Tread the Boards (A Rivervue Community Theatre Romance, #1)

by Nikki Logan

  Her feet wanted to fix her to the spot again but her will forced them on. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  ‘My family?’

  ‘Research, Mackenzie. Something you’ll learn about acting is that research is everything, no matter how small the role. And that the internet is your friend.’ He paused for effect. ‘Unless you’re trying to keep a secret.’

  God, how long had he been holding on to this little gem. Biding his time. ‘What secret, Richard?’

  ‘That you’re a de Vue.’

  Her stomach seized. ‘I’m a Russell.’

  ‘Half of you is. Ron de Vue was your grandfather. Why keep it to yourself?’

  ‘Great-grandfather …’ Lord the man was irritating. ‘It was a century ago. And just because I didn’t tell you, doesn’t mean I didn’t tell anyone. We’re not friends.’

  ‘Or is it more that you don’t want anyone knowing that you were cast more for who you know not what you know.’

  Kenzie hated that a dick like Yeates could get any scores against her, but that suggestion—which had never so much as entered her mind—sure crossed it now. Crossed it and took a seat right in her mind’s front row.

  And he knew it. His normally handsome face filled with ugly victory.

  ‘I don’t judge, Kenzie. Some people sleep with the director, some with the writer. I was pretty sure you and Lexi weren’t into each other that way and it’s not like you were hot for Draven …’

  An icy chill spidered down her back.

  ‘Turns out it was a different kind of nepotism you had going on. This will be quite a marketing coup for Lexi.’

  She spun on him. ‘You don’t think I earned my role, Richard?’

  It took everything she had to keep the contempt out of her face and to hit him with a double-barrelled challenge instead. A man like him made a decision in a moment whether you were predator or prey, and he’d clearly sized her up and found her more squirrel sized. She couldn’t let that go uncorrected.

  ‘This from a man who gets cast more for his face than his skill,’ she huffed. ‘Ever ask yourself how far you would get if you hadn’t crawled out the good end of the gene pool? Why it’s always your face plastered all over our walls?’

  The poor schmuck didn’t know whether to bask in the compliment or bristle at the offence. The end result was an unattractive kind of half-sneer, like a beaten dog. And dogs were never more dangerous than when they were wounded.

  ‘Don’t worry, Richard. Rivervue will be shut soon and we’re unlikely to work together again. I’m sure our trajectories will take us in different directions in the future.’

  She was just starting out, so there was only one way her theatre star could go. And by implication only one other that his could. For the first time, she got a thrill of satisfaction as Yeates’s smart mouth opened and closed again without something coming out. Old Kenzie would have felt bad for hurting his feelings, but new Kenzie was hurting, herself. She had a bellyful of ouch to exorcise and limited directions for it to go.

  Yeates had more than earned his share.

  But even as she brushed his hurtful words off, a nauseating kind of suspicion crept in on her. Dylan had been responsible for her getting this part all those weeks ago. He made out like her unintentional video audition was just unquestionably the best, but what if he’d had a more active role in her being cast? She’d stopped short of sleeping with him, but what if Yeates was right? What if she hadn’t earned her role fair and square?

  Her mouth dried.

  Had Dylan put some kind of pressure on Lexi to cast her? Was that why she’d been so off-centre since this play began? Was she under some kind of directorial duress?

  Only one way to find out.

  She didn’t bother excusing herself to Yeates—he’d manufacture enough excuses for the both of them and all of them favouring him. Instead, she turned wordlessly and headed for the stairs to Lexi’s office. By the time she’d reached the top, she’d convinced herself that her instincts were correct. That the only reason she got the part was because Dylan had applied exactly the right amount of pressure. And vagabond Dylan had zero leverage to pull something like that off. There was only one card he could have played.

  Which meant Lexi already knew that Dylan was Draven.

  ‘Kenzie, please don’t do this.’ Lexi’s normally soft voice toughened, but it wasn’t anger hardening it. It was despair. ‘Not today. Not on top of everything else.’

  It crossed her mind to ask what else. To what she could attribute the very grey circles under Lexi’s eyes. And was she still in yesterday’s clothes? That had never happened in all the years she’d known her. Lexi was never anything but impeccable.

  But Kenzie’s suspicions were too fresh, and her broiling anger just needed somewhere to go. ‘Tell me I earned my part fair and square. If I have, I’ll stay.’

  And if she hadn’t …?

  ‘Where is this coming from, Kenzie? What’s happened?’

  That wasn’t a yes. That was a good old-fashioned hedge. ‘Honestly. Friend to friend, did you cast me because I was the best for the role?’

  No. That pained crease between her friend’s brows said it loud and clear.

  ‘Does it matter why? What matters is that you are perfect. You’ve become perfect.’

  Oh my God. Dylan had pressured her.

  ‘I wasn’t perfect for it at the start?’

  ‘This is a Draven, Kenzie. You’ll never ever have this opportunity again. Not to put on one, not to be in one. You can’t seriously be thinking of stepping down?’

  ‘I don’t care whose play it is. If I didn’t earn my spot I’d rather go back to my basement.’

  Lexi’s body sagged. ‘You’re amazing in the part. You were born to play Mary.’

  Almost literally, with a good dose of Mary’s genes in her own body.

  Lexi’s face folded even further. ‘Does it matter how I found out you could act or only that I did?’

  ‘Of course it matters! I don’t need anyone putting pressure on you to cast me. I can stand—’ or fall ‘—on my own, thank you.’

  She didn’t want anything from Dylan North.

  Lexi frowned. ‘It wasn’t pressure, Kenzie. He just made sure I saw your audition.’

  ‘His audition. And are you telling me he didn’t have a quiet word in the right ear? The way he wanted things to go. You practically fangirl all over his name whenever it’s mentioned.’

  ‘What?’

  Kenzie plonked herself into one of the seats in front of Lexi’s desk. ‘I just want to know in my heart of hearts that I earned my part fair and square.’

  Lexi’s only response to her heartfelt plea was a frustrated sigh.

  ‘I can’t do this, Kenzie. Not on top of Mayor Forsdyke, and losing Sofia, and all the secrecy, and Mark and …’ She rubbed her temples with the mounds of her hands. ‘You are good, Kenzie, don’t ever doubt that. But theatre is a business. Sometimes I make business decisions. I’m sorry.’

  She was business. She wasn’t inspired or unsung or some kind of performance prodigy.

  Had she actually imagined she was?

  ‘I get it, Lexi. Someone like Draven asks you to cast his little protégée, it’s pretty hard to refuse.’

  That drew Lexi back from whatever stressed place she’d gone. ‘What? Draven? What do you—’

  The faux befuddlement was entirely convincing. Lexi should think about casting herself sometime. ‘Don’t waste your breath. He told me already.’

  ‘Kenzie, I have no idea what you’re talking about. No-one asked me to cast you.’

  Okay, please … She was tired of this game now. ‘Dylan gave you the audition. I assume he left some kind of instruction with it.’

  ‘He left a note that said “watch me”. That’s it.’ She sat upright in her chair. As stiff as the antennae Kenzie could suddenly imagine vibrating above her head. In the ensuing silence, she could practically hear the cogs grinding around. ‘Did you say Draven
told me to cast you?’

  A horrible kind of sucking started up low in her gut. Like a whirlpool getting ready to take all her organs with it.

  She didn’t know.

  ‘No.’

  It was official: she was the suckiest actor ever to have sucked. That squeaky denial would fool no-one.

  Dark eyes widened. ‘Oh my God, Kenzie. Is Dylan Draven?’ Lexi flopped back in her seat, her skin bleaching.

  ‘No.’ Better. Stronger. Almost believable. Except that Lexi had known her so long.

  ‘That makes so much sense. His arrival, hanging around. His interest in all the staging. Oh holy—’

  ‘That’s not what I meant.’

  ‘It’s what you said. Exactly what you said.’

  ‘I thought—’

  Wait, if Lexi hadn’t cast her because Draven wanted it, then … ‘What were you being so cagey about? Business woman first. Why did you cast me?’

  Lexi’s mind was still way too blown discovering Dylan was Draven to have any subterfuge to put into her answer. She waved the question away. ‘Because of who you are. I thought it would be a good marketing spin to cast a de Vue descendant.’

  ‘You knew?’ Kenzie shook her mind free. So Yeates was right? That was even more upsetting than anything else. And she’d been upset a lot this past twenty-four hours. ‘You’ve never said a thing.’

  ‘Because you’ve never said a thing.’

  She’d kept it a secret her whole life. And, now, in the space of ten minutes two people had already known it. Who else already knew?

  ‘But you were planning on using it in Larrikin’s marketing?’ Then the whole world would have known.

  ‘Not without speaking to you first. I would never have used it without your okay.’

  Lexi pulled a flyer out from under her in-tray. It was the promo poster for Larrikin with some additional text above her name.

  De Vue descendant, Kenzie Russell.

  It took four blinks for that to process. ‘You cast me to get bums on seats?’

  ‘Look around you, Kenzie, everything I do every minute of my life is to get bums on seats. To keep Rivervue running. To keep us here. I cast you because you were a good fit for Mary and because a bit of interest in your story might help us get Larrikin out to a wider audience.’ Her breath puffed fully out. ‘Yes, that’s how desperate I’ve become. I’m a horrible, exploitative person.’

  ‘Desperate?’

  ‘It’s Larrikin, Kenzie. De Vue is a national hero around here. And the play has the waft of incest about it. I had to have something up my sleeve to counter the mayor when he goes ballistic. Forsdyke’s agenda is more convoluted than any script possibly could be.’

  ‘So why put it on at all?’

  ‘Because it’s a Draven. And because it’s so beautifully written. It’s pure art. The way the two reverse timelines converge through act one and two to the very moment the audience discovers Ron’s true feelings for his sister—’

  ‘Half-sister.’ They said it together and the timing was so perfect it was impossible not to smile. And then chuckle. And then laugh outright.

  God she needed that laugh right now, when she was at her lowest.

  Just as everyone needed the laughs that her great-grandfather had brought them after World War II. Because the world needed to heal. Maybe his work wasn’t as empty or self-serving as she’d always thought.

  Lexi shrugged as the laughs waned. ‘And because I need something up my sleeve to save this magnificent, kitschy old building. To save Rivervue. I truly believe it’s too good to not put on, come what may. Brachen is grownup enough to handle a bit of veritas. I’ve just been trying to get us so close to the Bicentennial Festival that the shire can’t ask us to pull Larrikin. You were my secret weapon.’

  ‘I thought Draven was.’

  ‘You and Draven together … You were going to save Rivervue.’

  Past tense? Kenzie fought the tiny flush of pleasure that being linked so closely with Dylan brought.

  ‘If I can’t act, then I’m glad I get to be useful to Rivervue some other way.’

  ‘Oh, good lord, woman. You can act! I wouldn’t have cast you in the lead if you couldn’t. All those bums on seats only to put on a tanker? I don’t think so. You’d have been just as useful to me as a Hollywood starlet or one of Ron’s cows! That’s the nature of spin.’ She leaned forward on her desk. ‘You are still the best Mary I could have asked for. Your genes are pure bonus.’

  First time she’d ever thought of them as that. Yet, there was none of her usual discomfort.

  Soft fingers wrapped around hers where they lay on the desktop. ‘Please, Kenzie. Stay with us. I feel like this is all meant to be. Do you believe in serendipity?’

  She’d thought it was serendipity that made her poke her head through the bushes behind Rivervue all those weeks ago. Look how that ended up.

  ‘The story is going to be public a fortnight from now,’ Lexi reasoned, ‘with you or without you. Wouldn’t you rather make sure it gets done as respectfully and carefully as possible?’

  As rationales went, it was pretty manipulative, and entirely effective.

  There was a reason Lexi was so good at her job. And it wasn’t an easy job to do.

  Kenzie sighed. ‘I have to talk to my nan. To give her a heads-up. I can’t not tell her. She won’t know any of this history.’

  Lexi’s response was immediate. She rummaged in her bottom drawer before sliding a fully bound copy of Larrikin across the desk to her. ‘Of course you do. Be with her when she reads it. Invite her to a technical rehearsal if it helps. I don’t want her to feel ambushed with all of this.’

  Better to have a clean, bound manuscript for her to read than the tear-stained, wrinkled thing she’d thrown at Dylan and then gathered back up off the floor.

  ‘Because of the bad PR potential?’ It was undeniably substantial.

  ‘No. Because she’s your nan. Which makes her my nan. You’re family to me, Kenzie. I’m sorry that I couldn’t tell you all of this sooner. I just don’t want to lose Rivervue.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  ‘I’m running out of time and options. And apparently I get a bit mercenary when I’m desperate.’

  Kenzie took Larrikin into her hands and, for the first time, it felt heavy. Substantial and grave. She’d not yet held a full copy of Dylan’s play, only the three acts separately. Something about balancing its full weight on her fingertips brought everything home to her.

  This was big—there was no getting around it.

  This was a Draven set in little old Brachen and it was going to put Rivervue Community Theatre on the global arts map. Had anyone heard of Carston Youth Theatre or the StuttgART Collective before they received their parcel of mysterious goodness?

  No. They hadn’t. And now funding came to them, because of the wax paper–wrapped parcels they came to work to find one day.

  ‘I should go see Nanna,’ Kenzie murmured. ‘Sorry for coming in here all …’

  Insecure and uncertain.

  ‘All diva-like?’

  ‘Let’s go with that. I promise it’s the first and last time you’ll see it from me. I like my drama strictly onstage.’

  Which is what made this whole twenty-four hours so impossibly challenging for her. There was no drama downstairs in the shadows. Only predictable order. How she missed that right now.

  Lexi waved her away with slim fingers. ‘Go! I’m going to need a few minutes’ alone time to get my head around the fact that Dylan and Draven are the same person. And to suppress my curiosity as to how exactly you came to discover that.’

  ‘You can’t tell anyone, Lexi. I’ve breached Dylan’s trust in telling you.’

  Although he breached hers first.

  ‘You didn’t tell me. You blurted it. Totally different. Besides, you’ve kept my secret all this time, I’m sure I can return the favour.’

  ‘And you can’t use Dylan/Draven as a marketing thing.’ She picked up the flyer and handed
it back to her. ‘You can use this—me—I give my permission. But you can’t out Dylan.’

  Not because of her … and despite everything.

  She wanted to keep her comfortable spot on the moral high ground, thanks very much.

  ‘Fair enough, but when Larrikin is over, you and I should have a long conversation about all of this. I feel like there’s a lot more going on than I know.’

  Oh, so much. But none of it that she could talk about now. And maybe ever. Because if she started she might not be able to stop. And no friend was up for quite that much angst. Besides, she wasn’t ready to think about the time to come when there was no Larrikin. Because Larrikin was all she had left of Dylan and while it wasn’t the same as having him here under her very roof, it was at least something to remember him by. To hold on to.

  To cling to.

  She was staring down the barrel of losing Dylan, and Phantom, and Rivervue all in one big rush. A bit of clinging was surely okay, right?

  ‘I’ll work some of the solo scenes with Richard now. You take the afternoon off and go see Nanna. Good luck.’

  Kenzie clutched the Larrikin script to her as she trod back down to the foyer. The pages weighing down her fingers were going to change Brachen and Rivervue forever. Clearly it was even bigger for Lexi, who was battling some related demon all her own, but as nervous as Larrikin’s ending made her, at the end of the day it was based on her great-grandfather’s own memoir. Draven’s professional reputation hinged on him never getting creative with the truth, only with how he depicted it. And so she believed that everything in Larrikin was also in the secret memoir, which made it as close as they were going to get to the truth.

  At least Ronald Devon’s version of it.

  Now she just had to go and break it to the little girl inside her Nanna’s heart.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Dylan had been staring at the tiny square of glass high above the audience from down on stage for weeks now. He’d thought about asking Kenzie about it, but it had been three days since they’d spoken and, in the weeks before that, the two of them generally had better things to talk about when they were together than a single quirk of architecture in an architecturally quirky building. Plus, she likely took that tiny square for granted in the same way she’d come to just expect Rivervue’s doors to open inward. It was a given. Most people became blinded to the ordinary with enough time.