by Marcus Sakey
She’d put up a stonewall. But it was getting harder to ignore the cracks. The worst thing Daniel could have done was vanish. And there was that phone call, just before he took to the road, his strange, guilty apology for a sin he wouldn’t explain. He was confused, she thought for the hundredth time. Drunk and hurting and confused.
And worst of all, there was the man who broke into her home. Asking questions about Daniel and smiling, always smiling, his face as bland and banal as a supermarket manager’s even when he talked about torturing her.
It was getting to be a bit much. And perhaps sensing that, Waters surprised her at her office that morning. A shortish, intense-looking guy with just-so hair and a blocky suit made blockier by the shoulder holster. Seeing the gun prompted a quick flash to the intruder pulling the pistol from his belt, asking if she watched movies. She fought to keep her face straight. “Good morning, Detective.”
“Good morning, Ms. Zeigler.” His handshake was dry and professional. “I heard about what happened, wanted to make sure you were all right.”
“I’m fine.”
“You must have been terrified.”
Gee, do you think? The police who had responded had been very
polite. They had listened and taken notes and wandered around shining flashlights in the locks. But their expressions had been easy to read. They weren’t going to catch the guy. The whole process had taken about an hour, and then the police had left, promising to send extra patrols down her Palisades block, suggesting that she get a dog if she was still nervous. “I’m fine. Thanks for your concern.”
“What can you tell me about him?”
“I already told—”
“That was LAPD. I’m with the sheriff’s department. Sometimes
communication isn’t as good as you’d like. We butt heads, you know.” He smiled. “We both have pretty big heads, tell the truth.”
She ignored the attempt to disarm her, said, “It’s not your jurisdiction, right?”
“No ma’am. But your intruder was asking about Daniel Hayes.”
Sophie leaned back in her chair, studied the man. Most people who walked into her office, those that weren’t in the business, they had a surreptitious voyeurism thing going. They took in the leather couch, the framed poster of Accelerant that Phil Hoffman and Parker Posey had signed to her, the picture of Bobby De Niro kissing her cheek, and you could see them wondering if there was a portal to Oz somewhere. Non-industry folks didn’t realize that making movies wasn’t the same as watching them, that a hundred minutes of fantasy took three years of mundane, even boring work to produce.
Waters, though, seemed not to care. Maybe he was a book guy. Regardless, he’d taken in her office at a glance, and his eyes hadn’t left hers since.
“As I’ve told you before, I have no information about Daniel Hayes’s whereabouts, nor have I had any direct communication with him since—”
“I know.” The detective held out his hands. “But what I’m wondering, maybe this guy was involved in what happened to Laney.”
Sophie met the man’s eyes, couldn’t read them. She pressed the intercom button. “Mark, could you bring me a cup of coffee?” Pointedly didn’t offer one to Waters. The tiniest crinkle around his eyes told her he’d caught the move, but otherwise he gave nothing away. “He was average height. In shape. He had on slacks and a black—”
“I read the report. I meant, what was he like?”
She hesitated. “Calm.”
“Calm?”
“Like it was no big deal. Like this was a regular thing to him.”
“He surprised you in the bathroom?”
She crossed her arms. “As I was getting out of the shower. He was standing there.”
“Anyone have keys to your house, codes for the alarm?”
“My housekeeper. A few friends. The man I’m seeing.”
“Could one of them—”
“No.”
“Can you remember what he said to you? Specifically?”
Do me a favor and don’t scream, okay, sister?
Sophie said, “He asked me about Daniel, where Daniel was. He threatened me, told me that he wouldn’t enjoy it, but that he would hurt me.” Her voice mechanical.
“Did he say anything about Maine?”
She stiffened before she could catch herself. Looking up at Waters, she could tell that he had caught it. Sloppy, sweetie. Very sloppy. Well, no point bluffing now. “He asked why Daniel was in Maine. If he knew anybody there.”
“And you said?”
“I said I didn’t know that he was in Maine.”
Waters nodded. “I did.”
This time she controlled her reaction. “Oh?”
“In a town called Cherryfield. A little place way up north.”
“I see.” Her mind racing. So much to put in order. Daniel would need a first-rate criminal attorney, stat. The media had already crucified him in absentia; now that the he’d been arrested, the whole cycle would start again. God, it was going to be the trial of the year, had all the elements: sex, violence, money, celebrity. “When will he be transferred back here?”
“He won’t.”
“He’s entitled to a—”
“Daniel isn’t in custody, Ms. Zeigler.”
“I’m sorry?”
“A sheriff’s deputy responding to a Teletype spotted his car and tried to arrest him.”
Tried? What does that mean?
“Your client, you know what he did?” Waters knuckle-leaned into her desk, looking down at her. “He assaulted the officer, then drove his BMW through a hotel sign and led the deputy in a high speed chase. More than a hundred miles an hour.” Waters paused, let his words sink in. “The officer fired on him.”
There was a tentative knock on the door, and her assistant Mark poked his head in, coffee cup in hand, “Here you—”
“Not now,” she snapped. Mark looked wounded, but she ignored him, spoke to Waters. “Did he— Is Daniel all right?”
Waters paused, straightened. He shot his cuffs. “We don’t know.”
Sophie leaned back, put her fingertips to her temples. Flashed on a Thanksgiving years ago, one of her Hollywood Orphan dinner parties for those who couldn’t, or wouldn’t, go home for the holidays. Someone telling a joke and Daniel laughing at it, laughing that particular way he did, starting with a hand clap like he was marking the scene. He’d laughed that way as far back as she’d known him. It was a gesture that stayed the same while his body aged around it, while both their lives changed, while time plodded forward. She thought about how seeing that clap and hearing his laughter had given her a glow in her chest that was neither exactly lustful nor precisely maternal, but somewhere in between; a desire to help and protect him and relish the pleasure of his progress.
“Another thing,” the sheriff continuing, relentless. “Daniel had an office, right?”
“In Studio City. He didn’t use it much.”
“Last night someone broke in—”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re kidding. Wait, let me guess. You’re thinking Daniel did it, right?”
“—and when he was surprised by the security guard, beat the man to death with a rock.”
Sophie’s mouth dropped open. The retort withered on her tongue.
“Got your attention now? I understand that he’s your client, and your friend. I do. But this is the second murder he’s tangled up in. So please. Help me.”
“What.” Her voice came out a croak. “Why do you think—”
“The guard was in Daniel’s office. The rock had been used to break the window. Daniel’s fingerprints were all over.”
“It was his office.”
“I know. But it still places him there.” The sheriff sighed. “Look, I’m sure he didn’t want to kill the guy. Probably didn’t even mean to. But you know Daniel has a temper. Everyone he worked with said so. Said he was the nicest guy in the world, but that he could pop, go off.”
It can’t be true. Dani
el wouldn’t—he couldn’t— Oh, sweet boy, tell me this isn’t true. “He yells. He never hurts anyone.”
“He never hurt anyone before. But now he’s scared. Desperate.”
“Wait. I told the LAPD officers that the man who broke into my house was asking about a necklace. You know that Laney bought a necklace, an expensive one, the day she died. He’s who you should be looking for.”
The sheriff nodded. “I agree.”
“You do?”
“Absolutely. And we are. But you need to understand. The way Daniel is acting, he’s not giving us any choice. Even if this other guy is involved, right now it looks like Daniel was working with him. Until he talks to us, he’s going to look guilty.”
His words triggered a memory, one she’d tried a hundred times to ignore. The middle-of-the-night panic of a ringing phone. Daniel, his words running together, slurring drunk. Far past crying. Sobbing, the wet and choking sound of raw misery. Of a person torn in half. And barely audible between the shuddering gasps, his voice saying, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. It’s my fault.
She kept her mask in place. He was drunk. It doesn’t mean what this cop would think it means. She looked at the detective, calm in his suit, eyes sharp and hard, mind already made up. And she couldn’t blame him. Everything he said, it made sense.
“Sophie. Please. Is there anything else you can tell me?” But Daniel was still her boy.
“It’s Ms. Zeigler. And I have no information about Daniel Hayes’s whereabouts, nor have I had any—”
“Fine,” he said, going rigid. “As you like. But, Ms. Zeigler, you might remember this. You know when people are most likely to get hurt by the police?” He paused, then spoke with careful enunciation. “When they run from us.”
She opened her mouth, closed it.
“I’ll see myself out. But if you really want to protect Hayes, you’ll help me.”
5
Belinda Nichols was getting tired of bars.
She’d been working her way down Sunset, focusing on the dives, the tiki joints, the art bars with films projected on the wall and board games in a corner. Left on Silver Lake, the neighborhood Hispanics, homosexuals, and hipsters, a great combination for nightlife. But her head was pounding and she could smell a stale funk on herself—sleeping in the back of the van wasn’t doing much for her hygiene—and the gun tucked in the back of her waist was driving her crazy, digging in when she leaned back, feeling loose enough to slip when she didn’t. And through it all, the two thoughts spinning and colliding, dusting themselves off, and then spinning up again.
You’re going to point a pistol at a living, breathing person and pull the trigger.
And Where is Daniel Hayes?
It was only seven and a Monday night, so she found a place to park easily enough. As she walked past the side of the van, she stroked the four-foot wound in the side, felt the paint flake against her fingers.
You’re no longer Belinda Nichols. You’re Niki Boivin. You find people. You wanted to be a private-eye-slash-nurse who knew kung fu, like something out of a seventies action show, but really you work for lawyers and creditors. Most of the time that means you sit behind a computer and dial the phone, but sometimes you have to do it old school, and those are the nights you like best. The happiest moment of your day is jogging through morning mists with your dog, a mutt whose pit bull/dachshund heritage just had to include rape.
She’d been Niki Boivin most of the day, and slipped her on like old jeans.
A squat gray bunker abutting an auto repair shop and marked with only a small marquee, Spaceland looked like a roadhouse on some sad stretch of Southern highway instead of one of L.A.’s best music venues. Niki stepped in, blinking. The silver-blue curtain that framed the stage was bathed in light, but the band hadn’t started. She pushed over to the bar, ordered a beer she didn’t want from a pretty emo girl, all dyed hair and sadness. When it arrived, she pulled out a twenty, told the girl to keep the change.
Niki leaned back with her elbows on the bar. The place wasn’t crowded yet, maybe fifty people milling about. Friends of the band, probably. Monday was for up-and-coming acts hoping to share the success of others who had strut the same stage. As she watched, a skinny kid with nerd glasses walked on, picked up a bass, and began tuning it, the notes ringing low and slow.
Daniel Hayes wasn’t here.
She sighed, took a swig of beer. The headache was getting worse; the bassist might as well as have been strumming her raw optic nerves. When the bartendress came back, Niki gave her a finger wag.
“Whatcha need?”
“Actually, I’m looking for someone.”
“Somebody who works here?”
“No.” She pulled the photo of Hayes from her pocket, the print a little crinkled. “This guy.”
“Whoa, this is so film noir.” The bartendress leaned in to stare at the photo. She was wearing citrus perfume, clean-smelling and nicer than Niki expected. “Wait, wait. I know my line.” She straightened, tipped her head, hardened her eyes. “You a cop?”
Niki laughed. The girl wasn’t bad. “Nope.”
“Bounty hunter?”
If she wants to play, let’s play. “Something like that.”
“What do you want him for?”
“What’s it to you?”
“What are you going to do to him if you find him?”
“Well . . .” Niki stuck her pause. “I’ll probably shoot him in the head.”
The bass player ran through a quick little riff, a handful of notes cut off in the middle as he stopped to tighten the strings.
“I don’t want no trouble.”
“You don’t want trouble, you better tell me what I’m after.”
The emo girl smiled, said, “This is fun, but I got customers.”
“So—”
“Sure I’ve seen him. On the news. That’s the guy killed his wife.”
“But in here?”
“I think he’s been in before. But I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“All right. Thanks.” Niki folded the picture, took another sip of beer, then started away.
“Wait.”
“What?”
“You forgot. You’re supposed to pull out a business card, and say,” she dropped her voice an octave, “ ‘If you remember anything, anything at all, you give me a call.’ ”
Niki paused. The gun bit into her back. She stared at the girl. Read her whole life. Born in the Midwest, Michigan or Ohio. Acting classes twice a week. A spec script she’d had “almost finished” for two, three years. Been an extra on a handful of films, landed a role on a sitcom that died in development. Probably blown a rock star or two in the stockroom; had offers to do porn, but so far turned them down. Twenty-four years old. But L.A. years were dog years, and she didn’t have many left.
“I told you,” she said, and turned away. “I’m not a cop.”
5
It was time to get more botulism pumped into his face.
Jerry D’Agostino squinted in the mirror, swiveling his head to the left and right. Crow’s feet. No question. And were those lines on his forehead? Lines? Jesus Christ, cats and dogs living together. He’d have to schedule another Botox session. After Tuesday’s shoot, maybe, as a little reward.
He opened the medicine cabinet, took out the face cream—fifty bucks an ounce, you ought to be able to chop it up and snort it— and squeezed a pea-sized dollop on each index finger. Patted it in, careful not to rub.
He walked down the stairs, past the framed posters of The Last Taboo and A is for . . . and Mommy’s Nasty Secret. In the kitchen he pulled out a bag of carrots and began peeling them with long steady strokes, neat strips falling to the sink. When he was done, he chopped them and tossed the pieces in the juicer. A thick trickle of orange liquid filled a pint glass. He mixed in fish oil, green tea extract, a packet of vitamins, stirred the brackish liquid, and took a sip.
Uugh.
He coughed, took another slug, then tightened the
belt of his robe and walked through the house to his office. Stood at the window watching the San Fernando Valley flicker like ten thousand candles. The 405 was a glowing ribbon. Planes coming in to Burbank rose and fell like sparks. Up in the hills, though, the bright spots were fewer, jewels in the night. In dazzling, cramped Los Angeles, darkness was a luxury.
Can it really have been thirty years?
He’d come here after Watts but before Rodney King, the big bad eighties, when Arnold Schwarzenegger was dropping one-liners in action movies instead of speeches on the news, and Simi Valley was one of those jokes that wrote itself. Back then, he’d thought he was going to change the town, make it his. Thing about L.A., though, even though nothing stayed the same, it never really changed. But no matter how fortunes rolled and shifted, there were no slums in the Hills. If he hadn’t changed the world, at least he’d improved his address.
He moved to the couch, pulled out his laptop. The Dago Productions logo flashed onscreen, the “o” of it the male symbol, a big proud cock of an arrow straining ever upward. It was strange, looking at it now. He felt, what was the word, conflicted. He owed everything he had to cocks straining ever upward. But still. Thirty years in the business, four-hundred-plus films, a dozen Woodys lined up on his mantel. But what did it all mean?
Stop, he corrected. Clouds do not have to bring rain. You are of the sun. Feel the rays of empowerment, and let them change you.
He opened the script, scrolled to the last page.
INT. HOLLYWOOD APARTMENT—NIGHT
It is a small room. JENNA ST. JOHN SIMONE, a beautiful woman with a pure heart who has come to Los Angeles to become a STAR, sits on her bed. She is wearing a beautiful white dress symbolizing her PURITY.
JENNA
I know that you are out there. Jenna bites her lip. She is sad.
No, better than sad. He highlighted the word, looked at the synonyms.
Jenna bites her lip. She is wistful. JENNA
