Disgusted, Tate walked away.
—
Devlin rapidly headed to the front gate, while dialing his PI. When the man answered, Devlin didn’t bother with preliminaries. “I think I have a story. Find out about Christopher Montgomery and Olivia Trumbull. He’s from Maine and she lives in this two-bit town. I already did some searching and I know Montgomery is from a mega-rich family. I want to know what happened between those two. You have anybody who can help you find out about this? I want info fast.”
“Yeah, I have people, but who’s paying for it?”
“Landers will. He’s related to this guy Montgomery, and he’ll pay to keep him out of the media, so don’t hold back.”
“You still owe me from last time. You—”
“Listen, you moron! Montgomery hires people like Landers to entertain at his kid’s birthday party. I want to know what he’s been up to. Go back years on this one. I know it has something to do with this town, but it may also be connected to this vermin-infested plantation. Landers’s great-uncle Fred Tattington owned it. Find out about him. Send somebody here to ask questions of the old-timers. Not you, but somebody clean and decent-looking. You have people who can to do this?”
“I can send an army, just so you can pay for them.”
“For once in my life, money is no object. I’ve earned this! I’ll call you tonight and see what you’ve found out.”
“I don’t know if I can do anything that fast. I need—”
Devlin hung up, not wanting to hear the man’s excuses. Like all extremely lazy people, he expected others to work backbreakingly hard.
It was morning and Tate and Casey were in her bed, the first night they’d slept together. She had on just her pajama top, while Tate wore nothing at all.
“I’m glad I bought this place,” he said. They were snuggled together, her head on his chest. There’d been a few women before he was successful, but back then all he’d thought about was getting a job that could pay the bills. After his name had been on a couple of movies, there’d been more women, but they’d only been interested in him as a star.
Casey was the first woman who didn’t seem to care about his movie-star status or even his looks—except to make jokes about them. She was interested in him as a man.
“I’m glad you didn’t try to make it modern,” she said. “No odd-looking sculptures in the garden. Do you mind if I put some more plants in the herb garden? I could use a patch of cilantro. And I need more lemon verbena.”
He kissed the top of her head. “Sure. Buy whatever you want and give me the bill.”
“Or send it to your accountant?”
“Nina takes care of that and she’ll be here soon. She’s doing some charity work now, and as soon as she finishes, she and Emmie will come.”
Casey smiled up at him. “I can hear the anticipation in your voice. Why don’t they live in L.A. with you?”
“They did, but after the divorce, Nina moved to Massachusetts. L.A. had too many bad memories for her. Speaking of which, Nina says I need a house in California that isn’t all steel and glass.” He stopped talking and waited for her to say something, but she didn’t. “What kind of house do you like?”
“One with a kitchen,” she said. “Walk-in pantry, big marble island. Or stainless steel—I can’t decide.”
“Any rooms attached to it?” He was laughing.
“Bedroom.” She ran her bare leg down his.
“Sounds good to me.” He kissed her, his hands on her face. He didn’t want to leave. Last night he’d talked to the director of his next movie, saying he’d rather not leave the country to go look at sets.
The director had not been understanding. “You want to blow off a multimillion-dollar production for some local play?”
Tate hadn’t said any more.
He looked into Casey’s eyes. “After the play is over, maybe you’d like to see my house in L.A. If you don’t like the kitchen, we can find another house.”
“That sounds good. I bet there are fabulous grocery stores in L.A. Now I have to order some ingredients online. Tamarind was in the quail dish. I had to do overnight shipping to—” His cellphone was ringing. “You better get that.”
Tate stuck out a long arm to pick the phone up. “It’s Jack.” He clicked it on. “Yeah, yeah. I’m dressed and ready and waiting for you. I’ll be there in seconds.” He turned the phone off and rolled back to Casey and started kissing her neck.
She pushed away from him. “You told Jack you were dressed, so now you have to get up.”