There were faces in the snow scratching at the windows. Wind-shapened men in tipped fedoras and blue-heeled women threatened the integrity of the ice strewn dance floor. Susana wanted out into it, but each time she belted her dress and wrapped her fur, the door banged against her hand, bruising her palms, leaving her pulp.

It would have been Susana counting the beat at the heart of the party. Circling men dragged to center all because of her legs. Hollywood, 1929.

Susana was more Jean Harlow, less Greta Garbo, with the martini laced bite of Dorothy Parker. On a good night in a hot place, she caught stares like fireflies in mason jars. Kept notes in pocket books. Wrote sonnets on the backs of neckties.

Thirty-six years and one drink too many slipped her from the wagon, landing her the role of a lifetime—crimes of passion, twenty-five to life, and the slick, oil taste of a pretty pink gun.