Joe quickly managed a dry laugh. “Kelly, you’ll need to get checked out…for insurance purposes, all that.” He suddenly looked stricken. “I hope you’re all right! You’re due in Florida, at the theme park, on Tuesday!”
“I’ll be there,” Kelly said.
“Not if it jeopardizes your health!” Joe said.
She was fairly certain that he was sincere. Joe was a character. So were most of the people with whom she worked. Still, they’d been together a long time, and she believed that he did care about her.
Once again, Kelly tried to reassure everyone. “I’m fine.” But it didn’t seem to matter. The police had arrived along with the ambulance.
“Kelly, this is the way it has to go,” Joe said.
She knew that he was right. The show couldn’t afford a lawsuit, so the least minor accident required an investigation.
A gentle officer with graying hair and a kindly manner quizzed Kelly as she was seated in the ambulance. Mel hopped in with her. Like Joe, he was more than a co-worker. He was a friend, almost a father figure to her. He grinned, but looked a little worried.
“On the bright side, it will be in all the magazines,” he told her.
“The rags,” she said dryly.
“There is no such thing as—”
“Bad publicity, I know.”
“Miss, please lie down and relax,” the emergency medic said gently.
“But I’m fine. And whatever you do, please don’t put the siren on—”
But it blared, despite her protests.
Despite the obvious legal repercussions, Joe Penny wasn’t worried about the future of his show. After all, accidents happened. This one, however, was baffling. They’d chosen the place specifically for the cliff-top scenes. He’d been delighted to get the property for the price they’d paid for the day. He hadn’t been forced to pay travel bills to create the look of an island. Yes, they’d had to shuffle things around from the set—the cameras, the lights, costumes, trailers—but it had been a song compared to what they would have paid to find the right look on a Caribbean island. Everything had gone smoothly…until now.
The crowd had been dispersed. The officer in charge of the investigation, Ben Garrison, was a fellow with an easy manner that kept everyone calm. He and his men had asked dozens of questions of everyone involved, from the set director to the lighting personnel and camera crew. Even a few of the bystanders had been asked about what they’d seen.
Waiting to speak with the officer himself, Joe suddenly groaned inwardly. He loved his show. It was a good show. It held its own in an ever-changing world—and an ever-changing market.
He’d been through serious problems on the set before—murder could definitely be considered a serious problem—but the show had prevailed. And that was all in the past now.
He could feel himself sweating though the air was cool. As he waited, he stared at the house on the cliff, suddenly hating the edifice as if it had human qualities. Matt Avery walked up behind him.
“I don’t produce or direct,” Matt said quietly, “but we are vested in this show just as deeply as anyone else. And I have a suggestion, because this was one of the scariest ‘accidents’ I’ve ever had to witness.”
Joe turned to look at the man and forced a smile. The show had prevailed through its problems because of Household Heaven—and the company’s advertising dollars. Matt Avery was the man with the power to say how Household Heaven would continue to spend those advertising dollars. And Matt was a businessman first and foremost—and a very rich and powerful one at that.
“Your suggestion?” Joe asked, knowing what Avery was going to say. And understanding his concern.
“If it had been any other cast member, I might be inclined to think it was an accident,” Matt said. “But it was Kelly who fell. She could have gone over that cliff. The very landscape that meant so much to us as a location could have killed her.”
“The police are investigating.”
“But you rehearsed that scene. Over and over.”
“Maybe that’s what dislodged the earth,” Joe mused.
“Maybe one of those hundreds—or thousands—of people sending in hate mail meant for Marla Valentine to die.”
“Matt! We kept this shoot hush-hush.”
“There was a crowd here tonight.”
Joe waved a hand in the air, looking around. Matt Avery and some of his crew had been invited. There was the fellow he’d met through another executive on the show who was looking to do a rock video. The guy in the shades was the rock star. And one of the cameramen had asked if his visiting sister could be there. As to the others…he didn’t know. No one had pushed forward out of the crowd. The curious and the fans that had gathered around had politely kept their places out on the street.
“Matt, Kelly is an actress,” he said.
“Yes, and one we care a lot about. Come on, Joe, you don’t want another scandal with this show.”
“Actually,” Joe said uneasily, “scandal can be good. The audience thrives on who is doing what—and who,” he added dryly.
“We’re not talking about the sex lives of the stars, here,” Matt said. “We’re talking lethal scandal, and I don’t believe you want any kind of that ugliness tingeing the show again. I know that I sure as hell don’t.”
“What are you saying?” Joe demanded.
“We’ve got to take care of Kelly.”
“And how do you propose we do that?” Joe demanded.
“Well, Mel will have to be in on this, and Kelly’s manager also. But this is very serious. We have to work this out, for the sake of the show. And for Kelly, of course.”
“Of course,” Joe agreed, but he wondered why he was already feeling so ill. Valentine Valley was his show. He’d conceived it, worked it, tended to it like a lover. And he liked to believe he called the shots. But he also knew that, even as he professed his deep concern, Matt Avery had it in for Kelly.
Lance Morton remained outside the hospital emergency doors, having followed the emergency vehicle that had brought Kelly. There was not another soul outside the hospital doors. No one. It had apparently been a slow night in the City of Angels, a place so named despite the fact that every sin in the world was committed there.
It still awed him. Lance was a hometown boy. From the Midwest. Corn-fed, as he liked to say. In fact, people not from there liked to make fun of Ohio. But it had been a good enough place to grow up, and definitely a good enough place to study music. It had been a great place to get a garage band together, that was for sure. And now…
He still stood on the walk just beyond the emergency doors, even though she had already left with her agent. The outside had been thronged. How people had heard so quickly, he didn’t know. But there had been a crowd, mostly waving and wishing her well, a few calling out that Marla Valentine was getting what she deserved.
He probably could have gotten in. She didn’t know him. But Mel did. Besides, she would know him very soon!
Yes, he could have tried to get close…but he hadn’t done so. Instead he had stayed outside, like a scorned lover, or a would-be idolizer, just watching from afar. He adored her. And just knowing how close he was—not just touching her from the fringes, but being close, really close—gave him a feeling of rapture.
He felt a trembling all over. Soon they would dance. She, the object of his absolute affection, would be with him. Him, a nobody from the Midwest. Little Lance Morton, a nerd to some in high school. But the world was about to change. He was going to work with Kelly Trent.
With Kelly, he was going to tango right into terror!
CHAPTER 2
“Okay, you two. Why, exactly, am I here?” Kelly demanded.
A week after the incident, Kelly was just as frustrated, if not more so, than she had been the evening she had fallen. In the fleeting space of those few seconds, it seemed now everything had changed.
At the hospital, she had been given the exact diagnosis she had realized herself—s
he had a few scratches and bruises. She had been stunned by the concern that had arisen, even from her friends. Yes, she had been terrified at the time of the accident. But it had been an accident, and it was over. In her mind at least.
But no amount of protesting on her part would keep others from being concerned. She had been forced to forgo Soap Week at the theme park, yet found herself in Florida at Mel’s insistence, anyway. Something to do with the people who had been at the shoot and a music video. She hadn’t been in the least interested when he had first mentioned it. Yet he had kept nudging, telling her that since Joe Penny had been adamant about her not attending Soap Week, she could at least take the time to meet some of the people involved.
Ally Bassett was so concerned that she was in Florida as well. That Mel could sound cheerful about Ally’s presence meant they’d finally found something to agree on. Mel thought that, as her manager, Ally should be watching Kelly’s earnings and expenditures with a far more jaundiced eye. Ally was of the belief that you had to spend money to make money.
But since even her closest friends seemed really concerned about the accident, she had agreed to take the trip south that they had urged. It was to be a “vacation” combined with a fact-finding mission about the offer she’d had to do a music video. And though the very thought made her wince, Mel had been insistent on her finding out more about it, at the very least.
So now she sat on the balcony of her South Beach hotel suite staring at the two of them, and wondering why they were looking at her so seriously. And, for that matter, not only being polite to each other, but seeming to be allies, completely of one mind.
“How’s the coffee?” Mel asked.
“It’s fine, thanks. It’s coffee,” she said.
“Do you want anything else?” Ally asked.
They’d ordered up room service, and it, too, was just fine. Everything was fine.
Kelly sighed. “Just talk, you two. I swear I’m fine. Happy as a lark, though I can’t believe that you two are ganging up on me.”
Ally looked at Mel. “We’re not ganging up on you!” she protested.
“Never,” Mel assured her somberly. “We’re both here in your best interest, Kelly.”
“I know. And thank you. So…”
“So!” Mel looked at Ally, took a deep breath, then looked at Kelly very seriously. “Kelly, you should take the video.”
“Guys, I really don’t know. I find the idea very risky, career-wise. And I don’t really know that much about it.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Mel said. “You can meet the people involved, get a firm grasp of everything that will happen.”
“You might as well take the gig,” Ally said flatly. “You’re character’s been attacked and is in a coma. Quite frankly, I’m afraid that Marla is going to die.”
“What?” Kelly said, so startled she nearly spilled her coffee.
Mel shot Ally a look, obviously annoyed. Then he inhaled on a deep breath. “Kelly, it’s gone too far. They’re very afraid for you right now.” He hesitated. “And Ally’s not wrong. There has been talk about having to kill you off.”
“Oh, come on! You have to be exaggerating. They can’t kill me!” Kelly said, somehow managing to keep her composure despite the words being stated. She wanted to sound as if it absolutely couldn’t be true, but even as the protest left her lips, she wondered, could it be true? Is that why Mel had gotten together with Ally to break this news to her?
“This will blow over. And with Marla in a coma, I’ll get a few weeks’ vacation out of it. But I don’t understand why they would kill me off.”
“Kelly, you became a ball-buster,” Mel said. He lit a cigarette, puffed twice and tamped it out. Mel was always trying to quit smoking. He sighed. “I’m not explaining this well.”
“No, you’re not,” Ally agreed.
He shot her another severe stare. “You’re not helping much!” He turned to Kelly. “We’re speaking about your character on the show, of course. But many people think that you are Marla Valentine. And people really hate you.”
Despite her resolve, her voice was thick as she added, “A ball-buster, yes, but…I’ve never gotten more fan mail. I’ve never felt…well, more important to the show!”
“Well, there is that. And Kelly, everyone with the show knows that you’re one of the nicest, most dedicated actresses in the business. The thing is, everyone does care about you. So they’re worried. And because of that, they’ve decided that you will be written out for at least the next four months.”
She gasped with surprise and dismay. “Four months! People will forget me.”
“Hopefully not. You’ll be the subject of a lot of conversations as they try to solve the dilemma regarding what happened to you,” Ally put in.
“Four months…” Kelly murmured. “I just can’t believe it!”
“But you have to believe it,” Mel told her, shaking his head. “Kelly, do you ever read your mail? It’s deadly serious! The powers that be have no choice but to take it all to heart.”
She could do nothing but stare at him for a moment, shocked. Yes, her character was hated, hated in absolutely the best way a soap actress can be hated. Once sweet, Marla Valentine had become the evil vixen on the show, and in the show within the show. Marla had become an advice diva. Not that she had any credentials, but in Valentine Valley, no credentials were necessary. Kelly sometimes wondered just who in the writing department had such a deep, almost manic loathing for men. But there had to be someone in there with a very real and seething emotion, because her character now spent a certain amount of each half hour spewing venomous advice regarding cheating husbands, alcoholic husbands, nonworking husbands and, in fact, any poor fellow who just wasn’t nice. She’d been a little wary of the turn in the scripts at first, but then she’d had to admit herself, she’d never received more mail.
Apparently, there were a lot of women who did feel burned—and enjoyed the chew-’em-up, spit-’em-out suggestions given by her character. And though Kelly knew that many women were taken in by the wrong man and emotionally injured, her own opinion was that the bad out there worked both ways. Men and women could be incredibly cruel to one another, and, unfortunately, in most relationships, someone got hurt.
But Marla Valentine was a character, nothing more. And since they were talking daytime soap, she was really more of a caricature, whose opinions were as far from Kelly’s own personal philosophies as it was possible to get.
“It won’t happen,” Kelly said firmly. “Being evil has brought more attention than anything else the character has ever done before. She’s flying like an eagle right now. People love to hate a villainess.”
“And they love to see a villainess get her just rewards,” Mel said.
She shook her head again, dismayed that a rupture in a hill of earth could have done this to her. “Okay, I’m in a coma now. But things have never been so hot for Marla! We both know that what really matters is money, and I’m making them a lot of money right now. Trust me. The few months will go by, and I will get out of the coma.”
“No,” Mel murmured, looking away. “I really don’t think so.”
“Then, if they kill me off, I’ll come back as a ghost?” Kelly said lightly. “Or as my innocent twin sister from Peoria, whom I knew nothing about because we were separated at birth?”
Mel breathed a deep sigh. “Kelly, please listen. I’m trying to explain everything. There was trouble on your set before. Real trouble. So people are a little gun-shy these days. And they’re afraid. Some of these letters your character has received are extremely threatening. The show can’t afford any more trouble like this. And since they’ve made Marla so despicable, some people feel that it’s time to put an end to her.”
“Dead and gone, we’re afraid,” Ally said. “Joe said as much when we met with him the other day.”
“Great. Why wasn’t I at this meeting?” she demanded.
“Joe said you weren’t to come,” Mel said flat
ly.
“Joe’s a coward!” Kelly muttered. She stared at Mel. He was her friend, as well as her adviser. A man in his late fifties now, he was fierce when he needed to be, dignified in any situation and as kind as Santa when his clients were distressed. She believed with her whole heart that he never meant anything but the absolute best for her. And that he fought for her like a tiger, as well.
She looked at Ally Bassett. Though she wasn’t as close with Ally, she had liked her from the moment they met. Ally, too, was fierce. She meant to do the best for her clients, because she meant to further her own career.
“Okay, so I may actually be fired,” Kelly said. “What do we do now?”
“Just consider the music video,” Ally said.
“Consider it very, very seriously!” Mel said.
“Okay,” Kelly said, resigning herself to the idea. “When do I meet these people?”
“There’s going to be a party on a yacht,” Ally told her. “It will be fun.”
“Fun, right!” Mel agreed, though he gave a little shudder as he said the words.
“You’ll get to meet the people involved. Kelly, they want you so badly! They’ll pay extremely well. Just remember, Courteney Cox got her start dancing with Bruce Springsteen!” Ally added.
Kelly looked at her. “She was very young at the time. I’m afraid I’m not that young! And I’ve been working on the soap forever!”
“This is a new venue that can keep you from winding up being typecast,” Mel said flatly. “It’s time to stretch your wings a bit.”
“I could do a play,” Kelly said.
“You could. But this will be big money, and it will keep you in the public eye. The commitment isn’t forever. After, you’ll be a more wanted and valuable commodity. Trust me. Then, if you want, you can do your pick of plays.”
“You’re both going with me, right?” Kelly said.
Mel shot Ally a stare and said, “I’ll be there.”
“I have a few things to take care of here today, then I have to get back to California tonight,” Ally said. “Actually, I would love to go. It’s Marc Logan’s yacht. No expense spared. I’m truly sorry not to be there!”