Ocean Beach (23 page)

Maddie couldn’t get Max’s tortured face or the emotional rasp of his voice out of her mind. All day, while she tended to Dustin, ran to the grocery store, prepared pickup sandwiches, even while she made calls to theater groups around the Southeast to offer Millie Golden’s fabulous wardrobe and accessories, she thought about the couple’s lost child. Who’d be just a few years older than Maddie right now, assuming he were still alive, but who remained a frightened
and vulnerable toddler in his father’s eyes. That Millie had also lost the baby she was carrying at the time seemed almost inconceivable.

Haunted by the specter of that kind of loss, she got Dustin up from his afternoon nap, strapped him into the stroller, and set out for the playground at Marjory Stoneman Douglas Ocean Beach Park. There she angled the stroller into the shade of a palm tree and stared down at his beautiful golden face while the warm ocean breeze brushed across his dark curls.

Settling on a stone bench beside him, she pulled out her cell phone and dialed Andrew’s number. He was back in Atlanta and she caught him at the neighborhood pool. “I thought you and Dad might come down when the
Do Over
pilot airs on the first of July. Apparently we’re having a premiere party.” She was still trying to absorb this little tidbit. “Have you seen any of the footage of The Millicent that Kyra has been posting online?”

They chatted for a few minutes as Maddie built up her courage to place her next call, one to Steve. This time, when he tried to put off committing to a trip down to Miami, she refused to let him off the hook.

“The party’s on July first,” she said. “That’s a Saturday. I’m going to expect you and Andrew here for the weekend.”

“That’s a ridiculously long drive for a weekend, Maddie. And there’s no way we can afford to fly.” There was a pause. “Besides, you seem to be doing fine on your own.”

There it was. The reminder that in his mind she’d chosen Miami over him. That he still hadn’t forgiven her for being okay.

“This show is important to our whole family,” she said. “And so is spending time with your daughter and your
grandson.” She left the “even if you don’t want to spend time with me” unspoken, but it hurt just the same.

“Is there money in the budget for a party?” Steve asked dubiously. Another jab at how little she was being paid, how uncertain the payoff was.

“I guess so,” Maddie replied. “Fortunately, Deirdre’s handling the details, so that’s not our problem. All you have to do is show up and be charming.”

Steve grumbled.

“You
will
be charming, Steve,” she said when he complained again, though she was beginning to wonder if he remembered how. She hesitated, not wanting to fight with him over the phone. But she was growing tired of the effort it took to tread so carefully. “I need you to be here.” She hesitated again, but knew that backpedaling now would get them nowhere. “Just let me know your ETA and I’ll make sure that the welcome mat is out.”

Avery dragged a stepladder into the foyer and climbed onto the top rung so that she could reach and clean the chandelier that dangled from the vaulted ceiling.

It was quiet now in the early afternoon, the scrape of the ladder over the tile a mere whisper in comparison to the morning’s pandemonium. Then Donatello Dante and his crew had swarmed over the flat roof above their heads; Ted Darnell, the master electrician, and his young assistant had replaced the last of the knob-and-tube wiring; and the air-conditioning crew had cut into The Millicent’s ceilings and walls to accommodate new ductwork, registers, and returns, piercing the plaster like so much Swiss cheese.

In the living room, Maddie knelt in front of the fireplace attempting to sand the last of fifty years’ worth of paint off the carved fireplace surround. Kyra sat on the sofa nursing Dustin and talking to her mother. It was just the three of them and the baby in this welcome calm after the morning storm.

The chandelier, which was suspended on a chain from a hammered brass starfish escutcheon, was made of luminescent glass shot through with flecks of gold. Shaped like an upside-down umbrella, its eight glass panels curved up and outward and were held together by upright metal spines. Each panel featured a bas-relief of real or imaginary sea creatures even more fanciful than those that surrounded the front door.

Carefully, Avery sprayed the ammonia-water mixture onto a clean cloth and began to wipe the first panel, a delicately sculpted school of swimming fish, keeping her eye out for the artist’s signature or mark that Deirdre seemed certain they would find. As she worked, her thoughts turned to the upcoming premiere party and its ever-expanding invitation list.

Lisa Hogan had come through with large-screen TVs, digital transfers, and all of the other technical things that Troy and Anthony had requested. The network’s publicity people were all over the local tie-ins and press. Avery did not plan to come out and say so, but as much as she hated showing The Millicent in its wounded state, she was beginning to believe that the party might not only help build an audience, but provide the underwriting they so badly needed to give the house its due.

From her perch on the ladder, Avery saw a dented car pull into the drive. It stopped with a rattle and a cough of dark smoke. A gaunt white-haired man eased himself out from behind the wheel. He wore a red Hawaiian print shirt, beige Bermuda shorts, and black socks, which he’d paired with sandals that a tire had clearly given up its life to provide.

Leaning on a brass-handled cane, the man moved
carefully toward the entrance. Avery’s head bumped hard against the glass chandelier as she bent to hurry down the ladder, worried about how he’d manage the front steps. She reached out to steady it, but she was too late. Several panels of glass slid out of their brackets and beat her to the ground, shattering on the tile floor.

Avery looked down at the shards of glass then back up at the damaged piece of art, appalled.

“Are you all right?” Maddie called from the living room as a surprisingly brisk knock sounded on the door.

“Yes,” Avery called out, although she wasn’t sure if this would still be true once Deirdre saw what had happened to the fixture she was so in love with. Avery pushed large shards of glass aside with her shoe then pulled open the door, shaking her head to clear it.

The old man was quite tall. Even hunched over his walking stick, he had a good four or five inches on her. He also had a full white mustache and bushy eyebrows of the same color, suspended over Coke-bottle-lens glasses.

“I’m sorry,” she said before he could speak, her thoughts on the broken glass. Perhaps if she swept it all up carefully, she could find a way to piece it back together. “Max isn’t here right now. I’m not sure when he’ll be back.”

The man craned his neck to see past her then looked back over his shoulder and she wondered if he was hard of hearing. “I said Max isn’t here.” She raised her voice and enunciated carefully. “But I’ll be glad to give him a message.”

He glanced over his shoulder once more then stepped inside. She heard the crunch of glass under his feet. Avery fell back a step and heard the same sound.

Shit.

“Now wait a minute,” Avery began as he took another step into the foyer and the last of the shards crunched into pieces too small to ever go back together. Annoyed, she watched the old man close the door behind him. She was just beginning to wonder if there could, in fact, be such a thing as an octogenarian home invasion when the old man said, “I went to a lot of trouble not to draw a crowd and I don’t want to give away anything now.”

There was one more crunch of glass as Daniel Deranian stepped around the ladder, leaned the cane against the foyer wall, then removed the glasses with hands that were young and firm and unspotted. Without the Coke-bottle lenses to obscure them, his eyes were dark and sharp, in stark contrast to the pasty white makeup that covered his skin.

“Who is it, Avery?” Maddie called out.

“It appears to be Daniel Deranian,” Avery replied as she followed the man into the living room. She was so close behind him that she almost plowed into him when he came to a sudden stop in front of the sofa where Kyra held Dustin to her breast, a baby blanket draped strategically over her shoulder. A tiny hand was curled against Kyra’s bare skin.

From her vantage point at the fireplace, Maddie could see exactly what it took for Kyra to maintain her aura of calm. All three of them watched the actor’s face, or rather the artfully aged face of the white-haired man, as he stood watching mother and child. Maddie didn’t feel at all good about the expression on Deranian’s face, the way that, despite all of the makeup, it reflected awe and wonder.

“What are you doing here?” Kyra asked, shifting the baby’s weight in her arms while being careful not to detach him from her nipple. In the quiet that had fallen, the sound of Dustin suckling seemed as loud as a thunderclap.

The actor didn’t answer. His gaze remained fixed on the nursing child.
His
nursing child.

“Good grief,” Kyra said, but quietly so as not to disturb the baby. “You act like you’ve never seen a baby breast-feed before.”

Kyra’s tone was laced with the same irritation she’d displayed the last time Deranian had arrived in disguise. But Maddie could see that her eyes were drinking in the actor almost as greedily as Dustin was drawing down her milk. Despite the ridiculous disguise and Maddie’s and Avery’s presence, the tableau of mother and child was extremely intimate.

“I haven’t,” he said. Without asking, he crossed to the sofa and sat down next to Kyra. “My children are adopted. They’ve always been bottle-fed.” He reached out a finger and traced the baby’s cheek. “And usually by a nanny.”

Avery excused herself and went into the foyer. Maddie saw her sweeping up something and then saw her climb back up onto the ladder. Maddie knew she should go help her, but hesitated, unsure whether she should leave Kyra and Deranian alone. She wanted to believe that Kyra was immune to the actor’s charm—she had after all rejected the idea of continuing their relationship once she’d understood he wasn’t planning to leave his wife—but those charms were considerable. And he
was
Dustin’s father.

Kyra was so focused on Daniel’s face that she barely noticed when her mother left the room. He smiled. And despite the white hair and eyebrows and pasty makeup, it was the same smile that had made him one of Hollywood’s biggest draws. The same smile that had slain her completely the first time it had been turned on her.

“And here I thought you’d appreciate my disguise,” he
said to Kyra. “At least I got to be male this time.” He smiled again. “I had to swear my makeup person to secrecy and convince the car wrangler that I needed something that wouldn’t call attention to itself. I think I look pretty damned convincing. I drove right by a herd of paparazzi camped out near the set and no one even looked up.” His voice rang with delight, like a child who’d pulled off a complicated prank.

Kyra wanted to tell him that he shouldn’t have bothered, that she wanted him to leave, but his fingers had moved from Dustin’s soft cheek to the baby’s fist, which rested on her breast. A shudder rippled through her as the baby’s fingers opened briefly then wrapped around his father’s.

It took several long seconds to slow her heartbeat and find her voice.

“I don’t understand what you want,” she said finally. “You’re living with your wife and your children and you think it’s okay to show up here whenever you feel like it? This isn’t a game, Daniel.” She paused, trying to swallow the rise of feelings she’d thought she was free of. “You’re just making a bad situation harder.”

“I don’t actually know what I want,” Deranian said, a note of surprise in his voice. “I mean I know what I’m supposed to want, what I’ve always wanted.” He reached out and slipped the baby blanket out of the way. “But I don’t see why those things have to be mutually exclusive.” The fingers of his free hand trailed across her skin. “I’d like to be more to you and Dustin than a bank account.”

The old-man face moved closer to hers and her eyes fluttered shut. She heard the rustle of clothing as he leaned over her. When his lips covered hers, her arm stole up around his neck and the three of them were connected. She
said his name, but what she’d meant as a protest came out on a sigh.

Her brain knew and remembered all of the reasons she’d had to give him up. Her heart seemed to have developed a worrisome case of amnesia.