Page 67 of The Girl Who Knew Too Much

They both looked at the green handbag sitting on the coffee table where Irene had dropped it earlier.

“Open it,” Oliver said.

Irene went to the coffee table, picked up the bag, and opened it. She took out a lipstick, a compact, a hankie, a small coin purse, and a sheet of folded paper.

She unfolded the paper. “Looks like notes. Handwritten.”

She read a few sentences out loud.

“Trust me, you’ll want to hear what I’ve got to tell you. I know what really happened the night Gloria Maitland died.

“There’s a phone booth on the corner of Olive and Palm streets. Be there at eleven thirty tonight. I’ll call you and tell you where to meet me.

“There’s an old abandoned warehouse at the end of Miramar Road...Remember, come alone. Deal’s off if I see anyone else.”

Irene stopped and looked up, shocked.

“It’s a script,” she said. “Someone gave Daisy Jennings a script to make sure she got all her lines right.”

“Is that the end of the script?”

Irene looked down again. “No. There’s another line. It’s scribbled in on the side of the page. A last-minute addition, maybe.Ask Tremayne aboutIsland NightsandPirate’s Captive.”

“Those sound like film titles,” Oliver said.

“But those aren’t the two movies that Tremayne made in Hollywood.”

“Tremayne wouldn’t be the first fast-rising star to have a couple of pornographic movies in his past.”

“That’s the sort of problem that studios fix all the time,” Irene said. “You don’t kill someone because of a pornographic film.” She hesitated. “Do you?”

“That probably depends on what’s on the film.”

“Are we going to give this script to Detective Brandon?” Irene asked.

“Not until we know for sure what’s going on.”

Chapter 28

The assistant had given him the wrong key. It did not fit the lock that secured the chains. He was trapped in the steel cage.

That was all the warning he got.

He wasted precious seconds extracting thebackup key from its hiding place and unlocking the chainsthat bound him. He knew then that he had notbeen given the wrong key by mistake. There were nomistakes in an Oliver Ward illusion.

He was going to die if he did not free himself.

The first shot ripped into his thigh. Blood poured out in a hot fountain. The second shot grazed the same leg.

The third shot missed, just barely. He heard the shriek of metal as the bullet struck the chains.

He could hear the audience screaming now. The sound seemed to come from another dimension. He could not see anything because of the black curtains draped around the Cage of Death.

The horrified shouts and screams got louder. He realized the blood was leaking out of the cage and falling onto the stage.

His leg burned with cold fire. So did the truth. What had happened was not an accident...

Oliver came awake in an icy sweat, the way he always did when the nightmare struck. He sat up slowly, wincing at the throbbing ache in his thigh. The combination of whiskey, aspirin, and ice had taken the edge off earlier, allowing him to fall into a restless sleep, but the effects had worn off.