“Right. Good point. You always, usually, say just the right thing. Okay then, let’s go. The night awaits us.”

The thing of it was, I could still feel the impression of Jeanne’s body against mine, and her lips. Also, I was unattached now, wasn’t I? Was I? To be honest, I was starting to get a little confused myself. But she was herding me out the door into the hallway—and then Jeanne whirled around on me again. This time I was ready for her and took her in my arms. We kissed, and it was longer and more satisfying than the first time. She smelled terrific, felt even better, and her brown eyes were beautiful up close like this.

Jeanne took my hand, and she started to pull me back into her apartment.

I stopped her. “You just got dressed to go out.”

She shook her head. “No, I got dressed for you.”

But then I gathered it together, got hold of my senses, and said, “Let’s go eat, Jeanne.”

She smiled and said, “Okay, let’s eat, Alex.”

Chapter 67

Chapter 67

AT 4:00 IN THE MORNING, a twenty-two-year-old actress named Alicia Pitt left Las Vegas and headed for L.A. The open casting call started at 9:00, and she didn’t want to be blond chick number three hundred and five in line—the part would already be gone before she even got to read.

Her parents’ Suburban, which the highly imaginative Pitts called Big Blue, was a gas-guzzler without a conscience. Other than that it was a free ride, so all in all, the price was close to being right. Once Alicia got some kind of real work, maybe she could afford to actually live in L.A. Meanwhile, it was this endless back-and-forth for auditions and callbacks.

Alicia ran her lines as she drove west on I-10, trying not to glance too much at the dog-eared script on the seat next to her. The familiar ritual continued almost all the way to L.A.

“‘Don’t talk to me about pride. I’ve heard everything I need to from you. You can just —’”

Wait, that wasn’t it. She looked down at the script, and then up again at the road and passing traffic.

“‘Don’t talk to me about pride. I’ve heard it all before from you. There’s nothing you can tell me now that I’ll believe. You can just —’ Oh, shit! What are you doing, Alicia? You numbskull!”

Somehow, she had shuttled off the highway and then onto an exit ramp. It brought her down to a traffic light at an unfamiliar intersection.

She was in L.A., but this definitely wasn’t Wilshire Boulevard.

It wasn’t anywhere she’d ever been, from the look of it. Abandoned buildings mostly, and one burned-out car sitting on a far curb. A taxi, actually.