The Spiral Path (36 page)

"Good point. I haven't a tense
muscle left in my body. In fact, I might not have any bones, either."

"So the time hasn't been
wasted."

"I suppose not," she said, but
her expression was grave.

He wondered if the pressures of making
this movie would drive them into each other's arms again. He hoped so, because
physical intimacy had gone a long way toward repairing his tattered spirit.

A few more such encounters, and he might
survive this movie after all.

CHAPTER 20

O
ver
morning coffee, Rainey read Nigel Stone's latest article on Kenzie's
mysterious past. This time, "Morgan the Castle," the Welsh caretaker
of an ancient mined fortress, said he'd always suspected Kenzie Scott was
really a classmate of his from a fishing village in northern Wales. Rhys Jones
had been a handsome lad with a quick tongue and a taste for playacting. After
leaving school he'd joined the British Navy, then deserted and never been heard
from since. Morgan's guess was that Rhys had decided to become an actor and
taken the name Kenzie Scott, concealing his past because he didn't want to be
court-martialed for desertion.

Morgan supplied another photo of a small
boy, this one sitting on the back of a wide pony with his little legs sticking
out. The child looked vaguely like Kenzie, but not enough.

She set the newspaper aside. As Kenzie
had predicted, Stone was swamped with tips from an overhelpful public. The
Inquirer
printed only the most plausible possibilities out of the hundreds that had
been sent in. If anyone had offered the truth, it was buried in a haystack of
false sightings.

Which was good, because Kenzie had
enough to worry about. Though he hadn't flipped out again in the week since the
wedding scene, he looked as tense as a bowstring, and had withdrawn into
monosyllables off the set. She wished he'd talk to her, but he was doing
brilliant work, so she left him alone.

The production had rented him a sports
car, and after shooting ended for the day, he would roar away, not to be seen
until his call the next morning. Even though she knew he was a first-rate
driver and had been raised in this country where they drove on the wrong side
of the road, she had nightmare visions of him swinging around a curve on a
narrow country road and smashing into a truck or tractor. Or speeding off a
cliff into the sea.

His wanderings kept him out very late.
Since the hotel's two best rooms were in the same hallway with facing doors,
she would lie in bed and listen for him, unable to rest until she knew he'd
returned safely. She wasn't sure if she was acting like his wife, his director,
or his mother, but she couldn't stop worrying.

In another three weeks, shooting would
be over and they'd go their separate ways. She'd feel as if an arm had been
ripped off, but at least life would no longer be surreal. Post-production on
The
Centurion
would keep her crazy-busy for the next several months, and by the
time she surfaced again, she'd be a free woman, and over Kenzie. Mostly,
anyhow.

Or at least, maybe by then she'd
want
to be over him.

"Cut!"
Rainey's flat voice ended the take.

Swearing under his breath, Kenzie
released Rainey's hands, then stood and rolled his tight shoulders, wondering
if she was going to ream him out. Lord knew she had reason to, but in his
present mood he'd explode if she took him to task for his failures. This was
the eleventh take of this scene. Only two takes had been worth printing, and
both were marginal. The fault was solidly his--he was getting worse and worse.

He prowled away from the camera, the sea
breeze blowing his hair. The scene took place on a cliff where Sarah had
stopped Randall from hurling himself onto the rocks below. As she gripped his
hands, anchoring him to life, he stammered out the bare details of the
atrocities he'd endured, saying enough for her to deduce why he was so
profoundly disturbed and filled with self-loathing.

In other words, Randall had to spill his
guts to his wife, but Kenzie was incapable of evoking the right emotions. When
he wasn't blowing his lines, he was failing in his delivery. In contrast,
Rainey was at her best as a young wife offering compassion and acceptance for a
situation that she was barely capable of understanding.

Later the scene would be intercut with
flashbacks of Randall and his captor that would be shot on the sound stage in
London. Kenzie tried not to think about those last scenes, which came at the
very end of the shoot and would be truly harrowing. Assuming he'd be able to do
them at all. Based on how he was managing today, he might never make it as far
as the bloody sound stage.

He expected Rainey to call for another
take. Instead, she told her AD, "Break time," and took Kenzie's arm.
He flinched at her touch, then felt oddly comforted.

"Walk with me," she said.
"Maybe the sea breezes will clear our heads."

At least she was going to yell in
private rather than in front of everyone. He was grateful for that, though he'd
still bristle defensively. God knew he was trying, and Rainey ought to know it,
too.

Silently they followed the path along
the cliff, the wind blowing tendrils of her hair and fluttering her long, heavy
skirts. When they were far enough from the production crew for privacy, she
said quietly, "As this movie has progressed, you've had to reveal more and
more of yourself, and you've done it brilliantly. This scene is the most
intrusive yet, and it won't equal your other work unless you can allow that
camera into your soul. It's a lot to ask of you, maybe too much." She
glanced up into his face. "Think about it. When you're ready, we'll do one
more take and print whatever we get. If you still can't hit the right notes, to
hell with it. We'll do some editing magic with the film we have and fake it.
Okay?"

He drew a shaky breath. If Rainey had
tried to browbeat him, he'd have fought her, maybe even walked off the
set--something he'd never done before. Instead, she understood the hell he was
going through, and would accept it if he'd reached his limits. Which meant he
must do his damnedest to spill his guts for the camera. "You're one
amazing director, Rainey," he said gruffly. "Give me ten or fifteen
minutes alone, and we'll try it again."

She nodded, then shyly stood on tiptoe
to kiss his cheek. "Thanks for doing your best, Kenzie."

His gaze followed her as she turned back
toward the camera, graceful as any Victorian lady who'd been raised with
corsets and full skirts. Then he turned and continued along the cliff.

She was absolutely right that the
problem was one of self-revelation. He didn't know if he was capable of peeling
any more layers away. It didn't matter that no one watching the film would know
exactly what he was revealing--he knew, and he was already working way past his
comfort zone. If he didn't go further still, he would fail the movie and the
character he was playing. Authenticity was a subtle quality, but most viewers
knew when it was missing.