Reel Stuff

by Don Bruns

  I pulled my cell phone from my pocket, and she turned to say something.

  “Put the phone away, Mr. Moore.”

  “Just calling my partner.”

  We had entered the building, and I noticed the dim lights highlighting a walkway through the center of the structure.

  “Away, Mr. Moore. Put the phone away. I told you once. Please, don’t ask me to tell you again.”

  I’d just laid out two thugs on the streets of L.A. I’d just proven that mellow guys can be bad asses too. Don’t give me unreasonable demands. Just don’t.

  I looked into her eyes, ice-cold orbs, and nodded.

  Shoving the phone back into my pocket, I followed meekly.

  And I asked myself, what did I need a conference area for? There were two of us on an exploratory meeting. Two of us.

  We walked down the hall, footsteps echoing off the steel walls. Reminiscent of The Green Mile or Dead Man Walking. Prison movies where someone was going to die.

  “There’s no reception in this building. The steel prevents any electronic signal.” A warning.

  I was tempted to check my phone again for bars, but a stern look from the financial guru warned against it.

  Passing three unmarked doors on our left, we continued to the next, and she opened it and ushered me in. As promised, there was a small conference table and six chairs. A white board was mounted on an easel and a flat-screen TV monitor hung on the far wall. No windows, no wall hangings, just a stark, cold room with a polished concrete floor.

  She motioned to a chair and I sat. Betsy Timmermeister continued to stand.

  “We’re waiting for someone,” she said.

  “Is this the way these meetings usually work?”

  “Mr. Moore, how many financial advisors have you had for your three-million-dollars’ worth of investments?”

  “Several.”

  “I see.” She kept an eye on the open door. “How much are you really worth?”

  “Look, Mrs., Miss Timmermeister, I—”

  “Jason Londell didn’t recommend me, did he, Mr. Moore?”

  The guy was dead. How could she know what he recommended?

  “As I told you—”

  “Jason Londell was in the process of firing me and the firm. We were about to lose one of the biggest accounts we had. You see, Mr. Londell wasn’t at all happy with the way his financial interests were being handled. And he wasn’t at all happy with me. So I know that there was absolutely no way he was recommending me or my company to you.”

  “And you’re telling me because?”

  “Because, as I told you, I’m somewhat impressed with your background, Mr. Moore.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand. All you’ve told me about my background is that I may have come from some murderers and thieves.”

  “No, no, I’m referring to your more recent background. You’ve apparently gotten mixed up in some matters that are none of your concern, and it appears you’ve deliberately done so.”

  “How have I done that?”

  “You and your girlfriend, Emily, you’ve misrepresented yourselves, and because of that, you’ve apparently caused a lot of trouble. You actually had some very important people in this town convinced you were the real deal. Very impressive. Although, as you may have surmised, this is a town of fools. A smart person can swindle just about anyone in Hollywood. Take actor Adam Sandler for instance.”

  Even before she mentioned Sandler’s name, I had a bad, bad feeling about the direction this conversation was heading.

  “Where did you get my name?” she asked. “No, don’t tell me. You hacked Juliana’s computer, we’re pretty sure of that. Anymore, breaking into someone’s computer files isn’t so hard to do, is it? But in those files is pretty sensitive material. Obviously, not meant for your eyes.”

  “What makes you think I—”

  “Hacked her files?”

  I nodded.

  “She keeps her camera on.” She put on a smirky smile.

  “Her camera?”

  “On her monitor. The one people use for Skype? When you sat down at her desk to steal the files, you were looking straight into the camera on her computer monitor, Mr. Moore.”

  She again smiled at me. The dumbest guy in the world. The stupidest man on the planet. Checking all the cameras in the neighborhood, on the buildings, in the doorways, outside and inside a bar, and even a traffic camera. And I’d missed the most obvious camera of all. Right in front of my damned face.

  Pushing the chair back, I stood up.

  “Obviously, this meeting wasn’t for financial advice, and I apologize for that. Please forgive me.”

  “What did you expect? Seriously. What did you think was going to happen? That I didn’t do homework on you? From the moment we met, you knew I had you figured out. Didn’t you? What did you think you were going to get out of this meeting?”

  “Information, I guess. I’m not sure. Information on Jason and Juliana’s arrangement. You probably know that I’m working for a client who thinks that someone in Hollywood might have been responsible for Jason’s death, and I was hoping to get information from you. Since you obviously know now that I’m not client material, I’ll—”

  “You’ll what,” she barked. “You’ll just leave quietly? You stole valuable information from a client of mine and—”

  “I thought you said they fired you.”

  “Two things wrong with that statement. I never said they. I said Jason. And, I never said he fired me. I said he was going to. You’re a thief, Eugene. We’ve got the evidence. So I think you’d be smart to sit down and wait until my friend arrives.”

  Damn cameras. They are everywhere.

  I heard footsteps echoing down the hall and gripped the arms of the chair. God knows who her friend was, but I was not anxious to find out. All I know is I never should have listened to James when he told me to break into the Londell/Bavely office. “It’s a misdemeanor, Skip. No problem.”

  She walked into the hall, and I could hear a faint conversation. Grabbing my phone, I pushed speed dial for James. Without hanging up, I slid the phone back in my pocket. My luck he was on a plane and had his cell phone turned off.

  A moment later she walked back in, Randy Roberts two steps behind her.

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  “Security team sends their best. They miss you.”

  I stood up, hand out to shake his, but he didn’t seem interested.

  “Sit down, Moore.”

  “No, I think it’s time for me to leave.”

  “Not yet.”

  As if on cue, he reached behind himself with his right hand and pulled out a pistol. I’d faced down one armed man today already, and I’d done pretty well. Now I was pressing my luck.

  Glancing at Betsy Timmermeister, he said, “Teller called. Apparently our boy wonder here did some serious damage to Mitch.”

  I could only guess that Teller was the camera guy who impersonated Greg Handler and Mitch must be the driver with the broken jaw.

  Buoyed up by today’s experiences, I addressed him. “Tell me, Randy, it took me forever to figure out, but it was you who dressed up in that ridiculous garb and rented the camera, right? As Greg Handler?”

  His stoic look was almost an acting pose. A humorous look and I had to stop and think that these people could kill me without blinking an eye.

  “Come on, man, it was a bad makeup job. You knew it going in, right, Randy?”

  No response. And surprisingly, I was calm. I just didn’t see him killing me here in this isolated room with a professional financial advisor as witness. Then what better place? Maybe I should have been a little more concerned.

  “Look, I can make guesses all day long, but seriously, why am I here? Why? I don’t have any proof of anything. I’m just trying to make some money on the side. Get a couple bucks from my client. That’s all.”

  “You broke into an office, you stole important documents. You think that actions don’t have conse
quences?”

  “So what are you going to do with me? Turn me into the LAPD? Then do it. Come on.”

  “Who is your client?” Betsy Timmermeister walked up to me, a cruel gleam in her eye.

  “I can’t say.”

  “Mr. Moore, Mr. Roberts has a gun. He wants to know who your client is. If you don’t tell him, I may ask him to use the weapon.”

  I just couldn’t buy into the cold-blooded killer routine from the Timmermeister lady. Roberts, yes.

  “Bavely? Kathy Bavely?”

  I took a step back. I was sure everyone knew. Certain. There could be no doubt that Ashley Amber was my client. And why would Bavely have hired me? Maybe because they knew Bavely had been keeping tabs on all of Juliana’s meetings and boyfriends. And they thought hiring a private investigation company would give her help and advice. To be honest, I wasn’t sure why Kathy Bavely was keeping tabs on her. Did she have a personal vendetta against Juliana Londell?

  “Look,” Roberts sat down, motioning to me to do the same. With a gun aimed squarely at my chest, I thought it was a good idea to follow suit.

  “We know that Kathy Bavely has been trying to break the Londells up for some time. She’s been caught on Juliana Londell’s Skype camera several times. She doesn’t know we caught her, but we did.”

  And I was even trying to figure out why Randy Roberts was involved. It didn’t seem to make any sense. But if he’d been involved with the murder of Jason Londell, then he was trying to cover his ass.

  “We know you were hired by Bavely,” he said. “Kathy Bavely suspected that Juliana Londell had been unfaithful to Jason, but she couldn’t prove it. And because she thought that Juliana might have been behind the murder of her husband—”

  He kept swinging the pistol, waving it back and forth, and for just a split second, I considered rushing him. Probably not a good idea.

  “How much is Kathy paying you? Enough that you would risk jail time for breaking into the office and stealing records?”

  I didn’t know if I was being set up or what. The entire situation was ludicrous. How could Randy Roberts and company not know that Ashley Amber was the one who was paying us?

  And, again, the mind is an amazing tool. Like a computer, it comes up with answers you never even asked. They thought Kathy Bavely had hired us. And that triggered my venture through Bavely’s computer. The one thing I hadn’t figured out. Over and over Bavely had written on the calendar, ph A A. A A. Ashley Amber. Ph. Phone? Was she in touch with Amber? Were they communicating? Was there a conspiracy to prove that Juliana Londell was cheating on Jason? Ph A A. Phone Ashley Amber. Or did it mean that Juliana was calling her sister? Sometimes twice a day. Ph A A. It had to be phone Ashley Amber. I just wasn’t sure who was calling her. And even if I was right, it didn’t appear that was going to do me much good now.

  “Jason Londell was shot.” I held his gaze. “And, as surprised as you appeared, Randy, you directed the entire episode. I’m right, aren’t I? It was probably the best episode you ever shot in your career. You should have gone into acting. You were very convincing, dude.”

  There was no way I was going to talk my way out of this. No way I could plead innocence. No way they’d let me walk out the door. I knew it, they knew it. So it seemed to me the best thing to do was keep delaying the inevitable. Keep talking. Keep ad lib-bing. Don’t let them get to the next step, because I was afraid I knew what the next step was. Killing me.

  “Kid, you messed with the wrong people.”

  “I’m not really sure who the people are, but let me guess.”

  “There are no guessing games,” the Timmermeister lady stood and walked toward the door. “It’s time we left.”

  “No, humor me.” I raised my voice to her, tired of other people calling the shots.

  “Randy, you directed the shoot. I watched you, and I had no idea what you were staging. I bought into your little act. And, just like you probably got actress Audrey Love to overdose on prescription medication, you found a way to kill the grip Andy Hall with the same method. A simple overdose. Why? Hall came to you and told you he suspected you were involved in Londell’s murder? That must have been it. Protecting your story, am I right?”

  Pausing and catching my breath, I kept on going. “You killed Hall. I assume he was a threat. Is it true that once you kill, it just gets easier every time you do it?”

  He smirked, shaking his head.

  “You should have been a screenwriter, Moore. Great imagination.”

  And again on the calendar that Kathy Bavely had put together for Juliana when I hacked her computer, I remembered the meetings with C.A. and B.T. Over and over. C.A., Clint Anders, and B.T., Betsy Timmermeister.

  “And Miss Timmermeister, you were financial advisor for not only Jason Londell, but Clint Anders too.”

  She didn’t deny it.

  “Do you understand, Mr. Moore, you’ve committed a felony, stealing personal financial information?”

  I spread my hands wide open on the conference table. “At this point, does that really make any difference? You are all involved in a murder. A murder, for God’s sake. Maybe several. That makes copying personal financial information seem pretty petty, doesn’t it?”

  “I think this has gone far enough,” she said. Opening the door, she pointed at me, but I stayed glued to my seat. The minute I stood up, I was afraid my fate was sealed. They’d be in charge and could kill me any time they wanted. I didn’t move.

  “You are the financial advisor for Jason Londell and for Clint Anders. Am I right, Miss Timmermeister?”

  Her sharp glance to Roberts told me I’d scored a point.

  “You, Anders, and Juliana are pretty tight, aren’t you? You get together for lunch, have meetings together.”

  “How would you know that?” Her voice reverberated in the small room.

  “Time to go,” Roberts said.

  “Anders is having trouble with his production company.” I didn’t move. “He’s behind on some payments, trying to cut costs, cutting back on filming, among other things. Maybe he’s, I don’t know, gambling a lot?”

  I saw a glimmer in Roberts’s eyes. He knew that Anders had some indulgences.

  “Paying for expensive hookers?”

  “Jesus, stop. Get him the hell out of here, Roberts.” Betsy Timmermeister was practically screaming at Randy, and I was afraid my time of bluffing might be coming to an end.

  “Just tell me. Please. Was this a way to get Londell’s fortune?”

  There was no other reason.

  “Close to eighty million in assets, a ten-million-dollar insurance policy to Juliana, and what? Six or seven million dollars to Anders if the show was disrupted?”

  “Now.” Roberts walked up, grabbed me by the sleeve of my T-shirt, and yanked me to my feet, his gun pointing directly at my face.

  “Come on, Randy. Almost one hundred million dollars. How much were you going to get? Being the guy who had to actually kill people. Well, you and, what was his name? Teller?”

  And it all came together. It was a scheme to split the Londell fortune plus all the insurance money they could get.

  “Yeah. That’s what it was.” Roberts pushed me into the hallway. “That’s exactly what it was. You know, Moore, when there’s a pool of money that big, there’s enough to go around. No greed. And believe me, there’s more than enough to go around. One guy gets out of debt—”

  “Shut up.” Betsy Timmermeister shouted at him, but he ignored her.

  “Someone gets out of a bad relationship and is compensated for her suffering.”

  “Honest to God, Randy, you don’t need to—”

  “One lady,” Roberts said, pointing at her, “gets the fruits of her labor, and one of us doesn’t have to worry about climbing up the ladder in this industry. Ever again. Instead of begging for recognition, pleading for jobs, all his problems go away. He has more than he can possibly use. Not that that’s a bad thing.” Roberts smiled as he shoved his gun barrel in
to my back.

  “Teller?” I asked.

  “Teller? I can’t see much of a cut at this point. He couldn’t even deal with you. There’s the punch line, Moore. Our shooter couldn’t even deal with a low-level punk like you. That’s the funniest story out there. I’m trying to figure out who they should cast as Teller when they make the movie. Curly, Moe, or Shemp?”

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  He didn’t pull the trigger. Instead, we all got into the Escalade. Timmermeister drove. There was no more conversation. About fifteen minutes into the drive, I started to recognize the neighborhood. I’d walked it, scouted it, and burglarized it. We were on the same street where Londell’s office was located.

  Parking across the street, Roberts ordered, “Out.” He encouraged me with a push of his handgun.

  I stepped down and crossed at the light, walking toward the office building. I thought about the cameras. The stoplight camera, the two cameras mounted in the doorway, the cameras mounted to the outside wall less than a block away. They were all monitoring our miniparade, and could be used, I suppose, as evidence in the case surrounding my murder. I didn’t see that they had any other choice.

  And as I wondered about my murder, I thought about Em. Now that they knew, her dream of acting had probably come to an end. And there would almost certainly be a second murder. And yet it all seemed surreal. Everything so far was phony. The fact that James, Em, and I were being paid to investigate a murder when we were often clueless, the phony résumé and union card, a phony cameraman, so maybe my imminent death was phony as well. I was a lot calmer than I thought I’d be under the circumstances. I actually was more worried about Em. She’d almost pulled off a modern-day miracle, and no one would ever know.

  Roberts pushed open the door, and we entered Londell and Bavely’s domain.

  The Waronker lady was not at her station, and Kathy Bavely’s office door was open with no sign of the agent.