Try Dying

by James Scott Bell

  Her arms were around my neck as she leaned her head back and smiled at me. “Nice,” she said.

  I gently took her wrists and pulled her arms down. “Channing, I don’t want you to think—”

  “I don’t want to think. Neither do you.”

  “That’s just it. I am thinking. About a lot of things, and I’m just not ready for this.”

  “I can make you ready.”

  She closed in on me again, fast. She practically threw her mouth on mine, and I smelled the cabernet on her breath and thought she might be a little drunk. And then she had her right hand clutching the back of my neck and pulled me to her.

  I jerked back and her nails scratched me, hard.

  “Don’t,” I said.

  “A man’s not supposed to say that.”

  “Come on, Channing.”

  “Is something wrong with you?”

  “I just lost my fiancée. You’re supposed to be writing about that. I don’t need this right now.”

  “You still feel things. So do I.”

  I walked away from her and the window.

  “Why don’t we just forget that happened,” I said. “In fact, why don’t we forget the whole arrangement. I don’t think it’s working out the way we planned.”

  That’s when she cursed at me.

  “Hey,” I said. “A little overreaction.”

  “Shut up. Just shut up.” She turned her back.

  “Channing—”

  “Just get out, why don’t you?”

  One thing I never wanted, even in my days when one night was all I cared for, was a woman mad at me. Ty Buchanan, everybody’s friend, the charmer.

  I went to Channing and put my right hand on her shoulder. She didn’t turn around.

  “Can we give this a rain check?” I said. “Can you understand, in your journalistic capacity, that my head is screwed up at the moment?”

  I kept my hand on her shoulder. Finally she turned around and said, “Sorry. Sorry.”

  “Me, too. Let me call you in a few days. Let me settle down.”

  Channing looked at the floor, and I thought that nine hundred ninety-nine guys out of a thousand would have been really glad to be here right now.

  Maybe, given enough time, I would be, too.

  64

  THE SECURITY GUARD gave me the same look he’d shot me when I went upstairs. I wanted to rearrange that look for him and send him back to security guard school where all they teach you is to say, “Where you going? Go ahead.”

  On the street, the night was cool and wet. A fog had rolled in from the Pacific and made the streetlights fuzzy. I’d parked on the street about a block from Channing’s building.

  I’d only gone halfway when a voice behind me said, “Mr. Buchanan?”

  I turned around to a guy about my height in a white, very expensive looking coat and open-necked red shirt. His hair was clipped close to the skull, and he sported a manicured moustache. Thirty-ish, he seemed like he could lift the back end of a car.

  “You know me?” I said.

  “There is a man who would like to meet you.”

  His eyes were black as night, his expression even. In the dim light, though, I could see a pronounced teardrop tattoo under his left eye. I said, “You follow me here?”

  “It’s important to us.”

  “Who is us?”

  “If you’ll give us a moment?” He put his hand out like a butler showing someone into the library.

  “I’m not going anywhere with you,” I said. A small finger of ice traced my spine.

  “Mr. Barocas doesn’t do this for everybody,” the guy said. “You should consider yourself blessed.”

  “Barocas?”

  “He’s right over there.” He pointed across the street at a Hummer limo, a thing that looked like an office building tilted on its side and fitted with wheels.

  I stood there wondering all sorts of things, from how a Hummer limo could have followed me without me knowing it to visions of my demise.

  As I contemplated turning and running as fast as I could toward Hollywood, the guy said, “There’s been a misunderstanding somewhere. That’s all. Mr. Barocas would like to clear it up.”

  Imagining an automatic weapon or knife or flamethrower under the guy’s coat, and figuring if they could trace me here they could trace me anywhere, I thought what the heck.

  “Lead the way, Chalmers,” I said.

  He didn’t smile.

  65

  THE INSIDE OF the Hummer limo was a prom queen’s dream on steroids.

  I got let in through a rear door. The floor running down the middle was made up of lighted squares under Plexiglas. Running along the sides near the ceiling were speakers and subwoofers and who knew what else, a sound system that could have served one of those cliffside mansions in Malibu.

  Below that, also running the length of the limo, were separate bar areas, maybe five on each side. These were subtly changing colors, giving the whole interior a party atmosphere. The ceiling itself was mirrored with a starlight effect. I couldn’t believe this was a vehicle. It had to be a club. The only thing missing was a velvet rope.

  All the way at the other end, which seemed a football field away, were two large flat-screen TVs, one on each side. A cartoon was playing on both screens.

  The sound for the cartoons was jacked up, piping over the speakers. I heard the unmistakable voice of Homer J. Simpson.

  “Come on down!” someone yelled from near the TVs, someone I couldn’t see. The guy behind me said, “Just go on down.”

  I went, wondering if there was tram service from back to front.

  As I got nearer, I still couldn’t see anyone. Despite the flickering lights, it was fairly dark inside.

  Then a face appeared as if out of nowhere. It had turned toward me.

  “Have a seat, Ty,” the face said. “I’m Rudy.”

  66

  THE MOMENT I was seated next to him it was like I’d stumbled into a power grid.

  Some people walk into a crowded room and suck up all the energy. I’ve met billionaires and U.S. senators and Mel Gibson, and all of them had this aura.

  So did Barocas.

  He was dressed in black, so his brown face seemed disembodied, floating around on its own. The perfect features of the man I’d seen on the cover of the book in Hollywood were even more pronounced in person.

  “You seen this one?” he said, looking up at one of the TVs.

  “I couldn’t say,” I said. “I wasn’t much into The Simpsons.”

  “Oh, man, how can you not be? This is the one where Mr. Burns gets all the famous baseball players to play for his softball team. You got Jose Canseco, Darryl Strawberry, Griffey Jr., Mattingly. Is that too funny or what?”

  “Hilarious.” My heart was really pumping now. I had no idea how much Barocas knew about me or what I was thinking. It was like being in an old film noir where Robert Mitchum gets taken for a face to face with Mr. Big, played by Kirk Douglas or some other menacing dude. Only this was full-color L.A. and anything can happen here.

  “No, I mean it,” Barocas continued, like we were old friends. “You know, this show was making me laugh when there was nothing in my life to laugh about. You know who my favorite character is?”

  “Not really.”

  “It’s Mr. Burns! You know, that old guy, loves his power and his money and doesn’t make any bones about it. He’s no hypocrite. And that means a lot to me, not being a hypocrite. Does that mean a lot to you?”

  “Can I ask why you went to all this trouble to follow me?”

  “Wait, wait.” Barocas was still looking at the screen. Mr. Burns was giving some sort of mixture from a bottle to one of his players. The player said, “It’s like there’s a party in my mouth and everyone’s invited.”

  Barocas slapped his thighs and laughed. “I love that line! That’s Ken Griffey Jr. up there. Funny thing is, this was before the juice scandal in the majors. Today if they made this episode, that wou
ld be Barry Bonds.”

  He lifted a remote and pressed a button, and the picture froze on the face of Mr. Burns.

  “See, I came from about as low as you can get,” Barocas said. “And what I have now I enjoy very much.”

  “You and I are from the same place,” I said.

  “True?”

  “Miami.”

  “Get outta here. Isn’t that something? It’s a small world.”

  “Or a big limo.”

  Barocas rocked forward and laughed. “You are a funny guy. And I bet you are a very good lawyer.”

  “I do my best.”

  “And that is the key to success, my friend. Drink?”

  “No thanks. I’d like to get going if you don’t—”

  “Hang on, hang on. You know I talk about this all the time to people. I have a system I try to teach the young guys, the bangers, but it all comes down to that one thing. The best is all you can do, but the secret is you got to do it, day after day. When you do, great things can happen. This is still the greatest country on earth.”

  “Where anybody can follow anybody.”

  He looked at me for a long time. Not with menace, but almost like he was trying to read my mind and put the information into his head for future reference.

  “When you work hard and reach the top,” he said, “it’s kind of like climbing a mountain. You don’t ever want to come down. Or get knocked down.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “See, I help a lot of people. A lot of people depend on me. I have over three hundred good folks on the payroll. I got a camp that’s full of young guys who’d be committing crimes right now if it weren’t for me. That’s something to respect and protect.”

  I stayed silent. If you can get a hostile witness to run off at the mouth, he’ll sometimes say something to hang himself.

  “And when you’re standing at the top you’ve got people down below, throwing rocks. Sometimes worse. You ever been contacted by the Feds about me?”

  The question had come out of left field, and I knew that everything he’d been saying to this point was a setup. Sometimes a lawyer will ask a series of questions on cross just so he can throw the witness a sucker punch and get him all flustered. Barocas had done this brilliantly.

  In that brief second between his asking and my answering, I managed to stay cool. “No, why should they?”

  “’Cause they want to kill me, that’s why. They got guys want to bring me down because I’m a spic who’s got too much power, man. I had a couple guys from the ranch get into trouble last year, and they want to pin it on me. I ask you if that’s right, Mr. Buchanan. Can you tell me? A guy tries to do good and they throw it in his face?”

  “Sure,” I said calmly. “That’s the way of the world.”

  “You got it. So nobody’s come to you?”

  “No.”

  “But you’ve come to somebody.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “This reporter.”

  Even in the dim light I could see his eyes boring holes in me, and I knew he wanted me to wilt under the heat. It was a test.

  “I had a drink with her,” I said.

  “That all?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You got a thing goin’ on with her?”

  “Maybe.”

  “You could do a lot worse. Wait, didn’t you just lose your fiancée?”

  “You know about that?”

  “Somebody showed me something, from the news or something. Some real freak accident, right?”

  “Yeah. Freak.”

  “Accidents. What’re you gonna do? Can’t resign from life, can you? Well, I guess you can.”

  He paused and pressed a button and bright lights filled the limo. I squinted.

  “You know, I got to control the spin,” Barocas said. “News guys want to bury me, too. Hey, you’d think I was paranoid or something. But if everybody’s out to get you, hey.”

  “Nice meeting you.” I turned toward the back and saw the other guy sitting there like a jailer.

  “What’s wrong? Hey, you’re bleeding, man. What went on up there?”

  My neck. I put my hand back there and felt the stickiness.

  “Rough sex?” Barocas smiled and the light bounced off his white teeth.

  “Can I go now?”

  “Sure, I just wanted to say hello and lay things out for you. Make sure that when you talk about me, you’re informed, you know? I always like people to be informed.”

  “Appreciate it.”

  “I hope so. And one more thing.”

  I waited.

  “If you reach for the stars, you may not quite get one. But you won’t get a handful of mud either.”

  He winked at me. I nodded and made my way back down the dance floor where the jailer had opened the cell door. He gave me a look that was part warning, part amusement, and all attitude.

  67

  THURSDAY MORNING MCDONOUGH looked like the father who, after warning his kid not to smoke, calls the kid in and shows him the Marlboros he found under the bed.

  “What on earth is happening?” he asked even before my rear made contact with the seat.

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “You’re some sort of lightning rod, only it’s trouble you’re attracting.”

  “It must seem that way.”

  “Seem? Somebody tries to burn down your house? Why is that happening?”

  I sucked in some air and tried to anticipate what he’d want to hear, what would save my job.

  “I really don’t know,” I said. “But there’s arson investigators on this. I know Frank Trudeau got all Tourettes on me.”

  McDonough picked up a gold letter opener from his desk. He stuck the point into the pad of his left index finger and turned the letter opener back and forth. “He’s not the only one.”

  I waited. He obviously had something more to say. He turned the letter opener a few more times. “You attacked a man in a bar,” he said.

  My mouth dropped open. “How did . . . What did you hear?”

  “I got a call from Kendra Mackee’s lawyer, Don Bascombe. He said you blustered into her office, for one thing, and then you tracked down one of her clients and threatened him.”

  “Mr. McDonough, that is a load of—”

  “Are you denying it?”

  “Every bit of it.”

  “You didn’t track this guy to a bar in North Hollywood?”

  “All right, that much is true. And I did go to see Mackee. But it’s not like what some lawyer says.”

  McDonough raised his eyebrows. “I know Don Bascombe pretty well. He doesn’t just shoot his mouth off.”

  “Sir, this is what happened. Mackee had this high-profile case with a guy named David Townsend a few years ago. Involved a priest and charges of molestation. I talked to the priest and I followed up on the name, and I found this guy Townsend. I wanted to see what he was about.”

  “How did you find him?”

  “I had some help.”

  “From?”

  I cleared my throat. “Jonathan Blumberg.”

  “Blumberg! What’s that all about?”

  “I don’t know; he has some information networks and—”

  “Ty, Blumberg is a loose cannon. If we’re not careful, he’s going to explode all over our case.”

  “He just passed me some information, and I—”

  “Blumberg is about power, and he loves to throw his around, likes people to believe he worked for the CIA and was a mercenary before that. It all feeds his ego. We have to keep this guy on a very tight leash.”

  Shifting around on the chair, which suddenly seemed hard as cement, I said, “But his information was correct. I was able to find this Townsend.”

  “And so what? Attack him?”

  “He attacked me.”

  “That’s not what this lawyer said. And he said there was a witness who saw you take a shot at the guy.”

  “Oh please.” I tried to contain my building rag
e. “I think Townsend is a fraud, and he’s in on it with Mackee, and if he cracks we can nail this thing.”

  “Last warning,” McDonough said. “You mess up again, it’s over for you. And not just on the case, Ty. I won’t be able to protect you. And you know what? I won’t want to. You got that?”

  “How could I not.”

  “Good. I have to talk to you this way. This is really the end of it.”

  “Fine.”

  “And I want you to clear every move you make on the Blumberg litigation with me.”

  ‘You want to micromanage me?”

  “That’s right.”

  “But how can I work like that?”

  “Find a way. We clear?”

  I said, “Sure.”

  “Don’t look so hangdog. This is for your own good, Ty. I want to be part of the solution for you. No more messing around. Everything by the book, and I’m the book.”

  68

  SO I DID my best to live by the sacred text of Pierce McDonough.

  I spent the rest of the day digging into Lexis/Nexis and gathering everything I could on Dr. Kendra Mackee. Articles and professional journals and profiles and newspaper accounts. If it had her name on it, I downloaded it. There was quite a load.

  I found out that Kendra Mackee had been an actress wannabe herself, back in the eighties. Interesting connection to Claudia Blumberg, but I didn’t know what significance it had. Still, I jotted a note on my legal pad, Actress connection.

  According to a background piece in the L.A. Times on Mackee, published in 1993, the good doctor knocked around Hollywood for a year doing actor showcases, where actors paid a fee to appear in scenes from plays or movies. Showcases were put on in Equity waiver theaters, small venues with ninety-nine or fewer seats.

  The story said Kendra Mackee had done a scene from Medea, a play where a mother kills her children to get revenge on their father.

  Naturally she became a psychotherapist in L.A.

  I also found three articles that mentioned both David Townsend and Kendra Mackee, one in the Times, one in the Daily News, and one in L.A. Weekly. They mentioned Townsend only in passing, and all in connection with the Catholic priest controversy that was then exploding.