with her. That for the next few days, I’ll have to be with her.”
Zakiyyah leaned forward to kiss him. “Thank you for being honest with me. Besides, the maid of honor always dances with the best man. So I’ll get to dance with you, too.”
“Yes. Because you’re my maid of honor.”
“And you’re my best man.”
He gazed into her face. “You are so familiar to me,” Ashton said. “I don’t know why. You’re like my favorite song.”
“And you are mine,” Zakiyyah said. “Don’t worry about me. You do what you need to do. I’m playing the long game. I’ll stand aside.”
“And if at any time during the wedding and dinner and dancing, you hear me say the words Hey Baby,” Ashton said, “know that I’m thinking of you.” He smiled. “I’m thinking of the next time I can romance you again.”
“Ashton!”
“Yes, Z?”
“Hey, baby,” she whispered.
“Hey, baby,” he whispered back.
47
Pink Palace
“JULES, THE ORIGINAL GIRL THEY HIRED BROKE HER LEG IN A freak accident, and I got the part!”
Mirabelle had gotten the call while they were in the morning ocean learning how to surf in the gentle Waikiki waves. She took the phone to the lobby where the reception was better and ran back to their cabana on the beach to tell him. They were staying at the Royal Hawaiian, “The Pink Palace,” for their honeymoon.
“What’s the part?” Julian said, sipping his breakfast cocktail and looking up at her, blocking the sun, jumping up and down in her Marmont minimum-coverage bikini. She’d gotten crazy tanned in the lethal tropics by using one of his hacks: one day heavy SPF, next day light SPF. “Don’t tell me—Medea, the vengeful mother, in London?” Judging by how excited she was, what else could it be?
“No, sadly. Though that would’ve been so great.”
Julian shrugged. “Not that great, newlyweds being separated while the wife is wooed by another man in a foreign city.”
“Okay, that part might not have been great,” she said, “though I do like to be wooed, but—London! And why would we have been separated? You would’ve come with me, of course. To keep an eye on me. You know how you like to keep an eye on me.” She smiled. “You would take in the sights while I rehearsed.”
“London is not all it’s cracked up to be,” Julian muttered, glad they didn’t have to make that decision. “So what part did you get?”
“The part of a chick named Josephine—in a horror flick!” she said in a thrilled voice. “I tried out for it a month ago and had two callbacks.” She plonked down on the edge of his chaise, rubbing his leg. “You probably don’t remember; it was during that heady period in our courtship when you were contemplating moving continents so you wouldn’t have to make dreaded love to me.” She tickled his knee.
Julian kept a straight face. “What’s the film called?”
“The Dungeon of the Haunted Warlord!”
“Now that’s great.”
“Isn’t it?” She took a sip of his drink, their own invention—or so they thought—in honor of the Pink Palace, gin and tonic with angostura bitters, making the gin pink, hence their moniker for it: Pink Gin. “And get this, the film shoots right in the hills at Warner! Both soundstage and backlot. It’s a block away from the Treasure Box. You could come visit me on my lunch break. If you’re good, I’ll let you be my fluffer.”
He threw back his head and laughed. “I don’t think that means what you think it means,” Julian said, pulling her on top of him. “But how about if we go upstairs and I’ll let you be my fluffer.”
“What, again?”
“Yes, I believe they call this part the honeymoon. Did they email you the script? We can kill two birds with one stone. Ask the front desk to print two copies for us.”
“Don’t use my coveted film script to lure me into your dungeon, Haunted Warlord,” Mia said.
Post love and lunch, they returned to their cabana by the water in the late afternoon to drink Pink Gins and read the script. She sat on the sand, propped up by big cushions, and he lay on his back with his head in her lap.
“Okay, so it’s not going to win any Oscars,” Mia said, when they were finished, “but it’s my first leading role.”
“It’s awesome,” said Julian. “You can do a lot with this Josephine.”
“Josephine, the poor doomed maiden! I love how the killer is so obsessed with her, he stalks her everywhere, and no matter where she hides, he