Sweetie's Diamonds (50 page)

She nodded again.

Marshall continued.
 
“He's retired now, but he was willing to talk about you.
 
Mrs. Boston, he knew that you were innocent with regard to your sister's death.
 
But your uncle had you believing that you were responsible, and, well, you became delusional.
 
You were very close to your sister, as most twins are.
 
The guilt over her death combined with the tremendous abuse both of you suffered at the hands of your uncle caused your mind to shut out the truth.
 
However, Doctor Springfield said that you showed improvement during the four years you were there and you were released.
 
But you didn't go back to Texas, did you?”

Diane shook her head no.

“Instead you went to Los Angeles.
 
Doctor Springfield theorized, and I believe him, that you went to work in pornographic films and take drugs as a means of punishing yourself.
 
You see, you'd never really gotten over the guilt you felt for ‘killing' your sister.”

Diane stared at him blankly.

“And then you met Angela Gilliam.”

“Sweetie,” Diane whispered.
 

“Yes, the
other
Sweetie.
 
The woman who replaced the Sweetie you loved and lived with until she died.
 
Angela resembled you.
 
You were both blonde, beautiful, sexy… for all intents and purposes, she was your twin, all over again.
 
And you became lovers.
 
For a while, everything was as it was before the tragedy happened.
 
Your sister was alive again, in your mind.
 
Am I right?”

The tears began to flow again.
 
“Yes,” she whispered.

“And then,” Marshall continued, “later, after you disappeared from the adult business in 1980, you somehow convinced yourself that you could keep Diane alive by becoming her.
 
You began to use her name from then on.”

Diane was numb.
 
She merely nodded in agreement.

“The only thing I don't know,” Marshall said, “is what happened that night at Valentine's warehouse, when you and Angela Gilliam disappeared.
 
You obviously got away, but what happened to Angela?”

A
ngela came back to the apartment at nine o'clock in the morning.
 
She'd been out all night.

“Where have you been?” Diane/Dana asked.
 
She had been drinking for hours, ever since she'd realized that Angela was with Eduardo.
 
Wearing a tattered terrycloth robe, she sat watching an old rerun of
I Dream of Jeannie
on television.
 

Angela ignored the question and sat on the sofa beside her roommate.
 
“You look like hell, Sweetie,” she said.

Dana glared at her and said, “Fuck you, too, Sweetie.
 
I asked you a question.”

“I was with Eduardo,” she said.
 
“I got us some stuff.”
 
She opened her purse and removed a baggie full of white powder.
 
This improved Dana's mood a bit because she enjoyed a snort in the mornings.
 
It picked her up and shook off the effects of the wine.
 
But the way Angela used it worried her.
 
It hadn't been that long since she had OD'd on heroin and was at Cedars-Sinai for a week.
 

“Don't you think you do too much of that stuff?” Dana asked.

Angela was already busy preparing two lines on the coffee table.
 
“What are you talking about?”
 
She took a straw and inhaled the cocaine through her nose.
 
Angela closed her eyes and sniffed hard, forcing the drug into her sinus cavities.
 
“It's better than what I
was
doing, don't you agree?
 
You want some?” she asked.

Dana couldn't resist.
 
“Sure.
 
I just don't want to get another call in the middle of the night telling me that you're in the hospital again.”
 

After they were both pleasantly high, Angela said, “You're not mad, are you?”

Dana felt like pouting despite the euphoric effects of the coke.
 
“What can I say?
 
You're fucking Eduardo.”

“It's no big deal.
 
It's you I love, Sweetie,” Angela said.
 
“I do it for the stuff, you know that.
 
He has influence over Aaron and can get me some better roles.”

“You believe that?”

“Well, yeah.”

“And have you gotten any better roles?”

“Not yet, but Eduardo says it'll happen soon.”

“Eduardo's a slime, Sweetie.
 
He's in charge of all the dirty business that Aaron's involved in.”

Angela frowned.
 
“What do you mean?”

“Come on, Sweetie, you know what I'm talking about,” Dana answered.
 
“The drugs, the money laundering, the guns.
 
Who knows what else he deals?
 
Look who he hangs out with.”

“Who?
 
You mean Vincent?”

“Yeah, him and all his slick-haired friends.
 
They're all mobsters, Sweetie.
 
Mafia.
 
Cosa Nostra.
 
Whatever you want to call them.”

Angela grew quiet as Barbara Eden rambled on about pleasing her master on the television.
 

Dana eventually said, “I thought you said we were gonna try to quit together.”

“You mean the coke?”

“No, I mean the
business
.
 
Get out of this hellhole.
 
Do something else.
 
Get away from Los Angeles.”

Angela said quietly, “You know what would happen if we tried, don't you?”

Dana sat up and took a sip of her wine.
 
“What, you think we'll end up like Julie?”

Angela abruptly turned to Dana and said, “Sweetie, listen.
 
I found out something last night and it might be something we've been waiting for.”

Dana was intrigued by Angela's sudden enthusiasm.
 
“What?”

“I overheard Eduardo talking on the phone.
 
He's gonna make a big haul tonight.
 
He's gonna sell a lot of coke for a bunch of diamonds.
 
These guys from Africa are meeting with him at the warehouse around midnight.
 
Sweetie, he said those diamonds could be worth a couple of million dollars.
 
Maybe more.”

Dana snickered and said, “So?
 
How's that gonna help us?”

Angela shrugged.
 
“Maybe we can get some of them.
 
Somehow.”

“Oh, right,” Dana said.
 
“Eduardo's just gonna stand back and let you grab a handful?
 
Fat chance.”

Angela shook her head.
 
“Sorry, it was just an idea.”
 
She started to clear the coffee table of the now empty wine bottle and glasses.
 
Dana put a hand on her arm to stop her.
 

“Sweetie…” she said, softly.
 

Their eyes met.
 
It was amazing, Dana thought, how much it seemed like she was looking into a mirror whenever she gazed upon Angela's lovely face.
 

Dana placed her palm on Angela's cheek.
 
“Let's go to bed,” she suggested.
 
Angela smiled and nodded.

D
ana had a preliminary meeting with a film director that afternoon.
 
She had gone to the Erotica Selecta office in Hollywood, not looking her best and with very little sleep, and discussed an upcoming feature tentatively titled
Invasion of the Body Snatches
.
 
She didn't make a good impression.
 
The director told her flat out that she was losing her looks and he was considering signing a newer, up-and-coming starlet.
 
Dana told him where he could stick the role and left.
 

When she got home that evening, Angela was out.
 

Probably with Eduardo, Dana figured.
 
Unbelievable.
 
And after that warm and fuzzy morning together.
 
Still, Dana couldn't be too angry at her Sweetie.
 
After all, they were like sisters, weren't they?

She went to bed and was fast asleep when the phone call came at twelve minutes after midnight.
 

Dana groggily picked up the phone.
 
“Hello?”
 

“…help me…”
 

Angela sounded drunk.
 
No, she sounded ill.
 
In pain.
 
Out of it.
 
Hearing her this way snapped Dana out of her dream state.
 
“Sweetie?
 
What's wrong?
 
You sound—”

“Please…”

“Where are you?”

“…warehouse…”

“My God, what's happened?
 
Sweetie?”

“…shot…”

“What?
 
I can't hear you!
 
Did you say—?”

 
The phone went dead.
 
Angela had either dropped the receiver or hung up.
 
Dana called her name several times but there was nothing at the other end of the line.
 
She hung up and sat on the edge of the bed.
 
What should she do?

Dana decided there was nothing else to do but go to her.
 
She dressed and got into her 1973 Chevy Nova, a car that was on its last legs, and drove toward Santa Monica.
 
She had been to the Erotica Selecta warehouse before.
 
One of her films had been shot there but she couldn't remember which one—she had been stoned out of her mind.
 
She did recall having to perform a variety of uncomfortable sex acts on top of boxes and crates.
 

The warehouse was quiet and dark although some illumination was on in the rear, where the loading dock was located.
 
She recognized Eduardo's limousine parked back there, along with three other cars and a motorcycle.
 
The roll-up metal door on the loading dock was shut.
 
The light came through the window on a standard door at the top of a few steps, next to the dock ramp.
 
Dana got out of her car, ran to the door, and tried it.
 
It was locked, of course.
 

She peered through the window and saw that a couple of work lights were on inside the warehouse but she couldn't discern much besides stacks of cartons.
 
Should she dare knock?

Dana rapped on the door.
 
“Hello?
 
Anyone there?” she called.
 

When no one responded, a sick feeling hit her stomach.
 
Something had happened.
 
She came down the steps and searched for another way in.
 
She went around to the side of the building and noticed that there was a line of horizontally-hinged windows approximately eight feet off the ground.
 
A pile of empty crates had been stacked beneath one.
 
Perhaps she could climb the crates and get inside the window…?

It wasn't difficult getting on top of the crates.
 
The window, however, took every ounce of her strength to open.
 
It probably hadn't been budged since the building was built, and who knew how long ago that was.