I sighed and shifted from foot to foot as I looked for a polite way out of this conversation. Why in the world was she telling me all of this?
“So,” Eva continued, “I spent an entire year dismantling everything I wrote to learn the art of script writing and rewrite the story into a screenplay. Now, I am so sick of the material. I think I hate my characters, I’m so tired of them. But the movie is finally finished, and I just need one person to get behind it.”
“Did you ever pitch it to Steele Productions?” I threw out there.
I shouldn’t have continued the conversation, but given my life this week, the question seemed to ask itself.
“Jerry Steele was a dick,” she blurted out, and then clasped her fingers over her lips and glanced around. “I’m … I’m sorry. I shouldn’t talk like that.”
“No, no,” I laughed. “I didn’t know him too well, but from what I’ve found out about him, you’re not wrong.”
“He took advantage of … ” she trailed off, glanced down at the computer keyboard, and ran her fingers along the edges.
“Yes?” I prompted gently.
“A lot of my friends … ” she finished quietly as she averted her gaze.
Now, I was interested.
“I’m investigating his murder,” I told her.
Eva looked up, and her green eyes were hard but welling with tears.
“He deserved it,” she said firmly. “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t know anything about who killed him. I really don’t. But people I knew … let’s just say … it was cathartic. This town needed to be purged of him.”
“Those are some strong words,” I remarked with a cocked eyebrow.
She wiped her eyes and drew a deep breath.
“And when you find the murderer,” Eva said, “let me know, because I would like to personally thank them for their contribution to this town.”
“Do you have any ideas who that would be?” I asked.
“I would investigate any writer or actor who ever worked with him,” she replied with a shrug.
I nodded, and she clicked around on a computer for a minute, and then handed me my ID back with a name sticker.
“The Irving Group is back in Playroom C,” she told me.
“Thanks,” I replied. “And where is Playroom C?”
“Back down the hallway that way,” she responded as she pointed off toward the right. “You’ll see the indoor playground, which is Playroom B, and then C is the door next to it.”
“Great, thank you,” I said and walked down the hall in that direction.
I passed through the lobby and down a long carpeted hallway. Once I got out of the lobby, it started to look more like a school. Bulletin boards and photos lined walls painted in primary colors. At the end of the hall, I reached a rotunda with the biggest indoor playground I’d ever seen.
“Whoa,” I breathed. Plastic slides, ladders, tunnels, bridges, and ropes, all in bright colors, rose so high up, I cricked my neck to follow them with my eyes. Then a climbing disc structure rose to the ceiling before it arched back down.
The playground was currently empty, so I guessed the students were in the non existent classes somewhere.
“Hey you,” I heard Harmony say from behind me.
I turned around and smiled. “Hey.”
My sister was wearing a patterned floral sundress and brown ankle boots.
“Fancy meeting you here,” she chuckled as she winked at me.
“Damn,” I laughed and gestured toward the playground. “Speaking of fancy, why didn’t mom and dad send us here?”
She laughed. “Because if they did, there would be no money left for us to eat, let alone go to college.”
“Expensive, huh?” I snorted.
She shook her head, let out a long breath, and rolled her eyes.
“Holy crap,” she whispered. “These people are loa-ded.”
“As much as I’d like to continue gossiping,” I chuckled, “I’m actually looking for a witness I think you might know.”
“Morales,” Harmony nodded, “yeah, Paul Morales is in my cla--playgroup.”
I laughed. “You almost said class.”
“Okay,” she said with a rueful smile, “we do have classes. It’s not that simple.”
“Why call them playgroups then?” I asked.
“Well,” she sighed, “it’s … a way of thinking about them. We ‘play’ together, but we play learning games. Or play outside.”
“Or inside.” I gestured.
“Right,” she chuckled. “Well, come on in and see what we’re doing. Julie Morales has been waiting around for you. She went to talk to some of Paul’s other play leaders, but you can peek around.”
I followed her through a doorway into Playroom C, where she was immediately absorbed into a conversation with a parent. I looked around. This place was huge. It was decked out in easels and paints, and there were stations for pottery and claying. Student sculptures dotted the room and even hung from the ceiling.
I noticed Starry Night covered an entire wall, and when I looked closer, I saw it was a wood tile mosaic. Most of the people congregated at the art show on the other side of the room. Black gallery boards hung student paintings, and kids and their parents reverently milled around munching on light refreshments. The children were elementary aged, and then I noticed the parents. High end designer handbags, jewelry laden fingers and silicone injections to hide the aging. Most of them were so much older than me, closer to my parents age than my own, even though I was legitimately old enough to have a child this age. I guessed that was the price of success.
I thrust my hands into my pockets and looked around at some of the art work. Wow. The
