by Alan Russell
“It used to be this big orange grove.”
“And now there’s probably not an orange tree left.”
“There are a couple, but they’re on the outskirts of the property. Sometimes the gardeners bring us fresh oranges.”
The prod: “Life sounds idyllic.”
“It’s a beautiful place, and a gorgeous setting.”
“You make it sound like a museum.”
“With limited visiting hours.”
He could hear the rub: “What do you mean?”
“It’s supposed to be home. But lately we’ve been discommoded.”
“Discommoded?”
“That’s Vera’s word. She also lives at the Grove. Vera is Lanie’s aromatherapist. She also takes care of her animals.”
“What’s this about being—discommoded?”
“Last weekend Lanie gave her live-ins—there are three of us—the weekend off. She also told us to stay away from the Grove for the entire weekend. Vera and Tim didn’t mind. Vera’s got a boyfriend. And so does Tim.
“I decided to make a little vacation of it. I drove down to San Diego and stayed at a motel on Shelter Island. Well, this weekend Lanie has decided she wants the house to herself again. So either I’m going to have to pay for a motel again or impose on some friend.”
“How often does she give you these weekend walking papers?”
“Last weekend was the first time it happened, and I’ve lived at the Grove for over a year. Lanie’s got one wing of the house that’s off-limits to everyone and has its own private entrance and exits. And believe me, the Grove’s big enough for Lanie to have her own space. It’s not like we have to be ‘discommoded.’ ”
That word again.
“The non-live-in staff has also been given the weekend off, and there are a lot more of them than us. Lanie’s got her little army—you know, security, the gardeners, her dietician, her personal trainer, people like that. But they get paid, so they don’t care. For them, it really is a paid holiday.”
“Why do you think Lanie doesn’t want anyone around?”
This time the pause was just for effect: “It’s got to be a new boyfriend. She’s trying to keep him under wraps.”
“Any guesses as to who the boyfriend is?”
“Tim thinks it’s Leonardo DiCaprio, but I think that’s wishful thinking on Tim’s part. He’s the one with the crush on Leo.”
“Has Lanie entertained other men at the Grove before?”
“When I first moved in, Kurt Taylor used to stay over. Kurt was nice. But since their breakup, I don’t think there has been anyone since.”
Taylor was a producer.
“I thought Lanie was going out with Josh Dallas,” Graham said.
“He’s her sometimes escort, not her boyfriend.”
“Unless he’s the mysterious Mr. X.”
If he was, Graham guessed that their liaisons would be short-lived. Relationships between thespians rarely lasted very long. There were never enough mirrors to go around. Graham had to assume he was working under time pressure. There was no greater perishable commodity than a Hollywood romance. Pictures of Lanie and her new boyfriend would be very profitable, especially if that boyfriend was a name actor.
“What I’ll need from you,” Graham said, “is a layout of the Grove and its surrounding grounds.”
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
For as many years as Graham had worked LA, it still wasn’t an easy beat. Most of the problem was geographical: the world’s entertainment capital was spread out from the beaches to the valleys. Celebrity photographers working New York, London, or Paris had a much easier time navigating their city. Graham had covered wars and military interventions. He liked to say that shooting a war was always easier than shooting Hollywood.
His West LA apartment was convenient to Interstates 405 and 10. In his time away from the United States, LA hadn’t improved, or maybe the baggage he brought back just made it seem that way. He thought the freeways were that much more clogged, the bullshit piled up that much higher, and the lunatics that much more in control of the asylum. Absence hadn’t made Graham’s heart grow fonder.
The extended leave of one celebrity photographer hadn’t been noticed by many. To those who commented, Graham merely explained he had been “in rehab.” It was a frequently heard story in the Southland, and besides, if forced to elaborate, Graham knew the rehab turf well. Over the years, he had spent time hanging around such clinics as the Betty Ford Center. He had once suggested to one of the tabloids that they have a weekly feature called Gentleman Junkie. Some star was always drying out, and that made for a good photo or two.
Graham took Interstate 10 over to Santa Monica, and then headed north on PCH—Pacific Coast Highway. He drove a Honda Odyssey van, the sort of vehicle a soccer mom would be driving, but behind the tinted glass he wasn’t carrying three kids and the family dog. His van was set up to be a surveillance vehicle, the custom glass allowing him to photograph without being seen. Tricks of his trade filled up several bags. Graham had never been a Boy Scout, but he tried to live up to their motto: be prepared.
He had several cameras and lenses, as well as a night-vision monocular and an infrared light source. Hidden away was his parabolic microphone and recorder, complete with a laser to better pinpoint the area he wanted to eavesdrop on. He had his tablet with him, as well as his cell phone. By using a hotspot he could both get and transmit information from just about anywhere. His usual easy listening was a police scanner. Under his seat was a voice changer. With a flick of the switch he could disguise his voice and even its gender.
The Friday traffic along PCH was heavy, the affluent escaping the LA area for their parcels of paradise. The road began to clear after Pacific Palisades. Without bumpers on every side of him, the sights opened up to something more than painted metal. The Pacific Ocean looked blue and inviting. Surfers populated pockets known for their waves and were corking their surfboards while waiting for their rides. On the ocean side, a gentle breeze made the palm fronds wave; across the road the chaparral was green and lush, the recipient of recent rains. A picture-postcard day, Graham thought, but he knew only too well how everything could appear different with but a tweak of the lens. Beaches in the LA area periodically had to be closed because of pollution, surfers regularly had turf wars while they fought for waves, rats nested in most of the palm trees, and heavy rains brought mudslides to the canyons. For the natives, winter officially arrived when stretches of PCH were closed due to mud.
The sun set as he passed Topanga Beach, a red fireball that lit up the horizon all the way to Malibu. From past experience, Graham knew Malibu wasn’t an easy place to take pictures. A number of streets were blocked off to the public, barred by gates and guards. Though there are no private beaches in California, there are private roads. People were welcome to walk along the tideline unimpeded, but getting to certain spots sometimes took miles of trekking.
The light of day didn’t linger. Graham had checked; there would be no moon that night. He exited PCH on Malibu Canyon Road. Lanie wasn’t part of the Malibu Colony beach crowd. Her home was up in the hills.
He passed by Pepperdine University and wound his way up the hill. For much of the way the road paralleled the meandering Malibu Creek. Graham approached a tunnel that some locals still referred to as the Pink Lady Tunnel. For one memorable week in 1966, that artwork had adorned it, until some bureaucrat decided it offended the public’s sensibilities and had it painted over.
Graham turned on Piuma Road, then wended his way farther into the hills. Lanie didn’t live on a private road, but it was close enough. There were only three residences on Vista de la Ballena—View of the Whale—but it was the rare kind of street where all the houses had their own names. At the top of the road was the High Ground Ranch; the Whitman Estate had the middle ground; the Grove anchored the bottom str
etch of asphalt. Each of the properties sat on twenty acres or more. In California, major developments had been built on less land. The homes were all situated on the west side of the street, their windows facing the blue ocean off in the distance.
Graham didn’t park on Ballena, opting instead to pull off the road onto a bluff. Though Lanie’s personal security had the night off, Tina had told him there were several security services that periodically did a drive-by of the area. Graham threw on a black turtleneck, tossed a backpack over his shoulder, and grabbed a bag he had prepared earlier. He wished he could have packed lighter. The Grove was more than half a mile away.
He kept to the unoccupied side of Ballena. The road looked to have been paved out of a natural canyon, and the overhang allowed Graham to make his way forward in the shadows. Shrubbery offered abundant hiding places, but Graham didn’t have to hunker behind a bush. Night traffic was as nonexistent on the street as Tina had said it would be. He passed by the considerable manors of the High Ground Ranch and the Whitman Estate. The Grove was farther removed from the street than the other properties. Its design seemed to be a combination of country living and armed camp. A high gate fronted Lanie’s property and extended along the property line. Threatening signs warned away trespassers, and prominently mounted security cameras and lights offered no hint of a welcome mat. All that was missing was a tower and gun turret. The exterior of the property was meant to intimidate and even without security present in the guard gate, it did.
Graham worked his way forward along the south side of the property. The open land next to the fence was undeveloped and rugged and sloped downward. Plenty of cactus and prickly plants were there to dissuade any casual stroller. Graham kept within sight of the fence. He didn’t want to trespass on Lanie’s property if at all possible. The moment he stepped foot on it, he would be opening himself up to a lawsuit. There were certain invasions of privacy even the tabloids didn’t condone. Some photo editors were skittish about publishing any photos that were too invasive, but Graham knew they would have no qualms about buying shots of Miss L and her new boyfriend. Magazines or tabloid television never mind facing up to an invasion of privacy lawsuit if the pictures are exclusive enough.
Scarcity dictates price. Even so-called legitimate periodicals shuck their journalistic ethics whenever a major photo opportunity presents itself. When stars give birth, every major magazine and newspaper vies for that exclusive photo. Investigative reporters become bloodhounds when it comes to celebrity births. Names are run through databases, and friends and relatives are staked out. Bribes are offered, kin encouraged to betray for considerably more than thirty pieces.
Graham managed to avoid the beavertail and cholla cactus while making his way through the chaparral. He walked for several minutes before stopping to get his bearings. He pulled out a penlight, stuck it in his mouth, and studied Tina’s diagram of the house. Lanie’s wing was on the southwest side and had its own spa and deck. It was time for him to cut over. Tina had told him her quarters were about as far from the street as they were from the fence. A telescopic lens would be a must. Unfortunately, the distance didn’t tell the whole story. From ground level the house was obscured, hidden behind the fence, foliage, and blinding lights. Because of the slope, Graham found himself looking up. It wasn’t unusual for him to snap photos from as far as a quarter mile away, but in most cases he was shooting down on a subject. He wished he had a periscope that could plumb upward, but he hadn’t come totally unprepared. In his pack was a high-tech metal alloy tripod whose legs opened up like tent supports and extended somewhat higher than your average NBA center.
The spotlights needed to be disabled first. The lights weren’t mounted on the fence, but on stanchions in back of the fence. They were too high and too far removed to reach by hand, but security lights and motion detectors were obstacles Graham had encountered before. Extendable light-bulb changers were wonderful things. He let the pole out, positioned it, then worked the grip to the bulb, chanting “righty-tightie, lefty-loosie” while turning it counterclockwise. Graham proceeded slowly, quietly, letting several minutes pass between disabling each spotlight. It was possible Lanie was out on her deck, and he didn’t want her to take notice of the sudden patch of darkness. By all accounts, Lanie was a fresh-air junkie. Even when the mercury dipped, she kept her windows open. Graham was counting on that for his shoot.
Disabling four spotlights gave Graham the darkness he needed. He set up the tripod, adjusting its legs to compensate for the sloping ground, as well as the lens-heavy camera and night-vision monocular.
Graham moved in close to her property line. If security had been around, they would have moved in on him, perhaps tried to arrest him for trespassing. Or stalking. That’s what Barbra Streisand and James Brolin had done to a photographer following them around Malibu. But it was worth taking the chance. Needing a vantage point into the property, Graham decided to climb up the black wrought-iron fence. There was no razor-sharp concertina wire at the top, but the grating, spaced about six inches apart, raised upward to spearlike projections. He laid his backpack atop the points, and felt like a fakir resting on a bed of nails. His perch was damned uncomfortable, but at least he could see into the estate.
Placing his night-vision monocular up to his eye, Graham scanned the area. The house was dark, and he didn’t see any movement inside. One of the sliding-glass doors was open. He examined the patio area carefully, but there was no sign of Lanie out on her private deck. It might have just been a publicist’s story, but Lanie was supposedly an astronomy buff who enjoyed unwinding by studying the night sky. Graham looked up. Too early for stars, he thought, or at least her kind of stars. Maybe his kind would emerge first.
Graham lined up the camera for a shot of the open patio door. It was a likely spot for a couple to stand together. People generally paused at the doorway, one person waiting for the other. That momentary pause had afforded Graham hundreds of shots over the years. He checked the viewfinder several times. He had put a doubler, an optical attachment, on his 800mm lens. That gave him a 1600mm lens. But he wasn’t worried so much about the distance as the darkness. The problem with doing a night shoot was that it was like looking into a sea of green. Even with the night-vision monocular, Graham knew the images were going to be on the grainy side. That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. More often than not photo editors picked out shots that looked rough and unfinished. Unstaged photos often needed that patina of verisimilitude. The less finished the picture, the truer it looked. Graham had a six-foot cable linked in to the shutter. That gave him the latitude of not having to hover over the camera. A single click and he could capture forty frames in a second.
It looked as if it might be a long night, so he set about rigging himself a better perch. Using carabiners, rope, and the remains of a leather coat, he made a swinglike contraption that he could both sit and stand upon. Graham’s makeshift seat was at least a bit better than sitting on a spike. The minutes passed slowly. Graham had forgotten how difficult it was just to wait. Despite the image that most people have of paparazzi, it is rare for celebrity photographers to do stakeouts. There is usually too much time invested for too little payoff, not to mention the boredom and discomfort involved. It was generally a lot easier, and more profitable, to hang out at clubs and snap photos of hot recording artists or actors from popular television series. That was easy money.
What Graham was doing was rolling the dice. The downside was obvious—loss of time and money. Celebrity hunts were expensive, especially when no one was staking you. The potential upside explained why he was straddling a pointed fence.
Since returning from overseas, Graham had done few stakeouts. He told himself it was the long hours. Detectives know the toughest way to spend a shift is on a stakeout. There is nothing to do but watch and wait and think.
The thinking part was the hardest. On busy days Graham could almost forget what had happened in Paris. The accident, in a round
about way, had brought him home.
Though the Lady and Le Croc had been dead for years, the media was still perpetuating their myth. Somehow they still appeared on magazine covers. The world wasn’t yet ready to let them rest in peace. There seemed to be an industry out there devoted to perpetuating them as icons. In death, their romance was played up to fairy-tale proportions.
They would always be a once-upon-a-time story.
Yeah, and I’m a regular Hans Christian Andersen, Graham thought.
Graham raised the monocular, but again saw nothing. It was possible Lanie wasn’t even home. Time would tell. He rubbed his hands together. It always felt colder when you were just sitting. He tried to dredge up the thrill of the hunt to keep him warm. In the past, nothing had energized Graham more than nailing a rumor down. But Rio had opened his eyes, and then Paris had killed that feeling. The moment of truth had changed for him.
A flickering light coming from a room captured his attention. Someone had turned on a television set in the darkness. For almost an hour, that was the only sign of life, then a light went on in a room off the kitchen.
In an instant, Graham put the lingering memories aside. He forgot about his cramps, and how many places his body was hurting. Night-vision monocular in hand, all his attention was focused on the illuminated figure. It was Lanie.
Graham was already shifting positions, reaching for the arm of the tripod. He swiveled the camera over and caught her reaching for something in the cabinet. She didn’t stand still long enough for the camera’s autofocus to kick in, exiting the room with a bottle in hand.
Holding his breath, he waited for her to reappear. He was exhaling when a light went on over a table in the living room. Lanie poured from what looked like a bottle of Courvoisier into a glass. In a little over a second he fired off a dozen shots. Even if nothing else panned out, what he already had would make the shoot worthwhile. Editorial could get very creative even with seemingly innocent pictures. But there was nothing innocent about Lanie’s pour. She was filling her glass, and it was a tall glass.
