The Actor's Guide To Murder

by Rick Copp

  If Eli were telling the truth about San Francisco, it would put him hundreds of miles away from the scene. And it’s quite possible, given his simple mind and current line of work that he did panic when I questioned him about Willard. He was afraid I was going to turn him into the police for his hustling activities, and that they would pin a murder on him for the mere fact that Willard was one of his johns.

  Charlie came out of the interrogation room, and walked over to me. There was hope in his eyes, hope that I would drop this matter altogether so we could put this all behind us and move on with our lives.

  I instantly poked a hole in his balloon and deflated any hopes he had. “If he’s so bad with names, why did he remember that Willard’s middle name was Ray?”

  “Jarrod, please, he’s got an airtight alibi.”

  “If it checks out. He’s not telling us everything. If he didn’t kill Willard, he knows who did.”

  “We don’t have any proof that anyone killed Willard.”

  I thought about bringing up Isis’s prediction, but again, probably not the best course of action to rally the troops.

  Charlie sighed. “I’m going to book him for assault. Unless you really believe he was trying to kill you.”

  “No. Let him go. I don’t want to press charges.”

  Charlie nodded. “Okay. Your choice. Give me a few minutes to wrap things up here, and then we’ll go home and finish what we started.”

  I didn’t want Eli rotting in some jail cell for a simple assault. I was determined to put him under surveillance. I was confident that Eli the tattooed hustler was the key that would eventually unlock the door to the facts surrounding Willard’s death.

  Isis told me that someone close to me was going to be murdered, not die accidentally. No, I was far from finished. But Charlie didn’t have to know that. At least not yet.

  Chapter Twelve

  Laurette called me a few times over the next couple of days, imploring me to reconsider the sudden flood of offers that had poured into her office. But I refused. I was much too busy tracking the movements of Eli to take the time to humiliate myself in an exclusive interview on Access Hollywood in front of a national television audience.

  Eli wasn’t going out much, except for a pack of cigarettes and a six-pack of Budweiser once a day around noon.

  I sat in my car, parked just down the street from the Laurel Canyon house, and watched as several nervous looking men of various ages, shapes, and sizes arrived throughout the day for Eli’s “special” massage session. They were spaced out enough so there was no chance of any of them running into each other. I spent hour after hour in the car, playing every Madonna CD ever made, calling any friend I could think of to “catch up” on my Motorola Elite cell phone, counting the number of trees that lined the street.

  If only I knew how to wire tap. I could actually know what was going on inside the guesthouse instead of who comes and goes. But I had no Impossible Missions Force at my disposal, so I had to make due.

  A short, stout man with a piggish face hurried out the driveway. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes darted back and forth to make sure he wasn’t seen leaving. He was probably married and this was the only way he knew how to deal with the yearnings and desires he had undoubtedly suppressed since childhood. I saw him go inside about an hour earlier, and despite the quality time he had spent with Eli, he looked just as tense and scared as he did when he arrived. It was as if he expected to run into his minister or a Rotary Club buddy on this quiet, remote street.

  Ten minutes later, I finally got some real action. The garage door opened, and I could see Eli, dressed in a pair of jeans, leather cowboy boots, and a see-through netted shirt, don a black motorcycle helmet and climb onto a Harley Davidson. After a few kick starts, the bike roared to life and Eli sped off down the road. I was so excited that something was actually happening after days of interminable boredom that I barely managed to start the car and squeal off in hot pursuit before he disappeared around a bend.

  I kept a safe distance from Eli as we rolled with traffic down Laurel Canyon, passing Sunset Boulevard and the massive Virgin Megastore Complex, where the street turned into Crescent Heights Boulevard and carried us south towards the Beverly Center, a giant indoor mall constructed in the eighties, packed with shops, theatres, and restaurants. Eli weaved in and out of traffic, ignoring the cars that had to stop short to avoid sideswiping him.

  I detested motorcycles in heavy traffic because they assumed they had the right of way, the right of everything. They were too impatient to obey simple traffic laws, and I had to fight off that ever-growing L.A. commuter condition the media referred to as “road rage.” Sometimes I wanted to just ram into the tail of one, and give him a good scare. But that was just me.

  The light turned yellow, and Eli shot forward, zipping through the intersection, as it turned red. I got stuck behind an elderly woman in a Honda Civic, who didn’t dare drive over five miles per hour. Just ahead, Eli roared up the ramp into the five story Beverly Center parking structure. Maybe he was just going shopping, but I had to be sure.

  When the light finally turned green and mercifully the elderly woman in front of me turned onto a side street, I sped up and made a fast turn onto the ramp and up into the mall.

  I stopped at the gate, rolled down the window, and heard a cheery mechanical voice say, “Please take the ticket.” I would love to know whom exactly they recruit to be these irritating authority voices.

  I yanked the ticket out of the slot and raced up to find an available space. After parking and taking the escalator up several more levels to reach the long line of department stores and specialty shops, I knew I had to be careful not to be seen. Eli would know immediately that I was following him, and any chance of finding out anything useful would go up in smoke.

  I had no idea where Eli had parked his motorcycle or which store he was in, but I kept walking, scanning the sparse midday crowd. He could have been anywhere. If he had disappeared into Bloomingdale’s or Macy’s, it would be impossible to find him.

  I was hoping to spot him in one of the smaller stores, like Structure or Eddie Bauer. But I had no such luck.

  Satisfied he wasn’t anywhere on the first level, I took the escalator up until I reached the top level that housed a food court, movie theatres, and a Brentano’s bookstore, among other shops. The food court was nearly empty, and I figured Eli didn’t read much, so I chose not to scout out the bookstore just yet.

  And then I saw him. He was standing in line to buy a movie ticket, his left arm hooked around his motorcycle helmet, holding it against his waist.

  I rushed over to the line, and stood just a few people behind him. At one point he turned his head, and I was afraid he might see me, so I looked away, pretending I recognized someone. I strained to hear what movie he was going inside to see. It was an action movie starring rap star Ja Rule. Whatever tickles your fancy. He bypassed the concession counter (something I could never do) and disappeared down the hall of doors that led into the various features.

  After buying a ticket for the same movie, I stopped to buy a large tub of popcorn and some candy. Real investigators wouldn’t think to do this. Their focus is on the person they’re staking out, but detective or not, I can’t go into a movie without a medium popcorn and a super size box of Junior Mints.

  I walked down to the purple door where I saw Eli enter, and waited until the previews started and the lights faded to blackness before daring to sneak inside.

  There were only three other people in the theatre besides Eli and myself. The screen was the size of a postage stamp. The Sony flat screen HDTV Charlie and I had in our den was bigger than this one. The theatre owners at this complex seemed more concerned with quantity rather than quality, and it may have explained the low turn out, even for the middle of a weekday. I slipped in a back row seat and watched Eli who sat off to the side about three rows down in an aisle seat. He kept glancing back. Afraid he would see me, I ducked my face behind the tub
of popcorn. He was waiting for someone.

  As the previews ended, the THX digital sound advertisement blasted through the tiny theatre, and the movie finally started to unspool on the screen in front of us.

  Eli slouched down in his seat, folded his arms, and stopped looking back. I kept my eyes on him, but at this point he actually seemed interested in the movie. There was a violent drug bust in the opening scene, lots of cops screaming, “Freeze, motherfucker!” And Ja Rule himself, making a spectacular entrance on a crane, with an Uzi cradled in his arm, mowing down the bad guys in a spray of bullets.

  During the mayhem, light streamed into the theatre as the door in the back opened. A man entered, walked directly down the aisle to where Eli was sitting and slid in the aisle seat in the row directly behind him. The man whispered something in Eli’s ear, and then I saw him slip a white envelope through the crack between two seats. Eli nonchalantly took the envelope and stuffed it into his jeans pocket.

  I kept hoping the glow from the screen might illuminate the mystery man’s face, but the scene in the film was at night so it was too dark to see much of anything.

  After a minute, the man behind Eli got up, and walked back up the aisle of the theatre. At that second, the scene on screen cut to a bright gloriously sunny day, and the light from the screen lit up the man walking past me. It was Spiro, the chiseled Greek God boy toy of Willard Hornsby’s mother, Tamara!

  Spiro disappeared out the door. Eli kept watching the movie. He wasn’t going anywhere. I dropped my tub of popcorn and raced outside the theater to see Spiro heading for the escalator.

  I followed him down to the second level of stores, where he checked his watch, and then sat down on a bench. Concerned that I was out in the open for him to see, I darted into an H2O, home to a myriad of face creams, shampoos, and various other skin products. I was watching to make sure he hadn’t spotted me when a familiar voice startled me from behind.

  “Jarrod?”

  I knew who it was. But I turned around anyway and feigned complete surprise.

  “Tamara, imagine running into you here.”

  Where else would she be but a store that specialized in skin products designed to preserve everlasting youth? This woman was fighting age every step of the way. I grabbed an armful of bath gels and body oils off the shelves as if I had actually come in here to shop.

  “It’s good to see you.” She hugged me, as if our altercation at the funeral had never happened. I was startled, half-expecting her to plunge a knife in my back while her arms were around me.

  “So how are you doing?” I said.

  “I miss him terribly.” She let go, her eyes downcast.

  There was a twinge of sincerity in her voice. This wasn’t the Tamara I knew at all. This was almost, dare I say, a grieving mother. I had such a strong, disapproving opinion of Willard’s mother that it was disconcerting to see her now so vulnerable, so anguished. What had happened since the last time I saw her?

  She looked back up at me, her eyes brimming with tears. “I know you have certain ideas about me, and frankly, some of them are true, but I did love my son. I thought you should know that.”

  Either she was a better actress than I thought or she was speaking from the heart. I had always assumed she didn’t have one.

  “I’ve been meaning to call you,” she said, wiping the tears away from her face with a handkerchief. “At the funeral, you asked me if Willard was in therapy, and I said I didn’t know.”

  I nodded, remembering.

  “Well,” she said, “He was. The therapist called me when he read about Willard’s death in the papers. He was very saddened by the whole thing.”

  “Do you remember his name?”

  “Vito Wilde. He has an office on Manchester and Sepulveda, near the airport. Call him yourself. He’ll tell you about Willard’s state of mind.” She took my hand, and squeezed it. “He told me Willard was deeply depressed, and was dealing with a lot of issues. So you see, Jarrod, I was right.”

  Just because Willard was seeing a therapist didn’t necessarily prove he was unhappy enough to drink himself to death. I also could have pointed out that the root of all those issues he was dealing with was probably standing right in front of me. But accusing Tamara of being a terrible mother wouldn’t have done either of us any good. So for the moment, I told her what she wanted to hear. “Yes, I guess you were right after all.”

  “Dr. Wilde didn’t get into any specifics, but he did say there was something eating away at Willard. My guess is he got mixed up with another pill popping lowlife who took advantage . . .”

  A beefy hand encircled Tamara’s arm, physically pulling her away from me. It was Spiro. He had spotted the two of us chatting from the bench outside the store, and decided it was time to intervene.

  He spoke firmly into her ear. “Time to go, honey. We’re going to be late.”

  She nodded, and then gave me an apologetic look.

  “It was nice seeing you, Jarrod.”

  “Same here,” I replied as I watched Spiro spirit his wife away. As they retreated towards the elevator that would carry them down to the parking structure, I caught a glimpse of Eli, the white envelope sticking out of his pocket, ambling past H2O. I couldn’t resist shaking him up a bit.

  “Hey, Eli!”

  He looked up, confused, and searched the mall until his eyes settled on where I was standing. I held up a couple of small bottles. “They have a lot of aromatherapy oils in here that some of your massage clients might enjoy.”

  He stared at me in shock. What the hell was I doing there? He didn’t answer. He just fingered the envelope in his back pocket, quickly looked away, and stalked off in the other direction, as far away from me as possible.

  Chapter Thirteen

  It took me a few days, but I managed to get an appointment with Dr. Vito Wilde. I told him I was having trouble getting over the death of a close friend, and needed to talk to someone. Luckily, I had made the minimum amount of money during the year from a few small acting gigs to keep my health plan with the Screen Actors Guild in good standing. They agreed to cover eighty percent of the cost. The rest I pilfered from the house repairs fund Charlie and I kept at Bank of America.

  Despite the sizable nest egg I earned as a child star, I was hopeless with money. So it was with great relief that I handed over the financial reigns to my better half. He handled everything. I never had to worry about bills, which allowed me more time in the day to go to auditions and, of course, solve crimes. The downside I soon discovered was that Charlie kept a meticulous ledger of all our expenditures down to the last penny. Once my wallet was empty for the week, I had to find new and creative ways to come up with cash. A small withdrawal from a minor account like house repairs was probably my best bet. It wouldn’t even be a blip on Charlie’s radar.

  In the heavy morning traffic it took me a solid hour to get to Wilde’s office. It was a hot, steaming day and my nerves were frazzled. I still had no idea how I was going to go wheedle information about Willard out of the good doctor. Therapists are notorious for their discretion and personal code of ethics. Dr. Wilde and his kind could never fit into my loose lipped group of friends.

  I pulled the Beamer into a vast parking lot that was home to a large strip mall with stores ranging from Staples Office Supplies to a Vons supermarket, both of which dwarfed a small brick building with a small, weathered, chipped sign that read, “Los Angeles Counseling Services”. I also made note of a Del Taco just south of the lot, since I had discovered that investigating works up an enormous appetite.

  I rode the elevator to the second floor, and entered through a door that led to a small waiting room. On the wall was a row of switchers with instructions to flip the one next to your doctor’s name to alert him that you had arrived.

  I then sat down and started browsing through a People magazine article about a woman using DNA evidence to prove her husband’s infidelities. It warmed my heart to learn there were other people in the world just a
s obsessive as I am.

  The door to the inner office finally opened, and Dr. Vito Wilde stepped out to greet me. He was younger than I had expected, probably around thirty-five, and tall, massively tall, over six and a half feet. He was barrel chested, with a round face, mostly covered by a neatly trimmed beard and wire-rimmed glasses. His shirtsleeves were rolled up revealing thick, hairy forearms. He held out his hand and I shook it.

  In the gay subculture, Dr. Wilde would be what we call a bear—big hairy men who enjoy the company of other big hairy men. Ask any bear you come across, and he’ll tell you, it’s not just a look, it’s an attitude, a way of life. And with the growing acceptance of alternative lifestyles, their numbers are growing. They converge at festivals and convention weekends all over the world. I wasn’t sure if Vito had any connection to a Bear organization, or if he was even gay, but the minute he opened his mouth, my suspicions were confirmed.

  “Hello, Jarrod, please come in.”

  For such a hearty man, his soft, gentle, effeminate voice was a dead giveaway. If I closed my eyes, I would swear I was talking to Laura Bush. As he led me back to his private office, he turned and said, “It’s been pretty hectic around here today. I’m trying to catch up. I just got back from San Francisco.”

  “There on business?”

  “No. I went up for the Folsom Street Fair.”

  Bingo. Folsom Street Fair was a famous gay-sponsored weekend long festival for leather lovers. Bears were drawn to it like a campground barbecue. So far I was batting a thousand. But unfortunately I wasn’t there to do a profile on Dr. Wilde. I was there to trick him into talking about Willard.

  He led me into a comfortable room with an overstuffed couch and lots of fluffy pillows for maximum comfort. I sat down, sinking into the cushions, and grabbing one of the pillows to clutch in front of me. I wasn’t playing the role of a nervous first-timer. I actually was a nervous first-timer.