Private: #1 Suspect (9 page)

SEVEN YEARS AGO, after I returned from the war, I went into therapy, saw an excellent guy, Josh Moskowitz, who specialized in vets like me. That is, ex-military who’d gone through bloody hell and weren’t adjusting too well back home.

Like many of us, I had night terrors.

I kept hearing those boys in the bombed-out rear section of the CH-46, screaming as the helicopter went up in flames.

Dr. Moskowitz had an office in Santa Monica, a little office in a tall building on Fifteenth Street. I didn’t know it then, but Dr. Justine Smith worked in the same building.

I ran into her in the elevator one night, was thunderstruck in a way that you can’t explain by describing hair and eyes and curves. I rode up ten floors just staring at her before I realized that the elevator wasn’t going down.

She’d laughed at me, or maybe she just enjoyed seeing me go from zero to smitten in sixty seconds. Next time I saw her, I held the elevator door open, told her my name, and asked her to have dinner with me.

She said okay.

It was as if she’d cupped her hands around my heart.

Justine was a couple years younger than I was and maybe a decade wiser. Beautiful. Smart. Worked in a mental hospital most of the week, had a private practice and saw a handful of patients on Mondays and Wednesdays.

We had dinner together at a little Italian place out at Hermosa Beach, and I talked through it all. I told her more about myself over that one dinner than I’d told her since. I sensed she was a safe person, trustworthy, accepting, and she must have thought I was the kind of person who could open up.

Later she said that I was like a clam. With a rubber band around my shell. I laughed it off, said that she’d now met my real self when not in crisis. By the time we had that conversation, we were already in love.

Now Justine sat in a leather chair, swiveling gently from side to side. I came around the table and sat down next to her. Her face looked stiff.

She was so angry at me.

“I have a job offer,” she said. “A good one.”

“That didn’t take long.”

“I’ll complete my cases, including the new one if it’s a go. I didn’t give an answer yet, but that’s just negotiation. I’ll probably take the job.”

“I know this is a long shot, Justine, but imagine that I’m actually innocent here. Imagine that I never needed you more than I need you now.”

“Okay, Jack. Now you imagine that I just don’t care anymore.”

JUSTINE WAS AT the wheel of her midnight-blue Jaguar, Scotty in the passenger seat beside her. They turned off Melrose, passed under the arched gates of the Harlequin Pictures lot, and stopped at the guard booth.

Justine said to the guard, “Justine Smith to see Danny Whitman.”

The guard ran his finger down a list on his laptop, did a visual match between the picture on Justine’s driver’s license and her face. He said her name into a phone, then turned back to her and said, “Take a right, then left on Avenue P. Keep going until you see 231 on the corner of Eleventh.” He waved her through.

Scotty said, “I’ve seen everything Danny Whitman has ever made. I saw his first film,
Badger.
Played the kid with the wild dogs? I knew he was going to take off.”

Justine flashed him a smile, slowed for a speed bump, took a left at the second intersection, and headed down a street lined by soundstages and two- and three-story white stucco buildings once used as studio homes for writers and actors, now mainly production and administration offices.

Her mind ranged as she drove, thinking about Jack, about Jack with Colleen, about how she was sure he’d lied about what had happened at lunch with Colleen. Justine also thought about the job she’d been offered, which wouldn’t be as good as the one she had now—except for one important detail. She wouldn’t be seeing Jack five days a week.

Scotty was looking at her. She recalled what he’d said. Excited about working with Danny Whitman.

“We don’t have a check yet, Scotty. But if we take the job, bet you ten bucks you’ll be happy when it’s over.”

She lifted the visor, downshifted, and said to Scotty, “He’s just starting this new film. Action-adventure, of course. The question is, will he get to finish it?”

“Shades of Green
,
”
said Scotty. “I read about it. Spies and counterspies in the twenty-first century.”

“Okay, I’m impressed,” Justine said. “You do your homework.”

Justine’s mind flicked over this assignment. She wished she hadn’t told Jack she would do it. It could drag on. And the one thing you could absolutely count on with movie stars, it was going to get messy.

Please, God. Let this one be the exception to the rule. Let this one be easy.

“Sorry?” she said to Scotty. He was speaking again.

“So you missed the meeting. Jack was talking about Colleen Molloy. People seemed to like her.”

“She was adorable,” Justine said. “What number is that?” Scanning the nearly identical white buildings.

“
Adorable.
Interesting word choice.”

“Genuine. Funny. Unaffected.”

“And you dated Jack too?”

“Boy, you’re quite the background checker,” Justine said. “There it is. On the corner. Now listen, Scotty, I don’t even know if we’re going to get this job, so just watch and listen.”

“I can do that.” He grinned. “But you didn’t answer my question.”

Justine braked the car at the curb, turned off the engine, and looked at the new guy on the team. He was young, regular features. Probably a little German, a little Brit, a little American Indian. Nice looking and kind of full of himself, but he was also curious and dogged. Good-natured too. He was going to be a fine addition to Private. As long as he stayed optimistic.

“Jack breaks hearts,” Justine said. “That’s what he does. I don’t even know if it’s his fault. Women want to fix Jack, and they think they can. I thought I could too.”

She reached into the backseat for her shiny leather handbag, opened it, and found a makeup kit in there. She took out her lipstick and a mirror, put fresh color on.

Scotty said, “So it is as Jack says. He was framed.”

“Jack is a lot of things, but he’s not a killer.”

Justine snapped her handbag closed and opened the car door. Scotty was saying, “But wasn’t he in the war? Wasn’t he a marine?”

SCOTTY STOOD BESIDE Justine as the door to the building marked 231 opened and a barefoot Johnny Depp look-alike introduced himself as Larry Schuster, Danny Whitman’s manager.

Justine shook Schuster’s hand and introduced Scotty. They stepped inside, the air smelling of pot, burned toast, and air-conditioner coolant.

Scotty looked around the spiffy modern office, hardwood floors, round chairs in bright colors, desktops off to one side of the room littered with fruit baskets, stacks of scripts, half-eaten breakfasts on trays, and opened gift bags with watches and other loot spilling out, cornucopias of excess.

On the walls were framed posters of Whitman’s four previous action films, every one of them a blockbuster.

A man of about forty came toward Scotty and Justine. He had a crumpled brow and graying hair. He wore a wrinkled blue linen shirt with a monogrammed pocket, the sleeves rolled up. “I’m Mervin Koulos,” he said. “MK Productions.”

Koulos was the man who was making
Shades of Green.

Justine handled the introductions, and they all took seats, the manager, the producer, Justine, and Scotty, in the squat chairs around a low table that made them all look like kids.

A girl came out and asked if anyone wanted anything. Schuster said, “Pass,” Koulos said, “Fiji, no ice.”

Justine said, “Coffee, please. Milk and sugar.”

Scotty took a pad and pen out of his pocket. “Okay if I take notes?” he asked, and everyone nodded yes.

Scotty understood that Schuster, the manager, was the hands-on guy responsible for the actor’s career, took 10 percent. The producer, Koulos, the scruffy older guy, had a big stake in whether or not the film got made. No wonder he looked worried. His star was in trouble.

Justine was explaining how Private worked, their methods, billing, et cetera, and what she proposed to do in this case. Both the manager and the producer agreed to “Whatever it takes to contain this thing.”

Everyone stood up. Schuster went to the back door and held it open, saying, “Dr. Smith, I think you should talk to the rest of the guys.”

SCOTTY WAS THE last one out the back door. He saw a basketball hoop high on a wall forming an angle with another building. The asphalt court still had lines on it showing where to park.

A basketball sailed across Scotty’s sight line and went into the basket. Someone yelled, “Yeah!”

It was a guy about five-ten, short brown hair, shirtless, barbed-wire tattoo around his right biceps. He was grinning, triumphant, and he looked about twenty-two.

Schuster said that the guy, now dribbling the ball, was Rory Kovaks, Danny’s school pal from Nebraska. They’d grown up together, Rory coming out to LA to keep Danny company.

Schuster pointed out Alan Barstow, Danny’s agent at CTM, a big talent agency with top, top clients. Barstow was in his thirties, medium height and thin.

Last, Schuster pointed out Randy Boone, assistant to Danny, and Kevin Rose, Danny’s fight coach, all members of the Whitman entourage.

Schuster called out, “Time out, people. We have guests.”

The ball swished into the net and bounced off the asphalt onto the grass, where the various players gathered around. Schuster told the four guys that Justine and Scotty were from Private and that they had been hired to do damage control.

Some stood, some sat on the ground as Schuster gave Justine the floor. Scotty hung around at the sidelines, just watching.

Justine said hello to everyone and introduced herself as a senior investigator at Private. “The tabloids are watching for anything that they can exploit,” she told them. “Katie Blackwell, the girl in question—well, her parents have probably also hired private investigators. They could be following Danny, and any of you who are associated with him, just to find a questionable moment they can blow up, leak to the tabs, and use to tar Danny’s character.

“It’s critical to Danny’s case that he, and really all of you, keep the party down until after his trial. That means no drugs, no drinking, and especially no girls.”

“Sure, and no eating with your mouth open, no bare feet when entering this establishment,” Kovaks said.

Rose, the fight coach, said, “Dr. Smith, no offense, but we don’t need a PI dogging us. Come on,” he said to Larry Schuster. “You can’t be serious.”

Scotty watched Justine, fingers interlaced in front of her, smiling. She said, “Mr. Rose, it’s all of you or none of you. If you can’t go along with us on the terms, we’ll leave in peace. No problem.”

Scotty saw the job going south. Not what he wanted at all.

He said to the whiners gathered around the ball court, “What’s going on here? Danny Whitman needs our help. He’s being tried for the rape of a fourteen-year-old girl, isn’t that right? You want to help him with that? Or are you goons just out to suck his blood?”

AFTER SCHUSTER CHILLED down the ensuing scuffle with a garden hose, after Justine said, “Scotty.
Watch
and
listen,
” Justine sat with Scotty and Danny Whitman in the music room on the third floor with its nice view of the Harlequin lot, one of the oldest film studios in Hollywood.

Danny was at the piano, plinking out “Lay Down Sally.”

Justine said to the movie star, “Tell us what happened, Danny.”

Danny sighed, came off the piano bench, fell into a cushy chair. Justine thought how much younger he looked than he did on the big screen. And he was bigger too, well proportioned, the famous dimple on one cheek, thick brown hair, could have been a high school ball player, although he was twenty-four.

She noted the number written in ballpoint pen on the cleft between thumb and forefinger of his right hand. Looked like a phone number.

Danny said, “This is going to sound idiotic, but I honestly don’t know what happened. We were at Alan Barstow’s house. My agent?”

Justine nodded. “I met Mr. Barstow.”

Danny said, “Alan was having a party. There were a lot of girls there. Dozens. I woke up in my own house in my own bedroom—alone. Next thing, before my alarm went off, the police are at the door. They say this…Katie Blackwell is lodging a complaint against me.”

“You say her name like you didn’t know her,” Scotty said.

“I know who she
is,
” said Danny. “I’ve seen her around, but that’s all. I didn’t date her. I sure don’t know her age. I can’t even say she was at Alan’s that night, except that my boys saw her hanging on to me.”

“And Katie’s story is what?” Justine asked.

“She says we left the party together, that I made her have sex with me in my car, and that I dropped her off at her front door. You should see my car. Sex in that thing is physically impossible. But she has a girlfriend who says she saw us drive off together. Otherwise it would be strictly he-said, she-said.”

“Did Katie go to the hospital?”

“No. In her deposition she said she was embarrassed, took a shower, didn’t say anything to her parents until the next morning, then they called the police.

“Here’s the thing,” Whitman went on. “I was so stoned that night. If I did it, I deserve to be punished. But I really don’t think I had sex with that girl. I’m pretty sure I would have remembered.”

Justine said, “Pretty sure?”

“It’s all very sketchy. I just remember laughing. Falling down. Girls pawing me. That’s it. And none of my boys saw me leaving with Katie.”

“She could’ve been lying to get out of trouble,” Justine said. “If she was out late, that sort of thing.”

The star pulled on his lower lip, looking to Justine as if he was searching his memory, not making up a story.

Then again, Whitman was an actor.

“Dr. Smith, I might as well tell you, this wasn’t the first time I lost track of myself. My life’s kinda unreal, you know? I was just a kid when I came out here. A normal kid. Here there’s too much of everything and my time isn’t my own. Half the time it feels like someone else is running my life and I have no control over what happens to me.”

Justine said, “All I want to do is help you so that things don’t get worse, so that you can get through your trial without any more bad press. Do you want me to advise you?”

“Yes. Hell, yes. Tell me what you want me to do.”

Justine thought,
Oh, crap
. Danny was likable and now she was responsible for keeping him clean and celibate so he could make the hundred-million-dollar blockbuster.

She handed Whitman two cards, saying, “Here’s how to reach me and Scotty. It’s really simple. Don’t go out with girls at all. That way there will be no pictures, no headlines. Don’t spend the night out with anyone. Go to work, go home alone, keep your phone on, and stay in touch with us.”

“Done deal.”

“Whose number is on your hand?” Justine asked.

“I don’t know. This is what I’m talking about. Look. It’s gone,” Whitman said, spitting on his hand, wiping it against the leg of his jeans.

“Okay,” Justine said. “Starting now, pretend you’re a monk. And we’ll dig up what we can on Katie Blackwell.”