Brian Freeman - Stripped

“I do, yes,” Stride admitted.

Walker rolled his chair to the very edge of the balcony, where he could stare down at the waves slapping gently on the rocks. “Does it surprise you that many women want to marry me?”

Stride shook his head. “Not at all.”

Walker used his one eye to give him a knowing stare. “Very smooth, Detective. Of course, it’s my money. Actresses-hell, plenty of actors, too-seem to become very enlightened about wheelchairs and physical appearance when they think about all that cash in the bank. They tell me it’s love that matters. You really have to be from L.A. to make that line work.”

Stride laughed. Walker did, too.

“But MJ’s mother was different. Terrible actress-all the desire in the world but none of the talent. I think the director must have known she and I would hit it off, because he certainly didn’t send her to me because of her audition. Or maybe he just thought I needed a good lay. She wanted to be in this movie I was casting, and she was ready to do anything-I mean anything-to be in it. When I declined, she fell to pieces, crying. She was very unstable, but there was something oddly appealing about her. She was such a waif. I guess I wanted someone I could take care of. Much to the surprise of a lot of people in Hollywood, we got married. I guess you could say we were codependent for a while.”

“I understand,” Stride said. He thought about his second wife, Andrea. Their relationship was similar. Two people who needed each other but didn’t love each other.

“MJ was born two years later. I didn’t realize she was falling into a deep depression. People didn’t really talk about those things. I just thought she didn’t love me anymore and didn’t love the boy. I was a fool.”

Stride had read newspaper articles about Walker. His wife had killed herself a few years after MJ was born. “I think I know the rest,” he said.

“Yes, her suicide made the news. But you don’t know why , Detective. MJ understood it eventually, or he thought he did. He realized that my wife couldn’t stand the competition. She was fragile and neurotic, and I only made it worse. Because I couldn’t let go of the past, you see. MJ realized it, too. That’s why this business about the Sheherezade was so upsetting to him.”

Stride felt his senses shift as he heard the name Sheherezade. He tuned out his emotions and hardened his heart. It was a shame, because he found himself liking Walker Lane.

“You said your wife couldn’t stand the competition,” Stride said. “What do you mean? What couldn’t you let go?”

Walker sighed. “Yes, that’s what you’ve come for, isn’t it? To hear the real story.” He turned the wheelchair around and pointed up at the tower rising above the house. “Do you see it, Detective?”

Stride looked up, confused. He saw only peaked roofs and stone, and dozens of windows opening on the water. He saw the tower overhead, with a circular balcony at the top like a widow’s walk. “I don’t-” he began, but then his eyes finally lighted on the five stones different from the others in the tower. They were gray slate like the rest, but someone had carved a letter into each of them. There were other stones between them, so they were spread out, forming a word horizontally that stretched from one side of the turret to the other. Years of Pacific rain had washed down their edges, but he could still read it.

AMIRA

He stared down at Walker, not understanding. Walker was lost in thought, studying the letters with his one eye as if he could caress them.

“You named your estate after her,” Stride murmured. “Why?”

“Why? Detective, you’re not a romantic.”

“You killed her,” Stride said. The words slipped out.

Walker shook his head. He didn’t seem angry, just intense and heartbroken. “No, no. Never. Don’t you understand? I’d sooner kill myself. There are many days I’ve thought about doing that, just to be with her. I loved Amira. She loved me. We were going to be married that very night. The night that Boni Fisso murdered her.”

When they returned to the porch, Stride saw that the cloudless sky had dissipated into patches of darkness. It happened so quickly here, the changes from rain to sun, sun to rain. Drizzle began to dampen the garden outside and streak the windows. It grew colder. Walker called one of his staff, who stacked logs in the fireplace and started a blaze that quickly warmed the room. He opened wine, and Stride gave up his inhibitions and accepted a glass. Walker sipped the pinot noir and stared into the fire.

“I wish I could explain about Vegas in those days,” Walker said. “I think it had the same kind of allure that Hollywood did in the thirties. It was young, electric, glamorous. Millionaires rubbing shoulders with showgirls. Entertainers playing craps on the casino floor at two in the morning. Everyone dressed up in jewels and tuxes like they were going to the Met. I remember it seemed to me that everyone there was beautiful. Everyone was rich. It was illusion, of course. Sleight of hand. That’s what the town is so good at. You couldn’t walk into one of the casinos then and not get caught up in it. Maybe that’s because the real world seemed so far away. Walk a hundred yards in any direction and there was nothing but desert, an utter wasteland. I remember driving there on this two-lane nothing road from California, spending hours in the darkness without a glint of light anywhere. Then you’d see a glow like fire on the horizon, and you’d come over the crest of a hill and find this neon island blazing out of the night.”

“Helen Truax said the town had star quality then,” Stride said.

“Yes, she was right. That’s exactly what it was.”

Stride added, “Helen was one of the dancers with Amira.”

Walker shook his head. “Was she? I don’t remember her.”

“Her stage name was Helena Troy. She says she slept with you.”

Walker looked embarrassed. “I don’t doubt it. I played the game. I was young and rich, and I liked to sleep with lots of girls in those days. Vegas seduced me like so many others.”

“What about Amira?”

“Yes, her, too. She seduced me. Have you read about Flame?

Stride nodded.

“Words can’t do it justice,” Walker said. “I think I fell in love with Amira the very first time I saw it. I had had plenty of flings, but Amira was different. I fell for her, head over heels. Maybe I’m flattering myself, but I think it was the same for her. Perhaps she just wanted my money, or wanted an escape, but I think she loved me, too, just as passionately.”

“But Amira was Boni’s mistress, wasn’t she?” Stride asked.

Walker ’s face, the part of it that moved, showed his pain. “Foolish, wasn’t I? Naive. I was playing with gangsters, and I thought it was just another one of my movies. The tough guys in suits and fedoras looked like actors. But this was real.”

“What happened?”

“We thought we could keep it secret,” Walker said. “No one would know how we felt, until we were long gone and married.”

Long gone , Stride thought again.

“I wasn’t good at hiding my feelings. I was young, and love was written all over my face. Everyone knew it. They knew when I showed up every weekend at her shows. Boni knew, too, of course. Leo Rucci told me how it was. He told me Amira was Boni’s property, like a chair or a dog. That made me furious, but I pretended it was just a crush, nothing serious. Amira was the better actor. She never so much as looked at me in public. She told Boni if I ever laid a hand on her, she would knock me flat. Boni laughed about that, she said. So you see, we thought we were getting away with it. After her performance, in the middle of the night, she’d slip up to my suite on the roof, and we’d be together. It was our secret.”