by Tony Bulmer
‘Let me guess, you ain’t the marrying kind?’
‘Marriage is an unnatural and abhorrent lifestyle choice, that I am not prepared to entertain.’
‘What about your daughter?
‘Since you ask Ms Santos, Roxy’s mother and I had a complex relationship—hardly shocking in this modern age I am sure you will agree.’
‘So you are divorced?’
The Kid shot Inez a hideous, drooling smile that oozed malevolence.
Inez looked at Barrington quickly, but all trace of emotion had drained from him. He sat there staring into the distance, as the convoy turned onto Sunset Boulevard. ‘Roxy’s mother is no longer with us—she met with a very unfortunate accident.’ Said Barrington quietly.
In the hot glow of Hollywood neon, it was impossible to gauge what was running through Barrington’s mind, but Inez sensed instinctively, that now was not the time to ask. So she sank back in her seat, and prepared her self for the pounding chaos of the night ahead.
Dead Famous 16
The corpse was a real mess. The truck had dragged it five blocks, before making a turn; that is where the steel hawser that bound Hector Blandell’s ankles snared on the wheel arch of a parked car. The journey down the strip flayed most of the skin off the corpse, but as the powerful truck pulled its twisting cargo through the wheel arch of the stationary vehicle, the impact sucked much of the remaining flesh clear of the bone.
Ronnie Santorum, the driver of the truck, was a Cable TV installer from the San Fernando Valley, out for a few cocktails and a post work lap-dance. By the time he got out to inspect how his Chevy 4X4 had snagged a parked car the flayed corpse of Hector Blandell was bloody beyond recognition.
The Boulevard was a magnet for craziness, ugly scenes that most folks could only imagine. But this kind of sickness broke new territory. The Black and Whites came quick and in force. They sealed off half the street, and the sidewalk too. The police quickly found that Ronnie had previous convictions. He told the officers how pissed his first wife had been, that time he had got caught by vice having his weenie wagged by a Puerto Rican Prostitute on Fairfax; then he told them about his DUI’s, all of them in the past. But that didn’t matter in a situation like this, hell no—the cops ran him through field sobriety anyhoo—all the while, a squawking, jostling army of onlookers getting larger by the minute. The cops tried to maintain a perimeter, but the fly driven hoards buzzed ever closer, camera phones held high for posterity.
For Ronnie Santorum, the questions became more searching He was still explaining for the umpteenth time how he had come to have an LA County probation officer chained to the back of his vehicle, when detectives Ramirez and Kozak arrived on the scene. The zoo-like freneticism peaked, as a Fire Department Rescue Ambulance scraped up the mangled remains of Hector Blandell onto a gurney bound for the County Morgue.
A cheer rose from the thronging crowd, as the corpse was finally zipped away. Ramirez and Kozak stood in the street watching the circus unfold. A traffic cop ushered rubbernecking motorists through the bottleneck. A convoy of slick, black limousines slowed momentarily, as they passed the scene, then cut forward into the three-lane free-flow.
A door-sized beat sergeant approached Ramirez and Kozak, gave them the run down of the situation in hand. Told them the driver was gushing forth like a broken faucet. Said he knew nothing about the deceased. Said he was mystified how the corpse could have got hooked up to his truck in the first place. The cop loomed. Looked like he could bench 320 without breaking sweat.
Ramirez gave Kozak a sidelong. ‘What do you think.’
‘Poetic justice is what I think.’ said Kozak, He flipped the cop a nod, told him to run the driver down the puzzle palace, hold him in the trophy room, see if his story changed.
Ramirez pursed his lips, said, ‘Poetic fucking justice—what are you talking about?’
‘Our killer is trying to send a message, is what I am talking about,’ replied Kozak evenly.
‘I still don’t get what you are trying to say.’
‘What I am trying to say, is that we are dealing with a crazy with an education. In Greek mythology. Hector was the name of a Trojan Prince, the greatest hero in Troy, he met his fate when Achilles speared him, then dragged him around behind his chariot.
Ramirez frowned. Sounds like far-fetched bullshit to me Kozak. I’m thinking Saquina Johnson has some sick admirer, with a thousand pictures plastered all over his crib who thinks he can get “revenge” for her death, because she’s been treated so “unfairly” by the probation service. Let’s face it we’ve seen this kind of sickness before. And here is the pattern: first he drowns the personal assistant in the bathtub, now her probation officer meets an ugly fate. We are looking at the same person, you know they will kill again question is who? I am thinking the gangster-rap husband is a primo candidate…’
‘Possibility,’ said Kozak evenly. ‘The freak is sick and unpleasant. I tell you one thing, who ever is responsible, the Brass at City Hall are going to shit a brick,’
Ramirez scowled hard. ‘You suggesting we keep the connection quiet detective?’
‘All we got is a name on a list and an ugly coincidence—this Blandell character was trawling strip joints. Who knows what kind of connections he made: jealous boyfriend, sick freak party animals, or some crank recognized him from his day-job duties, decided it was time for a payback.’ Kozak popped a stick of gum. ‘One thing is for sure, the freak who did this has a warped sense of humor.’
‘If you can call dragging a man to his death a sense of humor.’
‘What else we got?’ asked Kozak masticating gum.
‘We got the mouthpiece Lawyer Weinman, and Barrington’s daughter Roxy, but we ain’t no closer to finding the connection. Someone hooked Saquina Johnson up with the dope. You ask me we got to make the ID there, if we want to move forward with this.’
‘Maybe we are looking ourselves crazy on this one, when there is really no need. I’m starting to think the girl in the bath was the connection, not the dealer necessarily—but the connection—what is a “personal assistant” for anyway?’
‘Damned if I know. I got so many damn people in my family I am lucky I see my wife most days. You asking me about personal assistants—I got to pay cash money just so I can have fresh socks in the morning and that ain’t no kind of life, how about you Kozak—you got yourself an old lady?’
‘I got this job. You expect me to have a family as well—you kidding?’
‘What the hell you playing at? You cannot be the man on the town forever. You got a sweet job, steady income, and you obviously pump it down the gym. What’s going on Kozak, you the eternal bachelor or something?
‘I do all right,’ sniffed Kozak.
Ramirez frowned, ‘Yeah, a real player huh? Well, get it together player, we got to go see a man about a drug dealer.’
Dead Famous 17
The mosh-pit crowd outside Club Zoo on Santa Monica Boulevard moved three of four hundred strong by the time the Barrington convoy pulled around the block. To Inez the scene boded ugly, entering a scrimmage like this, anything could happen. Inez marshaled the drivers on the two-way. Told them to keep it moving for another spin around the block. But the crowd knew what was coming. They surged forward against the metal security barriers that fenced off the sidewalk from the street. A forest of flash bulbs burned crazy in the night, as Paparazzi stalwarts focused in for the money shot. The scandal-sheet dogs had scented their quarry. There would be no stopping them now. The element of surprise had been lost. Circling the block, Inez noted that the alleyway out back of the club was blocked off with delivery vans. It would be madness to jam the convoy of limos in a barrel tight back road, but with a baying mob surrounding the club, a crazy gambit might be their only chance.
Inez called orders over the two-way—told the troops they were going to dismount shy of the drop-zone and hoof it down the alley. She turned to Barrington grim-faced—‘This is going to be hectic, you ready to move?’
‘Born ready,’ snapped Barrington.
‘We get gunfire tonight Santos, I’m going to be needing my piece—know what I am saying?’ whined Kid Dolla miserably.’
‘I know what you are saying junior, but there ain’t no way.’
‘You better have a motherfucking plan then, cos the first person who comes close is going down, whether you like it or no.’
‘I wouldn’t advise it. You do as I say—you get through this—maybe get to have a night out and enjoy yourself. You mix it up—I leave you to the wolves and collect you from jail tomorrow. Your choice kid.’
‘You seen that crowd, there’s a god damn riot going on, you expecting to get us through that?’
‘It’s my job Kid. It’s what I do.’
‘You got to be fucking kidding. I got my box fresh sneakers on and everything. Ain’t no way I am sneaking down no piss stink alley, what you say Sly?’
‘I say you shut your yap Dolla.’
Inez pulled the convoy up quick on the side street approach to Santa Monica. The crew formed up quick, a one, two, two combination with Inez running point. As soon as they hit the pavement the limo’s screeched off, heading away, at speed.
‘I see what you are doing,’ laughed Barrington. ‘You are working it smooth. Making with the empty limo ruse as a decoy.’
Inez smiled, ‘Once the limo gets around the front, it will hold the natives for a while, but they aren’t stupid, so we gotta move fast.’ Inez ushered the party forward at a brisk pace, told Barrington to keep it down. She knew there would be incoming out back for sure. More snappers, autograph hunters, maybe even a few crazies. The alleyway route was always hardcore, no matter how you played it. Denizens out back of a nightclub had no interest in getting in, they were there to hang out, take the action as it came. They would engage—there was no doubt about that, but this way the odds would be more manageable.
The dash to the back door was three hundred yards, and Barrington was not exactly a sprinter. Inez kept them in the shadows, playing it as close to the wall as she dare. The Kid meanwhile, whined like a spoiled child every step of the way.
Inez wanted to kick his skinny little ass so bad it hurt.
Fifty yards and closing, the crowd out back of the club came into focus, maybe a couple of dozen people tops. She hoped venue security were sharp, because the news of a celebrity arrival spreads quicker than a hill fire in August. If they got trapped out back, with a mob closing in, there was no knowing how ugly things could get.
Inez moved fast and hard, shouldering through the gathering as smoothly as she could. The help kept Barrington’s head down, but the Kid wasn’t a low-key kind of guy, he swaggered and shoved, bleating expletives at the first person that blocked his way.
The CCP team kept things moving, but word was out, strangled cries of recognition rose up followed by pleas for attention that couldn’t be met. The flash-guns popped, first one then another, then a strobing fusillade as the tabloid acolytes came alive for a photo-op. Ten yards to go and a television crew switched live, their halide spot burning down on the scene like a Cyclops eye. Inez was building speed now, heading for the steel security door at the back of the club, like she was heading for a touchdown. As the end zone approached, the scrimmage got thicker. Journalists firing questions now, asking about Saquina Johnson—was she murdered? Firing insults, just so as they could get a look was standard practice for the Paparazzi at events like this. Inez gritted her teeth, levered bodies out the way, so her party could cut through.
That’s when the Kid started swinging. Some hack had gotten the rise they were looking for, a burning insult turning a short-fuse temper into an explosion of hard-knuckled violence. Flash bulbs-strobed white, as the scene exploded. At the security door now pounding on the humid steel, the noise throbbing and rebounding to the sound of shouts and curses. Inez squeezed against the door. No place to go—a fast building perimeter of hostiles hemming them in—In the middle of it all—Sly Barrington, grinning wide in sunglasses. Beaming, like this was the most natural thing in the world.
Inez banged on the door with her heel. Surely venue staffers had seen their arrival on the security cameras? She hammered louder, as hard as she could, as the growing crowd of fame vultures pressed in around them.
As the Cyclops eye of the TV camera burned ever closer, Inez felt the weight of the security door swinging open. She danced sideways, grabbing Barrington by the back of his jacket. A squad of venue security funneled out the door, into the weight of the surging crowd. The Cobra team closed in on their charges, struggling over the final hard fought yards, before squeezing inside a pulsing red-lit corridor that assaulted the senses. Inez caught her breath, her nostrils burning with the stench of stale sweat and industrial grade cleaning fluid.
Moisture glistened on the walls, a powerful bass heavy thrud pulsed through the brickwork—so strong and heavy, you could feel it in your teeth. The team gathered about her. silent, omniscient, covering all angles of approach. Barrington still grinning like a madman, fired up a giant cigar, made some throw away wisecrack that vanished into the throbbing darkness, swept away by the heavy pulsing volume of the beat.
Club facilitators gathered. The team looked to Inez for the move. She signaled a go with her eyes and they were off, high-diving from the precipitous edge of reality, into the fathomless depths of Sly Barrington’s world of club land intrigue.
Dead Famous 18
I knew, even before the barkeep at L’Ermitage threw me the tip that something was off kilter in the world of Albert Weinman. Strange he should want to throw the Barrington job my way in the first place. There were other players in the market after all. Warranted they would be hard pressed to beat out Cobra Close Protection when it came to top-flight professionalism, or genial good humor in the face of insurmountable bullshit. But if Weinman really wanted to annoy, there were at least a half dozen competitors he could bellyache to, before they sent both him and his music-mogul partner-in-crime away, with a giant expenses claim and a passive-aggressive warning to never call again.
Still, passive aggressive ain’t my style.
I am far more proactive, especially when some hair-shirt lawyer with delusions of grandeur thinks he can cut me into his world of Cluedo puzzle pieces. I don’t take kindly to threats. That’s why at a time when most other civilized residents of the City of Angels were settling down to an evening in front of the television with a post-prandial cocktail, I was sitting in the bushes overlooking Beverly Crest, with my irascible partner Joe Russell. Together we sat in the shrubbery observing the Weinman residence through a military-grade night scope.
‘If you’d let me bring my 40 caliber like I wanted, this thing would be over by now.’
‘We are reconnoitering. Large caliber gunshot wounds tend to draw attention.’
Joe loves irony. He gave me a dead-pan look, ‘You are kidding right?’
‘You know how I feel about firearms.’ I admonished.
Joe looked to the heavens, ‘Why don’t we just go down there, bust his lip, see what he has to tell us—all this wading around in the bushes bullshit is getting on my nerves.’
I gave Joe a look. ‘You think we go busting into Mr. Lawsuits place and rough him up he will tell us all his nasty little secrets?’
‘Anything that takes me away from a Dodgers home game makes me unhappy. I feel unhappy, I get cranky—and that’s when I need retribution. Since when did you get so easy going anyway Costello. You ask me, that creep Weinman and that ex-wife of yours got real cozy when you were going through that divorce; super-cozy in fact.
‘You think the gorgeous Kim would cheat on me JR? That is a shocking and needlessly hurtful accusation, that I will choose to ignore.’ I let the sarcasm drip.
‘It’s true though isn’t it?’
‘I peered through the night scope. ‘True or not, I have now moved on to a better place.’
‘Obviously you have, and that is why we are stuck on this damn hill top, staring
into Dr. Creepenstein’s living room with a night scope, rather than watching the game over a couple of brewskis back at Fat Tony’s place.’
‘It’s called getting the drop, dumb ass—you don’t get the drop swilling beer with your sailor chums down the sea front.’
‘If you are calling the Marina Del Rey yachting fraternity sailors, you ain’t going to win friends and influence people Costello—fact come to mention it—you have been shaping up to be a real social pariah recently.’
I zoomed in for a close up on the interior of Weinman’s place. The crib was swanky-pants modern, with floor to ceiling picture windows, a real peepers paradise. He had a designer decorators palette of unfunctional furniture displayed tastefully, amongst an eye achingly expensive collection of modern art. I am no connoisseur, but I could tell even at this distance that Andy Warhol featured large. ‘What do you mean social pariah?’ I asked.
‘Ever since I hooked us up with those two Air-hostesses, you have been a face of misery.’
‘Diamond smuggling fraudsters might do it for you JR., but the company was a little rich for my taste. I think I would rather read a good book.’
‘See, this is what I mean about social pariah, you got your nose in a god-damn paperback you will never get out of this dry period.’
‘Life lessons come in many different forms Joe. Sometime we got to step back before we can move forward again.’
Joe snorted derisively. ‘What kind of Hapkido bullshit is that Costello? I swear you are turning into the Karate Kid, with all that half-assed fortune cookie philosophy.’
I adjusted the height of the tripod, zoomed in the scope, as Weinman walked out onto the observation deck, to admire the view below. I smiled quietly, if only he knew.
‘What’s going on?’ asked Joe, ‘There better be something happening, because I am damned if I am going to sit out on this hillside all night.
That is when I saw the girl. I recognized her right away, from the paparazzi pictures that Inez had shown me. If anything she was cuter than the pictures, taller too. There was only one constant: she was beautiful, the kind of beautiful that makes other beautifuls just work-a-day normal.
