If I Can't Have You (41 page)

“My father’s disappearance was the perfect cover for the real murderer,” Trevor said. “Do you honestly think Carole’s killer would have told the truth to protect my father?”

Trevor watched Charlie’s hands squeezing the knob at the top of his cane until his knuckles were nearly white. What was troubling him?

“Yes. I honestly believe the real killer would have done something to save your father—if it hadn’t been too late.”

“Why do you feel that way?” Adriana asked.

“Because Trevor Montgomery was a good man. He cared for people, like Janet. He helped her rehearse her lines and gave her the confidence she needed to be a good actress. He made sure there was an acting job for her when she got out of the hospital. She got to play his wife in
Break the Night.”
Charlie looked up, and Trevor saw the tears in his eyes. “She’d always wanted to play the part of Trevor’s wife. She might have been through in Hollywood if it hadn’t been for your father.”

“Most people have forgotten how generous he was,” Adriana said, “how much joy he brought into people
'
s lives—on-screen and off. He tried to live a normal life after Carole’s death, but he couldn’t. He loved being an actor, he loved being with his friends—but he lost the things that meant most to him after Carole died.”

“I’m so sorry your father had to suffer. He didn’t deserve it,” Charlie whispered, glancing at Trevor. “I wish there was something I could do to make things better for you.”

“We’ve read the police accounts and studied the photos,” Trevor said. “I doubt that you could help,
unless you have a clue who might have killed Carole. Of course, if you knew anything at all about the truth, I’m sure you would have helped my father sixty years ago.”

“I wish I could help him now,” Charlie said. “But it’s too late. He’s dead.”

“If you know anything at all, Charlie,” Adriana pleaded, “you could help my husband; that would be almost the same thing as helping his father. Please. Help us. My husband doesn’t believe his father was a murderer, but he has no proof.”

“I wish I could help,” Charlie repeated. “But I can’t.”

“It happened a long time ago, Charlie. I don’t want the public to know the truth. I just want to know for my own peace of mind. My father and I were very close. If you know anything at all, anything that might help me, it will be almost the same as helping him.”

“Yes, I can understand the need to protect the one you love.” Charlie walked slowly back to the bench and sat down. His fingers trembled as he rubbed his knees, his voice was barely a whisper when he spoke. “If I tell you...” His words trailed off, and then he began again. “It’s not fair of me to ask for forgiveness.”

“The only thing I want is to know in my heart that my
father
didn’t murder Carole. Nothing else matters to me anymore,” Trevor said. “Please, Charlie. Tell us what happened.”

Charlie stared at the floor for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, he spoke. “You have to know everything, right from the beginning.”

Adriana sat at Charlie’s side, and Trevor leaned against one of the uprights, waiting to hear what he hoped would be the truth.

“We were at the Trocadero,” Charlie began. “Janet looked beautiful. She was smiling and laughing with
everyone, no one ever would have known that Jack had fired her that morning. I knew, of course. I’d run into her shortly after she left Jack Warner’s office, and she told me everything. ‘It’s not fair,’ she’d cried. ‘Carole told him she’d quit if he didn’t get rid of me. She hates me, Charlie. She’s always hated me.’”

Charlie looked up at Trevor, all his concern, all his love for Janet showing in his eyes.

“She was so upset. That night, I knew she was close to another breakdown. She kept slipping in and out of her old roles. I don’t know if anyone else realized it, but I’d seen each of her movies so many times that I knew her parts by heart.

“I wanted to take Janet home,” Charlie continued, “but she told me that Trevor was going home with her. She had it all planned, she told me. ‘I’ve got champagne chilling, some caviar. We’re going to have a party. Just the two of us. Carole might have stolen one of my roles. She might have made Jack Warner get rid of me, but she’s not going to have Trevor Montgomery tonight.’ God, I was such a fool. She wanted Trevor, not me, but I kept hanging on in the background, waiting for my chance. I knew Trevor wasn’t interested in her as anything other than a friend, but she couldn’t see that as clearly as everyone else.

“Later on, I found her sitting all by herself, crying. She told me that Trevor didn’t want her. He wanted Carole instead. ‘I hate her,’ she said. ‘I wish she were dead.’ Again, I begged her to let me take her home, but she said she didn’t want to spoil my evening the way hers had been spoiled—and then she left. I thought about following her, but I had a job to do. Pictures to take. I waited until the last of the stars had left the Troc, and then I drove to Janet’s. I was going to ask her to marry me. I knew she’d laugh, but I didn’t care. I wanted her to know how much I
loved her, and that it didn’t matter to me if she was a star or not.

“Her car was gone when I got to her house. It must have been close to four in the morning. I waited for a long time, hoping she’d come back. When she didn’t, I started to worry. She was so upset when she left the party, I was afraid she might have tried to kill herself. And then I thought about what she’d said—that she wished Carole was dead. I didn’t think she could do it, but I got worried.

“I sped to Santa Monica. Trevor’s Duesenberg was in front of Carole’s house. I could see Janet’s car parked about a block away. I remember running up to the house, knocking, then just letting myself in when no one came to the door. There was blood everywhere. I gagged on the smell, willing myself not to get sick.”

Charlie’s lips trembled as he turned toward Trevor.

“I went into the bedroom. Janet was kneeling beside the bed, holding Trevor’s hand and crying. The knife was lying on his chest and there was blood everywhere. Oh, God. It was awful. I knew he was dead. He had to be. And Carole was lying there with her eyes wide open—just staring at the ceiling.”

Charlie hung his head and took several deep breaths.

“She was dead.” He looked at Trevor, at Adriana. “You’ve seen the pictures. She couldn’t possibly have been alive. I had to get Janet out of there. I knew what she’d done. She’d gone crazy, she’d done something horrible, and I didn’t want the police or the press to find out. She’d suffered enough already.”

Charlie took another deep breath. “I was sure that Trevor was dead, so I put the knife in his hands, making sure my fingerprints weren’t on it, then I picked up Janet and got out of the place.”

Charlie leaned against the wooden slats of the gazebo and closed his eyes.

For one short moment, Trevor thought about comforting him. Charlie loved Janet. It was easy to feel the pain he had gone through then and was going through now. But Charlie had let Trevor—a man who he’d thought was dead—take the blame for a murder. He felt no sympathy for that.

He looked at Adriana, at the tears streaming down her cheeks. She was trying to smile at him, but in spite of the revelation, happiness wouldn’t come.

“What did you do then?” Trevor asked, needing to know everything.

“I took her to my house. I carried her into the shower with me and got the blood off of both of us, and then I put her to bed. She didn’t know why she was in my house. I told her she’d gone home with me after the party, and she seemed to believe it. When she fell asleep, I called a cab and paid a fortune to be driven to Santa Monica. I got Janet’s car and took it back to my house. She was still asleep, and I just sat there on the edge of the bed praying that she’d never remember what happened.”

Charlie swept a hand through his hair. “It all seemed like the right thing to do at the time. Carole was dead. Trevor was dead. It didn’t matter to me that he’d be blamed for the murder. He couldn’t be hurt anymore.”

“But he
was
hurt,” Adriana blurted out. “He
thought
he’d killed
Carole Sinclair
.”

“I didn’t know he was alive,” Charlie stressed, his anguish clear in the redness of his eyes, the deep creases between his brows. “I didn’t know until I went back to Carole’s later that day.

“It must have been close to noon when I got a call that
her
body had been found. Janet was sleeping soundly, so I grabbed my camera,
jumped in my car, and sped to Santa Monica. There were no other photographers there, and I pretended I was with the police and sneaked inside. It was my chance to make sure I hadn’t left anything behind that might implicate Janet.

“Carole was on the bed, but Trevor was gone. I didn’t see a knife anywhere. I didn’t see any signs that Trevor had been there, either. I was beginning to think I’d lost my mind. I knew Trevor was dead when I put the knife in his hands. He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t breathing. I didn’t know what had happened, but I tried to stay calm, tried to pretend that this was just another murder case. No one seemed to care that I was snapping pictures of Carole. I was popping out flashbulbs right and left, and one rolled under the bed. I got down on my knees to get it, and I saw something sparkle just under the bedspread. I grabbed the
bulb and pulled at the shiny th
ing. It was a diamond choker, and I knew immediately it was Janet’s. I’d seen her in it dozens of times.

“I put the choker in my pocket and got out of there. Janet’s car was gone when I got home. She hadn’t left a note. Nothing. I went to her place, but she was gone from there, too. It was the Fourth of July, and I remembered Janet saying something about going to one of Harrison Stafford’s parties at Sparta. I hoped she’d be there, that she wouldn’t do anything crazy. I was afraid, too, that Trevor would be there, that he’d know what Janet had done and confront her, or turn her in to the police.

“It took so long to drive to Sparta. God, I hated those winding roads along the ocean. I got there as fast as I could. I ran out to the terraces where people were gathered. I heard a woman scream, and I ran toward the pool. Janet was on one of the upper terraces by then, yelling something about Trevor Montgomery floating in the water. I ran down to the pool,
but no one was there. A crowd was forming. Janet was telling everyone that she’d seen Trevor floating facedown in the pool. They were laughing at her. They knew she’d had a breakdown before, that she was unstable.

“She was sobbing. ‘Don’t let them laugh at me, Charlie. Please. Tell them I’m not crazy,’ she begged. I took her into the house and got her a drink, but she kept on crying, saying it was all her fault, that she hadn’t meant to hurt Trevor. I didn’t know what was going
on by that time. People were ru
nning around the place looking for Trevor. Someone said he’d been acting strange. Someone said he was drunker than normal. People were talking about Carole’s murder, about Trevor being with her the night before, and one assumption led to another.

“
Harrison Stafford was worried sick about his friend.
‘Trevor’s not involved. That’s impossible,’ he was shouting. He told everyone to leave—so Janet and I got out of there.”

Charlie looked at Trevor, at Adriana. His eyes were red, filled with unshed tears. “I know what I did was wrong. But once I’d put the wheels in motion, it was too late to turn back. I’d hidden the only piece of evidence that would prove Janet’s guilt. If the police found out what I’d done, I would have been arrested as an accessory.

“Jane
t cried all the way back to L.A. She kept saying, ‘
I remember it all, Charlie. Oh, God, what did I do?’
” Charlie shook his head. “She
told me she
didn’t want Carole to have Trevor, and then she told me everything. She’d gone home to get the champagne she’d planned to have with Trevor, and then she drove to Carole’s. She was tired of Carole getting everything. Tired of Carole taunting her and telling her she was mad.

“She got to the beach house before Carole and Trevor arrived. She crumbled sleeping pills into the
champagne, hoping they’d drink it and fall to sleep. She wanted Carole to die, but she didn’t want her to feel any pain.”

A vacant stare filled Charlie’s eyes as he looked across the gardens. “Janet was hiding in the living room when Carole and Trevor arrived. Carole was mad about something and stormed off to the bedroom. Trevor took the bottle and went outside.”

Trevor wanted to shut out the rest of Charlie’s words. He didn’t want to hear any more about the nightmare, but he needed to fill in those missing hours of his life.

“What happened then?” he asked.

Charlie tilted his head, looking away from the wall of roses he’d been staring at.
“Are you going to tell the police?”

“We’re not going to tell anyone a thing,” Adriana said. “We just want to know the truth, so Trevor can put it behind him. Please, Charlie. Go on.”

“Carole was asleep when Janet went into her room. She’d gotten a butcher knife from the kitchen.” Charlie closed his eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, then continued. “She thought if she stabbed Carole in the chest, she’d die instantly and not feel a thing. ‘It didn’t work,’ she told me. ‘Her eyes popped open, and she stared at me until blood came out of her mouth.’ She tried to struggle, Janet told me. She was screaming, and Janet kept hitting her with the knife, wanting to put her out of her pain. But Carole wouldn’t die, so Janet put the knife to Carole’s throat. Carole tried to grab it, but her strength was gone, and Janet wanted it all to end.” Charlie
swallowed hard
. “She sliced her throat.”