Vampyres of Hollywood

by Adrienne Barbeau; Michael Scott

  The detective’s smile was grim. “Someone else will take over the case. I’ll be reassigned and the new team will have a mandate to close the case any way they can. I’m not saying they’ll cut corners, but if someone looks good for the killings they may not investigate any further. I don’t see you as having a motive, but your friend Maral isn’t quite so clean. She’s got that murder charge in her sheet; she’s attached to you and Anticipation; I’ve heard rumors she was attached to Eva Casale. I don’t know what her story is yet, but whoever takes over from me will find out pretty quick. There’s too much pressure on the department to make this go away fast, and the time may come when they won’t care if the suspect they’ve got is the real killer or not. If they decide to press charges, then they can issue a press release. You can imagine the headlines,” he added.

  Unfortunately, I could.

  I couldn’t let any more suspicion fall on Maral. And I didn’t want Peter off the case. I bought myself a little time by crossing to the French doors and staring out into the garden. One of the news helicopters gave up hovering overhead and took off towards the beach—maybe they hoped to find me heading to the Malibu house. By the time it was out of sight, I knew what I was going to say. I turned back to Peter and fixed him with the most innocent, vulnerable look I could manage.

  “We’re innocent.”

  “I don’t believe that,” he said simply. “No one is ever entirely innocent.”

  “So you think one—or both—of us killed DeWitte?”

  “No,” he said, surprising me. “I saw what happened to DeWitte and the rest of the unfortunates in that club this morning. Neither of you is physically capable of doing that. Maybe someone shafted one of the South American cartels on a drug deal and the scene in Rough Trade was a warning to others. Maybe DeWitte was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or maybe the same killer who butchered Eddings, Goulart, Gordon, and Casale is upping their game.” King brushed his hair back from his forehead and leaned forward, forearms resting on his thighs. “I don’t think you killed DeWitte, but you know something. I am convinced of it.”

  “You are no fool, Detective.”

  “Please. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that Anticipation is somehow at the center of all this. In a roundabout way that—more than anything else—convinces me of your innocence. If you were guilty, I would imagine you’d hide your tracks more cleverly.”

  Solgar had been right; Detective King was not the brightest, but he was tenacious. When all of this was over—assuming I survived—I might have to do something about him. It would be regrettable but necessary.

  “I didn’t kill Thomas, Peter, I can prove that, but the fact is I may be responsible for his death. I think I know why he was killed.”

  He didn’t say anything. Just stared at me, waiting for the story I was making up on the spot. I’m a writer and an actress, used to thinking on my feet, but this was no movie I was pitching; this was life and death: mine.

  “I told you I am expecting a contingent of Japanese businessmen to arrive on Saturday?”

  King nodded.

  “They want to invest in Anticipation. They’re offering close to fifty million dollars in cash and probably the same amount in technological investment. When that happens, Anticipation will join the big boys. We’ll become a major player overnight.”

  King considered the news. He’d lived in Hollywood long enough to understand the ramifications. “Is this common knowledge?”

  “No. Not at all. We’ve managed to keep it pretty quiet, which in this town is as much a coup as the deal itself. The Japanese aren’t talking, and aside from Maral and Thomas and my attorney, no one else knows.”

  “And how does that tie in to DeWitte’s murder?”

  “About a year ago, just a month after the Japanese approached me, I got an offer through my lawyers for fifty-one percent of my company. I wasn’t interested. I didn’t even bother to get the details, just turned it down and didn’t think about it again. The next offer came in on my private office line. A male voice, offering me top dollar for fifty-one percent of Anticipation. The guy said he thought maybe I’d misunderstood the level of their interest—that the people he represented really wanted to make a deal. Again, I refused. Three more calls came in, the last one on my home phone, each one a little more threatening. And then Jason was killed and I got a call the very next day and the caller mentioned the murder. Said he was sorry to hear about it and wondered if maybe I wasn’t so upset I’d like to reconsider the offer and get out of the business. He called again after the police found Mai and Tommy. Each time the message was less ambiguous.”

  “What about yesterday?”

  “Yesterday the message was real clear. I got the call shortly after you left, same voice, same offer: fifty-one percent of Anticipation. The voice asked if I wanted to end up like the special effects lady. Told me I’d better make the decision to sell or someone close to me would die for every day I refused.”

  As spur-of-the-moment lies went, I thought it was pretty good. I wished I could summon tears, because right then would have been a good place to shed them. “It’s my fault,” I said, dropping my voice to a whisper and turning my back to Peter so he couldn’t see that my eyes were dry. “I killed him. I killed Thomas.”

  “No, you didn’t,” he said, right on cue. “But that’s what had you so spooked yesterday when you thought someone had broken into the house.”

  I nodded.

  He reached out and touched my right shoulder, the merest gossamer touch, but the heat of it flowed down my arm. “Why didn’t you go to the police?”

  “What could the police have done?” I said bitterly. “Up until yesterday, I had nothing concrete, an unidentified voice on a phone offering to buy a portion of my company. It’s hardly extortion and it’s only the vaguest sort of blackmail. The threat was so veiled in the beginning even I wasn’t sure there was a connection.”

  “But yesterday,” he said, and I could tell there was real concern in his voice, not just a professional reprimand, “you should have called me as soon as you hung up the phone. I was here, Ovsanna, this is my case. You’ve got to trust me to help you. And this is information I need.”

  “I’ve been in this business a long time, Peter, a very long time. I’m a genre actress and the kinds of films I do aren’t going to get me nominated for an Oscar. I’ve got a star in front of Grauman’s—which my studio paid for just like every other star there—and I get Fangoria awards and fantasy film festival awards and lifetime achievement awards for horror films, but I’m never going to be on Spielberg’s short list to star in next year’s A movie. Tarantino might rediscover me, but I doubt it. I’m getting older, so there aren’t that many lead roles in any of the interesting independents that I might be right for anymore. This studio is my life, but the last few years have been tough and getting tougher. This deal with the Japanese guarantees us a future. If I’d gone to the police with unfounded suspicions, the news of the threats would have been on the street in hours and the Japanese wouldn’t have stayed long enough to unpack their digital DVs.”

  Peter just stared at me. I couldn’t tell if he bought my story or not, but he didn’t say anything.

  “I made a terrible mistake not telling you, and Thomas paid for it with his life. Oh God, Peter, what do I do now?”

  He came around to stand in front of me, dangerously close. I could smell the blood on him, just hours old, mingling with his own heat, and I was starting to get aroused. There’s nothing like giving a good performance to get my juices going. I averted my eyes and turned my head to the side, just in case the blood vessels in my eyes started to burst and give me away. “Will they strike again?” I asked, pitching my voice to little more than a whisper.

  “Yes,” he said finally, after a long pause. “On the face of what we’ve seen so far, I am afraid they will.”

  “What do we do?” I whispered.

  “There are three things we do—right now,” he said quickly. �
��First, we make sure that both your alibis are watertight, so even if I’m removed from the case, we know you’re both safe from accusations. Second, we have to ensure your safety, because I’m afraid either you or Maral could be next on their list of victims.”

  “And third?”

  “The third isn’t ‘we’ Ovsanna. It’s me, by myself. I’ve got to find the killer.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  BEVERLY HILLS

  10:25 A.M.

  I work in one of the all-time great office buildings in Beverly Hills, certainly the best piece of architecture housing any police department I’ve ever seen. Like every great building, it’s got different moods and atmospheres—but for me, my favorite view is mid-morning, when the sun washes the blue, green, and gold tiles on the dome of City Hall. Then it looks incredibly dramatic, almost foreign to L.A. It reminds me of that turn on the 101 in the Bay Area where suddenly the entire San Francisco skyline is laid out in a dramatic vista. It’s breathtaking and heart-stoppingly gorgeous. You’d have to be dead not to revel in the glory of it. Well, the Beverly Hills Civic Center isn’t quite that glorious, but it’s still great to look at.

  It’s a stunning example of Spanish Renaissance architecture, originally designed in 1932 by William Gage. But by the late seventies it was way too small and of course, it wasn’t earthquake safe. Instead of letting it go, the city held a blind bid contest among the top six architects of the time, committing to a ten-year renovation for a hundred and ten million dollars. When people tell me that L.A. has no soul I remind them about that: one hundred and ten million dollars to preserve a building less than a hundred years old. Frank Gehry lost out to Charles Moore, who said he was going to build “a place that is distinguishable in mind and memory from all other places.” It’s one of my favorite quotes because, for me, he wasn’t just talking about the building; he was describing L.A. in general and Hollywood in particular. I think he succeeded. The civic center with its cop shop is pure L.A. Quintessential Hollywood, and like the famous sign, it’s even featured in the movies: Beverly Hills Cop and Down and Out in Beverly Hills.

  The department lives up to the building. We’ve got first-class equipment, up-to-date technology; damn, even the beat cops’ uniforms look good. It’s a good place to work and it’s not a job I want to jeopardize. I knew my father called in several favors just to get me this job and I knew, as I climbed the steps to the double doors, that I was dangerously close to blowing it. I wasn’t getting results fast enough for the brass to appease the press and the politicians. That cracking sound I heard in the background was the thin ice I was skating on.

  I’d had XM radio installed in the Jag, so I alternated listening to CNN and the local talk radio stations as I drove over from Bel Air. CNN had a piece on the morning’s killings, but it was pretty straightforward reporting. The talk stations, however, were heavy with commentary. Most of the deejays were buying my suggestion that the latest multiple murders didn’t fit the profile of the Cinema Slayer but were drug related instead. Rough Trade’s specialty had been leaked to the media by a source close to the investigation—me, in other words—and its reputation bolstered that theory. Bloody death, drugs, multiple murder in an S&M club, it didn’t sound like the Cinema Slayer. The three dead actors weren’t mentioned, and no one was talking about Eva Casale. We hadn’t released any specifics about her murder, but we had her ex-junkie lover in custody so, as far as the media was concerned, that case was old news. This was one of those times when the attention span of the MTV generation was a definite advantage.

  It’s a cliché that police captains are white haired or ruddy faced or Irish. Captain Barton isn’t Irish. He’s got a beautiful head of white hair, though, and enough red veins on his nose and cheeks to ensure a second career as Santa at Nordstrom if he wants it. Fortunately for the department, he hasn’t wanted it yet. He’s a good man to work for: bright, fair, driven, more politician than police, more bureaucrat than badge, with a Ph.D. in criminology, speaks six languages, and has been married to the same woman for twenty-five years. Two of his five kids are training to be cops.

  He’s second generation on the job—his dad and mine were rookies together back when the Two Tonys killed Bugsy Siegel on Linden Drive—and he’s worked his way up from the beat to captain without making a lot of enemies. No one knows Hollywood politics better than Barton. He’s a damn good administrator, but he can be a pain in my ass sometimes. I had a feeling, when I got the note on my desk saying he wanted to see me, that this was going to be one of them.

  We met in his glass-walled office, with its window looking out onto Rexford. It’s a fabulous view—if you like palm trees and traffic…and if you look closely you can see where the acid smog has pitted the bulletproof glass. A metaphor for something, I’m sure—maybe pollution will get us before firepower—but no one’s paying attention. The Captain was concentrating on a series of printed e-mails spread out across his desk. I didn’t even need to look at them as I sat down to know that they were from me. They changed colors ever so slightly as the lights on the miniature Christmas tree in the corner of the room twinkled on and off.

  “Good work, Peter. Excellent work,” he said in that peculiar clipped fashion of his. His praise took me by surprise, immediately putting me on guard. “Good, solid police work.”

  There was something coming.

  “But it’s not enough.”

  Barton pulled out a pair of rimless glasses from his top drawer—I glimpsed pens sorted by color—and glanced at the e-mailed reports.

  “I’ve got the higher-ups breathing down my neck for results. You haven’t got anything on the first three murders, we’re no closer to solving the Casale case, and now we’ve got this mess from this morning. I can’t go out there and talk to anyone with what little you’ve got. This isn’t going to cut it.”

  “That’s unfair, Captain. I think I’ve accomplished quite a bit, given that I was only assigned this case yesterday morning. I was promised a task force, resources, an office. I’m still filling in the requisition forms.”

  “These crimes were always a priority, but obviously the murder yesterday and the killings this morning have changed all that. Your team is being assembled now.”

  “I wanted to pick my own team,” I mumbled.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” he snapped, sounding like a disapproving parent. “You’ll take what we give you.” He looked back at the report. “I made you lead on the Cinema Slayer trio, but the murder yesterday and the massacre this morning changes all that. You’ll work with Milmore, Long, and Delaney.”

  I kept my face straight: Larry, Curly, and Moe. Well, at least he wasn’t turning it over to Homicide Special yet. Actually, John Milmore, Jake Long, and Del Delaney are all good cops and I’ve worked with each one on other cases.

  Barton opened the first murder book on his desk and started reading from it. “We have two separate murder scenes within the past twenty-four hours which, conceivably, could have been committed by the same person or persons unknown.” Without lifting his head, he looked at me over the rim of his glasses. “Nine bodies were taken out of this Rough Trade club. Six men, three women,” he added, as if it made a difference. “We seem to be missing some body parts, which suggests that the killer or killers took said parts away, maybe a trophy of their kill. The ME is having trouble making sense of the scene.”

  Our medical examiner is one of the best in the country. “I don’t understand. What can’t he figure out?”

  “There were teeth marks on some of the bodies.”

  “Teeth marks?” I blinked, and then shrugged. Why was I even surprised? I’m not squeamish, but I could feel my stomach start to gurgle. “A cannibal killer…the press will love that.”

  “The ME doesn’t think they’re human. Said at first glance they look canine. Or maybe feline—but big. Big. If it’s a cat, it’s a zoo animal—jaguar, panther, tiger, something like that—definitely not a pussycat. He’s making casts of the marks to identify them
.”

  “What about the weapons used?”

  “None, according to the coroner. No guns, knives, clubs…everyone was killed by hand.” He moved a buff-colored envelope of photographs across the desk toward me. I’d seen everything up close that morning, but these photos showed the minutest details. I closed the envelope and pushed it away. These were images they wouldn’t even use in Saw III. “Most of the traumatic injuries were made postmortem. Except for the people who were ripped apart. ME says they were alive when that happened. Something to do with the spray of the arterial blood. Oh, and we got an ID on another one of the vics. Kid named Neville Travis. I think this is what’s left of him.” The Captain pulled the top photo out of the folder and handed it back to me. It showed an arm resting three feet away from a mangled torso. They’d been jaggedly severed at the shoulder. No wonder I hadn’t recognized Travis at the scene; there was no flesh left on his face. “Are you suggesting an ordinary human did that—without any weapons?”

  “Hardly an ordinary human,” Barton said mildly. “But then, the people who frequent these clubs aren’t exactly ordinary, are they? I mean I don’t see my next-door neighbors walking in there. These are precisely the type of people who give this city a bad name. A TV weather girl—what was she doing in a place like that? I got my weather from her every morning, for God’s sake!” He sounded personally affronted.

  “We ID’d a judge and a pastor in there, too,” I reminded him.

  “Well, that I can believe,” he said dismissively, and I wasn’t sure if he was referring to the pastor or the judge or both. “A place like that, it wouldn’t surprise me to find out that there were animals there. Bestiality, you know. Makes me think about Catherine the Great.” Before I could ask the obvious question, he hurried on. “Did you know,” he said, leaning forward, “that there are more big cats in private hands in the United States than there are in the rest of the wild? More tigers in America than in all of India?”