Running From Mercy (28 page)

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Authors: Terra Little

BOOK: Running From Mercy
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TWENTY
Gillian stuck her head inside Pam's dressing room, saw Pam sitting at the make-up table, and came all the way into the room, closing the door softly at her back. “Hey, hey,” she sing-songed as she sashayed over to the table. “One more set and you're out of here. You ready to go home to your own bed?”
“Like nobody's business,” Pam sighed.
Gillian massaged her shoulders expertly and she purred like a kitten. “I feel like I've been to a hundred cities instead of nineteen.”
“You sang better than I've ever heard you sing, though.”
“Nobody sings sad songs better than a sad person, Gil. You know that.”
“Speaking of which, I was a little sad to see that luscious Nate Woodberry get on a plane this morning.” Gillian met Pam's eyes in the mirror and they grinned at each other. “You sure know how to pick them, I'll give you that.”
“Nate is the quintessential playboy. The day he finally decides he's ready to limit himself to one woman will be the day hell truly freezes over.” Pam picked up a pot of lip gloss and swirled a brush across the surface. She leaned forward and began applying the color to her lips. Gillian pulled up a stool and plopped down next to her at the table. “You ever been in love with two men at the same time, Gil? One you want and the other you need?”
She considered the question carefully. “Once I was. Couldn't figure out what the hell to do about it either. Which one is the one you want and which is the one you need?”
“I don't want to answer that,” Pam decided. She shuffled tubes and bottles around on the vanity and slid an envelope from under her makeup case. “Look, I want to show you something.”
Gillian studied the photos Pam handed her for several seconds. “This is your mom?”
“I never had a mother, but yes, that's the woman who gave birth to me. Moira.”
“And the old dude with your mouth? This is your father?”
Pam caught her breath and nodded hesitantly. She couldn't say she'd never had a father, just not one she had officially recognized as such. “Yeah,” she breathed.
Gillian flipped back to the photo of Moira and divided looks between it and Pam's face. She tsk-tsked and shook her head knowingly, a wide grin on her face.
“What?”
“Nothing.” She handed the photos back to Pam, stood and pushed the stool under the table with her foot. “It's just . . . I always told you, you had some white girl in you. Now I know why you can't dance.”
Pam laid her head back and roared with laughter.
There was a knock at the door and Gillian went to answer it. She talked in hushed tones to a stage assistant and then eased the door closed. “Freckles says we have ten minutes.”
“Okay.” Pam moved around the room gathering her things and dropping them carelessly in the duffel lying open on the floor. She tossed Jimmy Choos in with Manolos and topped them off with DKNY blouses and Kenneth Cole skirts. As an afterthought, she stuffed the photos back in the envelope and zipped them in a side compartment.
“Woodberry brought you those pictures?” Gillian asked from the doorway.
“Yeah.” Pam swished a makeup brush loaded with face powder across her nose, forehead, and cheeks, then stepped back to survey her handiwork in the mirror. She thought she looked like a circus clown. Stage lighting was harsh, though. “Nate always knows when I need him.” She missed Gillian's knowing look.
The tour wrapped up in Oakland, a little over three hours away from where Pam lived in Los Angeles. Just past two in the morning, she and Gillian boarded a private plane headed home. A limousine was waiting for them at Los Angeles International and they both slept stretched out on the backseats until the driver buzzed them awake after they pulled to a stop in Pam's circular driveway. She shook herself awake and said her goodbyes to Gillian, then went inside to reacquaint herself with her house and her bed. Too many nights in hotel beds had made her neck stiff and her back cranky as hell. She walked from room to room, making sure that all the windows were closed and latched and that she was the only person in the house.
It wasn't a large house by celebrity standards, but it was enough for Pam. When she was shopping for houses, this one was the fourth on the list, and as soon as she had walked in and felt its aura, she knew it was the one for her. There were five bedrooms, each with private baths, a formal dining room, an exercise room, and a den with a fireplace. She had converted the attic into an all-purpose studio, where she indulged in whatever pastime that currently struck her fancy. Some years back it was yoga, then painting and then it was dancing. These days she wiled away her free time curled up on a chaise, reading or simply staring at the sky through the skylight. It was her tranquility room and the only one she barred the interior decorator she'd hired from transforming.
Off the eat-in kitchen at the back of the house was a sunroom, which looked out over the pool and modest backyard. She took a long bubble bath, dropped a floor length caftan over her head, and took her mail there to read. She switched on a small lamp and began flipping through the envelopes methodically. There was the usual credit card offers and those she tossed into a rattan trash can. A leather bustier in one of the mail order catalogs caught her eye and she considered it at length before deciding against it and tossing all the catalogs, too. She perused her bank statement carefully, noting each debit and credit and checking that the balance was in the vicinity of where she thought it should be. She employed an accountant to handle all the pesky details surrounding the money she made and she had an excellent portfolio, but she still paid careful attention to where her money went and on whose authority.
The next envelope in the stack gave Pam pause. It was postmarked a week ago from Georgia. She recognized the flowing script and the faintly floral scent clinging to the envelope. There was a dried flower inside, somewhere between the folded pages, she knew. The first letter Moira sent had come along with a handful of pressed rose petals. The second, a daisy. This one would have something different. Maybe a lily, Pam mused as she slid her finger along the fold and opened the envelope.
She had been home two days when the first letter arrived by overnight delivery. In it, Moira had begged and pleaded for Pam to call her and tell her that she was safe. Pam never called and the second letter had come by Federal Express three days later. She sat in the same chair she was sitting in now and read it. This one was more of the same. Wanting her to get in touch, wanting the three of them to get together, so that they could talk, get everything out in the open. A pressed tulip tumbled from the pages into Pam's lap and she held it to her nose to inhale the fading scent. She had no intention of answering any of the letters.
She flipped the next item up to the light and froze. Jasper's scratchy, grumpy looking handwriting jumped out at her from the back of a postcard and snatched her breath.
Thinking of You,
he'd written. Just as she had written to him many times over the years. Short, simple lines to let him know that he meant the world to her and that she could never go far enough away from him to forget that. He had to know that she would get it, the wily old bastard. She cracked a smile despite herself.
After that, the letters and postcards stopped coming and Pam was relieved. Another month passed before a large padded manila envelope appeared. Pam nearly tripped over it as she came through the door. She had just finished in the studio, recording the final version of the song she had titled “Have Mercy On Me,” to be included on an upcoming motion picture soundtrack, and returned home. She cursed her housekeeper as she kicked the envelope out of the doorway with one foot and closed the door with the other. Her hands were full of clothes she'd picked up from the dry cleaners and the mail was hanging from between her lips.
Time to have a serious talk with the help, she thought as she laid the clothes across an armchair and scooped up the envelope. She figured it was a script that had somehow slipped past Gillian's eagle eye, so she brought it with her to the kitchen. Knowing that she had no real acting talent whatsoever and knowing that whoever sent the script probably knew it too, she didn't rush to open the package. She was constantly being courted for roles as promiscuous sex goddesses or ones that required her to be at least partially nude, and she wasn't particularly interested in either.
The envelope sat undisturbed on the kitchen counter for the rest of the day and halfway through the next. Then Pam finally decided to open the flap and peek inside. She took a seat at the breakfast bar and opened the cardstock folder. Miles Dixon's name caught her eye immediately. He'd given himself credit as the author of the manuscript she held in her hands. There was no title but there was a note paperclipped to the first page. She unfolded it slowly.
Pam,
 
I'd like you to be my first advance reader. As you know, I was extremely interested in writing the story of your life, the story of your rise to fame, if you will. I still am and this is what I have conjured up so far. Please do me the honor of reading it and letting me know what you think.
Rather than rely on various sources, who may or may not be credible, I collaborated with a most knowledgeable source. I hope that you will find this manuscript to be written with integrity and sensitivity. That was my intent, as it should have always been.
Truly,
Miles
Pam's first instinct was to toss the manuscript in the trash and then to call her attorney, but curiosity won out over common sense. If she was going to be laid bare for the public to pick the meat off of her bones, then she might as well be prepared. Forewarned is forearmed. She took the manuscript with her to her attic sanctuary and spread out on the chaise to find out just how much damage Miles Dixon was planning to do.
She read straight through the night, only pausing to use the bathroom and to unearth her emergency stash of “I don't smoke anymore, but just in case I'm going crazy” cigarettes from the butter compartment inside the refrigerator door. She dragged the manuscript all over the house with her as she read. She took it with her to the sun porch to keep her company while she soaked up some rays, to the kitchen to entertain her while she ate, and then to bed with her.
Her bedside clock read 9:20
A.M.
when she rolled across the mattress, stifled a yawn, and plucked the cordless phone from the base on the nightstand. Miles answered on the second ring.
“You've read it?” he asked by way of greeting.
“How did you know it was me?”
“Caller ID. What do you think?”
She took a deep breath and eyed the papers spread across the bed. “I think I hate you for being so persistent. Why is it so hard for you to leave well enough alone?”
“It's a great story, Pam.”
“It's my story, David, I mean Miles. Whatever your damn name is.”
“David is my middle name and Miles is my first name. Sorry about that, by the way.”
“Kiss my ass. It's good, I'll give you that. One thing, though. Your source got a few minor details wrong. It has to be absolutely accurate.”
“Tell me what they are and I'll double-check them with Moira.”
“Moira?”
“Yeah, I thought you would pick up on the fact that she narrated most of the text. She insisted on accuracy, too.”
“You didn't use the stuff Humpy told you and Clive Parker.” Nate had given her the rundown on the notes he'd found in Miles's hotel room.
“It's all hearsay anyway and not really relevant to the story. Who's Humpy?”
“James Humphries,” she clarified for him. “Where's the shit he said about me?”
“It's not included in the manuscript.”
“Duh. Why not? I thought you wanted a bestseller, a titillator?”
“That manuscript is not a titillator, Pam. It has strong literary merit, and titillator is not a word,” Miles said, sounding offended.
“That's why you get paid to write trash about people and I don't. You don't need my permission to publish this manuscript, so why send it to me?”
“You're right, I don't need your permission, but I'd like to have it anyway. I thought maybe you could write the foreword.”
“I'm not a writer.”
“You could be. What do you say? Give the manuscript your stamp of approval, and I'll share the advance and the royalties with you, fifty-fifty. That's fair, isn't it?”
She ignored his question in favor of one of her own. “It goes to the press just like it's written?”
“Except for the changes you mentioned and anything else you might want to add.”
“I don't have anything to add.” The rape hadn't been included in the manuscript, and neither had any mention of her connection to Chad and Nikki. If it had to be published, it was perfect the way it was.

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