You Know Who I Am (The Drusilla Thorne Mysteries Book 2) (5 page)

Oh, that
carabiniere
. I stopped by his station to thank him for being so kind to us; he asked me out to dinner. By the time Stevie and I moved on three weeks later, I spoke pretty good Italian and he’d asked me to move in permanently. Sometimes I really missed him.

My attraction to cops is not really good for my long-term health.

The local British hangout in a city was always a good place to start when searching for a friend, because groups of British people in strange warm climates tend to be very helpful, glad of finding a kindred soul. That was how I’d found the magic act in Vegas. I’d met Kristin at the Crown and Anchor, and she’d taken me to meet Colin, who’d been working out a new illusion by himself. He took one long look at me, up and down, and asked me to step into his latest box. I did, I fit, I had a job. In celebration, I splurged on a very cheap motel room for Stevie and me. And after she fell asleep, I went back to where Colin was still awake and working, and waiting for me.

Stevie watched that darts match with keen interest. The older actor I recognized immediately: Sir Gareth Macfadyen, he of the multiple Oscars and starring roles in the West End and such. When I was fifteen and Stevie ten, I’d taken her to see him in
Much Ado About Nothing
at the Old Vic. She’d loved it; I hadn’t understood a word. The younger actor took me longer to name. Liam Something. He was a TV actor who had been in lots of the shows Stevie liked to watch about detective inspectors and wartime correspondents and such. Stevie had told me his name once (at least once) when I made the mistake of asking what she was watching. She proceeded to give me a rundown not only of the current show, but the entire series and then the life histories of several of the actors.

Never ask Stevie a question you do not want the complete encyclopædic answer to.

Damnation, what was that guy’s name? At last it came to me: Liam Bishop. Liam Bishop was quite the ladies’ man, flirting with every female within radius and not a few who weren’t. I had the feeling that grin had done a lot of work for him over the years.

My sister was staring at Sir Gareth Macfadyen with something approaching awe.

“You want to meet him?” I whispered.

She looked up at me, her big blue eyes even rounder, and she shook her head rapidly.

“Oh, come on, it’ll be fun,” I said. “First day in Los Angeles and look! Movie stars.”

The back of her jaw popped out and her lips pressed together. She was grinding her teeth. She was afraid. And maybe seconds from a panic attack.

I rubbed her shoulder blades again, trying to get the muscles to relax. “It’s okay, Stevie. I was funning with you. But we can watch them play for a while.”

She looked at me.

“You will sit and no one will talk to you.”

“Promise?” she whispered.

“You doubt my ability to run interference?”

She looked up at me then, under her thick black lashes, and I saw a hint of a smile.

“Smart girl.” I cuffed her cheek. Stevie needed some kind of real-world entertainment after being cooped up in Las Vegas for six months. And I needed to find us a place to stay for the night. Just one night. Then we were getting the hell out of Los Angeles, first thing in the morning, after dealing with Colin. I had no idea where we were going after this, but I already knew Los Angeles wasn’t it for me.

We took a table near the game and watched. The waitress came by and I ordered a pint of lager for me and a milk for Stevie.

Macfadyen seemed to be a friendly sort, chatting with several of the people standing around in between taking his throws. He leaned over the backs of chairs to hear what people wanted to say to him, whispered in the waitress’s ear and made her laugh as he dropped something on her tray, borrowed a pen from one person to sign an autograph for another. Whenever the pub’s door opened, he’d glance at who would come in, sometimes wave and say hi. Just a regular bloke. Except for one thing. Macfadyen never gave one person a lot of attention. Anyone, that is, except the woman sitting near his table. She was maybe around my age, dark hair, maybe biracial. She had a fabulous classical profile—definitely a beauty. Macfadyen looked at her fairly often. Once he laid his hand on her shoulder to get her attention, ask if she wanted anything to drink. She touched his cheek lightly in response.

So he was spoken for. Bishop clearly wasn’t. He was the place to start.

I have no especial adoration of someone whose only claim to fame has been reciting someone else’s words on television. Once you’ve watched your father tell some of the leaders of the free world how he is and isn’t willing to work with them, you’re not impressed by someone who got lucky because they’re good-looking. Also, actors of both genders tend to be a mite self-involved. That could work in my favor; Bishop wouldn’t be interested in anything beyond himself, so he wouldn’t pay any attention to little things. Like my little sister.

After all, I’d really hate to smash that lovely face of his in.

Pint glass in hand, I left the table and moved closer to the game. I watched Macfadyen and his lady friend and yes, she was hot. Probably used to having men compete for her attention. Something else I noticed from this angle that I couldn’t see before: she stared at Liam. A lot. Whenever Macfadyen was otherwise occupied, which seemed to be damn near constantly, she was focused on Liam, her body even turned toward him.

This was going to be interesting. I love interesting.

Bishop picked his pint off the table, and as he took a quaff, he gave me a once-over. By the time he got back to my face, I was staring back and not shyly. He had nice eyes, blue, framed with a thick line of brown eyelashes. Very direct. The eyes made up for the slightly pockmarked skin and then some. He had a square face and a slight cleft in his chin. And that wonderful body.

“Who’s winning?” I asked.

“I am,” he said.

“Is there money on the match?” I asked.

He leaned against the other side of my column. “Isn’t there always?”

If there’s a Brit involved there is. There’s nothing they won’t wager on.

“What’s your name?” Liam asked.

“Who’s asking?”

His grin froze on his face. Perhaps he was a little put out by my ignorance of his glory. “I’m Liam. And you are?”

“Drusilla.”

“Hello, Drusilla,” he drawled.

In my peripheral vision, I could see Macfadyen bending down to whisper something in the woman’s ear, but she was staring daggers at Liam. Or perhaps she was aiming them at me. We were standing fairly close together, after all.

Amateur.

Never let the bloke see it bothers you. And if does bother you? Walk away. Men are like buses: there’s always another one.

Macfadyen took his turn throwing and a few of the assembled crowd whooped. Seventy-eight points.

“Shit,” Liam said.

When Macfadyen finished collecting his darts, he turned around and looked at Liam and me. His eyes were as green as when I’d seen him all those years ago. Either that or he wore contacts. I hoped it wasn’t contacts because that would be disappointing. Macfadyen pulled his darts out of the board. “And that’s five-oh-one,” he said.

Liam took a pint off the waitress’s tray and winked at her. The bloke who’d been expecting that pint started to protest, but the waitress reassured him another one would be on its way. “We’re playing nine-oh-one,” he said with careful enunciation. “So it’s my turn again.”

Macfadyen stopped in the middle of putting his darts into their velvet case. “The hell we are.”

“I said nine-oh-one.” Liam picked up his score sheet. “Did you hear five-oh-one?”

Oh nice, I thought. Change the rules of the match and insinuate it’s the other player’s fault, that he has bad hearing or something. Because of his age, perhaps.

The woman crossed her long, toned legs. Liam couldn’t help but follow the motion.

Macfadyen noticed Liam checking out his girlfriend for a moment, and then smoothed out his brow and shrugged. “You want to keep playing because you’ve lost, that’s fine.”

He didn’t know. He had no idea his girlfriend was putting the move on Liam.

Tsk, tsk.

“Getting tired, Gary?” Liam asked.

Macfadyen shook his head. “We can keep playing.” He opened his dart case again. “But let’s play for real money. Factor of ten?”

Liam hesitated for a second. “Brilliant.” He picked up his darts and his beer. He drank and winked at me, as if I was supposed to be impressed that he’d managed to keep things going.

Macfadyen moved to the column opposite mine, putting himself slightly between the woman and Liam. Things were going to get nasty now.

A young woman, her boyfriend hovering behind her, touched Macfadyen on the sleeve and held up a camera. Macfadyen said, “Yes, of course, I’d be delighted.” She handed the camera to her boyfriend. Who, if he took the picture from where he was standing, was going to get me in the background. That was not going to happen if I could help it. It wasn’t likely anyone would recognize me from a photograph. I looked a hell of a lot different when I was a kid, when I’d had short blonde hair, a short body, and no chest whatsoever. But why take unnecessary chances?

I quickly intervened, holding up my hand for the camera. “Would you like me to do the honors?” He nodded, and I took snaps of the three of them together.

Macfadyen stared at me, and for a moment I wondered, is there any reason he might recognize me? The only thing my parents had ever agreed on was a pathological desire to stay out of the tabloids, so my face wouldn’t have been well-known. And we hardly would have traveled in the same circles in London, but there was always a chance. I gave him a flirtatious grin. He said something to the young woman, who handed him the camera. Which he then raised toward me.

I did what I always do. I turned away. When I turned back, he was handing the camera back to the girl, but staring at me. “Here you go.” He gave her a quick, shy smile, the one he used in a hundred movies. When he looked back at me, he didn’t have the smile. I got a raised eyebrow and a very studied look, as though he were trying to figure something out.

The dark-haired beauty noted Macfadyen’s attention to me. She stood up and leaned into him, her hand lightly curving around his wrist. Marking her ownership.

Liam pulled his darts out of the board before he returned to where I was standing. “Do you live in Los Angeles?” he asked.

He’d clearly seen the woman’s attention returning to Macfadyen, so he concentrated on me, moving this flirtation along. I shook my head. “Arrived today on holiday.”

“Here to see anyone in particular?”

I raised one eyebrow at him. “The sights are fantastic so far.”

He grinned at that. “Perhaps you, me, and Rachelle could head back to my apartment for a while.”

“Rachelle?”

He jutted his chin at the woman sitting with Macfadyen.

“Isn’t she with Macfadyen?” I asked.

“She’s keeping her options open.”

“Does he know that?”

Liam shrugged. “Is your hotel room closer?”

“I don’t have one.”

There was an immediate tenseness in his spine that drew his torso away from me. Only a few millimeters, but it was enough to signal that he didn’t like that answer. “Well, you see…”

I could have helped him out of his awkward pause. I didn’t. I let the empty space widen. I’m good at that.

He cleared his throat. “I have an early call time.”

I shook my head, as though I couldn’t for the life of me understand what he was attempting to imply.

“You can’t stay at my place tonight.” He grinned. “But we can have fun anyhow.”

Oh, could we now? I’d already started feeling iffy about Liam—changing the rules of the darts match mid-stream set off warning bells enough—but this confirmed for me that he was not my idyllic prospect for the evening. Time to have fun. “That sounds lovely,” I said.

Liam’s attention went back to Rachelle. Who glowed. But she was careful not to be too obvious about it, so that Macfadyen wouldn’t notice.

I wondered if Liam was interested in Rachelle for her sake, or simply to annoy Macfadyen. Who cared? It didn’t change what I was about to do. Liam wasn’t an option anymore. I glanced over at Macfadyen. Older, true, but probably had much nicer accommodations than Liam anyhow. And he wasn’t that much older.

So the task at hand was to separate Macfadyen from Rachelle.

I sent a hand signal to Stevie, telling her to stay put, because I was going to be busy for a little while.

“You said you have a ‘call time.’ What’s that?” I asked Liam.

That annoyed him. “It’s when you have to be on a movie set.”

“Oh, you’re an actor, too? I mean, I recognized Sir Gareth over there. Of course.” The “of course” had the intended effect.

“And what do you do?” Liam asked, his voice icy.

“I’m a psychic,” I said.

His eyes widened and he backed up, just a step. Actors are such a superstitious lot.

I nodded toward Rachelle. “She’s not going to leave him. I mean, she might get together with you behind his back—”

The way his gaze jerked slightly to the left told me that had already happened.

“—but he can do so much more for her than you can.”

From the way Liam’s mouth tightened, I’d scored a direct hit with that one.

I smiled at Macfadyen, who was pulling out his darts. He narrowed his eyes at me, wondering what was going on. I gave a quick tilt of my head toward Rachelle and Macfadyen looked over at her. Then I grabbed Liam and kissed him, hard. He didn’t take long to respond in kind. He was a good kisser.

I couldn’t see Rachelle’s reaction clearly, but she definitely had one. And Macfadyen had to have seen it.

When I pushed Liam away, I looked over at the older actor. He was gazing at Rachelle, completely neutral. I suppressed my urge to grin.

“Your turn to throw,” I said.

Liam went to the throw line and I wandered over to where Macfadyen had taken up residence against the wall.

“What was that for?” he asked quietly.

“I was wondering if you knew.”

“Damn.” He shook his head.

“Also, he’s an asshole, and she deserves him.”