She grabbed at Flynn’s hands and extricated herself from his embrace. “Something’s wrong,” she muttered.
“I think you’re overreacting.”
Livvy gave him a look.
“Go get your clothes off the deck and I’ll drive you home.”
She wasted no time doing as he said, not caring that her dress was lightly damp from the morning sea mist. Flynn had scarcely wrestled himself into a pair of khaki pants and a striped shirt before she was at the front door, bouncing on her toes like a child waiting to leave.
They drove in silence the entire way, and she turned over increasingly worsening scenarios in her mind. Flynn didn’t try to reassure her again, just drove with a single-minded purpose. She wondered how things had gone so wrong, how she’d managed to turn the easy comfort of last night into this tense silence. But she couldn’t rest until she knew Judy was okay.
After what seemed an interminable drive, creeping away from the foggy banks of the Malibu beach to the sunnier climesof Hollywood, they arrived at the Garden of Allah. Livvy didn’t even wait for Flynn to come to a complete stop before opening the door of his roadster and running out.
“Judy, I’m home,” she called out.
Her sense of foreboding grew, and she unlocked the front door to find the living room silent and still. She raced to the back to see if maybe Judy was asleep. But Judy’s nightgown was still laid out on her twin bed, her slippers neatly arranged on the floor—the way Livvy had left it for her last night so that she could easily slip into bed after a late night on set dancing.
Judy had never come home. Livvy choked back a sob.
It’s fine,she tried to tell herself.Maybe Judy went to stay with a friend.But the memories of the policeman coming to her door, telling her that her parents were dead and Judy was seriously injured, flashed before her eyes.
She bent over, holding onto the cheap cotton bedspread, and retched. Nothing came up but watery bile, and Livvy dabbed furiously at her eyes, trying to recover herself.
She would go to the Rolodex in the living room and see if there was any name there that would offer a clue to Judy’s whereabouts. But when she emerged from the bedroom, she was startled to see that Flynn was standing on the stoop…talking to a police officer.
Her knees buckled and she braced herself against the wall.
Flynn looked over his shoulder and saw her, rushing to her aid. “Livvy, Livvy, it’s all right. She’s okay. She spent the night in jail, that’s all. But she’s alive. She’s unharmed.”
Flynn rubbed a gentle pattern on the small of her back and led Livvy to the sofa, before disappearing into the kitchen, running the sink, and returning with a glass of water.
Livvy gulped at it, trying to catch her breath. “Jail?” she whispered. “Did you say jail?”
Flynn stuck his head out the door. “Officer, will you please come in and explain to Miss Blount what you told me?”
Flynn took her hand and sat next to her on the couch. The officer stepped through the door, blocking out the sun with his hulking frame, and Livvy held back a gasp of fear.
He’s not here to tell you the worst. Pull yourself together.
The officer removed his hand and worried the brim in his hands. “Sorry to drop in on you like this, miss, but your sister has been trying to reach you all night.”
Livvy closed her eyes in shame. Judy had needed her. And she hadn’t been here. She’d been too busy frolicking in the waves and Flynn Banks’s bed. Once again, she had chosen Flynn over family, and Judy had gotten hurt. Rationally, she knew that it wasn’t Flynn’s fault her parents had died while she was watching one of his films. But the universe had a sick sense of humor. After four years of tamping herself down, denying herself her dreams, she’d finally felt free for one night. And it had coincided with her sister meeting some misadventure. She pushed the thought down, realizing all it would do was make her feel like she was the worst sister that had ever lived. “What, what happened?”
Flynn squeezed her hand a bit tighter, but it didn’t cut through the numbness she’d come to rely on to survive.
“We arrested her last night for aggravated assault.”
Livvy’s mouth fell open. “My sister wouldn’t assault someone. She’s gentle and kind.”
Flynn cleared his throat, cutting Livvy’s excuses off. “Let the man finish, Olivia.”
He was back to calling her Olivia, and only the strange gravitas of that got her to stop talking.
The officer scratched the back of his head, looking profoundly uncomfortable. “I’m not entirely sure of the details, miss.I’m just a patrol officer sent out to see if I could find you. But it’s my understanding that she attacked a guest at a studio party last night. The gentleman in question called the authorities, and she was taken in. She’s being held for a ten-thousand-dollar bail.”
If Livvy’s jaw could reach to the floor, it would have hit it after hearing that sum. “Ten thousand dollars? That’s, that’s more money than I’ve ever seen in my life.” It was the entirety of her year’s contract with Evets’s Studios.
Flynn waved his hand. “I’ll pay it.”
