Bombshell Max Collins (best ereader for textbooks .txt) 📖

to be disturbed here—and dug his key chain out of his slacks pocket. A backroom behind the concession stands across the way had a working phone.

But who should he call? The Anaheim police? Or the State Department? Even without Khrushchev on the grounds, the foreign intruders at the park would seem to be the business of the American government, after all. Had he added that agent—what was his name, Harrison?—to the names and numbers in the little black book he carried?

Walt dug that out, too, knowing it was time to leave the charming past and re-enter the dangerous present.

Under the moon’s watchful ivory eye, revolver in hand, Jack Harrigan—with cadaverous CIA agent Munson on his heels— raced across the manicured lawn of the Beverly Hills Hotel, dodging the heavy foliage as if avoiding shell holes on a battlefield, heading for bungalow number seven.

Although it was well after two in the morning, a light in the front room shot rays out around the edges of the drawn curtains, tiny beacons of hope in Harrigan’s very dark night.

The State Department man ignored the bell, pounding on the door instead with the ball of a fist, his gun in-hand behind his back. “Miss Monroe, it’s Jack Harrigan… Open up!”

No sound came from within.

He banged again.

Impatient, Munson said, “Damnit man, I’ll break a window…”

Like a safety patrol boy at a grade school, Harrigan held his out a hand in “stop” fashion. “No—I hear something. Wait…”

And then the lock clicked.

The door cracked open, revealing wide, brown eyes that were not Marilyn Monroe’s, peering back out at them from behind the chain-latched door.

The secretary.

“It’s May, isn’t it?” Harrigan asked, forcing a smile, not wanting to frighten the woman further. “Forgive me, but I’ve forgotten your last name.”

“It’s Reis,” she said quietly, guardedly. “May Reis.”

“Do you remember me, Miss Reis?”

Her face bisected by the chain, the secretary nodded.

“I’m with the State Department,” he reminded her, “and this gentleman is another government agent … his name is Munson. It’s important that we speak with Miss Monroe.”

The secretary shook her head, eyes narrowing. “She’s not here.”

Harrigan glanced behind the woman, taking in what he could of the living room through the cracked door. Munson’s breath was hot on his neck, an over-eager suitor.

“Where is she, Miss Reis?” Harrigan asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Is she inside—with Mr. Khrushchev?”

The secretary’s eyes grew wide again … with fear possibly, and perhaps something else… The burden of a secret? Harrigan was certain she knew where the missing pair had gone.

“She’s not here,” May Reis insisted. “They’re not here.”

They’re not here!

“Has she taken him somewhere?” Harrigan demanded.

The woman said nothing, her mouth a tight line, her face blank but for a twitchy nervousness about the eyes.

“Please let us in,” he said firmly.

“No.”

“Miss Reis, this is a matter of national security, of international importance.”

“Do you have a warrant?”

“I don’t need a warrant in a case of crisis like this. Open the door, or we’ll open it. Understood, Miss Reis?”

The woman closed the door. Harrigan could hear the chain being unlatched. Then the door opened again, wide this time.

The two men stepped inside the lavish, white-appointed bungalow, Harrigan keeping the weapon behind him, Munson leaving the door slightly ajar.

Harrigan approached May, who had retreated to the beige sofa, but she didn’t sit. Her chin high, the little woman wore a blue robe and fuzzy slippers, her short, brown hair disheveled, dark circles rimming troubled eyes.

Munson went into the bedroom, returned moments later, shaking his head.

“So they’re not here,” Harrigan said, and returned his weapon to its shoulder holster.

“I told you they weren’t,” the secretary said, not successful at hiding her alarm at the sight of the gun.

Folding his arms, planting himself before the petite woman like a sentry, looking down at her gravely, Harrigan did his best to intimidate the secretary, to shake her professional cool. “We have to find them, and soon—their lives are at stake.”

“Lives … ?”

“Didn’t Marilyn tell you? Somebody tried to murder Premier Khrushchev tonight … in his bed, here in the hotel.”

May collapsed onto the couch, sitting there numbly, staring at hands clasped tightly in her lap. Harrigan waited with strained patience, aware that Munson was pacing behind him, mindful that the CIA agent would use a more forceful tactic on the woman if Harrigan failed in his approach.

Finally the secretary spoke. “Marilyn told me not to trust anyone … not even you, Mr. Harrigan…” She looked up sharply at Harrigan, her distress turning suddenly to anger. “This is your fault!”

“My … ?”

“ Why didn’t you listen to her?” the secretary demanded. “You pretended to take her seriously … but you lied to her. You shrugged her off, because she was just some, some … dumb blonde to you!”

Munson stepped past Harrigan and loomed menacingly over the woman. “Lady, we don’t have time for your soap opera— where the hell are they?”

Eyes and nostrils flaring in fright, May reared back on the couch. Harrigan shot Munson a look, and the CIA agent backed off.

Harrigan took a seat next to May.

“Marilyn was right,” he admitted, his voice gentle. “The attempt to kill Khrushchev took place at two o’clock this morning, just as she’d predicted, based upon what she overheard …”

May was nodding at his words.

“… and, yes, it’s my fault. I wasn’t there to stop it. I promised her, and I let her down… I let both of you down.”

Harrigan hoped that this admission of culpability would soften the woman, but her lips remained a tight, stubborn line.

Harrigan sighed. “And now she’s helped the premier, and made herself a target, as well. This is an assassin, Miss Reis—a highly skilled, completely ruthless killer … and he’s after both of them, right now.”

The secretary stiffened, turning toward him on the sofa. Her eyes were friendly, but still she shook her head. “Marilyn said they’d be safe, where she’s taken him … that nobody could ever find them … and in the morning …”

Munson broke in. “The fact that we didn’t find you with your throat