Warning: grownup, err, HBO, stuff happens in this chapter 😎
'Look,' Callie breathed, pushing the magazine across the booth.
Hildy quickly skimmed the first few paragraphs of the story, then looked up at Callie, her eyes shining.
'This must be your picture,' she squealed. 'You have to be the one to write it. There's nobody more perfect.'
Montana Dreams was a Western, a clever, thrilling Western, about a New York businessman who discovers he has inherited the ranch of a distant cousin. He travels to Montana to manage it, but discovers that his cousin, besieged by debts, faked his own death to escape violent moneylenders who are now after the businessman.
'The rights will have been snapped up long before it was published,' Callie said. 'This story is made for pictures — the New York story editors will never have missed it.'
'Are you talking about Montana Dreams? asked Fred, sliding into the booth. He grabbed his sister's sandwich and took a large bite, grinning at Hildy's protest. He moved his knee, just a tiny bit, until it pressed against Callie's and Callie felt a white hot flutter deep inside her. 'The title is terrible, but I hear the story is first rate.'
Fred was tall and handsome, with thick unruly hair he wore long enough to curl around the nape of his neck, and piercing eyes the colour of the Pacific on a sunny day. He had worked seven days a week since he was ten years old to try to keep the family's small holding afloat after their father's death, and Hildy had confided in Callie her fears that he would never forgive himself for eventually being forced to sell the land to the Keystone Studio. He worked now as a stunt rider and set aside every penny he could to purchase enough land — he had a lot picked out, far from the city in Pasadena — to return to his true love of ranching.
'If I could find out who optioned it, I might have a chance of being contracted to script it,' Callie said. 'If I explain to them how I grew up, how I know this world —' She trailed off with a sigh. 'Oh it's hopeless.'
The story had the potential to be the hottest picture of the year. Last year, Mabel's Mickey made a staggering $8 million at the box office, a record beaten only by Griffith's Birth of a Nation, which Callie had found melodramatic and rather vicious. Montana Dreams could eclipse them both, Callie was sure of it.
Fred shook his head, a rather smug grin on his face. He shifted his weight more urgently against Cassie's, and Callie struggled to keep her expression steady. Half of her wanted to start questioning the neighbouring booths to find out who had optioned the story she was already thinking of as hers, and the other half wanted to drag Fred out by his tie into the nearest shadowy alleyway. His tie was crooked as it always was – he insisted that if he had time for tying the perfect tie in the morning, he would have a very dull life – and he smelled of man: soap, tobacco and something musky and indescribably masculine.Â
She really couldn't put off deciding whether or not to take him much longer, she thought with a pang. He had proposed again last week. He wasn't yet pressuring her for an answer, but it wasn't fair to make him wait indefinitely.
'Look at the title page,' Fred said tapping the magazine. 'The author is anonymous. Nobody can buy the rights because nobody knows who wrote the story.'
Callie was quiet on the drive home. The top was down on Fred's pride and joy, a canary yellow Monroe Roadster – and the night air ruffled Callie's hair as the engine throbbed contentedly up the steep hills. Fred's driving gloves were tight across the backs of his hands, and he steered around hairpin bends, downshifting so expertly that the car barely is jolted.
Nobody knew who wrote the story. The words kept rattling around Callie’s mind. So nobody has optioned it. The rights to make the picture of the year would be available only until somebody found out who the author was and bought them. Somehow, that person had to be Callie.
Somehow.
'There's something in the story,' she murmured a little while later in her apartment. 'It's familiar, I just can't quite place it.' She stood by the kitchen window, thinking vaguely about the fact that she should probably wash the meatloaf dish before morning. 'It's going to drive me loopy.'
Fred came up behind her and in a fluid movement, lifted her short skirt to her waist and placed his strong fingers on her hips.Â
'Don't think about work for a moment,' he whispered.
She could feel the warmth of his hands through the thin silk of the daring French knickers Lillian had persuaded them all to purchase at the Famous Department Store in Los Angeles. A soft sigh escaped her lips as all thoughts of pictures and authors floated from her mind and she leaned back against Fred's broad chest.Â
He dropped his head to rest gently on her shoulder and she could feel the roughness of his cheek against her bare skin, as she reached up, entwined her fingers in his thick curls. He started to softly nibble her neck, his hips swaying almost imperceptibly as the coarse fabric of his trousers brushed thrillingly against the silk of hers.
'You know, when I was a kid,' Fred murmured against her neck, the thrum of his voice vibrating along her spine. 'I saw so many horses and cows do this that I have no idea humans do it face-to-face.'
Callie giggled softly despite the delicious shivers shuddering through her. 'Neither did I,' she said. 'I quite startled the young man who had to set me right.'
'You know humans can do it like this too, though?' he added casually, his hips straining against hers so that part of him pressed urgently against her in a way that it made it difficult for Callie to think of anything else.
'Can they?' She breathed in surprise, arching back against him as his fingers tightened, pulling her even closer. 'I thought they must, but every man I've known has insisted otherwise.'
'I'll show you, if you like,' he teased, his voice hoarse in her ear. A tense, thrilling urgency pulsated through her.
The next morning, as Fred rummaged around the kitchen for coffee, grumbling about her complete lack of domesticity, Callie realised what had been evading her all night.
'The rock,' she gasped, pulling the card from the wall.
'What rock?'
'In the story. The ranch in Montana — it's named the Butler Ranch because of that curious rock that marks its location.'
'Oh yeah, I liked that detail,' Fred murmured, tutting as he came across a rusted old grinder and a small tin of beans. 'Were you really going to have these mashed potatoes for breakfast?'
'This is it,' said Callie. 'The rock in the story – it has to be, it is far too distinctive.'
Fred took the postcard from her, looked at it for a long time. 'I think you're right,' he said finally.
'So I don't know who the writer is, but I know where he is.'
Fred nodded slowly. 'Callie, you know if we were married, you wouldn't have to worry so much about working?' he said, the deliberate lightness in his tone tearing at her heart. 'I'd never stop you from writing or anything, you know that?'
'Do you think you could give me a ride to the station?' Callie blurted. 'If I hurry, I could catch the nine o'clock to Seattle.'