It had been two years since her name had been entered into the unofficial Celebrity Stalker Hall of Fame. It had been the top entertainment story for several weeks. Interest was revived again a year later when she was convicted of a laundry list of offenses. That’s when Elijah caught on and decided she was his meal ticket.
He’d read and saved every article he could find online about her. Plenty of them were helpful. Some of them were sensational. A few were downright lies. He even found a very early one that reported her name as Laura Boneville. Those kinds of inaccuracies made him want to weep for modern journalism.
Online articles weren’t enough for him to go on if he intended to tell her real story. He would have to do the legwork. If she wasn’t willing to give him her story, he needed to drag it out of the people who knew her. He intended to walk where she walked; to see the world through her eyes, demented as that world view might be.
Despite having a pathetic social life, Elijah did have friends. One of those friends was able to hook him up with the judge involved in Lucy’s case. That judge gave him somewhat limited access to the evidence against her. But he wasn’t using that evidence to solve a crime. He was using it to follow in her footsteps.
Armed with what he knew, Elijah tracked down her former coworker. Her name was Joni and she had probably spent more time with Lucy around that time than anyone. Hopefully she could give him a better idea of what Lucy was like as a person and not as a criminal.
He had arranged to meet her at the Bliss Day Spa where she worked as a massage therapist. The business was in a strip mall with a façade that gave nothing away. When he stepped inside he was greeted with ambient light and sound and the almost overpowering scent of lavender and spice.
The woman behind the high counter smiled and welcomed him. She was slim and pretty with black hair pulled into a long ponytail. Her winged eyeliner accentuated the upward curve of her eyes. He wondered what heritage was responsible for the mocha shade of her skin.
"I’m here to see Joni Silva."
Her professional smile dropped as if she was glad to be rid of it.
"I’m Joni." She looked him over which made his forehead produce beads of sweat. He was suddenly nervous to be interviewing this woman. He would have to constantly remind himself to keep it professional.
"And I’m Elijah Rhee." He reached his hand across the desk in a professional gesture, but she didn’t take it.
"I figured," she replied coldly.
"Great." He was skilled at keeping his cool, even around attractive women. "Where can we go to talk?"
"There’s a Panera next door. Let’s go there." She reached down and produced a handbag which she hefted over her shoulder. Then she stepped from behind the counter to reveal the rounded belly of a woman in the middle stage of pregnancy. Elijah’s nerves eased a bit. His professionalism would not suffer.
When he offered to buy her a soft drink and a pastry, she didn’t decline. She chose a booth and slid in while he remained at the counter waiting for their order. Within minutes he brought the food to the table and sat down across from her. Then he pulled his phone from his pocket, opened an app, and set the phone between them.
"Do you mind if I record our conversation?"
Joni looked down her nose at the phone. Her brown eyes flitted back to his face. God, she was nice-looking.
"I guess not," she said. "This is about Lucy, right?"
"Yes. You knew her from her uncle’s store? Were you friends?"
She let out a short sniff and looked away. "No. We just worked together. She was quiet. Seemed kind of lonely."
Elijah made a mental note of this. A lonely woman with a boring job latched onto a celebrity and couldn’t let go.
"Did she have any friends?"
"None that I knew of. She would go out with me and Leron sometimes and she never invited other people. She never ran into anybody she knew."
"Is Leron your husband?"
"What?" She laughed, but not in a funny way. It was more of a mocking laugh. Like, how dumb was he?
"I’m not married. Leron is my best friend. He worked a couple doors down back then."
"Did Lucy ever have a boyfriend when you knew her?"
Joni took a large bite of her bear claw. She chewed while he waited for her answer.
"She had a couple, supposebly. She talked about a guy named Kevin and then there was Joel." A look of realization crossed her face. "But obviously that was made up. I never met Kevin, so I can’t tell you if he actually existed or not. And then she said she was moving to Colorado to live with this guy she’d met. I honestly thought he was real." She chuckled and shook her head, apparently amused with the situation.
"Did she show you pictures of this guy?"
"No, I guess not."
"Did you ever ask to see a picture?"
Joni scowled. His line of questioning was making her visibly irritable. He wondered why that was. It’s not like she was the one being scrutinized.
"Maybe. I don’t remember. She did say he wasn’t on Facebook because he was really private, or something. And one time he was in town. She said she’d bring him by, but she never did."
"He was in town?" This was interesting.
"Yeah. He flew in from New York," she said.
"But you never met him?"
She grimaced again. It was as if she felt she was failing a test. Her tone became defensive.
"No. I remember we were going to the bar that night, me and some friends, and I suggested she and him come along, but she said he probably didn’t want to. It was Shifty’s. That’s a karaoke bar and she said something about he don’t like that kind of stuff, or whatever. I don’t remember what her excuse was, actually. That was a long time ago. Then one time she went to visit him."
"She went to New York?" The intrigue grew. If Lucy had gone to New York to stalk Joel Ruskin, he was the first one hearing about it.
"Yeah, New York. She said she did, anyway. She was gone for the whole weekend. Took time off. It was a pain in my ass because I had to work that Sunday, open to close."
She put the straw to her mouth and loudly sucked up air from the bottom of her cup. When she raised her eyebrows at him, Elijah knew it was a signal. Silently, he took the cup from her, walked to the self-serve fountain, and filled it again with Diet Coke.
Before he was even seated he posed his next question.
"Did she ever mention Joel Ruskin, the TV host, to you? Not pretending he’s her boyfriend, I mean."
"Not that I can remember. I didn’t even know who he was until all this was on the news." She looked down at the table and smiled. "Hell, I think Lucy might have made him more famous. Probably helped his career."
"I don’t know about that." He lifted his phone slightly to check the time. The information about New York had put his mind on another track. This interview couldn’t end soon enough. Then he’d be ready to follow this new lead.
She still had a bit of her bear claw left. He wasn’t going to cut off a pregnant lady in the middle of a snack, so he bought a little time before letting her get back to work.
"Did you ever have any suspicion her boyfriend wasn’t real?"
"Only later, after she moved to Colorado. I called the store she worked at."
"Why did you call?"
"Because I was starting to not believe her."
CHAPTER TEN
Omaha – 2015
Lucy spent Friday afternoon carefully packing her suitcase. She packed the black dress she'd worn to her cousin's graduation and some red heels she'd bought but hadn't been daring enough to wear. The other essentials were thrown in and the bag was zipped, unzipped, and zipped again for good measure.
She smiled at the suitcase on her bed, thinking of how amazing a weekend with Joel could be. He would want to make up for their terrible first date. He would invite her to visit him in his hometown. She’d accept on the condition she stay in a hotel and not at his Manhattan apartment. After all, they were still in friend statu
s. She wanted it to be more. She hoped he did, too.
She lifted the suitcase and headed for the door.
At the bottom of the elevator she was met by the frail old woman from down the hall.
"Going on a trip?" She smiled sweetly.
"I'm going to New York."
"Oh." The woman was genuinely impressed. "How exciting. Is it a special occasion?"
"I'm going to see a friend." She wasn't going to tell her she was going for a date. She didn't know what this woman's moral standards were. She might judge her and make their whole neighbor dynamic even more unbearable. The woman only nodded politely.
"My husband took me to New York in the summer. It was 1983. No, ’84."
Lucy’s eyes widened as she tried not to blow up at the lady. There wasn’t time for this.
"Anyway," the woman continued. "It was wonderful. The tall buildings. So much different than here. Of course, Omaha didn’t have the skyline it does now."
She couldn’t take it anymore. She had to interrupt.
"It sounds great." She tugged on her suitcase. "I’m sorry. I have a plane to catch."
The woman nodded.
"Have a safe trip." Her bony hand patted Lucy's arm. For a second, she gripped it as if trying to steady herself. Lucy smiled feebly and thanked her, taking a step away to indicate she was going.
Once freed from the woman's kind little clutches, Lucy exited the building. She hoisted her suitcase into her trunk, got into her car, and headed east. As she drove with the radio blaring, a Beau Castle song came on. She let out a heavy sigh and pretended as if he had called her on the phone. She turned down the radio slightly and proceeded to have a conversation with no-one.
"I can't talk right now, Beau. I'm on my way to the airport."
"Where're you headed?"
"New York. Just for a couple days."
"Oh, nice. Business there, or pleasure?"
"I'm going to see a friend."
"I didn't know you had friends in New York."
"You don't know everything about me, Beau. In fact, you don't know much about me at all."
"Come on, Love. Don't do that. I didn't call to fight with you."
"Then why did you call?"
"I wanted to hear your voice. I'm on the bus and everybody's doing their own thing. I've had enough of those guys already. Then I remembered when we were together and I used to call you and you'd make me feel better. You were always there for me, Lucy. I miss you."
She missed him, too. She'd stopped listening to his songs and now she missed his voice. She missed watching his videos, intently analyzing every move. Had she made the wrong choice by going with Joel Ruskin? His life wasn't as exciting as Beau's. But he was much more accessible. She had an easier view into his world. True, she missed Beau. She couldn't have it both ways, could she?
"I'm sorry, Beau. I'm almost at the airport. I have to go."
She drove with tears in her eyes. The conversation may not have been real, but the twist in her stomach was. It was a real pain–the pain of leaving Beau behind.
Twenty minutes later she pulled into the parking garage at the airport. With her suitcase rolling behind her, she entered through the sliding doors. Instead of approaching a ticket window as everyone else did, she found an empty bench near the baggage claim.
She loved to watch the carousel turning. She loved to see all kinds of bags and suitcases rolling down the conveyor and then around the huge, silver oval. She loved it when a young man approached a woman waiting there, kissed her passionately, and then retrieved her bag when she pointed it out. That should be her.
Her phone chimed. It was a post from Joel. He said he was flying back home. She smiled. Even with his hectic schedule, he'd made time to let her know. She remained on the bench in the airport, staring off as she thought about him. The people rushed around her, but she was in no hurry to go. Not until the scene in her head was complete.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
I caught an evening flight to New York. Joel was also flying in that night from Hollywood, so I knew we wouldn't be seeing each other until Saturday. That didn't bother me. I'd had a rough day at work. And then there was the phone call from Beau. That had stressed me out even more. The only thing I wanted to do was climb into a big, fluffy hotel bed with crisp, white sheets and fall into a deep sleep.
Because Joel hadn't even told me where I was going, I was met at baggage claim by a driver holding a sign bearing my name. He rolled my one suitcase to the waiting car. I'd packed light, hoping I'd have time to do a little shopping while I was there and because I had no idea what plans Joel had in store.
This wasn't my first time in Manhattan, just my first time there alone. I watched the lively city from the back seat of the black sedan. Omaha was alive on Friday nights, but this place was indescribable. Without someone here to escort me, I felt the city would swallow me up.
Finally we arrived in front of the Plaza on Fifth Avenue. The driver pulled up to the curb, and the door was opened by a man in uniform. I stared up at the massive stone building, gawking like a misplaced country girl in a romantic comedy. My bags were removed from the trunk and preceded me into the giant lobby.
Joel had booked me into the Carnegie Park Suite, complete with a living room and two bathrooms. It seemed over-the-top for one person. Still, I had no complaints. I settled in and awaited further instructions. The suspense was almost too much to bear.
◆◆◆
When the turnstile in front of her was empty and the departing crowd had cleared, Lucy stood and pulled her suitcase behind her toward the exit. She found her car again in the garage and put the bag back in its place in the trunk. At the exit, she paid the fee and pulled out with the rest of the traffic. Her next stop was Iowa.
She checked into a casino hotel in Council Bluffs, right across the river from Omaha. It was the perfect backdrop for her fantasy with Joel. She loved the sights and sounds of this lively place.
She had chosen a room with a king bed. It was already late, so she stripped off all her clothes and climbed under the sheets. She leaned back on the pile of ultra-soft pillows and opened her laptop. Using the satellite map again, she found the Plaza hotel and dropped herself into the street view to look around.
She wandered Manhattan's streets until her eyes began to cross. When her stomach growled from hunger she obeyed its request and closed her laptop.
From her suitcase she retrieved her outfit for the evening. Before she began to dress, her phone chimed an alert. It was another post from Joel.
"Chivalry isn't dead. It's just been shot in the leg."
She chuckled at his humor. He had put her mind at ease. It was definitely time to let Beau go because she had found someone she could be friends with; a friend she could love.
CHAPTER TWELVE
It was almost eleven the next morning when I finally got a call from Joel. I'd already taken a shower, ordered and eaten breakfast, and was watching meaningless TV from the comfort of a plush loveseat.
"I was beginning to think you'd forgotten about me." I tried not to sound annoyed. I'd been through this kind of thing plenty of times with Beau and I wasn't happy about reliving it. I had never enjoyed the waiting around part, which inevitably was detrimental to our relationship, even if it hadn't been the nail in the proverbial coffin.
"Sorry. I had a conference call. I'm coming over now, and we'll have lunch."
When he arrived, I once again tried to be casual and not rush to the door. I opened it, and he was standing there with a warm smile on his face. He was holding a bundle of three yellow roses like something out of an old romance. He handed them to me and stepped inside.
"Lovely," I said with a smile.
"I know," he began. "So 1950s."
"It's okay. I can appreciate a guy who's a gentleman."
"Then I'll try to be one." He winked, and my knees melted a little.
I placed the roses on the desk. We stared at each other for a minute, not knowing what to say. It was
awkward again. We still hadn't established whether this was going to turn into anything romantic. The closest we'd come to romance was a quick kiss on the cheek. Yet, here we were standing in the pricey hotel suite he was paying for. He was obviously trying for romance, right?
"Lunch?" Joel took my hand and ushered me out of the room and to the elevator. When we got to the street I expected to see a car waiting for us. But there was none.
"I walked over," Joel explained. "It's a nice day."
"How far do you live?"
"A few blocks."
"That explains the pricey accommodations."
"Only the best, my dear." He proffered his arm, and I linked mine through it.
We walked through a large crowd of people where only a few heads turned. A couple photos were snapped, but nobody bothered us. It was one of many clues that New York was unlike Omaha in more than just its size.
A few blocks later we arrived at a deli. Joel hopped ahead of me and opened the door. He swung his other arm and bowed slightly.
"M’lady."
"Why thank you," I responded with a fancy accent.
"You see, chivalry isn't dead. It's just been shot in the leg."
I giggled a little too girlishly.
By 1:00 p.m. we were strolling through Central Park with bellies full of sandwiches. Joel was giving me a quick history lesson on the park itself. Then he pulled me off the pathway, and we sat down in the grass.
"Do you want to go to a party tonight?" He plucked up a blade of grass and shredded it while he talked. "Or dinner? If you don't like parties, we can skip it and just have dinner." He was still studying the shredded grass and acting nervous, like he was asking me out for the first time again. Hadn't I flown here through the sky in a metal tube for a date? Didn't that mean I was pretty much up for whatever date he had planned?
"What kind of party?"
"Uh, it's a cocktail party. A cocktail party at, uh, Tim Fontaine's house."
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