A PORTRAIT OF OLIVIA (12 page)

Peter smiled encouragement at Emily as they walked to where the couch and armchairs had been rearranged for the benefit of camera angles. As they sat down, Olivia turned on her famous charm.

“Let’s just chat a little before they start the shoot, shall we? It’ll help loosen you up.” She peered at Emily. “You look nervous, honey. Don’t be. Try and think of this as just another visit to your friends.”

“We don’t usually have all these people running everywhere,” Emily replied, trying to laugh.

“Eve, honey!” Olivia waved Peter’s mother over. “You should be a part of this, too. Let’s get spontaneous here, Grant. I don’t want this to look stiff and fake.”

Eve hesitated for a moment until Peter smiled and patted the space on the couch between Jeff and himself. “Come on, Mom. Sit here with us.” He looked at Olivia. “We should have invited Rod and ‘A’ over, too. They always liven things up.”

“The two old guys I met at your party?” Olivia asked.

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“They used to be in show business, years ago,” Peter told her.

Oh great, Olivia thought, keeping her smile in place, another couple of has-beens. That’s all we’d need.

A sudden commotion behind them made everyone turn round to see what had happened. It was Luke tripping over some camera cables.

“Quiet!” Grant barked, glaring at Luke who flushed with a mixture of embarrassment and anger at having been yelled at.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, moving to a corner of the room.

“Let’s try and keep this as professional as we can, people.” Grant drummed his clipboard with his pen and cast a withering glance at Luke.

“Okay Grant,” Olivia snapped. “We get the point. Now let’s get on with it shall we?” She waggled her fingers at Luke who gave her a sheepish grin.

“Right,” she continued. “Let’s go. Peter, how did you meet Emily and Anthony?”

As Peter began his story, Grant signaled for the cameramen to start rolling.

Olivia had told him she wanted this as informal as possible, and skillfully she kept the line of questioning going—Jeff being the only one who realized that they were actually being filmed.
Clever
, he thought. This way Emily won’t be as intimidated as if they had told them this was a take.

“…And so,” Peter was saying, “Jerry, Emily’s husband…except at that time, they had only just become engaged, asked me to paint Emily’s portrait. During that time we became friends…”

Olivia turned her attention to Emily and her brother. With gentle persua-sion, she pulled from them the story of their devastating experiences at the hands of their father, of the years of painful loneliness when they felt there was no one to whom they could turn—not even their mother.

“I believe you’re still estranged from your mother…is that correct?” Olivia asked.

Emily nodded. “She could never bring herself to believe that my sister Paula and I were, in fact, the victims of my father’s perversion. She deluded herself into believing that we had seduced him.”

“Little girls seducing their father?” Olivia assumed a shocked expression.

“How could any loving mother think such a thing of her daughters?”

Anthony cleared his throat uncomfortably and Olivia looked at him, a small smile on her lovely lips.

“Did you want to add something, Anthony?”

“Yes.” He looked down at his hands clasped in his lap as he spoke. “I think my mother…our mother…went through a terrible time of loneliness and
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despair. That she ignored what was going on, I’m sure is hard for most people to understand…but…she had no one to turn to, either. Our father threatened to throw her out of her own home…to publicly humiliate her if she so much as breathed a word of what she knew. She may have made the wrong choices, but…I am sure she regrets that to this day. I still love my mother, despite the fact she has turned her back on all of us…”

Emily took his hand in hers as he spoke, and Olivia had to fight hard to not let her smile of sympathy turn to one of triumph as she imagined the public’s reaction to this scene. This pretty girl and her handsome brother, holding hands, their eyes glistening with tears of sadness for the lost love of their mother—oh, they would eat it up. Her show’s ratings would climb as never before. This was a slam-dunk!

“Okay,” Grant was saying, “Let’s take a break, people.” He beamed at Olivia.

“That was great.”

“A break?” Peter asked, puzzled. “But we haven’t done anything yet.”

“Oh yes, we have,” Jeff told him. “We’ve been ‘on’ for the last twenty minutes.”

“You’re kidding…Olivia?”

“Jeff ’s the sleuth all right,” Olivia laughed. “I wanted y’all to be as relaxed as possible, so we’ve been rolling since we sat down. Don’t worry,” she added as he frowned. “It’ll be great.” She rose and walked over to where Luke stood waiting for her to give him some attention.

“Well, what do you make of that?” Peter gasped.

“Sneaky,” Jeff chuckled. “But effective. You have to admit no one appeared to be nervous or tongue-tied.”

“You mean the cameras were on the whole time?” Emily asked.

“Uh huh.” Jeff smiled at her and Anthony. “And you were both terrific. Very real.”

“Yes, you were,” Eve agreed. “I only hope your mother sees this show and realizes how wrong she’s been. It may very well be the encouragement she needs to get in touch again.”

“Somehow, I doubt that,” Emily said. “What d’you think, Anthony?”

“Well, she’ll at least hear we still love her…”

“No, she’ll hear that
you
love her, Anthony. I could never go that far, after all that’s happened.”

“I know, Sis. Still, I keep hoping that one day a miracle will occur and she will make amends.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Emily said, standing up. “I know I won’t.”

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Peter stood for a moment by himself, as everyone returned to their places.

He looked over to where Olivia and Luke were engaged in a display of affection that would have better suited in more private surroundings. Watching them, Peter felt a slight shiver ripple down his back. A feeling of nausea enveloped him as he turned away, heading for the door and some fresh air.

He hated when this happened. He knew it was a presentiment of danger—but once more, he could not be certain for whom. He breathed a little more easily as the sick feeling passed. Not so bad this time, he thought. Maybe just too much going on, he tried to convince himself. Giving himself a shake, he walked back into the house.

The rest of the interview went smoothly, despite the fact that now everyone was aware of the cameras being on them. Jeff found himself admiring the skillful way Olivia managed to draw out an answer to even the most loaded question. In spite of his own prejudices, he had to admit Olivia Winters did her job very well indeed.

Later, as the camera technicians started to pack up their equipment, Olivia cornered him. “Brenda tells me you still haven’t given her an answer about taking on this situation with the threatening letters,” she said, getting straight to the point. “I really could use your help.”

Jeff wondered how sincere was her tone of entreaty. “I’ve talked to a friend of mine with the LAPD,” he told her. “They don’t have a lot to go on so far.

Have you had anymore threats since you outed the letter writer?”

“No, but that only aired yesterday. I expect there will be some repercus-sions.” Her eyes scanned his face, trying to read his reaction. “So, you’ll help me?”

He nodded. “Yes, Olivia. Nick and I took a good look at the letters Brenda faxed us. Seems to be the work of at least two people. The letters are similar in tone, but some are definitely the work of a more educated person than the others—and probably a woman.”

“A woman?” Olivia reacted with surprise. “A
woman
. It never occurred to me that a woman would write that stuff.” She managed a small smile. “Shows how naive I can be. I had it figured to be some right-wing loon—you know, like a preacher or somebody involved with those family values coalitions.”

“You could be right,” Jeff agreed. “But there are a lot of women involved in those too. It isn’t a male prerogative to be a bigot.”

“True…but would a woman actually carry out the threats? It’s one thing to sit at home and write a poison pen letter, and quite another to physically attack
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the person you’re writing to. Besides,” she added, as if trying to convince herself, “She isn’t really threatening me with bodily harm. More like hell-fire and eternal damnation.” She laughed as she continued. “I mean, c’mon—who believes in that shit anyway?”

Her question must have been intended to be rhetorical, as she did not wait for Jeff to answer. Instead she beckoned Brenda over. “Jeff ’s just accepted the job of finding this lunatic who keeps sending those dumb letters. Give him everything he needs.” With that, she turned and strode off toward where Luke stood waiting.

Brenda shook her head as she watched them walk to a far corner of the room. “She’s just not taking this serious enough,” she said. “It’s going to take something really awful to happen, before she sees this is not just some nut-case playing games.”

“I think there are two nut-cases involved,” Jeff told her. “The letters seem to have been written by two distinctly different mind-sets,” he continued as Brenda’s face registered surprise. “One wants God to punish her—the other wants to do it him or herself.”

Brenda groaned. “Oh, Jesus. So what else do you know?”

“That’s it for now. I’ve asked my friend Joe—he’s with the LAPD—to fill me in on anything he hears from forensics or handwriting specialists. These cases are never easy in the beginning. Most times we have to wait for the perp to make a mistake.”

“
Great
,” Brenda moaned. “Well, if I can be of any help, let me know.”

“Just keep me informed,” Jeff said. “Let me know what fallout you have from yesterday’s show. If any more letters arrive, let me have copies.”

“You got it.” Brenda turned to leave, then paused. “Hey, you and I got off to a bad start. I’m sorry about that. I’ve just been worried as hell about all this.

Olivia’s not the easiest person in the world to deal with. She’s stubborn, hard-headed…but, it’s my job to make sure she’s looked after, you know…so, I hope you understand if I come off a bit like a bitch sometimes.”

Jeff found himself admiring the woman’s honesty. “That’s OK, Brenda. I figured your job to be pretty stressful. You really don’t need all this added aggra-vation.”

“Ain’t that the truth? Okay Jeff, thanks. I’ll be in touch. Caio.”

Jeff watched as Olivia made her goodbyes to everyone. He breathed a sigh of relief as she and her entourage departed. Thank God she hadn’t suggested they all go out for dinner or drinks, he thought. He’d had quite enough of Olivia
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and her gang to last him a lifetime. He smiled as Emily and Anthony approached him.

“Jeff,” Anthony said. “I just asked Peter if you’d both like to come up for dinner a week from this Saturday. Justin and I would love for you to see our new home. Emily and Jerry will be there too.”

“Thanks, Anthony. What’d my ‘better half ’ say?”

“‘Yes, but you’d better ask Jeff.’”

“He knows to defer to me in all things, of course,” Jeff said, laughing.

“Sounds great Anthony. We’ll look forward to it.”

“Terrific,” Anthony said with enthusiasm. “And don’t worry, Justin’s a really good cook. Not like me…I can’t even fry an egg.”

“Time you learned,” his sister kidded him.

Anthony grinned at her. “Well, I pull my weight—and keep him happy in other ways, you know.”

“Too much information,” Emily laughed. “Okay, we’d better get out of here.

These guys have put up with enough commotion for one day.”

“Right.” Anthony gave Jeff a hug. “See you next Saturday.”

“You bet. Tell Justin ‘hi’.”

“Will do. Hey Peter, we’re leaving…”

“Okay guys.” Peter rushed over to hug them both goodbye. Eve walked them to the door, while Peter and Jeff began straightening the room.

“Did she say when this epic would air?” Jeff asked.

“Yeah…next Tuesday, unless there are editing problems. But they seemed pretty happy with everything.”

“They should be. Those kids were great. I can’t imagine anyone not being totally moved by their stories. Even though I knew all about it, I felt myself getting choked up listening to them both. Hell…how could old man Hastings have been that evil?”

“It is unbelievable, isn’t it? Thank God they’ve come through it all so well.

They both seem to be very happy these days.”

“Long may it last…” Jeff smiled at Eve as she came into the room. “We were just saying how well Emily and Anthony did today.”

“Didn’t they? But I think Anthony’s very concerned about what his mother will think if she sees the show.”

“The old bat should call him and beg his forgiveness, if you ask me,” Peter said, helping Jeff push the couch back into its former position. “As if he hadn’t suffered enough, she has to try and spoil his happiness with Justin, out of sheer spite.”

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“She must be a very unhappy person herself,” Eve remarked.

“A very vindictive person,” Peter said. “If she’s unhappy, she only has herself to blame.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Jeff grunted, pulling the sofa into place by himself.

“Well, I can’t help but feel sorry for her,” Eve sighed, watching him.

“That’s because you’re a very sweet woman,” Jeff said.

“Unlike Patricia Hastings,” Peter added. “Well, I don’t know about you two, but I need a drink after all that.”

“Sounds like a plan.” Jeff threw himself down on the couch. “Bring on the libations, young man—and be quick about it!” He beckoned to Eve. “Come sit here, you sweet woman you, while we are waited upon by yonder lackey.”

“Excuse me?” Peter affected indignation as Eve sat down beside Jeff. “Does talent count for naught around here?
I’m
the one who should be waited upon, hand and foot.”

“Right!” Jeff scoffed. “Away with you, before I have to inflict dire punishment upon your person.”