by Lankford, Terrill Lee; Raphael, Lev; Parker, T. Jefferson
I wondered if the porn reference was for my benefit or if it was just the way he talked, just a coincidence. I had the feeling he was trying to earn my confidence, show me he was one of the guys, an insider of the world I used to inhabit. There was something phony about this guy. He was another cheap actor in a town full of them. But maybe that was the problem. He'd been fixing for so much show biz trash that the act had worn off on him. No matter, he had honed in on the same similarities in appetites between Candice Bishop and Teddy Vincent that had struck me and now he wanted to make things happen. I had the feeling that Teddy was about to encounter some very rough road on his ever bumpy journey through life.
"If Vincent did it, I'll find out," Holiday continued. "Even if he didn't, he's a great guy to have as a neighbor considering the state of things. Reasonable doubt, my man. Reasonable doubt."
I had never looked at it that way. Despite the optimism in Dale Holiday's voice, I felt a cloud of doom descending around me. All the shysters and shylocks in town weren't going to pull my fat out of the fire. I wasn't any legendary movie star who could curry favor with a jury. I was an ex-pornographer with a shady past who had lived under an alias for the last decade. If a jury got hold of me, I'd be finished. If anything could be proven against Teddy Vincent or whoever the true murderer was, it would have to be ironclad in order to get me off the hook. Innuendo and slander against an easy target wouldn't do it. No, the only way I would walk away from this would be to get hard evidence against the killer or killers, and that sort of thing didn't look like it was going to drop out of the sky. Time was running out.
4
The sun was setting on the Pacific as I sped home. People were packing it in for the day. Empty picnic baskets and coolers were being loaded into cars; jet skis were being reeled onto their trailers; surfers were stripping off their wetsuits right alongside PCH and changing into civvies behind beach towels; homeless people were making their way to their favorite sleeping spots. All was normal except for the haze in the air that still hung low from all the recent fires. The Santa Ana winds were expected back soon. They would sweep the soot south, but they would also bring more heat and dryness, more risk of arson and wildfires.
I could see from a distance that the front of my house was thick with paparazzi. I had to time my approach appropriately. I hit the clicker for the garage door and came close to nailing a number of photographers as I turned into the driveway. My garage door opened barely in time as I came roaring in from PCH. I skidded to an abrupt halt inside the garage, an inch away from hitting the rear wall. The garage door closed automatically behind me and I sat staring at my face in the Lamborghini's rearview mirror. I felt calm for a moment, then I suddenly exploded with rage and frustration. I took it out on the steering wheel, slamming it with my fists, grabbing it, shaking it, trying to rip it right out of the dash. Fuck it. Fuck it all!
I entered the kitchen from the garage and turned on the lights in the house. I pulled my hair back off my face, composed myself, and walked through the house to the stairway that led up to my bedroom. I ignored the flashing light on the answering machine as I passed it on the stairwell. I no longer had any interest in anything anyone might have to say.
Angry red light from the setting sun shone through the bedroom blinds, but the room was filled with shadows and pools of darkness. I collapsed on the bed, exhausted. Suddenly a voice came from a far corner of the room.
"Nick. . . . "
I sprang up in the bed and looked wildly around the room, but whoever was there was hiding in the shadows.
"Who's there? Who the fuck is it?"
Jennifer Joyner leaned forward out of the dark corner into a shaft of red light.
"It's me," she said. "Jennifer."
I was on my feet now "Jennifer? You scared the piss out of me."
"Sorry. I fell asleep in the chair and didn't hear you come in."
"How'd you get into the house?"
"You loaned me a key when you wanted me to meet you here two weeks ago, remember?"
I sat on the edge of the bed and tried to clear my head. She was right. I had been working late a couple of weeks earlier and she had dropped by the set. She had said the right things to get me in the mood and I had told her to wait for me in my bed. I had given her a spare key to get in, something I almost never do for anyone, and I had forgotten to ask for it back. She had probably taken it as some mild sign of commitment. We had both made mistakes.
"I forgot," I muttered.
"You're pretty jumpy."
"I'm in a lot of trouble, Jenn."
"No kidding. I had to sneak around to the beach entrance to keep from getting plastered all over the front page tomorrow."
"You didn't have to come by at all."
"I wanted to."
Jennifer got up and crossed to the bed and sat beside me. She put her arms around my shoulders for comfort. It was a strange move, but I didn't pull away from her. She smelled good and felt even better.
"I spoke with Mark Pecchia," she said. "He wasn't very communicative. He's pretty angry."
"Who isn't?" I responded.
"I went to his set. He was in the middle of shooting another one of his black leather, rock and roll fantasies. Lots of smoke, girls, and guitars. He seemed kind of hyper. Maybe he's back on the blow."
"So what did he say, exactly?"
"He was pissed. He thinks you killed a friend of his. You met her at his party so he feels responsible. I told him you could never kill anyone and he told me to 'wake up and smell the espresso.' He said anyone who survived in show business was a killer already. That it's a natural instinct. He said you just took the symbolism to its logical conclusion. He wasn't in the mood to say much more. He was pretty rude."
I laughed. "There seems to be a lot of that going around."
"What's this all about, Nick?"
"I don't know. I don't know. I think I've been set up by someone, but I don't know why and I don't know who. What I do know is that I am into shit up to my eyebrows and no one believes I'm innocent."
"I believe you," Jennifer said.
I looked at her face. She returned the look with compassion.
"I know you couldn't do anything like that," she said. "I believed what I told Mark."
She gave my shoulders a squeeze. It didn't cheer me up. If anything it made me feel gloomier. Jennifer was so blind. For all she knew I could have been the killer. Hell, for all I knew, I was. The hours after I passed out with Candice Bishop were a complete blank. Even I was beginning to doubt myself. Could I have suffered some kind of psychotic blackout and done the horrible deed after all? What if I was guilty?
"You trust too much," I said. "At the right time anyone is capable of anything."
Jennifer withdrew from me, suddenly disconcerted, as if she thought I was trying to confess to the murder. But I didn't do it. I couldn't have blanked out that completely. I had to believe I was innocent. I didn't want to lose Jennifer's trust, either. I needed someone on my side and there weren't a lot of volunteers for the job.
"But this isn't one of those times," I said, trying to regain her confidence. "I didn't kill that girl. The last time I saw her she was very much alive."
This seemed to sting Jennifer deeply. "I bet," she said bitterly. It was almost as if she'd rather have me kill another woman than sleep with her.
"I'm sorry if I hurt you, Jenn. I'm so fucked up I don't know what I'm saying anymore. My entire life has been turned upside down. But you've stuck with me when nobody else would. You're a friend. A good friend."
I leaned over and gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. She was visibly moved by the simple gesture.
"Why, Nick. . . . Maybe there is a human being in there after all."
I involuntarily blushed at my show of affection. My wall had briefly dropped for someone. Or at least it had torn away a little. Jennifer returned a kiss, but this time on the lips, tender at first, then turning more passionate. She slowly pushed me back onto the bed, our lips n
ever parting. I slid my pants off and removed her panties. I still had my shirt on and she was still wearing a red blouse and a black wraparound skirt. I decided to leave them on her, for now.
Jennifer positioned herself on top of me and we made contact. I slipped into her like we were two interlocking pieces of a combustion machine. Foreplay was nonexistent. We got right down to it. I slid my hands under her blouse and unsnapped the front of her bra. I freed her breasts and caressed them appreciatively. Her nipples were little rocks. She slid back and forth rhythmically on top of me. She pulled her skirt up and began moving faster and faster. I grabbed the sides of her hips and lifted her up and down. She was really burning now.
"Jeeeeesus . . . Christ," she moaned. "I'm coming . . . I'm coming!"
She pumped and slid along my cock, using it like her own private fuck tool. She was about to set a land speed record for us. She had never come this quickly before. It usually took quite a while to break through her cynicism.
I suddenly found myself straining to enjoy the experience. Maybe even straining to stay interested at all. Something had happened to me during my encounter with Candice Bishop. Another layer of callus had built up on my sexuality. Another jaded memory to distance me from normal pleasures.
Jennifer looked deep into my eyes and I tried to appear involved and intense. Suddenly her entire body began to shudder and shake with orgasm. She gasped, as if fatally stabbed.
"Oh God . . . oh God . . . ," she repeated over and over like some horny mantra.
I strained to remain fully erect. Something suddenly triggered a memory in my head. The way Jennifer moved her hair briefly reminded me of Candice Bishop. I could feel my interest swell noticeably. Jennifer climaxed and collapsed on top of me. She panted for a few moments before she could speak.
"Whew," she said. "Amazing what a kind word can do."
I slid out from under Jennifer. She started to roll over onto her side, thinking we were finished, but I grabbed her hips and kept them elevated.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
I flipped her skirt up and positioned myself behind her.
"What's it look like?"
"Oh."
I pressed my pelvis against her buttocks.
"Careful. . . . Watch your aim," she said. I slipped into her vagina. She wasn't ready for anything rougher.
I flashed on Candice, tied down in a similar position under me, begging to be pushed over the edge.
I began pumping away at Jennifer from behind. She was still sensitive from her recent orgasm.
"Easy, Nick, easy . . . give a girl a chance to breathe."
I didn't hear her. I leaned my head back, remembering Candice as I thrust into Jennifer savagely. As I replayed my night with Candice in my head I relived it through Jennifer's body. My needs had been expanded by my experience. Jennifer, unaccustomed or unready for my sexual assault, experienced pleasure/pain similar to that which Candice craved.
"Goddamn," she stammered. "I don't believe it . . . I'm coming . . . again."
I could feel her tightening and drenching herself. I pressed into her as deeply as I could and let loose as well. Jennifer and I climaxed simultaneously for what seemed like a lifetime. We both went delirious. We kept grinding away at each other, trying to drain every last drop from our genitals, trying to meld our bodies at the point of contact. Finally we gave up in a moment of existential agony that reminded us we were actually two separate creatures, that we could never truly be one. I collapsed on her back and she rolled over onto her side. We were both soaked with sweat and come. I was tired, but I still hadn't gotten what I really needed out of the encounter. I wasn't satisfied. Maybe I never would be satisfied again.
_____
"Nick worked a box of paper clips on me one night and I thought I was with the fucking Marquis de Sade. That's what I like about him: his sense of the perverse."
—Jennifer Joyner
_____
5
It took ten minutes before I felt like moving again. Jennifer was still face down on the bed, half asleep, covered in a cold sweat. I put on a black robe and went downstairs for a glass of water. Night had fallen over the ocean, turning it cold and gray.
I brought the ice water back upstairs and touched Jennifer's back with the frosty glass. She spun around in shock from the sensation.
"Ouch," she said as she took the glass. "Thanks."
Jennifer sipped the water. I sat down on the bed and propped myself up against the headboard.
"Well, looks like I'm going to have to drop out of the triathlon," Jennifer said. "Unless they'll let me use a wheelchair. Christ, what got into you? I haven't been fucked like that since college."
I didn't really hear her. I was brooding, off in another world. Jennifer shrugged off my indifference, rolled over, picked up the TV remote control, and turned on the tube. She began flipping through the channels. Violence and sex. Sex and violence. And that was just the networks. PBS was running a documentary about Nazi concentration camps.
Jennifer stopped on CNN. They were issuing an update on River Phoenix's overdose. There was actually no new information, but they felt obliged to keep the station on the air so they were continuing the speculation. Muckraking pays well. This was followed by a three-minute update on the latest Michael Jackson sex scandal. Then the latest "alleged Hollywood madam," Lise Rattinoff, picked up another three minutes of infamy. She was now selling designer satin sheets while awaiting trial, and the media was giving her plenty of free commercial airtime. Jennifer took it all in hungrily and when the news switched to politics she began channel-surfing again. She was clicking through the airwaves so quickly I didn't think she could possibly tell what she was passing. Something caught Jennifer's eye and she went back a few channels. She landed on MTV, the rock video station.
"Here's one of Mark's videos," she said. "You can't watch this station for more than ten minutes without seeing one."
I shook the cobwebs from my head and looked at the screen. Black-leather-clad women with huge breasts were running long razor blade-like fingernails across the chest of a stringy-haired hard rocker sprawled out on the floor of a large, empty room, while he played his guitar. Blood dripped profusely from the scratches. It was part Nightmare on Elm Street, part Penthouse fantasy. But there was something about the video that was even more familiar than the pop culture references. The location. . . .
"I know that place," I said to Jennifer.
"What?"
"I was there. I was at a place that looked just like that today. A warehouse owned by a freak named Nate Boritzer."
"What did you see Nate Boritzer for?" Jennifer asked.
"You know him?"
"Everybody does. A lot of the guys shoot at his warehouse. Its a popular space. It's cheap and it's on the beach. He's also a dealer, so it's doubly convenient."
"A drug dealer?"
"Well, he sure doesn't sell Hondas."
"Does Mark Pecchia buy from him?" I asked.
"I don't know. . . . Probably. Nate hangs around Mark a lot. Mark's a good connection. Nate was at the party."
I squinted, trying to force the pieces into place. "He was? I don't remember seeing him."
"He showed up late. You were probably busy right here with your 'friend' by the time he got there."
There was still some bitterness about my dalliance in Jennifer's tone. I tried to let it pass.
"How late did he stay?"
"I don't know. I left pretty soon after he showed up."
Now it was my turn to discuss fidelity.
"Who'd you go home with?" I asked.
Jennifer didn't answer for a moment. She was caught with her double standard in her mouth. Finally she just gave a little laugh and confessed, "You're not the only one who knows how to make friends."
"I know."
We shared a moment of ennui. I think we were both trying to figure out what the hell we were doing with our lives. What were our lives anyway? A series of empty sexual enc
ounters punctuated with flurries of work. The moment of introspection passed quickly.
"I got the feeling Nate wasn't going to stay long," Jennifer said. "I think he and Mark were going to go out and score some coke."
The wheels were starting to turn. I got up and walked out onto my deck. I could hear the ocean crashing on the beach, but the night and the ash in the air had enveloped the distant lights of the city. Somewhere offshore a foghorn sounded, signaling that a marine layer was moving toward the coast. The foliage would get some much needed moisture tonight. Maybe nature would save Southern California from being burned to the ground. And maybe I was going to find a way to save myself from the dark forces that had been surrounding me.
PART XII
"Don't panic."
—Dale Holiday
1
I woke up around eleven the next morning. I felt terrific. Well rested and clearheaded. Jennifer was gone. I assumed she wasn't out in the Dumpster. I slipped on my robe and stepped out onto the deck for a smoke. The sky was clear and the wind was hot. The Santa Anas had returned with a vengeance. I took two puffs from the cigarette, then put it out. I'd be able to breathe enough hot air today.
The phone rang. I felt so good that I picked it up, forgetting about all the people I didn't want to speak to. It was Dale Holiday.
"Bad news on the neighbor front, Nick. Teddy Vincent was in Vancouver shooting a Roger Corman movie the night of the murder. He was definitely there and working when the thing went down. He got back two days later."
I could feel my heart sink. "What about Momberg?" I asked.
"He was working, too. Logged off around eleven. Had the next morning off, but I've got a source that places him at the Mondrian hotel with a couple of starlets from two a.m. till checkout Saturday afternoon. Seems he went to a wrap party at the Roxy and got himself lucky with the Doublemint twins."
"You get a lot done before lunchtime."