No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking. FORTUNE COOKIE
“Who the fuck is Joseph Watkins?”
Larry screaming in the humid, practically airless interrogation room at the precinct in downtown L.A. He sat opposite a squat, bald detective named Brubaker, a desk between them. Larry would cast Telly Savalas to play Brubaker, even though, except for the baldness, the guy didn’t look anything like Savalas.
“He went by ‘Jo,’ ” Brubaker said.
“Right,” Larry said. “Bad mojo.”
“Bad what?”
“There were two guys who abducted my wife, Mo and Jo.”
“That some kind of joke?”
“That’s what I thought too, like The Three Stooges, except with Jo and no Curly.” Larry smiled, then realized he shouldn’t be smiling, being interrogated about his wife’s murder and all, and tried for an appropriately somber, stone-faced look.
“Regarding the abduction,” Brubaker said, leaning on the word, as if maybe he didn’t believe it. “How come you didn’t report this to the cops right away?”
“I was afraid,” Larry said. “I thought they’d kill her.”
“And they did kill her.”
“I guess I fucked up.”
“You guess?”
“They could’ve killed her anyway.”
“Where were you this evening?”
“What?” Larry had heard, he just wanted to hear it again.
“I said where were you this—”
“In ’N’ Out Burger on Sunset.”
“All night?”
Shit, this wasn’t some bullshit movie script with holes in it, Larry realized. This was real life, with real cops, who could do things like check security footage and other technological shit.
“Most of the night, yeah.”
“Define most.”
“What difference does it make where I was?”
“’M’I asking the questions or you?”
Larry was about to shit his pants, thinking, Were these questions about Bev and Jo just decoys? Did the bastard want to nail him for Dr. Hoff? He thought he’d done a good job cleaning up, but so did every schmuck on C.S.I.
“Instead of talking to me,” Larry said, “you should be out looking for the killer. It has to be the guy I gave the money to. Mo. Or maybe it was the guy I’ve never met, the one who’s been leaving the notes.”
“What’s his name?”
“I’m sorry, I forgot to tell you.” Larry rolled his eyes sarcastically. “I don’t know his name. I just know they call, called him ’the boss,’ and I’m willing to bet it’s not Tony Danza or Bruce Springsteen, so that rules two people out.”
“You think this is funny?” Brubaker asked.
“Do I look like I think it’s funny?” Larry said, and, of course, fuck, he couldn’t stop smiling.
Stone-faced, Brubaker went, “If my wife got whacked, I wouldn’t be cracking dumb jokes, I’d be crying.”
“Maybe I’m internalizing my anguish,” Larry said.
“Yeah, maybe,” Brubaker said, “but I fuckin’ doubt it.”
“Look,” Larry said, “instead of this nonsense with semantics…” He knew semantics was the wrong word, but he liked the way it sounded. Continued, “…let’s be a little more productive, shall we? How about you bring a sketch artist in here and I’ll give you a full description of Mo, down to his yellow teeth?”
“Tell me about Dr. Hoff,” Brubaker said.
Larry tried to hide the full-blown surge of panic he was feeling.
“Dr. Who?” he tried, squinting, going for a completely confused look, but he was a shitty actor, why he’d gone into producing. The irony was you have to do more acting as a producer, which was why his career was in the shitter.
“You know him,” Brubaker said. “He’s your doctor.”
“Oh, Dr. Hoff,” Larry said. “Sorry, out of context, I was thrown off. What on earth does Dr. Hoff have to do with this?”
Could he sound any more dishonest?
“He was killed earlier today, stabbed to death with a letter opener.”
“Jesus,” Larry said. Better, maybe because he didn’t have to act to express shock and horror. “That’s awful.”
“When was the last time you saw him?” Brubaker asked.
“I saw him?” Larry said.
“That’s what I’m asking you,” Brubaker said. “When?”
“Couple days ago? I had a flesh wound when Bev’s abductors shot at me and I went to the doctor for some…” He almost said Vike, but he wasn’t dumb enough to open that can of worms. Went with, “Band-Aids.”
“Were you aware that Dr. Hoff was having an affair with your wife?” Brubaker asked.
So Larry had been right all along, and Dr. Hoff had been the Sam Adams drinker. Larry was glad he’d killed him, the son of a bitch.
“The news doesn’t shock me,” Larry said.
“So you knew about it?”
“I didn’t have any evidence. I mean a beer bottle, but…”
“We have evidence,” Brubaker said. “It’s early, but we saw the texts that the doctor and your wife exchanged, and the pictures.”
“My wife sent him fucking pictures?”
“They sent each other pictures.”
Thinking Who would want to see a naked picture of Bev? Larry said, “Jesus Christ.”
“Do you think it’s possible that Dr. Hoff was this ‘boss’ you mentioned?” Brubaker asked.
“I think that’s very possible,” Larry said, though he knew it was impossible, because he’d gotten the most recent note on his windshield after he’d killed Dr. Hoff. But he liked that it deflected attention away from him—for the moment, anyway.
After more questions, mainly rehashing and rephrasing what had already been asked, Larry was told to wait in another room in the precinct. It was hard for Larry to not feel like a total moron. He could have ditched his cheating whore of a wife and been in Brazil by now, but he’d tried to do the right thing, the moral thing, and look what fucking happened.
One of Larry’s ex-assistants had set up e-mail alerts for Larry from Variety. Larry always had trouble logging on to the Internet so the alerts were a way of keeping him up on the major Holly-wood news, so he wouldn’t sound like an out-of-it jackass at meetings.
Larry was trying to check his email when he saw he’d gotten one of the Variety alerts about fucking Bust. Lionsgate with Darren Becker and, Jesus Christ, Brandi Love had hired Bill Moss to the write the pilot. Were they fucking kidding? Why did they want Moss, whose claim to fame was the script of Spaced Out, which had never even been set up at a studio?
Larry stewed, cursing to himself and pacing. A few more hours went by. Fuck, what was going on? Were they analyzing evidence taken from Dr. Hoff’s? Larry thought about demanding a lawyer, but how would that look? It would seem like he was nervous, like he had something to hide. He was nervous and had something to hide, but the trick was not to seem that way. He had to play it cool, get a vibe going of, I’m not worried. I’m a hip movie producer, a Hollywood player, who always comes out on top.
Like that.
Finally Brubaker came to the room and announced that there had been a new development. Brubaker led Larry to another room where there were several other people sitting in front of a big TV. The fuck was this, a screening?
Larry said, “The fuck is this, a screening?”
No one laughed or even smiled.
“Sit the fuck down,” Brubaker said.
Larry did.
Brubaker played grainy footage of two guys in, it looked like a parking lot.
“This is from a couple of hours ago,” Brubaker said. “Do you recognize these men?”
Larry leaned forward. Looked like the guys were talking, one holding a briefcase, and then there was a gun, a struggle—
“Fuck, that’s him,” Larry said. “The guy in the suit. The one who gets strangled. It’s Mo.”
“You sure?” Brubaker asked.
“Positive,” Larry said.
“Who’s the other guy?”
The other guy looked familiar. Larry wasn’t sure why at first, but knew he’d seen him somewhere.
Then it clicked.
It was Bill Moss. But why was Moss meeting with Mo? It was like all the disasters of Larry’s recent life were colliding.
“You recognize him?” Brubaker asked.
Larry’s brain was churning. Was Bill the boss? Shit, it made sense, was adding up. Bill had always seemed a little out there, a little, what’s the word? Unhinged. Yeah, unhinged. And seventy-five K. Wasn’t that how much Larry had promised him to write the script?
“No, I have no idea who that is,” Larry said.
“You sure?” Brubaker said. “Watch it again.”
Brubaker replayed the footage.
“I’m sure,” Larry said. “I have no idea who that is.”
A couple of hours later Larry was released. He was proud of himself for thinking fast, not I.D.’ing Moss and not letting a golden opportunity slide. This was the break Larry had been waiting for, his way back into Bust.
Larry went directly from the police station to Moss’s bungalow in Venice Beach.
Bill came to the door, surly and disheveled.
Larry, smiling and upbeat, asked, “Miss me, boss?”