Blonde BOMBSHELLS

It’s been six years since Hugh Hefner died, and his wife, Crystal, kept her promise to say only good things about him and the legacy he created. Now, in an extract from her new book, the Playboy founder's widow shares what really went on behind the walls of the mansion, and the fake smile on her face

- Crystal Hefner

Last night I dreamed about the mansion again. In the dream I am driving, racing to get back before curfew. The sun is already setting, the LA light turning golden in my rear-view mirror. I’m panicking because while I don’t know what will happen if I arrive past my curfew, I know I can’t be late, and the terror claws at my throat. I press on the gas pedal, desperately trying to go faster, to make it back to that ivy-covered Gothic house before the clock strikes six. In my dream I know I’m not going to make it in time.

I wake up with old familiar feelings: sick, anxious, afraid. It’s been years since I lived in the mansion. I haven’t been back to the mansion since my husband died. He died, I left, and I never went back. But I seem to go back there in my mind all the time.

In a lot of ways, I am still trying to get out of that mansion.

I always had to be home by six o’clock. If I wasn’t, it was a problem. He would be upset. He would be yelling my name through the house. The pantry staff would start frantically calling my phone at exactly 6.01pm, even though I’d already be winding my way up the long, curving drive, around the tall stone fountain topped with a cherub watching me with his empty marble eyes. And then I would run in, pushing through the heavy wooden door, and go find Hef so I could kiss him on the cheek and show him: here I am, I’m home, I’ve followed the rules.

I’m a good girl.

For almost a decade, the Playboy Mansion was my home. But it never really felt like home.