by Philip Cox
‘Prick.’ Leroy redialled. ‘Sir, don’t hang up.’
‘I got permits, I got permits.’
‘I’m not interested in whether you have permits. I’m not from the City, or from Vice. Who am I talking to?’
‘Weller. My name’s Kurt Weller. What’s going on? Where’s Marty?’
‘He’s dead, Mr Weller. He was killed last night.’
‘Shit, fuck, no. Marty’s dead? You gotta be kiddin’ me.’
‘I’m afraid I’m not. Where are you, Mr Weller? I’m guessing from what was on the voicemail here that you’re somewhere shooting. I need to talk to you; to you and your co-workers.’
‘We’re up at a house in the Hollywood Hills.’
‘We’ll drive to you. Stay there. Give me the address.’ He took down the address and hung up. ‘I think we’re done here, for now,’ he said, standing up. ‘Let’s lock up here, set the alarm, then get over to Park Oak Place.’
‘Where’s that?’
Leroy glanced at the address.
‘Hollywood Hills. He – what was his name, Weller? – said it was five minutes’ drive from Franklin Avenue. Franklin and Beachwood.’
‘We should get there in under an hour. If you’ve finished here, I’ll reset the alarm.’
They set the alarm, locked up and hurried downstairs to where they had parked. Leroy drove this time.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Leroy exited the freeway at the Hollywood Bowl. Straight along Franklin, then a left a few blocks later, into Canyon Drive. The house where shooting was taking place was in Park Oak Drive: Leroy left Canyon Drive just before the end and the canyon itself and took several narrow and winding streets until they arrived.
‘That’s it, there; has to be.’ Quinn pointed to an adobe style bungalow at the end of the street. Two white vans were parked outside.
Leroy pulled up directly behind one of the vans. Running the length of the front boundary was a tall hedge, hiding the property from view: in the centre was a tall, black iron gate which was hanging open. A kind of arch made from hedging ran above the gate.
As they approached the open gate a security guard appeared in the gateway. The question of where he had been hiding flashed through Leroy’s mind.
‘Can I help you, guys?’ he asked. He wore standard security guard uniform of light khaki shirt and tie, appropriately badged up, with matching pants. He was carrying, but Leroy could not make out what type of gun it was. He was wearing reflective ray bans.
Leroy and Quinn held out their badges.
‘Okay; yes, Mr Weller said to expect you. He said to go straight up to the house.’
‘How will we recognise him?’ asked Leroy.
‘Tall guy, wearing a baseball cap. Can’t miss him.’
They turned and began to walk up the path to the house. Then the guard called out.
‘Leroy, isn’t it? Sam Leroy?’
Leroy swung on his heels.
‘Yes, I’m Leroy. Have we met?’
The guard took off his shades.
‘Lew Bridger. I’m ex job.’
‘Yes,’ replied Leroy, clicking his fingers. ‘You worked out of… Hollenbeck?’
‘That’s right,’ Bridger grinned, enthusiastically shaking their hands. ‘Our paths crossed on a couple of cases back in the day.’
‘So what the hell are you doing here? Moonlighting? I won’t tell.’
‘No, nothing like that. I left the department. Got invalided out couple years back.’
‘Shit, no. I’m sorry to hear that. What happened?’
‘I was shot. We had a call, suspected break-in. The perp fired first. I took two slugs here.’ He stabbed at his chest with two fingers.
‘Jesus, I had no idea.’
‘Why would you? Anyhow, I managed to pull through the surgery - obviously - but it put one of my lungs out of action.’
‘So you only have one lung?’
‘I still have two, but one doesn’t work. Well, it kind of works, but not very well.’
‘So they invalided you out?’ Quinn asked.
‘That’s the sum of it.’
‘Couldn’t they have found you a desk job or something?’
‘The captain talked about that, but that wasn’t for me. You know what I mean? After twenty years on the streets? Could you do that?’
Leroy shook his head.
‘Probably not. You’re lucky to be alive.’
‘Tell me about it. Anyway, as I’m ex job, can you tell me anything about what’s going on? Mr Weller didn’t say why you were coming.’
‘It’s to do with Martin Wheat,’ Leroy explained.
‘Yeah? What’s he done now? Wait a minute, you still in homicide?’
Leroy related to Bridger the events of the last twenty-four hours.
Bridger slowly shook his head.
‘Shit, man. But why hit the dogs as well?’
‘We’ve only found one dog. Also shot, lying next to Wheat. We’re guessing the second took fright and ran off.’
‘Shit,’ Bridger said again. ‘His wife’s gonna be so upset. She adored those dogs. They both did.’
‘After we left her, she was going back up to the scene to try to find it.’
Bridger nodded.
‘Yeah, I can imagine she’d want to do that.’
Leroy asked, ‘Lew, you can’t think of any reason why somebody would want to kill him? You must see quite a bit here, all the comings and goings. Or is this a one off gig for you? You know, while they’re using this house?’
‘No, I do all the security for Joder Films. Hey, you know why Wheat named the company Joder Films?’
‘Spanish for fuck; yes, we know. So, are you aware of any reason why someone would want to kill him?’
‘Nothing. Nada. Sorry.’
‘No problem.’ Leroy passed Bridger a business card. ‘Lew, if anything comes to mind later – you know how it is – give me a call, yes?’
Bridger pocketed the card.
‘Sure thing. Glad to help. By the way, Weller – he’s full of shit. Take what he tells you with a grain of salt.’
Leroy nodded and he and Quinn walked up to the house. The screen and door were open. They walked straight in.
They had both had previous cases where they had to visit a movie or TV set. Leroy’s was to one of the sound stages at Warner Bros: he was astonished how many people there were behind the camera. The job titles were explained to him: make-up artist, hairdresser, props master, second assistant director, key grip – some were obvious, self-explanatory, others not so. On the last set Leroy visited, there were at least twenty people behind the camera, and two in front. Here, everything was on a much smaller scale. A man and two women were sitting round a table on the patio. They all had drinks and one of the women was smoking. They were wearing bathrobes and had bare legs and feet. Indoors, a man was sitting on an armchair, looking at his phone. A small portable camera with an extended microphone boom rested on the floor. A woman also engrossed on her phone was sitting at a small table on which stood about a dozen pots of makeup. A script rested on the empty couch.
It was obvious who Kurt Weller was. Wearing blue jeans, a red lumberjack shirt, and a red baseball cap with a Make America Great Again logo, he was sitting on a patio chair the other side of the pool to the others. He was drinking from a large paper cup. He stood up when he noticed Leroy and Quinn and walked over to meet them by the pool.
‘Is there somewhere we can go to talk?’ Leroy asked, after they had shown Weller their badges.
‘Why? Am I a suspect?’
‘Not at this time, sir, but I don’t want an audience. We will need to talk to everybody individually before we leave.’
‘I think the kitchen’s free.’ Weller wandered off indoors then into the kitchen. He poured more coffee into his cup. ‘So Marty’s dead, is he?’
‘You don’t seem that upset,’ said Quinn. He nodded to outside the kitchen. ‘Do they know?’
Weller peered through t
he kitchen window.
‘Can’t you tell?’
‘They don’t seem that upset, either.’
‘I guess they’re in shock, but let’s be honest, nobody liked the motherfucker. How did he die?’
‘He was shot.’
‘No shit? What was it, a break-in?’
‘No, he was killed just off Mulholland. He was parked to walk his dogs.’
Weller downed some coffee.
‘Well, I hope they got those fucking dogs as well.’
‘I don’t follow, sir,’ said Leroy.
‘Fucking animals. He used to bring them to shoots sometimes. God knows why; some of the cast used to get freaked out by them. Fucking flea-ridden things. I protested once, but he said he was the producer, so he was God. Prick. It was a power thing, had to be. They were a mean, nasty pair of bitches.’ He sniggered. ‘No pun intended.’
‘When did you last see him?’ asked Quinn.
‘Yesterday. We wrapped here around six. Cleaned up and handed the place over to Bridger, that security guard. His company is babysitting us while the owner’s in Reno, or somewhere. He left first, around five thirty, I guess.’
‘Was that normal? For him to leave at that time?’
‘That was late for him, but I think he got caught up on his cell. He’d probably leave earlier. He wasn’t a very hands-on producer. He was more interested in making deals, getting the finance for his next picture. You know his old lady used to be on the payroll?’
‘Mrs Wheat? Yes, she told us.’
‘The current Mrs Wheat, you mean. When I first met Marty he was married to an older woman. A woman with money, came from the East Coast, I recall. Like I said, Adrienne was a cast member, and she and Marty would… take their work home, shall we say? So he and… what was her name? Alicia. He and Alicia split, and he married Adrienne, the current Mrs Wheat. I think that it was Adrienne’s influence that made him take a step back. I think she had designs on him becoming mainstream.’
‘Or wanted to stop history repeating itself?’ Leroy added.
Weller nodded.
‘Could be.’
Leroy asked, ‘Where does the first Mrs Wheat live now?’
Weller shrugged.
‘No idea. I’m not even sure if she’s still in LA. That was a few years back.’
‘We spoke to Mrs Wheat at his house on West Hollywood Boulevard,’ said Quinn. ‘Would that be where he lived with his first wife?’
‘I’m pretty sure it was. Moved one out, moved one in.’
Leroy asked, ‘Are you aware of Wheat receiving any threats? Did he have any enemies?’
‘None that I recall. He was a difficult son of a bitch to work with, and pissed off a great many people, but not enough for anyone to put a bullet in him.’
‘So nobody would have wanted him dead?’
‘They’ll be plenty of folks out there who won’t be shedding any tears, but not…’ His sentence trailed off as he took another mouthful of coffee.
Leroy nodded.
‘Thanks for all that. As they say in the movies, don’t leave town. Or maybe they don’t say that in your pictures. We’ll need to talk to everybody else here; I think as a group will be okay for today. I’ll need names and contact details for everybody.’
‘Sure thing. There’ll be no more shooting here today.’
‘On the message you left for Mr Wheat,’ added Quinn, ‘you said something about the money running out.’
‘Yeah. Getting this place as a location was kind of last minute. Marty had arranged another place for us, over in Los Feliz, but the owner cancelled the deal when he found out what type of picture we were making.’
‘You mean he found out what Joder means?’ asked Quinn.
Weller paused a moment.
‘Yeah, maybe he did,’ he replied, without any sense of irony.
‘Where is the owner?’ Leroy asked.
‘Marty said he’s away in Reno for a few days. A security company’s looking after the place. Bridger out there hands the place over seven pm. Anyway, with this change of location, it was all very last minute. Marty got this place, but didn’t pay the owner.’
Quinn asked, ‘So what’s going to happen now?’
Weller shrugged. ‘I guess the production closes. No location, although we could probably shoot anywhere, but no producer, and no money. The last bit is the most important.’
‘I’m sure,’ said Leroy. ‘Could you gather up everybody? I take it the cast don’t have a problem with being in the same groups as the crew?’
‘Nah. No prima donnas here.’
‘That’s good. Let’s get this done, then.’
‘Just out of interest,’ Quinn asked, hesitatingly, ‘how much was Marty going to pay the owner to use the house?’ Leroy flashed him a frown.
‘I think it was in the region of five k a day. Why? You offering your place?’
‘His wife wouldn’t like it,’ Leroy cut in.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Darkness had fallen by the time they had finished at the house. Weller had gathered the three cast members and the crew and Leroy told them what had happened to Marty Wheat. They knew already that he was dead, but were not aware of the circumstances. Nobody shed any tears.
‘Hardly Mr Popular,’ said Quinn, as Leroy took them back along Franklin. ‘Everybody seemed more concerned about the dog.’
Leroy turned into La Brea. This would take him directly to the 10 freeway, which, at this time of day, would be busy, but he preferred this to the constant stop-start at the numerous red lights he would encounter on the surface streets.
‘I noticed that. Even the grieving widow. Although I can kind of understand her wanting to go find the missing one.’
Leroy was interrupted by Quinn’s phone. He could tell instantly that it was Quinn’s wife, Holly, who was clearly less than happy that her husband would be late home, even though Quinn had sent her a text earlier. Partly out of respect, and partly so he could hear what Holly Quinn was saying, Leroy was silent as he drove.
They had been on the freeway for five minutes before the call ended. Quinn sighed as he slipped the phone back into his pocket.
‘She’s not happy, then?’
‘No. Pissed that I’m going to be late home.’
‘She needs to wake up and smell the coffee, Ray. How long have you guys been together? Doesn’t she realise that’s part of the job?’
‘We’ve been over it again and again, Sam. She doesn’t get it.’ He paused. ‘I think her folks - or at least her old man - are making things worse.’
‘That’s been happening for ages, Ray.’
‘I know, but she’s always been a daddy’s girl, and that bastard gets on the phone to her, and it starts. He’s probably been talking to her this evening.’
‘No developments on the baby front?’
‘Nothing yet. She says she wants to wait a while. Not have kids while we’re young enough to enjoy life.’
‘That’s an odd thing to say. Who’s saying that, Holly or her old man?’
‘Who knows?’
‘How do you feel about that?’
‘I’m not sure.’
Leroy tried to change the subject.
‘You said something like, “put it in the garage, then.” What’s going in the garage? Your dinner?’
‘No. I’ve bought a bike.’
‘Yeah? Pedal or motor?’
‘Motor. It arrived this morning.’
‘I didn’t know you were a biker, Ray.’
‘I’m not. It’s a new side-line I’ve taken up. I buy and sell things on eBay.’
‘No shit? So you just buy stuff you don’t need and sell it? For a profit, of course.’
‘That’s the idea.’
‘So how long you been doing that?’
‘A few months, I guess.’
‘Not pulling enough overtime?’
‘No, that’s okay. Just a kind of hobby.’
‘What bike is it?’
&nb
sp; ‘It’s a Hawk 250 DLX.’
‘And how much did you pay?’
‘Two grand.’
Leroy whistled.
‘And how much are you going to sell for?’
‘I’m going to post it for three, although I’ll probably have to drop it to two five.’
‘If Holly’s going to put it in the garage, where’s it been?’
‘In the kitchen.’
‘No wonder she’s pissed, Ray. Why don’t you get off home? I’ll go in, log us both in and out, and check for messages and update Perez.’ They had arrived back at the station, Leroy reversing into a parking space.
‘I will, thanks, Sam. What about you? You still going to see the Washington woman?’
‘I will, yeah. Even if it’s to stop her calling me all the time.’
Quinn got into his own car.
‘See you in the morning, then, Sam.’
‘Sure. Have a good one, Ray.’ Leroy tapped twice on Quinn’s roof and went inside the station. On the wall of the corridor outside where their desks were, was a large whiteboard, neatly taped in rows and columns, like a gigantic spreadsheet. The detectives were supposed to use the board to log in and out, and state where they were headed when they left the building. It was also used to record the cases they were working on. Leroy updated it with his and Ray’s movements for the day then walked round to his workstation.
The Homicide Desk was practically deserted; only two detectives from the Night Shift were there, one working a keyboard, the other on the landline. They briefly looked up and acknowledged Leroy’s wave.
He tore off the three post-its which had been attached to his PC screen. He briefly scanned them, decided they could wait until the next day, and stuck them back on his screen. As he made to leave, much to his surprise, he noticed Lieutenant Perez was still at his desk, eyes darting from whatever was on his desk to his screen, and back again. Leroy tapped on the door and half opened it.
‘No home to go to, Lieutenant?’
Perez looked up. He seemed to welcome the interruption.
‘I have some reports for the Chief. He wants them yesterday.’
‘Doesn’t he always?’
‘Every time. How did your day go? You’re on that shooting up on Mulholland, aren’t you? The porn guy?’
