Dead by Midnight - Beverly Barton [37]
Damn it, she had to stop comparing every man she met to Michael Birkett.
“So, how long have your worked for Powell’s?” Lorie asked.
“Hmm…almost five years. I was sort of at loose ends when I left the Bureau, and as luck would have it, Griff called and offered me a consulting job and put me on a retainer I could hardly refuse.”
Maleah snorted as she joined them. They glanced up at her. She shrugged. “Nothing. Don’t mind me.”
“Something tells me that Perdue doesn’t approve of independently wealthy men actually working for a living,” Derek said.
“Oh, are you independently wealthy, Mr. Lawrence?” Maleah asked mockingly. “Then the rumors about the men in your family having squandered most of their fortunes on wine, women, and song must have been vastly exaggerated.”
A quick flash of annoyance passed over Derek’s handsome face before he grinned and then laughed. “That was hitting below the belt. Keep that up and Lorie will think you don’t like me.”
“I don’t like you,” Maleah told him and returned his insincere smile.
Lorie cleared her throat. “I thought that after dinner, we were going to discuss the cast members of Midnight Masquerade.”
“We were,” Maleah said. “We are. I’ve got the file folder with the computer printouts on the kitchen counter.” She set her glass on a decorative coaster on the table between the armchairs and hurried back into the kitchen.
“Let me clear up the matter of my economic status, not that it’s anyone’s business,” Derek said, his voice loud enough for Maleah to hear him in the adjoining room. “Although there’s a great deal of truth to the rumors about the men in my family, they didn’t actually squander the entire fortune. And my very wise and very frugal paternal grandmother set up sizable trust funds for each of her three grandchildren.”
Before Lorie could think of a proper response, Maleah sailed back into the room, the file folder in her hand. She completely ignored both Derek and his confirmation of being a trust-fund baby.
“Here we are.” Maleah plopped down on the huge mushroom-shaped ottoman draped in a green and gold silk material. She opened the folder and handed several printouts to Lorie. “This is a list of actors who starred in the movie, along with the names of the producer, writers, director, and so on.”
Lorie clutched the papers in her hand and focused on the top sheet, reading over the names slowly, doing her best to remember each person and anything of importance she could recall about them.
“Just take your time,” Maleah said. “If it’ll help, I’ll go over each name with you.”
In her peripheral vision, Lorie noticed that Derek had relaxed as he sipped on the wine and had closed his eyes. Was he napping? Or just thinking?
“Let’s start with Hilary Finch and Dean Wilson,” Maleah suggested. “What do you remember about them?”
“Not much about Hilary. I didn’t really know her. She wasn’t overly friendly with her female costars. Not hateful to us or condescending. She mostly ignored us. What I do remember is that she looked like a Barbie doll, all plastic perfection. And at the time, rumor had it that she and Travis Dillard were having a hot affair.”
“And Travis Dillard was the producer, right?”
“Uh-huh. The producer of Midnight Masquerade and quite a few other porno movies. And he was also an agent for numerous wannabe stars, most of whom wound up in his movies. Me included.”
“Dillard was your agent?”
“That’s right.”
“How well did you know him?”
“Well enough not to like him or trust him,” Lorie said. “But I learned that lesson the hard way.”
“I hate to ask this, but did you