Charming Grace (36 page)

And then people began screaming.

I jerked my head toward the sound but couldn’t see anything except the crowd on the slope below us leaping to their feet. I pivoted toward Boone, expecting some grim reaction to potential danger.

But Boone just stood there, watching the leaping spectators. I caught his eye. He pointed toward the screams, then pointed at me.

Something or someone was headed my way. And he knew it.

I faced the chaos. A phalanx of uniformed security guards diplomatically bulldozed a path through the applauding crowd. Behind them walked a handsome, late-twenties-something man and beautiful young woman who waved and smiled big, capped, young-movie-star smiles.

“Surprise, Grace!” Stone yelled in my ear. I winced and looked up at him. He grinned. “You know that famous story about how Vivien Leigh showed up on the set of
Gone With The Wind
while they were still hunting for an actress to play Scarlett, and it was the battle of Atlanta scene, so they had set a whole huge studio back lot on fire, and the cameras were rolling, and Vivien’s people went up to David Selznick, the director, and they said—real dramatic— ‘We’ve finally found Scarlett O’ Hara for you, and here she is,’ and Selznick looked over, and right there, against the background of all those giant flames, stood the
perfect
Scarlett? Vivien Leigh.
And it was like magic.
You know that story?”

“You’re planning to set something on
fire
?”

He laughed. “Here’s your Scarlett O’ Hara.
Both
of ‘em.” He swung a big hand toward the couple headed my way. The security men stepped aside, and the gorgeously casual man and woman walked up to me with earnest, gorgeous eyes. Of course, I knew who they were. I just hadn’t expected to meet them at the burning of Atlanta. The man put a hand to his heart, then spoke in a heavy Australian accent. “I’m your husband, Grace. I’m Harp.”

The woman smiled at me through big, sincere-looking tears. “And I’m
you
. I’m you, Grace. It’s such an honor.”

I stared at rising action heart-throb Lowe Taber and up-and-coming Julia Roberts wannabe, Abbie Myers.

The Kangaroo and the Princess.

Harp’s cinematic doppelganger. And mine.

“Frankly, my dears—”

Abbie Myers burst into sobs as she grabbed one of my hands. “This is the role of a lifetime. I want to be
you
. I
will
be you. Please, help me
be
you.”

“Ditto,” Lowe added hoarsely, in his down-under accent. He grabbed my other hand. “It’s an honor. Please help
me
be Harp Vance. Really be
him
.
Be
him.”

Sincere. Clueless. Eager to please. Fond of the Zen of
being
. Or, at least, the Zen of the word
be
.

Easy to manipulate.

So
be
it.

The light bulb of a scheme lit my smile.

“You’re
exactly
what I hoped for,” I said. “Bless your hearts.”

Abbie’s real name was Abigal Dunklemeyer. She’d been born twenty-seven years ago in Wisconsin. Kanda—a likewise Wisconsinite—had lobbied for Stone to cast her in the part of
me
, and Stone liked to make Kanda happy. Plus as a teenager Abbie had been a beauty queen, “just like you, Grace,” Stone said. “You’re two peas in the same beauty queen pod.” I had been Miss Georgia, queen of the Peach State, and Abbie had been Miss Wisconsin, queen of the cheese state. “Everybody knows fruit and cheese go together,” Stone said.

He said that. Really. I swear it.

Lowe and Abbie glowed like cut-rate Alabama-interstate fireworks as I welcomed them with open arms.
Open arms
. And smiling. Miss Hostess With the Mostest Reason To Pull A Fast One.

I turned once that night at the festivities, feeling Boone’s dark, wary eyes on me, but also his warmth, his misery, like my own. I searched through the flickering shadows of the tent, and while Sousa marched even louder on the boom boxes and the finale of the fireworks show
ka-boomed
I finally found him, out in the no-man’s land at the edge of the festivities, or rather, the no-man-and-his-pig’s land. Shrek lay by his feet, scrubbing his head against Boone’s shoes the way affectionate cats rub themselves along a favored person’s legs.

The pig loved him. And the pig understood why Boone
deserved
to be loved.

Boone looked grim but determined. I held up a hand, palm out, giving him a motionless wave, full of repressed emotion. A secret apology from a lady werewolf who was about to bite his boss’s new guests. The great-granddaughter of a moonshining con warned him she was going to make some white lightning.

My ex-con raised a hand back and wagged a warning finger.
Gracie, don’t make me do my job. Leave those tasty little actors alone.

I touched a finger to my lips.
Ssssh. They’ll never even know what bit them.

“I’m bored with my movie script,” Stone announced the next day to all of us assistants and flunkies at Casa Senterra. “Now that Lowe and Abbie are on the set and Grace is on my side, I think it’s time to start fresh and kick some creative ass!”

“Oh, shit,” Mojo whispered to me and Tex. “He’s going to rewrite the script.”

I stared at Mojo. “What gives?”

Tex bent close and hissed, “Stone said exactly the same thing about ‘kicking creative ass’ when he rewrote
Viper
Platoon. God help us all. That’s how the
killer monkeys
got in that movie.”

“I thought the
killer monkey
storyline came from a studio exec who was busted for smokin’ crack.”

“Naw. The monkeys were
Stone’s
idea. The studio had a shit fit, but the movie surprised ‘em and made a wad of money. And at Christmas the killer monkeys turned out to be the hottest action toys since
GI Joe
. But when all was said and done, they were still
killer monkeys
. Stupidest damned thing you ever saw. And
Stone
thought ‘em up. Just like he’s gonna think up some kind of killer monkeys for
Hero
.”

“
Mais non. Holy merde.
”

“Shit,
yes
. Never underestimate the idiot factor in the movie audience, Noleene.
Stone
understands it. That’s why he’s decided to turn
Hero
into a killer monkey movie. He can’t resist the urge to do what he does best.”

My gut twisted. Grace would be piling up more gravel and loading her shotgun for real, this time.

“I need to talk to you,” I said to Stone later, when I was out back guarding him from squirrels while he lifted weights. “It’s about your rewrite of
Hero
.”

“You got a problem with my plan? Spit it out, Noleene! Look at it this way—this lets you off the hook for casing Ladyslipper Lost. I’m goin’ in a whole new direction.” Stone grunted under the heft of two huge barbells. I caught a flash of movement up in the oaks behind the swimming pool. Brian stared down at us, a high-rise spy kid, his eyes as big as marbles. When he caught me catching him he grinned but ducked behind a branch.

I raised my voice so Brian could hear every word. “If you’re planning to rewrite the script of the movie, Boss, I think you ought to at least let Grace
know
.” I looked up at the tree. “
Let Grace know you’re planning to rewrite the movie to make it less realistic
.”

“What the hell are you
shouting
for, Noleene?” Stone dropped the barbells. “I’m losing my damned hair,
not
my hearing. Do I
look
like I’ve lost my hearing lately?”

“Sorry. Just makin’ my point. You said you wanted my opinion on how to work with Grace, so here it is: Best to tell her what you’ve got in mind for script changes. It’s only fair.”

Stone rolled his eyes and sighed. “Noleene, you don’t know women the way I do. They don’t need a
fair
fight to be happy. They don’t
want
to win any
real
wars, they just want to win the
war of words
. Grace has done that already. She’s made her point, and she’s a happy camper now, and so I can do whatever I want.” He paused, flicking a sweaty hand along the cashmere towel tucked into his customized leather back brace. “So I’m going to jazz up this movie the way it
needs
to be jazzed up.”

“But just tell her you’re changing the script, then. That’s my advice.”

“Nope. Trust me, Noleene, she’s
fine
. Didn’t you see the smiley face she gave Abbie and Lowe at the fireworks? She saw how good my actors look—how good they’re going to make
her
and Harp look in the movie. All her fears were settled right then, my man. I could put
dancing giraffes
in this movie now, if I wanted to, and she’d be okay with it.” He picked up a new barbell, grinned, and shook it at me. “Movies are tricky to make, my man. But women are easy.”

About that time, Kanda marched out of the house. She carried a bathroom scale, a book on high-protein diets, and a stuffed antelope head from Stone’s safari collection. She halted in front of her big lug of a
goyim
husband, who took one look at the antelope head and began to turn red. “Now, honey,” he said.

“Don’t even
try
to fake me out, mister. Do I look like a Wisconsin Jew who fell off the farm-girl wagon yesterday?” Kanda upended the antelope head and shook it. “You
schmuck
.”

A dozen hunks of
Fudge Factory
fudge fell out of the antelope’s neck.

“I have no idea how those got in that animal’s head,” Stone lied.

She plunked the scale down on the patio. “Let’s see how much damage we have to undo by the time you start filming
Deep Space Revenge
this fall. On the scale, mister.
Now
.”

“Honey, sweetie, awww—”

“
Now
. On the scale.”

Stone scowled at her, then at me. No one was going to witness his weigh-in and Kanda’s follow-up lecture. “Beat it, Noleene.”

For a man who thought he could control women, he was one, big, teddy-bear-hearted, fudge-addicted wussy. Kanda touched my arm sympathetically. “Thank you, Boone. I know you’ve tried to keep his fudge indulgences under control. I don’t blame
you
for this pathetic incident.”

“I searched the moose head and the rhino. Just never got around to the
antelope
.”

“Beat it, Noleene,” Stone repeated grimly. “Kanda doesn’t like witnesses when she slaps me around.”

“That’s right,” Kanda said.

I nodded grimly and headed indoors, but not before I heard the oak limbs rustle under the weight of little-boy spy feet. My good deed for the day was done.

Brian was hurrying to tell Grace every word.

“And Stone Senterra says he might even put
dancing giraffes
in the movie!” Brian reported when his grandmother dropped him off at the Downs.

G. Helen and I traded dark looks. “I should have shot him, back in May,” I said.