Her Red-Carpet Romance

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“Why are we going to Arizona?”

“Because that’s where the movie’s going to be shot,” he said, referring to his new “baby,” a movie he had helped write, one based on his own story idea. “At least most of it. Whatever we can do indoors, we’ll take care of at the studio. But there’s no way, in this day and age, to be able to fake that kind of background—especially not Monument Valley,” he added. He slanted a long look in her direction. “Ever hear of Monument Valley?” he asked.

So far, she seemed like efficiency personified, but that might be because she had him on the rebound from his previous relationship with Janice. He’d leaned on her completely. When she’d told him she was leaving, he’d felt as if his entire foundation was about to crack and dissolve into pieces under his feet.

Hanna had appeared just in time to be his superglue.

“Several of John Wayne’s movies were shot there,” she told him without pausing to think.

He smiled, impressed she knew that. Impressed with her. Something that was beginning to occur on a daily basis.

“You knew that,” he said, somewhat marveled.

“I knew that,” she reaffirmed. “So you’re going to be shooting this film somewhere around—or in—Monument Valley?”

“No,” he answered breezily.

Okay, now she was confused, Yohanna thought. “I don’t understand. If you’re not shooting there, why did you just ask me if I knew what Monument Valley was?”

“I thought I’d spring a pop quiz on you,” he told her. And then he grinned again. “And maybe Monument Valley will sneak in a time or two when we’re shooting background shots for the movie. But right now we’re going to be flying to Sugar Springs, Arizona. It’s near Tombstone.”

On what seemed like a winding road, they were approaching the small private airport that was his immediate destination. It housed approximately half a dozen private single-engine plans. Including his.

The area was a revelation to Yohanna. “I didn’t know there was an airport there.”

“There isn’t,” he told her, driving over to the hangar that housed his plane. “It’s more like a landing strip than an airport. But the plane isn’t very big, either, so it works out.”

She looked at him, a queasiness beginning to work its way into the center of her stomach. “You can fly a plane, too?”

“I’ve got a few hours of piloting under my belt,” he told her.

She immediately seized on what she hadn’t heard. “But no pilot’s license?”

“Not yet.” He saw grave concern etching itself into her features. “Don’t worry, I’m not the one who’s going to be in the cockpit,” he assured her. “I’ve got a pilot on call.”

Lukkas was on the private airstrip now. He drove straight toward where his plane was waiting. Arrangements had been made with the pilot the night before. He’d wanted to make sure the plane would be gassed up, inspected and ready to fly by the time he arrived this morning.

“Your color’s coming back,” he informed her, amusement highlighting his tanned face.

She looked at him, bewildered. “Excuse me?”

“Just now, when you thought I was flying the plane, the color drained completely out of your face. It’s back now,” he noted.

“Must be the lighting in here,” she said, grasping at any excuse. She didn’t want him to feel undermined by what had to seem like a lack of faith in him. From what she’d learned, most of the producers had egos the size of Texas and wouldn’t stand for any attempts at taking them down a peg or three.

Lukkas didn’t appear to have an ego, but it was still too early in the game to tell.

“Maybe,” he intoned, appearing to consider her comment about the lighting being responsible for her ghostly pallor a few minutes ago. “Contrary to what you might think, I don’t have a death wish, and the only risk I take is when I cast certain performers thought to be washed up in the business by everybody and his brother. What they don’t seem to understand,” he continued, “is that if you show some faith in that person, they tend to try to live up to that image.”

Parked now, he opened his door. “Let’s go,” he urged, getting out of his car. “Right now we’re burning daylight.”

He was already walking toward the airplane before she could say a word.

Yohanna wasn’t exactly sure why he wanted her to accompany him on this flight. She’d effectively begun to organize his vastly overwhelming schedule so that he could actually have a prayer of staying on top of his agenda. Educating herself as best she could about the man she was taking all this on for, she’d begun to prioritize what absolutely needed to be done and what could wait for another day to come.

She had a feeling the reason Spader was so disorganized was that his mind raced around, taking everything he had to do into consideration, going first down one trail, then another and another. It seemed as though the man’s day was filled with a great many starts and no conclusions. Without someone to take charge of the details and put them into a workable order, the producer was headed for a complete meltdown, which would in turn lead to utter chaos in his professional and his private life.

And she could do all that right from his office in Bedford. Which was why she didn’t quite understand why he was taking her with him to Arizona. Especially when it all seemed rather spur-of-the-moment. At least, he hadn’t mentioned anything to her about it yesterday.

“And why are we going there?” she asked.

“Let’s call it a final run-through,” he told her. “Among other things, I want to look around the town we’re renting, make sure nothing modern’s lying around to mess up a shot when we’re filming. I don’t want to be in postproduction and suddenly looking at an iPod left on the bar or something equally as jarring.”

Well, that part at least made sense. “And what am I going to be doing?” she asked.

“Off the top of my head, I’d say you can be the person taking notes to make sure that I can keep track of everything that occurs to me while I’m doing that run-through.” Then he summed it up for her. “You’ll do what every organizer does. You’ll organize,” Lukkas informed her.

Hurrying up the short portable stairs that had been positioned beside the sleek plane, Lukkas greeted the pilot as he entered the plane.

“Jacob, this is Hanna Something-or-other. She’ll be taking Janice’s place,” he told the pilot. “Hanna, this is Jacob Winter, the very best pilot around.”

The pilot flashed a modest smile. “He’s just saying that because I didn’t crash the plane.”

Obviously there was more to the story than just that, Yohanna thought, looking from one man to the other. But if there was, it would be a story for another day, she could tell.

Inclining his head ever so slightly for a moment, the pilot told Lukkas, “We’ll be taking off as soon as you strap in.”

Lukkas looked at her as if they were equal partners in this, not boss and employee. “Then, let’s get strapped in.”

* * *

A few minutes later Yohanna was gripping the armrests of her seat and holding her startled breath as she felt the single-engine plane begin its takeoff.

This was the easy part, she told herself, but she remained stubbornly unconvinced of this.

“I take it that you don’t fly very much, do you?” Lukkas asked, looking at the way her very white knuckles seemed to protrude as Yohanna continued gripping the armrests.

“No,” Yohanna answered without looking in his direction.

He thought he heard a slight quiver in her voice. That didn’t seem like the young woman he was getting to know. “How often have you flown?” he asked.

This time she tried to turn her head to glance in his direction. But something seemed to almost hold her entire body in place. She recognized it as fear and started to mount a defense.

“Counting this time?” she finally responded, answering his question with a question.

“Yes.”

She took in a shaky breath. “Once.”