In her autobiography, she stated that Rudolph Valentino was the love of her life and said that they were engaged at the time of his death. Ben Lyon later claimed that she ordered a blanket of flowers to be placed across Rudy's coffin, reading "P-O-L-A" in large letters. However, photographs of Valentino's funeral show that flowers draped over his coffin had no such lettering and no contemporary newspaper accounts support this claim.