“Eventually, he told me not to tell you. He knew what he was doing, and so did I. Stealing from you, and it makes me feel sick that I helped him.”
“You call that a ‘small confession’?” Tallie looked appropriately shocked.
“That wasn’t what I meant.” Brigitte looked profoundly distressed, as well she should be. It was the most upsetting thing Tallie had ever heard about a man in her life, worse than discovering that her British movie-star husband was cheating on her with his leading lady, and reading about it in the press. What Hunt had done was profoundly dishonest. It was stealing. “My ‘small’ confession was that I did go to the Chateau Marmont once, and charged it on the card. I didn’t have my credit card with me. I’m not even sure now who I went with. I think it was that cameraman I was so crazy about. He was married, and you didn’t want me to sleep with him, so I didn’t have the guts to tell you. I paid back the money though, in cash, to the petty cash account, every penny.”
“Victor says there was more than one credit card slip with your signature on it from the Chateau Marmont and the Sunset Marquis,” Tallie said sternly. “He checked.”
“I may have gone twice, but I always reimbursed it. Maybe someone forged my signature on the other slips. Maybe even Hunt. And that’s the other thing I have to tell you.” She took a breath and plunged in. “I think he’s been seeing someone for about a year now. I suspected it at first, and I have a friend who works in his office. He confirmed it when I asked him. She’s some young secretary, very young I think. She has an abusive ex-husband and a child, a three-year-old boy. I think she’s about twenty-five or twenty-six. My friend says that Hunt must have been sorry for her, and tried to help her. Her ex came back to beat her up, and the kid, after she left him. Hunt was very sympathetic, and helped her find a place to live, and I guess it all started from there. They’ve been having an affair for about a year. He stays at hotels with her, mostly when you’re away, I think. And the maid says he never sleeps at the house now when you’re gone. Apparently that’s true. I checked.” Brigitte looked devastated as she told Tallie the details.
“The maid told you about this? Does everyone know except me?” He had played her for a fool, while stealing money from her and cheating on her. She never would have suspected it of him in a million years. Instead of being the best man she had ever had, he had turned out to be the worst one.
“What are you going to do?” Brigitte asked, looking desperately worried and remorseful. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I’m always trying to protect you. I knew you’d be upset about the money, but I thought maybe you’d think he was worth it, and I thought the affair with this girl would blow over. But it hasn’t. They say it’s very serious, and she wants to marry him as soon as her divorce comes through.”
“And when was he going to tell me that little piece of news? After their honeymoon? Jesus, he’s a shit.” Tallie looked as though the bottom had just fallen out of her world.
“And so am I for not telling you all this before. I only heard about the affair with the girl about six moths ago. I should have told you then. And about the money before that. I really made all the wrong decisions on this one.” Her confessing it now made Tallie feel a little more benevolent toward her, but she was badly shaken. Brigitte had hidden important information from Tallie, because she didn’t want to hurt her. But she had hidden Hunt’s cheating on her and stealing money from her. Both were serious offenses, and Tallie didn’t deserve it. Brigitte had never been in such a tough position in her life. She was crying as she sat in the car looking guilty and devastated.
“I have to figure out what to do,” Tallie said, looking shell-shocked. “I need some time to digest this before I confront him.” There were tears in her eyes as she said it, and they were both crying as they looked at each other and Brigitte hugged her in sympathy and remorse. She felt terrible about the news she had delivered.
“I thought you’d want him around, at any price,” Brigitte said as she blew her nose.
“I don’t want anyone that badly, no matter how much I love him. I don’t want anyone enough to let them cheat on me and steal my money.” She was most hurt by his cheating on her, even more so than the money. Money could always be replaced, but her faith in him couldn’t. She couldn’t imagine ever trusting him or any man again. He was the last of a long, checkered career of bad men. And she no longer trusted her own judgment.
“I’m so sorry, Tallie,” Brigitte said as she sat there and cried, and finally Tallie looked at her watch and said they had to go to work. She didn’t reach out to comfort Brigitte. She was much too upset at her for not telling her the whole story sooner, and at Hunt for what he’d done.
Tallie had no idea how she was going to work today, but she had no choice. Even with her heart breaking, she had to continue working on the film. She wished it were already over. And she wanted to confirm the two stories first, for her own peace of mind, before she accused him. She had to figure out how to do that and who would help her. It was going to be agonizing living with him in the meantime.
“Are you going to fire me?” Brigitte asked her with a look of terror.
“Maybe. I don’t know.” It was as honest as she could be with her. “I don’t want to. Let’s let the dust settle on this and see what happens.” It was the best she could do for now, and Brigitte was grateful that Tallie was taking some time to think about it. It was a terrible shock and an ugly story. They drove to the set then, both of them with heavy hearts and in silence, wondering what would happen. Tallie felt as though her world had just come to an end. Again.
Chapter 6
TALLIE STAYED AT the hotel in Palm Springs the night of Brigitte’s confession. She didn’t want to go home to Hunt, and didn’t want to say anything to him yet. And she was keeping her distance from Brigitte too. She understood that Brigitte’s motives had been good, but what she’d done was so wrong, not telling her about the money Hunt was taking, and about the affair. She still couldn’t understand why he was taking money from her, he had so much of his own. And she was just as disturbed about Hunt cheating on her. If it was true, and it probably was, he had destroyed the last bit of faith she had. Tallie lay in bed in her hotel room that night feeling sick. She wanted to call Max in New York, but she knew Max would hear it all in her mother’s voice, and there was no need to upset her too, and Max was crazy about Hunt. It would be a blow to her too.
Tallie didn’t bother to eat that night, all she did was cry, after working hard all day. And finally at nine o’clock she called her lawyer. He handled mostly contracts for her, but had taken care of a few personal matters too, and had managed to avert several lawsuits. She called him at home, and he came to the phone immediately after one of his children answered. Greg Thomas was an excellent attorney, and she knew he was discreet.
“Hi, Greg,” she said in a mournful tone.
“Hi, what’s up?” He sounded surprised to hear from her at that hour of night. Tallie wasn’t the sort of client who called him at home. She was always respectful of him, and called him during business hours, so he was worried this was an emergency of some kind, and to her it was. “Something wrong?”
“Possibly. Our big investor for the new film wanted an audit, and we’ve been dealing with that for the last two weeks. And some things came to light as a result. Our investor gave us a clean bill of health, but I’m concerned about a couple of matters that surfaced.”
“That’s too bad.” He was concerned for her. She sounded terrible to him. “What can I do to help you?”
“I’d like the name of a private investigator. I want to check this out, for my own peace of mind. I don’t know who or what to believe right now. I’ve heard some pretty bad stories, and I’ve got a lot of cash going out the door that I can’t explain. It’s probably what I’ve been told, and none of it is pretty. It looks like Hunt is stealing money from me and cheating on me, but before I confront him, I want to be sure.”
“Hunt?” He sounded shocked. H
e had met him several times, and knew about the movies they had worked on together. He had done a limited partnership agreement between them for the last two, and he liked him a lot.
“Yeah, Hunt. You never know about people.”
“I think you’re smart to check it out before you confront him. Who told you all this?”
“My accountant pointed out the missing money, and Brigitte just admitted that she knew about it, he’s been pumping her for money for three years, and she knew about the affair too. She thought she was doing me a favor by not telling me.”
“How well do you know her?” Greg asked coolly. He had heard stories like this before over the years.
“As well as I know myself. She’s like a sister to me. She’s worked for me for seventeen years, and I’ve never had a single problem or reason to doubt her. She comes from money, so she has no reason to steal from me, or to lie about Hunt. I would trust her with my life, my kid, and everything I have.” And she had only known Hunt for four years, as opposed to Brigitte for seventeen.
“There’s no telling about people. Human nature is a fearsome thing. Sometimes people who have no reason to be dishonest are pathologically unable to do the right thing.” That applied to Hunt, from what she had just heard. “I’m sorry, Tallie. I know how distressing this must be.” He had been through it before with clients, and it was heartbreaking to see the damage it caused, to all concerned. “I actually use a very good woman when I need an investigation done. She has her own firm, she’s an ex-FBI agent. She’s smart, nice, and tough as nails. I think I have her home number here. I’ll give her a call right now. I’ll call you back.” She gave him the number at the hotel in Palm Springs, and they hung up, and while she was waiting to hear back from him, Hunt called her, and her stomach did a double flip. She didn’t want to talk to him, given everything Brigitte had said, but if she wasn’t going to confront him yet, she had to pretend that everything was fine. Her hand was shaking as she held the phone.
“I miss you,” he said, as soon as she answered the phone. Since he was on his cell phone, she had no idea where he was and didn’t trust him anymore. For all she knew, he was waiting for his girlfriend at a hotel, and planning to spend the night with her.
“I miss you too,” she said quietly. Her words had a false ring to her own ears, knowing all she did now.
“How’d it go today on the set?” He sounded happy and relaxed.
“Okay. We’re moving along. We should be shooting back in town again in a few weeks.” But for now, she was suddenly glad they were there. It gave her a chance to breathe and figure things out away from him.
“I’ll come up tomorrow, if you want,” he said, sounding affectionate, and she didn’t know what to say.
“Sure, that would be great, but we might have a night shoot tomorrow. If that’s the case, it wouldn’t be worth it, because I’ll be on the set all night. I’ll call you tomorrow and let you know.”
“That’s fine,” he said easily, and then sounded rushed, as though he’d gotten to his destination and had to go. “I’ll call you later,” he promised, and hung up just as the phone in her room rang, and it was Greg. She was feeling ill after talking to Hunt. Everything they had had for four years suddenly seemed spoiled.
“I got her,” Greg said immediately. “She said she’ll make time to see you whenever you’re free. I know you’re on location. Can you come into town?”
“I’ll do it. I think we have an easy day tomorrow.” She had lied to Hunt about the night shoot to keep him away. Now she was lying too, she thought with despair. She had always thought their relationship was impeccably honest. And all Hunt had done was lie. “I could probably be in the city by six or seven, at the latest. Do you think she’ll see me that late?” Tallie wanted to get the investigation started as soon as possible. She wanted to know the truth. She was miserable with it all up in the air.
“She said anytime you want. She’s a kind person, and I gave her an idea what this is about. She said you can call her tonight at home. I’ll give you the number.”
“Thanks, Greg.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sorry you have to deal with this. Call her—she’s at home right now.” They hung up, and she did. Her name was Margaret Simpson, and she had a young, warm voice on the phone, but she was businesslike in what she said. Tallie gave her a brief rundown of the problem, and Meg, as she called herself, asked her a few questions that seemed run-of-the-mill to Tallie. They made an appointment to meet at her office at six o’clock the next day. There were no important scenes being shot the following day, and she was going to leave the assistant director in charge when she left, which would be a thrill for him. It was rare for Tallie to leave the set before shooting ended, but this was important. She thanked the investigator for being available to her.
“Could you bring me a couple of photographs of the subjects?” Meg asked her. “It’s not vital if you can’t. But it would help.”
“There are good photographs of Hunt on his website, if you look it up.” Tallie gave her the address. “And I’ve got a bunch of Brigitte at the house.” She didn’t want to go there before the meeting and risk running into Hunt, but then she remembered a few she had on her phone, that she had taken recently of both of them. “I can forward you a few candid shots I have of them on my phone.”
“That’ll work fine,” Meg assured her. “It’ll give us a start. I take it you’re going to want surveillance on both of them, or just Hunter Lloyd?” Tallie nearly gulped. This seemed so invasive and so mean somehow, but so did cheating and taking money.
“I don’t have any reason to suspect my assistant of anything. She wouldn’t take money from me, and I think all she’s guilty of is not telling me what she knew about Hunt.” But she had denied all the hotel charges except one or two, which didn’t make sense to Tallie.
“It’s up to you, but it might be smart to check them both out, and figure out what’s going on. You’ve got a money issue happening, and a romantic issue with your man. The two aren’t related, but you’ve got concerns about two important people in your life. You might as well know what’s going on with both of them.”
“I guess you’re right. I think she meant well not telling me about him. She’s very protective and she didn’t want to upset me. But she kept it from me for a long time. She’s very sorry about it now,” as well she should be, Tallie thought to herself. “What do we do with the information once we have it?” Tallie asked the investigator. She was feeling overwhelmed. She had expected none of this to happen, and since Sunday her whole life had been upside down and her mind was in a whirl. She didn’t feel like she was thinking clearly. The only moments of sanity she had had were on the set, when she was occupied with her work and not preoccupied about them. The rest of the time, she felt distracted and confused, and suddenly afraid of what she might learn.
“That’s up to you,” Meg answered. “How you handle the personal side of this is your decision. People react differently. Some of my clients find out terrible things about their mates and decide not to do anything about it. They don’t want to rock the boat, and they just use the information to keep an eye on things in future and be more alert. Others make some major changes after they find out. The money is a different story. You’ll probably want to confront that, and depending on what we find out, you may want to involve law enforcement. It really depends if it falls into the criminal realm or not. And you’ll be the best judge about your assistant, and all of it. All I do is give you the information and enough backup so you know it’s reliable, and no one is lying to you. But you’re in charge.”
It sounded reasonable to Tallie, given how uncomfortable the situation was. Meg would give her what she needed to make her own decisions, depending on what she heard. She couldn’t imagine allowing Hunt to continue his affair, if it was true, without saying anything to him about it. If it was true, she was going to ask him to move out. And then she’d have to figure out what to do about their work together. It
was all so complicated and felt like such a mess to her. But as much as this was a relationship and a person she cherished and was important to her, it wasn’t a marriage, with young children involved and the kind of situation where she might want to close her eyes to his having an affair. That sounded inconceivable to her. And there was obviously nothing criminal happening. Even if he had been taking money for the past three years, she would never bring criminal charges against him. She would ask him to return the money. He could afford to, and she was sure he would. This was entirely a private matter, not a criminal one. And if Brigitte had gotten sloppy about charging things to her, like hotel stays, she would have to deal with her about it, and decide what to do. In that case, it was more about poor boundaries on her part, which wasn’t okay. But that was hardly a criminal matter either.
“I don’t think we’ll need law enforcement,” Tallie said quietly. Just a doctor for her broken heart and shattered faith. Both felt injured beyond repair right now, and no one could fix that, only time. “I don’t think this is a criminal matter.”
“You never know,” Meg said reasonably. “We’re talking about a lot of money here. You can’t always tell what that will lead to, and what kind of discoveries you’ll make.” Tallie wondered if she should ask Meg to check Victor out too, but that seemed a little extreme. She was sure that her accountant was honest, even if he seemed distracted and over the hill, but he had picked up on the missing cash, so he wasn’t completely out to lunch. But she wondered why he had never noticed it before. That seemed somewhat negligent to her. But they could always investigate him later. First, she wanted to find out what was happening with Hunt, and possibly Brigitte. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” Meg promised, and they hung up. As soon as they did, Tallie forwarded her the three photographs she had on her phone of Brigitte, and two of Hunt. And as soon as the photographs went through, her cell phone rang and told her it was Brigitte.
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