The sun was dipping toward the horizon as they all piled into the yellow car.
“The lead part!” Aurelio cried, sliding behind the steering wheel. “I need to telegram my uncle. Two hundred bucks a week!”
“Oh, I make loads more than that,” Bonnie said cheerily. She slid closer to him, leaving plenty of room for Kate on the front seat.
“I won’t know what to do with that much money.”
“Pay the phone bill,” Hugo advised from the back.
“I get to call the Galaxy and tell them I quit their crappy job where they take all my tips.” Aurelio laughed as he started the engine. “Nah, I’m just not going to show up tonight.”
“Where’s Ollie?” Reuben asked, sitting behind Kate.
“Must have taken a bus,” Hugo said.
“Six in the morning!” Aurelio looked over his shoulder as he backed up the car. “Why do we have to start so early?”
“So we can rehearse, silly. I know all the songs and dances, but you don’t.”
“That music guy said he thought I would have a Mexican accent. I said—why would I have an accent? I was born in Fresno.” He and Bonnie laughed together. As the car left the studio, Bonnie turned on the radio, and the two of them sang along to Ella Fitzgerald.
Kate glanced back at Hugo and Reuben, wondering how they felt about Aurelio getting a part when they hadn’t. Reuben chewed on a thumbnail, and Hugo stared out the side window, his expression strangely empty. She remembered what a failure she’d felt like after leaving Clive Falcon’s office and couldn’t imagine feeling that way for two years … over and over again.
Hugo’s time would come.
Wouldn’t it?
Hundreds of cars passed them on the crowded highway, and Kate wondered how many of their drivers had come to Hollywood seeking fame and fortune, only to settle for jobs pumping gasoline or selling vacuum cleaners.
The sky was peachy dusk by the time they turned onto her grandfather’s street, lined by lovely mansions. Ollie’s property stood out like a dark smudge. Kate hoped he’d made it home all right. The house looked abandoned.
“You have to come inside so we can tell Mama,” Bonnie told Aurelio as the car turned into the Fairchilds’ driveway. “You too, Kate. The two of you can stay for dinner.”
“Thank you, but not tonight,” Kate said. As soon as the car stopped moving, she stepped out and hurried down the street.
Hugo caught up. “He’s probably in his office.”
They went up the long front path and entered the house. Kate found the light switch and flipped it on, illuminating the golden lantern overhead.
A whimpering sound made her look to the staircase.
Ollie sat hunched a few steps up, squinting against the new light, his cheeks damp. At the sight of her, his face crumpled. “I’m sorry, Kate. I tried—I really did—but I couldn’t—” His voice cracked. “And now I’ve ruined everything.”
“Nothing is ruined.” She took a step and stopped uncertainly. She rarely cried herself and never knew what to do or say when her friends got upset. She was relieved when Hugo walked by her and sat next to Ollie, putting his arm around his shoulders.
“That’s why I gave you the bus fare, so you could leave when you wanted.”
“I took the wrong bus. I got lost and walked for hours.” Tears streamed from Ollie’s eyes. “I was so upset when I got here, I didn’t know what I was doing. I couldn’t think straight.”
Hugo squeezed Ollie’s shoulders. “You’re home now and everything is fine. Better than fine. Aurelio got a part in the movie, and Kate’s going to be a production assistant.” His gaze shifted to her. “She’s not leaving town for a while.”
“I’m not leaving,” she echoed.
“But you didn’t see. You don’t know what I’ve done.” Ollie’s voice broke on a sob.
“It’s all right. You’re home now,” Hugo said.
Kate’s chest felt hollow. She shouldn’t have forced him to go. A person didn’t stay inside a house for four years without some powerful feelings holding them back. She should have known that; she had her own irrational fears. If someone forced her into a dark room and locked the door, she would lose her mind. She felt queasy at the thought. “I’m so sorry, Ollie. I shouldn’t have made you go.”
Reuben and Aurelio entered, stopping short at the sight of Ollie. “What the hell,” Reuben said.
Ollie moaned and buried his face against his knees, wrapping his arms over his head. His muffled voice came through. “I don’t want to be seen like this.”
“You guys go into the living room,” Hugo said. “I’ll get him settled, then make us some dinner. Food fixes everything.” He patted Ollie’s shoulder.
“Sure thing,” Aurelio said, turning to the living room.
But Reuben didn’t move, his eyes narrowing. The lantern overhead cast his face into stark shadows, making the long scar across his cheek stand out. “You think this has something to do with…?” He didn’t finish, but the look he shared with Hugo seemed to hold a hidden message.
“I don’t know. Give me a minute and I’ll find out.”
Reuben walked to the living room, looking back over his shoulder with an uneasy scowl.
“What was that about?” Kate asked.
“Nothing.” Hugo tipped his head toward the back of the house. “Go on. I’ll take him upstairs.”
“But—”
“Just go!” Ollie wailed, his head still buried beneath his arms. His gray hair was matted from wearing a hat, and he still wore the too-tight clothes he’d put on for the studio. Not the same jovial man who’d greeted her the night before. And it was her fault. But Hugo could comfort him better than she could, so she obeyed and left.
The back hall was nearly dark this late in the day. She flipped a switch and two sconces flickered into light. She passed Ollie’s dark office.
The dog rose to its feet at the end of the hall and whined. The back door was open, like last night, but tonight’s breeze had a bite in it. Kate went to close the door but paused, looking up.
The moon was already visible in the sunset sky, hanging at about seventy degrees. It looked full, but she knew it wasn’t tonight—a waning gibbous of about 98 percent. She stepped outside and oriented herself, knowing the moon was roughly east right now, which meant north was on her left. She glanced around for a good vantage point for the telescope.
The patio was large but worn by age, with several fat urns filled with barren dirt. A couple of steps led to a swimming pool filled with green water, speckled with dead leaves from the overgrown trees.
No—green, healthy leaves, Kate realized. She walked down the two steps, curious, and saw lily pads and grass growing in the pool. The water rippled and an orange fish skimmed the surface.
She gave a weak laugh. “Why am I surprised?” The pool’s pumping equipment had probably stopped working a decade ago. She wondered if the plants had grown naturally, or if someone in the house—Hugo, maybe—had turned it into a pond on purpose. It was almost pretty.
Kate looked at Hugo’s pool house and saw the corner of a bed through the window. She took a step, then stopped herself, glancing back at the house.
The dog watched her, rooted in the doorway.
She returned to the house, hugging herself against the chill. The dog whimpered and backed out of her way. “In or out?” she asked, holding the door. The dog shuffled to the dark kitchen doorway and looked back with lonely eyes. “You’ll have to wait for Hugo to feed you.” Kate shut the back door and entered the kitchen, flipping the light switch. She took a step—and halted with a gasp.
Lemmy lay sprawled on the kitchen floor, between Kate and the table.
Her alarm quickly hardened into anger, her heart racing. “Very scary, Lemmy, but I never fall for the same trick twice.”
He kept up the act, not moving. He’d probably returned from visiting his boss in prison to find an empty house. Ollie had told him they’d gone to Falcon Pictures, and now he wanted to prove his own acting skills, hoping for a chance at Hollywood fame.
But tonight’s death pose wasn’t as convincing as last night’s, his body curled on its side, his face half hidden by his arm. “It can’t be comfortable down there.” Kate watched for a blink or breath, but there was nothing, and a prickle of unease ran through her. She took a few cautious steps and saw a dark puddle on the checkered floor beneath him, hard to see on the black tiles, but leaking red onto the white.
Her legs turned to jelly. She stumbled back into the wall and screamed.
Hugo arrived in a worried rush. “What’s wrong?” He noticed the body on the floor and released an exasperated breath. “Get up, Lemmy. It isn’t funny.” He looked at Kate. “He’s just faking.”
She gave a stiff shake of her head, unable to say it.
Hugo’s gaze darted back to the floor. “Lemmy?” He walked closer and crouched down.
“Stupid mutt,” Reuben muttered, pushing his way around the dog in the doorway. He saw Hugo inspecting Lemmy and his eyes widened. “Jeez, is that for real?”
Aurelio entered behind him, stopping short when he saw.
Hugo took his time, bent low, fingering Lemmy’s neck for a pulse, then checking the eyelids. He rolled Lemmy onto his back, and the arm flopped in a strange, stiff way. He pulled back the front of the suit jacket and inspected the bloody shirt underneath.
Kate closed her eyes, but that made her body sway, so she forced them back open.
Hugo rose, shaking his head, holding his bloody hands away from his sides.
“No fooling?” Reuben stepped closer. “What’d he do, slip when he was carrying a knife, or something?”
“Stabbed twice, I think. One of the wounds doesn’t look too deep, but the other one is pretty bad.” Hugo’s eyes met Kate’s, his expression grim, and she knew he was remembering what she was remembering.
I was so upset when I got here, I didn’t know what I was doing.
She pressed a hand over her mouth, suddenly cold all over. Her father was a killer, and now her grandfather.
Hugo moved toward her and stopped, his own hands covered in blood. He gave a small shake of his head, his eyes tight on hers—a private message she didn’t believe. They’d both heard Ollie’s tearful confession. You don’t know what I’ve done.
“Jeez, I gotta tell my sister that her stepkid is dead.” Reuben rubbed a hand over his bald head. “She thinks he walks on water.”
Kate said through a dry throat, “We have to call the police.”
“Wait,” Hugo said. “I need to think a minute.” He took a restless step, picking up a rag on the counter.
“What’s there to think about?” Kate asked, her voice a little stronger. Lemmy lay dead on the kitchen floor, his blood pooling. “The sooner the police get here, the sooner they can figure out the truth and arrest his killer.”
Hugo wiped his bloody hands on the rag, avoiding her gaze. “The killer is far away by now.”
“Or very close,” she said tightly.
He rubbed the rag hard around a fingernail.
“You think Ollie did this?” Reuben asked.
Hugo shot him a furious look. “Are you crazy? Why would he kill Lemmy?”
“You saw him blubbering out there. We made him leave the house and he cracked. Maybe Lemmy said something that, you know, got him riled up.” He gave Hugo a look that seemed to say more.
Hugo glared back. “Ollie wouldn’t kill someone. He won’t even kill a spider.”
“You don’t know what people are capable of,” Kate murmured. Her father had been a thief for years, and no one had guessed. Certainly not Kate, lying in a dark hole, waiting for her smart, handsome father to rescue her. She’d imagined him crazed with worry, offering a reward, demanding the police do more. But he’d been too busy hiding his crimes and killing her mother.
Reuben stared down at Lemmy. “Let’s not pretend any of us are sad he’s dead.”
“Show some respect,” Hugo snapped.
“For him? He was a louse, and we all know it.”
Aurelio hadn’t moved past the doorway. “We better call the police.”
“Not yet,” Reuben said. “I gotta go through my room and make sure nothing has my real name on it. Nothing linking me to the club, or they’ll turn me over to the feds.”
Aurelio’s eyes widened. “Maybe someone at the club did this. None of the upstairs guys like him very much. That’s the talk in the kitchen, anyway.”
Hugo looked at Reuben. “You think Moe Kravitz ordered a hit?”
Reuben ran a thumb over his scar. “Beats me. I haven’t talked to anybody at that place in months. I go near the club, the feds will slap me with a subpoena and make me testify. But there’s a way to find out.” He crouched next to Lemmy, stuck his fingers inside the shirt collar, and pulled out a string with a key at the end. “Nobody at the club did this. They all know to take the key.” He pulled the string over Lemmy’s head.
“Why’s he so stiff?” Aurelio asked.
Hugo answered, “Rigor mortis.” He added gruffly, glancing at Kate, “I studied it for my play.”
Reuben searched Lemmy’s pockets, not seeming to mind the blood. He pulled out a pack of Wrigley’s gum, a handkerchief, a scrap of paper with writing on it, and another key. He stood, shoving the items into his own pockets.
Evidence, Kate realized. “We shouldn’t move anything before the police get here.”
“Nobody calls the coppers until I say so,” Reuben said. “They find out who I am, I’ll have to testify, and it doesn’t matter if I lie on a stack of Bibles all day long, the minute new evidence turns up, Moe will think I squealed, and that’s my death sentence. So I’m Charles Kensington, you got that?” He pointed a bloody finger at Kate.
“Back off,” Hugo warned.
“She needs to understand the gravity of the situation.”
“I just found a dead body,” she said through gritted teeth. “I think I understand the gravity.” But her heart beat madly. In the fun of going to Falcon Pictures, she’d forgotten that Reuben used to count money for a mobster now in prison, and Aurelio waited tables at the same shady club, and even Hugo had once washed dishes there.
“What’s going on?” a faint voice asked, and they all turned. Ollie stood in the doorway, puffy-eyed but calmer than a moment ago. His gaze shifted to Lemmy and his eyebrows lifted. “Rehearsing without me? I thought you were going to cook something, Hugo.”
No one moved for a second, then Hugo gave a gasping laugh. “You don’t know.”
“Know what?”
“He’s dead, you nitwit,” Reuben said. “Did you do this?”
“Dead?” Ollie’s gaze darted back to Lemmy. “No, he’s just … rehearsing.”
His confusion looked real, but Kate had been fooled by a good performance before. “He’s been stabbed,” she said. “Did you hear anything or see anyone?”
“No, I was … I was in my bedroom. I didn’t come back here.” Ollie looked at Hugo, his brow furrowing in childlike confusion. “Is this some sort of prank? Because I’m really not in the mood for it.”
“Not a prank,” Hugo said, his voice steadier now that Ollie seemed innocent. He tossed the bloody rag at Reuben. “Clean up, Charles Kensington, get rid of anything with your name on it, then give Aurelio the all clear so he can go next door and call the police. Ollie, you better go upstairs and get in bed. Say you’ve been there with a headache since you got home and didn’t hear anything.”
“I didn’t hear anything.” Ollie stared at Lemmy. “He’s really dead?”
“Come on,” Reuben growled, steering Ollie toward the door. He muttered under his breath, “Jeez, I hate Mondays.”
Aurelio left with them, and the room fell silent except for the tick of the clock on the wall. Lemmy looked strangely small and alone on the checkered floor, staring at nothing.
“I’ll watch over him,” Hugo said quietly. “You go sit in the living room.”
“All right.”
“Kate.”
She turned back in the doorway.
“You won’t tell the police about Reuben’s real name, will you? He wants to escape that life, and if the feds make him testify against his old boss, he’ll end up dead.”
She debated for a moment but knew Reuben couldn’t have killed Lemmy; he’d been at Falcon Pictures with her. “Reuben who? I thought his name was Charles Kensington.”
Hugo’s lips curved in a smile of appreciation that made her forget everything else for a moment.
But her mood quickly sobered. “Hugo, you don’t think Ollie—”
“No. You saw him. He didn’t even know Lemmy was dead. And besides—” Hugo hesitated, glancing at the body. “He’s too stiff. That much rigor mortis means he’s been dead at least four or five hours. Ollie hasn’t been home that long. He took the wrong bus and got lost, so he couldn’t have done it.”
“We only have his word for that.”
Hugo’s eyes burned with certainty. “Ollie’s word is good enough for me.”
He believed in her grandfather more than she did.
“Kate, I don’t think we should tell the police about Ollie crying on the staircase. It might give them the wrong idea.”
This lie felt heavier than Reuben’s. Lying to the police in a murder investigation wasn’t smart or sensible. But right now, looking at Hugo, all she wanted was for him to be right. Partly, because she wanted Ollie to be innocent. Partly, because the fire in Hugo’s eyes warmed something inside her that had been cold for a very long time.
“Kate.” The low rasp in his voice stoked the warm embers. “I can’t explain how I know Ollie didn’t do it, I just do. He and I understand each other. I know that’s not proof, but it is for me.”
“All right.” For now, at least, she would shield her grandfather—the actor with a thousand faces.