The Last Embrace Read online

  “So you’re going to take the kid home with you after all? And the cat?”

  “I suppose another day won’t hurt.”

  “Bless you,” said Lily.

  CHAPTER 18

  What’s new, Miss Kessler?” a grating voice called as Lily walked up to the rooming house.

  “Nothing,” Lily said, as the reporter named Violet McCree fell into step beside her, gliding along like a perfumed shark.

  “Did you have a productive day?” Violet asked with an insinuating smile.

  Lily felt the devil playing the xylophone along the knobs of her spine. Had this gal followed them?

  “Please go away,” she said. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

  “Well, I had a very productive day, Miss Kessler. I thought you’d like to know…I’m working on a story about you.”

  “Me?”

  The reporter smirked. “It’s called ‘Who’s the Mystery Girl at the Heart of the Scarlet Sandal Investigation and What Isn’t She Revealing About the Starlet’s Murder?’”

  Lily swallowed. The headline was more apt than Violet McCree could imagine.

  “That’s horrible,” Lily said. “You’re not even a real journalist, all you do is print lurid gossip and innuendo. You’re like a vampire, feeding off people’s misery. Leave me alone.”

  The reporter cocked her head. “Perhaps you’ve been gone from America too long, Miss Kessler.”

  Lily’s head jerked up. How the hell did she know that?

  “Surprised that I’ve done my research? That I know you’ve spent the last five years in Europe, long after most loyal, God-fearing Americans have come home? Makes me wonder whether you’ve fallen prey to foreign influences. I’m as real as Eric Sevareid and Edward R. Murrow and I’ll bet more people read Confidential than listen to those blowhards. Americans are tired of wars. They want glamour. Entertainment. We take them inside Hollywood, show them what the stars are really like. People have a right to know.”

  “You disgust me.”

  “And you make me wonder, Miss Kessler, what strange people you’ve befriended on your travels. Those who might loathe the American way of life, be bent on destroying it. Hollywood is full of such people, working deep undercover. It’s our job to root them out. Do you get my drift?”

  Lily shut the front door on Violet McCree.

  “How’s tricks?” said Red, who was drinking coffee and reading a typed manuscript with a blue cover. A script.

  “You got a part!” Lily said. “Congrats.”

  Red looked especially pretty tonight, almost glowing. Her wool sweater clung to her bosom. Her lips and nails were painted luscious red.

  “I went down to RKO today and met with the casting director.”

  “About what?”

  “I made him a proposition and, well, he wants me to finish out Kitty’s contract.”

  “Oh, Red, he doesn’t!”

  Red looked squarely at Lily and pouted. “Why shouldn’t I? A girl’s got to eat.”

  “It just seems so prema…as if…”

  “Premature? She’s dead, Lily. She’s not coming back.”

  “I know but…” Lily remembered Pico accusing her, the day they’d met, of wanting to take advantage of Kitty’s disappearance.

  “You should try it sometime, lining up at auditions, praying for two minutes of a director’s time. Waiting for a callback that never comes. When you’re under contract, you don’t go out on cattle calls, you get a screen test. Understand the difference? And I deserve it. I’m every bit as talented as Kitty and I’m sick to death of modeling clothes for J. C. Penney.”

  Once again Lily felt how opportunistic this business was, the envy that churned just below the surface, how one actor’s tragedy meant another’s big break. She wondered, then, how big a step it would be from wishing for your rival’s demise to orchestrating it.

  Lily studied Red in her furry slippers, legs propped up, memorizing her lines. No, it was ridiculous. She was just being paranoid.

  “I learned some things today about Kitty’s murder,” Lily said, “that I’d like to discuss with you and the other girls.”

  Behind Red’s eyes, something flared, then banked. “Fine,” she said. “I’ll make a fresh pot of coffee.”

  Lily ran upstairs to see who else was home and found Mrs. Potter emerging from Beverly’s room, looking like she’d been caught red-handed at something. The landlady hurried down the hall. Beverly was at her vanity table, sniffling.

  “What’s wrong?” Lily wondered what Mrs. Potter had done to upset the girl.

  “Nothing.” Beverly composed herself. “I’m just being silly.” Her apple cheeks quivered as she tried not to cry. Lily could smell the Jean Naté perfume she wore. “Oh, Lily. I found out today I got passed over for a role I really wanted.”

  Lily considered Beverly’s high forehead, her barrettes and little-girl hair, her matronly bosom. She exuded common sense and favored conservative clothes—blouses never too tight, skirts never too short. Jinx said she’d done well in the war years, when the studios wanted girl-next-door types that homesick soldiers could pine for. But as the decade inched to a close, it was glamour girls like Red and Kitty, all sexual allure, curves, and cleavage, that excited the public’s imagination.

  “Did you hear about Red?” Beverly asked.

  Lily nodded.

  “I’m so happy for her,” Beverly said, and her eyes shifted sullenly.

  “Don’t worry, another casting director will snap you up in no time,” Lily said.

  But in her heart, she wondered.

  Soon everyone was in the kitchen except Louise, who was at a photography studio, having new, glammed-up head shots taken so she’d stop getting typecast in girl Friday roles.

  Lily recounted for them how she’d met Harry Jack and Gadge and what they’d found, leaving out the note for now.

  Fumiko put her hand to her mouth. “Kitty bought that purse last month.”

  Just then Mrs. Potter walked in with a basket of tea towels and aprons. She began to fold them and put them away and Lily wondered if she wanted an excuse to listen in.

  “Oh God,” Jinx said. “I bet Kitty was on her way home when it happened. She probably screamed and screamed, and nobody heard her.”

  “We don’t know that,” Beverly chided.

  “Did Kitty ever talk about someone named Kirk?” Lily asked.

  “Why?” they chorused.

  “Just wondering,” Lily said. She noticed that Mrs. Potter had stopped folding towels. She stood at the sink, slowly washing a glass.

  “Did Lily know anyone named Kirk, Mrs. Potter?” Lily asked.

  Mrs. Potter turned, regarding Lily with blank eyes.

  Lily repeated the question.

  “The girls don’t confide their affairs in me,” she said at last.

  “What have you learned, Lily?” Jinx said. “Out with it.”

  “There was something in the purse?” Red said, going pale.

  Lily explained how Gadge had bartered away everything except a note. Screwing up her eyes, she recited it from memory.

  The girls sat in stunned silence. Finally, Beverly asked Lily if she’d turned the note over to the police.

  “Not yet,” Lily said. “I wanted to talk to you all first.”

  She didn’t point out the obvious—that Magruder and Pico would shut her out of the investigation as soon as she surrendered it.

  “Kirk,” said Red thoughtfully. “Well, I have no idea if this is significant, and I don’t want to jump to any conclusions, but Kitty had a small part in a Kirk Armstrong movie called Young Man with a Horn over at Warner’s just before RKO signed her. She said he’s just dreamy.”

  Lily pondered the enormity of this. What if Harry Jack had been right?

  “Could they have been”—Lily cleared her throat—“seeing each other?”

  “Kitty never mentioned it,” Beverly said stoutly.

  “Kirk Armstrong is married. Lovely wife and three girl
s,” Fumiko said.

  “That never means anything,” Red said in a tone that made Lily think she’d dallied with married actors herself.

  “So Kitty never even hinted she was dating a star?”

  “No,” Beverly said. The rest shook their heads.

  “I always wondered if she might have caught the eye of Howard Hughes,” Jinx said. “He’s notorious at RKO. Treats the place as his own private harem. And someone sure was showering her with silk lingerie and perfume.”

  “Naw,” said Red. “He would have moved her into fancy digs.”

  “Not if she turned him down,” Jeanne said.

  “I think Howard Hughes is as farfetched as Kirk Armstrong,” said ever-practical Beverly.

  Fumiko looked at her watch and left, saying she was late for a date.

  Lily recalled a movie magazine she’d flipped through in a Berlin canteen, how she’d stopped at a photo layout of the handsome star, his beautiful wife, their children. They’d been posed with the family dog by a swimming pool, a white mansion in the background, the living embodiment of the Hollywood dream.

  “Maybe he swore her to secrecy,” Lily said. “It would have ruined his career. And imagine if she was pregnant on top of it…”

  “I can’t believe it,” Beverly said.

  “Say, let’s see that note.” Red licked her lips.

  Reluctantly, Lily brought it out, admonishing the girls not to touch it.

  Five heads bent over the kitchen table.

  “Sure looks like her writing.”

  “Who’s got a sample?”

  Jinx got a thank-you card Kitty had written her and they laid them side by side. The Kirk note had been dashed off in a hurry, the letters sloppy and running together, but it looked like the same hand.

  “The police will analyze it,” Red said, sliding it over to Lily. “You’d better call them now.”

  “I suppose I should.”

  In the hallway, Mrs. Potter was on the phone. When she heard Lily’s tread, she hung up and moved past Lily in the narrow hallway.

  Lily dialed. An LAPD operator answered and said she would take a message. Lily left word for Magruder or Pico to call her as soon as possible.

  Back in the kitchen, the girls were disappointed to learn that the detectives weren’t on their way. Soon they drifted upstairs. At midnight, after eating an avocado sandwich and drinking a glass of milk, Lily joined them.

  Lying in bed, she tried to recall her fiancé’s face, but the image that came to mind was blurry and indistinct. When she focused harder, what materialized was a tawny face with wavy hair, a long straight nose, and hazel eyes flecked with gold. She saw a full, sensuous mouth, lips parted, asking in a hushed voice if she was cold.

  CHAPTER 19

  October 15, 1949

  How dare you withhold evidence from the LAPD!” Magruder screamed.

  Mrs. Potter had roused Lily before dawn to tell her the police were on the phone.

  “Pardon me?” she asked, still half asleep.

  “Don’t play coy. It’s splashed all over today’s Confidential. The note. The purse. The missing shoe. You’re tampering with evidence in a murder case, you stupid girl, and your fingerprints are probably all over everything. It’ll be a miracle if we can lift anything useful—”

  “Detective Magruder—” Lily began.

  “And this base speculation about Kirk Armstrong? A fine actor and devoted family man. How could you have mouthed off to the press like that?”

  “I didn’t,” Lily said, wondering how Violet McCree had found out.

  “The hell you didn’t. I’d like to put you both in lockup until you come clean.”

  The idea of being thrown in a cell with Violet McCree filled her with alarm.

  “Please, Detective Magruder—”

  He gave a blubbery sigh. “But that would just create an even bigger scandal than we’ve already got. I’m warning you, though. Stay put. Detective Pico is on his way to collect the evidence and take your statement. Meanwhile, give me the address of that freelance photographer and the orphan’s last name.”

  When Lily said she didn’t know, Magruder exploded again, threatening her with bodily harm.

  “I have his phone number,” Lily said.

  “Then speak, woman. What is it?”

  “I have to get it.”

  “Run.”

  Lily ran back upstairs and got the number Harry had jotted down the night before, realizing she’d have to warn him.

  “We told you to call immediately if you learned something,” Magruder said in a whispery voice that frightened her even more than his tirades.

  “I did. Last night.”

  His early morning phone call had caught her off guard. Now her confidence began to return.

  “Perhaps you should check with your operator,” Lily said testily.

  “I suppose the message could be on my desk somewhere,” the detective backpedaled. She heard papers rustling. “But you’re still in hot water for talking to that reporter.”

  “I keep telling you I didn’t.”

  “Then who did?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Who knew about it?”

  “Me. Harry Jack. The kid. Kitty’s roommates and the landlady.” As she ticked off their names, Lily recalled how Violet McCree had accosted her outside. Had she been listening at the window? Did she have an informant inside the boardinghouse? Lily flashed to Mrs. Potter on the phone, Fumiko dashing out for a date.

  “Someone’s got loose lips,” Magruder said. “And I intend to find them and sink their ship. This is not information we would have chosen to release to the public, with the killer still at large.”

  Then maybe it’s for the best that it leaked, Lily thought. At least now nobody can cover it up. She wondered what other evidence had been suppressed.

  “Well, now that it has,” Lily said, “I hope you plan to interview Kirk Armstrong.”

  “That’s department business, and not some snot-nosed gal’s who’s already caused enough trouble for one lifetime,” Magruder roared. “Now sit tight on that bottom of yours until Pico gets there.”

  He hung up.

  Hands shaking, Lily replaced the receiver. It scared her, the way he bounced between glassy calm and unhinged mania. She wondered if he was dangerous. At least he wasn’t coming with Pico. She suppressed a sudden twinge of anticipation. Pico would just yell at her too.

  Lily cleared the line then dialed Harry Jack.

  “I just saw Confidential,” he said. “Who the hell leaked?”

  “It must have been someone here,” Lily whispered, realizing whoever it was could be in the kitchen. The smell of coffee and cinnamon toast wafted out to the hallway. “And I had to give your phone number to a detective this morning. He’s furious.”

  “Christ Almighty.”

  “You better get those pictures to the paper before they confiscate everything.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up.”

  “Will you let me know how it goes?”

  “You bet.”

  “You’re in big trouble,” Detective Pico said, sitting down at the kitchen table.

  Lily had managed to shower and throw on her blue serge suit before he arrived. She brought him a cup of coffee with cream and two packets of restaurant sugar the girls smuggled home in their pockets.

  “I left a message for you last night,” Lily said, joining him.

  His hair was still damp from the shower. There was a crimson pearl on one side of his throat, where he’d nicked himself shaving. She wanted to grab his jaw, rub it off with her thumb. She could almost feel the rasp of his skin.

  “You also blabbed to that reporter,” Pico said.

  “I never said a word to Vile Violet. But I’m afraid someone did.”

  “We’re going to find out.”

  Lily slid down in her chair. “At least you’ve got some new leads now.”

  Magruder was right, Pico thought. She was a bossy, nosy, full-of-he
rself little bitch. But he couldn’t take his eyes off her. The blotches of color staining her cheeks. Those porcelain nostrils, flaring with annoyance. The way her auburn hair fell softly, framing her oval face.

  “I haven’t threatened you,” he said. “Don’t be so high-strung.”

  She averted her eyes. “Better than low-strung.”

  “Okay Miss High-Strung.” He sounded amused. “Let’s take it from the beginning.”

  He proceeded to question her in depth about the previous day’s events. When she explained she’d met Harry Jack at a lunch counter, Pico’s brow furrowed.

  “You shouldn’t go off with strangers you meet on the Boulevard,” he said. “L.A.’s not the safe place you knew before the war. And not everyone is as honorable as this fellow apparently was.”

  “I know,” she said wearily. “He told me the same thing. It was the kid who swayed me.”

  The detective tried to poke holes in her story. He made her repeat exactly where Gadge had found the shoe, then consulted his notebook.

  “Hmm, that’s four blocks from where our special effects fellow lives. Max Vranizan.”

  Lily stopped in surprise. They looked at each other, both of them wondering the same thing

  “Where’s the note?” Pico said at last.

  “Upstairs. I’ll go get it.”

  “I’ll accompany you.” Just in case there’s something else you’re hiding, he thought.

  He followed her up, forcing himself to look at the flocked red velvet wallpaper instead of her swaying ripe peach of an ass.

  At the door, she paused, hand on the glass knob.

  “It’s a bit of a mess,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting visitors.”

  “There’s nothing in that room that could possibly surprise me.”

  She shrugged and unlocked the door and he admired her foresight in having locked it.

  In her room, Pico’s eyes fell on a silk robe crumpled in a heap. He imagined sliding it off her shoulders, pressing his lips to the warm hollow below her neck. He looked away, his glance falling on the closet that hid the Murphy bed. He scowled. Thinking of beds was no better.

  Lily brought over a manila envelope. She slid out a piece of paper, handling the edges with her palms.