Page 55 of Celebrity in Death

“There’s going to be a vid of me tearing strips off your ass then using them to wallpaper my office. I’ll make copies for everybody. Get Marlo down here. I’ll start on Julian.”

Eve headed to Interview. Inside Julian sat, head in hands. When he lifted his face, he was pale, hollow-eyed, unshaven.

“I don’t feel well,” he began.

“Don’t look well either. Record on. Dallas, Lieutenant Eve, in Interview with Cross, Julian.” She added the pertinent data, sat.

“I’m fasting,” he told her.

“Is that so? Is that a mourning for Harris deal?”

“A—no. I drank too much. Then the Sober-Up, the blocker, and I took a sleeping pill when I got back to the hotel. It’s all too much for my system. I’m taking nothing but clear liquids today, to flush out the toxins.”

“That’s one way.”

“Do I need a lawyer this time?”

“Do you want one?”

“I want to go home, go to bed. I want to wake up yesterday before all of this happened. It’s like a dream, a really bad dream.”

“You argued with K.T.”

“At dinner.”

“After dinner. Before the gag reel.”

“I did?” His eyes, bloodshot and dull, stared into hers. “About what she said at dinner? I was upset, embarrassed. Did I tell you already?”

“Some of it. How about when she came banging on your trailer door yesterday? What did she want then?”

“I... don’t remember.”

“Bullshit, Julian. You weren’t drunk then. I have a witness who saw her banging on your door. And she was angry, insistent.” The timing worked, Eve thought, and she was banking Peabody had heard Harris yelling outside Julian’s trailer.

“She was always angry about something,” he said with a shrug.

“She wanted you to claim you and Marlo were having an affair.”

“That’s just studio hype. It’s—”

“No, Julian. She wanted you to tell Matthew you and Marlo were screwing around behind his back. Matthew and Marlo are involved. Harris didn’t like it. She wanted you to help her break them up.”

“I didn’t know Matthew and Marlo were a thing.”

“Until?”

“Yesterday. When K.T. started raging about it. They’re really good at keeping it low. I could see it last night, when I looked for it. Up until then, I just thought they were friends. Maybe they had sex—it happens—but I didn’t know they were a thing.”

“Why would she expect you to do what she wanted, to tell Matthew Marlo cheated on him with you?”

“Hell if I know. And I wouldn’t. I like Marlo. I like Matthew.” Sincerity shimmered in his voice. “I’m not going to do anything to hurt them like that.”

“It didn’t bother you that Marlo preferred Matthew to you?”

“Actually, it was good to find out there was a reason she turned me down.”

“Not used to getting turned down, are you?”

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