“I’m not looking to take on something that winds up being a heavy burden.”

Morrison smiled. “I can certainly understand that. You should have an opportunity to meet with the producers and key personnel before filming actually begins. If what you learn isn’t to your liking, you can always opt out of the project.”

“That sounds reasonable,” Kerney said. He thanked Morrison for her time and left with a copy of 100 Years of Filmmaking in New Mexico, which she insisted he should have.

Johnny Jordan lived and worked in a late-nineteenth-century brick building in downtown Denver that had originally been a warehouse. The developer who renovated it had added a two-story penthouse with a wall of glass that looked out at the Rocky Mountains. It featured a large balcony, a media room, four bedrooms, two home offices, and a huge living room adjacent to the kitchen and dining area. This was where Johnny and his wife, Madeline, a partner in a law firm that specialized in corporate mergers and hostile takeovers, lived. Madeline retained sole ownership, having bought the property prior to their marriage.

Johnny loved living there, loved waking up to the city views and the distant mountains, and especially loved that it hadn’t cost him a penny.

He didn’t expect Madeline to be home, and she wasn’t. Johnny always timed his trips out of town with other women to coincide with his wife’s travel schedule. It reduced the odds of discovery. This week she was in Toronto, heading up a team of lawyers negotiating the merger of two multinational lumber companies.

Johnny cared about Madeline, maybe even loved her every once in a while when she wasn’t obsessing about her career. But like every other woman he’d been seriously drawn to and married over the years-Madeline was wife number four-she now bored him.