When I came out of the shower, wearing a terrycloth robe that had been hanging on the back of the door, Ava was seated at the table with a pot of coffee, two cups, and some pastries.
‘I called room service,’ she said. ‘I don’t have anything here in the kitchen.’
‘This is great,’ I said.
I sat down and poured myself a cup, grabbed a Danish.
‘Eddie,’ she said, ‘don’t feel bad. I had a great time. Didn’t you?’
‘It was fabulous,’ I said, ‘but that doesn’t mean I won’t feel guilty.’
‘Why? Because of Frank?’
‘Well, yeah!’
‘I’ve been with men since Frank, and he’s certainly been with women since me. What’s the problem?’
‘Frank’s my friend,’ I said. ‘I don’t sleep with my friend’s wives.’
‘Ex-wife.’
‘That, either.’
‘Well,’ she said, looking at me with those big green eyes and nibbling on a pastry, ‘if it’s any consolation, I practically raped you.’
‘Yeah, you did,’ I said, ‘but I think I got into it, eventually.’
‘Yeah, you did,’ she said, with a deep-throated giggle.
I laughed, too, and then the tension seemed to break.
‘What are your plans for today?’ she asked.
‘Well, I was going to go over to MGM.’
‘And you’ve changed your mind?’
‘I’m worried about leaving you alone, here,’ I said. ‘If I knew you’d be safe-’
‘And how can you know that?’ she asked.
‘By having somebody watch you.’
‘Like who?’
‘That’s the problem.’
I thought about Fred Otash again, the Hollywood P.I., but he lived for publicity. Bodyguarding Ava Gardner would be too tempting not to talk about it.
‘I’ll have to try to think of somebody,’ I said.
At that point there was a knock at the door. In fact it was a pounding. I got up and walked over, gathering the robe around me.
‘I’ll have to make some calls, see if I can come up with-’ I was saying to her as I opened the door. I stopped short when I saw who was standing on the doorstep.
‘Hey, Mr G.,’ Jerry Epstein said. He looked me up and down. ‘How’s it hangin’?’