Chapter Thirty

THREE VODKAS LATER, my body moves in sync with the fit young bartender from the hotel’s seedy cocktail lounge downstairs, Mack or Mick—can’t remember his name. Who cares? Doesn’t matter. In the decade since I made Hollywood my home, the amount of doesn’t matters could fill a theater with standing room only.

My hands grasp his firm twentysomething ass, and my breasts press hard against his smooth, hairless chest. He moans, whispers sexy things, and I return the volleys on cue. I know my lines.

The second round wraps up quickly—a collage of mouths on body parts—and the cooldown begins. Only then, when the young man loses all shape and form, becoming nothing more than a function of night, can I finally relax. Closing my eyes with a companion smile, the lover mistakes it for pleasure, the frothy laugh for the satisfaction he thinks he gave me. Feeling generous, I let him have it.

“So good, better than I imagined,” he says as he sits up, stretches, showing off his strong abdomen and, thankfully, signaling his imminent getaway. “But break’s over. Got to head back downstairs for the late shift. Can’t have the boss complaining ‘Where’s Mick?’”

Mick.I tell myself, You do need to remember his name. And you do want the boss complaining that he’s late. One more added detail, one more witness.

I watch him strut toward the heap of clothes near the door. He just slept with the woman every man in America desires, and every woman strives to emulate: Lena Browning, Tinseltown’s leading lady. Long, supple legs, cat eyes enhanced by thick arched brows that are five shades darker than her highlighted shoulder-length blond hair, with a mysterious half smile that captivates audiences, dominates magazine covers. Make no mistake, not the Girl Next Door. That title goes to Doris. No, we’re talking beguiling, knife-in-your-back Queen of the Trysts—that actress. At thirty-six (in Hollywood years I’m twenty-nine), I am no longer an actor—not even a person—but a high-paid femme-fatale fantasy.

If only they knew.

The bartender turns to me as he slips on his well-worn loafers. “Dinner next time, perhaps?” he asks with a sly, lazy grin. I force a smile back and let my eyes do the talking: There won’t be a next time. I needed you as an alibi. Now go.

THE NEXT MORNINGin my trailer, Connie, my personal assistant, places cucumber slices doused in chamomile over my eyes to help correct the morning puffiness. A masseuse is busy working my feet and both women are discussing the homicide that took place last night, the body found floating face down in Lake Placid, about twenty minutes from our movie set.

Connie speaks first. “A bullet right between the eyes... father of three. Near his vacation home, apparently.” Everyone, especially those in this industry, loves a good murder story.

“I hear the wife is a suspect,” chimes in the masseuse. I refrain from rolling my eyes beneath the cucumber slices and bite back a smile. Here it comes. Grist for the gossip mill.

Connie’s turn. “A neighbor said she heard the man and his wife arguing earlier that day. I saw her interviewed on the news this morning.”

“A nightmare,” I respond, sitting up and removing the sticky slices from my eyes, while mustering the appropriate look of concern and shock.

But inside, I am high-fiving. Thrilled to learn that the wife is now a suspect. This should buy me enough time to wrap up this movie and get out of Dodge before anyone comes sniffing. Because I, alone, know the real story, all the facts.

The dead man, father of three, was an engineer with the U.S. Department of Defense, identified as Ralph Winters. He happened to be taking his kayak out for an evening paddle near his Lake Placid vacation home that day. A man of rigid habit, Winters doesn’t happen to do anything. That was the beauty of this kill... the predictability made it so damn easy.

Earlier that day, Winters was enjoying a happy hour schnapps or two and a cigar, legs splayed out lazily from his Kelly-green Adirondack chair on the end of his dock, a ritual he adhered to every evening. He finished off the cigar, then took his usual hour-long ride ’round the bend before dinner—his favorite activity and only daily exercise. He loved the quietude as the sun began to set. Just him and his lake. His slice of paradise. While approaching a deserted section of the bend, Winters “happened” upon a redheaded woman in a canoe frantically waving her arms, crying out for help. It looked like she’d lost her paddle. A damsel in distress. (What actress among us hasn’t played this demeaning role on repeat?) Whether you are a man or a Nazi or a Nazi-in-hiding like Winters, woman-in-despair works every time. Even the worst among men envisions himself a knight in shining armor on occasion.

Steering his kayak my way, Winters sidled up to help me, his jaw dropping like a dump truck when he saw the barrel of my pistol facing him at point-blank range.

I stared deep into his shocked pale-blue eyes when he realized that the redhead with the gun was the film star Lena Browning. If only I could have photographed that look.

“Why?” he asked.

“Why?” I laughed in his face. “You know damn well why. You’re a liar and a murderer. No more hiding. I know who you really are. Saw you with my own eyes riding alongside Jürgen Stroop wherever he went. His bitch. This is for Stach Sobieski and so many others—with love from the Warsaw Ghetto.” My all-time favorite line. Cheesy, but I’ve used it on repeat. I aimed my Browning P35—a replica of the original—and took one perfect shot right between his eyes.

Never. Waste. A. Single. Bullet.

Winters fell sideways, tipping the kayak over with him, and I relished his portly plunge into the icy water. Every pore on my skin rose animatedly, and my heart danced as blood cradled the man’s bloated face, his cheeks filling up with water like a puffer fish, a bluish-black halo of plasma encasing his bald head.

The dead man was not Ralph Winters from Darien, Connecticut, a town known for its anti-Semitic history. He was Rolf Wagner, born in Munich, Germany, and rose in the S.S. ranks to become a high-level Nazi engineer, who was sent to Warsaw to serve directly under Jürgen Stroop.

Wagner was single-handedly responsible for masterminding the bomb attack on the ?egota headquarters, setting the entire building on fire, and then a month later, his most memorable explosion: the destruction of the Great Synagogue of Warsaw—signifying the Nazis’ ultimate victory over the Jews of Warsaw. It took four weeks for the Nazis to quash my people—not two days, as Vladek predicted. Four full weeks of the ghetto’s fighters giving everything they had—slingshots against tanks—to the very end. If only Zelda had lived to see her fighters hanging on until the very last bullet. If only I were there too.

Wagner should have been tried for his war crimes in Nuremberg. The evidence against him was staggering, with many eyewitness reports. But he possessed that little something extra special that protected him and bought him a golden ticket to freedom: superb technological skills and engineering expertise. Instead of hanging by a noose, he was saved by the U.S. government, as part of its Operation Paperclip, a top secret intelligence program in which sixteen hundred high-ranking Nazi scientists, engineers, and technicians were rescued from Nazi Germany, their criminal pasts wiped clean, and given U.S. government employment after the war.

Why waste a brilliant mind, right?

I heard rumors about Paperclip and decided I needed to find out for myself if it was true. I did my research and assembled a list of high-level American leaders who were there at the Nuremberg Military Tribunals—particularly those in the inner sanctum of the American High Commissioner for Occupied Germany—the men in charge of deciding Nazi guilt or doling out clemency. On the heels of the huge success of my film Moon Over Monaco in 1953, I made sure I was invited to a prestigious White House cocktail party loaded with military bigwigs to see what I could discover up close.

When I was introduced to a prominent married Pentagon official named Frank Campbell (on my list), who appeared to have a yen for tall, lanky blond movie stars and a penchant for gin and tonics, I knew I’d found my man. The flirty gentleman was perfectly drunk and bragging about his wartime activities to impress me. We talked about Europe, politics, movies, and I kept making sure that his glass was full.

“Did you have direct dealings with the Nazis?” I asked, playing dumb.

“More than direct.” He grinned. “I had a key role serving in Germany right after the war, in Nuremberg.”

And that’s exactly why I’m here.“There’s talk that some high-level Nazis escaped to Argentina and Venezuela. What about on our soil?” I signaled the bartender over for another round.

“Now, that’s classified information.”

“Now, that’s sexy,” I said, lightly pressing against his tuxedo jacket, giving him a better view of my cleavage. “Sounds like you are a classified kind of guy. If only I had that list of Nazis hiding here...”

“What would Hollywood’s most famous star do with a list of Nazis?” He laughed, raising a curious bushy brow.

I winked back. “You mean, what would Hollywood’s most famous star do for a list of Nazis?” I matched his brow lift, laughed lightly, luring him out of the ballroom into a nearby private alcove.

“I’m serious,” he said.

“Well, so am I. The thing is, Frank... I’m not just simply curious,” I told him, remembering Zelda’s words that the best lies are wrapped around a truth. “Nobody knows this, so I’m trusting you, but I just signed on to star in a top secret role in a new film about a female rocket scientist planning to outsmart her Russian counterparts. The woman will stop at nothing to get to the top, even luring a Nazi rocket genius to help her.” I paused, cleared my throat. “I can’t reveal more than that, because of my contract. But that’s why I’m here in Washington—doing research. And now, lucky me, I seem to have met the right guy.” I squeezed his arm, saw his face change colors, and knew it was time to pounce. I leaned in and gave him a deep kiss.

“I can’t believe I’m kissing Lena Browning,” he panted.

I stopped mid-kiss and whispered huskily, “And I can’t believe I’m with such an important military hero. Is there any chance I could see the document? Perhaps there’s someone on it who I could talk to off the record for deep background, to really develop my new character.” My eyes ignited with hope. “Frank, it would mean so much. I really believe this is my Oscar-winning role. If you do this for me...” My voice trailed purposefully, accompanied by a firm press of my hand to his crotch to seal the deal.

A tryst at the Jefferson Hotel was planned for the following night. I exchanged my body for a glimpse of Frank’s classified list—a road map of prominent Nazis living free and easy in America, with their real names and locations. I picked one Nazi name from the list, a man who worked for NASA, then Frank quickly slipped the document back inside his briefcase and we got down to business.

I drugged Frank’s postcoital gin and tonic with heavy tranquilizers. And once he fell into a deep slumber, I removed the list from his briefcase, took photos, got dressed, and then shook him awake.

“Frank,” I told him in his drowsy state. “The evening was lovely, but best for both of our careers and your marriage that this never happens again. Did I mention that the president is a dear friend?” I placed my hand over my heart. “A man who easily trades government secrets for sex is not to be trusted. If I were you, I would watch my back.” And then I left, knowing Frank would not only keep his mouth shut, but would be looking over his shoulder for the rest of his life.

Rolf Wagner’s death was “payback” number four from my list of names. I will never be able to get to all sixteen hundred criminals, so I targeted only those Nazis I knew of personally back in Warsaw—who’d destroyed my family, my friends, my community, who had made it their mission to crush our existence.

As always, I had a solid alibi in place. Mick, the flirty bartender at my hotel, would be waiting for me right around the time I finished off Wagner. We prearranged a rendezvous in my hotel room timed perfectly. And after I was done with Mick, he’d never forget his own satisfying tryst with Lena Browning—something he’ll surely brag about to all his buddies, which I wholeheartedly welcome. More witnesses to back me up if anyone tries to connect me to Wagner’s demise.

As I watched Rolf Wagner float away like a wet Goodyear blimp under the setting sun, I let out a deep cleansing breath, and for a short, precious time, the part of me that would always be at war was tranquil and at peace.