by Davis Bunn
Danny had repeatedly taken his place in five circles of chairs and told the groups what their project was all about. When he ran out of air, Emma and Robin chimed in. Describing the characters and the story and the impact it was having on them. Emma’s words proved the most powerful of all. How she had started coming back to a normal life all because of Danny’s voice. That was how she said it—returning to a normal life. None of the gathering had needed to ask what she was talking about.
Afterward each group had allowed Jennie to come in, along with the entire film crew. They listened as Jennie spoke her lines, two and sometimes three times. When the crew departed, Danny personally made the final request. In reply, each group had agreed to serve as extras when they shot the final series of scenes.
Danny looked down at the young woman sprawled on the carpet. “Thank you for today. A lot.”
She smiled up at him. There was a freshness to her features that he had not noticed before. A light to her eyes. “You can call today payback.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You know. Your lessons.”
“Oh. That.”
Every day he had started her scene with another question. Making the shift from Emma the fourteen-year-old actress to the role she was playing. Today he had returned to the very first thing he had asked her. To think of a secret she had never told anyone, then think of one her character held close.
Emma went on, “The secret I came up with today? The one you said I never told anybody? Mom thinks you’re a hottie.”
There was the sound of crashing pots in the kitchen. “Emma Sturgis!”
Emma might as well not have heard a thing, she was so calm. “I heard her say it.”
“I said no such thing!”
“She was talking with her friend on the phone. Consuela.”
“The bartender,” Danny recalled.
Robin remained hidden inside the kitchen. “Young lady, that is enough!”
“Mom said you probably weren’t house-trained. Yet. Whatever Consuela said made her laugh.” Emma did a teenager thing, rising from the floor like she was a liquid pretzel. “Would you like to hear a song I’m working on?”
“Sure.”
Robin did not appear until Emma had left the room. Then she stepped into the doorway, showing Danny a scarlet face. “There’s probably something I should say at this point. But I have no idea what it is.”
“It’s fine. Really.”
“Can we pretend my darling daughter didn’t actually say what she just did?”
“Sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Maybe I was wrong about the house-trained part.” She licked the wooden spoon she held and inspected him thoughtfully. “Do I need to say something about how you’re safe in this house?”
“No, Robin. You don’t.”
“I mean, everybody knows about you and Megan.”
Danny said softly, “It’s all my fault.”
“Of course it is. You’re a guy. Admitting it is a very good start.”
“What, men are to blame for every wrong move?”
Robin smiled as she returned to the kitchen.
Emma came back carrying the tenor sax and her tablet. She plugged the latter into the living room’s sound system, wet her reed, hit Play, and launched straight in. With the first strands emanating from the wall speakers, Danny instantly recognized the song.
Emma did not attempt to match Jesse Cook’s flaming speed. Instead, she played backup, melding her sounds into the riffs played by Cook’s violinist, Chris Church. Danny felt himself becoming lost in the music, a sure sign of true talent.
When she was done, Danny found himself reluctant to return to the here and now.
Robin said, “That was lovely, dear.”
Emma asked Danny, “You liked it?”
He nodded. “Very much.”
Robin said, “Go put your instrument away, honey. Dinner’s ready.”
Emma seemed to find what she was looking for in Danny’s subdued response, for she kissed his cheek before bouncing away. Robin remained in the doorway, watching him.
Finally Danny said, “What?”
“You don’t know, you can’t imagine, what an impact you’ve had on that child’s life,” Robin said. “And mine.”
Danny had no idea how to respond. So he remained silent.
“Now you can help me set the table. Consider it your next lesson in becoming house-trained.”
After dinner, as Danny drove back to the hotel, he could still feel the hugs that Robin and Emma had given to seal his departure. Now that he was alone, their gift felt like it marked a turning.
He parked in front of the hotel and stood there a long moment, drinking in the sight of the starlit building and all the mysteries it represented. The dark path that skirted the barn and corral was familiar enough that he felt no need for a light. The closer he came to his cabin, the wearier he became. As he skirted the lake, his fatigue whispered a lullaby as strong as any he had ever known.
But none of that mattered, because seated on his cabin’s top step was Megan.
53
MEGAN HAD LEFT SAN LUIS OBISPO with one goal in mind. She could not think further than parking in the hotel lot and looking Danny in the eye. Every time she started to wonder what she would say, her mind deflected.
Facing a jury for that first opening statement was always like taking a cliff dive at midnight. She prepped as best as she possibly could. She had all the available data on the people seated before her. The sort of deep-background investigation seen in movies was not possible on smaller trials, which was where she had always operated. So Megan had treated her first words as a joining. She and the jury were about to enter a mystery together.
Megan liked to make her opening remarks in the space between the defense table and the judge. Under California law, this was the only time when the lawyers were allowed to step in front of their tables and approach the jury box. As a result, LA attorneys called this space the proving ground, and for good reason. Megan never used a lectern or prepared notes. It was just her, standing there exposed and vulnerable, revealing herself to the people who would decide her client’s fate. She had never lost a case that had gone all the way to a jury trial.
She recognized Danny’s silhouette the moment he appeared around the hotel. Her first reaction was to do what she always did. She wanted to build a defense, do her best to take control. Starting with an explanation as to why she was sitting on Danny’s top step in the dark. Waiting and hoping. Desperately.
Just then, though, all she could manage were a few tight breaths.
Danny stood in front of her for a time, not moving. His silhouette was made luminescent by the moon, the lake, and a single light shining through the kitchen windows.
Finally he said, “You’re stronger than I am.”
Megan tasted several responses. But the air just wasn’t there to shape them.
Danny went on, “I’ve wanted to do what you’re doing. Meet you. Call you. Something. But every time I started, my mind was such a jumble. And everything I wanted to say sounded so wrong.”
Megan forced herself to say, “I’m here. What do you want to say?”
“That you were right. I’m fighting shadows. I’ve been doing that since forever. Every relationship I’ve ever been in, the littlest thing has set me off. And then I’ve blamed anything within reach just so I don’t have to face the truth. That it’s me, and it always has been.”
Danny stepped forward and lowered himself onto the step beside her. Megan felt his warmth, strong as heat off the sun. She wanted to melt into him. But she resisted. He wasn’t done. And she needed to hear him out. Drink in every word.
“When it’s over and the air is filled with the stench of arguments I started, I blame my past. But I know that’s just been another convenient lie. I think maybe I’ve always known. How can it be the fault of something years ago? The past is over. The problem is what I’ve insisted
on carrying.”
“You have to let it go, Danny.”
He nodded slowly, then surprised her by saying, “Emma has been showing me the exact same thing. How the only way to move forward was to do what you just said.”
She wrapped her arms around him and said the words a second time. “Let go.”
“Walk away from the chains I’ve had holding me down since forever.” He sighed. “It’s so hard.”
“Yes. It is.”
“I don’t know how.”
“One step at a time,” Megan said.
Danny puffed several hard breaths. “Will you help me?”
“There’s nothing on this earth I want to do more,” Megan replied. “Except . . .”
“What?”
She turned and cradled his face in her hands. “This.”
Her kiss held such a yearning hunger, it felt like she had carried the need for years. She stopped, pulled back, and loved how he sat with his eyes still closed. As if he too was captivated by the dreamlike moment.
She kissed him again.
54
THEY MOVED OVER to the kitchen and made a pot of coffee. They were still talking when the cook arrived at five. Danny had never known a situation like this. Tired as he was, he marveled at how it felt. Here he was, holding hands with a woman who exasperated him with the way she took control of every situation he presented to her. And yet with the way she talked, he could tell she held his best interests at the forefront of her mind and heart. Of course, there had been others who had put him first, at least for a while. The Marine who had taken him and JR in and reshaped them into the men they had become, for one. But this was different. Megan’s eyes shone with a dark, molten love. Now and then she paused in their discussion and took time out for a kiss, an embrace, a soft word of how much she had missed him. How glad she was they were here together. Waiting for the dawn of another very busy day.
Even the fatigue they shared was okay. They accepted the cook’s offer of breakfast burritos, thanked her for the freshly refilled mugs, and continued with their planning. The day would be long and stressful and full of monumental events. But that was okay too.
For the first time in his life, Danny Byrd was learning what it meant to give up control. Willingly. For all the right reasons.
He knew this was one cause behind the wreckage of his partnership with JR. At some level Danny had probably always known. He entered into most situations with the unspoken assumption that he could do things better than anybody else. But Megan proved him wrong. She was smarter. She knew things he had never even considered. She talked in a way that crystallized things.
It threatened him.
Several times he came face-to-face with a new truth. Turning away from the past was only the first step. This was what came after. Walking into a new definition of life.
The more they worked through what needed to happen next, the more Danny became certain he could not have done this himself. At least, not successfully. Several of the issues Megan raised were precisely the sort of things he would have tried to avoid. Starting with JR.
Danny said, “I don’t want to talk with him.”
“You won’t.”
“I don’t want to see him.”
Megan didn’t push. She simply waited. Her silence was a dagger that carved away at all his arguments.
“The guy landed me in jail.”
“He did more than that. He broke a lifetime trust. He hurt you. Of course you want to avoid him.” She reached across the table and took his hand. “But it probably will be necessary to meet him once. The people on the other side of this mystery may insist on it.”
That was the moment Annie and Greg and Rick crowded through the kitchen door and saw them seated there.
Annie said, “Well, all right.”
Greg said, “Now my day is complete.”
“Where’s the coffee,” Rick asked, “and can I have mine through an IV?”
Megan did not give any indication she heard a thing. She held Danny tight with her gaze. “Sooner or later you’re going to run into him. And then what? Right now you’re the one in control.”
Danny nodded slowly. “And I won’t have to do it alone.”
“That’s right. I will handle JR. Your job is to get through the meeting. You don’t need to say a word. In some respects, it’d be best if you kept silent the whole time.”
“Fine by me.”
“You may change your mind when you see him,” she warned.
“Doubtful.”
“If you do, you just . . .”
Megan stopped because Emma came through the door with her mother, saw how they were seated, and said, “Finally.”
Megan smiled at the two women. “Good morning to you too.”
Emma gave Danny a quick hug. “Hey there, hottie.”
“Emma, please, just stop.” This from a very red-faced Robin.
Megan asked, “What’s that all about?”
Emma accepted a burrito and a hug from the cook and headed for the back door, singing, “Hottie, hottie, hottie.”
Robin said, “All the guns around here are loaded with blanks, right?”
Evelyn entered, smiled at the two of them holding hands, scooped up a tray the cook had prepared holding a thermos, mugs, and burritos, and asked Greg, “When is she due on set?”
“Forty-five minutes.”
As Evelyn departed, one of the grips entered the kitchen and said, “There’s a guy out front saying he needs to talk with Danny about a soundtrack.”
And so their day began.
55
EMMA HAD NEVER LOOKED more like a young teen than now, skipping down the stairs behind Danny, almost singing the words, “You and lawyer lady? Really?”
“Her name is Megan.”
“And don’t you forget it.”
“Pay attention. This is important.”
“When did it start? Last night? Who’s she on the phone with now, her bestie? Telling her all the deets?”
Danny stopped when his feet touched the gravel and turned back. He wished Rick could appear like magic, capture the smile and the light in Emma’s eyes. “Megan is talking with JR.”
“The guy who landed you in jail?”
“None other.”
“What’s she saying—hands off, he’s mine?”
There was no reason why he should tell her anything. Even so . . . “Megan is arranging a conference for this afternoon.”
“With JR? Ewww. Why?”
“She thinks we should tie up loose ends. And get answers to some questions that have been bugging me.”
For some reason, Danny’s words caused Emma to shiver. “That lady is totally ice.”
“I’m glad you approve. Now can we get down to business?”
“I thought you said I wasn’t filming today.”
“You’re not. Matter of fact, what are you doing here anyway?”
“Jennie said she’d give me some pointers between takes.”
The news doubled the sun’s warmth. “I want you to have time with her, but it may need to wait for another day.” He walked her over to the man standing beside the eighties-vintage Mercedes convertible. “Emma, say hello to Myron Riles.”
“Hi.”
Danny had never met the gentleman, but the photographs did not come close to capturing Myron’s courtier charm or the mischievous gleam to his gaze. Though in his early eighties, Myron held himself impossibly erect. He was also blade-slender and dressed in a double-breasted suit, highly polished shoes, a striped shirt with white dress collar, and a foulard matched by his silk pocket handkerchief. His features were movie-star clean, his eyes crystal grey, his smile a thing of brilliance.
Myron gave a fractional bow and said, “A genuine honor, Ms. Sturgis. May I say, after viewing your first cut several times, I detect a star on the rise.”
Danny could tell Emma had no idea how to respond. He said, “I grew up loving your soundtracks, sir.”
“If you noticed
my hand on the tiller, young man, I failed in my duty to the film.” His smile carried a grandfatherly warmth. “Nonetheless, I am eternally grateful for your lifting me from a premature grave.”
Emma said, “What did you mean about not noticing?”
Myron showed the good sense not to talk down to her. “A soundtrack should never enter the spotlight, Ms. Sturgis.”
“Emma.”
He played the courtier once more. “An honor, I’m sure. And I am Myron. My job is to heighten the emotions that the audience feels, yet remain always in the background.”
“But Danny is putting my music front and center.”
“And well he should, from what I’ve witnessed. But that is different. You see, your music is part of the story. My job, if Mr. Byrd here decides to let me remain on set, is to weave a series of subtle melodies that will come and go between your solo acts. I am here merely to help dress the background. The correct term for that process is ‘setting a thematic structure.’ If I’m successful, I’ll deliver the audience, ready and eager, to your next time on stage.”
Danny could see Emma was taken with the gentleman. “I’d like Emma to play several of her favorite pieces for you. We’re not tied to any of them, but it would be great if you could use songs she already is comfortable with in forming the central themes.”
“I agree.”
“Greg is thinking we’d like to have her play four times through the film. Once at the Soho Club, twice by herself, and then in the finale. We need you two to work those out.”
Myron did the right thing by asking, “Does that seem acceptable, young lady?”
“Sure. I guess.”
Danny went on, “Greg has been thinking ahead. In case this is as big as we hope.”
Myron did not need to have things spelled out. “You are considering a possible album.”
Danny ignored Emma’s round eyes. “We’d have to keep costs to a minimum. Find musicians who would work for studio scale and a cut of the profits.”