by M. Z. Kelly
“I’m fine.” My thoughts then went to Noah. Joe and I had become good friends, sharing almost everything about our lives. I decided he needed to know about him. “I met someone, Joe. I think we’re good together.”
After another pause he said, “I’m not sure I’m happy for him, but I’m thrilled for you. I just hope…” He took a breath. “Make sure he’s the one is all I’m saying. We’ve both had our share of false starts.”
“I will. Stay in touch, Joe.”
After ending the call, I poured myself a glass of wine and tried to put everything out of my mind. I was watching an idiotic reality show about a couple who were supposed to do ballroom dancing in the nude when there was a knock on my door.
When I answered it, I found Natalie standing there with Mo. They looked like they’d just crawled out of a grave and, all at once, everything came back to me. The fashion show. The zombie theme. Sistah Slam. Our rap song.
“We’re gonna be late,” Natalie said. “You can change in the car.”
They were pulling me through the doorway when I said, “What about Bernie?”
“Izzy can watch him. He’s packing up our apartment for the move.”
A wave of depression hit me when I thought about having to move in a few days. I hadn’t packed anything.
After dropping Bernie off at their apartment and getting Izzy’s promise that he wouldn’t turn him into a goat, we made the trip to the West Hollywood Arts Center in record time. I changed, putting on a dress that had more holes than material, while Natalie teased my hair. I was then pushed, no, make that dragged, onto stage with my friends and the oldest zombie on planet earth.
Before our performance began, Nana came over to me and whispered, “You ruin this performance and I’ll see to it you’re six feet under with a stake in your heart.”
I guessed that she meant business. I took a breath and looked out at the crowd. There were probably a couple hundred people in the audience, no doubt anticipating us making complete fools of ourselves.
Then I noticed Archibald Griswald. The rapper was in the front row, mouthing words of encouragement to me, or maybe it was more of a threat. It might have been my imagination, but I could have sworn he was saying, “Don’t mess this up, or else.”
Then the music began and we broke into a ridiculous dance, something that probably should have been called The Walking Dead Waltz. I put my arms out and did a stiff-legged walk around the stage with my friends and Nana as they delivered the goofy rap song that described all the crazy things zombies do.
Then it was my turn. Archibald mouthed the words with me as I broke into the zombie hip-hop lines he’d created just for me.
“People always ask me, how you stay so thin?
You got some se-cret, why people call you Slim?
All I gotta say is, I don’t want no ri-ot
I got a big fat secret, it’s all in my di-et.
I am a zombie, no drug in my veins,
I am skinny, ’cause I eat people’s brains.”
When it was finally, mercifully over, I came off stage with my friends in a state of abject humiliation. My head was slumped down as Nana took me by the arm and turned me to face her. “Your song sucked. I’ve seen dead people rap better than you.”
“I think it was a marvelous performance.”
The woman’s voice had come from behind me. It sounded familiar, but, at first, I couldn’t place it. I turned around and realized Shelia Woods was standing there with her camera crew.
The reporter went on, “My crew recorded the entire performance. I think it will make a marvelous segment for Hollywood Detective. I can’t wait until all your coworkers see it.”
SEVENTY-FOUR
I had the next few days off, which was a good thing. I spent some of that time with Noah, trying to forget my rap performance. I’d almost gotten over it when the TV station airing Hollywood Detective began showing promo spots for the show, including snippets of my zombie rap-dance. I hid out in my apartment after that, spending the time packing up a few things for my move and contemplating joining a zombie relocation program. Maybe Bernie and I could be relocated to an island for the walking dead where they hadn’t invented television.
The only positive outcome of my humiliating performance was that it raised part of the funds that I’d promised Samantha Potter she could use to visit the grandmother in England she’d never seen. The production company for my upcoming TV show had agreed to match my contribution, probably as a good-will gesture on their part to entice viewers. Whatever the rationale, at least it meant that Sam would get a chance to see the grandmother she’d never known.
When my last day off work came around, I put everything out of my mind, and went to Chanteclair, where I had lunch with Laura Trenton. As Bernie soaked up some sun on her patio, we ate and chatted about our childhoods, Laura telling me that after her aunt died she hadn’t come back to Chanteclair in over a decade.
“I lived in Portland with my parents as a child, but I missed spending summers here after Aunt Jean was gone. This place is so…magical.” Her gaze moved off, taking in the beautiful grounds, before coming back to me. “It’s very special to me, probably because of my aunt. Despite what you might have seen about her life in the movies and on TV, she was a sweet person who always tried to do her best by other people.”
“I can tell she was very exceptional by the way you remember her.”
“What about you? It must have been very difficult after your father died.”
I forced a smile. “It was.” I took a moment, thinking about my childhood, and added, “I think his death has continued to impact me in ways that I’m still coming to grips with.” I felt the heaviness in my eyes. “I don’t think I’ll ever really have closure until I find the man who ordered his murder.”
After saying that she understood my feelings, Laura stood up and said, “I have some of my aunt’s old photographs in some boxes in the bedroom. Let’s go take a look.”
We spent the next hour rummaging through her aunt’s photos. Seeing the pictures was like taking a journey back in time to another era when Hollywood reigned supreme and the stars were bigger than life. Jean Winslow had surrounded herself with the elite of that era, everyone from producers such as Donald Regis, to famous directors.
I then came across a photograph that caught my interest. It was a picture of Jean Winslow standing in front of the Platinum Theater. It looked like it was taken in the early days of her career.
I showed the photo to Laura, remembering my conversation with Robin’s new boyfriend. Adam had said the lines in the script he’d been working on had been changed to include a reference to the Platinum Theater. Maybe it was just a coincidence, but I couldn’t dismiss the thought that the venue might have some ties to the Revelation. “Do you remember anything about this photograph?”
She studied it for a moment before handing it back. “I think it might have been where Aunt Jean’s first movie premiered. It was a popular place in the old days. I’m not sure it’s still in business.”
I set the photo aside, remembering what I’d read about the theater on the Internet. “The building is still there, but the theater is closed now.”
We moved on, looking through the other boxes. After we’d sifted through the final snapshots, I was disappointed. We hadn’t come across any photographs of my love-dad.
After she’d set the boxes aside, Laura’s face lit up. “I almost forgot. My aunt had a room…” She giggled. “Maybe it was more of an escape. It’s behind a secret wall in her bedroom. I haven’t been in there since I was a kid, but if you’d like, we can take a look.”
“A secret passageway in the bedroom of one of the most famous stars in Hollywood history. Who could resist that?”
I followed her to the main house, where we spent a few minutes walking through a few of the lavish rooms in the massive residence before we came to Jean Winslow’s bedroom.
“I suppose this is considered somewhat ordinary by the stan
dards of today’s stars,” Laura said, after opening the door.
I couldn’t argue with her. The room was modestly furnished with a double bed, polished brass lamps, and a dark wood dresser. There was a small writing desk with a makeup mirror over it in one corner. French doors opened from the bedroom to a small courtyard with a fountain.
“A simpler era,” I said, looking around the room and agreed with her.
She went over to a wall next to the desk and felt around. “If I remember, there’s a lever or something…” She continued to work her fingers around the edges of the wall. After a moment, she said, “I’m not finding anything.”
Bernie turned his head from side to side, watching as I went over and joined her. The wall appeared to be part of the main structure of the building until I came to a corner where it gave way. I pushed harder and the entire wall shifted. It opened up to a room that was about the size of a large walk-in closet. I found a small Maglite in my purse, clicked it on, and Laura followed me inside.
“This must be where your aunt kept her clothing and other personal belongings,” I said. “But it looks like someone went through everything.” The hangers were mostly empty, with just a couple of scarves and a belt.
“Her manager probably cleaned everything out,” Laura said. “I know he sold everything he could get his hands on. He even tried to claim Jean’s will was invalid and tried to take Chanteclair away from me, but I eventually won the court case.”
There were stacks of old newspapers and a few books in the corner of the room, but otherwise it looked like there was nothing worthwhile. I heard Jean calling to me and turned around. She held up a binder. “This looks like an old photo album.”
We left the secret room and carried the album over to the bed where Laura blew the dust off the cover and opened it. I gave her a moment so she could go through the photos on her own, knowing it was like opening a time capsule to the past.
“These look like they were taken just before…” She brushed a tear and looked at me. “I think most of these were around the time of Aunt Jean’s thirtieth birthday. She died a few weeks later.”
I looked over her shoulder, seeing there were several snapshots taken around the estate’s swimming pool. There were even a couple of stars I recognized that I pointed out.
My eyes held on one of the final photographs. I cleared my throat. “I think…” I felt my emotions surfacing, my eyes misting over. “…it’s my dad.”
“Johnny,” Laura said, examining the photograph, then looking at me. “I remember him like it was yesterday.”
My love-dad was standing with a group of people behind Jean Winslow and a man I recognized as Donald Regis. I scanned the other faces in the photograph and my heart began racing. “Oh, God.”
“What is it?”
I took a breath, pointing to a smiling man who was standing near my love-dad. “That’s Ryan Cooper. He’s…he’s the man who shot my dad.”
Jean touched my arm. “Goodness. I’m so sorry.”
I brushed away a tear. “It’s okay. I took in the other people surrounding my father before I realized I was looking at a very young, very handsome Kellen Malone. I pointed him out to Laura. “This only confirms what I thought I knew. Malone and Cooper were…” I stopped in mid-sentence, my eyes holding on someone else that I now recognized. “I don’t believe this.”
“What is it?”
I took a long moment before answering her. The man’s hair had been much darker thirty years ago, but his eyes left me with no doubt about who I was looking at. They were the color of tropical water, clear and bright.
“Kate?”
I pointed out the man. “Do you know him?
She shook her head. “No.” She looked at me. “Who is he?”
I released a breath, at the same time trying to make some sense of what I was seeing. “I work with him. He’s my lieutenant, Ozzie Powell.”
THE END
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More by This Author:
The Hollywood Alphabet Thriller Series, with Detective Kate Sexton and her canine partner Bernie:
•Hollywood Assassin
•Hollywood Blood
•Hollywood Crazy
•Hollywood Dirty
•Hollywood Enemy
•Hollywood Forbidden
•Hollywood Games
•Hollywood Homicide
•Hollywood Intrigue
•Hollywood Jury
•Hollywood Killer
•Hollywood Lust
COMING SOON : Hollywood Notorious
Copyright © 2015 by MZ Kelly
Published by Kingston Roads Press, L.L.C.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places, businesses, events, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Acknowledgements:
Editing by: onlinebookservices.com
Translation by: Monica Meza
