One Magic Night (5 page)

The pizza was in the oven when the knock on her door finally came. Nervously, Leigh leaped out of the chair, aware of Deke's lazy gaze on her as she walked to the door, smoothing her hand down her denim skirt.

Eve blew in like a winter storm, breathless. "I didn't know what you were having to eat, so I brought some red wine. I hope that's okay." Eve thrust the brown-wrapped bottle at her and moved to take off her khaki rain jacket, when she saw Deke. Her green eyes flew back to Leigh's, and they glistened with anger. "I thought you weren't busy," she muttered in an undertone to Leigh. "I could kill you for this." Her arm went back into her jacket, and she looked over Leigh's shoulder and spoke to Deke the way she might have if he had been a stranger she had jostled in a public place. ''I'm sorry. Leigh didn't tell me she had company. I'm obviously crashing the party." Eve turned to make her escape.

Desperately, Leigh tried to think of a way to stop her…and got sudden, unexpected help. "Don't go," Deke drawled, moving away from the stove, taking a step toward them. "This isn't a private party.  Ty was supposed to make the fourth but he was a no show…and I did forget the wine."

"I really don't think I can stay," Eve said bluntly, but she wasn't walking out the door. Leigh watched with interest as the color climbed in her friend's cheeks.

"Don't let me chase you away. I don't bite," his hands came out, palms up, unguarded, and the grin widened, "at least not on the first meeting."

Inwardly, Leigh groaned. That touch of sexual teasing would be just enough to send Eve flying out the door.   But Eve wasn't moving. She impaled Leigh with those green eyes and hissed at her under her breath, "You set me up for this."

Recovering, Leigh said, "You heard him.  I thought I was going to have to entertain the two of them.  Please stay."  She played her trump card, the one she should have played at the very beginning.  "I need backup."

Eve shot her a look that stung.  Leigh fended off the sharp arrows in those flashing green eyes, shifted the bottle in the crook of her arm and stared back at her, her own gray eyes pleading. While they waged silent combat, Deke walked closer, introduced himself, and reached for Eve's coat. She handed it to him and in response to his introduction, explained she and Leigh were coworkers.

His hands rested briefly on her shoulders, ostensibly to help her with her jacket. Eve's cheeks brightened more than ever. Her movements were always quick and graceful, but she was even quicker getting out of her jacket. She shrugged it off in two seconds flat.

Deke hung Eve’s jacket in the closet near the door.  Leigh turned away, opened the wine, went to the cabinet and got out the glasses, leaving Eve and Deke to stand on the other side the room, gazing at each other, Deke with interest, Eve with barely contained anger.  Leigh poured out the dark, glossy liquid and crossed the room to hand a glass to Eve.  “Sit down,” she said, indicating the sofa.  Eve went to one corner and sank down into the cushions nervously.

"Deke was a stunt man in Hollywood."

Eve tried not to be impressed. "Sounds dangerous." She sipped her wine carefully.

Deke lowered himself into the sofa on the opposite end, a comfortable distance away from Eve. Leigh sank into a chair across from him, congratulating herself. Eve wasn't happy, but she was here.

He said, “It’s probably not any more dangerous than what you do…facing an unruly mob of kids.”

Eve’s eyes flickered under black lashes.  “There are some days when I’d agree with you one hundred percent.  What kind of stunts do you do, Mr. Slayton?”

“Deke, ma’am,” he corrected her gently.  “I’m out of the business now, but when I was in it, I did the horse stunts mostly.  I grew up on the rodeo circuit.  My father and brothers were all riders.”

“Are they in Hollywood, too?”

Deke sipped his wine and closed his eyes in appreciation of its taste.  ”No.  They had more sense.  I ended up in Glitter Town because of my wife.”

Eve stiffened and then relaxed.  “You’re married.”

“Was.  She was killed three years ago in an accident on the freeway.”  He looked down, as if studying his wine, his face dark.  “She always worried about me getting killed at work.”  He raised his head and looked straight at Eve.  “Funny how things turn out sometimes.”

“Yes, it is,” Eve agreed, her voice soft.  “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Yeah, I am, too.  I’ve never stopped being sorry.”  Deke lifted his wineglass to his lips.  “We were going to start a family the next year.  Now I wish we hadn’t waited.”

Then Leigh lifted her glass, too, and sipped.  Only someone with the hide of an elephant would remain unaffected by the bitter regret in Deke’s voice and Eve did not have the hide of an elephant.  Leigh saw Eve’s mouth soften and her eyes lose their angry, defensive look.

The pizza was warm and rich with tomato sauce, cheese and pepperoni, and after they had eaten, Eve leaned back in her chair and looked almost normal.  The meal had been punctuated by congenial conversation and occasional bursts of laughter, and Eve’s face was flushed with the wine, her eyes sparkling.

She plied Deke with questions about the movies and doing stunts and he answered each one thoughtfully.  "A stunt man has to know a lot more about filming than just being able to jump through a window. He has to know about camera shots and lenses and the way a set is built, or he might end up doing his stunt ‘off camera' and have to do it again because he missed the big eye. Of course, unlike actors, every time he has to do it again, he gets paid again. 

Though he isn't considered an actor and doesn't use an agent, he still has to know how to act. He has to take that fall or handle that horse in a way that convinces the viewer he is the actor he's doubling for."

"You said your specialty was horses," Leigh said, relaxing back against the sofa cushion.

"Most stunt men don't like working with horses. They'd rather ride a car into a wall. Not me. I'll take a horse any day. Trouble with a horse is, most of them are too smart to ride into trouble. They can see it coming, and they back off. You gotta know that about horses or you can't work with them. Ty hated horses. He did cars and stunts that involved fire."

The lovely euphoria that had surrounded Leigh fell away.  ''Fire…"

"Yeah, sure. Chances are if you saw a man on fire from his head to his heels in a film, it was Ty."

She felt a sharp stab of anxiety. "He doesn't do that anymore, does he?"

"No," Deke drawled, "he doesn't do that anymore."  A tiny gleam lit his eyes.

"Why did you do it?" Eve asked, watching him.

Deke shrugged. "With me, I just kind of fell into it." He grinned. "No pun intended. I suppose I did it for the same reason anybody risks life and limb unnecessarily, just to see if you can flirt with death and win. Somehow, you always feel more alive afterwards. It's the adrenaline, they say."

Eve shuddered. "I'll certainly pay more attention to those people I see in the movies hanging around on the side of a mountain from now on."

"Ah," Deke .said softly, "but if you notice us, it means we aren't doing the job correctly."

"It's just plain stupid for a man to risk his life like that,” Leigh burst out.

Deke looked at her, his eyes narrowing.  "There are stunt women, too, plenty of them. There's a whole organization."

“I’m glad," Leigh said coolly. "More coffee?"

Deke frowned, slid back the cuff of his blue plaid shirt, and looked at his watch. "Guess I'll go on back and see what Ty's up to.  Thank you for the company,” his eyes swung to Eve, “and the wine."

"Thank you for the pizza…and the quick course on stunt people," Leigh said hastily, getting to her feet.

"My pleasure." With the agile grace of an athlete, Deke got to his feet. At the door, he turned and looked at Eve.  "Since it looks like we'll be stranded here for a couple of days, I may see you again."

"I suppose that's possible," Eve said lightly, gazing up at him.

"Well…good-night," Deke said, dipping his head.

When he had closed the door and Eve heard the second riser creak, she said dryly, "Thanks a lot…friend."

Leigh got to her feet and began to pick up the wine glasses and coffee cups. "You're welcome."

"Well, don't just scurry around here like Mrs. Good housekeeper. Give. Tell."

"What's to tell?"

"You might start with where you met him and end with why you dragged me into this."

“You heard about the car that lost its brakes yesterday.  It was driven by his friend. They'll have to wait till Monday to get their car fixed, and they've rented the apartment below. That's all there is to it."

"What are Hollywood stunt men doing in the back water of Springwater?"

"Looking for material for a book, so they say."

"In Springwater? That doesn't make any sense."

It did, of course, but Leigh couldn't explain. She had told no one in Springwater of her background, not even Eve. She made her shrug casual. "People from the entertainment world don't have to make sense, do they?"

"Hey, don't kid yourself. They're out to make a buck just like the rest of us.  I don't think there are many bucks to be made in Springwater."

Leigh went on tidying up the apartment, trying to keep a calm, smooth face. Eve was only saying what she knew to be true, but somehow it hurt more to hear it from her best friend. When she picked up the ashtray that Deke had used, she saw that he had left his packet of tobacco lying beside it. "Perhaps when you see Deke again, you can ask him about it."

"I won't be seeing him again, and you know it. Men like that aren't interested in single, independent schoolteachers."  She put her hands on the sofa cushions and pushed herself to her feet. "Well, thank you for a most instructive evening, Miss Carlow. I learned more about movie stunts than I ever wanted to know."

Leigh turned, frowned. "That's not fair and you know it. You enjoyed listening to him."

Eve bent over to pick up her purse and, with the easy familiarity of many visits, went to the closet to get her coat. "Too much," she said huskily.  "I'd stay and help you with the dishes, but you deserve to be left in the lurch."

"Eve--"

"Don't say it," she warned. "I'm too old and too smart to believe a lie. See you Monday morning."

She went out the door, leaving Leigh standing there looking after her, wondering if she, too, was too old and too smart to believe a lie.

"Have a good time?" Ty heard the ill humor in his voice, and cursed himself for a fool. Deke stepped into the apartment, closed the door behind him, dropped his denim jacket on the back of a chair and carefully avoided looking at Ty, who was sprawled out on the dark green lounging chair, his feet lifted off the floor, a laptop perched on his thighs, his dark hair tousled as if he had run his fingers through it frequently.

Deke calculated the odds, decided to live dangerously. "As a matter of fact, I did," he drawled. "Best evening I've had in a long time." He took off his boots, flopped down on one of the double beds, stretched out with his hands folded under his neck…and waited.

Ty looked down at his computer and scowled. "Save me anything to eat?"

"Nope." Deke was unrepentant.  "We ate it all, every last crumb."

"Took you all this time to eat one pizza?"

"No," Deke let the word linger. "We got acquainted,” knowing full well he was being dishonest by omitting mention of Eve's presence. But he was curious. Leigh's reaction to the news that Ty had done dangerous stunts with fire had been interesting. He'd do a little more probing.

There was a long, drawn-out silence. "Make any headway with her?"

"Kinda hard to tell at this point, wouldn't you say?" He purposely walked closer to disaster. "What did you find out about the car?"

"Brake line is rusted through. Must have been that water I had sloshing around inside the back foot well when I was in New York last March and didn't discover till I started back to California."

"How long will it take to get it fixed?"

"I’m not sure. Why?" The word was a short, pointed dagger.

Deke went over the precipice. "Just wondered how much more time I had to get acquainted."

The bottom part of the lounge chair snapped down. Ty twisted his head and glared at Deke. "Dammit, leave her alone."

"Hey." Deke held up his hands in mock surprise. "You gave me the impression you weren't interested."

"I wasn't." The words were ground out.

"Sounds like you've changed your mind."

"Maybe I have. Just stay away from her while I'm deciding, okay?"

"She's not your usual style,” Deke stifled a grin, "especially with those health shoes and that hair tied back in a bun."

Deke closed his eyes to shut out the look of fury darkening Ty's face. "You should have seen it tonight. That hair glows from the inside, like honey held up to the sun. I wonder what it feels like to bury your hands in it…"

Ty shot to his feet and grabbed his computer, while papers scattering around him like leaves. They fluttered to the floor, white scraps of refuse that Ty stepped over as he went to the closet.