Wild Cards

“My family’s from Whittier,” Nick admitted with a bashful grin. “Went to the same high school as Dick.”

“Hard to compete with a hometown hero,” Jack said with a laugh, “but I’ll try.”

Nick turned his self-deprecating grin to the senator. He’d already decided a while ago Kennedy would get his vote if he got the nomination, but he was not about to tell anyone. Not even Jack Kennedy as it turned out. “I’m willing to listen.”

Nick did. He was not enough of a policy wonk to follow everything, but Kennedy’s stance on civil rights was quite clear, for jokers, aces, Reds, blacks—everyone.

Hef patted Nick on the back. “Convinced now?” He then said to Kennedy, “Remember that same speech, with the same intensity. We’ll have you deliver it tomorrow on Playboy’s Penthouse when we introduce Nick. And I’ll try to get Mayor Daley there for a second chat.”

“Do I get introduced too?” Julie asked hopefully, her ears flopping slightly as she cocked her head.

“We’ll see, but I want to see your test shoot first. Talk about it with Nick.”

“Talk about what?” asked a tall blond middle-aged man walking up along the deck. He looked about Nick’s own height, around six four, and even had the same epicanthal fold next to his eye like Nick had inherited from his mom. “Who’s Nick?”

Nick looked closer, realizing the man looked and sounded like his uncle Fritz, if slightly older and in better shape.

“This is Nick,” Hef said, “our new photographer. Nick Williams, meet Will Monroe, Julie’s … agent.”

Nick shook Will’s hand as he stepped down into the hot tub. “Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.” Will’s smile was genuine, but cursory. He gave Nick an intent look, but then distracted by the inexorable draw of celebrity, turned to Senator Kennedy.

“John Kennedy.” The senator introduced himself with a politician’s handshake. “But you can call me Jack. Monroe, huh? Not perchance a descendant of President Monroe?”

“Not so far as I know”—Will Monroe chuckled, sitting down in the hot tub—“but I might have a president somewhere in my family tree …”

“Any relation to Marilyn Monroe?” Nick asked. He’d never met her himself, but they’d been on the same set when he’d gotten a bit part for the swimming ensemble in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

Will gave him a sly look. “Not yet,” he said with a chuckle.

“Everyone wants to meet my first centerfold,” Hef pointed out, adding to the merriment. “Hell, I still want to meet her. I just bought pictures a calendar company took before she made it big.” He glanced then to Kennedy. “But speaking of meeting people, think you’ve soaked your shoulder enough to mingle a bit before seeing Daley?”

“Happy to.” Jack Kennedy climbed over the lip of the Jacuzzi and back into the main pool.

Nick could take a signal: Hef had left him to talk with Julie the joker and get ideas for her shoot. This was a test for him as well as her. Fortunately for Nick, he’d gotten over the idea of jokers a while ago, having barely missed becoming one himself.

Will Monroe asked Nick, “Join me?” He gave a glance to Julie as well. “You too.”

“Okay,” she conceded, her coral-painted lips forming a perfect moue, “but don’t laugh if I end up looking and smelling like a wet rabbit.”

Nick did a swimmer’s push-up, hauling himself out of the pool and swinging his legs around into the hot tub just as Julie slipped in. He glanced to Will. “From SoCal too?”

“Yep. Hollywood. Grew up in the movie business. Mom was an actress.”

“Anyone I’ve heard of?”

Will Monroe paused, giving a smile of equal parts humor and sadness. “Possibly.”

Nick judged Will Monroe’s age and did the math. “Didn’t make it into talkies?”

“Oh, she had some success there.” Will smiled. “Lost her, well, a few years ago, but it feels like a lifetime away.”

“What about your dad?”

“Never met him.” Will looked sad. “Or at least not that I knew.” He sighed. “Big scandal, of course. But my mom was a bigger star, so she just went on. Papers had a field day, everyone speculating. All I know is that it was someone important, someone powerful: politician, movie mogul, maybe someone in the mob. Mom never told anyone, not even me.” He grimaced. “Every time I asked her, she got angry, then cried. But I think the truth was, she was scared and trying to protect me.”

Nick couldn’t really understand Will’s pain. He had a close relationship with his father—or at least close enough, he’d never told Dad he’d drawn an ace—but mentioning the fact would be cruel. So he just said, “I’m sorry.” After a long moment, broken only by the bubbles of the tub and the bright chatter in the background, he asked, “Any other possibilities? Other leads?”

“Not really.” Will shook his head. “After a while, I learned not to ask. It hurt Mom, and I knew she wasn’t going to give me an answer, so I just went on with my life.” He sighed again. “The only other chance is something I didn’t really pay attention to. When I was busy making The Final Ace, my first major picture, there was this fake psychic who said she knew who my father was and would tell. And she did. Dumped an old beat-up man’s hat on her head, said she was channeling his spirit—like bad community theater with no costume budget. I was so used to people making up wild guesses and bullshit that I completely blew it off until my mother threw lawyers at the psychic to make her shut up.” Will looked up over at Nick, tears in his eyes. “That’s when I knew the psychic had said something right. I’d never seen my mom so scared, not just for herself, but for me. She made me promise never to look into what that psychic said.”

“Even a stopped watch is right twice a day,” Nick pointed out. “I know fake mediums were a big thing in the twenties, but the more convincing ones dug up dirt on their targets first. Could be this medium was a better investigator than she was a psychic.”

“Funny you should mention that.” Will gave a dark chuckle. “The psychic said her phantom had been a private investigator too, some minor gumshoe and background actor who’d stumbled into something bad with my mom and paid the ultimate price.”

Nick felt geese walk over his grave, a horrible horripilation all the weirder for being in a hot tub. But broken watches were often right because coincidence was always a possibility. “Well, at least in the twenties they didn’t have real psychics. Not like now.”

Will chuckled a bit too long. “No, not like now.”

The conversation had taken an odder and more uncomfortable angle than Nick had expected, so he switched the subject. “So, what do you think about Hef guessing the Golden Globe nominations on last week’s Penthouse and scooping the scandal sheets? Louella Parson’s livid, and Hedda Hopper’s speculating that Hef’s a secret ace.”

Will laughed uproariously. “That crazy old bat. Actually, Hef’s picks were my picks. We had a gentleman’s bet, so he asked me to prove it. So I told him who would be nominated.”

Nick was taken aback. “So you’re the ace?”

Will shook his head. “No, just a guy from Tinseltown who knows the score.”

Nick whistled. “Knowing the score like that, you should be composing for the cinema.”

Will shrugged. “They’re both savvy women, but Louella has her ego and alliances while Hedda has a whole arsenal of axes to grind and puts those at a higher priority. Whereas I just have a professional interest in the business and not much in the way of alliances.”

“Except Hef.”

“We go back a long way.”

“Father figure?”

“You could say that.” Will chuckled again.

“So what is your professional interest in the business? Just agent?”

“For the present,” Will said, sharing another chuckle with Julie at some private joke, “but I’ve made some pictures myself. Not acting, mind you—producing and directing. The Final Ace with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Hindenburg with Leonardo DiCaprio.”

“Sounds like Rudolph Valentino.” Nick laughed. “Stage names?”

“No, their actual names.”

“Never heard of them. Sorry.”