Charming Grace (29 page)

“I like Boone Noleene. Sometimes he knows I’m up in the trees, but he doesn’t tell anybody. He didn’t see me today, but I saw him. He looked mad but
sad
.”

Oh, Boone.

Brian darted toward the mansion. His grandmother balled her apron over her stomach as she appeared in the service door of the mansion’s huge kitchen. “I told him he shouldn’t be spyin’ on no famous actors,” she called.

“It’s all right,” I called back. “Stone Senterra isn’t an actor.”

G. Helen spotted me from a window and strode from a pastel-draped sunroom, a silk siren in flowing coral pants and a white silk top. “So there you are. Looking like something the cat dragged in and the dog forgot to bury. Glad to see you’ve finally come back from hiding by Harp’s grave.”

“Granny, back off.”

“Call me ‘Granny’ again and I’ll give your inheritance to cousins you don’t like.”

“Boone has resigned from his job. Because of me.”

“I know.” She arched a slender, honey-gray brow. “You took the man to bed and ruined him. Don’t you feel evil and decadent and secretly amazed at your womanly powers?”

My silent misery erased the sly humor from her face. She motioned to Brian’s grandmother, who retrieved something inside the arched and ivy-draped service door to the kitchen. During her reign G. Helen had transformed the kitchen’s electric pragmatism into a propane-powered chef’s heaven of gas stoves and professional baking ovens set in a French farmhouse with a wine fridge and computer-controlled veggie storage. The governor had come to her kitchen last year to be photographed for a piece in Southern Living Magazine promoting Georgia cuisine. G. Helen knew how to make a statement.

She made one now, bringing me a thick, travel-scarred leather portfolio bulging with unseen papers. She held it out. “Boone’s left for Louisiana. He sent this as his going-away gift to you.” She dropped the thick slab of leather and documents on a wrought iron patio table then held out a small envelope. “From Boone. To You.”

Gracie
, the envelope read in tall, scrawling script. My heart twisted. I opened the note and read:

You’re right. I’m scared to build these houses. Maybe they’d just fall down around me. You take care of them for me. Boone.

I opened the broad brown portfolio. Beautiful architectural drawings of homes filled the pages. Boone’s vision of the good life. Entrusted to me because he believed in me. I bowed my head.

“If you don’t fight for him, just as you fought for Harp,” G. Helen said softly, “You don’t deserve him.”

Chapter 13

I stood at the picket gate of the Senterra house, dressed in stern white linen pants and a dark navy jacket, looking like a studio tour guide. Maybe Stone would let his guard down, or at least allow me to lead visitors through his gym equipment. I gave a pair of beefy uniformed security guards my firmest
I Was Never Voted Miss Congeniality
look. “Tell Mr. Senterra that Grace Vance is here to see him. I’m not armed or dangerous. He has nothing to fear this time. I promise.”

“Mr. Senterra is busy, ma’am,” one snapped. “Call Mr. Senterra’s secretary if you want an appointment. And bring proof of your rabies vaccination.. Sorry. That’s what his sister told us to say.”

“If you’re taking your orders from Diamond, you’d better think twice. She’s known to be wrong about her brother’s wishes.”

“You’ll have to speak with her about that, ma’am. Mr. Senterra has put her in charge of his personal security now that Boone Noleene is gone.”

“Then let me talk to her.”

“She’s down in Atlanta, supervising background shots for
Hero’s
city scenes, ma’am.” The guard paused. “And her mouth is still too swollen to talk much.”

“Where’s Leo?”

“His mother flew in from New York. She’s taken him to lunch at the Oar House over on the Chestatee River. Said the cool air and scenery would help his recovery. He can drink without a straw now, ma’am.”

I made a mental note to tell Mika. She was frantic. Leo was still so drugged on painkillers even his Internet e-mails to her sounded woozy.
Luv u. My teeth hurt
.

The other guard interjected somberly, “Mr. Senterra promised his sister he’d keep you away from their nephew. Come back tomorrow, ma’am.”

“Tell Mr. Senterra I’m here to negotiate. He’ll be too curious to turn me down. It’s to his benefit to listen. I promise you.”

“You’re a security risk, ma’am. Mr. Senterra says he can’t afford the dental bills.”

“I’ll be a security risk if I don’t get into this house to see Stone right now!”

Stalemate. Things were about to get ugly. Then a hearty drawl rang out.

“Mrs. Vance! Thank Gawd!”

Tex loped from the house, covering the acre of shady front lawn like an arthritic mustang, followed closely by Mojo. Tex windmilled his arms and Mojo put his fingers to his lips in a New York cab-calling whistle two octaves higher than testicles ordinarily allow. The guards grimaced but turned toward the boss’s favored bodyguards dutifully.

“Let her in!” Tex yelled. “The boss has cleared her! She’s the cavalry, boys! Come to save Boone!”

That didn’t make the guards look happier, but they stepped aside. Mojo leapt ahead of Tex, then smiled at me as he swung the gate back. “Stone saw you out the window and he’s already put on his mouth guard.”

“I promise I won’t lay a finger on him. Thanks, guys.” I headed up a long flagstone walkway at a quick pace. Behind me I heard Tex say to Mojo, “Wonder what Stone’ll look like with his ass chewed off?”

Inside, the house was as familiar to me as all the other historic Dahlonega homes on the beautiful old streets just off the town square. I’d attended parties there as Little Miss Mountain Princess and receptions there as Miss Lumpkin County, Miss Northwest Georgia, and finally, Miss Georgia. The stately Victorian with its huge lot and giant oaks and marble-surround swimming pool had only become a rental property in the past few years, after the last owners retired to a Florida condo and turned the home’s management over to their lawyer. Before Stone rented it, the house had been a gracious old lady sitting on a woody green couch sipping liquored tea.

Now she looked like a cross between Rambo’s gym, John Wayne’s gun parlor, and the set of an old Tarzan movie. Animal heads cluttered the walls alongside movie posters from Stone’s films, and gun racks bulged with everything with antique Colts to modern Uzi’s. Every room was filled with desks, phones, computers, huge television sets, and DVD players. A rotund little assistant with tiny reading glasses and a diva attitude led me through pristine old rose-papered halls now decorated with leopard skin chairs and buffalo heads.

“All he needs is a chimp and a hoop for the lions to jump through,” I muttered.

Secretaries and assistants peeked at me from every doorway; every cell phone in the house went on mute as Stone’s administrative entourage popped up from desks and couches to get a good look at Crazy Grace Vance. They seemed nervous. I halted at the open door to the house’s formal dining room, staring at a huge work table. Several artistically rumpled people froze. Propped on the table were big easels bearing drawings of sets for the Hero scenes. I frowned at renderings of Dahlonega shops, backwoods cabins, and GBI offices in Atlanta. The framework of mine and Harp’s life was being reduced to smears of colored chalk and diagrammed camera angles.

“Quit standing there putting Methodist voodoo evil-eye curses on my movie,” a familiar deep voice boomed. Stone glowered at me from the archway of what had been the home’s large library, now his personal office. He wore a black silk jogging suit. In the light of a tall verdigris wall lamp shaped like a palm tree, his brown hair plugs filled in his scalp nicely, his salon tan was perfect, and he towered over me with brawny charisma.

“You caught me,” I said drily. “I was just about to sprinkle some Methodist potato salad on the floor and finish the spell.”

“Hah. The fact that you’re here at all means you want something.”

“Perhaps.”

“Come in. Sit down.” He gestured. I went ahead of him into the library. Stone waved me toward a fat, round arm chair of burnished leather with ram-horn arms. Then he went behind a huge teak desk with a big executive chair sprouting even bigger ram-horn arms.

“I’ll stand, thank you.”

“You got something against sheep?”

“Only dead ones that look like furniture.”

“You hate me and you think I have bad taste.”

“I don’t hate you.” I said nothing about his taste.

He slapped his hands on the desk. “If you’re here to threaten me about Leo and Mika, forget it. My wife likes your niece. So she’s welcome here, anytime. My wife is planning to call her this afternoon. Invite her back over. I had a long talk with my Sis, too. She knows she was out of line with Mika. She apologizes. But she wants to schedule a ten-round match with you in a ring. Pay Per View.”

“She wouldn’t stand a chance. Now, let’s get down to brass thumb screws. I’m not just here about Mika and Leo. I’m here about Boone.”

“I didn’t fire him. He quit. And it’s all your fault. You seduced him,
didn’t
you? Did some kind of Scarlett O’Hara kissy-kiss on him and wrapped him around your little finger so you could turn him against me.”

“You don’t honestly believe Boone betrayed your trust. All he did was try to take care of your son—a son you ignore and bully. I’m very sorry I distracted him the other night and that Leo got hurt as a result. I’m even sorrier that Boone blames himself for what happened to Leo. I’m
not
going to allow him to be punished.”

“I didn’t punish him! How many times do I have to say it?
He quit
! And as for my kid, I don’t—”

“But he’ll come back under the right circumstances.”

“No, he won’t—damn, stubborn Cajun. All because of you. And about my kid—”

“Then
I’ll
get him back here.”

“How? You plan to use magic potato-salad love potion on him, Scarlett?”

I shut my eyes for a moment.
Harp, trust me. I’m not forgetting my goals. Just changing the way I accomplish them.
I turned a steady, duel-if-you-dare gaze on Stone. “He’ll come back if I tell him I plan to cooperate with your film.”

Stone sank slowly into the executive sheep chair. “You’ll . . . cooperate?”

“Yes. Consult. Collaborate. Cooperate. Give it my blessing.”

His jaw fell on the teak desk and rolled around until it hit an ivory tusk paperweight. Stone grabbed it and slid his composure back in place. “You’re kidding.”

“No.”

“I did a scene like this in
Alien Bounty Hunter
. A beautiful girl came on to my character. But once she had him softened up, she pulled off her fake head and tried to skewer him with her jaw pinchers.”

“I’m not saying I won’t offer opinions on the film.
Strong
ones. But you have my word I’ll be the epitome of gracious support in public. And here’s what I want, in return.” I ticked off the list on my fingertips. “One: Boone is welcomed back to his job. Two: my niece is treated with the utmost respect and allowed full access to Leo. Three: I’m allowed on the set of
Hero
for all scenes, and I’m provided with a full working script and allowed to read all daily script rewrites.”

His eyes began to gleam. “My God. You mean it. I’ve won you over!”

“Only if my conditions are met.”

He clapped his hands and grinned. “Do I
look
like the kind of man who’s hard to get along with? Do I
look
like the kind of man who bullies the people who work for him?
Including his kid?
”

“Does a bull belong in a china shop?”

“Never mind! You’re giving me your A-OK on my movie, and that’s all I care about. I’ll have my publicity people spread the news and break out a case of champagne and a ton of chocolate fudge to celebrate!” He bounded around the desk and thrust out a hand. “Grace, you get Noleene back here, and then we’ll start filming a
great
movie!”

“I’ll settle for a dignified, truthful one.”

He grabbed my hand and pumped it. “Whatever!”