Star Attraction (28 page)

“A pretty big cocaine deal, by the
looks of it.
 
We can get the snaps
blown up, get some samples of fibres and stuff from the inside of that
fascinating jacket he wears.
 
We
can set him up with the police to make a deal with him, then get him arrested
on his own charges of drug dealing.
 
Then maybe he’ll be willing to help us out with everything he knows.”

“Hold off on that just for now
though.
 
We don’t want Jonathan
running scared if they take Mike into custody.
 
Besides, if your photos are as good as they say, we could
lean on him ourselves.
 
With my
photos and tape, it’s obvious there is one huge conspiracy going on here.”

Kelly stared at her, her eyes wide
with astonishment as they pulled up in front of the house.

“From the conversation I overheard
in the Studio, it would appear friend Mike already has quite a record sheet.
The last thing he wants is another spell in prison.
 
He asked Jonathan for a ticket to Tahiti, one way.
 
We can go to him, get him to help us
with names, dates, places, for immunity.”

“God, and I thought you university
professors all lived in a world of your own, and now I find you tailing
suspects, cutting deals,” Kelly laughed.
 
“Are you sure you’re in the right job?”

“I’m sure.
 
Thanks for the offer though, but this
is a once in a lifetime operation,” Zaira joked.

“Well, in any case, we’re getting
somewhere, so I would suggest you ring Brad now, and tell him to sell his story
to a reputable newspaper.
 
We’ll be
in that studio tonight.
 
You’re
going to meet with his father tomorrow, and then we’ll decide on our next
move.”

“All right, but I’ll go out to a
payphone to call, just in case anyone is tapping the lines in London.”

Zaira placed a brief call to
Brad.
 
He seemed so far away, she
nearly cried when she heard his voice.

“Listen, Brad, we haven’t got much
time, so here’s what I want you to do.
 
Ring one of these newspapers.
 
I’ll give you the names and numbers in a minute.
 
Get them to print your side of the
story.
 
Say that you've been in New
York all this time, not in LA, and give them the names, dates, places of anyone
you were with.
 
That will include all
of us in the cast of
Hamlet
,
and I'm sure Adam and Brian will be more than
willing to help.”

“But I don’t see...”

“Just do it, trust me.
 
It will work out, but under no
circumstances should you consider coming back until you hear from me or Matt
that it is all over.”

“I feel so helpless,” Brad sighed.

“I know, my love, but trust me,
things will work out.
 
I’ve heard
things about the investigation.
 
It’s going well.”

“When I get my hands on the person
who did this...”

“Don’t worry about that now,"
she soothed. "Just concentrate on what you're going to tell the papers
tomorrow.
 
Listen, what did your
father say when you told him?”

“It was just as I predicted.
 
Condemned without a trial.
 
He insists he's going to disown me, but
he’s said that before.
 
He’s
stormed out of the apartment, gone to a hotel.”

“Oh, damn!” Zaira sighed, now
feeling more certain than ever that Jonathan was going to make his big move
soon.

“Don’t worry, Zaira, the money
doesn’t make any difference to me.
 
I still have plenty of money to get by, and if my father has so little
faith in me, then I don’t want to be his son and heir anyway.”

“Brad, he’s your father, the only
family you have, and you would feel terrible if anything happened to him.
 
So please, for my sake, find him while
he's still in London,
 
and try to
patch things up,” Zaira begged.

“I don’t see why I should!
 
This is the one time in my life when
I've ever really needed him, and what does he do? He turns his back on me.”

“Brad, I'm going to have to go
now, so please do those things for me, and I'll talk to you soon.”

“Zaira, I miss you, I miss New
York.
 
I want to come home.”

“I want you to come home, darling,
believe me.
 
But it isn’t
safe.
 
Things will change.
 
Please, just work on “The Dark Lady,”
or anything you can to take your mind off things, and I’ll speak to you soon.”

“Listen, I’ve tried to ring you, but
haven’t got an answer.
 
Is there
something wrong with the phone?”

“I haven’t been answering it.
 
They're tapping the phones,” she
lied.
 
“I’ll ring again from
another payphone soon.
 
Take care.”

“I love you, Zaira.

“I love you too, Brad, no matter
what.”

Zaira was pensive that night as
she contemplated her meeting with Cormac Clarke the next day.
 
Certainly he and Brad had had their
differences, but was that any reason to suspect him of all the foul crimes he had
been accused of?
 
Unless of course
Jonathan was trying to put his foot even more firmly in the Clarke Studios
door, by offering Cormac “proof” of his son’s guilt in other ways?
 
Zaira felt a grown sense of fear that
she was in over her head, that Cormac was in grave danger, and only she could
help him.
 
If only he would listen
to her…

Zaira took her laptop computer
with her to the Bonaventure hotel, and checked into a small suite to wait for
Cormac Clarke’s arrival.
 
She used
the name Zoe Dominick, and rang the Studio offices to say it was an urgent
matter about “The Dark Lady” project.
 

The secretary reassured her that
Cormac had not forgotten the appointment, and also mentioned in passing that he
was just getting back from London, so not to be too impatient if he ran slightly
late.

Zaira was relieved to know that
Cormac had been out of Jonathan’s way in England, but she also wondered whether
it would cause problems for their investigation.
 
Now that the cat was back, the mouse might not be so free to
play around with his various activities on the side.
 
But with any luck, Brad’s exclusive might make front page
news, and force Jonathan’s hand.

Zaira wondered if she should get
Cormac to openly declare his faith in Brad in the national press. But she was
reluctant to make Cormac a sitting duck for Jonathan.
 
Would it not be better, if more dangerous, to get Jonathan
to think Cormac really was intending to make him his heir?
 

True, he might try to get rid of
Cormac more quickly, but on the other hand, he might just get careless,
thinking he had won it all.
 
It
certainly might prevent him from running away until they had enough evidence to
put him behind bars.

Zaira worked on her latest novel,
the story of her and Brad, thinly veiled as fiction.
 
She typed steadily, but always at the back of her mind was
the knowledge that the happily-ever after ending would not be the one for
her.
 
As soon as Cormac and Brad
found out who she was, it would be over between them.
 
Jonathan had won that battle, at least, but Zaira would make
sure he didn’t win the war.

A tap at the door signalled
Cormac’s arrival. Zaira hastily pulled him into the room before anyone could
see her.
 
She hoped Jonathan hadn’t
decided to come along for the ride.

Cormac stood gazing at her,
puzzlement written in his eyes.
 
Zaira took a step back. He was so like Brad in many ways, it was painful
to see him.

“I was told to meet Zoe Dominick
here, but you’re the girl I met in the apartment.
 
Auburn hair, grey eyes.
 
Where is Miss Dominick?”

“Please, Mr. Clarke, won’t you have
a seat.
 
I’m afraid there are a few
disturbing revelations I'm going to have to make today, and that will be the
least of them.”

She briefly explained about her
deception concerning her identity to Brad, and the reasons for it.

Cormac looked her up and down
speculatively for a few moments, and then remarked caustically, “Well, I can
certainly see why my son decided to cast you as the Dark Lady.
 
You're a consummate actress, I’ll give
you that.”

“I’ve had a good teacher, my
husband, as a matter of fact. Hopefully soon to be ex-husband.
 
I was planning to divorce him on the
grounds of desertion, and that was the price for my silence about his
whereabouts.
 
But I can’t keep
silent any more. Not when I'm certain that he's doing a great deal of harm to
you and Brad.”

“Your husband?
 
I don’t know anyone called Dominick, or
Darcy for that matter, Miss, er-”

“Let’s make things simple, shall
we?
 
My name is Zaira.
 
Mr. Clarke, Cormac, you know all these
accusations against your son—”

“If you are going to plead on his
behalf, you’re wasting your time,” Cormac said, shaking his head. He started to
rise from the chair, stiff with anger.

 
“No, please, hear me out.
 
I love Brad, but a lot of this is my fault. You must give me
the chance to tell the truth, even if it means I’ll never see him again.”

“Your fault?” he exclaimed.
 
“How could it be, unless you’ve led him
into this seamy life. I hardly think that’s likely.
 
You’ve only known each other a few weeks.
 
So if he says he's innocent, don’t
believe him.
 
He's tricked you.
Tricked us all.”

“No, he hasn’t,” Zaira denied
stoutly, but softened her tone rather than risk angering Cormac even
further.
 
“Please, look at these
photos, tickets, evidence, and then tell me who's being fooled.”

She spread her evidence out on the
table for him piece by piece, explaining each item and its significance as she
went along.
 

Cormac looked completely skeptical
at first, as she showed him the photos of Mike the model, and the transcripts
of a couple of odd telephone calls they had recorded from the Studio
office.
 

But finally some photos Kelly had
taken the night before at the Studio, for one of their porn sessions, with
Jonathan right there looking on,
 
were enough to convince Cormac that every word she had told him was
true.

He sat silently with his head in
his hands for a few minutes.

Zaira was bold enough to go over
to him and touch his shoulder.

Cormac looked up at her and smiled
thinly.
 
“My God, and all this
time, Jonathan has been convincing me that Brad was skimming money off the top,
doing drugs, and now this smear campaign, with pornography.
 
But why?
 
Why is he doing all this?”

“For the same reason my husband
stole every penny from our advertising agency and ran, leaving me destitute,
alone, facing criminal charges.
 
Because he's utterly ruthless. He doesn’t care who he hurts, what he
destroys. He found a cozy niche for himself at Clarke Studios, and he aims to
make the most of it.

"I'm sure at first it started
out with him just lining his own pockets.
 
But Brad is your only son and heir, after the car accident that killed
your poor wife and daughter.
 
He
saw an opportunity to hit it big.
 

“But when Jonathan came to New
York with you and saw that by some quirk of fate, Brad and I had got to know
one another, and I could blow the whistle on him at any moment, he knew he had
to move fast.
 
I could have spoiled
everything for him simply by revealing his true identity.

"I know now that I should
have told the truth, and spared us all this. I admit I made a bad bargain with
him, and for that I'm truly sorry.
 
My only excuse is I loved Brad and didn't want to lose him.
 
Not so soon after finding him, when I'd
been looking for a wonderful man like him my whole life. It was selfish, I
know, but I really didn't see the harm in snatching a few days of bliss til the
play was over and I could think straight, and decide what to do for the best
for all of us."