One of Us (38 page)

As soon as I could see the dashboard properly, I pulled the disk from the machine and threw it out the window. I turned the ignition, put my foot down, and left at the speed of sound.

THEY DIDN'T WANT to let me on the lot. No, they surely didn't. At first they tried to deny the movie was even being shot there, but I trusted Melk's information and stuck to my guns. Finally they admitted it, but insisted I still wasn't allowed in. Three big security guys explained this to me in no uncertain terms, and our discourse took on a rather depressing circularity.

In the end I just gave them the message again and powered the car windows up, making it clear I was going to sit there with my arms folded, blocking the way, until either the cops arrived or the guards did what I asked.

One of the guards went into the booth and got on the phone. There was a hiatus while he had a conversation involving a good deal of gesticulating, during which the other two guards took the opportunity to glare malevolently at me through the windshield.

Eventually the booth guy came out, and indicated for me to roll down my window.

"So?" I said.

"Mr. Jamison will see you, sir," he replied. You could see the pain in his eyes. "Just follow the road around there to the left and have a nice fucking day."

"Cool," I said. "Thanks for working with me on this. Oh, and if you ever want to get a reservation at E. Coli, just mention my name."

His face brightened. "They know you there?"

"I should think so," I said. "I left without paying last time."

I pulled away and drove down the path at significantly higher than the requested speed, past little huts full of busy creatives, including the offices of Mary Jane, the current last word in virtual film stars. Melk once got a job escorting her to a party, which basically involves walking around carrying a workstation and monitor on which her face and responses are projected in real time, worked by a small team of animators and scriptwriters who hide in the John with remotes. Melk's back still gives him grief every now and then, but I think he regards it as the highlight of his career.

I saw Jamison strolling down the path toward me, and pulled over into a parking space at the side of the cafeteria, thus probably leap-frogging about seventy grades of hierarchy and starting a small status war. The outside seating area was empty. Jamison sat at a table and waited patiently until I joined him. His face was lightly made up, his hair gorgeously silver, and he was wearing a sober suit.

"Good morning, Mr. President," I said. "Sorry to yank you out like this."

"Hello, Mr. Thompson. I thought I wasn't going to be seeing you again."

I sat down. "Don't worry. I haven't come for the blackmail money."

"I assumed not. Is there going to be trouble of some kind?"

"I'm afraid so. You haven't heard anything more about the blackmail?" He shook his head. "You're going to. The guy who was running Hammond is picking up the reins, and this is a man who doesn't give up. One of his sidekicks has already contacted some of the other victims. Can I ask you a question?"

"You may."

"Did you ever make illegal use of an organization called REMtemps? For temporary memory dumps?"

Jamison looked glum. "I assume that question is rhetorical. You seem to know a great deal about me, as usual."

"No," I said. "It was just guesswork, but it's nice to have it confirmed. Now—the situation is this. The cops know about the extortion scam, and have loose surveillance on all the victims. This means that the blackmailers—who, incidentally, are working for Stratten, the guy who runs REMtemps—are going to have to step lightly until he works out a deal with some high brass so he can return to business as usual."

"I hadn't noticed anyone keeping an eye on me."

"That's because I didn't let on to the cops that you were involved."

"Thank you," he said. "What can I do in return?"

"I want to fuck Stratten over, for personal reasons and because the lives of two of my friends—including the woman who came with me to visit you—seem to depend on it. You know that unless this racket is killed dead, you're always going to have to watch your back. So I'm asking for your help. I want to set up a meeting between you and Stratten's right-hand guy."

"But how can you do that?"

"I've got something on a bottom-feeder in Stratten's operation. Or at least he thinks I have. I can get him to call his boss and tell him two things: one, you're not under surveillance, and two, that you're refusing to pay up. It's very likely that Stratten will send a man called Quat around to work you over. I'm going to be there waiting for him, with another friend of mine, and we're going to make this guy extremely unhappy. He's going to be ready to turn anyway, because he's a Net-head and I've just nuked his Web site with a supervirus that will look like it came from REMtemps."

"What do you need me to do?"

"I need you to be there. Quat may call ahead, and he needs to hear your voice. Once we know he's on his way over, you can—and should—make yourself scarce."

Jamison nodded briskly. "Of course I'll help. Call the studio at any time, and ask for extension 2231. My assistant will put you through to me immediately. When do you want this meeting to take place?"

"It's got to happen tonight."

We stood up together, and he shook my hand. "Thanks," I said. "And I hope I haven't caused you any embarrassment on the set."

"Hardly." Jamison winked. "Hauled out by a youngish man of roughish mien, who wouldn't tell Security his business? You've done me a favor."

I watched as he walked regally off down the path, back straight, silver head high. He looked like he had nothing in the world to worry about except saying his lines and not banging into the furniture. I hoped I'd get a chance to see his new movie, even if it was only on cable in a jail cell. He looked the part.

Hell: He'd get my vote.

I GRABBED BRUNCH at one of the sidewalk tables outside the Prose Cafe, then headed back to my apartment, burping and replete. The Prose, as you'd expect, understands the importance of making sure there's enough fat and cholesterol in your diet. You can actually get them as side orders if you want. When I got home, I called the number Romer had given me, and he picked it up on the first ring. It was nice to get the sense that someone was taking me seriously. It had been a while.

I told Romer that I'd tried to shake down Jamison independently, implying that my master plan was to skim a little money off the Stratten gravy train. I did this to make myself sound stupid, which never does any harm, and also to get him confused as to what my motives actually were. I then gave him his instructions, and said I'd be waiting for his call.

I sat by the phone and smoked a cigarette. Romer called back before it was finished. He'd spoken to Quat, told him both that Jamison was unknown to the police and giving him problems, and that he needed reinforcements. Quat had sounded distant and shaken, but promised he'd go lean on Jamison at nine that evening.

"Good work, peanut-face," I told Romer. "What I want you to do now is stay out of the way and remember two things. The first, as you know, is that your ass is mine."

He knew. "And the other is?"

"Fuck with me, I'll kill you." I put down the phone knowing that wasn't true, but that he'd believe me.

I looked around the apartment, trying to figure out where to start. Had there been more to do, I could have drawn up a schedule: As it was, it hardly seemed worth doing at all. In the end I went to the bedroom first. Not much of interest had ever happened there, and it didn't take long. I collected a few items of clothing that had sentimental value and slung them in a suitcase. I left the rest, reasoning that by the time I got out of prison, most of them wouldn't fit, and chances were fashions would have changed anyhow. People might be wearing unisex dresses made out of eagle saliva, for all I knew.

There was plenty of room left in the suitcase, and I filled it with the few remaining objects in the apartment that seemed worth taking. Some books, and the manual to my organizer— which I'd never read but kept for superstitious reasons, in case I threw it away and suddenly the thing stopped working. A few bits and pieces from the drawer in my desk: matchbooks from places where I'd had a good time; a couple of postcards from Deck and my folks; a photo of Helena I'd happened to be carrying on the day of the heist and never quite had the heart to throw away. At the back of the drawer was a paper journal I used to keep, noting the years of traveling, the motor lodges and Holiday Inns and then the Hiltons and Hyatts—plus accounts of many of the dreams and memories I'd carried. God knows why I wrote that all down like some inventory of my life. A guy thing, I guess. Men are collectors, earnestly accruing experience, possessions, and time. Accruing women, too, as I realized, scanning the names I'd noted down. Voices I'd listened to, hair I'd stroked, backs I'd seen curled in front of me in the morning. All gone now, butterflies pinned in a case of some dusty museum, trophies collected out of boyish enthusiasm and never really understood. Male hormones are like viruses. They want to go out and conquer, explore new places to hang their hat, and they're not always that good at discerning how much damage they'll do to their host.

I dropped the notepad back in the drawer. The journal was like a collection of letters from a first love, or from an earlier Hap. If any of it meant anything, it had already become part of me. I didn't need to keep the envelopes to prove the letters had been sent.

I left the answering machine on and asked it to redirect my calls to Deck's. It said that it would, and was surprisingly polite. Then I locked the apartment and lugged the suitcase to the elevator. Down in the lobby I spied Tid, who was in the middle of helping a stallholder rip a couple of tourists off. When they'd staggered off laden with charming pieces of driftwood and Kincaid-inspired daubings, I took him for a beer at the bar where I'd waited for Deck and Laura a lifetime ago. I gave him a spare set of my keys and asked him to keep an eye on the place for six months. I was paid up that long: Then it would be repossessed and wouldn't be mine anymore. Tid was cool, and promised he'd do what I asked. He'd heard from Vent, understood I was in some kind of jam. He didn't think me maudlin for getting things sorted out, and you shouldn't either. It's not something you get the chance to do very often. I was going to take it.

Then I just got in the car and drove. I spiraled out of Griffith, taking in the sights, then meandered out into Hollywood and Beverly Hills. Doubled back and hooked up with Sunset at La Cienega, and took that all the way to the coast.

As I drove I felt calm and almost happy, as if life's loose ends were tied up for once. I didn't know what I was expecting to achieve that evening. I might get as far as talking to Quat if I was lucky, but I didn't believe I had much chance of dealing with Stratten himself. The whole point of operating remotes like Romer and Quat is keeping yourself as far away from the action as possible, and Stratten had made himself remarkably elusive. The man in the dark suit had told me to focus on Stratten, however, and so that's what I was going to do in the time I still had left. I thought about calling Travis, seeing if there wasn't some way he could let me have a little more time. But it would have been pointless, so I didn't. Travis didn't believe that Helena had been abducted. He hadn't believed in the alien theory, and I sure as hell wasn't going to try him on the new information. If I told him I was on a mission from God, it might get me a psychiatric ward rather than the main cell population, but that was all. Travis had his own agenda, and ticked items off it to keep himself sane. If you're a cop in a city drowning in crime, you take your victories where you can. Tonight the tick was going next to the bloodbath three years ago at Transvirtual, even though nobody but Travis, me, and the victims' families even cared about it anymore.

Deck might keep looking after I was gone, but I didn't think he'd stand much chance on his own. And I wanted to do it. I wanted to believe that I could set things right by myself. Maybe that made me no smarter than Laura, when she'd stepped out of the shadows and murdered a man who'd done the world little deliberate harm, in the hope that it would make everything all right. But sometimes life gets so unraveled that you have to stop and fix it, or you'll never be able to get it working again. You can't sleep with demons forever crouched at the end of the bed.

Fixing things doesn't solve everything: Your life will still have been broken. But you can at least use it again.

Deck and I spent the rest of the afternoon sitting on his back porch, drinking beer and looking out over people's yards, listening to the flick of lawn sprinklers and the distant cries of children. We loaded up our guns and then set them aside. We ran through five ways of getting me out of the city, and couldn't get any of them to stick. We tried to think of ways just the two of us could corner Stratten, and couldn't even find a place to start. So we stopped and just watched the sky getting hazy instead, the first smudge of darkness deepening the sky.

Sometimes it doesn't pay to go running to things. You have to let them come to you.

CHAPTER TWENTY

At half past eight Deck and I drew up a little way down the street from Jamison's house in the Hills. His car was parked in the drive—I'd called him midafternoon and told him the time Quat would be stopping by. Jamison's assistant had seemed to giggle when she said she'd go fetch him. I guess a new rumor had already started. I hoped the story didn't make it as far as
Pan-Space/Time Continuum "Say What?"
magazine, or I was going to have a trying time on the cellblock. Deck let me out of the car, and headed off to park and then make his way back on foot to hide on the other side of the street. I waited until he was out of sight. Then I walked up to Jamison's house.

Jamison and I sat in the living room and waited for a knock on the door. I still hoped that Quat would call first, but if he didn't, the plan was that Jamison would just answer the door. Quat wasn't going to come in shooting, not when blackmail money was at stake. Meanwhile Deck would be hurtling up behind from over the street, and within seconds he and I would take over. I'd never seen Quat in the flesh, and had no idea how big he was. I'd always assumed he was just typical pinwheel-hat fodder, but events of the past week had suggested he might be a little more than that. Deck had clear instructions to stick his gun in Quat's back at the earliest opportunity and make it clear we weren't screwing around.