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Joe Cosentino
Category:
Mystery/Suspense
Publisher: Whiskey Creek Press
ISBN-10: 1499279477
Type: Fiction
Pages: 253
Copyright: May 28, 2014
ISBN-13: 9781499279474
Price: $3.99 (eBook)
Jana Lane was America’s most famous child star until she was attacked on the studio lot at eighteen years old. Now Jana’s flashbacks from her past turn into murder attempts in her present.
Jana Lane was America’s most famous child star until she was attacked on the studio lot at eighteen years old. Now she’s a thirty-eight-year-old beauty and mother of two living in a mansion in picturesque Hudson Valley, New York. Jana’s flashbacks from her past turn into murder attempts in her present. Forced to summon up the lost courage she had as a child, Jana visits the California movie studio she once called home. This sends her on a whirlwind of visits with former and current movie studio personnel. It also leads to a romance with the son of her old producer – Rocco Cavoto – the devilishly handsome filmmaker who is planning Jana’s comeback both professionally and personally. Can Jana uncover a web of secrets about everyone she loves, including the person who destroyed her past and threatens to snuff out her future?
Excerpt
No longer postponing the inevitable, she rested back on the tree stump. As Jana peered out at a tree with a yellow ribbon tied around it, she thought of how her life had been held hostage during the past twenty years. With eyes sealed tightly shut she blurted out, “They’re like flashbacks. I see myself at the studio on the set of my last film—on the final day of shooting.” She moistened her lips. “We’re outside in Lot C. After my father, playing the town sheriff, makes me an assistant sheriff, I strike my last pose on my horse, Ginger. She bucks underneath me, but I control her until Mr. LeClerc, the director yells, ‘Cut!’ Hank, the trainer, helps me off my horse. A few speeches are made. My agent, my sister, Mr. Cavoto—the studio head, and his son are there. Everyone applauds. As usual—”
“—you walk inside to your dressing room with your agent.”
She opened her eyes. “How did you know that?”
He bit at a blade of grass. “I just assumed.”
“You really are good at this.”
Another satisfied nod from Jackson led her eyelids to close again.
“My agent, Simon, waves at someone who passes us in the hallway. Then a flash hurts my eyes. I think it’s a photographer. Simon approaches him, scolds him I think then leaves me alone...and this part of the dream occurs over and over again...”
“Tell me.”
After a shaky breath, she said, “A masked figure in black appears in front of my dressing room door. I’m forced into a dark corridor...pushed down onto the floor...we struggle. His touch is angry but somehow...familiar. I try to scream...but...nothing.” She opened her eyes.
“Then what?”
“Then Jana Lane—the girl who swam the rapids, climbed Mt. Everest, parachuted from a plane to save the world from mad scientists in her movies—wept uncontrollably in a psychiatric hospital for nearly a year while the masked man got off free.”
“How do we know it was a man?”
She replayed her nightmare and came to a realization. “I guess we don’t.” Her eyes suddenly swam in tears. “Jackson, the years since I left Hollywood, I’ve been hiding. Housewife, mother, community fundraiser—they’re shields, so I don’t have to face an assault and breakdown from when I was eighteen years old...or face something worse.” She wiped her face with the back of her hand. “Maybe I should see a shrink again.”
Jackson diagnosed in his best German accent. “You don’t need a shrink. You have me.”
“I wish I had Brian, too.” She knew Jackson would understand.
Jackson helped her to her feet, and laid a pansy in the palm of her hand. “Brian will come around.”
“So will the F.D.R. Benefit,” she said, happy to change the subject. After a nervous glance at her watch, she added, “Let’s get to work.”
* * * *
The room was cold and full of ominous shadows. As the viewer waited in anticipation, the most famous child star in history filled the screen nearby.
Jana Lane, at eighteen in Sugar and Spice, was dressed in a canary and brown leather cowgirl suit and matching boots. With determination beaming from her face, she pushed a kidnapper off a cliff and lifted her little friend, Timmy, onto her horse. After she sped Timmy down the mountain to safety, her father—the sheriff—kissed her on the cheek and proudly presented her with an assistant sheriff’s badge. Jana remounted her horse, Ginger, and waved her cowgirl hat triumphantly as Ginger stood up tall on hind legs.
As Jana’s celluloid face filled the room, restless fingers lifted a glass of liquid and sent it crashing into orange droplets against the screen.
Eerie laughter transformed into a hushed voice. “It’s time to play again, Jana. The first time was sweet, but the second time will be so much sweeter!”
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