The Last Deep Breath (7 page)

Pax let his silence talk for him, the same way Grey often did, the way they’d been taught to do as kids.

Finally Pax took a breath and said, “You’ve been busy.”

“Running in circles mostly.”

“It’s not easy finding someone who doesn’t want to be found.  What’s your next move?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Ellie could be dead, you know.  From the knife wound in New York.  You never did check the morgue or the hospitals or the police.  That should’ve been your first stop.  Maybe this Johnny tried to ice her again.”

“She’s not dead,” Grey said.

“She could be,” Pax insisted.  “She could’ve died twenty steps outside your front door and you wouldn’t have known it.  If it’s true, and she is dead, are you going to be able to handle it?”

The question offended Grey.  He wet his lips and his mouth worked for a moment before he found his voice.  “You just keep blowing up insurgents, right?  Leave family matters to me.”

18

He drove back to Judy the casting agent’s place.  She was auditioning two actors that Grey recognized from a couple of indie films he’d really enjoyed.  They were doing a comedy scene about two guys on the road with a stolen gorilla being hunted by neo-Nazis and a pre-op tranny CIA agent.  They played to the little tripod camera, screamed and ran around the little area like the gorilla or the chick with a dick was after them.  Grey sat in the corner again thinking, Jesus, what these poor fuckers have to do to make a buck.

They finished up and walked past him without a word, their heads hanging.

Judy bustled up and said, “I’m glad you came back.  I wanted to offer you the part of the hit man in
Killing Time
.”

Grey said, “What?  I’m not even an actor.”

“You’re a natural.  I’ve interviewed more than a dozen men for that role and you were by far the most authentic and appealing.  We want you for it.”

“Who’s we?”

“All of us.”  She gestured to the empty room like it was full of people.  “I showed the digital video to our director and writer and they loved you as well.  You won’t even need to do a call-back.”

Grey took a step away, drew his chin in like he was in a fight with enemies all around.  “No, no, that’s not what this is about.  Listen, have you ever heard of a manager named John Raymond?”

She waved her hands in the air again, doing the nail thing.  “Tell me he’s not repping you!”

“No, he’s not, I’m not an actor, but I need to get in touch with him.”

“Who is representing you?”

“No one.  Listen, I—”

“I know just the person.  Kendra’s agent.  Monty Stobbs.  Have you met him yet?”

“I have, but Monty, he’s—”

“I think you two will work magnificently together.”

Nobody in this town ever heard a damn word you said.

“Look, about John Raymond—”

“He’s a bottom feeder.  Small time with aspirations.  He doesn’t protect his clients; he uses and wastes them.”

“He’s here in L.A.?”

“He has offices here and in New York, from what I recall, but please, if this film means anything to you, don’t bring him on board.”

The film didn’t mean anything to him but he wasn’t getting anywhere this way.  “I won’t, I promise. 
Killing Time
is far too important.”

“It is, it truly is!”

“But I need to talk to him.  He’s been trying to lure Kendra away from Monty with promises of television work in New York.”

“That bastard will ruin her!”

“I think so too,” Grey agreed.  “So I need to see him face to face in order to...dissuade him.”

 Grinning, Judy got that look in her eye, the one that said she knew he was capable of great violence and wanted him to stay the course.  “I’ll get his address for you.”

She vanished into her small office and Grey stood there wondering where Ellie was right at that second, and if she had any idea at all what he was willing to do to find her.

Judy returned with a Post-it note scribbled with John Raymond’s L.A. address and phone number.

“Nothing for New York?” Grey asked.

“No.”  She touched his wrist with a little extra something, rubbed the back of his hand.  “I can’t wait to work with you.”

Her wedding ring was a wide band of gold with deep-set diamonds.  She backed up toward the wall where he and Kendra had pawed each other.  The fire in her eyes filled the rest of her face.  A bead of sweat dripped down her cleavage.  He smiled and thanked her, thought of her husband, wished the poor fucker well, and walked out.

19

He called the number but got no answer and no voice mail.  He had to stop into three gas stations to get the directions down to Raymond’s office.  He was in a shit part of town but Grey liked the liveliness of it.  A lot of people out on the street, gangs of punks yelling and fucking around, drunks laughing, homeless pushing carts.  Raymond’s office was in the middle of the block bookended by a pawn shop and a liquor store.  He imagined how tenuous Ellie’s grasp on the world must’ve been for her to believe Raymond could do anything for her besides put her to work on the street.

The lettering on the front window read STARMAKERS INC.  The lights were out, the door was locked, and there was a sign glued to the glass saying the building was for lease.  He put his face up to the window and saw that there was still a desk, chair, some photos on the wall, phones, and a computer inside.

Grey called the leasing company’s number and said that he was considering renting the property but he wanted to know more about STARMAKERS INC.  They told him that the owner, John Raymond, hadn’t paid his rent in over three months and they were planning on putting his belongings in storage and selling them off at auction to help defer costs.  Grey said he couldn’t think of leasing the office until the matter had been completely resolved and maybe he could help facilitate the process if they gave him John Raymond’s contact information.

They said that as a matter of course they couldn’t give it out, but since these were somewhat special circumstances they would.  They gave him a New York number and an address in East Village that he realized was about three blocks from Premium Friends.  He’d been close but not close enough.

Grey phoned and got no answer, no voice mail.  He walked to the street, opened the trunk of the Chevelle, and rummaged through the tools that he’d stolen from Bo.  He grabbed the hammer, wrapped it in an old shammy cloth, stepped back up and smashed in the glass door of STARMAKERS INC.

He went through the drawers of the desk looking for anything that might have information on Ellie or Eva Rains.  He found a couple of DVD’s, including
Teen Ball Busters 2
, and some nude shots of her.  On the back of the photos were her measurements, her sexual likes and dislikes, and Monty Stobbs’ address, which had been crossed out and poorly replaced with a stamp of the STARMAKERS INC. logo and phone number.

For a moment the edges of his vision turned black and red and he didn’t know why.  It took him a second to realize that he’d been holding his breath.  He didn’t know for how long.  He took the least offensive photo of Ellie, climbed back into the car, and hurtled toward east Hollywood.

When he got back to the apartment Kendra was sitting naked on the bed, sipping from a champagne glass, a bottle on ice.  She was looking through the paper for moving companies and had already started to box up some of her belongings.

She filled another glass and handed it to him.  “So, I got us a new place.  Judy called me.  I hear you’re my co-star.”

He gulped the champagne down.  “I’m not a co-star.  I’m not doing it.”

“Why not?”

He snorted.  “Jesus Christ, you people.  I’m not an actor.”

“Who cares about that?  You’ve got better instincts than at least half the schleps I’ve worked with over the years.  The payday is a big one.  There’s already a buzz building.  You were right, the writer’s been getting a lot of publicity again.  He’s being hailed as a hero.  Interviewed on all the major talk shows.  They might overturn his brother’s conviction. 
Killing Time
is going to be a big release.”

“None of it means anything to me.”

“None of it means anything to anybody.  It’s just what we do.”

“It’s not what I do.”

“Not yet maybe, but why not play along until something better comes around?”

He imagined the next phone call with Pax, telling him about being in a movie, and that Grey was doing better than the guys playing opposite the gorilla.

“We have a new agent, by the way,” she said.

He didn’t ask who.  “I’m leaving.”

“When?”

“Now.”

“Where?”

“New York.”

“I’ll go with you. 
Killing Time
starts in six weeks.  You can show me the lay of the land before we start.  I need to work on my east coast accent.”

“I’m not starting anything.  And I need to go alone.”

“Why?”

“I’m going to find John Raymond.”

“You’re still on that?”

He turned and she put her hand on his belly and started rubbing him the way she might try to calm a wired puppy.  He wondered why she thought that he would stop looking for Ellie just because this dumb-ass film fell in his lap.  Did she sincerely believe that once he had some cash he could set the search for his sister aside?  That all he needed was something shiny flashed in front of his nose to make him forget the knife sticking out of Ellie’s side, the blood on her teeth, the tracks, the hardness?  These people, didn’t they hold anyone or anything sacred?

The women out in the desert, the dust in the hollows of their cheeks, the careless way they smeared their lipstick on, the way their shoulders bowed beneath the burdens of their loneliness and failed dreams.  It wasn’t only L.A.  He thought of the savagery in their kisses and the way they pleaded with him to commit murder.  Everyone had a scheme.  Everyone had a plan. They all wanted a dupe.  At least Monty had manned up at the end and taken responsibility.

“What is it?” Kendra said.  “What’s this expression on your face?”

“Nothing.”

He drank directly from the bottle and finished about half the champagne.  Then he packed his few bags, put them by the door.

“You’ll need money,” she said.  She took the dowel off the corner post of the bed and he saw that inside there was a niche deep enough to hold a wad of cash. At least it proved she didn’t trust him enough to keep her money lying around.  She pulled it out and counted off five thousand.  “Here, you deserve it.  You picked the script.  You won me the audition.  You made it happen.  Besides, Monty won’t be getting a cut in prison.”

“I can’t take it,” he said.

“Call it a loan.  Until you get your check from the company.”

“I’m not doing the movie.”

“I think you will when the time comes.”  She stuffed the roll of bills in his hand.  “Who knows, maybe you really will find your sister in the next six weeks.  Maybe you can even help her get a bit part in the film.  Isn’t that better than doing damage?”

He thought, No.

20

 After twenty hours on the road Grey started to see double.  He pulled over and got a room at a highway motel outside of Oklahoma City.  Tired as he was he couldn’t fall asleep, so he spent a couple of hours flipping through the cable stations.  He half-expected to find one of Kendra’s movies but there weren’t any playing.  He checked the adult entertainment channels and saw he could order an Eva Rains and Harvey Wallbanger film for $19.99.  He drew out Ellie’s photo and stared at it, thinking again about how he’d let her go and hadn’t done enough to protect her.  He dropped off with the sun still shining and had fitful dreams about Pax beating hell out of old man Wagner, neo-Nazis and monkeys, Monty’s wife’s brains running like undercooked eggs thrown against a wall.  He saw himself at the premiere to
Killing Time
, standing on a red carpet, wearing a tux and smiling and waving to screaming fans.  Except they weren’t fans at all, they were just people in pain who couldn’t stop shrieking.  And it wasn’t a red carpet at all, it was white and growing more and more stained with lapping blood.  Grey kept grinning and waving.

21

 With only six hours sleep in three days, having covered 2700 miles, Grey crawled through the mid-day traffic of the Holland Tunnel, crossed into Manhattan and made his way to the Village.  He parked on the street half a block down from STARMAKERS INC.

The New York office looked very much like the L.A. one, stationed between a liquor store and a vintage clothing shop.  The same kind of “For Lease” sticker was glued to the glass.  Grey stuck his nose up to the window and saw a figure go by and a light snap off.

The door was locked.  Grey knocked and the figure in the shadows ignored him.  He banged harder and the figure gestured for him to leave.

Grey took the shammy-wrapped hammer out of his jacket pocket and smashed the glass in.

Turned out not to be John Raymond but a girl of about twenty-two who was cleaning out a desk.  She looked so much like Ellie that his stomach dropped and he took two quick steps toward her, arms wide as if going in for a hug.  He realized his mistake just in time and stopped short, his heels squeaking on the dirty tile floor.

She backed off into a corner and spoke quietly, calmly, like she was talking to an escaped mental patient.  “Okay, okay, I suppose I should have opened the door.  But now you’re here, so, right...how may I help you?”

He hit the light switch on the wall.  Now that he could see her clearly she didn’t look much like Ellie at all.  Her face was rounder, eyes bright with a swirl of fear and maybe even droll mischief in them.  There was a small space between her front teeth that gave her a little girl appearance.  Her hair was a dirtier blonde, longer and more curly.  How could he have mistaken her for Ellie?

“I’m sorry,” he said.  “I thought you were someone else.  I’m looking for John Raymond.”

“You thought I looked like that fat bastard?”

“No, I—”

“Let me guess, you’re another satisfied client, yeah?”