“So you liked the concept of Sanctum,” I said. “What about Lowell’s choice of fellows?”
“Terry? Terry was a talented guy, actually. Personal problems, but who doesn’t.”
“So you never saw him act violent.”
“Not to me. He used to put on this Mr. Macho thing, walking around without a shirt, all these tattoos of naked girls. But he had talent.”
“Whatever happened to him?”
“Hell if I know. Idiot had all sorts of good stuff coming to him. I coulda had deals for him, and he just split.”
“Do you think Lowell knows where he went?”
“I always figured he did, but he never admitted it. That was the final straw between us. After all I did for the bastard, I figured I had some honesty coming. You meet him yet?”
“Just briefly.”
“Sick, isn’t it? Guy’s rolling in money and he lives like a pig.”
“If he’s rich, how come he needed to come to you for financing?”
He slid his arms from behind his head and placed them on the desk. “Because I was a jackass. Didn’t know he was rich, never checked him out. And I used to be a fucking financial analyst, no excuse.” Tapping the marble. “Hey, that’s showbiz.”
Another glance at the platinum watch.
I said, “So you have no idea about what happened to Trafficant?”
“No, but if you find out, let me know. Asshole owes me a script.” Shaking his head. “Stupid mudfuck. He coulda made a living. Great ear for dialogue, he knew how to conceptualize in terms of scenes. Now, Denny Mellors was another story—wooden ear, thought he was some fucking Ivy League literati-type. And no fucking boy scout, either. He never got the bad PR Terry got, but he was antisocial from day one, nasty temper. Not that I have anything against black people—not that he was even that black. I think his mother was white, or something. He talked like a white. But the guy …”
Waving disgustedly, he put his feet up on the desk. The soles of his shoes were shiny black, unmarked.
“What did he do?” I said.
He looked out the window. The San Gabriel Mountains were capped with brown air. “You know, my friend, talking to you is giving me ideas. Any film interest in your book yet?”
“Some.”
“You have any experience in film?”
“Not really.”
“Then don’t jump into anything. People are going to tell you they can do all sorts of things for you; meanwhile they’ve got a thumb in the Vaseline, ready to yank down your jockeys. I’ve been in the industry for twenty years, can get things done. And this book of yours is flashing concept lights. Like you said, fall from grace. And did you know the place used to be a nudist colony? How’s that for a premise? Writers and artists and nudists. They get thrown together and shit happens.”
“Violent shit?” I said.
“All kinds of shit. You’d have to change things around, of course. For legal purposes. Maybe make Lowell a musician—a cellist. Yeah, I like that. It’s a music retreat—nudists and musicians, rock types and classical types, all thrown together—seductive, right?”
“Interesting. So who’s the bad guy, Mellors? That’s not too PC.”
“So we make him white—he was mostly white anyway. Blond hair, little yellow mustache. Big, strong buck … nasty.”
“Nasty how?”
“Nasty temper. Talked all the time about hurting things—hurting women. I’m not saying he actually did anything, but you talk like that long enough, who knows?”
“See what you mean,” I said. “I’ve read about the grand opening party for Sanctum. Sounds like a wild affair—a love-in. That might be a good place for the shit to happen.”
He looked up at the ceiling. Cheap acoustical tiles. “Maybe, yeah. Like a Felliniesque thing. Dolce Vita with acid, pot—kind of a sixties/seventies thing. That’s coming back, you know.”
“Were you at the party?”
“In the beginning,” he said. “Then it got too loud, and my wife made me take her home.”
“Did you see Mellors or Trafficant?”
“Nah,” he said. “Too many people, noise, mess, all sorts of shit. One of those situations where you see everyone but you don’t see anyone, know what I mean?”
“La Dolce Vita meets The Trip.”
“Exactly.” He moved his eyes from the ceiling to me. “You know how to conceptualize. Have an agent?”
“Still looking for one.”
“You got a book deal without one?”
“Contacts from journalism.”
“Who’s your editor?”
I made up a name.
He nodded. “Well, get yourself an agent or talk to me directly, and we just might work something out. Let’s say an eighteen-month option with first rights to renew.”
“What kind of option money are we talking about?”
“Hey,” he said, grinning. “Maybe you don’t need an agent. What kind of money? The usual. Assuming we get a network interested. But I’ve got to have everything tied up before I go to them. Nowadays, they’re more cautious than a virgin on horseback—you weren’t thinking big screen, were you?”
“Actually—”
“Forget it, Sammy. TV’s the only way to go. They’re taking chances the studios won’t, and even though syndication’s not the honeymoon it used to be, it’s still a serious game. Think you can write me up a treatment—one or two pages? Let’s say by next Tuesday?”
“Sure,” I said, “but I want to discuss some story elements with you first, make sure we’re talking the same language.”
“Story,” he said dismissively. “You’re the writer. Give me good and evil, some conflict, resolution—maybe some martial arts. Networks are ripe for martial arts, nothing decent since Kung Fu. Musicians and nudists and evil. ’Course they couldn’t be shown nude, but you’ll find some way to let everyone know they’re buck naked. Like a sly wink, know what I mean? But respectful of the human body. Something women can get behind. Good and evil. The characters arc, but they maintain their basic good-bad nature. The more I think about it, the better I like it.”
He rubbed his hands together and stood. “You got thirteen fucking minutes for the price of five, Sam.”
“You see Mellors as the evil lead?” I said.
“If you make him white.”
“Can you tell me anything more about him that would flesh out the character?”
“Nasty piece of work. Like I said, he hated women, called them manipulative bitches. I took him in, after Sanctum closed. Gave him a job because I felt sorry for him. He was working on a book, couldn’t finish it.”
“Writer’s block?”
“Money block. Writer’s block was Lowell’s game. Talk about big talk, no action. Anyway, Denny came to me begging because he knew I was a soft touch. Broke—he’d depended on Lowell. He was writing this novel, gonna be the greatest thing since Moby Dick if he could only finish it. Being a liberal do-gooder, I gave him a job with my company in return for first refusal on the manuscript.”
“What kind of job?”
“Idiot work. Business Affairs office. Writing memos, filing contracts, xeroxing. The idea was to free him up to write. Then one day he waltzes in, announces no more book, it’s a screenplay now. The story lends itself to that form. Fine, makes my life that much easier. I wait six months, then six more.”
He walked to the bookcase. Eyeing the shelves for a second, he pulled a thin unmarked volume out of the middle, opened it, put it back, and removed another one, even thinner.
“This is what he gives me.”
I took the folder. Bound in brown, marbled cardboard. The title page said:
THE BRIDE
A Screenplay by Denton W. Mellors
“Take it home,” said App. “I like you, but you’re outa here. Got a meeting.”
I folded my notes and put them away. App tossed the script I’d used for a writing board back into the trash. We walked to the door.
�
�I haven’t been able to locate Mellors,” I said. “Any idea what happened to him?”
“Who the fuck knows? After I told him I couldn’t use that piece of shit you’re holding, he cursed me out, threw a chair—broke some pre-Columbian pieces—and left. Last I saw of him, thank God. Scared the shit out of me. First time I hired a bodyguard.”
We left the office and walked down the postered hall past the empty reception desk. He opened a glass door and held it.
“Nice meeting you, Sammy—what makes you run, ha ha. Let’s both of us do some serious thinking about what we want out of this, write something up, and then we can break some bread. Let’s say Wednesdayish. Lunch?”
CHAPTER
36
I walked over to the Century City shopping mall, found a café with private booths, and sat down to coffee and Denton Mellors’s script.
Not a complete script, it soon became clear. Just a five-page triple-spaced summary, what App had called a treatment.
THE BRIDE
We open upon a man watching a woman undressing. From his face we see he is a homicidal maniac, but handsome and muscular. The kind of man women gravitate to.
He holds a boning knife. It is nighttime. The moon hits it and it glints.
The maniac gets up from his crouch and cuts through a sliding glass door. The woman is in the shower, soaping herself up. We see soap on her breasts and her vagina. She is masturbating, enjoying it.
The maniac flings open the shower door. The woman screams as the maniac rapes the woman anally, then fillets her.
The maniac removes his clothing, showers in the woman’s shower as the body still lies there. Then he gets dressed and drives home to his marital bed. His bride is young, beautiful, clearly virginal. She loves him madly. He is the love and lust of her life.
The maniac and his bride engage in foreplay and the maniac makes tender love to his innocent young bride: he is capable of great sensitivity when the situation calls for it. As she comes, thunderously, the camera cuts to juxtaposed faces of the bride and the maniac’s other savaged women—all of them his chosen. The bride’s prolonged, cataclysmic orgasm alternates with their anguish. To the maniac, it is all music.…
I managed to finish the rest of it, resisting the temptation to stow it in the garbage.
Instead, I took it home and called Milo the minute I got through the door. But he wasn’t at the station and I had to content myself with leaving a message at Blue Investigations.
I tried Lucy in Brentwood. Phone off the hook, probably sleeping again. Checking in with my service got me one message: Wendy Embrey wanting to talk about billing problems. That irritated me, and I didn’t bother to copy down her number.
I got a beer from the fridge and watched a couple of surfers struggle to master infinity.
Mellors’s treatment screamed in my head like a car alarm.
He and Lowell and Trafficant drawn together not by art but by hatred of women.
Discovering common interests.
Slaking their needs together the night of the party.
Lowell shutting down the retreat less than a year later.
New use for his acreage?
Another type of cemetery?
Robin came home in a great mood and we ended up in bed. I tried to keep the bad pictures out of my head, wondering if I’d be able to make love.
When the time came, I did the right things but my mind was still elsewhere, firing like a strobe light.
She fell asleep quickly, but I found myself itching to get up. I lay there for a long time, not moving.
“Restless?”
“Maybe I’ll get up and take a drive or something.”
She started to sit up but I kissed her forehead.
“Rest.”
“Is everything okay, Alex?”
“Just one of those jumpy nights. You know me.”
“Sometimes I wonder,” she said. But she closed her eyes and pursed her lips. I kissed them and touched her eyelids with my fingers. She gathered the covers around her head and curled up.
I sped past Broad Beach, Zuma, the Colony, Carbon Beach. La Costa.
One very bright light shone above the Sheas’ house. Two proto-Malibu cars were parked along the highway in front: a Porsche bathtub roadster and a Corvette. Between them was an elderly Olds 88 that looked vaguely familiar. I pulled up behind the Corvette and was walking to the front door just as it opened and a man backed out, stumbling.
I thought I heard a voice from inside the house, but the combined roars of the highway and the ocean drowned out the words.
The man approached the house again and I got close enough to hear a woman’s voice.
“Go away! I’ll call the police!”
The man shouted, “Just you—”
“Out! Get the hell out! I’ll call the police!”
The man stopped and folded his arms across his chest. “Go ahead, Gwendolyn. Tell them you’re a murderer.”
Then he charged the door.
The woman screamed again. “You bastard!” The man stumbled again, shoved back with force.
Falling into a pool of lamplight.
Sherrell Best, in his dark suit and tie, his hairless dome shiny as a ball bearing.
I was right in back of him now as the door started to slam shut. He whipped out his right foot and managed to wedge it between the door and the jamb. His ankle was trapped. He shouted in pain.
Threats and curses from Gwen Shea. No backup from Tom, so she was there alone.
Best tried to pull his ankle free but it was vise-gripped.
Gwen Shea kept screaming through the crack. Putting her weight against the door, trying to crush the ankle.
I shouted, “Cut it out, he’s stuck!”
Her eyes spread with panic as she focused on my face. She opened the door, kicked at Best’s leg as I pulled it free, and slammed it shut.
Best lay there, groaning. I pulled him up but when he stood on his right leg, he buckled and I had to support him.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said, trying to pull him toward the Olds.
He shook his head. “I’m staying here.”
“What if she calls the police?”
“She didn’t, did she? Because she knows she’s guilty. I can smell guilt.”
He folded his arms again.
“What if she has a gun?” I said. “This is exactly how bad things happen.”
“Then she’ll add to her sins.”
“That won’t solve your problem.”
“Will anything else solve my problem?”
“That’s not a very religious answer.”
He looked away.
“Come on,” I said. “Let’s talk about this rationally. I’ve learned some things that may—”
He grabbed my sleeve. “What kinds of things?”
“If you leave and promise not to confront her again, I’ll tell you.”
He looked back at the house. Shook his right leg and winced. Stared at the speeding cars, then once more at the house. All lights off.
“I take that as a solemn oath,” he said.
“Tell me,” he said, sitting in the driver’s seat and massaging his ankle.
“Do you need to see a doctor for that?”
“No, no, it’s fine. Tell me what you’ve learned.”
“I need you to promise you won’t act on it.”
“I can’t promise that!”
“Then I can’t tell you.”
“You swore!”
“It’s for your own safety, Reverend.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“I see that.”
His nostrils widened. For an instant he looked like anything but a man of God.
“All right. I made a fool out of myself. So did Elijah, coming down from the hills, raving at Ahab. So did Moses, talking to a bush, and Jesus, consorting with the low and the needy—”
“Reverend, the last thing I want to do is prolong your suffering. I want to find out the
whole truth about Karen also.”
“Why?”
“For my patient,” I said, keeping it simple.
“That’s hard to believe.”
“So was walking on water.”
He started to touch his sore ankle, then stopped himself and brushed his fingers against the keys dangling from the ignition. “If you really know something, tell me, doctor. Trust me to do the right thing.”
“Not unless you promise not to act. Your getting involved the way you did tonight will only slow things down.”
“Slow things down? Does that mean there’s progress?”
“Some. I’m sorry, I know you’ve lived with this for a long time, but it’s going to have to be a while longer.”
“A while,” he said, flexing his foot. “Why did you come here tonight?”
“Because you’re probably right about the Sheas knowing something. But if you get in the way, we may never find out what. And I won’t tell you another word unless I’m sure you’ll cooperate.”
The pain in his eyes had nothing to do with his leg.
“All right. I promise not to do anything that gets in the way.”
“Nothing at all,” I said. “No contact with anyone associated with the case until I tell you it’s safe.”
“Fine, fine. What do you know?”
“I consider that a religious oath.”
“I won’t swear needlessly, but you have my word.”
I gave him some of it, leaving out names. The growing possibility that something had happened to Karen at the party and that Felix Barnard had learned about it, tried to profit, and died because of greed.
A tremor of rage took hold of his face. He forced himself placid. An unsettling calm, almost like death.
“I knew there was something about that man,” he said. “Polite—too polite. I never completely trusted him. How did he die?”
I told him. “That’s why we have to be careful, Reverend. If covering up was worth killing for then, it still is.”
“Yes, yes,” he said. But there was no fear in him, only a cold, quiet acquiescence. I’d asked a lot of him. Thinking of the picture in his kitchen—Dinah’s Abduction by Shechem—I wondered if I was putting too much faith in him.
Four Classic Alex Delaware Thrillers 4-Book Bundle Page 159
