Page 119 of Mazywood

“Don’t be so sure about that,” she said, venom lacing her voice. She remembered Richard’s infidelities and how a couple of his whores had the nerve to call him at their home number before hanging up when they heard her voice.

“I would never do anything to shame you,” Sam said. “If we get married, no one ever sees me in public with another woman. Our story is, we’re old pals who fell in love. It would be a sensation in the white press. And the Negro press? Mazelle, imagine it! We’d be the King and Queen of Negro Entertainment. They would never call us sellouts again.” He said this with his signature grin and a flourish of his hands, as if he were on a stage. Ta-daaaaa.

The word sellout stung with its unfairness. What had she and Hattie ever done except exemplary work with the jobs they had been offered? But Sam had thought it through from every angle. Mazelle forced herself to consider the notion—but the thought of sharing a bed with him did not appeal to her, and why marry someone you didn’t want to take to bed, even if the marriage was just for show?

“I’m a mother, remember?” Mazelle said. “You can’t help me raise my kids. You were never a real kid, so what would you know about raising one?”

Sam had danced with his father, Sam Sr., and Will Mastin since he was three, dodging truancy officers his whole childhood. He’d confided that he never went to school or knew how to talk to other children growing up, and sometimes in the past he’d hated his father for that.

“Me?” Sam said. “Look who’s talking—‘Little Mazy.’ ”

“You’re right. Neither of us has any business raising children.”

Mazelle never hated her parents for relying on her for income for so much of her childhood, but how might her life have been different if they had refused to allow her to perform that darky act as Little Mazy? And God help her, sometimes she resented the way her own children lived in comfort and leisure without having to work a steady job like she had, rain or shine. All Ricky talked about was comic books, and Sadie played mindlessly with long-haired white dolls. The older Mazelle got, the more she understood poor Aunt Ruby. Nothing was worse than a spoiled, lazy-ass child.

But show business ruined children. She was the proof of that.

“Hey,” Sam said gently, holding her by the crook of her arm. He ducked his face around to meet her eyes. “Let’s try just one kiss. Remember that time…?”

“Sam…”

“One kiss. If you don’t feel what I think we can feel, I’ll never ask you again.” He looked so earnest that his request felt genuine. Maybe he was just friends with Novak. And Mazelle had to admit that she was seduced by his fantasy of redemption in the press. If she married Sam, she wouldn’t be Lazy Mazy for all of time—she would be Mrs. Sammy Davis Jr. That was a whole different bag. It had a spectacular ring to it.

She was surprised to feel her skin glow under Sam’s gentle palm on her arm, or was it from the fireplace radiating waves of heat just beyond them? She jumped when a pan clattered where Marguerite was washing dishes in the kitchen, but they were still alone. Sam moved closer to her, sliding his hands to her waist. She relaxed beneath his touch by imagining his feet in a mechanized blur when he danced. Sam was the best tap dancer she had ever seen. But he was also so much more. His celebrity impressions were so real they were uncanny. His singing was lovely too. Why shouldn’t she marry him? He was a dynamo with money to burn. Hell, she would be able to quit her radio job, leave the kids with Dottie, and move to Mazywood, while he toured. Like he’d said, he would have his life and she would have hers.

Despite herself, Mazelle’s heart fluttered with the possibilities.

Sam cupped the back of her neck to urge her to lower her face to his, and she bent over just enough for their lips to touch. Gently at first. Tentative. Then his hold on her neck grew urgent, and his tongue explored her mouth as if he meant to swallow her whole. She tried to relax and close her eyes, but she was so aware of every sensation, from the heat of standing too close to the fireplace to his mustache tickling the bridge of her lip. Just like the first time, kissing Sam felt like kissing a little brother.

Mazelle pulled away. Sam opened his eyes, disappointment clouding his face.

No, she couldn’t marry Sam. She couldn’t marry anyone. Not anymore. She was surprised to feel tears threatening behind her eyelids. She quickly turned away from him, annoyed with him for unburying her longing for a different time, before she reconjured Scout. Her future had forked in a new direction now. She had a goddamn corpse in her yard.

“All right…” Sam said in a comforting voice that made her feel sadder. “We tried.”

“If we were supposed to get married, we would have known already,” she said. “Let’s talk about the other women you know. There’s a better bride for you somewhere in that bunch.”

Sam sighed, moving away from her to light another cigarette. “What makes them think they have the right, Mazelle?” he asked. “What makes them think they can tell people who they can love?”

So he was in love with Kim Novak. And was she in love with him? Poor, silly fools.

“These studio heads think they’re kings,” Mazelle said. “Believe me, I know.”

She tried not to think of Lorenzo often, but any time she did she wanted to hurtle herself back through time so she could kick him in the balls. He had made her rich, but he didn’t give a damn what her wealth had cost her. If she could go back in time, she would do worse than kick him the night he touched her in his office.

Sam cracked open a window to blow his cigarette smoke outside, his homage to Mazelle’s request that he only smoke in the cabins or in his room. “You don’t even wanna know how much mob money is in Hollywood,” he said. “Your guy? He’s knee-deep in it.”

“Lorenzo?” Mazelle said, startled. Sam might have read her mind as well as Scout.

Sam waved at her dismissively. “Forget I said anything.”

“Lorenzo’s in the mob?” she said, incredulous. Jerry Lorenzo might be a lot of things, but he didn’t have the backbone to be a mob boss.

“They own him,” Sam said quietly. “Always have. Remember that fire?”

The fire at Lorenzo Studios during the Depression had seemed sudden. Mazelle had suspected that Lorenzo burned down his own buildings and reels for the insurance money. “Why? Did he owe somebody?”

“He owed everybody,” Sam said. “So, they sent him a message. Just like in all the gangster movies.” He paused and blew out a long stream in a sigh. “I’m gonna tell you something about Lorenzo as a friend, Mazelle… because you’re being a pal when I really need one. But, hell, maybe you don’t even wanna know.”