Murder With Sarcastic Intent Read online

  “My chance to be in a masterpiece,” Mary said. “Exciting. What’s its working title: Slitizen Kane? On Golden Shower Pond?”

  She got to her feet.

  “So just to be clear, do you or don’t you know Nina Ramirez?” she said.

  “Never heard of her until now.” He turned and started tapping away on his computer. “Please leave. Now.”

  “Okay, porn boy,” Mary said. “I’ll shut the door so you can spank your little monkey in private.”

  She slammed the door shut.

  And hoped she had a bottle of hand sanitizer in the car.

  Eight

  Mary wanted to drive through a car wash with the windows down to cleanse herself of the scum layer from her visit to ExtReam Productions.

  It wasn’t that she had anything against pornography per se in theory, as long as no real harm came to anyone involved. And therein lay the problem. It attracted a lot of damaged women and then exploited them. And she knew there were some porn films where people did get hurt. Mary had a big problem with that.

  The way that piece of shit Buslipp had talked to her made her skin crawl. She saw his viewpoint of women perfectly clear: objects to be exploited.

  She pulled into the parking lot of a department store and took the production book she’d lifted from ExtReam out of her purse.

  Mary had seen this before and knew they listed the crews by name, with contact information, and important addresses for the shoot. Unfortunately, there were several addresses listed, without specific dates attached to them.

  She found Archer DeLoof halfway down the crew list. There was no phone number for him specifically, but there was for the production’s line producer.

  Mary put her Bluetooth earpiece in place—talking on cell phones while driving in Los Angeles would cost you at least a hundred bucks. No thank you, Mary thought. Can’t write that off.

  She dialed the number and when the voice of a harried woman answered, she said, “Where are we shooting today? I need to drop off stuff for makeup.”

  Mary heard noise in the background and someone speaking. She held her breath.

  “Warehouse one.”

  Mary sensed the woman was about to disconnect the call so she spoke quickly. “Okay, been there a bunch of times, but what is the street address again? I get turned around so easy. I’m used to Ohio—“

  “2987 Olympic.”

  “Thank—”but before she could finish, she heard the dial tone.

  Mary pulled into a Ralph’s parking lot, turned around, and headed back toward Olympic. Ten minutes later, she pulled up in front of a warehouse. There was a gravel driveway in front of the place and a weed-choked section of old blacktop.

  “Glamorous,” she said to herself.

  She parked and went to the main door of the warehouse. It was a steel deal, with no window, no doorbell, and no sense of a welcome.

  Mary knocked on the door and waited. She pulled on the handle, but it remained locked.

  She’d heard it was easy to break into the porn industry, what the hell?

  Suddenly, the door opened, and two men stepped from the building, almost crashing into Mary.

  “Oh sorry,” one of them said, a young guy in jeans, a T-shirt, and Vans tennis shoes.

  They held the door open for her, and she stepped inside.

  It was a mess, with thick electrical cables strewn everywhere, lights on black metal tripods, and the general look of a town hall meeting gone to chaos.

  At the back of the building, Mary saw a cluster of people and walked forward.

  There were four people standing around a small camera mounted on a contraption that looked like a giant mechanical arm. Mary could see the foot of a bed in front of the camera, but not much else.

  One of them men near the camera turned to her.

  “The fluffer is here!” he called out. Mary looked over her shoulder. She had no idea what a fluffer was, although the term sounded familiar. For whatever reason, the people on set seemed to think she was one.

  A large black man, naked, walked out from behind a curtained partition.

  “Over here,” he said to Mary.

  Mary approached the small group near the camera. “Uh, I’m actually here looking for Archer DeLoof,” she said.

  “Aw fuck, you’re not the fluffer?” a man behind the camera said. He was a middle-aged man with a big beer belly and a white goatee.

  “No,” Mary said.

  The beer belly rolled his eyes. “Then who are you?”

  “I told you,” Mary said. “I’m the one looking for Archer DeLoof. Now where is he, Chubby?”

  The man’s face turned red. “How’d she get in here?”

  “Fucking guys must’ve left the door open,” one of the other men said, a lanky man in black jeans and a long-sleeved, black shirt.

  “Get her outta here,” beer belly said.

  “Archer!” the guy dressed in black yelled out.

  A younger man in gray dress slacks, a checked shirt, and a gray vest scurried forward from the back of the building. He had a walkie-talkie clipped to his pants that were already riding low and a cell phone earpiece dangling over his shoulder.

  “What?” he said, at both petulant and clearly subservient.

  “She says she’s not the fluffer, and she’s looking for you,” the guy with the belly said. “Get her the fuck out of here, now please.”

  Archer DeLoof looked at Mary. His face seemed older than the preppy slacker outfit he was wearing. Glasses shadowed his brown eyes, and he sported a beard struggling to take hold along his somewhat handsome chin. Mary thought he could actually be pretty cute if he let go of his lame accoutrements.

  “What do you want?” he said. “How’d you get in here?”

  “Nina Ramirez. I need to talk to you about her,” Mary said, ignoring his question with obvious disregard.

  DeLoof shot his eyes back to the men around the camera, who seemed to be debating about the proper angle of the upcoming shot. The black man was still looking at Mary.

  “I’ve got one minute for you,” DeLoof said to Mary and guided her to a spot about twenty feet from the camera.

  “Look, I’m working here,” he said. He looked back at the group around the camera. “I can’t really talk now. What the hell do you want to know about Nina? If you’re related to her, or a friend or something, you should know she dumped me, not the other way around.”

  “She’s missing,” Mary said.

  DeLoof blinked twice, rapidly. “What do you mean, missing?”

  “You know, no one knows where she is. That kind of missing.”

  “Archer!” someone called from the set.

  DeLoof looked toward the group around the camera, then back to Mary. “Look, I have no idea where she is. She broke up with me, said she was looking for something else. Someone told me she hooked up with a guy named Trey. He’s some kind of agent supposedly. That’s all I know.”

  “What’s his last name?”

  “No fucking clue,” he said.

  “Do you know the name of the agency he’s with?” Mary said.

  DeLoof had already started to walk away, albeit backwards.

  “No, but it’s some fancy place right on Ocean. That big, white office building. Nina pointed it out to me once, you know, before.”

  Mary knew the building.

  “Okay, you need to leave now,” he said. “I have to get back to work.” For a moment, it looked to Mary like he might have something else to add, but then he turned and jogged away.

  “Hey, what’s a fluffer?” Mary called out after him.

  He didn’t answer.

  But the naked black guy waved to her and then pointed at his overgrown member. Then she remembered what a fluffer was.

  Mary waved back then pointed at her own private area.

  “Yeah, I need a fluffer too!” she called out.

  Nine

  “Oh, that’s bullshit,” Aunt Alice said. “Porn stars don’t have agents. It’
s not a real profession, sort of like private investigators.”

  They were sitting on Alice’s back patio. It was a wooden deck with a small glass table and two padded chairs. An open bottle of chardonnay sat between them. Alice’s backyard was small, but the grass was freshly mown, and flowers bordered the small space. A hummingbird feeder sat at the rear of the property.

  “What do you mean they don’t have agents? And how would you know?” Mary said. “You landed all those lonely, horny hitchhiker roles by yourself?”

  “If it weren’t for hitchhikers, you’d never get a date,” Alice said.

  Mary nodded, not disagreeing.

  “There’s big money in porn, though,” Mary said. “It makes total sense there are agents for that stuff too. I mean, if there’s money to be made in any kind of film endeavor, there’s going to be all the hangers-on. Agents included.”

  “That’s a fair point,” Alice admitted. “Leeches don’t tend to be very discriminating.” She took a sip of her wine. “Speaking of not being very discriminating, did you ever get in touch with your boyfriend?”

  Mary twirled the wine in her glass. “No, apparently he has gone undercover.”

  “Gone undercover or gone into hiding?” Alice said. “You know … from you. Isn’t that what happens to most of your boyfriends? Kind of like a Mary Cooper Ex Protection Program.”

  “Ah, I always find a way to track ‘em down,” Mary said. “They don’t get out that easily.”

  “So what do you mean he’s gone undercover?” Alice said. “He’s a homicide detective. They don’t go undercover, right?”

  “He was put on temporary duty with Vice,” Mary said. She sighed.

  “Why the big sigh?” Alice said, and then glanced at Mary. “Oh, I get it. It had something to do with you. What, you two get caught in a broom closet playing with his nightstick?”

  “I wish,” Mary said. “No, it seems Jake had a bit of a falling-out with his boss. My name may have come up a time or two.”

  Mary noticed Alice’s glass was empty. She refilled it, then topped off her own.

  “You know,” Mary said. “An LAPD detective in a relationship with a private investigator … Sometimes, that put him in awkward positions.”

  “Oh, I bet you put him in awkward positions all the time,” Alice said. “You’re probably a pervert.”

  “The indignation coming from you is precious,” Mary said. “Should we get the opinion of your yoga slash sex teacher? I bet you’ve begged him to teach you the downward doggy style.”

  “My lips are sealed,” Alice said. “Except to drink this wine. Because it’s delicious.” She took a sip, laying on the dainty, ladylike mannerisms a bit thick, Mary thought.

  “So are you going go talk to this missing girl’s agent?” Alice made the quotation marks with her fingers around the word “agent.”

  “No, I’m thinking the direct approach isn’t the best strategy,” Mary said. “So much hostility in the porn industry toward a woman who asks a lot of questions. Big surprise there.”

  “So what’s your plan?”

  “Well, I was thinking of going undercover too. Hell, if Jake can do it, I can too.”

  “You mean you’re going to pretend to be a porn star?” Alice said, her voice incredulous. “At your age? Wow, talk about a tough acting gig.”

  “What do you mean at my age?” Mary said. “I’m a total hottie. I could play a teenage babysitter. Or a gym teacher gone wild.”

  “Oh dear me,” Alice said, then started to stand up. “Let me get you a mirror.”

  “Oh sit down,” Mary said. The wine was hitting the spot. Maybe she felt a little fuzziness sprinkle its way across her forehead.

  “I like where this is going,” Mary said. “A porn star. I could pull it off. So to speak.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding, Mary. And you can’t pull it off,” Alice said. “What if they want you to audition? I mean, they’ll be able to tell you haven’t had sex in ages.”

  “I can look trampy if I have to,” Mary said. “They’ll think I’ve been ridden hard and put away wet. No problem.”

  “They say the camera adds ten pounds,” Alice said. She glanced at Mary’s body.

  “That’s perfect, I’m about ten pounds underweight,” Mary said.

  “Yeah, if you were six foot four,” Alice said.

  “I actually think I’ve got a better idea,” Mary said. “Instead of being an actress, maybe I’ll be a producer.”

  Alice snapped her fingers. “I’ve got the perfect idea for a film! It’s about a mature, older woman who lets herself get seduced by her incredibly hot Indian yoga instructor.”

  Alice looked wistfully toward the mountains. “The sex could be so hot …”

  “Maybe I’m not an American porn actress,” Mary said. “You know, maybe I was European.” She snapped her fingers. “Wait, I’ve got it—I was an Italian porn star, but now I’m in America, looking to produce a porno film here. You know, breaking into the industry. And I’m looking for fresh talent to star in my new film.” Mary clapped her hands together. “It’s perfect.”

  “I don’t know, sounds a bit thin,” Alice said.

  “No, it’s dead-on. But I think I might need someone else,” Mary said. “If I’m an actress turned producer, I need a director. I think it would be more believable if I had a director with me.” Mary glanced at Alice.

  “You wouldn’t work,” Mary said.

  “Why the hell not?” Alice said.

  “Jesus Christ, you look like an overgrown Girl Scout,” Mary said. “Maybe if I told them you were in charge of baking muffins for the porn stars between takes.”

  “Don’t give me that,” Alice said. “I’ve got Hollywood harlot written all over me.”

  “No, I need someone totally sleazy,” Mary said. “Someone that doesn’t have to act too hard to come across as being completely without morals. Someone totally inappropriate. With absolutely no shame.”

  Mary lifted her eyes for a moment. Then she glanced over at Alice. They locked onto each for the briefest of moments, then both spoke at once.

  “Kurt.”

  Ten

  Mary and Alice sat at the back of the Calabasas City Fair’s main stage. Calabasas was northwest of Los Angeles proper, near Topanga Canyon, and it had taken them quite awhile to get through traffic.

  Now, Mary sat and looked around. There were forty steel folding chairs, approximately thirty-five of which were empty. The faint smell of livestock hung in the air, along with the sickly sweet smell of fair food, tinged with deep-fried everything.

  Kurt Cooper, Mary’s uncle and Alice’s brother, was on the stage. He was younger than Alice, but looked about ten years her senior. He wore jeans, tennis shoes, a T-shirt, and a shabby sportcoat—probably the only one he owned, Mary surmised. She’d never seen him wear a different one on stage.

  “I don’t want to say last night’s audience was old,” he told the audience, “but when the ladies got all turned on by my act, instead of panties they threw their Depends on stage.”

  One of the audience members—Mary guessed he was one of the ride operators on break—started snoring.

  “How much does he make for something like this?” Mary said to Alice.

  “Whatever it is, they’re paying him too much.”

  Mary heard someone scream. Probably trapped on the Ferris wheel. The entire audience of five people turned toward the commotion, but Kurt Cooper was not about to lose his audience.

  “But don’t get me wrong,” Kurt said. “There are some pretty hot females here. Unfortunately, they’re all down in the livestock barn. You don’t even have to buy them dinner and drinks. Just give ‘em a blue ribbon, and they’re yours for the night.”

  “Oh dear,” Mary said.

  “Check out the guy with the cotton candy,” Alice said. Mary spotted the audience member, clearly stoned, poking the pink cotton candy as if it was some kind of science experiment.

  “Isn’t that—” Mar
y started to say.

  “Jason.”

  Jason Cooper, Kurt’s son and Mary’s cousin, was in his early twenties, and Mary noticed that whenever she bumped into him, he was usually encased in a marijuana cloud.

  “Jason,” Alice whispered at him.

  Mary looked at her. “Yeah, whisper … wouldn’t want to throw off Kurt’s act.”

  Mary’s cousin stood and walked over to them, a tall, gangly young man with curly hair and stooped shoulders. He sat in the chair next to her. The scent of pot followed him.

  “Hey,” he said. Mary looked at him. He wasn’t actually a bad-looking guy, she thought. Kurt’s brother, Brent, who’d been murdered the year before, had always been a ladies’ man. Jason had luckily taken after him, not his father.

  “How’s the cotton candy?” Mary said.

  “It’s so pretty,” Jason said.

  Alice reached out, tore half of it off the stick, and shoved it into her mouth.

  Jason looked at her, aghast. His lip started to tremble.

  “It’s okay, Jason. I’ll buy you another one. Maybe even win you a stuffed polar bear,” Mary said. She glared at Alice who continued to chomp on the candy, a flame of pink shooting out the side of her mouth.

  “I thought you already ate,” Mary said.

  “Mmff mfff frghh,” Alice said.

  There was the sound of a microphone dropping, and Mary looked back at the stage. Kurt was gone.

  “Come on, let’s get in line to see the star of the show,” she said.

  Mary led the way to the side of the stage, where Kurt was talking to a man in jeans, cowboy boots, and a Western shirt, carrying a clipboard.

  “Look, if the set was too short, I can go up and do another fucking hour if you need me to,” Kurt said. “But the deal was a hundred bucks.”

  The man shook his head. “A hundred if we sold out. There were maybe six people out there. And just as many laughs, frankly. Forty bucks is all I can do.”

  “Forty bucks? I spent that on gas to get out here!” Kurt said. “Eighty.”

  “Fifty.”