Bungalow 7
Griff parked on Oxford, then cut through Glen Way on foot to the Beverly Hills Hotel, slipping discretely into Bungalow 7. Despite the late hour in Chicago, he called Lance.
“You never call. You never write,” Lance answered. “Trouble? Or do you just want money…again. You are worse than my kids.”
“Perkins, Holmes and whatever. What’s the scoop?”
“Why should I know?”
“Seem to have an annoying interest in the Nickolsons. Client or a cutout?”
“Doesn’t ring a bell.” Lance thought for a moment. “I do not recall seeing the name in any of the background I read. Likely a cutout.”
“Supposedly from the Bay area.”
“Ahh…probably JR. He haunts Silicon Valley. Fancies himself the next Zuckerberg-in-waiting and, from all accounts, has burned through an unhealthy chunk of cash trying to make it happen. Kind of an entrepreneur without a clue.” Lance snickered. “You know he and Helena…well, let’s just say there’s more warmth between the Israelis and the PLO.”
“Ah, family. I do miss the holiday rock throwing.”
“Well, she never did embrace Mrs. Nickolson number two. That’s why she went all Ivy League on her education. Maybe three thousand miles away wasn’t far enough.”
“Maybe.”
“So, where are you bunking out there?”
“Beverly Hills Hotel.”
“Ouch. A room or…”
“Bungalow. Number seven. Bill Shatner highly recommended it.”
“The Norma Jean.”
“Yeah. I guess. Off the beaten path.”
“That’s your style. Am I going to see a bill for this?”
“Maybe. We’ll see. Can you check out those Bay area clowns for me?”
“Will do.”
“West LA PD blotter might be a good place to start. You know the address in Bel Air. There were three of them. Ask for Allen, Steve or Dominic.”
“Sure. I’ll let you know.”
Griff changed clothes and went to the fitness center to work out for an hour. After a quick shower, he roamed the neighborhood streets, a walking meditation. He window-shopped a bit while passing by the closed Pacifica Gallery on Rodeo Drive. After a leisurely patrol through the jungle of wealth and fame, he went back to Bungalow 7 and went to bed.
***~~~***
The next morning, Griff got up early and swam laps in the pool for an hour. He ate breakfast poolside while he read Lance’s email, then dressed in a lawyerly pinstriped suit. He drove by the Stone Canyon mansion to discreetly photo the landscaping crew on his way downtown to Century Plaza which held the offices of the Hornet Investment Group on the 32nd floor of Tower 1. A gorgeous dime-a-dozen former starlet wannabe with a slightly disqualifying crooked smile the camera likely did not love at the reception desk showed him into the conference room—a huge one up front with a panoramic view to the west which failed to either impress or intimidate Griff—for his mid-morning appointment with Managing Director Donald Wallace.
Wallace stood up from the conference table and motioned to a chair pulled out across from him, too far away to shake hands. Behind him another man, dressed like a golf pro, scowled and scanned the Pacific coastline with his arms crossed over his chest. Griff correctly surmised: JR.
Griff plopped a leather messenger bag heavy with aviation magazines for effect down hard on the highly polished conference table with a dull thud, eliciting an ever so slight grimace from Wallace. He smiled as he sat down. “Thank you, Mr. Wallace, for taking time to meet with me.”
Wallace glanced over his shoulder at JR, then back, and said, “I’m not sure what exactly the purpose of this meeting is, Mr. Crowe.”
“Call me Griff.”
“Okay…”
JR sighed heavily and marched over to the table. He was a solid six foot three, in excellent shape, and, just as Helena said, had the stereotypical visage of an evil capitalist: thick, protruding eyebrows, dark deep-set eyes, and a five o’clock shadow at ten in the morning—though with blonde hair like Helena’s. He looked like a weird combination of a surfer dude and Richard Nixon. JR leaned on the table with both hands. His biceps bulged and his throat muscles clenched tight as he directed an angry, greedy smirk down at Griff. “Enough. Enough. Just what is my sister up to this time?”
Wallace leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands on top of a leather FranklinCovey planner like a poker player who just folded his hand.
Griff smiled. His inside voice reminded him, Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet. “You mean half-sister, right?”
Wallace’s poker face cracked with a hairline grin, obviously no stranger to the Nickolson sibling rivalry.
“Where does she keep finding you guys? Huh?”
“I’m in the book,” Griff said in a soft and casual manner.
“She is always stirring up trouble for me.”
“You mean like making bail for Steve, Allen and Dominic?” Griff shook his head. “Where do you find your guys?”
“Fuck you.”
“Yeah…I don’t think so. Not you, anyway.” Griff smiled broadly. “Not my type, if you catch my drift.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Him either.”
JR turned to Wallace and growled, “Get this guy out of here.”
“Your office, then?” Griff asked Wallace.
Wallace stood up and headed towards the door.
“I said get this guy out of here!” JR barked.
Wallace sighed. His shoulders slumped. He did not look back. “Helena owns the same number of shares as you do.”
Griff got up and followed Wallace out of the conference room. “Nice to meet you, Junior.”
“Son-of-a-bitch.”
***~~~***
“Can I get you a cup of coffee?” Wallace asked as they made their way through a maze of hallways.
“Sure.” Griff never declined an offer of java, as it usually allowed for a bit of recon and loose lips chit-chat. Wallace led him to the breakroom and handed him a corporate mug with a silhouette of an F/A-18. Griff poured. “JR is wound a bit tight.”
“Mmm. Yes.” Wallace answered. “Always has been.”
“The shadow of a legend is usually a stressful place to live.”
Wallace gave Griff a knowing smile and led him deep into the executive suite, passing by his own nameplate on the wall to go into Cliff Nickolson’s office. Though it was lit, the computer screen on the desk was dark. He led Griff inside, and they sat at a round glass table. “My office is a bit of a mess. End of the quarter, don’t you know.”
“Sure.” He surveyed Cliff Nickolson’s office, pausing at the “I Love Me” wall with its framed citations and pictures of airplanes and fellow warriors. “Marines, too?”
Wallace nodded. “You?”
“Navy. Special Warfare.”
Wallace relaxed visibly.
“I got no dog in this hunt. In fact, I am the dog in this hunt. That’s all.”
“What is it that Helena wants?” Wallace asked wearily. “And how can I help?”
“Some items seem to have gone M.I.A. She’d like them back. Personal stuff. Probably just some tit-for-tat shell game with JR. That’s all. You been through this drill before?”
“No. Not this particular one.”
Griff laughed. “Yeah. I get it. Anyway, you knew Mr. Nickolson well?”
Wallace nodded. “We served together. Desert Storm. His wingman. And worked closely after.”
“She said he kept a journal—personal stuff, not business. Travels, I guess. Interesting people, places and events…”
“He did.”
“What, was he going to write a memoir or something?”
“No. Just a lifelong habit. A mental exercise, he said. Always had a notebook with him—except on missions, of course. So, I imagine the last one…”
“Lost.”
“Yes. Lost.” Wallace sighed. He looked around the office as if searching for a ghost, his eyes ending up on the “I Love Me” wall. “The Major was a quite remarkable man. Would have earned a star easily, if he had stayed in the Corps.”
“I’ve met guys like that—not many. Could count them on one hand and give away a couple-three fingers. You’d follow those guys anywhere.”
Wallace nodded.
“I read the NTSB report…”
Wallace locked on Griff’s eyes.
“Did that read right to you?”
Wallace started to shake his head but shrugged a shoulder instead and looked away.
“Was he on the stick?”
“I doubt it. He was in the left seat.”
“But…”
Wallace gave Griff the thousand-yard stare. “You read the report: Pilot Error.”
“It’s always pilot error, isn’t it.”
“No. Not always.”
“Gut feel?”
Wallace shrugged. “The Safety Board has spoken.”
Griff waited then said, “He must have filled a lot of those Moleskins. A hundred, maybe.”
“Leuchtturms.”
“What?”
“The brand he used, Leuchtturms. Not Moleskins. They’re German.”
“Oh. Well, is there another place he might have kept them? Somewhere, maybe someone…off the books?”
Wallace looked back at Griff with a stern expression.
“Be better if I could get in, get out. No one gets hurt.” Griff took a sip of coffee. “You know, rather than stumble into a shit storm. No one wants a fire fight here.”
Wallace stared.
“I’m going to find them. That’s what I do. And I’m good at it.”
Wallace began, nearly imperceptibly, to nod his head. He opened his planner and wrote something down. He tore out the page, folded it in half, then slid it across the glass table top. “Need-to-know basis only.”
“Helena?”
Wallace shook his head. “And I have no idea how you found out about it.”
“Understood.”
“Now, if you will excuse me, I have an angry share holder waiting to see me.” Wallace stood up.
Griff pocketed the paper without reading. He stood. “Does Hornet use Perkins, Holmes and Bond for legal services?”
“From Frisco?”
Griff nodded.
“No. We have local representation.”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Downstairs on level D of the subterranean parking beneath the Towers, Griff opened and read the paper Wallace gave him: Blue Wing, LLC.
He lit the paper on fire with his father’s Marine Corps Zippo lighter, then left.
***~~~***
Bungalow 7 was empty when Griff returned, but a faint tease of Perfume Notorious hung in the air. Griff smiled. He changed into cargo shorts, a T-shirt and Ray-Ban Wayfarers, then went out poolside. He stood across the water from Helena, savoring the sight of her sunning in only a tight red one-piece bathing suit and her Jackie Ohhs.
“It is impolite to stare, mister,” Helena called out across the pool.
Griff felt all the eyes around the pool drawn his way.
“Darling, there you are. Done shopping so soon?” He walked around the pool and laid back in the lounge chair next to her. “You are resurrecting lurid Baywatch fantasies from my childhood.”
“So to speak…” She reached over and quickly grabbed his crotch, then let go. “So, how was your day, honey?”
“I met Junior—”
“I told you, he hates that—”
“Yeah, I know, but I had to find out first hand.”
“Did you boys play nice together?”
“I didn’t feel any love in the room, so we left.”
“We?”
“Mr. Wallace and I.”
“Oh, Donnie? How is he? I always liked him.” Helena raised herself up on an elbow and turned to face Griff.
He looked over at her. “He says hi.”
“Was he helpful?”
“Eh…” Griff shrugged a shoulder. “We’ll see.”
“He was always my father’s guard dog.”
“So…did you want me to bill Lance for the room?”
“No, silly. He’ll just mark it up with his outrageous overhead, so I took care of it already.”
“It is good to see you, Helena.”
“You just wait.” She stood up, took Griff’s hand, and led him back to Bungalow 7.
***~~~***