“A lot of them did. She said it was sold to her as an ‘empowering statement of feminine allure.’ Anyway, you know how Sharon Tate was nearly nine months pregnant when she was killed? At the time Granny was heavily pregnant with my mom. She stayed away from the funeral because she thought her belly would be too much of a reminder of what Sharon Tate’s family had lost, and she said she would have been a mess, anyway—the thought of her friend lying in that coffin with her arms around the swaddled baby she never got to meet…”
“Say no more.”
“Plus, at that point the killers were still unknown and on the loose—they didn’t arrest anyone for months. People become guarded—literally. Granny rallied the neighbors and lobbied for this street to be gated. Dead-end road, and the hillside forms a natural amphitheater, so it didn’t take much, just some greasing with the authorities. There are much bigger gated communities around now. Then five years later, Patty Hearst was kidnapped,and private security became big business—a status symbol, even.” He looked out at the pool. “Sharon Tate sat out there once in a bikini and drank martinis. We have photos.”
It didn’t take much to imagine a seventies starlet draped along a lounger, looking over the same skyline that rolled out before Lana. The view was almost painfully beautiful, too much to absorb in one sitting. Sure, Lana had seen views like that—from the Griffith Observatory, the overlook above the Hollywood Bowl, the Greystone Mansion. But to own one? To have such a view that you got to know it as intimately as the brick wall in her studio, which had been generously sold as a feature wall?
No chance of hearing the sea though. This was where Griffin sat, looking out over the world he didn’t feel safe in. Look, but don’t touch. Like with Griffin, currently staring into the fridge—right there in front of you, but no chance he would ever be yours.
The only view from Lana’s studio was the parking building next door. But she’d set up her apartment to face inward. That was the point—to fold cozily in on itself. Vivien liked to tease her about making an apartment out of books, thanks to the rudimentary bricks-and-planks shelving she’d stacked around the walls to house her ever-growing collection.If there’s an earthquake, I’ll know to look for you under a pile of Edith Whartons.
Vivien.
“So, to recap,” Lana said, opening the sparkling water and pouring a glass. A loud bang sounded outside, and something splashed into the pool. Lana started, knocking the entire glass over her pants.
She leaped up, flicking water off. “Was that a gunshot? Did someone just shoot a bird?”
“A drone,” Griffin said, looking into the pool. He sounded unimpressed but not surprised. “Paps fly them over from time totime, trying their luck getting pictures. The guards are permitted to take them down. They use a silencer, but it doesn’t completely muffle the shot.”
“Drones?!”
“They’re less of a problem here than they were in Malibu, where people would fly them up from the beach. They’re banned there now but for a while they were a pain in the ass. Let me get you a towel.”
As he came back from the bathroom, something beeped—the tablet by the entrance. He tossed Lana the towel, then diverted to the door and touched the screen.
“Nice shooting,” he said.
“Sorry for the disturbance,” a woman replied. “Did you see where it landed?”
“In my pool. I’ll fish it out later.”
“I can’t locate the operator—nothing on the cameras. It was definitely zeroing in on your place.”
He ended the call. Suddenly Lana didn’t feel so safe.
“Ah, man, you’re soaked,” he said. “I’ll grab some clothes from Mom’s closet.”
“She won’t mind?”
“She won’t know. Her wardrobe is twice the size of this room.” He looked around, reconsidering. “Three times. And it’s packed.”
He came back from the house with a short-sleeved white sweater and a pleated skirt—pale pink with tiny white polkadots. Lana headed to the bathroom to change.
“If you give me your clothes, I’ll put them in my folks’ dryer.”
The skirt didn’t fasten all the way, but it felt secure enough, and the top was just long enough to drape over the waistband. Lana felt like an unconvincing screen siren. When she returned, Griffin was setting a platter on the coffee table—mandarins,halved cherry tomatoes, smoked salmon, and bocconcini sitting in what she guessed was balsamic.
“I pretty much opened the fridge and caught whatever fell out,” he said.
“It’s amazing, thank you.” She popped a tomato in her mouth. Griffin seemed much more relaxed here than out in the world. He moved with a fluidity that reminded her of the spy he played inYou Only Die Twice. In a parallel life, she might jump him right now.
“So,” she said. “Vivien.”
“Yes, Vivien.”
Griffin sat beside Lana on the sofa, his knee knocking into hers. He grabbed a notepad from a shelf underneath the coffee table and flipped past a few pencil sketches. She caught his hand, mid-flip.
“Wait, you draw, as well?” As soon as she said it, she realized the sketch he’d stopped on was of him—shirtless, lying in his bed, his expression far from neutral. She released his hand, her mouth drying. An intimate portrait.
