Long, Lean, and Lethal

by Heather Graham

For a moment she forgot the scene. His lips broke from hers. She felt them slightly swollen and very damp.

  “I … I … know nothing.”

  “Maybe it’s better if we keep it that way,” he said harshly.

  “You act as if there are things I shouldn’t know about you.”

  “Maybe there are.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like my name.”

  She drew away from him. “What do you mean? What is your name? Do I know it?”

  “Too well. Far, far too well.”

  There was dead silence in the room. The cameras kept rolling and rolling. Staring at Jennifer, Conar began to grin. She smiled in return, and at last turned to Jim.

  “Aren’t you supposed to call ‘cut!’?”

  “What? Oh! Cut, cut, yes, cut!”

  “Did we get it right in one take?” she asked.

  “Enough passion for you?” Conar asked.

  “Wise-asses. Just what a director needs—a cast full of wise-asses.”

  Conar was all business then, reaching for his robe, rising. “Miss Connolly and I couldn’t possibly flub a scene today, Jim. We’ve an appointment this afternoon. Ten minutes enough time, Jen?”

  “Absolutely,” she agreed.

  She was out of makeup and dressed in a mere eight minutes, but Conar was already dressed and ready and waiting outside her dressing room door.

  He grinned at her. “Jim had no idea that you had decided I wasn’t entirely repulsive. He thinks you’re the best actress in the world.”

  “Maybe I am,” she said.

  He watched her for a moment. “Maybe you are,” he agreed softly. “Shall we? We may be a little early, but that’s better than late.”

  “I’m absolutely ready. But don’t go thinking that because I’ve decided you’re not entirely repulsive that I’m going to agree about surgery for my mother.”

  “We’ll see what the doctor has to say.”

  “From every angle.”

  “From every angle.”

  He wasn’t such a great actor, Andy thought ruefully. He really was sick. And he wasn’t going to be able to hold it.

  He crawled out of the car, glad to see that he was by a weed-infested vacant lot, being used illegally as a dump. There was a half-broken picket fence in front of some wire mesh. He leaned on it and was sick.

  He held still for a few minutes, closing his eyes.

  Amazing. He felt so much better. But what had caused it? He hadn’t really had any kind of wild night, he sure as hell hadn’t gotten lucky.

  Nerves. Idiot nerves. He’d known Joe forever. Joe wasn’t trying to conceal some awful crime.

  He thought he was going to be sick again. Bile rose in his throat. He heaved and instinctively swallowed, heaved and swallowed again. Time to get the police.

  And tell them what?

  His best friend had apparently murdered a woman?

  He was losing it.

  From every angle! Jennifer thought.

  She, Conar, and her mother sat in the office of Dr. Theobald Dessinger. He had a model of the human brain, and he took it apart. He explained neurons and what science knew about the function of the brain. He had shown them a tape. He had explained the progression of the disease—and he had talked about what surgery could accomplish. He was so thorough that, although Jennifer had always considered herself to be a reasonably intelligent human being, she had no idea of what he had actually said by the time he had finished. He talked about the changed lives of patients who had survived the surgery, and he admitted that not all patients survived. Conar pointed out that younger patients had a better chance with the surgery, and that in this instance Abby was considered a younger patient. Jennifer pointed out the fact that her mother had a weak heart, and the doctor again admitted that certain patients weren’t meant for surgery. In the end, he pointed out the fact that each human being saw life, and the quality of life, differently, and in the end, it was the patient who had to make the decision.

  As they drove home Jennifer and Conar were still arguing. Abby at last interrupted them. “You’ve quite exhausted me. May I get home and to my own bed before you continue speaking about me as if I were not present?”

  “Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry,” Jennifer exclaimed. She and Conar were in the front, Abby in the back. She turned around, but Abby refused to look at her. She was staring out the window.

  They returned to the house. Edgar was there ready to greet them, ready to help Abby to her room when she announced that she was exhausted. And that she wanted to be alone.

  Conar went into the den. Jennifer couldn’t help but follow him.

  “Conar, she could die.”

  He swung around on her. “Jennifer, she doesn’t feel that she’s really living.”

  “Well, of course, her life is different.”

  “Different? It sucks! She was a brilliant actress.”

  “She’s still a brilliant actress.”

  “Jennifer, she shakes. She can maintain a normal mode of behavior for about half an hour on a truckload of medication. She won’t always be eligible for the surgery.”

  “It could take her life.”

  “It could give her a real life back.”

  Jennifer swung around and started out of the house. She knew that her mother was upset with her. She couldn’t help but feel that it was partly Conar’s fault. He was supporting Abby. Neither of them seemed to realize what a risk they would be taking.

  She had used her clicker to open the lock on her car door when she realized that he was behind her. He reached around her to open the driver’s side.

  “I’ll drive,” he said.

  “It’s my car.”

  “But you’re upset.”

  “Right. And I’m trying to get away from you.”

  “You’re not going to get away from me. I’m here to look after you, remember?”

  She didn’t answer. But she knew him well enough to know that she wasn’t leaving without him. Abby had brought him in as a guard dog. There was no way he would fail in his duty to Abby.

  “Fine. Drive.”

  She strode around to the passenger’s seat, jerked open the door, sat, slammed it. A second later, her car revved into gear.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Away from the house—and you.”

  “On the first I can oblige,” he murmured. They were both silent. Jennifer rolled down her window. The air rushed in. He drove fast, taking the curves with an expertise born of long experience. After a while, she realized that they had come to Sunset Boulevard. He pulled down a side street and parked the car. They were in an area of hotels, bars, and clubs. She stared at him blankly.

  “It’s late. I thought we’d get something to eat.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Then you can watch me eat.”

  He got out of the car and walked around to open her door. She stepped out and started ahead of him down the street.

  The sun had almost set. Deep red shadows were forming over the landscape. She wasn’t paying attention where she walked, as long as she was ahead of him. That’s why she almost tripped over a whiskey-sodden bum lying in the street. He stirred himself enough to ask for a handout.

  “Got a twenty, lady?”

  “A twenty?” The request startled her so much that she stood still, staring at the man. He had all his limbs, and he didn’t appear to be too thin. He grinned at her. He had all of his teeth. They were heavily tobacco-stained and contained little pieces of whatever his last meal had been as well.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be asking if I’ve got any spare change?”

  “Inflation, lady. But I’ll take change, too.”

  Conar was right behind her. He dropped a five on the guy. “Use it for food—no more booze, you hear?”

  “Oh, yeah. Sure.”

  “Yeah, sure.” He grabbed Jennifer’s arm and hurried her on past the bum. She wrenched her arm free.

  “You are a fool. No wonder your m
other called me out here.”

  “I was in no danger from the bum.”

  “How the hell do you know? There are lights and businesses to the left of us—dark empty lots to the right. Which way do you go? To the right!”

  “Conar, I’m not really thinking about bums or directions, light or dark. What you’re planning is insane.”

  “I’m not planning anything.”

  “You’re agreeing to idiocy. And … you’re going to kill my mother,” she said, wrenching free from his touch and spinning on him.

  “Are you thinking about your mother—or yourself?”

  His eyes seemed very dark in the shadows, deep, riveting pits that seemed to fill his face. His jawbone was set and hard; he seemed almost a stranger.

  “What do you mean by that? I’m thinking about my mother.”

  “Your mother, who is proud, dignified, talented, intelligent, able, compassionate, giving, and a million other things.”

  “Yes—which is why she should live a nice long life!”

  “She has a chance at a nice long life with quality!”

  “Who makes the decision on what gives life quality?” Jennifer demanded. “You?”

  If possible, his jawbone clicked harder. “No, not me. Each person individually. Abby sang like a nightingale, danced like Ginger Rogers, and was possibly one of the best actresses of her generation.”

  “She’s a person first, my mother first—”

  He gripped her by the shoulders. “Do you want her to live for her—or you?”

  Jennifer wrenched free from him and started walking down the street again.

  “Jennifer!”

  “Leave me alone.”

  “The hell I will.”

  “I’m not running away from you, I just need some space.”

  “You want space, you got space!” he snapped angrily. “Just quit walking off blindly like an idiot.”

  She had gotten some distance from him. She turned back and lifted her arms. “I’m walking toward the lights and—”

  She broke off. A car was going by them, beaming headlights into the slope of the empty lot at her side.

  Despite the NO DUMPING signs on the property, it had been used as a trash heap. There was a discarded refrigerator halfway down the slope, clearly defined by the sudden glow of headlights. There were broken chairs tossed into the lot, and tons and tons of Coke bottles, beer cans, and candy wrappers. There was a discarded coat lying in a pile of overgrown grass, next to a torn bag that had once contained “the world’s best rippled potato chips.”

  Something about the coat gave her pause.

  “Conar?”

  “I’m right behind you.”

  Another car drove by. Another set of headlights, another beam on the coat.

  “Conar!”

  “Jennifer, what the hell are you doing?”

  She had already cut into the lot, not thinking of any personal danger. The headlights had revealed that the coat was not empty.

  “Conar, hurry.”

  “Jennifer, what the hell are you doing? Where are you going?”

  “Conar, there’s someone …”

  “Jennifer, damn it, stop!”

  He came up behind her fast. But she reached the coat before he did.

  “It’s a woman,” she called back, knowing that he had nearly reached her.

  “She’s probably wigged out, like the last bum you decided to befriend.”

  “Hey, she might need help.”

  “This isn’t a good time to start making friendships with bums in vacant lots.”

  She reached down, thinking that the woman beneath the coat might indeed be wigged out, too messed up on something to help herself. She might be hurt, or she might have passed out.

  She drew the coat back and screamed.

  And screamed and screamed.

  Chapter 12

  THE WOMAN HAD BEEN strangled to death with a necktie.

  The necktie remained garrotted around her.

  Her nude body had been hidden by the coat until the breeze, growing brisk at sunset, lifted the fabric, exposing enough flesh so that Jennifer had recognized that a body lay beneath.

  Jennifer had never been in such a situation before: No role she had ever taken had prepared her for the reality of finding a murder victim. The ghastly color of the flesh. The way the lips had swollen, the way the tongue protruded.

  The way that the eyes of the dead woman still seemed to stare at her.

  She hadn’t wanted to think, realize, or see.

  For once in her life, she had been glad for Conar to take control. She was grateful, still in shock. She had let him lead her away, to the closest business establishment.

  It was an upscale adult entertainment club. People clad in nothing but G-strings and nipple rings helped and consoled her, and she didn’t even notice anything out of the ordinary. A woman with monstrous breasts, who later confided in her that she’d had a sex change, gave her a large snifter of brandy and wrapped a boa around her for warmth as Conar took the police to the victim. Then he sat by her, arm around her, as they questioned her and she gave all the answers she could. Not many. She’d seen a coat in a vacant lot, over a form. She’d just stepped over a bum. She’s assumed it was another. The police went to look for the first bum, hoping he might have seen someone. He hadn’t. The night was filled with sirens. The medical examiner arrived. The cop who had arrived first continued to quiz her as to why she thought there would be a body in a vacant lot. She explained for what felt like the millionth time that she hadn’t expected to find a body in a lot. She had just seen the form and thought that it was a woman who might need help. How had she known it was a woman? Something about the shape. When had she realized there was a body there? Why was she walking down the street?

  Conar did not escape the same questioning. Why was he there, when did he realize there was a body in the lot, why had he decided to pull off the road right there?

  She heard all the questions. At last she roused herself from her state of shivering shock to get up and scream. “You idiots! We’re the ones who found the body, not the ones who put it there!”

  Conar, about to answer a question, paused, a brow arched, a look of amusement in his eyes. A few minutes later, Liam arrived on the scene, and the pressure was eased off of both of them. A while later he came over.

  “The behavioral guy is saying that these killings are very different—a stabbing and a strangulation. There may be no association whatever.”

  Liam looked at Jennifer, frowning. “I’m sorry you were the one who found her, Jennifer. In any case, we don’t need you two anymore. Conar, you might want to take Jennifer on home.”

  “Definitely,” Conar said. Standing, he drew Jennifer up with him. He had started for the door when he muttered, “Shit!”

  “What?”

  “The press is here.”

  “Maybe there’s a back way out.”

  “Maybe. Why don’t you ask your friend, the bosomy blonde? You can return the boa while you’re at it.”

  Jennifer and Conar made a neat turn, heading for the rear of the establishment. The blonde smiled at them both. “Lap dance, honey?” she asked Conar.

  “You think you can sneak us out the back?” Conar asked her.

  “Sure thing.”

  The blonde walked them around the stage, where an exotic dancer with a ball python around her neck was getting erotic with a pole. She led them through a dressing room filled with naked women sitting in front of mirrors.

  “I can see why you don’t want to meet the press!” the blonde said. “You two are going to be headlines tomorrow. This isn’t a publicity stunt, is it?”

  “God, no!” Jennifer said, horrified.

  “This isn’t the kind of publicity we want,” Conar told her.

  She looked him up and down. “You are a good-looking hunk. You’re the kind of man I became a woman for. But I like soaps—watch ’em all the time.” When Conar didn’t react at all, she said,
“Anyway, that dead girl out there is not one of ours.”

  “You’re certain of that?” Conar asked.

  “The owner went out with the cops—naturally. She was found naked and this is an adult club and strippers do have to be careful about what kind of freaks they get to know. But the girl wasn’t a stripper. Not here, at least. Her face didn’t look too good, but Arnie—he’s the owner—he would have known if she was one of ours.”

  “I wonder who she was,” Jennifer said.

  “An actress.”

  “How do you know?” Conar asked sharply.

  The blonde grinned. “Hell, honey, this is Hollywood. Everybody is an actress out here. Every waiter, waitress, bellhop, and cabdriver.”

  “Not everyone,” Conar said. “There is a real world out here, too.”

  “Somewhere out here. Maybe,” the blonde agreed with a vague shrug. “Well, there’s the back door. Get going before those nosy newshounds figure it out, too.”

  Jennifer returned the boa with thanks, then they fled.

  Edgar was stunned by the news. He’d been up, waiting for them, and brewed tea while he listened to them tell about finding the body and talking to the police. He kept shaking his head, assuring them that Abby was well when Jennifer paused to ask about her mother. “She heard nothing on the late news tonight, Miss Jen. I know that. She’s been sound asleep now for several hours. I saw to it that she had some sleep medication this evening,” he told them. “She had such a full and restless day herself. That long doctor’s appointment. And then, after you left, Mr. Parker came by. He and Miss Abby talked for ages, even though she was shaking, and losing her breath. Then that big-shot director showed up.”

  “Do you mean Jim Novac from my set?” Jennifer asked, sipping the chamomile tea he had brewed.

  “No, I mean that slasher big shot.” Edgar made a face. His opinion of Hugh Tanenbaum’s movies was quite obvious.

  “What did he come here for?” Jennifer asked, tensing.

  “I don’t know. I wasn’t in on the conversation.”

  “But, Edgar, you shouldn’t have let him in.”

  “I work for Miss Abby,” Edgar said.

  “Yes, but you know that she isn’t always in her right mind! Edgar, you have to look out for her when I’m not here.”

  “Jennifer! He’s right. If your mother chooses to see people, there’s little that Edgar can do.”