Rill’s clamped jaw made Katie sure she’d gone too far once again, but the pressure in her chest wouldn’t allow her to stop. She was compelled . . . or hysterical, one of the two.
“I’m not saying she was a snob,” she added nervously. She screwed up her face and tried to hold Eden’s image in her mind’s eye, the glossy brown hair, the kind gray eyes, her elegant, expressive hands. They’d been roommates in college for two years, and Katie had always been envious of Eden’s hands and her long, graceful limbs.
“She actually wasn’t snobbish at all,” she continued, “but I always pictured Eden in refined places, like libraries or conservatories or art galleries. The first time I visited her at her job at the Hammer, I thought . . . perfect. She belongs here,” Katie recalled, referring to Eden’s position as a collector at the Armand Hammer Museum of Art. “She was like a piece of fine china. I could never really picture her in the country.”
“She was a lady.”
Katie started at the abruptness of Rill’s gruff voice.
“Yeah,” she whispered. Both of them sat for a moment in silence. “What was the name of that godforsaken town where you filmed in Ireland?”
“Malacnoic. She really didn’t belong there. She was right to want to stay in Dublin.”
“I sort of liked it.”
She chuckled when he glanced over at her. The dim light from the kitchen allowed her to see his wry expression.
“I did. It had its charm.”
“Malacnoic is about as charming as a clatty old whore. I should know. I was born there.”
“What?” Katie asked, sure she’d misunderstood him.
“You heard me,” he said evenly, his face once again turned in profile.
“But . . . you never mentioned it to us. Did you ever tell Eden? Or Everett?”
“Everett knew. Couldn’t keep it from him. Most of the crew and cast ended up at the pub with me after we were done filming for the day. I paid most everyone in Malacnoic—including five-yearolds—a small fortune to keep it quiet that I grew up in that town. Didn’t want the press to get ahold of it. What?” he asked when she made a miffed sound.
“You might have told Eden and me. It would have made the visit more interesting. Don’t even tell me your family was nearby that whole time.”
“My mother lives in the country, or at least she did at the time. My uncles were in prison while I was filming. They’re usually on a one-year-in, three-month-out cycle,” he said darkly.
Katie frowned. She’d never before heard him make mention of his uncles, and he was always closed-mouthed about his mother. He had once told her he’d never known his father. “Still . . . you’d think you’d have taken your wife to meet your mom.”
He shrugged. “Like you said, Eden was like a piece of fine china. I didn’t want to dirty her by exposing her to my ma.”
Katie just stared at his large shadow for a moment, her mouth hanging open. There was so much she didn’t know about Rill Pierce, so much nobody knew. Sometimes it seemed he’d just sprung into existence when he’d arrived in Los Angeles. His brilliance as a writer and director was widely acclaimed, his intelligence nearly palpable when one looked into his incising gaze. Before Eden had died, he’d always been the first to laugh, the quickest to get off a witty barb aimed at one of his friends. He’d been the epitome of insouciant male charm, a bad boy with a heart of gold, a lighthearted jester always ready to use his films to poke fun at people who took themselves too seriously.
And all along, this darkness, this turmoil, had existed at his core. Of course it had. Katie had known it all along, this hidden side of Rill. Deep inside, she’d sensed it, even if it hadn’t become completely obvious to her until that moment. It wasn’t just Eden’s death that had turned him into this tortured soul. Sadness and fury had been a shadow on Rill’s face since the first time she’d set eyes on him.
It was the contrast of that shadow with his heart-stopping smile that made Rill so attractive. The sparkle in his blue eyes was so magnetic because she’d sensed a different gaze, a dark, lost one just beneath it.
She sighed heavily. For some reason, the pressure in her chest eased some. She joined Rill in studying the thick blackness of night.
“How’s Everett?” he asked after a moment.
“He’s fine. He’s furious you’re allowing Kevin Battershea to direct Ellen Drake.”
“I didn’t pick Battershea. The studio did.”
“The only reason they were looking for another director was because you refused to direct your own screenplay. You and Everett can’t stand Kevin Battershea. You always say his films are like shite dipped in syrup,” Katie said, imitating Rill’s accent.
“I told Everett I wouldn’t be offended if he took the part. He shouldn’t have turned it down. He loved that part,” Rill said, his flat tone nearly silencing his lyrical accent.
“He doesn’t want to work with Kevin Battershea. He doesn’t want to be there seeing him butcher your film firsthand,” Katie exclaimed heatedly. It irked her—alarmed her—to see Rill so disengaged from a topic that used to consume him.
“I’m staying,” she said suddenly.