The Two Deaths of Daniel Hayes (16 page)

She’d been working her way down Sunset, focusing on the dives, the tiki joints, the art bars with films projected on the wall and board games in a corner. Left on Silver Lake, the neighborhood Hispanics, homosexuals, and hipsters, a great combination for nightlife. But her head was pounding and she could smell a stale funk on herself—sleeping in the back of the van wasn’t doing much for her hygiene—and the gun tucked in the back of her waist was driving her crazy, digging in when she leaned back, feeling loose enough to slip when she didn’t. And through it all, the two thoughts spinning and colliding, dusting themselves off, and then spinning up again.

You’re going to point a pistol at a living, breathing person and pull the trigger.
And
Where is Daniel Hayes?
It was only seven and a Monday night, so she found a place to park easily enough. As she walked past the side of the van, she stroked the four-foot wound in the side, felt the paint flake against her fingers.
You’re no longer Belinda Nichols. You’re Niki Boivin. You find people. You wanted to be a private-eye-slash-nurse who knew kung fu, like something out of a seventies action show, but really you work for lawyers and creditors. Most of the time that means you sit behind a computer and dial the phone, but sometimes you have to do it old school, and those are the nights you like best. The happiest moment of your day is jogging through morning mists with your dog, a mutt whose pit bull/dachshund heritage just had to include rape.
She’d been Niki Boivin most of the day, and slipped her on like old jeans.
A squat gray bunker abutting an auto repair shop and marked with only a small marquee, Spaceland looked like a roadhouse on some sad stretch of Southern highway instead of one of L.A.’s best music venues. Niki stepped in, blinking. The silver-blue curtain that framed the stage was bathed in light, but the band hadn’t started. She pushed over to the bar, ordered a beer she didn’t want from a pretty emo girl, all dyed hair and sadness. When it arrived, she pulled out a twenty, told the girl to keep the change.
Niki leaned back with her elbows on the bar. The place wasn’t crowded yet, maybe fifty people milling about. Friends of the band, probably. Monday was for up-and-coming acts hoping to share the success of others who had strut the same stage. As she watched, a skinny kid with nerd glasses walked on, picked up a bass, and began tuning it, the notes ringing low and slow.
Daniel Hayes wasn’t here.
She sighed, took a swig of beer. The headache was getting worse; the bassist might as well as have been strumming her raw optic nerves. When the bartendress came back, Niki gave her a finger wag.
“Whatcha need?”
“Actually, I’m looking for someone.”
“Somebody who works here?”
“No.” She pulled the photo of Hayes from her pocket, the print a little crinkled. “This guy.”
“Whoa, this is so film noir.” The bartendress leaned in to stare at the photo. She was wearing citrus perfume, clean-smelling and nicer than Niki expected. “Wait, wait. I know my line.” She straightened, tipped her head, hardened her eyes. “You a cop?”
Niki laughed. The girl wasn’t bad. “Nope.”
“Bounty hunter?”
If she wants to play, let’s play.
“Something like that.”
“What do you want him for?”
“What’s it to you?”
“What are you going to do to him if you find him?”
“Well . . .” Niki stuck her pause. “I’ll probably shoot him in the head.”
The bass player ran through a quick little riff, a handful of notes cut off in the middle as he stopped to tighten the strings.
“I don’t want no trouble.”
“You don’t want trouble, you better tell me what I’m after.”
The emo girl smiled, said, “This is fun, but I got customers.”
“So—”
“Sure I’ve seen him. On the news. That’s the guy killed his wife.”
“But in here?”
“I think he’s been in before. But I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“All right. Thanks.” Niki folded the picture, took another sip of beer, then started away.
“Wait.”
“What?”
“You forgot. You’re supposed to pull out a business card, and say,” she dropped her voice an octave, “ ‘If you remember anything, anything at all, you give me a call.’ ”
Niki paused. The gun bit into her back. She stared at the girl. Read her whole life. Born in the Midwest, Michigan or Ohio. Acting classes twice a week. A spec script she’d had “almost finished” for two, three years. Been an extra on a handful of films, landed a role on a sitcom that died in development. Probably blown a rock star or two in the stockroom; had offers to do porn, but so far turned them down. Twenty-four years old. But L.A. years were dog years, and she didn’t have many left.
“I told you,” she said, and turned away. “I’m not a cop.”

Jerry D’Agostino squinted in the mirror, swiveling his head to the left and right. Crow’s feet. No question. And were those lines on his forehead?
Lines?
Jesus Christ, cats and dogs living together. He’d have to schedule another Botox session. After Tuesday’s shoot, maybe, as a little reward.

He opened the medicine cabinet, took out the face cream—fifty bucks an ounce, you ought to be able to chop it up and snort it— and squeezed a pea-sized dollop on each index finger. Patted it in, careful not to rub.

He walked down the stairs, past the framed posters of
The Last Taboo
and
A is for . . .
and
Mommy’s Nasty Secret
. In the kitchen he pulled out a bag of carrots and began peeling them with long steady strokes, neat strips falling to the sink. When he was done, he chopped them and tossed the pieces in the juicer. A thick trickle of orange liquid filled a pint glass. He mixed in fish oil, green tea extract, a packet of vitamins, stirred the brackish liquid, and took a sip.

Uugh.
He coughed, took another slug, then tightened the belt of his robe and walked through the house to his office. Stood at the window watching the San Fernando Valley flicker like ten thousand candles. The 405 was a glowing ribbon. Planes coming in to Burbank rose and fell like sparks. Up in the hills, though, the bright spots were fewer, jewels in the night. In dazzling, cramped Los Angeles, darkness was a luxury.
Can it really have been thirty years?
He’d come here after Watts but before Rodney King, the big bad eighties, when Arnold Schwarzenegger was dropping one-liners in action movies instead of speeches on the news, and Simi Valley was one of those jokes that wrote itself. Back then, he’d thought he was going to change the town, make it his. Thing about L.A., though, even though nothing stayed the same, it never really changed. But no matter how fortunes rolled and shifted, there were no slums in the Hills. If he hadn’t changed the world, at least he’d improved his address.
He moved to the couch, pulled out his laptop. The Dago Productions logo flashed onscreen, the “o” of it the male symbol, a big proud cock of an arrow straining ever upward. It was strange, looking at it now. He felt, what was the word, conflicted. He owed everything he had to cocks straining ever upward. But still. Thirty years in the business, four-hundred-plus films, a dozen Woodys lined up on his mantel. But what did it all mean?
Stop,
he corrected.
Clouds do not have to bring rain. You are of the sun. Feel the rays of empowerment, and let them change you.
He opened the script, scrolled to the last page.

Jerry sighed, rubbed at his eyes. It was good, but what now? The books all said that a screenplay was about 110 pages, but he was on page 68, and so far, Jenna St. John Simone hadn’t had any luck either becoming a star or finding the man she knew was waiting for her.

Don’t lose faith. You are of the sun—
Someone moved on his patio.
Jerry came upright so fast the computer slipped off his lap and

hit the carpet. He killed the light, stepped closer to the window. Squinted. A man’s shape was framed against the railing, barely visible in the glow of his pool lights.

A boyfriend. About once a year some brokenhearted hick from Kansas tried this. They all had visions of rescuing their girlfriends, like D’Ago the Dago was some kind of fairy-tale monster who had enslaved them, instead of a businessman who knew talent when he saw it. Though none of the boyfriends had been dumb enough to sneak onto his fucking property.

Well, this one was going to get a lesson in business. He slid open his desk drawer, pulled out his pistol and racked it. Then he tightened his bathrobe and padded through the house. Squaring his shoulders, he yanked open the patio door.

“Asshole, you’re trespassing.”
The guy didn’t move, didn’t turn around. What the hell? Jerry stepped forward. “Hey! I can see you. Turn the fuck around.”

Bennett turned, leaning back against the railing with his elbows propped up. The wavering illumination of the pool lit D’Agostino from below, splashing a pallid yellow over his tan and glinting off the gun in his right hand. “Hell of a view you got here, Jerry.”

“Bennett? Jesus.” The producer heaved a sigh, lowered the pistol. He had that slightly pickled motivational speaker vibe: skin too tight, teeth too white, spray-tan too thick. Still, for a man who used to boast that breakfast was best served on a mirror, he looked damn good. “Didn’t know you were back in town. What are you doing here?”

“Calling in a marker.”
“Whose?”
“Yours.”
“Hey, whoa. You said we were even. After I did the thing.” “I lied.”
“You promised.”
“I lied.” He nodded at the gun. “And if you don’t put that away,

I might decide you’re being inhospitable.”
The producer paled, and quickly tucked the pistol into the pocket
of his robe. “Sorry.”
Bennett said nothing, just let the silence deepen. Every second
was weighing on the other man, he could see that. Poor Jerry had
always been a nervous boy.
“So. What do you—”
“I’m going to be staying here for a while.”
“Great. Let’s plan dinner, some drinks. I’ll have a couple of girls
join us—”
“You don’t understand. I’ll be staying here.”
“Here? In my house? I mean,” the guy tripping over himself, “we go
back a long way, you know I’m glad to see you, but come on. I can’t—” “Jerry.”
Just saying his name was enough. The trick was always in breaking them the first time. They would never forget. After that, it rarely
took more than a hint. Didn’t matter if you were talking about a
hard guy or a TV starlet or a porn producer.
Back in ’81, Jerry D’Agostino had convinced his girlfriend to let
him shoot video, fantasy stuff—the secretary who gave her all for
the company, the cheerleader raising team spirit—promising that it
would be just for them. That was back in the dawn of porn’s golden
day, when every home suddenly had a VCR and every video store
had a back room obscured by a bead curtain. The girlfriend hadn’t
lasted, but Dago Production’s first film had done quite well, and
hundreds had followed.
Bennett had heard rumors, did his due diligence, and found out
that the Dago kept two sets of books. A dangerous move, since the
men he was skimming had ties to Vegas and New York and a habit
of leaving bodies in the desert. He’d come at Jerry sideways, offering
a business proposition, a little sideline using some of D’Agostino’s
“stars” to run a honeypot scam.
Dago had tried to pass. But in the end he’d come around to
Bennett’s way of thinking.
“So. Um. You just need a place to crash?”
“Something like that.”
“Okay, yeah, sure. I’ll ah, I’ll make up the guest room.” “Sorry, Jerry, I wasn’t clear. I need peace and quiet.” He put on
his affable smile.
“I don’t—”
“You’re going on vacation.”
“What?”
“Tonight.”
“No, I can’t, I’ve got a shoot this week. This new girl, she’s dynamite. Eighteen and tits like artillery shells. Plus she’ll do it rough, doesn’t mind choking, spitting. She’ll throat-job and moan like it’s the highlight of her day. Shit’s hot now, near-rape fantasies. They
eat it up in the Midwest.”
Bennett said nothing. Just smelled the night air, listened to the
murmur of distant traffic and the burble of the pool filter. His thigh
ached a little in the cold, where the bone had been broken a dozen
years ago. Complications on a job in . . . Dallas, had it been? “B., really, I can’t.” The man talking faster, angling and wheedling. “How about this, how about I take a room at a hotel? You
can have the house, you know, my pleasure, I want you to have it.” Ripples in the pool’s surface cast streaks across the producer’s
face. Far away, a car honked, loud and long. There was really no
need to drive Dago out of town—Bennett mostly didn’t want the
guy near him, talking too much and thinking too little—but he also
didn’t want Jerry to think that they were negotiating. So he just
slowly let his smile fade.
“I.” D’Agostino staring at his bare feet. “I’ll get packed.” Bennett nodded, turned back to the view. A police helicopter
swung back and forth in circles somewhere over Van Nuys, the
searchlight glowing. He heard the sound of Dago’s footsteps, waited
till the man was almost at the door, then said, “Jerry?” “Yeah?”
“The gun.”
A pause, and then the sound of the guy walking back. He came
alongside Bennett, reached into his pocket, pulled out the pistol. Bennett took it, held it loose, not quite aiming at the man. “And
your car keys.”
“What? How do I get to the airport?”
“Call a cab.”
Later Bennett explored his new house. It really was a nice place,
the décor a little tacky, but the views spectacular. He set up his laptop in Jerry’s office, at a desk facing the window, so that he could
look out at the city spread wide below him.
Shortly after Laney’s death, Bennett had broken into their house
and left a few things. Life had gotten so much easier these days.
God bless the Internet. Used to be difficult to get surveillance equipment, never mind streaming video, broadband wireless, scriptable
file transfer protocols.
He’d placed three cameras. The first appeared to be a carbon
monoxide detector and plugged into the wall in the entryway, with
a clear view of the door. The second, secreted in a book, had gone
on a shelf in Hayes’s home office. The final camera, his personal
favorite, was in a Kleenex box, one of those decorative types that
rich people liked, so that even their tissues matched their color palette. That one he’d put in their bedroom, on Laney’s nightstand. All
three were high-res, worked in near darkness, and best of all, were
motion-activated. They broadcast right over Hayes’s wireless router,
dumping everything they recorded to an anonymous file server. Not so many years ago, Bennett would have had to sit on his ass
and watch the house himself. Now he just logged in.
All three cameras showed multiple files. Busy busy. He opened
the most recent first, starting with the hallway. The video began
with the front door flying open, men rushing in, cops with their
guns out. Moving fast and splitting up, yelling,
Clear!
Interesting.
The office and bedroom cams showed the police—scratch that, sheriffs—coming in equally hard. Then, once it became clear that whoever they were looking for wasn’t there, they relaxed, wandered about. Opened drawers, glanced in closets. The audio was a little muffled, but he could hear them talking about an intruder, and
saying Hayes’s name.
So his boy was back in town.
He was about to switch to earlier files when he saw one of the
deputies glance around, then quickly open one of the dresser drawers, pull out a pair of white lace panties, and jam them in his front
pocket. Bennett chuckled. He took a screen cap into Photoshop,
upped the image size, and tinkered with the unsharp mask settings
until he could read the cop’s nameplate. “Deputy Wasserman. You
nasty celebrity crotch sniffer.” Bennett saved the file, made a note of
the sheriff’s info. Never knew, might come in handy.
The next video clip was the man who vanished. Daniel Hayes in
living color, walking into his front hall.
Gotcha.
The man looked exhausted. No surprise, given the distance he’d
covered. Bennett had a woman at American Express who’d rather
her boss didn’t know about her “recreational” freebase habit, and
based on the charges on Hayes’s card, he’d sprinted east like his ass
was aflame. Then vanished once he reached Maine.
What brings you back, Dan?
On the screen, the man stared at photographs, a shell-shocked
expression on his face. Up in the bedroom he moved slow, a glass
of whiskey in his hand, going through his own drawers like he was
looking for clues. He looked over at Laney’s side of the bed, right at
the goddamn camera, and for a second Bennett wondered whether
he’d been burned. But no; something else had obviously affected
him, the guy slipping to his knees, shaking and crying. In the next scene, the writer walked into his office like he’d never been there. Looked at his shiny award, chuckled. Then sat down at the desk, gazed out the window, and saw something that spooked him. He was on his feet, tearing through cabinets, snatching his computer. The audio caught something, a voice, but too far and too garbled. Based on the time stamp, that would be the sheriffs. Hayes sprinted out of his den, then into the bedroom, and then, nothing.
Must have gone out a window.
Bennett leaned back, tapped a finger against his teeth.
What did
you just see?
There had been something off in Hayes’s behavior. Grief? Partly,
sure, but there was more. Exhaustion? The guy had driven back and
forth across the country in near record time. He had to be ragged
as hell.
You know what ragged looks like. This is something else.
He
couldn’t put his finger on it, but the guy seemed . . . well, off. Bennett watched the video again. There it was. In the office,
when Daniel picked up his award. He had smiled. It was a small
thing, but it was out of place. Exhaustion and sorrow made sense.
He’d lost the love of his life, and it didn’t look like he’d slept since. So would a writing award cheer him up? Even briefly? Bennett set the video to loop and watched until he was certain.
Something else was going on. He didn’t know what, but something. Regardless, he’d gotten what he really needed. Daniel Hayes was
back in town. Bennett was about to close the video when he noticed
there were earlier files. Someone else had been in the house. The
police again?
He fired up the camera in the hallway. The front door opened,
and a woman walked in, a bag on her shoulder.
Bennett froze the image. Stared at it.
You have got to be kidding me.