Picture Perfect

Dedication

For my grandmother, Jeanette, who always loved a good mystery. I only hope she would have enjoyed this one.

Also by Lucie Simone

A Taste of Italy

The Waterdance

Hollywood Ending

Picture Perfect

by Lucie Simone

Chapter 1

My heart hammers in my chest as I am rattled awake from a shallow sleep. My nerves jangling, I peel open one eye. Except for a sliver of grey light slicing through the damask curtains, my bedroom is in complete darkness. I roll over and lift my head, searching for the glowing LCD numbers on my alarm clock. Six-o-three in the morning. Can that be right? Who the hell would be banging on my door at six in the morning?

Bang bang bang!

It is not the sound of a normal knock. It is urgent and loud and terrifyingly arresting. But I live in a safe building with around the clock security. Who the hell could have gotten up to the twenty-third floor without being announced? If Alan were here, he’d be the one to find out. But he isn’t here. He hasn’t been here for six months.

Bang bang bang!

“For fuck’s sake,” I grumble, tossing back my down comforter and throwing my legs over the side of the bed. My feet hit the cool hardwood floor, and I scurry to the closet in search of my fuzzy robe. It may be Los Angeles, but at six a.m. in the middle of February, it’s cold enough to send goose bumps marching up and down my body. I finally get the robe tied tightly around myself and shuffle into the hallway. I flip on the light, but it is blindingly bright, and I shut it off again.

Bang bang bang!

“Jesus! I’m coming,” I say, but not loud enough for anyone on the other side of my front door to hear.

I make my way to the door and peer through the peephole to find a woman wearing a broad-brimmed brown hat and a tan and brown uniform. Judging by the gold star on her chest, I’m guessing she isn’t from UPS. I unlock the door and open it a crack.

“Yes,” I say as indignantly as possible. The woman shines a flashlight in my eyes, and I put my hand up to block the light. “Is that really necessary?”

She turns off the light. “Laurent Tate?” she asks with the kind of flat authoritative tone that tells me she knows damn well who I am.

“Yes,” I reply.

“Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.” She hands me a manila envelope. “You’ve been served.”

“Served?”

“Divorce proceedings. Good day, ma’am.”    

***

I glance at the offending manila envelope resting on the passenger seat of my BMW. The drive from Westwood to Sunset Strip is even more nerve-racking than usual. I grip the steering wheel fiercely, as if I were taking a hairpin curve down a twisty mountain road and not crawling through rush hour traffic on Sunset Boulevard. Heading east, the morning sun is blindingly bright, and I pull down my visor to try to shield my eyes. It is always the same, this drive to Timeless Television. I know every pothole, every bend, every broken sprinkler to avoid on my route. Day after day for five years I have traveled this path, weaving in and out traffic, dodging road hazards with the instinct of a Formula 1 driver. But today, I am off my game.

As I turn into the parking garage beneath the twelve-story building where Timeless Television’s offices are located, the manila envelope slides to the floor. I wind down to the second level and pull into my parking space. It’s in a good location, close to the elevator and at a spot where the attendant can see it. I often slip him a few extra bucks every week to make sure that he’s looking after it.

I’ve learned it pays to pay others.

I flip up my visor, cut off the engine, and stare down at the envelope sitting on the floor. A knot forms in my stomach.

Damn it, I could kill Alan.  

I make my way to the elevator, the envelope under my arm, and press the button for the twelfth floor. A gentle chime announces my arrival and the doors part, revealing a bright and busy office with assistants in high heels and tight skirts clattering across the marble floors, their arms full of file folders. Sally, the receptionist, offers me a broad smile.

“Good morning, Ms. Tate,” she chirps at me as I whiz by, my fingers wrapped tightly around the manila envelope.

She’s a sweet girl and a good receptionist as far as I can tell, but I often wonder how she got a job as the first face visitors see upon entering Timeless Television. She doesn’t have the first clue about appearances. The girl looks like she should be milking a cow on some farm in Ireland with her frizzy orange hair, fish belly white complexion, and a wardrobe that appears to have come from the set of
Little House on the Prairie
.

Still, I give her a friendly nod as I head down the hallway. A receptionist today could be an executive tomorrow in this business.

I pass by cubicles of young girls barely out of college as I stomp toward Alan’s office, my hands trembling with anger and anxiety. I grip the envelope tightly in my palm as I swivel on my heels and march through his open doorway.

“I knew you were a bastard, Alan, but I didn’t think you’d have the nerve to send the LA County Sheriff’s Office to my house at six a.m. to serve me with divorce papers.” I toss the envelope onto his desk. “But then again, I’ve always underestimated you, haven’t I?”

“Uh, Bob, I’m going to have to call you back,” he says into the phone cradled on his shoulder. “Something just landed on my desk.”

Alan hangs up the phone as I launch into him. “We’ve only been separated for six months. I thought we were trying to work this out,” I say, fully aware that all of the office gossipmongers are hanging around the corner with their iced lattes in one hand and their cell phones in the other, fingers at the ready to tweet the latest Hollywood break up.

Alan and I have tried to be discreet, but I no longer have the energy to keep up the charade. Both of us being VPs in a highly volatile industry, we are extra sensitive to the possible damage to our jobs should anyone get wind of our shaky situation. Since professions in entertainment can be made and obliterated based on a relationship, it’s especially important to keep up appearances.

The career-ending effect that even a rumor in this industry can cause requires us to be on our best behavior. If they (and by they I mean anyone from a lowly production assistant to a studio president) learns of a break up (or any other unsettling event), they immediately start calculating how soon ‘til the poor slob starts falling apart at the office, takes up drinking dirty martinis for breakfast, starts producing crap movies, gets sacked, goes into rehab for addiction to pain killers and finally moves to an ashram in Oregon. So, to avoid all the bad publicity the studio might get, they just can the poor guy (or girl) before the situation spirals out of control.

“Jesus, shut the door,” Alan orders me.

I slam it closed and collapse onto his black leather couch. He stares at me from behind his glass desk, custom-framed classic movie posters hanging on the wall behind him. Bela Lugosi’s
Dracula
bends over the neck of an unwilling victim. I feel almost as vulnerable as that helpless woman just before he sucks the last drop of her blood.

Almost.

“Lauren, don’t get your panties in a twist. What did you expect? That we’d go on being separated forever? It’s time to cut the cord,” he says leaning back in his chair and glaring at me with his steel blue eyes.

“We aren’t even going to talk about this?”

“There isn’t anything left to talk about,” he says flatly. “I don’t want to be married anymore.”

“What does
that
mean?”

“Oh, Lauren. Let’s not do this now.”

“No. I want to know what you mean by that. Do you mean you don’t love me anymore?”

“Of course I love you. I’m just not
in
love with you.”

“What is
that
bullshit?”

“It’s just not fun anymore.”

“Fun? A marriage isn’t supposed to be fun. It’s a relationship. Sometimes you have to work a little at it. You can’t just bail the moment it gets rocky. You can’t just leave,” I bark at him.

Working in Hollywood, I understand rejection. I’ve got a nice thick skin to rival any Florida alligator, but hearing the love of my life compare our marriage to the likes of a video game he’s played one too many times is too much even for me to brush off.

“How could you just spring this on me? We’re supposed to be working this out. This is a
trial
separation.”

“Lauren, take it down a notch, will you?” He glares at me from behind his desk. “We know each other. We know it isn’t going to work.”

“So, five years mean nothing to you?”

“Of course not. We had our time. It was good when it was good, but now it’s over. It’s time to move on.” He fingers a Mont Blanc pen on his desk, tapping the blotter with it as if to hurry me along. But this is not a fight I feel like forfeiting just so he can get back to his phone calls.

“Dammit, Alan! This is a marriage, not a Mercedes you can return at the end of your lease because the new models are out.” I get to my feet and pace toward his desk, planting my hands firmly on my hips. “We took vows. We said, ‘’til death do us part.’”

“Come on. You don’t believe in that,” he says, tossing the pen aside and leaning one elbow on the arm of his oversized black leather desk chair. He knows it’s going to take more than a few platitudes to get me out of his office.

“Why not?”

“Because it’s totally passé. And it doesn’t work for people like us.”

“People like us?”

“You know. Showbiz people. It’s just the way things work in Hollywood. Don’t take it personally.”

“Don’t take it personally?” I balk.

He sighs deeply. “Not everything is always about you.”

“Wait a minute,” I say, realizing that there might be more to this than irreconcilable differences. “Did you meet someone? Are you having an affair?”

“You’re too close to the subject. Let’s talk about this later,” he says as if we are haggling over the print campaign of one of my films.

“The subject? The subject is our marriage, Alan! Not a fucking movie-of-the-week!”

“Oh, yeah. Congrats on the Saturday Night Movie. I hear the numbers were really great,” he says, leaning back in his chair and clasping his hands behind his head. “You should be proud of that. You really know what our audience wants.”

“Don’t patronize me. I’m not one of your eager little assistants trying to impress you with my business acumen while you size up my tits.”

“Thirty-six D, if I remember correctly. And worth every penny.”

“That is low, even for you. And not true.” I say that last part for the benefit of those listening at the door. He knows full well that they’re real.

“Look, I don’t really have time for this conversation right now.” He picks up the manila envelope on his desk and offers it to me. “If you had bothered to read the settlement agreement before flying in here like a banshee, you would have seen that my lawyer has drawn up a very nice alimony package for you.”

Alan’s self-righteousness sets my stomach on fire, and though five minutes ago I wanted nothing more than to save our marriage, now all I can think is how badly I want to see him suffer.

“First of all, I make more money than you do,” I say, leaning over his desk and snatching up the manila envelope. “Secondly, we have a pre-nup, which guarantees me two million if you quit the marriage before seven years is up. So, I don’t need your lawyer to draw up a piddling alimony package that’s supposed to appease some pathetic little
hausfrau
. Or did you forget that seven-year-itch clause I added? After all, we’re showbiz people, Alan.”

“Are we done here?” he asks, his smug smile dissolving. “Because I’ve got a new Marketing Manager coming in tomorrow, and I’ve got to get her office set up.”

“Oh, yeah. We’re done. We’re so done,” I say before stomping out of his office and straight into a herd of rumormongers hanging outside the door. I know I should try to mitigate the damage right then and there, but it is all I can do just to walk past them. The whispers, the sounds of their feet hitting the floor on their way back to their desks, the chuckles and the snickers, all pierce me, and before I know it, I am practically sprinting down the hallway, past Sally’s smiling face and into the stairwell.