"Yeah," Trent says. "You did."

I pause. "Isn't that what you wanted to see me about?"

Trent thinks about it before saying, "In a way."

The empty Ferris wheel looms over us as we pa.s.s by barely visible in the haze, just a dim circle, and except for a few Mexican fishermen no one's around. Holiday decorations are still up and a dead Christmas tree wrapped in a garland leans against the peeling wall of the arcade and the faint smell of churros floats toward us from a brightly colored cart and it's hard to concentrate on Trent because the only sounds are the distant surf and the squalling of low-flying gulls, the psychic calling out to us, the calliope playing a Doors song.

"This isn't about Blair?" I suddenly ask.

Trent looks over at me as if he's shocked I would ask that. "No. Not at all. This has nothing to do with Blair."

I keep moving with him down the boardwalk toward the end of the pier, waiting for him to say something.

"I want to make this quick," Trent finally says, checking his watch. "I've got to be back in Beverly Hills by three."

I shrug and put my hands in the pockets of the hoodie I'm wearing, one of them forming a fist around my phone.

"I guess you're going to stop this with Rain Turner, right?" Trent asks. "I mean, the audition's this afternoon, right? And then it'll be over?"

"Stop...what, Trent?" I ask innocently.

"Whatever it is you do with these girls." He quickly makes a face, then tries to relax. "This, I don't know, this little game you play."

"What are you talking about, Trent?" I ask, sounding as casual and amused as possible.

"Promise them things, sleep with them, buy them things and then you can only get them so far and when you can't get them the things that you really promised..." Trent stops walking and takes off his sungla.s.ses and looks at me, mystified. "Do I really need to say this?"

"It's just a very interesting theory."

Trent stares at me before he continues walking, and then he stops again.

"It's interesting that you-what? Abandon them? Try to screw things up for them once they figure it all out?"

Something in me snaps. "I think Meghan Reynolds is doing okay," I say. "I think she benefited from using me."

"You don't really need to work, do you?" Trent asks. He sounds genuinely interested. "You've got family money, right?"

I don't say anything.

"I mean, you can't afford to live like you do just off screenwriting," Trent says. "I mean, right?"

I shrug. "I do okay." I shrug again.

"I know Rain Turner doesn't have a shot at that role." Trent keeps walking and then he puts his sungla.s.ses back on as if it's the only thing that will calm him down. "I talked to Mark. I talked to Jon. You can keep f.u.c.king with her as long as you want, I guess-"

"Trent, you know what? I just realized this is none of your business."

"Well, it has, unfortunately, become my business."

"Really?" I ask, trying to sound neutral. "How's that?"

We're both suddenly distracted by a drunken man in a bathing suit who's gesturing at something invisible in the air at the end of the pier, sunburned, bearded. Trent takes off his sungla.s.ses again and for some reason he doesn't know where to look and he's more agitated than he was before and the land has disappeared behind us and there's no sound coming from the distant sh.o.r.e, which is now completely hidden by haze, and we're out over the water now and two Asian girls pulling tufts of cotton candy off a stick are the only other people wandering by.

"It's much more complicated than you know." Trent says this in a strained voice as he keeps looking around, and I just want him to stop but I also don't want him to look at me. "It's just...bigger than you think. All you need to do is, is, is remove yourself," he stammers before regaining his composure. "You don't need to know anything else."

"Remove myself from what, exactly?" I ask. "Remove myself from her?"

Trent pauses a moment, and then decides to tell me something. "Kelly Montrose was a close friend of mine." He lets the statement hang there.

It hangs there long enough for me to ask, "What does Kelly have to do with why I'm here?"

"Rain was with him," Trent says. "I mean, when he disappeared. They were together."

"With him?" him?"

"Well, he was paying for it, I guess..."

"I thought she had stopped doing that," I say. "I thought she met Rip and that she had stopped doing that."

"She knows things," Trent says. "And so does Julian."

"What things?"

"About what happened to Kelly."

I stare at Trent stone-faced but the fear begins swirling around us softly and it causes me to notice a young blond guy in cargo shorts and a windbreaker leaning against a railing on the pier, purposefully not looking at us, and I realize he could not be more obvious if he were holding a hundred balloons. Invisible gulls keep squalling in the hazy sky above him, and the blond guy suddenly seems familiar but I can't place him.

"I'm not saying she's innocent," Trent's saying. "She's not. But she doesn't need someone like you to make things worse for her."

I turn back to Trent. "But Rip Millar is okay?"

For some reason this question forces Trent to shut up and figure out another tactic.

We start walking again. We pa.s.s a Mexican restaurant that overlooks the sea. We're near the end of the pier.

"What did you get out of taking Rain on as a client?" I ask. "I'm curious. Why did you take on a girl you knew was never going to make it?"

Trent keeps matching my steps, and his expression momentarily relaxes. "Well, it made my wife happy to help Julian out before she realized..." Trent pauses, thinks things through, and continues. "I mean, I knew about Julian. Blair and I didn't talk about it but it wasn't a secret between us." Trent squints and then puts his sungla.s.ses back on. "If I have any problems they're not with Rain Turner. And they're not with Blair."

"But you have a problem with Julian?"

"Well, I knew that Blair had loaned him a lot of money-well, seventy grand, but for him that's a lot of money." Trent moves alongside me toward the end of the pier, seemingly unaware of the guy who's following us and I keep looking back at. I notice he's holding a camera. "And I knew she really liked him." Trent pauses. "But I also knew that in the end nothing was going to happen with him."

"And what about me?"

"See, there you go again, Clay," Trent says. "It's not about you."

"Trent-"

"It comes down to this," he continues, cutting me off. "Blair loaned Julian a large sum of money. Julian decided to go to Rip to borrow some cash to pay Blair back. Why? I don't know." Trent pauses. "And that's how Rip met Miss Turner. And, um, the rest is, well, what it is." He pauses again. "Do I need to say anything more? Do you get it?"

I look over at the blond guy again. He's supposed to be in costume, he's supposed to be camouflaged but he's not: it's almost as if he wants us to notice him. He keeps moving down the pier, twenty, maybe thirty yards behind us.

"Rip told me he was going to divorce his wife," I say. "What would they have done then? I mean, if Kelly hadn't shown up? How much longer could they have played this game with Rip if he actually went through with the divorce?"

"No. It was safe," Trent says dismissively. "The divorce would've been too expensive for Rip. They both knew that."

"But then your friend Kelly got in the way," I say.

"That might have been a problem," Trent says, nodding his head.

"The problem being what?"

"Whatever happened between Rip Millar and Kelly Montrose..." Trent stops, figuring out how to phrase it differently. "Kelly knew a lot of people. It's not like Rip Millar was the only person who had issues with him."

My iPhone starts vibrating in the pocket of the hoodie, its sound m.u.f.fled.

"Actually"-Trent stares at me-"you and Rip have much more in common than you might think."

"Oh, I don't think so," I say. "I didn't have anything to do with Kelly's death."

"Clay-"

"And I don't know how but I think Rip did." I stop walking. "And you knew something at the Christmas party, didn't you? You knew Rip had done something to Kelly. You knew Rain had left him for Kelly and you knew Rip liked her-"

Trent cuts me off. "Yeah? Well, I guess we all have our little theories."

"Theory?" I ask. "It's a theory theory that you knew he was probably dead that night?" that you knew he was probably dead that night?"

The haze obliterates everything: you can't see the Pacific or the pier behind us, the Mexican restaurant is barely visible at the end of the pier and nothing else at all. The pier falls away into the sea and beyond that is just a sheet of haze blocking out the entire sky so there's no horizon and Trent leans against the railing studying me, still intent on pitching the narrative he wants me to respond to, but I can barely pay attention.

"Why do you keep looking at that restaurant?" Trent suddenly asks. "You thirsty for a margarita or something?"

Trent doesn't realize I'm not looking at the restaurant. The young blond guy in the windbreaker is somewhere around us but I can't see him.

"Why is Kelly Montrose dead?" I say, almost murmuring to myself instead of directing this at Trent. "What happened to Amanda Flew?"

Trent isn't cool enough to hide the desperation that quickly flashes across his face. "It's not just about Kelly and it's not just about Amanda." Trent breathes in and looks around. "You don't understand...This...thing...it has...a scope, Clay..." Trent stops. "It has a scope scope...There are other people involved and it's-"

"Can't you just answer my question?"

"But you're asking for an answer where there isn't just one."

The iPhone in my pocket starts vibrating again.

"You smell like alcohol," he mutters, turning away. "I heard rumors but Christ."

I clasp my fist around the iPhone as if that will make it stop.

"Look, she's not going to get that part," Trent says. "Okay? You understand?"

"Do you know that for sure?"

"Anything could happen, I suppose," Trent says. "But I don't think that's one of them."

"Well, then she won't get the part and then it'll be over," I say. "And then she'll go off with someone else. She'll move on."

"No she won't. Because you'll offer her another one," Trent says quickly. "You'll just prolong it. Like you usually do. And like the others, it'll take her a while to understand." Trent stops. "And then, as usual, it'll take even longer for you to understand and-"

"Why are you here, Trent?" I ask, unable to contain the stress that's whispering around us. "What? You're here on Julian's behalf? You want Rain to be with Julian? You want them to live happily ever after?"

"No, no, you're not paying attention. You don't get it," Trent says, shaking his head. "Just stop all contact with her. Starting this afternoon. Don't see her anymore. Don't return her calls. She'll come back to you but don't let her-"

"What if I say go f.u.c.k yourself?"

"That would be very stupid."

"Unless you tell me why I should stay away, I don't think what you want is going to happen."

Trent stares at me, and then he tells me something that I know he doesn't want to.

"If she can make Rip Millar happy for a couple more months then everything will calm down." Trent stops and looks into my face. "Do you get it, now? Do I need to explain this any further? Julian's really not the obstacle right now. You are. Julian's already tried to talk her out of being with you. But, in this case, you're the only one she's going to listen to."

"Why me?"

"Because she thinks you're the only one who can do something for her," Trent says, and then shakes his head again. "You're the only one who cares enough." He pauses. "Because she thinks that you're her only chance."

I force myself to laugh but it's just a gesture to overcome the fear. When I reach into my pocket for the iPhone three consecutive texts read: why are u with him? Why Are You With Him??? WHY ARE YOU WITH HIM??? why are u with him? Why Are You With Him??? WHY ARE YOU WITH HIM???

I'm not listening to anything Trent says until I hear "As of now, you've officially made yourself a target" because this reminds me of what Rip Millar told me in the back of the limousine a few nights ago. "What?" I look up from the phone and then glance fearfully down the boardwalk at the guy in the windbreaker, who has appeared again, pretending to stare dreamily into the hazy distance.

"Someone could be setting you up," Trent says.

"Being set up for what?"

Trent notices something as I light a cigarette.

"Your hand is shaking," he says. "You can't smoke here."

"I don't think anyone's around to enforce that."

On the roof of the Mexican restaurant someone is scanning the pier with a pair of binoculars. And then I realize that the guy who's been following us is taking more pictures, his camera aimed at the ocean even though the haze makes these pictures almost impossible, unless instead he's taking pictures of two guys leaning against the railing at the end of the Santa Monica pier, one of them smoking a cigarette, the other one backed away from him in frustration. The windbreaker guy crosses the pier again as if he's looking for a better angle and I don't say anything to Trent because he hasn't noticed the guy and the empty roller-coaster cars glide slowly down their tracks, slipping in and out of the haze, and someone faintly sings you're still the one you're still the one from a radio inside a surf shop and on the beach a surfer shuffles through the sand near the water's edge, a towel wrapped around his head like a turban. from a radio inside a surf shop and on the beach a surfer shuffles through the sand near the water's edge, a towel wrapped around his head like a turban.

"You know she came on to Mark," Trent says. "Or did you know that?"

I keep looking at the phone.

WHAT IS HE TELLING YOU?!?