Judith McNaught (69 page)

"I didn't find out how Diana felt until a few months after the trial, when Zack was already in prison. I'd written him one letter and sent it to him there, but it came back unopened with 'Return to sender'

scrawled across it in Zack's handwriting. A few days later, Diana came to see me. Of all things, she wanted me to send Zack a letter she'd written to him, but in an envelope from me. He'd returned her letter the same way he'd returned mine. I knew he'd also returned letters from Harrison Ford and Pat Swayze, and I told her all that. The next thing I knew, Diana was crying her heart out."

"Why?"

"Because she'd just come back from Texas, where she'd tried to surprise Zack with a visit. When he saw her on the other side of the screen, he turned his back on her without a word and told the guards to get her out of there. I told her I was certain it was because he was ashamed and didn't want any of his old friends to see him, and that's when she started to cry. She said the prison he was in was like a giant nightmare, that it was dirty and squalid, and that they made Zack wear a prison uniform."

"What did she expect him to be wearing, a Brooks Brothers suit?"

Emily gave a sad little laugh and explained, "Seeing him dressed like that was what hurt her so much.

Anyway, she started to cry, and she told me she'd been in love with him and that's why she'd changed her schedule and took a lesser part in
Destiny—
to be near him. Rachel guessed how Diana felt

somehow, because she teased her about having a crush on Zack one day, and when Diana didn't deny it,

Rachel made a point of climbing all over Zack whenever Diana was around. Keep in mind that Rachel

was already having an affair with Tony Austin and intended to file for divorce within days. Then, the following week—the same week Rachel died—

several people heard her warn Zack not to use Diana in

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his next movie."

"Yes, but he never made another movie, so Diana didn't lose anything."

"That's not the point," Emily said. "The point is that Rachel was like a beautiful witch. She couldn't bear to see anyone happy. If she could figure out what you wanted, what would make you happy, no matter how small it was, she'd find a way to stop you from having it or to steal it from you."

Her husband studied her in silence for a long moment, then he said quietly, "What did she steal from you,

Emily?"

Emily's head jerked up, and then she said, "Tony Austin."

"You're joking!"

"I wish I was," she said somberly. "There's just no accounting for the blind stupidity of youth. I was completely crazy about him."

"He's a junkie and a drunk! His career was already on the skids—"

"I know all that," Emily said, standing up. "But, you see, I thought I could save him from all that and himself, too. Years later, I figured out that was actually Tony's big appeal to women: He was so sexy and

cool on the surface that you felt as if he could protect you from the world, then you discovered that part

of him was actually a vulnerable little boy, and suddenly you wanted to protect him, too. That's probably

why poor Tommy Newton was in love with him.

Now, Zack was just the opposite of Tony—he didn't need anyone, and you
felt
it."

Her husband ignored the last sentence. "Tommy Newton," he repeated in disgust, "the guy who directed

your last movie, was in love with Tony Austin?"

When Emily nodded, he shook his head and said,

"That

business you've been in since you were a child reminds me of a human cesspool."

"Sometimes it is," Emily said with a laugh, "but most of the time it isn't—it's just business—just a lot of

hardworking people living and working together for four or five months, then going their own way, meeting again someday on another film."

"It can't be all bad," he relented, "because you've lived in it for years, and you're straighter and sweeter

than any woman I've ever known." Reverting to their earlier topic, he said thoughtfully, "It's amazing all that stuff with you and Tony and Diana and Rachel didn't come out during the trial."

Emily shrugged. "The police didn't look very far for other suspects or other motives. You see, they knew Zack put the bullets that killed Rachel into that gun.

We all knew it. Besides the fact that he'd threatened to kill her the night before and that he had enormous emotional and financial reasons to kill her, he was also the only one of us with enough
guts
to do it."

"He may have had guts, but he had to have been arrogant as hell to think he could actually get away with

it."

"He was definitely that," Emily agreed, but her smile was sentimental and her voice was threaded with admiration. "Zack was like … like an irresistible force, like the wind coming from so many directions, with so many sides, you never knew which one he was going to show to you. He could be incredibly witty or warm, gallant and sweet, or completely suave and sophisticated."

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"He sounds like a damned paragon."

"He could also be brutal, cold, and heartless."

"On second thought," Dick said half-seriously, "he sounds like a multiple personality."

"He was complex," Emily admitted. "And private.

He did as he pleased when he pleased, and he didn't give a damn what anybody thought of him. He made a lot of enemies because of that, but even the people who detested him were in awe of him. He didn't care about being hated, and he didn't care about

being admired either. As near as anyone could tell, the only thing he cared about was his work. He didn't

seem to need people … I mean, he didn't like anyone to get too close, except me. I was probably closer to him than almost anyone."

"Don't tell me he was in love with you. I couldn't stand another triangle."

Emily gave a shout of laughter. "I was a mere child to him, which is why he let me get as close as he did.

He used to talk to me about things I doubt he talked to Rachel about."

"What sort of things."

"I don't know—little things, like the fact that he loved astronomy. One night, when we were shooting on

location on a ranch near Dallas, he sat outside pointing out the stars to me and naming them and telling

me stories about how the constellations got their names. Rachel came out and asked what we were doing, and when I told her, she was dumbfounded that Zack was interested in astronomy or that he knew

anything about it."

"Given all that, how do you explain the fact that he made a threatening call to your father tonight?"

She swung her legs over the side of the chaise. "I think it was a crank and my father was mistaken,"

she

said. "My father also said he thought he saw someone who looked like Zack hanging around across the

street from his apartment last night."

Her husband's concerned frown faded to a look of irritated comprehension. "By any chance was your father drunk when he called you?"

"I … I couldn't tell. Maybe. Don't be too hard on him," she said, putting her hand on his arm, "he's lonely

with me gone. I was his whole life, and then I deserted him to marry you."

"You didn't 'desert' him! You're his daughter, not his wife."

She put her arm around his waist and laid her head on his shoulder. "I know that, and so does he." As they headed inside, she added, "A few minutes ago, you congratulated me on staying so sweet and straight after all my years in the business. Try to remember that the only reason I managed to become what I am is because of his vigilance. He sacrificed his own life for me."

Her husband kissed her forehead. "I know."

By the time Julie pulled into her driveway, it was midnight, and she'd spent all seven of the hours since

leaving Zack's grandmother fighting a mental battle against the insidious doubt and confusion that had haunted her at that house. She'd won her battle and now that she was home, she felt much better. She opened the front door, turned on the living room lights, and looked at the cheerful, cozy room. Here, the

idea that Zack was insane seemed so ludicrous that she was angry with herself for ever entertaining the notion. In this very room, she remembered as she hung her coat in the front closet, Matt and Meredith Farrell had spent a wonderful evening with her and bade her good luck and good-bye. Matthew Farrell, she realized, would have laughed in Mrs. Stanhope's face for suggesting Zack was insane, and that was exactly what she herself should have done!

Shaking her head in self-disgust, she walked into her bedroom, sat down on the bed, and took Zack's letter from the nightstand drawer. She reread every beautiful, loving word, and her shame for ever doubting him was as great as her sudden need to scrub away the traces of her journey to his home.

Putting his letter aside, she pulled off her sweater, stepped out of her skirt, then she went into the bathroom and turned on the shower.

She washed her body and her hair as if they'd been contaminated by the malevolent atmosphere of that gloomy pile of rocks that Zack had once called home. There was no warmth there, not in the house nor

the people who lived in it, she thought as she blew her hair dry and brushed it. If anyone was suffering from vicious delusions, it was his grandmother! And her butler! And Zack's brother, Alex!

Except, her mind argued, that his grandmother had actually seemed more despondent than vicious, at least toward the very end. And the butler had looked a little forlorn but absolutely certain of what he said.

Why would they both lie about Zack's fight with Justin, Julie wondered. Shoving the question aside, Julie

yanked the blow dryer's plug out of the wall, tightened the belt of her bathrobe, and walked into the living

room. Maybe they only thought Justin and Zack had quarreled, she decided as she turned on the television set and turned it to CNN so she could watch the latest news.

But there was one fact she couldn't avoid, justify, or dispute: Zack had lied about the way Justin died.

Either he'd lied to her or he'd lied to the police, the newspapers, and the coroner.

Her mind skated away from that unsolvable dilemma, and she looked around the living room for something that was out of place, something to physically straighten and put to rights, except there wasn't

anything. Her normally neat home was now

antiseptically clean because she'd spent all her free time

during the last five days making it ready to be examined by police and reporters when she vanished. The

plant near her left had a yellow leaf on it, so she reached over and plucked it off, then she stopped, warmed by the sudden memory of Zack in Colorado when he'd watched her doing something like this.

"Is that a nervous habit you have—straightening
things out when you feel uneasy?"
Just thinking of that lazy smile of his and the way his eyes had gleamed with amusement made her feel all right somehow.

She needed to concentrate on those memories, she realized, because they were real. He was real. And he was waiting for her in Mexico.

He'd lied to everyone else about Justin's death, Julie decided at that moment, he had not lied to her. He couldn't have done that. Wouldn't have. She knew that in her heart. And when she saw him in Mexico, he'd explain why he'd lied to the others. The television program was a special broadcast about China,

and since Julie was too keyed up to sleep, she decided to work on the letter she was leaving for her family while she waited for a late-night news update to be certain there wasn't anything about Zack on it.

He'd told her to take care of everything within a week and be ready to leave on the eighth day. Five days

288

had already elapsed.

Getting up, Julie went into her room to get her partially written letter, then she sat back down in the rocking chair and reached up to turn on the floor lamp beside her. With the television program droning on

in the background about the economic future of China, she reread what she'd written:

Dear Mom and Dad, and dear Carl and Ted,

By the time you read this letter, you'll know that I've left to join Zack. I don't expect you to condone what I'm doing or to forgive me, but I want to explain it to you so that maybe you'll at least be able to

understand someday.

I love him.

I want so much to give you more and better reasons than just that one, and I've tried to think of them, but there don't seem to be any. Maybe it's because that's all that really matters.

Dad, Mother, Carl, Ted—all four of you know what love is, you've felt it, I know you have. Dad, I remember so many times when you stayed up late and sat on the sofa with your arm around Mom. I remember all the years of your laughter and hugs. I also remember the day Mom came home from the doctor and told us he'd found a lump in her breast.

That night, you went out in the backyard and you cried. I know you did, Dad, because I followed you.

These are the things I want to share with Zack—all of them—the good things, the quiet things, the happy things, and the sad ones. Think of them, please, and

know that just as Mom and you were meant to be together through them all, I was meant to be with Zack. I believe that. I know it with every breath I take. I don't know why it had to be him. I would never

have chosen it to be this way. But it is. And I'm not sorry.

Carl, you have your wonderful, funny, sweet Sara.

She's adored you since the two of you were in grade school, and I don't think you realize just how much she did. She waited for years for you to notice her.

When we were in high school, she used to do the most amazing things to try to get your attention, like falling out of a tree when you drove past and dropping her books at your feet. Sara and I were studying

together the night she found out you'd asked Jenny Stone to your senior prom. She cried that night. You hurt her terribly, and now I'm going to hurt all of you by going away with Zack. Sara loved you anyway.