone—Anita couldn’t believe Price was still disgruntled over the outings the studio had set up for her so many decades ago.
“Those weren’t real dates,” she told him, perhaps for the hundredth time.
“Next you’ll be telling me your escorts weren’t real men.”
“They weren’t. They were actors. Mostly pretty, manufactured versions of the real thing. And what we were doing was generating valuable publicity.”
“A wedding between you and me would have gotten us more publicity than you ever dreamed of.”
“Don’t start.”
“All right,” he grumbled. “It’s both our faults for letting the studio interfere with our personal lives.”
Their bickering was interrupted by the arrival of cake and coffee. Anita stared at the fruit-and-whipped-cream confection in front of her, thinking she’d soon have to go on a diet if Price kept taking her out to eat. She didn’t have the high metabolism that seemed to have kept him thin all his life. And since she’d practically turned the dance school over to Gabby, her decrease in exercise kept her on her toes in a less satisfying way—counting calories.
Price took a bite of his dessert, then a sip of coffee. “Publicity. Sol Lowenstein always wanted control.”
Anita dug at her cake in disgust. “You’re going to harp about RPO? Sol is dead now, for goodness’ sake.”
And after the authoritative head of RPO Studios had passed away, the organization had been absorbed by one of the larger production companies.
“You fell right into Sol’s hands.”
Obviously Price was going to beat the subject into the ground. “And you didn’t?”
Price glared at Anita, but she glared right back.
A big part of their problem had been the studio’s jerking them around, telling them how to behave, and with whom. Sol Lowenstein had been afraid their romance might be viewed as illicit, since Anita had been so young and had had a reputation to uphold. He’d maintained that, if they wanted to continue seeing each other, there wouldn’t be any problems from the studio—not to mention the press or the public—if they each agreed to go out with other people selected by the publicity department.
Price had not only despised each and every one of those events, he’d made sure Anita had come to hate them, as well. She had always been certain they would fight afterward, sometimes on the set.
Made petulant by the memory, Anita said, “I seem to remember you dating several starlets—one of whom you eventually married.”
“Now don’t you start,” Price said, the squabbling obviously getting too close for his comfort. Dropping his fork, he glanced around. “Where’s the waiter? I want the check.” He turned back to Anita. “Are you ready to leave?”
“Whenever you are.”
At least they agreed on something, she thought.
He settled the bill and they left the restaurant, careful not to touch each other as they walked to the car, which they’d parked nearby on the street. Then their conversation took a friendly if impersonal turn as they rode along Hollywood’s Sunset Boulevard. Remembering the good old days, Anita was put off by the sight of a flashily dressed hooker waving at the passing cars.
“I can’t believe it,” she said. “Living in New York is enough to make anyone aware of the seamier side of life but, for some reason, I always kept the idealized vision I had of Hollywood.”
“And this neighborhood is much better than it was ten years ago,” Price told her.
Anita shook her head sadly. “Remember the ballrooms where we used to dance?” Before they’d become so famous that Price had begun avoiding public outings, she added silently, trying to sidestep another argument.
“There are still places where you can dance. Want to try one?”
Anita’s heart tripped at the thought of being held in Price’s arms, moving to music with him, making their own special magic. It had been so many years….
“Dance?” she whispered. “With you?”
Price sounded a little indignant when he assured her, “I haven’t forgotten how.”
Anita smiled. “Neither have I. So what are we waiting for?”
The Castle, a popular club, hardly resembled the elegant establishments of the past any more than its loud pounding music could be compared with the bygone era’s tunes, but Anita didn’t mind. And when Price presented an identification card of some sort, the young people who ran the club treated the couple with respect, even waiving the entrance fees. Because of his fame? Anita wasn’t certain. She noticed that no one paid them any mind when they joined the crowd thronging the gymnasium-like dance floor. All eyes were on the celebrities of the day. She thought a few faces looked vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t identify them. The thought made her feel old…but dancing always brought back her youth.
With artificially generated fog creeping along their legs and strobe lights making their every movement look like some strange machination, she and her partner danced, their manner conservative compared to the young bodies, mostly clad in black, wildly gyrating around them. It wasn’t exactly what Anita had been hoping for—Price didn’t take her fully in his arms once—but she was having more fun than she’d had in years.
“Why do these kids want to look so somber?” she yelled in Price’s ear, struggling to be heard above the music.
Growing tired after nearly an hour, she was also thinking about leaving. She’d worked off not only the whipped cream dessert but her irritation with her escort.
“Black is just the style.” Price leaned closer to shout at Anita. “You know how it is. Remember those silly little hats you used to wea
r? And my double-breasted suits?”
Price moved closer again, his breath feathering Anita’s ear and making goose bumps rise on her neck. “Have you had enough yet? I’m getting a little tired.”
Thinking she’d give anything to be alone with him in some romantic setting, Anita nodded vigorously. Price took her hand and moved off the floor. In the lobby they picked up her wrap and headed for the door, making their way past a human river of newly arriving guests.
A young man in a black leather jacket bumped into Price, then gazed at him in surprise. “Pardon me, Gramps.” His eyes swept over Anita, then returned to Price. “Isn’t it a little late for you old folks to be out?”
How dare the kid speak to a legend that way! Anita narrowed her eyes, about to tell the young idiot to stuff it, only to have Price pull her close.
“Don’t pay any attention to that punk,” he whispered, gently guiding her away.
At least the casually dressed doorman was respectful as he sent a parking attendant after the Mercedes. “It’ll only be a minute, Mr. Garfield. Have a good night.”
Price nodded. “A good night to you, too.” He smiled at Anita after they’d moved to the curb. “That young man isn’t being polite because he’s a fan of our movies, you know. The Garfield Corporation owns the Castle.”
“It does?”
“I showed them my corporate ID when we came in. That’s why we didn’t have to pay.”
“Oh, I wondered.”
And in her secret heart of hearts, Anita couldn’t help being disappointed, having thought Price, at least, would still be recognized by the younger generation. How fleeting fame could be. Not that Price cared, having always wanted anonymity.
While they waited for the attendant to deliver the car, two young women strolled by. The taller of the pair, a redhead wearing high-heeled boots and a short skirt, turned her head to stare.
“It is them,” she cried.
“It is not,” her companion argued. “They can’t both still be alive.”
“Yes, they can and I’ll prove it.” The redhead stopped and approached the older couple. “Excuse me,” she called to Anita, then smiled hesitantly. “Um, aren’t you Anita Brooks and Price Garfield?”