Here is a preview from Forced Perspective, a Grant & McNulty thriller by Colin Campbell.
ONE
Flatline. The point where the spikes stop spiking and the beeps stop beeping, and your vital signs stop everything. Flatline. It’s funny what goes through your mind at a time like that. Palm Springs was a long way from The River Forks Inn at Drake, Colorado, but if Vince McNulty were to trace it all back, before the siege and the carnage and the biggest snowstorm in fifty years, it would lead to the Tarquitz River Estates in Palm Springs, Southern California. He hadn’t seen any of it coming when he’d set up the location-scouting trip to Palm Springs; he’d just been trying to do his job as technical adviser and undercover security cop, and not piss off Larry Unger. At least that’s how he remembered it…
McNulty crossed West Mesquite Avenue in Palm Springs to the abandoned Mac Magruder car dealership. The boards had been pulled off the main windows, the frontage spruced up, and there was a Titanic Productions van parked out front. The passenger window slid open, and Larry’s voice pierced the still desert air.
“McNulty. Why the fuck are we here?”
Why the fuck they were there was a matter of opinion, depending on who you asked. For Larry Unger it was the smell of cheap publicity. For Vince McNulty it was the chance of redemption and a shot at reclaiming the family he’d lost all those years ago. Not the sister he’d distanced himself from for her own safety but the boys in blue, way back in Yorkshire. It was a longshot, but he reckoned it was a chance worth taking. As some sage Chinaman once said, the journey of a thousand miles begins with but a single step. Palm Springs was that single step, and a dull one at that. The parched earth of the Tarquitz River Estates was beige and gray, and the desert hills of the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation weren’t much better. The only green was in the tall slender palm trees that lined the roads and grew in clumps at the golf courses and country clubs in the more affluent parts of Palm Springs. The Mac Magruder car dealership blended right in with its surroundings, being mainly bleached concrete and asphalt skimmed with dust and sand. The sun baking in a clear blue sky had turned the site into an oven.
McNulty crossed the driveway and entered a showroom that hadn’t seen a car in eighteen months. The full-length windows had already been cleaned and a reception desk had been set up against the back wall. A production runner was busy stripping old car posters and business calendars off the walls and replacing them with posters from the Titanic Productions back catalog. The prime display area had been reserved for Dead Naked, the second Alfonse Bayard movie that was threatening to become a minor blockbuster. For Larry Unger, minor could have been his middle name, but blockbuster wasn’t a word commonly associated with the former porn producer. McNulty scanned the broad white interior.
“Where’s the back room?”
The runner paused in hanging a Dead Naked poster and glanced at McNulty. “Through the back.”
McNulty gave him a withering look. “Very funny. Where?”
The runner freed one hand and pointed at a door behind the reception desk. McNulty waved for the cinematographer to follow him. F.K. Parenteau nodded and joined McNulty at the door. F.K. had been working on Larry’s productions for years and always accompanied him on his location scouts. This was the farthest from Boston they’d ever scouted, now that Titanic Productions had moved to Hollywood. The light was much better here, thought F.K. This should be easy.
McNulty opened the door and stepped into a large, square room with scuffed adobe walls and dirty skylights. It had looked bigger on the architect’s plans, but it was big enough to set up a makeshift studio. If they filmed during the day, they wouldn’t even need to use arc lamps, just reflectors to balance the shadows. The earthen walls would make an ideal backdrop for what they planned to shoot.
McNulty turned to F.K. and held his arms out in triumph. F.K. formed a makeshift viewfinder with his hands and paced the floor, checking camera angles. He looked more impressed than Larry when the producer entered the room.
“And for this we’ve driven halfway across the desert?”
McNulty looked at his producer. “The desert is good. Think about Lawrence Of Arabia.”
Larry looked at the ex-cop-turned-technical-adviser. “Think about the sand up my sinuses.”
McNulty ignored the short, round man who ran Titanic Productions and turned his attention to practicalities. The room had no windows, unless you counted the skylights. One wall looked as if it had once held a workbench or similar work surface, indicating this might have been a workshop but not a functioning repair garage. Maybe for small stuff or interior cleaning. Whatever furniture or tools had been here were long gone. Apart from the entrance, there was a door in one corner marked “Restroom” and another, unmarked on the far side. McNulty crossed the room and opened the mystery door, which led to a small office and a wide, window-lined hallway. Good, he thought, an entrance and an exit. He didn’t want incoming subjects bumping into the ones on their way out. Discretion was essential. Just in case anyone got rough. In his experience people often did. He glanced up and down the hallway to see if there was access from the outside. He needed to ensure that nobody outside could see what was going on inside. He came back into the workshop, closed the door, and turned to Larry.
“What time did you put on the flyers?”
“For the cattle call?”
McNulty didn’t think Larry was taking this seriously.
“For the auditions.”
Larry put his hands on his hips, making him look even shorter and rounder.
“These aren’t actors we’re looking for here. It’s mug shots, not auditions.”
McNulty tried not to sound impatient. “It’s local extras. Head and shoulders to see what they look like. If you’re casting for cowboys, you don’t want to be hiring Indians.”
Larry jutted his chin out. “The reservation’s just over the hill. Indians is what we’re gonna get.”
McNulty sighed. “Your point being?”
Larry gave him his hardest stare. It wasn’t very hard.
“Meaning I don’t want to get scalped.”
“Larry. As long as I’ve known you, you’re the one who does the scalping.”
“I resent that.”
McNulty tapped his watch.
“What time did you put on the flyers?”
Larry looked up at the sun through the skylight. “Ten in the morning.” He jerked his head toward the front of the showroom. “Your friend’s cutting it fine, isn’t he?”
McNulty glanced through the showroom door to the reception desk. With somebody checking invitations at the desk and passing people through here for F.K. to get their head shots, the conveyer belt should be able to process ten an hour. Provided everything was in place before morning. He gave Larry a calming smile.
“He’ll be here.”
Then he concentrated on making sure that the Mac Magruder dealership became a Hollywood production office searching for local talent, instead of what they were really looking for.