Glamorous Notions
Prologue
Los Angeles, California—1951
The street and traffic lights streaked past the car windows, reminding her of the neon of Rome as she told them the story of what had happened to her there, how well it had started and how terribly it had ended, with the escort to the Rome airport and the warning not to return. After the last fifteen hours she’d spent on the plane, with all of its luxuries and strangeness, she felt lost in a dream, moved from one self to another and back again, forced to return to a life she’d never intended to come back to, and yet ... here she was.
She finished to silence.
Charlie stared out the passenger window as he said, “What do you think you were involved in?”
“I’m not sure.”
Soberly, from the driver’s seat, Harvey said, “I don’t think you should tell this story again. Not to anyone. You can trust us to say nothing, but this world now is strange. Now that the Soviets have the bomb, McCarthy and his cronies see spies everywhere. I think it’s safer to just keep this to yourself.”
Charlie agreed. “You don’t know who’s watching. Or listening. Just forget it ever happened. Forget you ever went to Rome.”
Their words frightened her, though she knew they were true. “I don’t think I can forget.”
“Then take it as a warning. You’re lucky you’re alive and not in some Italian jail. You don’t want to end up in an American one,” Charlie said.
Harvey’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Treat it as if it happened to someone else in a faraway land. You’re going to have to become someone new here. Someone they can’t find. We can help you with that.” He looked at Charlie. “Can’t we?”
Charlie nodded. “You’ll need a new name. A birth certificate. With that you can get anything else. Fortunately, we know an artist or two ...”
“I told you they’d come in handy,” Harvey said.
Charlie rolled his eyes. “I’m going to pretend you never said that. And you, my dear, are saying goodbye to the past. Hopefully forever. Don’t ever mention Rome again.”
“I won’t,” she said. “I promise.”