by Nora Roberts
“I’ll do what I can.” He blew smoke from between his teeth. “It’s not going to be easy. Reporters are staking out the place.”
“Fuck.”
“You said it. I’m going to keep the business of Julia’s relationship with Eve under wraps for as long as I can, but that’s going to bust loose too. When it does, they’ll be on her like fleas.” He glanced up as Julia stepped through the doorway. “Get her out of here.”
Panting, Drake shoved through the door, then locked it behind him. Thank Christ, thank Christ, he thought over and over as he rubbed shaking hands over his clammy face. He’d made it home. He was safe.
He needed a drink.
Favoring his ankle, he hobbled through the living room to the bar and snatched a bottle at random. A quick twist of the top and he was drinking Stoli. He shuddered, gulped oxygen, and guzzled some more.
Dead. The queen was dead.
He gave a nervous giggle that ended on a racking sob. How could it have happened? Why had it happened? If he hadn’t gotten away before Julia had come back …
Didn’t matter. He shook even the possibility away, then pressed a hand to his spinning head. The only thing that mattered was that nobody had seen him. As long as he kept calm, played it smart, everything was going to be dandy. Better than dandy. She couldn’t have had time to change her will.
He was a rich man. A fucking tycoon. He raised the bottle again in toast, then dropped it to the ground on his rush to the bathroom. Clinging to the John, he vomited up sickness and fear.
Maggie Castle heard the news in one of the coldest ways—a phone call from a reporter asking for reaction and comment.
“You slimy son of a bitch,” she began, leaning forward in her buttery leather swivel chair. “Don’t you know I can have your ass for pulling a stunt like this.” She slammed the phone down with relish. With a pile of scripts to review, contracts to revise, and phone calls to return, she didn’t have time for warped jokes.
“Fucking jerk,” she said mildly, and eyed the phone with dislike. Her stomach rumbled, distracting her, and she pressed a calming hand to it. Starving to death, she thought. She was starving to death and would have cheerfully killed for a big fat roast beef on rye. But she was going to fit into that size ten she’d plunked down three thousand for, and the Oscars were less than a week away.
She dealt out a trio of eight-by-ten glossies like playing cards and studied the sultry faces. She had to decide which one to send to read for a plum part in a new feature under development.
Tailor-made for Eve, she mused. Sighed. If Eve had been twenty-five years younger. The hell of it was, even Eve Benedict couldn’t be young forever.
Maggie barely glanced up as her door opened. “What is it, Sheila?”
“Ms. Castle …” Sheila stood in the doorway, one hand gripping the knob, the other braced on the jamb. “Oh, God, Ms. Castle.”
The trembling tone had Maggie’s head jerking up. Her half glasses slid down her nose. “What? What is it?”
“Eve Benedict … She’s been murdered.”
“That’s bullshit.” The anger came first so that she reared out of her chair. “If that asshole’s called again—”
“The radio,” Sheila managed to say, fumbling in her skirt pocket for a tissue. “It just came over the radio.”
Still fueled by fury, Maggie snatched up the remote and aimed it at the television. By the time she’d flipped the channels twice, she hit the bulletin.
“Hollywood, and the world, is shocked this afternoon by the death of Eve Benedict. The perpetually glamorous star of dozens of films was found on her estate, the apparent victim of homicide.”
Eyes glued to the set, Maggie lowered herself slowly into her chair. “Eve,” she whispered. “Oh, God, Eve.”
Locked in his office miles away, Michael Delrickio stared at the television, dully watching the pictures flicker. Eve at twenty, bright, vivid. At thirty, sultry, sensational.
He didn’t move. He didn’t speak.
Gone. Wasted, finished. He could have given her everything. Including life. If she’d loved him enough, if she’d believed in him, trusted him, he could have stopped it. Instead, she had scorned him, defied him, detested him. So she was dead. And even in death she could ruin him.
Gloria lay in her darkened bedroom, a chilled gel mask over her swollen eyes. The Valium wasn’t helping. She didn’t think anything would. No pills, no ploys, no prayers would ever make things right again.
Eve had been her closest friend. She hated that she couldn’t erase the memories they’d shared, the value of their woman-to-woman intimacy.
Of course she’d been hurt, angry, fearful. But she’d never wanted Eve dead. She’d never wanted it to end like this.
But Eve was dead. She was gone. Beneath the soothing mask, tears streamed. Gloria wondered what would become of her now.
In his library, surrounded by the books he’d loved and collected over a lifetime, Victor stared at a sealed bottle of Irish Mist. Whiskey, he thought, the way the Irish made it, was the best way to get drunk.
He wanted to get drunk, so drunk he wouldn’t be able to think, or feel, or breathe. How long could he stay that way? he wondered. One night, one week, one year? Could he stay that way long enough so that when he came to himself again, the pain would be over?
There would never be enough whiskey, there would never be enough time for that. If he was cursed to survive another ten years, he’d never outlive the pain.
Eve. Only Eve could stop the pain. And he would never hold her again, never taste her, never laugh with her or sit quietly in the garden and just be with her.
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. In his heart he knew it could have been changed. Like a bad script, poorly written, the ending could have been revised.
She’d left him, and this time there could be no reconciliation, no compromise, no promises. Now all he had were memories, and empty days and nights to relive them.
Victor lifted the bottle, flung it against the wall, where it exploded. Choking against the ripe smell of whiskey, he covered his face with his hands and cursed Eve with all his heart.
Anthony Kincade gloated. He rejoiced. He laughed out loud. As he greedily stuffed pate-smeared crackers into his mouth, he kept his gaze fixed on the television. Each time a channel segued back to regular programming, he switched, searching for a fresh bulletin, a recap of the news.
The bitch was dead, and nothing could have made him happier. It was only a matter of time now before he dealt with the Summers woman and got back the tapes Eve had taunted him with.
His reputation, his money, his freedom, they were safe now. Eve had gotten exactly what she’d deserved. He only hoped she’d suffered.
Lyle didn’t know what the hell to think. He was too scared to bother. The way he figured it, Delrickio had iced Eve—and he was connected to Delrickio. Sure, he’d only been doing some snooping, but men like Delrickio never went down. They made sure someone went down for them.
He could run, but he was damn sure he couldn’t hide. He didn’t figure his alibi about sleeping off a fat joint all afternoon would hold much water with the cops.
Goddamn, why had the broad gone and gotten herself wasted now? If she’d waited a few weeks, he’d have been long gone, his pockets fat, his road clear. Just his luck. His fucking luck.
Naked, he sat on the bed, dangling a beer between his knees. He’d have to come up with a tighter alibi. He drew on the beer, racked his poor brain, then grinned. He had the five big ones Delrickio had planted on him. If he couldn’t buy an alibi with a couple of grand—and his famous, tireless dick, life wasn’t worth living.
Travers wouldn’t be comforted. Nina tried, but the housekeeper wouldn’t eat, she wouldn’t rest, she wouldn’t take a sedative. She simply sat on the terrace, looking out at the garden. She wouldn’t even come inside, no matter how Nina coaxed or prodded.
The police had been all through the house, poking into drawers, running their cop hand
s over Eve’s personal belongings. Contaminating everything.
Through her own swollen, red-rimmed eyes, Nina watched her. Did the woman think she was the only one in pain? Did she think she was the only one who was sick and scared and uncertain?
Nina spun away from the terrace doors. Christ, she needed someone to talk to, someone to hold. She could pick up the phone, dial one of dozens of numbers, but everyone she was close to would ask about Eve. After all, Nina Soloman’s life had begun the day Eve Benedict had taken her in.
Now Eve was gone, and she had no one. Nothing. How could it be that one person should have such an affect on another? It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair.
She walked over to the bar and fixed herself a stiff bourbon. She grimaced at the taste. It had been years since she’d drunk anything stronger than white wine.
But the taste didn’t bring back ugly memories. Instead, it soothed and strengthened. She drank again. She was going to need all the strength she could muster to get through the next few weeks. Or the rest of her life.
Tonight. She would concentrate on getting through just this one night.
How was she going to sleep here, in this big house, knowing that Eve’s bedroom was down the hall?
She could go to a hotel—but she knew that wouldn’t be right. She would stay, she would get through the first night. Then she would think about the next. And the next.
When Julia fought off the weight of the sedative, it was after midnight. There was no disorientation, no instant when she convinced herself it had all been some terrible dream.
She knew, the moment she regained consciousness, where she was, and what had happened.
She was in Paul’s bed. And Eve was dead.
Aching, she turned, wanting to feel him, to press herself against warmth and life. But the space beside her was empty.
She pushed herself up and out of bed, though her body felt too light, her head too hazy.
She remembered that they had driven over to pick Brandon up—at her insistence. She couldn’t have stood it if he’d heard from the television. Still, she hadn’t been able to tell him everything, only that there’d been an accident—a pitiful euphemism for murder—and that Eve had been killed.
He’d cried a little, his natural emotion for a woman who had been kind to him. Julia wondered how and when she would find the way to tell him that woman had been his grandmother.
But that was for later. Brandon was sleeping, safe. Perhaps a little sad, but safe. Paul was not.
She found him on the deck, looking out to the sea that plunged in black waves onto black sand. For a moment she thought her heart would break. He was silhouetted in the moonlight, his hands thrust deep into the pockets of the jeans he must have pulled on when he’d left her alone in bed.
She didn’t have to see his face, his eyes. She didn’t have to hear his voice. She could feel his grief.
Uncertain if she would help him more by going to him, or staying away, she stood where she was.
He knew she was there. From the moment she’d stepped into the doorway, her scent had carried to him. And her sorrow. For most of the night he’d been doing what needed to be done, automatically. Making the necessary calls, screening others. Eating the soup she’d insisted on heating, browbeating her into taking the pills that would help her rest.
Now he didn’t even have the strength to sleep.
“When I was fifteen, just before my sixteenth birthday,” he began, still watching the water roll dark toward the sand. “Eve taught me to drive. I was here on a visit, and one day she just pointed to her car. A goddamn Mercedes. She said ‘Get in, kid. You might as well learn to drive on the right side of the road first.’ ”
He pulled a cigar from his pocket. The flare of the match etched the misery on his face, then plunged it into shadows again.
“I was terrified, and so excited my feet were shaking on the pedals. For an hour I drove all over Beverly Hills, bucking, stalling out, bumping over curbs. I nearly creamed a Rolls, and she never blinked. Just threw her head back and laughed.”
The smoke burned his throat. He threw the cigar over the rail, then leaned on it. “God, I loved her.”
“I know.” She went to him and put her arms around him.
In silence, they held on to each other, and thought of Eve.
The world grieved. Eve would have enjoyed it. She copped the front page of People along with a six-page spread.
Nightline dedicated an entire segment to her. Eve Benedict festivals preempted regular programming on nearly every channel. Including cable. The National Enquirer was screaming that her spirit haunted the back lot of her old studio. Enterprising street people were selling T-shirts, mugs, and posters faster than they could be manufactured.
One day before the Oscars, and Hollywood was draped in black glitter. How she would have laughed.
Paul tried to bury his grief, imagining her reaction to the tributes—tacky and triumphant. But there were so many things, countless things, that reminded him of her.
And there was Julia.
She moved through each day, doing what needed to be done, her energy constant and practical. Yet there was a haunted desperation in her eyes he couldn’t ease. She’d given her statement to Frank, spending hours at the station going over every detail she remembered. Her seamless control had torn only once—the first time Frank had played back one of the tapes. The moment she’d heard Eve’s rich, husky voice, she’d bolted to her feet, excused herself, and dashed away to be violently ill in the ladies’ room.
After that, she managed to sit through every replay, corroborating the tape with her own notes, adding the date, the circumstance of the interview, the mood, her own interpretation.
And during those three miserable days, she and Brandon had stayed in Malibu while Paul had made arrangements for the funeral.
Eve hadn’t wanted the simple. When had she ever? Her instructions had been left for Paul in the hands of her lawyers, and had been crystal-clear. She’d bought the lot—prime real estate, she’d called it—nearly a year before. Just as she’d chosen her own coffin. A gleaming sapphire blue lined in snowy white silk. Even the guest list with predetermined seating arrangements had been included, as if she’d planned the ultimate party.
The music had been chosen, as well as the musicians. Her burial dress had been selected—a glittery emerald evening gown she had never worn in public. Its debut was a grand one.
Of course she’d insisted her hair be styled by Armando.
On the day of her funeral, Eve’s public lined the streets. They crowded the entrance of the church, some weeping, some snapping pictures, necks straining as people fought for a glimpse of the mourning famous. Video cameras hummed. Wallets were stolen, and occasionally someone fainted. It was, as she would have appreciated, a production number. Only the crisscrossing spotlights were missing from this particular premiere.
The limos arrived, ponderously disgorging their gilded cast. The rich, the famous, the glamorous, the grieving. The best designers were shown off in basic black.
The crowd gasped and murmured as Gloria DuBarry stepped out, leaning heavily on her husband’s sturdy arm. Her Saint Laurent was accented by a heavy veil.
There were more murmurs, and a few chuckles, as Anthony Kincade heaved himself out of a limo, his bulk sausaged obscenely into a black suit.
Travers and Nina passed through the lines buffered by anonymity.
Peter Jackson kept his head down, ignoring the giddy fans who called out his name. He was thinking about the woman he had spent a few sultry nights with, and how she’d looked on a rainy morning.
A cheer went up as Rory Winthrop stepped out. Unsure how to respond, he assisted his wife from the car, then waited for Kenneth to join them on the curb.
“Christ, it’s a circus,” Lily muttered, wondering if she should turn her back or her best side to the ubiquitous cameras.
“Yes.” With a grim smile, Kenneth scanned the crowd, plunging and pressing agains
t the police barricade. “And Eve’s still the ringmaster.”
Turning from him, Lily supported her husband by slipping a hand through his arm. “Are you all right, darling?”
He could only shake his head. He could smell his wife’s exotic perfume, sense the firmness of her guiding arm. The cold shadow of the church seemed to reach out for them with dead hands. “I feel mortal for the first time in my entire life.” Before they could climb the stairs, he spotted Victor. There was nothing he could say, no words that would even touch the grief so clear in the other man’s eyes. Rory leaned closer to his wife. “Let’s get this bloody show started.”
Julia knew she could get through it. Knew she had to. She clung to an outer calm, but her insides churned with fear of the ritual. Was this rite to honor the dead or entertain the living? When the limo drew up to the curb, she closed her eyes quickly, tightly. But when Paul reached down for her hand, her fingers were firm and dry. She had a bad moment when she saw Victor at the entrance to the church. His gaze flicked over her, then away.
He didn’t know, she thought, and her fingers convulsed into a fist. He didn’t know how intimately they had shared the woman they had come to bury.
Too many people, she thought on a flare of panic. There were too many people, all of them too close, and pressing closer. Staring, calling out. She could smell them, the hot flesh, the hot breath, the shimmery energy that came from the combination of grief and vivid excitement.
The trembling began again, and she started to pull back when Paul slipped an arm around her waist. He murmured something, but she couldn’t hear it over the buzzing in her ears. There was no air here. She tried to tell him that, but he was sweeping her up the steps and inside.
Now there was music, not the ponderous moan of an organ, but the clear, sweet strains of a violin, melded with the elegant notes of a flute. The church was packed, flowers and people. Yet the thick air seemed to part, to cool. The somber garb of those who had come to Eve’s last party was offset by the jungle of blossoms. No funeral wreaths for Eve. Instead, there were oceans of camelias, mountains of roses, sweeps of magnolias heaped like snowdrifts. The scene had both glamour and beauty. At center stage, where she had spent most of her life, was the glossy blue casket.