Locked Down with Mr. Right

“Oh.”

“We begin shooting on Monday. I can see you are on Long Island. We can send a car if you don’t have one.”

I was speechless. Even his voice was beautiful, not at all like I thought it would be. For starters, I thought they would have some intern or secretary call to give me the news, not someone who sounded like he was the lead producer on the show.

Apparently, Mr. Ford, a designation on which he would very soon correct me, took a hands-on approach to running his shows. From what I had heard, a lot of producers also took a hands-on approach with female staff and performers. There was something in his tone that made me doubt that Mr. Ford was among their number. I had been around the truly unscrupulous before. He did not strike me as one of them.

“I’ll be there,” I said.

“Shall I send a car?”

“Please,” I said, knowing full well that I would never be able to find parking downtown. The company cars probably had their own parking garage. Goodness knew that Avalon studios would have enough money.

I did not squeal or pump my fist or whoop-whoop until the phone was already hung up and I was sure Tobias couldn’t hear me anymore, saving us both the embarrassment.

I was worried about leaving, just in case Dave decided he was sick of having Duncan around and decided to bring him back. It seemed unlikely, though, and it was a risk I would have to take.

The far bigger threat was that Dave would find out I was doing the show and decide to make a stink about it to the courts, using it as proof that I wasn’t a fit mother. The more I thought about it, the more absurd the whole thing seemed.

Not that he would try to do such a thing. It was definitely within his capacity for petty cruelty. What seemed outlandish was the idea that anyone, let alone an experienced judge, would in any way take his mad ravings seriously. It seemed like a bit of a stretch.

The car was there exactly when he said would be. An intense looking young woman in a form-fitting black suit, with a bulletproof stare got out of the driver’s side. I was to the car by the time she had the back door open.

It was almost like she was shielding me as I got in the back. The door closed with a crisp click and the car pulled away from the curb like a gilded carriage, whisking me away to what I hoped would be a better life.

My excitement grew with our proximity. I was born in Ithaca and lived on Long Island since I was a teenager, yet I had never actually been to the big, scary city. Not even for a visit or on vacation. Manhattan was as distant and exotic an island to me as Ireland or Bora Bora.

I did my best to contain my excitement and wonder as we crossed the bridge affecting an air of cool detachment, trying to match the one radiating from the driver. She tried to hide it behind the collar of her crisp white shirt, but I knew a scar when I saw one. I had more than enough of my own. Hers was an angry red ropy thing marking most of a circle around her otherwise creamy neck. Only the vary back of it. It looked like a burn, but it was an odd pattern. Rope. It was a rope burn. Someone had tried to hang her.

“Later, darlin’,” she said, letting me out in front of the massive building, her Virginia twang unmistakable.

It looked like a supervillain’s lair. The towering black glass reflected the world back at itself like a very tall inverse of the Fortress of Solitude.

Taking a breath to calm myself, I went through the sliding glass doors with what I hoped came off as a confident stride. There was a desperate lack of mirrors in the beautiful white marble lobby, which made it impossible to check.

“Yes?” asked the security guard, his cut-glass accent clear and clipped, standing like a Beefeater behind the desk.

“Hi, I’m Addie Harris.”

“Oh yes, go right through, Ms. Harris, you are expected.”

It took a moment for his words to sink in. Finally, they did, and I went toward the elevators, shocked at how easy it had been. Then again, who the heck would pretend to be me when they weren’t?

The elevators hummed their way up the floors, quieter and smoother than any I had even been in. I guessed the designers of such an impressive building wouldn’t have skimped on the details.

I wondered, just for a moment, how many workers were buried in the foundation. It was most likely spurred by the quote that I once heard that every Utopia is built on corpses.