Fade to Black (36 page)

“You’re welcome. I … I wish I could come to your play next week, Manny. I’d love to see you perform.”

“It’s okay,” he says with a shrug.

“As soon as I get to Los Angeles, I’ll call you with my number.”

“Are you going to your house there? The one they showed on TV?”

“No,” she says quickly. “That isn’t my house anymore. I’m going to be staying with a friend of mine. I haven’t been able to reach her to tell her I’m coming, but I’m sure it’ll be fine with her. So I’ll call you from her house as soon as I can.”

“Okay,” he says in a small voice.

“I really will be there for you, Manny,” she says, looking first into his eyes, then over her shoulder at the limousine driver outside, who’s standing at the curb by the car with his legs spread apart and his hands clasped in front of him.

“I know …”

“And I want you to call me if you need me. Just because I’m in Los Angeles doesn’t mean I won’t come if you need me. Okay?”

He nods, staring into her eyes, trying to memorize what they look like.

And then he realizes that they’re all shiny. . .

And she’s crying.

She pulls him into her arms, holding him close against her so that he can feel her heart beating.

He lets his own tears spill over, unable to stop them. He cries so hard that he’s making loud, gasping noises, clutching her tightly around her neck, never wanting to let go.

Then she says in a strangled-sounding voice, “I’ve got a flight to catch. Be good, Manny. I’ll be in touch.”

One last squeeze, and she’s gone—out the door, down the stairs, and into the car.

Still sniffling, Manny steps out onto the lopsided porch. The windows of the limousine are tinted; he can’t even get one last glimpse of her.

He waves anyway, in case she’s watching.

Waves as the limousine and the police cars start up and drive away.

Waves until they have disappeared around the corner.

Only then does he believe that she’s really going—that she’s really
gone
.

Only then does he wipe at the tears that are still trickling down his face, and softly call, “Good-bye.”

B
rawley Johnson steps out of the rented car on Green Garden Way and stares down the street at the small white Cape Cod.

He would have known it’s the right house even if he hadn’t seen it on the news the day before; press vehicles and satellite trucks are parked directly in front of it, and there’s a throng of reporters and other people milling about in the street.

He moves toward them, vaguely disturbed by the notion that they almost appear to be … disbanding.

What’s going on?

Can he possibly be too late?

If only his flight into New York hadn’t been late last night … too late to catch the last connection to T. F. Green.

If only it had been easier to find ground transportation once he’d landed first thing that morning. But there hadn’t been a cab, and the car rental place had been a nightmare. And then, once he’d rented a car and gotten on the road, he’d found himself hopelessly lost. He’d missed the exit off 95 in Providence and was halfway to Boston before he realized what had happened.

And now he’s here at last, at the house where Mallory has been living for five years …

Five years of him thinking she was dead …

And something tells him it’s too late.

He approaches a man who’s loading camera equipment into the back of an open van.

“Is this where Mallory Eden is?” he asks the guy, a scruffy type in ripped jeans and a goatee.

“Not anymore” is the terse reply.

Brawley’s stomach turns over. “What do you mean?”

“You just missed her, man. Left in a big stretch limo, police escort and everything. She’s out of this burg.”

“What? Where did she go?”

The guy flashes a sarcastic expression. “Hmm, let’s see. Big movie star. Now, where would she go?”

“Are you telling me that she’s on her way back to L.A.?”

“That’s my guess. She didn’t stop to consult me. I spent the whole night driving down here from upstate New York just to get a look at her.”

Brawley narrows his eyes. “You a fan?”

Again the sarcasm. “Yeah, right. That’s why I have all this camera equipment. I’m a reporter, man. Like everyone else hanging around here.”

“Newspaper?”

“Uh-uh.
Eyewitness News
. How about you?”

Brawley shifts his gaze away from the now-deserted house, glancing absently at the man beside him.

“Actually, I’m an old friend of hers,” he tells him.

“Of whose?”

“Cin—Mallory Eden’s.”

“Yeah, right.”

“I’m serious.”

“Come off it.”

“Look, I don’t care whether or not you believe me. My name is Brawley Johnson. I was engaged to her a long time ago.”

The guy frowns. Adjusts the visor of his baseball cap so that it faces forward, shading his face from the sun. He peers at Brawley, then nods. “You know, that name is familiar. Brawley Johnson. Weren’t you on some TV show last week, talking about Mallory Eden?”

“I was on a couple of them,” Brawley informs him, straightening his shoulders.

“Yeah? Would you mind talking to me for a few minutes? I’d like to get some tape … and my producer’s over there … hey, Bob? Can you come here for a minute?”

Brawley hesitates, thinking about it.

Eyewitness News
from upstate New York?

It’s really no decision.

“Hey, where are you going?” asks the reporter as Brawley strides away toward his rental car. “Just let me ask you a few questions, man.”

“Who is he?”

“Why do you want to talk to him?”

Brawley hears the buzz among the press.

He breaks into a run.

So does the
Eyewitness News
reporter.

So do the rest of them, scrambling pell-mell to interview him despite the fact that they have no clue who he is.

Brawley, who spends five hours a week with a personal trainer, is into the rental with the engine started before the out-of-shape East Coast tribe reaches him.

He speeds down Green Garden Way, heading back in the direction he came: the airport.

M
allory breathes a sigh of relief once the airport security guard has deposited her inside the private airline club, the heavy door closed firmly behind her, blocking out the trickle of reporters who managed to catch up with her at the airport.

The place is Sunday-morning deserted; she glances around and sees that there’s a man reading a newspaper in one corner and a well-dressed couple chatting quietly in another.

Nobody seems to notice or care that she’s Mallory Eden.

Or maybe they don’t recognize her, with her hair still dark and the extra pounds padding her once-skinny figure.

What had she been thinking when she got ready to leave that morning? Why had she worn all this makeup and hairspray; why hadn’t she put on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt?

Because if you’re going to go back, you might as well do it right
, she reminds herself.

You can’t hide anymore
.

You don’t
want
to, remember?

She thinks of Harper Smith and lifts her chin defiantly.

If he wanted to stop her from leaving, he could have. He could have called, or come over to her house, and told her …

What?

What could he—a virtual stranger, or so she’s trying to convince herself—have said that would make her change her mind about going?

One word, actually.

Stay
.

If he had said it, she would have done it. At least, for a little while. Long enough to collect her thoughts, to make rational decisions about the future …

Long enough to get to know him better.

But Harper Smith hadn’t said anything but “Good-bye.”

And “Good luck.”

A perfectly appropriate farewell, coming from a man she’d known for only a few days.

Even if he did save her life.

Even if he did make her wonder what would have happened between them if she didn’t have all this …

“Baggage, ma’am?”

She looks up, startled, to see a pleasant-faced female airline employee looking down at her.

“Excuse me?”

“Do you have any baggage that needs to be checked?”

“Oh … no. No, just this.” She holds up the small carry-on bag at her feet, the one that holds her money and some toiletries, a change of clothes.

The same bag she’d brought with her from her old life.

The bag had cost more than most people in Windmere Cove made in a month.

If the airline employee recognizes her, or if she thinks it’s strange that someone would fly across the country without luggage, she doesn’t let on.

Once she’s alone again, Mallory turns her attention to the telephone sitting on the table beside her.

She has to call Rae.

Collect, she realizes …

Because she doesn’t have a credit card.

She doesn’t have a lot of things she’ll need now that she’s going back to the real world.

She reaches into her pocket for the sheet of paper the cop had handed her yesterday, the one with all the names and phone numbers on it.

Flynn Soderland
.

Brawley Johnson
.

Rae Hamilton
.

Gretchen Dodd
.

Becky O’Neal
.

Of them, Rae is the only one she’s tried to reach. Last night, and this morning. After getting constant busy signals, she had concluded that her friend’s phone was off the hook.

Was it because Rae doesn’t want to talk to her?

No, of course Rae wants to talk to her. Rae had called, had left a number.

Mallory figures that under the circumstances, there’s only one other reason that Rae’s phone would be off the hook.

She must be getting barraged by the press.

She supposes she could have tried to reach Flynn. He would be glad to let her stay at his place.

But with Flynn, things were touchy before she left. Because of his drinking. She had actually threatened to fire him over that.

It seems like it had happened in another lifetime…

And it had

But with Flynn, you never knew. He might be carrying a grudge. And if not, he might want to talk business right away. Try to convince her to audition again.

She isn’t ready for that.

She isn’t ready for any of this.

But she’d told Harper Smith she was going back to L.A., and so she will.

She just isn’t ready to face … everyone.

Not Flynn.

Certainly not Brawley.

And not Gretchen …

Poor Gretchen.

Mallory notices for the first time that the telephone number she’d left had had a Connecticut area code.

She vaguely remembers now that Gretchen had grown up in New England.

Funny, after living in Rhode Island for all these years, it had never occurred to her that her former assistant might be close by.

She should call Gretchen.

And she will.

But not yet.

Her eyes flit over the last name on the list.

Becky O’Neal
.

She will never call the mother who beat her, who abandoned her, who came back only when she needed money.

I will never, ever call you. Never
.

Swallowing hard, Mallory forces thoughts away from her mother, her gaze back to Rae’s name and number, which she hasn’t tried in over an hour.

And then, taking a deep breath to steel her nerve, she begins to dial.

“I
s it true that you’re Mallory Eden’s mother?”

“Have you spoken to your daughter in the past twenty-four hours?”

“Were you aware that she hadn’t really committed suicide?”

Becky O’Neal Baxter puts her hands up in front of her eyes, trying to shield them from the glare of the camera lights gathered at the foot of the steps in front of the old rooming house.

She clutches the railing for support, wishing she had stopped to comb her hair before coming out to see what all the fuss was about, wishing she were wearing something other than these holey jeans and the size small T-shirt that hangs like a sack on her bony frame.

“I … can you ask one question at a time?” she asks timidly, glancing around at the clamoring reporters.

They pay no attention to her request, continuing to shout questions at her.

Confused, disturbed, she turns away, wanting only to escape back to her room, to wait by the phone …