Shooting for the Stars (29 page)

Chapter
55

I
STILL
think about the Laura Marlowe story. A lot.

And wonder what really did happen on that long-ago night.

Like I said, there's a part of me that wants to believe—just like Sherry DeConde—that Laura Marlowe really is still alive out there somewhere. That she didn't die in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. That Thomas Rizzo somehow pulled off the impossible and came up with his own plan to make Laura disappear into a new and better life after the shooting.

What a story that would be, huh? I mean just imagine if I amazingly tracked down this legendary actress thirty years after she supposedly died, wrote about how she faked her death all this time, and told the world about her new life. That would be the exclusive of a lifetime. I'd be famous all over again.

But I know that will never happen.

Whatever secrets Thomas Rizzo still had about Laura . . . well, he took them to the grave with him.

In the end, it really didn't matter though. Because even if I did discover that Laura had somehow lived that night, I don't think I'd go looking for her. Not because I'd be afraid I might fail to find her. Because I'm afraid I might succeed.

I fear there is no happy ending to the Laura Marlowe story. Even if she had managed to run away to a new life, there was no reason to think she wouldn't have made many of the same mistakes all over again that she made in those first twenty-two years of her life. Wherever she went, she probably would have wound up with someone just like her mother or Edward Holloway or Thomas Rizzo. No matter how far you run, you can't run away from yourself. I knew this better than anyone. Eugene O'Neill said it best a long time ago: “There is no present or future. Only the past, happening over and over again.”

Laura Marlowe may have been America's sweetheart, but she was inexorably doomed to a life of unhappiness.

Sometimes late at night, when I'm sitting alone in my apartment, I go on Netflix and watch Laura Marlowe's final movie,
Once Upon a Time Forever
. The one about a beautiful princess who runs away from all her fame and power and riches—and lives happily ever after with the man she loves.

She looks so young on the screen.

So beautiful.

So full of hope.

This is the way I want to remember Laura Marlowe.

I still want to believe in the fairy tale.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I
've spent a lot of time as a celebrity journalist. I was news editor of
Star
magazine during the '90s. Managing editor for features/entertainment at the
New York Daily News
in between news desk jobs there. City editor at the
New York Post
when we launched Page Six as a must-read gossip column. And I've covered all the big celebrity news stories like O. J., John Lennon, and the death of Princess Diana.

So for a follow-up to
The Kennedy Connection—
which is about the most famous unsolved murder of all time—I decided to make Gil Malloy's next front-page story about the death of a famous celebrity. Because so many people—and I'm one of them—care passionately about the lives and deaths of celebrities just like they do about the JFK assassination. Laura Marlowe is fiction. But I touch upon some true celebrity crime in the book—notably the murders of John Lennon and movie actress Sharon Tate. And I draw on my real-life journalistic experience to paint a picture of Laura Marlowe as a tragic celebrity who had it all for too short a time.

Most of this book was written at The Writers Room in New York City. This is a wonderful workplace located in the East Village—my new office, as I call it since I left daily journalism at NBC News—that is home to more than 200 writers of all types. Thanks to Donna Brodie and the staff there for providing such a creative environment that makes it almost impossible to find an excuse not to write.

I'd also like to express my gratitude to all the terrific booksellers at stores around the country I've met over the past year who prove that reading is still alive and well; fans of the first two Gil Malloy books—
The Kennedy Connection
and
The Midnight Hour
—that have given me so much encouragement; Todd Hunter at Atria Books, who made Gil Malloy come alive in the series; and Nalini Akolekar, my agent who has believed in Gil (and me) from the beginning.

Finally, they always say writers should write about what they know, and I couldn't have written these books without the knowledge and inspiration I've gotten from working in newsrooms for so many years. The front pages, the circulation wars, and—most of all—the colorful characters. I love it—and I've tried to put that same passion for the news business in my Gil Malloy character. My favorite newspaper movie of all time is
Deadline—U.S.A
with Humphrey Bogart as a newspaper editor. At one point, he tells a kid looking for a job at the paper: “About this wanting to be a reporter, don't ever change your mind. It may not be the oldest profession, but it's the best.” Gil Malloy couldn't have said it better.

Enjoy more Gil Malloy mysteries

Gil Malloy breaks the story of the link between seemingly unconnected murders where a Kennedy half dollar coin was found at each of the crime scenes.

The Kennedy Connection

Gil Malloy picks up a lead a fellow reporter kept secret which may have led to her murder.

The Midnight Hour

Photograph by John Makely

R. G. Belsky, a journalist and author based in New York City, is the former managing editor of news for NBCNews.com. Prior to joining NBC in 2008, he was the managing editor for the
New York Daily News
, the news editor for
Star Magazine
, and the metropolitan editor of the
New York Post
. He is the author of the Gil Malloy mystery series, which began with
The Kennedy Connection
.

OTHER GIL MALLOY MYSTERIES

The Kennedy Connection: A Gil Malloy Novel

The Midnight Hour: A Gil Malloy Novella

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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by R.G. Belsky

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First Atria Paperback edition August 2015

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Cover design by James Perales
Cover photos: VINTAGE Theater marquee © SHUTTERSTOCK/Kobby Dagan BILLBOARD © SHUTTERSTOCK/ESPRIT

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Belsky, Richard.
Shooting for the stars : a Gil Malloy novel / R. G. Belsky.—First Atria paperback edition.
pages ; cm.— (The Gil Malloy series)
1. Reporters and reporting—Fiction. 2. Serial murder investigation—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3552.E53385S55 2015
813'.54—dc23
2014049242

ISBN 978-1-4767-6236-4
ISBN 978-1-4767-6237-1 (ebook)