“Not me,” Roch called down, grinning.
“No, you can’t be replaced,” Nancy agreed. “But you can be written out and I know Heather is a good enough writer to make it believable.”
Her remark left the silent set even quieter. The wind, which had been wailing like a banshee along the moors of Ireland, became still. Not even Mother Nature dared to question Nancy. It was Roch who finally broke the tense silence, no longer calmed by whatever drugs left him docile and dense.
“Who the hell do you think—”
“I wouldn’t finish that statement if I were you.” Rage flashed in Nancy’s eyes. “I meant what I said. You’re not as hot a commodity as you once were, Mr. Turner. You may be the title character of this show, but you’re not its star. As long as we have Alson, we have a show.”
“Do you have any idea who I am?” Roch demanded. “I’m Roch Turner! I’m the greatest action star Hollywood has ever seen. I’m—”
“Old, Mr. Turner,” Nancy interrupted. “And in case you forgot, you’re not an action star anymore. At one time, yes, you were one of the best, but it’s not 1979 anymore. You’re not the man you once were. You can’t do stunts like you did in Full Metal Fury or the Deadly Payne films. For God’s sake, Roch, we have a stunt-man to do your action scenes!”
“A stunt-man, huh?” he repeated, his large hands tightening into fists as his chest heaved. “I don’t need a stunt-man!”
“Please, Roch, don’t bore us with another one of your futile, egotistical exploits.” Nancy sighed, shaking her head. “We’re wasting time here. Again. We need to get back to work. All right, everyone. We’re done with this scene for today. We’re just going to have to film the action scenes with Amber, Emma and Roch’s stunt-man. Hopefully by tomorrow, Mr. Turner will be feeling better and we can—”
“Stunt-man? Stunt-man? I’m Roch Turner, dammit! I don’t need a stunt-man! Especially not for a pathetic show like this one!”
Emma stared up at him, startled by his uncharacteristic behavior. Amber hadn’t budged from her chair nor had her eyes left the screen of her cell phone.
Pointing down at Nancy, Roch declared, “I’ll show you a true stunt-man!”
“Oh, this can’t be good.” Jon crossed his arms as we both watched Roch, unaware of what he could be planning or what we could do to intercede. “A middle-aged, washed-up, drugged-up, action star desperate to prove his worth in front of an entire film crew? Yeah, not gonna end well.”
From beside the props table, I watched as Seth, the opportunistic, sleazy Props Master, held up his cell phone. It was obvious he was taping both Roch’s tirade and whatever crazy act he was about to attempt, undoubtedly hoping to unload it for an obscene amount of cash. I had a sudden and strong desire to punch the jerk in the face. Unfortunately, I had a more pressing matter to address. Anxious, I glanced around the set, searching for answers, and once again, my gaze landed on Rosalyn. While the rest of the cast and crew were watching Roch was growing apprehension, her eyes danced with excitement.
“You want to see a real action star?” Roch challenged. Motioning to the cameraman at the trail’s base, he called down, “Steve, start rolling. You’re about to see genius at work.”
Skiing over to his assistant, Chad, Roch snatched the silver thermos from his hands, took a big gulp, tossed it back, and skied across the trail to its center. Rolling his shoulders back, he took a deep breath, leaned forward, and in a flash, was racing down the trail. Traversing side to side with expert precision for the first few seconds, I began to feel relieved. That is, until he dropped the ski poles. Slumping forward, he began picking up speed. It would not have been a good thing because of the trail’s relatively short length, but it worsened when he began rolling down the rest of the mountainside. He was headed towards the same trees that ended Trip’s life at a similar breakneck speed, with only seconds before he would crash.
25
As I stood there, watching Roch fly down the mountainside, I realized I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. I knew that I had mere seconds to react, but I couldn’t move. And I wasn’t the only one. All around me, everyone watched Roch in stunned silence, eyes wide, mouths open, no one helping. No one that is, except for Jon.
While I stood staring, Jon bolted away from me. I had never seen him move so fast or with such dexterity. He maneuvered his way through a group of crewmembers across the trail’s base. As he ran, his feet started to sink into the powder.
I realized that his slowed momentum would not allow him to reach Roch in time to do whatever crazy plan he concocted to save the ‘middle-aged, washed up, drugged up action star.’ Jon, apparently, was aware of this, too. As Roch neared the trees, he jumped up and threw himself forward, colliding with Roch and stopping him just before he reached the trees.
Jon landed on his back, groaning as he massaged his head. Roch lay beside him, unconscious, but alive. As soon as they stopped moving, I started to breathe again. The rest of the cast and crew rushed over to check on Roch. Shortly after the breathing came the questions, and then the accusations.
“What the . . . ?”
“What just happened?”
“Hey! Did that guy just try to kill Roch?”
“Holy crap . . . that guy tried to kill Roch!”
“Security! Somebody call security!”
Before I could react, two security guards rushed across the clearing and grabbed Jon, yanking him up with such force his head snapped back. Dragging him toward Nancy, they handcuffed him, but still held his arms. Standing on Nancy’s left side was Rosalyn and for once, she was not smiling.
“Did you see that?” Rosalyn gasped, glaring at Jon with malice. “Did he try to shove Roch into the trees?”
“Yes.” Nancy narrowed her eyes.
“Oh my . . . this is terrible, simply terrible. Nancy, do you think he could be responsible for what happened to Trip, too? And Alson?” Rosalyn asked, covering her ruby lips with her perfectly-manicured nails.
“I think so.” Nancy nodded again. Suddenly, Rosalyn’s smile reappeared, as mesmerizing as ever. For the executive producer of the highest-rated sitcom in the nation, it certainly didn’t take much to sway Nancy’s opinion. Jon shared my sentiment. He looked at them both and cocking his head to the left, rolled his eyes.
“Are you frickin’ kidding me?” He stomped his boot into the snow with frustration. Glancing around the set, he called, “Are you people all blind? Has the L.A. smog affected your mental abilities? Old man river keeled over . . . I saved his life! So what’s with the handcuffs, 5-0? I deserve a medal. And an ice bag. Am I bleeding? I have an audition on Tuesday. I better not bruise.”
“For God’s sake, shut up!” Taking a step closer, Nancy poked Jon in the chest with her index finger. “You. If you ever want to see daylight again, you’re going to tell me exactly why you did what you did and how you did it before any of this gets out to the press. I want to know what the hell is going on here!”
“If you want to know what’s going on, just ask Psycho Barbie over there,” Jon nodded at Rosalyn.
Nancy glanced back, then returned her gaze to Jon. “How dare you accuse Dr. Grace? She is a dedicated psychologist! You’re just a . . . a . . . who the hell are you anyway?”
“I’m an actor,” Jon retorted, holding his chin up, which made his six-foot frame appear taller.
At this, Nancy laughed. “You and everyone else here, honey.” Turning to the guards, she said, “Bring him back to the hotel, but I don’t want him arrested yet, do you understand me? I have to figure out how to handle this before involving the police. All I need is for the press to hear about this, too.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The older of the two guards nodded. They began pulling Jon away. I glanced at Heather, who was hiding behind the cameraman to avoid Nancy’s wrath. I knew our next conversation was going to b
e less than cordial, regardless of what I did next, but if I kept my mouth shut . . .
As the guards dragged Jon past me, our eyes met. I expected him to beg for my help. I expected him to yell at me, to tell me to tell them what we knew, to get him out of this mess. That’s what I expected because, well, that was Jon Riché. That’s what I expected, but that wasn’t what he did. As he was carted away, our eyes met and with a sad smile, he shrugged, almost as if to say, “Oh, well. Guess this was inevitable.”
Standing there, watching him perform another selfless act on my behalf, everything became clear. I knew what I had to do. I had to help the one man who always helped me, and trust that my friendship with Heather would survive the consequences. I had to help . . . because it was Jon.
“Wait!” I exclaimed, my voice echoing across the clearing. The guards stopped. Everyone turned to look at me, including Heather. Taking a deep breath, I declared, “He’s telling the truth.”
“What?” Nancy approached me with such alarming speed, it gave me pause. When she was inches from my face, she stopped. “Tell me what’s going on. Right now.”
“You asked me to look into this morning’s incident,” I began, trying to focus on the facts and not the overwhelming intensity of Nancy’s stare. “You asked me to, and I did.”
“I’m listening,” she replied, her steely gaze still trained on me.
“Jon had nothing to do with any of this,” I continued, feeling less anxious. “I mean, to blame him is just crazy. In my profession, we rely on facts. This isn’t some television drama where an unexplained plot twist shows up at the last minute in a pathetic attempt to shock viewers because some lazy writer didn’t set out enough clues for the audience. In my world, true suspects have to have three things, means, motive and opportunity. Jon has none of those things.”
“Continue.”
“Whoever did this had to have access to the set, the cast, the crew, and a few items that someone like my associate could not get without a script.” When she stared at me in confusion, I clarified, “Not a manuscript. A script. As in prescription.”
“If you’re suggesting—”
“Let me finish.” I held up my gloved right hand. Rage flashed across her eyes, but she didn’t argue. “Someone with access to all of this has the means, but that isn’t necessarily the killer because means doesn’t equal motive.”
“Get to the point.”
“The point is, there aren’t many people who could have pulled this off,” I replied. “I had three suspects before coming to the conclusion I’m at right now.”
“You’re not getting to the point.”
“Are we going to call an ambulance for Roch?” a crewmember called out.
“Someone get a medic over here now.” At Nancy’s command, five crewmen ran off, speaking into headsets at a low volume. Turning back to me, she added, “You have five seconds to convince me not to have your friend arrested and you thrown off this set.”
“I thought the target was Alson,” I began, speaking quickly as I glanced over at Heather, whose face had turned as white as the snow. “But it wasn’t. Roch’s been the target all along. Trip’s killer didn’t know the script, I mean manuscript, had been changed and Roch would no longer be filming this morning. That’s why she tampered with the ski. She thought it would be Roch up there, not Trip. And when that plan failed, she had to make sure Alson couldn’t perform today, so she drugged him with enough tranquilizers to knock out a horse and made sure the writers rewrote the manuscript to avoid another screw up.”
“So you’re saying the killer is—”
“Dr. Rosie,” I said, taking a deep breath and holding my ground.
“Dr. Rosie,” Nancy repeated, shaking her head. “Naturally, I don’t believe you, but I’d love to know how you came up with this little . . . theory. As far as I can tell, she wasn’t the one who tackled Roch and tried to shove him into the trees. Again, make it quick.”
“Who gave Roch that silver thermos?” I called out, glancing around the set at people who refused to meet my gaze for fear association might lead to termination. “The silver thermos! Where’d it come from?”
“Someone answer her,” Nancy snapped.
“That . . . would be me.”
Nancy turned around and we were both startled to find Rosalyn walk toward us, a slight smile on her lips as she sashayed across the clearing, the studio lights overhead making the powder glisten like diamonds. From the perimeter, whispers rose high above the set and into the cold night sky as we stared at her in silence. The wind blew her silky hair across her flawless face and she brushed it back. Still smiling, she stopped beside us.
“Why would you give him a thermos?” Nancy asked, narrowing her eyes with confusion. “Rosie, he has an assistant.”
“Told you it was Psycho Barbie!” Jon called out.
“Shut up,” Nancy and I said in unison.
“It’s quite simple, really,” Rosalyn replied, clasping her gloved hands as her smile widened. “Everyone is on edge today. It’s completely understandable, considering what’s happened. People say and do strange things under stress,” she added, glancing at me with amusement. Don’t punch her . . . don’t punch her, I repeated to myself in silence. “I just wanted to help. I thought cocoa might calm Roch down.”
“Because you drugged it!” I exclaimed. “You’ve drugged them all, haven’t you? Admit it!”
“I did put a little something in it to calm his nerves, yes.”
“And Alson?” When she refused to respond, opting instead to maintain a charming smile, I snapped, “He’s awake now. He told me you gave him pills!”
“I did,” she said, offering neither a hint of concern or remorse for her actions.
Nancy’s eyes widened as she struggled for words. “Rosie, that is highly irregular,” she stammered. “For one thing, Alson’s a minor and we could be facing a huge lawsuit if his mother finds out. And for another, why Roch? How is he supposed to act if he’s sedated?”
“I suppose I may have made an error in judgment,” Rosalyn let her eyes and her smile fall as she feigned regret. “I’m sorry, Nancy. I just know how much stress you’ve been under the past few weeks with all that’s been going on. After this morning . . . well, I wanted to make sure everything worked out all right. I didn’t mean to make Alson sick or to cause Roch any harm. I feel awful. Roch may have a concussion or worse, and it’s my fault. He may be hospitalized and—”
“Rosie, it’s . . . it’s all right,” Nancy nodded, squeezing her shoulder for reassurance. “Your heart was in the right place, but you shouldn’t have—”
“What’s going on here?” Roch groaned, rubbing his head. He was leaning against his assistant, Chad, as they approached the cameraman and Milt, the director. Roch’s face and outfit shimmered with white powder as he let out another low groan. Except for obvious disorientation, which could have been a concussion, and some bruising and swelling around his chiseled face, it appeared Roch Turner was going to be all right. Jon did, in fact, save his life. Glancing over at Rosalyn, I watched as the façade slipped and rage flashed across her big brown eyes.
“Roch!” Nancy hurried over to him as a medic arrived on set. “Are you all right?”
“Depends on your definition.” He rubbed his neck and squinted through the bright lights. “What’s going on?”
“You had an accident. This man is going to make sure you’re okay.” Nancy gestured at the medic. “Just go with him.”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Must drive you insane.” I stared at Roch as I inched closer to Rosalyn, whose gaze never left him. “All that effort and he’s going to be all right.”
“I’m so relieved.” Rosalyn kept looking at him. “I was really worried.”
“That act may work in Hollywood, but I don’t buy it,”
I retorted, still watching her.
“Forgive the bluntness, but you don’t know me at all.”
“I know more than you think.” Still speaking softly to avoid being overheard, I said, “I know your name is Rosalyn Grace Leigh. I know that you left a lucrative job on the east coast to move over here. And I know you did so to work for some no-name clinic. Doesn’t make much sense . . . unless you had a motive for coming back home. And California is your home, right?”
“Born and raised,” she replied, offering a brief, brilliant smile as she watched the medic shine a light in Roch’s eyes.
“By your grandmother,” I continued. “That’s what you said earlier. Your mother died, right?”
“What are you getting at?” She glanced at me for a split second before turning back to Roch, who was repeating a series of words at the medic’s command.
“What I’m getting at is this – I think your mother was the actress from Red Steel, that movie Roch made in the 1970s, and that you have it out for him.”
“Well, that’s an interesting theory.”
“Are you saying I’m wrong?”
“I’m not saying that.”
Bitter Retribution (Jordan James, PI Series) Page 26