Day One
July 21, 1952
Monday Afternoon
Wilde silently backed out of the woman’s bedroom when her thrashing and moaning got sufficiently loud, then he tiptoed down the stairs, ducked out the door and was gone.
Back at his office, he drank coffee and had a smoke.
He still needed to talk to her.
Should he head over now and knock on the door?
He pictured it.
No, she was too fresh in his mind.
He wouldn’t be able to look her in the eyes.
So now what?
He struck a match and watched the smoke snake up. The sulfur smelled like sex and was just as addicting. He lit the whole book on fire and stared at the flames. They were always the same. They were predictable.
Secret St. Rain.
Who was she behind those haunting eyes?
Suddenly the door opened and a woman walked in.
It wasn’t Secret.
It wasn’t Alabama.
It was someone Wilde didn’t know.
Their eyes locked and in that brief moment, Wilde’s life got complicated.
If Secret was yin, this woman was yang. She was just as hypnotic but in a contrasting way. Her hair was black, her skin was sun-kissed gold, her eyes were mysterious and her lips were made for one thing and one thing only. She was older than Secret, somewhere around the twenty-seven mark, four years younger than Wilde.
A perfect age, actually.
She was conservatively dressed in a crisp white blouse and a black skirt that was tight but ended slightly below her knees. Her hair was up. She wore a simple gold necklace. An image flashed in Wilde’s brain of him ripping it off and licking her neck.
“I’m London Marshall,” she said. “I’m in trouble and I’m hoping you can help.”
Wilde tapped a Camel out of the pack and held it towards her.
“No thanks,” she said.
“You don’t smoke?”
“I do, but only when I’m on fire.”
Wilde smiled, lit the stick and blew smoke.
“So what kind of trouble are you in exactly, London?”
The woman exhaled, pulled an envelope out of her purse and handed it to him.
It was too light to be money.
“This is what has me in trouble,” she said.
“This?”
“Right. Open it up and look inside.”