Sympathy for the Devil

by Jerrilyn Farmer

  I had spent most of the two days in bed, watching developments on the news, reading the papers, talking on the phone. Exhausted and bruised, I had thus far not developed a cold. So tell that to your mother the next time she catches you out in the rain without your galoshes.

  By Friday, I’d had enough of recuperating. Wesley had been released, and we decided to meet at Pinot Bistro for lunch to celebrate his freedom. Holly and I drove there together and when we saw Wes, looking thin and handsome, none of us knew whether to joke around or thank God.

  “You’ve lost weight,” were my first words. In L.A. that’s like the ultimate compliment.

  “I found this terrific spa.” He hugged me tight and then gave Holly a turn.

  After we were seated, Wesley grabbed my hand and looked at me. “Can I say thanks?”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “You could have been killed, Madeline, you could have…”

  “Okay, that’s enough thanks. Let’s look at the menu.”

  “Madeline…”

  “Food!” I said, and both Holly and Wes dutifully picked up their menus.

  We concentrated on what would be good with what, and what we were in the mood for and allowed the moment of too much emotion to gently wash away from our shores. The waiter took our order, puzzling over our eclectic choices, and left us.

  “To freedom!” I proposed and we clinked glasses. Wes’s was champagne, Holly’s was iced coffee, and I was back to Diet Coke.

  I waited for our first course to be served to drop my bombshell.

  “I’ve got big news.”

  Wes did not interrupt his reverent plunge into a serving of green risotto with salmon flakes, sugar snap peas, and scallions, but his eyes did briefly flicker upward.

  “Lily just heard from the attorneys. Guess what?”

  “Bruno’s a-l-i-v-e!” Wes did a pretty fair impersonation of Geraldo.

  “Please.”

  Holly was stumped. “What more could they have to say? Isn’t Bruno broke?”

  I smiled.

  Wes stopped eating.

  Holly said, “Don’t tell me…”

  “He’d set up a living trust the week before he died, transferring all of his holdings into a special account. Technically, that meant he didn’t own them anymore because legally, they now belonged to this trust.”

  “I don’t get it,” Holly said. “Does that mean he gave away all his money?”

  “See, he turned over everything to the Bruno Huntley living trust and then he appointed himself as the trustee. That way, he had total control of the assets even though he didn’t hold title to them anymore. Got it?”

  “Not really. Why would he do something like that?”

  “Really rich people do it all the time so their heirs won’t have to pay millions in estate taxes.”

  “Wow,” Holly muttered.

  “So, this morning, Bruno’s estate attorney calls Lily. He tells her that all the assets, the land, the money, everything, are residing in Bruno’s living trust. Bruno had set things up so that in the event of his death, Lily would be appointed the trustee and have control of all the whole enchilada.”

  Wes smiled. “So you mean that everything Bruno owned is still intact and Lily gets it?”

  “Right.”

  “Unbelievable!” Holly said with a sigh. “How much?”

  “Roughly one hundred and five million in cash, stocks, and property.”

  We all thought about that number and went back to our food.

  “What I want to know is, since the will is invalid, does that mean you have to give back the pots?” Holly was always the practical one.

  I ignored her.

  “So Bruno never meant for his sons to have a penny of the money,” Wesley mused.

  Our plates were cleared quickly and the main course was served. The food was exquisite, and we took a moment to savor a bite of whole lamb shank with garlic mashed potatoes here, a forkful of spicy grilled swordfish medallions there. It was our habit to taste each other’s dishes, despite the disapproving looks from our neighbors at the next table.

  “Seems like Lily has gotten a whole lot of weird news lately.” Wes brought us back to the subject. “Nothing could be weirder than what you found out about the sperm. Nothing. It had to be like the world’s first case of semen fraud.”

  “She actually took that news a lot better than I would have thought,” I explained. Instead of being disillusioned with Bruno, in light of how miserably he’d tricked her concerning the parentage of her own child, she gave the sad event an almost romantic spin.

  “Lily was delighted to find out that little Lewis contains some of Bruno’s D.N.A. after all,” I announced to the table.

  Holly picked up the thread. “So she was glad that if Lewis couldn’t be Bruno’s child, at least he was like Bruno’s grandchild. That it?”

  “Well, yes.”

  We all kind of shook our heads at that one.

  “I think Lily was about the only person who really got Bruno, you know?” Holly suggested. “It’s like there’s always somebody out there for you, no matter how weird you are.”

  “At least you hope there is,” Wesley said.

  “And here’s some grim news,” I said. “Lily’s decided to have a double funeral. Tomorrow.”

  “Gross!” from Holly.

  “Father and son? It’ll save the family some time and trouble, I guess.” Wes thought that one over. “I’ve never actually heard of such a thing, under this kind of circumstances. But why not? It’ll be small, no doubt.”

  “Oh, no. Lily feels Bruno deserves more. She’s expecting a thousand people.”

  “Really?” Wes asked. “Who’s catering?”

  “Wesley!”

  “Hey, someone has got to be thinking about our moribund company.”

  We’d have to talk about the shambles that our business had become, but now didn’t seem like the right time to get depressed.

  I tried to change the subject. “Oh. I’ve got something for the gossip-lovers in the group…”

  Wes and Holly looked at each other in complete innocence.

  “Lily says Donnie is moving into the guest house.”

  “Bruno’s runner?”

  “Uh-huh.” I looked up for their reactions.

  “Life must go on,” Holly observed.

  “You can always use a good runner,” Wesley opined. “What do you think, Mad?”

  “I just want everyone to be happy!” I wailed.

  We laughed and asked for the dessert menu.

  “What was Bru, Jr.’s reaction when he learned that Gray murdered their father?” Wes asked me.

  “No one knows. Bru disappeared on Tuesday night and no one has heard from him. He even left his car parked up there at the house. He had to be concerned about not inheriting his daddy’s fortune. If Perry Hirsh gets to him, it could be pretty serious trouble.”

  “He’ll turn up sooner or later. On a night like that, where could he run?” Holly asked.

  “He couldn’t run in the hills that’s for sure,” I seconded. And then I had a chilling thought. Bru knew Perry was at the house. Perry’s car was blocking Bru’s in the driveway. If Bru was on the run and he didn’t leave by car, had he tried to evade Perry by escaping into the hills? I pushed the gruesome possibility out of my mind.

  “Well, what’s the story on Perry Hirsh, anyway?” Wes asked. “You said you saw him again on Tuesday night at the Huntley place. Did you guys make up?”

  “Yep. We’re buds. In fact, I got a call from old Perry, yesterday, asking if we’d like to cater a party for forty of his closest associates.”

  Wes’s ears perked up. “I’m spotting a trend. I see a renaissance of Madeline Bean Catering. I see us starting to pick up all the great funeral business that’s in town, then moving into small catered affairs for the organized crime set. Interesting client base.”

  “I told Perry no thanks.” It was time to tell Wesley the worst. “I told Perry we wer
e closing the company.”

  “No, Mad.”

  “Wes, let’s not spoil this lunch, okay? We’ll talk about it later.”

  I knew it would be hard for him to accept. Here he was, just out of jail a few hours, and instead of his nice comfortable life, look what was waiting for him. Because of the murder and our connection to it, we had gone from “in” to “out” in record time, even for this fickle community. Being unemployed was a stomach-churning thought, especially with the loans we still had to pay off, but all that could wait until after lunch.

  “Oh, did I tell you?” Holly asked. “In Variety today, there was a little item about Angelica Sands. She just landed a big part. She’s going to play the girlfriend of Billy Baldwin in the new Oliver Stone movie. Isn’t that cool? Maybe we could visit her on the set.”

  “Quiet down. Can’t you see Mad is studying the dessert menu?”

  The waiter came to get our orders and, of course, we all chose different selections, the better to get a sampling.

  The guilt set in as soon as the waiter left our table. “I shouldn’t have ordered dessert.”

  “Oh, of course you should.” Wes always played “good cop” in my struggle over calories. “This is a celebration. How many times does one of your closest friends get sprung from the slammer?”

  “I know. But I’m going out again tonight…” I had this rule about how many meals I could indulge in on a given day. The “bad calorie cop” inside me was sure this one lunch had already blown my day’s limit.

  “So?” Wes said, helping me rationalize. “Arlo doesn’t like to eat anything fun. Take him to a salad place.”

  “Arlo doesn’t eat salad,” Holly reminded him. “And anyway, Arlo’s show films on Friday nights so…”

  They both looked at me and by the transformation on their faces I could tell that they weren’t such bad detectives themselves. Damn.

  “So who are you going out to dinner with?”

  Why prolong the heat they were about to lay on me? “Honnett,” I said casually.

  “The cop who arrested me?” Wes gave me that reproachful look, like Mrs. Bean really should have taught her girl better manners.

  “I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” I said.

  Both my companions smirked. I hate that.

  The desserts were served and Wes remarked that he had never seen seven thousand calories displayed with such artistic flair. The chocolate mousse came scooped on a large, white plate and had a special message written in chocolate syrup around the flat, broad rim. It said, “Welcome home, Wes!”

  “Oh, here’s something you probably don’t know about, yet,” Wes said. It was a rare conversation in which Wes missed an opportunity to top us with his own gossip finds. Naturally, being detained by the County of Los Angeles, he wasn’t expected to contribute at today’s lunch, but Wes would not be stopped by mere bars alone.

  “I got home to my apartment and there were a few messages. Friends who heard I was getting out mostly. But there was also one from Carmen Huntley’s mother.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “With all the publicity about my arrest, the story had been told a hundred times about the whole land deal I had done with Bruno. Apparently, Carmen’s mom had just found out that I was the one who had made the arrangements to sell the forty acres to Bruno. Now, get this. She was making me an offer to act as go-between with Lily and help her acquire the land. She offered to pay me a ten percent finder’s fee.” Wes smiled at the irony.

  “Oh, God! Here we go again!” I couldn’t believe the circles within circles that make up our daily dance. Honestly, it’s a wonder we aren’t just holding our heads all the time, dizzy with life.

  “Anyway, I called her back and I found out that Carmen has moved out of town.”

  “So soon?” I guess she didn’t want to stick around for the double funeral. It kind of made sense.

  “Yeah. Her mother was upset. Seems this is the first time that Carmen has been out on her own and her mom doesn’t think she’s strong enough to make it.”

  “Where’d she go?”

  “To Ojai with a friend of hers from high school.”

  Ojai was an idyllic little grove town just inland of Ventura that attracted artists and writers.

  “Ojai. Yeah. It’s a jungle out there.” We all enjoyed the thought of Carmen being on her own. Maybe the best outcome for her was simply going it alone for a while.

  Bringing Wesley up to date had taken us the better part of a two-hour lunch. We sent a note back to Octavio in the kitchen, thanking him for the brilliance of his cooking as well as his generosity. The chef had insisted on treating us and would not accept payment for our bill.

  In our two separate cars, we headed back to the office. We had to plan the closing down of the company and get serious about finding ourselves employment. In one week, we had gone from Hollywood’s culinary rising stars to something exactly like yesterday’s news. The catering business, when played out on such a high profile, trend-setting stage, is like a souffle. One lousy client gets murdered and poof!

  As we walked in the door, none of us really wanted to face it. Holly, as always, led the way.

  “So, do I call the lawyers and tell them to start up bankruptcy proceedings or what?”

  “What’s on the floor?” I asked, avoiding the inevitable answer she was waiting for.

  “On the floor? Oh! It’s a fax.” The long white roll of fax paper had been keeping itself pretty busy while we’d been out.

  “What is it?”

  Holly bent down and rolled it all up, trying to get to the beginning. “It’s from Six Star Pictures,” she said.

  Wes looked at me. “We’ve never done any parties for them, have we?”

  I shook my head. Six Star was the result of a merger between two of the oldest and most venerated broke movie studios in Hollywood. Two years ago a Japanese car company spent billions and bought them out.

  “What’s it about?” I asked Holly, who was still reading.

  “Oh my god!” she exclaimed. “Read this.”

  I looked at the letterhead, which was from the head of legal affairs at the studio. Puzzled, I read on.

  Dear Ms. Bean and Mr. Westcott:

  As per the terms of an agreement dated October 31, 1997, between SIX STAR STUDIOS and BRUNO HUNTLEY PRODUCTIONS for the purchase by SIX STAR of that company, Mr. Huntley specified that certain monies be paid, certain stock rights be transferred, and guarantees of consulting contracts be offered.

  In addition to the above arrangements, and as a condition of sale, Bruno Huntley required that SIX STAR tender a purchase offer for the company known as MADELINE BEAN CATERING for the purchase price of $3 million.

  In the event that the owners of MADELINE BEAN CATERING choose not to accept the offer by SIX STAR, the monies offered will revert to Mr. Bruno Huntley and be added to the purchase price agreed upon for acquiring BRUNO HUNTLEY PRODUCTIONS.

  Please call me at your earliest convenience to let us know if you will be selling your company to SIX STAR.

  That was as far as I read. Wesley, who had been reading over my shoulder, was silent.

  “Bruno arranged all this. He was selling his company to Six Star for big bucks, and as a little twist of the knife, he forced them to buy some insignificant catering company as part of his deal,” I said in wonder.

  “Why would he do that?” Wes asked, stunned.

  “To piss them off, I expect. Just for fun.” I started to reread the fax.

  “Does that mean we get three million dollars?” Wes was just catching on.

  “If we want to let go of this treasure.”

  “But then what will we all do?” Holly wondered.

  “We’ve always wanted to move up into major event planning full time. How about Mad Bean Events?” Wes suggested.

  “And why must all of our ventures feature my name?” I asked, full of curiosity.

  “Because you’re so lucky!” he said, with the exhilaratio
n of discovering all of his bills were about to be paid off.

  “But I’m still mystified,” Holly said. “Why did Bruno arrange for Six Star to give all that money to us?”

  “Maybe he just got a kick out of making the Japanese buy something they couldn’t possibly want. The power angle. Or maybe he felt it would pay Wesley back on that old Los Feliz score and, this way, it wasn’t even coming out of his pocket.”

  “You should hear yourself,” Wes said. “You still have a soft spot for that monster. You think of him as a prankster, a naughty kid bugging the big corporate grownups, a guy just out to pay off an old debt!” Wes shook his head. “More likely, he was after you, Maddie. He was planning to offer you one of his legendary bribes.”

  Bruno had dealt in a sick kind of barter; celebrity contacts, the glamor of his lifestyle, the money, the parties, Hollywood’s largest dreams…anything you wanted.

  Wes was warning me. Accept the bribes, and Bruno grabbed your soul. And it appeared that death hadn’t slowed him down much.

  Holly said, “I’ll go get you a Diet Coke.”

  Wes was thinking of something else, now, because he was staring at me with a silly grin on his face. “Remember the soothsayer?”

  “Angelica.”

  “Well, yes. But, no. Think of her as the soothsayer on Halloween. She predicted you’d meet a dark man. That’s Honnett. And she said you’d come into a lot of money.”

  “I thought that was the thirty thousand, but of course I gave that back.”

  Wes said, “Think bigger. Like a hundred times that. Then didn’t she say something about a change of career?”

  “We’re selling the old catering business and starting a new one. Yikes. And didn’t she tell you, Wes, that your life was soon to be in jeopardy?”

  “Right. And I laughed. Was there anything else she said? ’Cause I’m getting frightened here.”

  “She said Arlo was going to propose, but of course, Bruno put her up to that one. Angelica told us that he was trying to scare everyone, and that is a pretty scary idea.”

  Wes eyed me to see if I was serious. I avoided his look.