“I’m still here.”
“What the hell’s the matter with you? You need to stretch as an actor. Everyone says so. You need to show the money in this town you can bring more than charm and good looks to a role. This is it, Kelleran—your ticket to an Oscar.”
“The problem isn’t the role. It’s the scheduling.” He wanted to shoot The Virginian next summer, not some other film.
Greenberg steamrolled over the objection. Time didn’t exist in the agent’s universe, not if it conflicted with the bottom line. “Do you know what a nomination would do to your asking price?”
“Increase it to ridiculously unheard of levels?”
Greenberg launched into another tirade about Montana and westerns and the idiots who wasted their time on them—nothing Fitz hadn’t heard a dozen times before. “Give Barton the stall treatment,” he said. “Tell him I’m interested in his project, but I need a little time to finesse my schedule.”
“Are you interested?”
Fitz hesitated long enough to keep his agent wriggling on the hook. Greenberg wasn’t the only one who knew how to play out a stall. “It’s an interesting script.”
“I’m telling you, it’s your ticket to the number one slot.”
“I thought I was already there.”
“You think everyone else in this town is going to sit back and let you keep it?”
One corner of Fitz’s mouth tipped up in a grin. So, he was number one. For the moment, at least. He hadn’t been paying attention to the dollars and the deals lately—a mistake for someone trying to finesse an executive producer for an optioned script. He’d have Burke make some calls tomorrow morning, bright and early, plant a few rumors in a few fertile spots.
“You’re right,” he told Greenberg. “I’ll give it another look and get back to you.”
“What is this? The ‘don’t call me, I’ll call you’ crap?”
Fitz stood and placed his thumb over the disconnect button. “Why, yes, Myron. I believe it is.”
ELLIE RESTED HER ELBOWS on the back porch railing after dinner and stole a moment simply to let herself be. Meadow grass and cinquefoil blazed like gold, banding rosy shreds of prairie smoke with the mauve of the foothills and the violet of the Tobacco Root Mountains. The scent of wild strawberry rose from the lingering warmth of the earth, and the keening notes of a red-tailed hawk’s cry echoed like Taps over the dying day.
She stepped off the porch and headed out into the twilight. There was one last chore to do before she could turn in for the night.
She took a shortcut through the temporary trailer park and swung around the humming power vans. Grips and cameramen waved at her as they loaded cameras and dollies for tomorrow’s work. The next few scenes would be filmed at the makeshift town they’d built down the trail beyond the stables. Kelleran getting tossed out of a saloon, Nora’s confrontation with a store owner. Jumbled bits and scraps that someone would stitch together later, like the pieces of a quilt.
She flipped a switch as she entered the stables and stepped into the pale yellow oval of light cast across the breezeway floor. “Hey, Hannibal.”
An answering nicker followed a rustle of shavings, and the gelding’s head shoved over the top of the half door. Big brown eyes locked on hers, and long reddish lashes held steady against dust motes drifting on invisible currents. Her heart easing at the sight of him, she grabbed his lead and slipped into his stall. “Gonna make you even prettier than you already are, big boy.”
She leaned against the warm, solid body and smoothed a hand over his neck. So soft, so supple and powerful. So gentle, with her. “Come on out and let me fuss over you a bit.”
She soothed them both with pieces of a song as she secured him with leads fastened to both sides of his halter. Hannibal enjoyed a good grooming, but he could get ornery about the application. He didn’t much care for getting his mane or tail trimmed or his whiskers shaved, and he’d been born too big to wrestle.
She ducked into the tack room for supplies. When she emerged, electric razor kit in hand, Fitz Kelleran stood at Hannibal’s head, sneaking him an apple. He flashed one of those movie-star smiles, and she braced to take the hit to her equilibrium.
The fact was, he was simply stunning to look at, and having all that male beauty aimed in her direction was something akin to intoxication. Those looks of his, and the liquored-up sensations they induced, were a monumental inconvenience. But she had to look at him, and accept the tongue-tying, spine-tingling impact he had on her, because they had a job to do.
He’d changed his outfit, though somehow the pleated slacks and stylish shirt didn’t seem any more out of place than the work clothes she’d seen him wear before. It struck her that he always seemed to fit, always seemed the same. Must be some actor’s trick.
She rolled her shoulders and started toward Hannibal, feeling slightly off balance and a little resentful because of it. Why should she stumble over a disadvantage in her own place? Someone like Kelleran was bound to pick up a kind of polish when he spent his life in the kinds of places that layered on the shinola. She’d never been to those places, didn’t even know the way. All she knew was the more his smooth, easygoing way bumped up against hers, the rougher she felt by comparison.
But not so rough as to forget her manners. “Evenin’, Fitz.”
“Evenin’, Ellie.” He waited for Hannibal to lip the last bit of apple off his palm and then wiped his hand across his pants. “I understand this horse is sort of special to you.”
“He’s stock.” She set the razor down on the grooming bucket and picked up a wide-toothed comb to tug through Hannibal’s mane. “Good stock as it turns out, and that’s the sum total of his value. Sentiment’s got no part of it.”
“Still, I suppose it might sneak up on a person, sometimes.”
“Yeah, I guess so.” She was surprised by his diplomatic approach to the request that had already filtered down through Trish. More evidence of those smooth ways of his, she supposed, but…considerate. He didn’t have to be concerned with her feelings in the matter or take the time to pry them out of her.
She shoved her confusing thoughts aside and concentrated on her task, combing Hannibal’s mane and gauging where to make her first cut. The moment he felt the tug of the razor, she’d have to work fast.
“Tell me about his name.” Fitz tucked a shoulder against a support post and slipped his hands into his pockets, looking as if he were settling in for some conversation. “Hannibal. Not a typical name for ranch stock.”
She shrugged. “Not much to tell.”
“Why Hannibal?”
Keeping one eye on her horse, she made a swipe at the edges. Hannibal flinched, but didn’t seem to mind the tugging—for now. “I had to name him something. That’s the first thing that came to mind.”
“Hannibal?”
She shrugged again and hoped he wouldn’t read
