AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We flew into L.A.X. and there was a driver holding an iPad with the name ‘Harry Wallace’ on it, waiting for us.
“That’s my fake name,” Dean explained. We followed the man out to his car and loaded our own luggage into the trunk; except when I went to haul my suitcase in after Wyatt’s, the man grabbed the second handle to take half the weight.
The air was cold, and I hugged myself to stay warm — when I’d packed my suitcase, I’d forgotten that it was winter in the northern hemisphere, and my suitcase was full of summer clothes.
“Do you think I’ll be able to buy winter gear here?”
Wyatt laughed as he wrapped his arms around me, letting the heat from his body seep into mine.
“Are you kidding? There are clothes shopseverywhere.”
He was right, I saw, as the driver took us down a palm tree lined boulevard and steered us towards the Hollywood Hills. I kept my eyes open as we drove, afraid to blink in case I’d miss part of the view. I wanted to burn the white Hollywood sign into my brain forever, so that one day I could tell my kids about it.
I glanced back at the three men in the back seat. So I could tellourkids about it, I mentally corrected myself.
Every inch of L.A. felt alive with possibilities. Even the air, despite its chill, seemed to be full of fairy dust.
“I can’t believe you live here,” I breathed. “This place is amazing.
“You haven’t seen anything yet,” Isaac said, as the car ascended Mulholland Drive. The houses on either side of the road were so far back from their fences that I could barely see them, but their gates gave me an idea of what their size and scale might be. These things werehuge, nothing like the chicken wire fences and federation houses from back home. The fences were made from solid steel and tall enough that not even a professional gymnast could vault over them.
The driver pulled into one of the driveways, spoke into the intercom, and the gates swung open soundlessly. The driveway was long and at the end of it was a massive house, bigger than anything I could afford in fifty lifetimes. It was a white Greek-style mansion, with arches, columns, and lots of stairs. It must have held at least twenty-five bedrooms and behind the main building, I glimpsed a tennis court and a sparkling blue pool.
“Come on,” Isaac said, as he climbed out of the car and hauled his suitcase out of the trunk. I followed, and he gave me a hand with my own luggage. He led me into the house as the car circled around the end of the driveway and disappeared in the direction of the gates.
The marble foyer was the size of my dad’s entire house and featured a sweeping spiral staircase that circled the perimeter of the room. Isaac passed it, leading me through one of the arched doorways and through the first floor of the house.
All the rooms that he led me through looked like they belonged in a museum. The furniture was ornate and beautiful, and gave me the feeling that it had never been used. His whitecouches were clean and lacked any dents where people might have sat on them. The tables were polished and unmarked. There were fresh flowers in vases all around the room, and I assumed he had cleaners or assistants who’d replenished them before he’d arrived home. Beyond that room was a massive kitchen and dining room, and beyond that, a butler’s pantry.
Despite the grand size and scale, it felt lonely.
A massive house like this needed family, laughter and closeness, not one man wandering around by himself.
The only room that looked like it had actually been used was the library. It was even more beautiful than Isaac had described on the plane. The antique armchairs and rolling ladders were there, but he hadn’t mentioned that the library took up an entire wing of the house, with floor-to-ceiling windows that spanned at least two storeys, a beautiful garden outside, and potted plants on shelves that jutted out from the walls inside. The shelves contained more books than I’d ever seen in one place before, and most of their spines were creased, indicating that he’d read almost all of them.
I stood in the center of the room and moved in a slow circle, taking everything in.
“Holy fuck.”
“I thought you’d like this room,” he said with a smile. He selected a book from one of the lower shelves and passed it to me.The Time Thiefby Levi Grenville.
I gasped as I opened it and saw Levi’s scrawled signature on the title page.
“It’s yours,” Isaac said. I held it out and shook my head.
“I couldn’t possibly take it.”
“He’s my neighbor,” Isaac said, holding his hands behind his back so I couldn’t push the book into them. “I can get another one anytime. I want you to have this.”
“He’s your neighbor?” I looked out the window, squinting at the bushes. The adjacent properties were too far away for me to see. “How does an author earn enough to livehere?” I wondered aloud.
“He’s also a screenwriter,” Isaac said. “Plus, a couple of his books were adapted into movies and he had a good agent who negotiated a good contract.”
I gaped at the photo on the back cover of the book. Who knew screenwriters earned that much money? If I could earn that kind of income from writing screenplays and reading books, I’d be the happiest person alive.
“Come on,” Isaac said. “There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”
He led me to another room that was filled with sunlight and overlooked the pool. He had a laptop there, and he opened it and started a video chat with a woman with high cheekbones and a severe hairstyle.
