“I’m glad you were spared that much, at least,” Vera said. “Unfortunately, the drug left me in a sort of waking dream at night. I knew what was going on but I could not react.”
“But in the end you were the one manipulating Paxton and you used him to get your revenge on the others,” Adelaide said. “How did you get control of him?”
“Gill and Paxton took turns with me at first. They were thrilled to know that they were getting away with raping the most beautiful woman in Hollywood—and that the next morning she never seemed to remember that they had abused her. She thought she was hallucinating.”
“But you did remember.”
“Oh, yes,” Vera said softly. “I remembered everything.”
“How did you get released?”
Vera shrugged. “Paxton became obsessed with me. He also saw me as great advertising for his awful diet drink. That gave me all the power I needed to manipulate him. I pretended that I was equally obsessed with him. He wanted to believe that he had seduced the most beautiful woman in Hollywood. In any event, they had to let me go eventually. I was a famous movie star. I couldn’t just vanish. If I did, I wouldn’t have any value as a blackmail target.”
“How did Zolanda get your file and those pictures?”
“I asked Zolanda that after she laughed about her plans to blackmail me. She said it had been very easy. She contacted one of the orderlies who worked on ward five and offered him a thousand dollars for the file. He told her that Gill also had some pictures in his safe that might interest her. She said she would pay him another thousand for those as long as he got the negatives, too. I understand he took the money and quit his job.”
“Jake and I found Zolanda’s stash of blackmail material in the trunk of Paxton’s car. We are going to burn everything that is in that hatbox.”
Vera glanced at the hatbox. “Do you know, I actually believe you.”
“Well, that’s the plan—assuming you don’t kill me first. But you aren’t going to do that, are you? There’s no need to take the risk of getting arrested for murder. After all, at this point there is nothing to connect you to Zolanda’s death or the drug ring operating out of Rushbrook.”
The gun in Vera’s hand wavered a little. After a few seconds she lowered it.
“No, I’m not going to kill you,” she said. “I just wanted to find that damned file.”
“And now you’ve got it. What will you do with it?”
“Burn it, as you suggested. And then I’m going to disappear.”
“Why? You’re a famous movie star. You’ve got a brilliant future ahead of you in Hollywood.”
“Don’t you understand?” Vera said. “It was Hollywood that nearly destroyed me. Hollywood is the reason I ended up at the Rushbrook Sanitarium. I just want to be free. The only way to do that is to vanish.”
“If you succeed, you’ll become a legend. People will never stop looking for you. You’ll spend your life hiding from the press.”
Vera smiled at that. “You don’t know Hollywood as well as I do. I’ll give the press one last good story, a suitably dramatic ending for a sadly troubled movie star. In a few months the gossip magazines will declare another actress to be the most beautiful woman in Hollywood. Within a year no one will remember my name.”
“How will you survive financially?”
“I’ve been planning this for the past few months,” Vera said. “I’ve made three very successful films. I didn’t get paid much for the first two, but I got better terms on the last one, Lady in the Shadows, so I wouldn’t have starved in any event. But I’ll let you in on a small secret—Paxton kept a fortune in cash in a safe in L.A. He didn’t entirely trust the banks. I found the combination weeks ago when I searched his study. I cleaned out the safe before we left for Burning Cove because I knew I would be disappearing after my plans were complete here.”
“Will you stay in California?”
“No. I’m going to move to Seattle. Who would think to look for a faded movie star there?”
“If you ever do decide to return to Burning Cove, will you promise to come and see me?”
Vera’s eyes widened. “You’re joking. You really want to see me again? After all the trouble I’ve caused you?”
Adelaide held out her hand. “You’re the only other person on the face of the earth who really understands what I went through at the Rushbrook Sanitarium.”
Vera hesitated and then, cautiously, she put the gun on the table and held out her own hand. Tears glittered in her eyes.
“You’re the only person who understands what I went through at that damned asylum,” she said in a choked voice. “I suppose that is a bond of sorts, isn’t it?”
Adelaide grasped Vera’s hand and squeezed gently. Vera returned the silent gesture. They let their hands fall to their sides.
“Tea?” Adelaide asked. “A cup of Tranquility before you leave to find your new life?”
“I’d like that,” Vera said. “I’d like that very much. It has been a long time since I’ve had tea with a friend.”
* * *
• • •
Jake came through the doorway, a gun in his hand, just as Adelaide was pouring a cup of Tranquility for Vera. He stopped and looked at both women.
“What the hell?” he asked.
Vera ignored the gun in his hand. She smiled her enigmatic smile. “Hello, Mr. Truett.”
“We were just having tea,” Adelaide said. “Would you care for some? I’ve got your favorite green.”
Jake glanced at her. “I tried to call you. Your phone was out of order. I was . . . concerned.”
“No need to be,” Adelaide said. “Sit down. Why did you try to call?”
Jake did not take his attention off Vera. “Luther told me that the reason he found out that Paxton had stolen a car and slipped out of town was because someone on his staff received a mysterious phone call from a woman. When Luther got the message, he immediately phoned the Rushbrook police. Can I assume it was you who made that call, Miss Westlake?”
“Yes,” Vera said. “I owe you a debt of gratitude, by the way. I am very glad that Calvin Paxton is dead.”
“It was an accident,” Jake said without expression.
Vera smiled. “Of course.”
“Sit down, Jake,” Adelaide said. “We’ll all have tea, and Miss Westlake can tell you her story.”
Jake hesitated and then he put the gun back into the holster. “I assume Miss Westlake’s story in an interesting one?”
“Oh, yes,” Adelaide said. “You see, she was Patient A, the other one who vanished.”
Chapter 54
“She’ll be gone by morning,” Adelaide said. “Soon there will be a headline in the press about a brilliant actress who took a sailboat out alone and never returned. She will be presumed lost at sea. It’s rather fitting that her last film, Lady in the Shadows, was about a woman who vanishes under mysterious circumstances.”
“The nation will be distraught for a couple of weeks and then a new Hollywood scandal will hit the papers,” Jake said.
Adelaide nodded. “Yes.”
She and Jake were sitting in front of the fireplace, feeding blackmail secrets to the flames. Before they began the ritual, Jake had opened a bottle of champagne that Luther and Raina had dropped off earlier.
We’ve all got something to celebrate, Luther had said. Adelaide had noticed that he was looking at Raina when he said it.
“I still can’t believe you invited Westlake to stay for tea and then sent her off with two large packages of her special blend,” Jake said. He tossed some letters into the fire. “You even told her to telephone you when she ran out so that you could put some more in the mail for her.”
“For the bad nights,” Adelaide said.
Jake exhaled. “I get it.” He fed a photograph of two men engaged in a s
exual act into the fire. One of the subjects was a famous star. “For the bad nights.”
“Everyone has them occasionally,” Adelaide said.
“True,” he said. “But you and I have each other now.”
She smiled. “For the good nights and the bad nights.”
“Yes.” He looked down into the empty hatbox. “That’s the last of it. Ready for your file?”
“Yes.”
She opened the file marked Patient B and fed the contents to the flames. It was good to watch the papers go up in smoke. By the time the file was empty, she felt free.
She reached across the short distance between the chairs and took Jake’s hand.
“It’s nice to know that the next time we check into an auto court I won’t be a fake wife,” she said. “It will make a pleasant change of pace.”
Jake laughed. He got to his feet and pulled her into his arms.
“It’s good to be home,” he said.
She framed his face with her hands. “Yes. It’s very good to be home.”
Author’s Note
The hallucinogenic drug Daydream is fiction, but I took my inspiration from the fact that lysergic acid diethylamide—LSD—was discovered by a Swiss scientist in 1938. Over the years many researchers have been convinced that it has genuine medicinal properties. Others believed that it could be used to brainwash captured soldiers, implant hypnotic suggestions, or function as a truth serum.
Several sources claim that decades ago some famous Hollywood celebrities used LSD in conjunction with psychotherapy. And, of course, legends of secret government experiments abound . . .
Amanda Quick is a pseudonym for Jayne Ann Krentz, the author of more than fifty New York Times bestsellers. She writes historical romance novels under the Quick name, contemporary romantic suspense novels under the Krentz name, and futuristic romance novels under the pseudonym Jayne Castle. There are more than 35 million copies of her books in print. She lives in Seattle.
Visit her online at jayneannkrentz.com, facebook.com/jayneannkrentz and twitter.com/jayneannkrentz.
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Amanda Quick, The Other Lady Vanishes
(Series: Burning Cove # 2)
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