A Date You Can't Refuse Read Online Free PDF Page A

“Tell me you're not doing some fed thing again, Wollie.”
    “Does Simon know about this?” Joey asked. “Because if he does, I have to seriously question his judgment.”
    Fredreeq nodded. “If he doesn't know about it now, he will soon enough. Look at her. She couldn't fool a parsnip. What are these government people thinking? They may as well recruit from a high school marching band.”
    I wanted to weep. Any hope I might pull off this operation, whateverit was, died on the vine. “Okay, I quit. I haven't even begun and already I know I can't do it. I can't tell you a thing about it, but I can tell you this: I'm going to fail.”
    “Damn, Fredreeq,” Joey said. “Way to undermine her confidence.”
    “Okay, you're an actress,” Fredreeq said. “Teach her to act her way through it.”
    Joey raised her eyebrows. “I don't know if I can take artistic theory and squeeze it into an infomercial.”
    “Try,” I said.
    “Okay.” Joey pried open a pistachio nut. “If we had time, we'd go with Stanislavsky, who liked working from the inside out, as in ‘how would I feel in Lady Macbeth's shoes?’ and analyzing what Lady Macbeth wants, scene by scene, but that requires rehearsal and it's not what's needed here, is it? Here, you're writing Lady Macbeth's lines as you go, and—”
    “Could we use an example other than Lady Macbeth?” I asked.
    “Fine. For you, let's work from the outside in. Construct a character, okay? Give her a name. Dress like her, talk like her, act like her and as she sinks into your skin—”
    “Like self-tanning moisturizers,” Fredreeq said.
    “—you'll find that you're feeling more like her and less like you. The longer you live in her costume, the more comfortable you get. It's more clown school than method acting. Put on a clown costume, you feel like a clown.”
    “Like you're possessed,” Fredreeq said.
    “For moments,” Joey conceded. “Not all the time. That's called psychosis.”
    “Great,” I said. “My life as a horror movie.”
    “No, as a graphic novel,” Joey said. “Since you're a graphic artist. Yeah, that's the ticket. You need to create a superheroine, not a clown. A tough cookie.”
    I shook my head. “Everyone's into superheroines all of a sudden, but I have no affinity for them. I don't want an adventure. I don't think I can do this, you guys.”
    “You
can
do this,” Fredreeq said. “The question is, should you? I voteno. It's Mercury retrograde, which is no time to sign contracts, and I do not like the sound of this job. Or these Russians. I'm old-school.”
    “Fredreeq,” Joey said, “it's not like they'll use her for black ops, or wet work.”
    “What's wet work?” Fredreeq asked.
    “What's black ops?” I asked.
    “Covert operations. Wet work is killing people in a particularly bloody manner. I don't see you doing that. Anyway, whatever this is, given your qualms, you must have a good reason for taking it on.”
    I did. And it actually helped having a plan of sorts and two people who knew what I was up to, even though they really didn't. The comfort didn't last. It may have been an ocean breeze wandering a few blocks inland, but I was cold suddenly, and I found myself looking around, feeling as if someone was watching me.

FIVE
    C alabasas is in the San Fernando Valley just off the 101 freeway. I passed it every week on my way to see my brother in Santa Barbara, but I'd never stopped there. It was, as far as I knew, a place where people lived, shopped, and sent their kids to school. Well-to-do people, for the most part. Unless you were one of them, or knew one of them, there was no reason to be in their neighborhood.
    I took the Valley Circle exit, got lost, ended up at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital, where old movie people go to die, got directions, found Mulholland Highway, and kept driving, checking the roadside addresses, which were few and far between. It was like the Old West here, dusty and dry, brown