Stolen Kiss with the Hollywood Starlet
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Lauri Robinson
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19
Chapter One
Look out, Los Angeles! Shirley Burnette’s rolling into town!
Shirley giggled at her own thoughts. Could almost hear Pappy saying them.
He used to say, “Look out, Shirley’s up and at ’em,” every morning without fail.
Nose glued to the window, she was enthralled, so thrilled her own breath kept fogging up the glass. Swiping the glass clean, she felt her excitement rise higher and higher as she watched the buildings roll by.
Big ones, little ones and those in between.
Los Angeles.
Hollywood.
The place where dreams came true.
No more washing dishes. No more shucking corn. No more mucking out stalls. Nebraska was half a nation behind her, and that’s where it was going to stay.
The train whistle, a screech that could make the hair on your arms stand on end, sounded like bells straight out of heaven to her. She’d waited years to hear that sound.
Years and years.
This wasn’t just her dream, it had been her mother’s, and she had to make it come true. No matter what.
There had been times she’d wondered if that was possible, especially four years ago, when Pappy had died. That’s also when she’d focused on making it come true even harder. She’d tucked away every spare penny she’d made working for Olin Swaggert, and made sure none of the overgrown thugs he called sons didn’t get their grubby hands on it. She made sure they didn’t get their grubby hands on anything else, too.
Olin kept saying that she was bound to fall in love with one of his boys, get married and live right there on that pig farm forever.
She’d assured him that would never happen.
Never.
Ever.
A lot of lazy dewdroppers, that’s what the entire clan of Swaggert boys were, and more than once she’d wanted to throw in the towel. The only reason she hadn’t was because Olin had paid her. The Swaggerts were one of the few families who could afford to have a live-in worker.
Live-in because, thanks to some city slicker lawyer, as soon as Pappy had died, the Swaggerts got the farm. Lock, stock and barrel. The lawyer claimed Pappy had owed Olin money. Lots of it. She’d argued that, but that hadn’t done a wit of good. In the end, she’d been left with no place to live. No place to do much of anything. Olin had offered her a job—out of the goodness of his heart, that’s how he’d put it.
A heart like his didn’t have any goodness. He’d known how badly it had hurt her to see the house she’d grown up in, lived in her entire life, torn down, but that hadn’t stopped him from tearing it all down and plowing up the land.
Corn. That was all that was there now. A field of corn.
That lawyer hadn’t had a heart, either. He’d refused to listen to a word she’d had to say. So had the sheriff, who’d ordered her out of the house. It had been hard to swallow, that there was nothing left of her family. Other than memories and a dream, so with no other options, she’d taken the job with the Swaggerts and turned her focus to saving up the money to get here. To where the only thing she had left was sure to come true.
Los Angeles. The City of Angels.
It was fitting. A girl who sang like an angel should live in the City of Angels.
People had been saying for years that she sang like an angel. Pappy, of course, and other family members before they’d died, but town folks had said it, too.
Granted, the population of Roca, Nebraska, was little more than two hundred, but a couple of churches in Lincoln had paid her to sing at funerals. Donations. She’d gotten donations. Piddly ones. But money was money and every penny she’d earned had brought her one step closer to this day.
She was here to become a singer. Sing like she and Pappy used to. Sing like her mother had, years ago, when she’d been young and traveled the country. That’s how her mother and father had met. He’d heard Momma sing at a playhouse in Lincoln. Within two shakes of a cat’s tail, they were married and Momma moved to the farm.
Pappy had claimed that Momma had never regretted that because she still sang all the time. Just not on a stage. Shirley couldn’t say if that was true or not. She’d been young when her parents had died. Sometimes, late at night when it was dark and quiet, she could hear her momma singing inside her head and her heart. That’s where her singing lived, inside her, where no one could take it away from her.
Pappy had said that, as a baby, she’d never cried. She’d sung instead. Sung her lungs out from the day she’d been born. He said it was in her genes and that she’d grow up to be just like her momma. A singer. A famous one, like her momma had dreamed of becoming before she’d married her father.
That’s what she was here to do. Become a singer. A famous one. She would learn how to dance, too. Really cut a rug. Had to. The two, singing and dancing, went hand in hand.
Oh, yes, she was going to sing and dance, and live and laugh!
The train jerked and bucked as it rolled into the station, and she swiped away the fog on the window one last time before straightening the collar of her blue paisley dress and picking up her purse, ready to get her first real look at her new world.
An entire new world that was there for the taking. Her taking. Like apples hanging on a tree ready to be plucked.
Life is good. When you make it that way.
Smiling at her own thoughts, Shirley was first in line, standing at the door, when the heavy metal was slid aside. She rushed down the steps, wishing she could twist her head like an owl. There was so much to see.
Buildings that went so high into the sky a person could dang near touch the clouds if they were to stand on top of one, and cars, more than she’d seen in a month back in Nebraska, and people. Tall ones, short ones, skinny ones, fat ones, old ones, young ones...just all sorts. All sorts!
We’re here, Momma. The place where our dreams are going to come true!
In an attempt to quell her enthusiasm long enough to collect her luggage, she gave herself a nod and leaped off the edge of the train station platform.
A second later she comprehended the baggage compartment was in the other direction, and had to step back up on the wooden platform and follow the crowd heading that way.
That didn’t faze her.
She was too happy.
Too free.
Shirley stood in line, tapping a toe and looking in all directions, until it was her turn. Then she collected her suitcase, thanked the man wearing a bright blue coat with shiny brass buttons and spun around while filling her lungs with California air.
Full of train smoke, the air stuck in her throat. She had to cough three times to clear her passageway, and wipe aside the tears the coughing caused.
But none of that fazed her, either.
Nothing could.
Her ordinary life was over.
Or soon would be. Her first order of business was to find a job. The money she’d saved was down to a pouch of coins and a few bills.
She wasn’t overly particular, and certainly wasn’t afraid of hard work. Things took time; she fully understood that. Becoming a singing sensation would be no different. Until then, she could only imagine that no matter where she got a job, it would be wonderful. It had to be. This was California!
Swinging her purse in one hand, her suitcase in the other, she headed toward the blocks upon blocks of tall buildings. Made of brick and concrete, every building was connected to the next one. The entire block was that way. Every block for as far as the eye could see. Some buildings were tall, some short, some had arched windows and decorative dormers, others just had rows and rows of windows.
Ten. That one building had ten rows of windows! She couldn’t help but wonder what could be behind all those windows, and scurried forward, rushing across the street to the next block. The first floors of most every building were businesses, all sorts of them. One sold only shoes. Another cigars and tobacco. Another one sold cakes.
Just cakes?
She stepped closer and peeked in the big window. Sure enough. That’s all that was inside there. Cakes. And people buying them.
People. Good heavens but there were people everywhere. Dressed in fancy suits and work clothes alike. Men, that is. The women, they all had on stylish clothes. Not simple dresses like the one she was wearing. Someday, she’d have dresses like they were wearing, but she wasn’t going to worry about that. Not today. Not when there was so much to see.
Like that cake shop.
Who’d have thought a store could sell nothing but cakes? That was truly fascinating.
Everything was fascinating.
There were big signs, like the one about selling nothing but cakes, everywhere. In all the windows. On the storefronts and on the sides of the buildings, even sprouting out of the rooftops like an old man with only a few strands of hair sticking straight up.
Billboards. That’s what those signs were called. She’d seen pictures of them in magazines. Every chance she’d got the past few years, she’d popped into Lester Frank’s store and read those magazines cover to cover. When she had time to read. Other days, when she had to hurry or be left behind by one of the Swaggerts, she’d just looked at the pictures. Every last picture before she put the magazine back and bought the items on her lists.
The pictures in those magazines looked just like everything around her.
Everything.
Except those pictures had been black-and-white. Here, everything was colorful.
Right down to the automobiles parked along the curb and those buzzing up and down the street. They were red, green, yellow, blue, silver, even white. Why, there was hardly a black one to be seen.
Back home, they’d all been black.
Dull black cars. Just like her life had been. Dull. Colorless.
Happiness bubbled inside her. She was here. Truly here! And everything about her old life was behind her.
All those colorful cars, of all different makes and models, were something, but the roads, they were amazing. These roads weren’t made of dirt like back in Nebraska. No, sirree! They were paved. And the sidewalks concrete. Her heels clicked against it as she walked.
That made her smile.
Everything made her smile. She spun in a circle, looking up at all the signs, around at all the stores and cars and down at all the concrete. It was all she’d dreamed it would be.
Stopping before she made herself dizzy, she drew in a breath and set her focus on her first necessity.
Money made the world go around and she needed to find a way to make a few bucks—seed money—to get her world spinning.
Her smile increased upon noticing a newspaper stand across the street.
Ask and you shall receive!
She stepped off the curb and walked between two parked cars. When there was a break in traffic, she took the opportunity and hurried forward to cross the street.
Out of nowhere, a sound, or flash of color, had her looking left.
A big red car was barreling right at her.
Shirley leaped backward, but her feet went out from beneath her as a screech the likes she’d never heard before scared the very soul out of her body. The next second, her rump landed on the pavement so hard her teeth nearly rattled out of her mouth.
Walter Russell shut off the engine of his Packard at the same time he threw open the door. Thank goodness the roadster had mechanical brakes on all four wheels, otherwise he would have hit the woman. He didn’t think he had hit her, but couldn’t see her over the hood. She’d gone down while his brakes were squealing like a stuck hog.
Where had she come from? It was as if she’d shot right out in front of him on purpose.
He rounded the front of the car, saw her sitting on the pavement and ran closer. “Are you all right? Are you hurt anywhere?”
Eyes wide and mouth open, it was a moment before she shook her head. “My behind is throbbing and my teeth are stinging ’cause this here pavement is a hell of a lot harder than dirt. I can tell you that. And hotter. Boy-oh-howdy but it’s hot. That sun is doing its job.”
He held back a grin, because it certainly wasn’t funny. Not even her thoughts about the pavement. She just looked so cute, so startled, sitting there, shaking her head.
Walter gave his head a clearing shake. “Here,” he said, taking ahold of her arm. “Let me help you up.”
She pulled her arm away. “I can get up all on my own. Been doing it every morning since the day I was born.” She let out a tiny giggle. “Well, dang near since then.”
He stepped back as she planted her heels and palms on the pavement, then arching her back, she literally leaped upright. It was a smooth, somewhat graceful movement, just one he’d never seen done before. And wasn’t overly sure he’d seen it this time. She was a little thing. The top of her head barely came up to his shoulders. That could explain why she was so agile. How she’d hopped up off the ground like some acrobat in a circus show.
“Hand me that suitcase, would you?” she asked, nodding toward the Packard as she picked up her handbag.
He spun, and frustration washed over him. The suitcase had landed on the hood of his roadster. His brand-new roadster. He’d owned it less than a month. Gingerly, he lifted the hard-sided suitcase off the hood, checking to make sure none of the bright red paint had been scratched.
It didn’t appear to be. The chrome Flying Goddess of Speed hood ornament appeared undamaged, too, so did the big chrome headlights on both sides of the ornament.
“Well, give it here,” she said. “Why’d you try to run me down like that?”
Walter handed her the suitcase as more frustration filled him. “Run you down? I wasn’t attempting to run you down. I’d just pulled away from the curb and you jumped out in front of me. There is a city ordinance against jaywalking. You can be arrested for that.”
“Arrested?” She took a step back. “For what?”
“Jaywalking.”
“Ain’t never heard of that.” A deep frown wrinkled the smooth skin between her brows. “What is it?”
“Jaywalking?”
She nodded.
Between her accent and knowledge, it was apparent she was not from California. Had most likely just stepped off the train from some Midwest town. That was where most of the newcomers came from. The center of the nation. He’d been born and raised there, smack-dab in the middle of nowhere, and had been happy to leave. “It means you can’t cross the street in the center of the block. You have to walk to one corner or the other.”
She looked up the road, and then down it, before turning to look at him again. “Now, why would I want to walk all the way to that there corner?” She pointed up the street. “Or all the way down to that there one.” She pointed to the corner behind him. “When where I want to go is right there.” She pointed directly across the street. “Makes no living sense to me.”
Yes, she was most certainly from the Midwest. Walter pointed to one, then the other corner. “Drivers know to watch for pedestrians at the corners.” He then pointed at the road before her. “Not in the middle of the road.”
Her short blond hair bounced as she shook her head. “Well, they better learn to. It ain’t that hard. Folks back home do it all the time.” She gestured at his car. “You need to learn it, too.”
A horn honked. “Get out of the road!” a driver shouted while steering around the Packard.
Walter ignored the driver. “No, you need to learn not to jaywalk. Better yet, why don’t you just walk back to the train station, on the sidewalk, and go back home.”
Her eyes, a deep blue, narrowed and darkened as she planted a hand on her hip. “I just got here and no one is going to make me leave.”
A part of him felt sorry for her, the other part was thoroughly disgusted. Not by her, but by what she expected. Los Angeles was full of newcomers. Just like her. All dreaming the same dream. “Look around. The streets aren’t lined with gold and the beds aren’t made of rose petals.” That was what the magazines made people believe, and believe they did. “Go home. You’ll be glad you did.”
“No, I won’t. I came here planning to stay, and stay I will.”
“Plan on becoming a star, do you?” He huffed out a breath. That wasn’t a dream. It was a nightmare. One he was still living.
“No. A singer.” She squared her shoulders. “Folks back home say I got the voice of an angel.”
He shook his head. She’d find out sooner or later, so he might as well tell her. “There are no angels in Los Angeles.” Just a lot of devils. He personally knew several of them.
She lifted her chin a bit higher. “There are now.”
He should just surrender. Leave her to her head-in-the-sky dreams. “Where are you from? Kansas? Oklahoma?” Her accent wasn’t deep enough for Texas.
“Nebraska. And I ain’t going back.”
He remembered wanting to leave that state, and had left it, only to discover there were times that he wished he’d ended up someplace other than here. Burying those thoughts, he asked, “Why?”
“Because I’m a singer.” A tiny frown formed over the bridge of her nose. “At least, that’s what I’m going to be. Soon. Real soon.”
Another car honked, the driver shouted, shaking a fist while driving past.
There was nothing he could do to change her mind. That was for sure. So there was no use trying. He should have known better right from the beginning. “You keep jaywalking, and you’ll become an angel, all right.” He pointed toward the sidewalk. “Walk to one corner or the other before you try crossing the street again.”
She shook her head. “I tell you, that there is about the craziest thing I ever did hear.”
He took a step toward his car, but stopped, looked at her again. She was cute with her big blue eyes, blond hair and catalog-ordered dress. Cute enough to catch attention. He didn’t like the thought of that, but it was a reality. She was of no concern of his; however, he knew one thing for sure. “You won’t get a singing job here.”
She puffed up like a hen shooed off its nest. “You can bet your darn tooting boots I will.”
He lifted up a foot, showing her a shoe. “I’m not wearing boots. No one here wears boots. And no one is going to hire you to sing speaking the way you speak.”
“Speak—” Her eyes narrowed. “What’s wrong with the way I talk?”
“Nothing.” He let out a sigh because being rude wasn’t his way, but neither was lying. “In Nebraska. But California wants the entire nation to believe everyone here is sophisticated. A cut above the rest, and you sound like you’re a country bumpkin straight off the train. Which you are.” A solid stab of guilt hit his stomach at the way her face fell. However, a little disappointment now was nothing compared to what she was going to experience. “Go home,” he said earnestly. “Just go home.”
She spun around. “You go home.”
A heavy sigh escaped as Walter watched her march between the cars and back onto the sidewalk. He couldn’t help but think how another beautiful woman would soon be gobbled up by the evils that be, and that there wasn’t anything anyone could do about it.
Trying one last time, he leaned against the side of his car, and shouted, “It’s not here. Whatever you hope to find, it isn’t here.”
She looked at him and spread her arms wide. “Hope? Hope is everywhere. You should go get yourself some.”
