Hollywood Forbidden: A Hollywood Alphabet Series Thriller

by M. Z. Kelly

  I crossed by arms, returned the eye darts. “I don’t believe a word you’re saying.”

  “I don’t give a flying fuck what you believe.”

  “Stand up and turn around.” I pulled the handcuffs out of my purse.

  “What? You can’t arrest me.”

  “Really? Let’s just see about that.”

  I came over to her, pulled her up, turned her around, and put the cuffs on her wrists. “You’re under arrest for withholding information that’s impeding a murder investigation,” I said. It was nonsense, a total bluff, but I had nothing to lose and knew we were running out of time to find the girls. The worst case scenario was that if we learned nothing we could release the woman in a few hours.

  The effect of what I’d done was like turning on a faucet. Claudette broke down, crying like a baby. All the bravado we’d seen a moment earlier was suddenly gone. I’d seen a similar reaction before with a few suspects. There’s something about suddenly losing your freedom and facing jail that can sometimes shift a bad attitude. In Shaw’s case, the shift was dramatic.

  “Okay…okay, I’ll tell you what I know if you let me go.”

  “We’re listening,” I said, glancing over at Buck who had a bemused look on his face. I helped her back into the chair but left the cuffs on. I sat down across from her again. “I’m waiting.”

  She let out a heavy breath. “Derek was his own person, wouldn’t listen to me ‘bout things. He got mixed up in something bad. All I know is it involved girls.”

  “What exactly did he tell you?”

  “Just that he was supposed to go out and find some girls. It was for guys in some kinda club or something. From what I know he got paid a lot of money for each girl, so even though Derek knew it was wrong, he said he didn’t care.”

  “Did he ever mention who was in this club?” Buck asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Did he ever use the term Blue Hoods when he mentioned the club?” I asked.

  “No.” She brushed the remaining tears on the sleeve of her shirt. “Like I said, I don’t know who was in the club, all I know is that Derek was working with some other kid.”

  I felt my adrenaline spiking. “Did he mention the boy’s name?”

  “Not that I remember. But I do know they were both working for some high-priced attorney on the island. Not sure about his named either, but Derek said he and the other kid got the girls and the lawyer paid them.”

  I over looked at Buck, back at Shaw. “Did Derek ever mention the name Clay Aster or Harvey Brill.”

  Claudette Shaw’s red-rimmed caramel eyes brightened. “That’s it. Now I remember the guy’s name cause it made me think about a Brillo pad when Derek mentioned it. It was Brill.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  We were starving by the time we finished up with Claudette Shaw so I pulled off the freeway in Hollywood for lunch. It was my chance to give Buck a brief tour of the city where I lived and worked.

  “From what I’m told, Hollywood owes its origins to the temperance movement. Settlers came west where they had strict laws against any form of alcohol and they had absolutely no use for actors.”

  Buck turned away from me, his gaze fixing on the costumed characters on the sidewalk in front of Grauman’s, or what is now called the TLC Theater, as we passed the famed attraction. Everyone from Batman to Chewbacca to SpongeBob was on parade.

  My partner met my eyes. “Wonder what they’d think if they could see this place now?”

  I laughed. “They’d probably start drinking.”

  We stopped at Kings Road Café on Beverly Drive and took seats on the outdoor patio. The restaurant was small, giving the impression of a small town neighborhood café, but the food was to die for and the prices reasonable. After ordering drinks and sandwiches we recapped what we’d learned from Claudette Shaw.

  “If Harvey Brill was paying Derek Shaw and another kid to find girls for the Blue Hoods it seems likely that Clay Aster was also involved,” I said.

  Buck took a sip of bottled water. “It would seem to fit. Maybe they got on the wrong side of one or more fellow club members and paid the ultimate price for it.”

  “It’s also hard for me to believe that Carly Lucia didn’t know about any of this.”

  “Or Hal Quinton for that matter.”

  “Maybe they’ve both got ties to the Blue Hoods, although Quinton doesn’t seem the type.” I poured a packet of sugar into my iced tea. “It could be they had some kind of financial interest in what was going on.”

  Buck’s blue eyes glazed over, his gaze moving off to where cars buzzed up and down the road. He finally looked back at me. “I’ve got a feeling this thing is a lot bigger than we thought and somebody’s going to a whole lot of trouble to keep it all covered up.”

  “I think we should go back to Quinton and Lucia when we get back on the island. Maybe put them in a box at the station and get serious.”

  “I’ll make a call after lunch, see what I can arrange.”

  I studied him for a moment after our sandwiches arrived. He seemed distracted, bothered by the noise and traffic of the city. “I can tell you’re not much of a city boy.”

  He smiled, crinkling up his eyes in that way that melted me. “Is it that obvious?”

  I nodded, returned the smile. “Tell me something. What was Buck McCade like as a boy?”

  “Just a barefoot kid on a bay, out look’n for whatever trouble he could find.”

  “A bay?”

  “A horse, light red in color. I called her Ginger.” He laughed. “We had this thing we’d do most every day. I’d saddle her up and ride out at dawn. In the spring there was this big field of clover where Ginger liked to refill her tank. Afterwards, we’d both lie down in the grass, feel the glade against our backs, and look at the sky and the clouds. She was more like an overgrown puppy than a horse.”

  “It sounds like an idyllic life for a boy.”

  “No bellyaching from me. I had it real good.”

  “Bellyaching? Really?”

  He shrugged, smiled again. “What about you? Tell me about the ten year old girl named Kate.”

  “Wow.” I took a moment, sipped my tea. “I didn’t have a Ginger or a ranch. But I did have a brother, who turned out to be gay, and a sister who doesn’t speak to me now.”

  “Another sister?”

  “Amanda. She lives in Europe where she’s busy spending her idiot husband’s inheritance.” I sighed. “We’re just different souls, I guess.”

  “And?”

  I held on his eyes for a moment, then looked away. “I was pretty lost after what happened to my dad. And my mom was…” I laughed and found his eyes again. “She’s a part-time psychic who demonstrates for world peace in the nude.”

  “You’re fool’n with me.”

  “I’d love to fool with you, Buck.” Okay, I was fantasizing and didn’t say it. I did say, “No fooling. Mom marches to the beat of a different drummer.”

  He laughed. “I always say never judge a person by their relatives.”

  “Or their friends, as you mentioned before.”

  His eyes held on me as he smiled. “I think the ten year-old Buck and the ten year-old Kate woulda had some good times together.”

  I nodded, thinking the grown-up versions might have an even better time.

  ***

  We got back to Catalina around six and headed straight to the station where we met Lieutenant Sloan. “Got ‘em both in room number three,” Sloan said, referring to Quinton and Lucia. And I can tell you, they’re none too happy about being here.” He handed over Bernie’s leash. My big dog did a tail wag and happy dance, probably recovering from a bout with depression after being with Sloan all day.

  “That’s just the way we want them,” I said, at the same time nuzzling Bernie. I took a moment, making arrangements for one of the clerks to take him for a walk while we interviewed Quinton and Lucia.

  “I demand to know why we’re here,” Hal Quinton s
aid as we came into the room. The legal assistant was in jeans and a T-shirt. Carly Lucia was also dressed casually in shorts and a tank-top. While the outfit showed off her considerable assets, it did nothing to improve her personality.

  “This is harassment, plain and simple,” Lucia spat. She looked at Quinton. “Maybe we need our own attorneys.”

  “You can call an attorney but you’re not being charged with anything—yet,” Buck said.

  Carly crossed her arms. I saw there were still some bruises after her last encounter with Brill. “What’s that supposed to mean? You’re acting like we’re guilty of something.”

  “We can start with you being accessories to kidnapping,” I said, raising my voice.

  “That’s ridiculous,” Quinton said, rapidly blinking his eyes. “We demand…”

  “You are in no position to demand anything.” I decided to again take some liberties with the truth and see where it went. “We know about everything. We know about Harvey Brill being involved in the Blue Hoods. About how he paid Derek Shaw to procure girls for the games. Aster probably also had a hand in what was going on. Start talking or I’ll let you sit in a holding cell until your attorneys get here.”

  I sat back as Quinton looked over at Lucia who still had her grumpy face on. He brushed a hand through his thinning gray hair and exhaled. “There was something going on. I’m just not sure about all the details.”

  “You both need to tell us what you know,” Buck said.

  Quinton looked at Lucia again, blinking away. She sighed and finally spoke up. “Harvey was involved, maybe along with Clay, but I can’t be sure. It all began a long time ago.”

  “Were they the men in the sex video we found in Aster’s house?”

  “Probably,” Lucia said. “But I can’t say for sure. I don’t think Harvey was personally involved in recent years, except for paying Shaw to find some girls.”

  “Who was Harvey working for?”

  “I’m not sure. All I know is that in the past few years the Blue Hoods changed from what it had once been.

  “How do you know that?”

  She sucked in a breath, released it slowly. “Because I was one of the girls…in the games.”

  I looked at Buck, back at her. “Tell us about the games, how you were chosen.”

  Lucia took a moment. I saw her eyes turn inward, maybe remembering the horrors she’d witnessed. “It was about a dozen years ago. I was using drugs and living on the streets at the time. I met some guy who said he wanted to help me. I ended up being drugged and later woke up in a house. I was locked in a room for several days until the games started.

  “When they came for me I was taken into the woods by the men in the Blue Hoods. They told us that we had an hour before they would begin hunting us. I ran and hid out and luckily wasn’t found until morning.” Lucia brushed a tear. “Some of the other girls weren’t as fortunate. They were sexually assaulted and…” There were more tears.

  “And what?”

  She wiped the tears, sniffed. “I don’t know for sure. I heard lots of screaming. Maybe they did to the girls what you saw in the video. I’m not sure.”

  I was making notes as she talked and looked up at her. “What happened when the men found you?”

  “Harvey…he was the one who found out where I was hiding. He made me a promise that if I would never reveal what happened he would take care of me. I agreed and in return he took me home and let me stay with him. He eventually paid for me to go to school and I went on to become Harvey and Clay’s legal secretary.”

  “So you got your freedom in return for becoming Brill’s personal sex slave.”

  Lucia met my eyes and nodded. “Yes, for a while. We continued our relationship off and on for years, but Harvey… as I told you before he liked different girls. He was tired of me, even though I let him do almost anything he wanted to me, including what you saw the other night.”

  “The house where you were taken,” Buck said, “and the woods where you were hunted. Where did all this take place?”

  She shook her head. “I have no idea. As I said I was drugged and ended up locked in a room. All I know is that it was in the middle of nowhere.”

  “But it was here on the island?” I asked.

  She nodded.

  “So if Harvey was paying Shaw for girls, he must have still been involved in the Blue Hoods,” Buck said.

  Lucia shook her head. “I don’t think so. Harvey and I never talked about it directly, but I think there was someone else who wanted the girls. I just don’t know who.”

  “Maybe Aster,” I said.

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. Clay was…” She took in a breath, released it slowly. “He had prostate surgery about three years ago. From what Harvey told me it left him impotent.”

  “Did you and Aster ever specifically talk about the Blue Hoods?”

  “Not in so many words, but he knew about my past with Harvey. I just assumed he was involved but I have no way of knowing for sure.”

  “Derek Shaw’s mother said there was another boy he was working with to find girls.” My gaze moved between Lucia and Quinton. “Do either of you know who that was?”

  They both shook their heads. Quinton’s face was ashen and he was trembling. I said to the attorney, “You need to tell us what else you know—everything.”

  “I don’t know any more than what Carly’s already said. But I can tell you that in the past few weeks Clay had changed. He put in an office security system and bought a gun. I heard him arguing on the phone with someone in his office a few days before he was killed. When he ended the call I went into the office to bring him some legal documents. He was still upset. I asked him what was wrong. He wouldn’t say but he did give me something.”

  Quinton reached into his pocket, removed a key from a keychain, and handed it over. “He said this is the key to a safe deposit box at the Crescent Street Bank. He told me if anything ever happened to him I needed to hand over the key to the authorities. I have no idea what’s inside the box.”

  I was angry and made no attempt to hide it. “What didn’t you both tell us all this right after the shooting?”

  “I was afraid,” Quinton said. “I didn’t want whoever killed Clay coming after me.”

  My gaze swung over to Lucia and held on her violet eyes. “I just wanted the past to stay in the past,” she said. “What happened brought back terrible memories for me. After Harvey was killed I was also scared.”

  I looked over at Buck, back at Quinton and Lucia. My eyes narrowed on them, my words full of contempt. “You were both afraid. How in the hell do you think those poor girls who were kidnapped feel?”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Two hours later, after meeting with the president of the Crescent Street Bank at his place of business, we had a large manila envelope containing what we’d found in Clay Aster’s safe deposit box. We returned to the station where we emptied the contents onto Lieutenant Sloan’s desk. It was evening but Spencer and Baxter had come back to the station to meet with us.

  “A photograph and a necklace,” Sloan said, examining what was on the desk. He looked up at me. “That’s it?”

  I nodded, showing him that the envelope was empty. He placed both items in plastic evidence envelopes. We then took a closer look at the photograph. It was an aerial view of a small house. It was probably in a rural area but we couldn’t be sure because the shot was narrow, only giving us an overhead view of the house.

  “Anybody recognize the house?” Sloan asked, looking at Buck and the two other Catalina cops. There were head shakes all around. “Damn.”

  “The necklace,” I said, suddenly making the connection. “I think it’s the same one worn by the girl in Aster’s video.” Sloan got out his laptop and brought up the video. The necklace was made of small seashells, nothing fancy, but it appeared to be an exact match for the one worn by the girl.

  “I’ll get what we found over to the crime techies tonight,” Sloan said. �
�Unless there’s something else, let’s plan on meeting here first thing in the morning.”

  “We did get a lead on Brian Green,” Julie Spencer said before we left the office. “We think he’s staying with a cousin. We’ll go by the house first thing then come into the station.”

  When Buck and I got to the parking lot he said, “Oh hell.”

  I turned to him. “What’s the matter?”

  He put on his Stetson. “My truck’s in the shop. Forgot all about it.”

  “I’ll give you a lift.”

  “It’s not necessary. I’ll call…

  “It’s no problem.” I motioned to Mo’s sister’s car that I was still driving. “Come on.”

  He hesitated then agreed. I had the feeling that for some reason he didn’t want me to see where he lived, or maybe who he was living with him. One way or another, I decided that I needed to know more about him.

  We left the city and drove north, Bernie drinking in a stream of salty air from the open back window. The area we drove through was open fields and grasslands, with no structures. We talked about our case, me taking a moment to summarize what we knew.

  “So there’s a secret organization on the island called the Blue Hoods. From what we know it goes back over a decade. Harvey Brill and probably Clay Aster were part of the group. They worked with others, kidnapping, sexually assaulting, and maybe killing the girls they took.

  “One of the girls, Carly Lucia, got lucky. Brill took her home as his personal sex slave and later got her a job working for him and Aster. Lucia and Brill continued their relationship off and on over the years, with Brill abusing her.”

  Buck took it from there. “We know that Brill continued to be involved with the Blue Hoods, maybe not directly, but he hired Derek Shaw and another unknown party to kidnap girls for somebody else. Apparently, whoever is involved had some kind of falling out with both attorneys. Aster ends up getting shot in court and Brill is tortured and murdered in his own home.”

  “They must have really pissed somebody off.”

  “Or, maybe it was just a matter of Aster and Brill knowing too much about who was involved in the organization. Aster knew somebody was out to get him and took precautions, even though they were too little, too late.”