Dream a Little Death, page 4
I shook my head. “Do they really think they’re going to find the money under your mattress? Who could get a decent night’s sleep like that?”
Roy gave me a rueful smile. “$40,000 doesn’t take up that much room. You could fit it in a manila envelope.”
One minute after he left the doorbell rang again.
I ducked into the bathroom to check my teeth for pie, then went to open the door.
No one was there.
There was something on the stoop, however.
A manila envelope.
I looked up and caught the tail end of Miles McCoy’s black stretch Bentley.
After the car disappeared from view, I went inside, sat down on the couch, and opened it up.
There was cash inside.
The five figures I’d been promised.
$40,000, to be exact.
Chapter 6
I believe in certain laws of the universe. Cold hands, warm heart. Objects in the mirror are closer than they appear. There is no such thing as a coincidence—much less forty thousand of them. Which meant it was time to talk to Miles. About the money he’d just left on my doorstep, and what it might and might not have to do with my uncle. And about Carmen Luz, and who exactly she was or was not to him. Today, however, was not going to be the day.
Today was Maya Duran’s debut.
My invitation had been dropped into the mailbox sometime this morning, while Teddy and I were otherwise engaged. It came with a souvenir flip book in which a dark-haired girl in her birthday suit performs a series of acrobatic maneuvers while dangling from the swing of a birdcage. The girl’s face was so small I couldn’t tell if she and the green-eyed girl in the photo I’d stolen from Miles’s wallet were one and the same. Neither could Teddy, who was gracious enough to go through the flip book for me at least a dozen times. Not that it mattered anymore. I was about to see Maya Duran in the flesh. Which was only one of the reasons I’d decided against bringing Teddy as my date.
Sundays were slow at Cat House, so tonight was going to be girls’ night. It was just after eight when I pulled up in front of Cat’s West Hollywood condo. She was waiting outside in a midnight blue sequined mini-romper and thigh-high black boots, her short blond curls tucked inside a floppy, seventies-style hat. “Go big, or go home” is her mantra. For me, this was a work event, so I dressed accordingly: low-cut silk top, narrow black leather pants, leopard-skin ankle boots, a fluffy, cream-colored faux-fur jacket.
We made it downtown in record time. Maybe I’d been reading too much Raymond Chandler, but that evening L.A. looked exactly like he’d described it back in the thirties, the lights an endlessly glittering sheet, neon signs glowing and flashing, the languid ray of a searchlight prodding the high, faint clouds. Chandler also wrote that L.A. had the personality of a paper cup, proving you can’t expect consistency from romantics with drinking problems.
No street parking, so we pulled into the lot next door to the Mayan Theater, whose spectacular pink façade—embellished with carved stone serpents and stout warriors in ceremonial headdress—looked like a Mesoamerican wedding cake.
Cat snapped a couple of pictures on her phone, then said, “Bet you didn’t know this is the place that Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner go clubbing in The Bodyguard.”
Of course I did.
Kevin was another one of my uncles.
The lobby looked like a set designer’s Aztec fever dream, every surface ornamented with hieroglyphics and animal-sacrifice-themed bas-reliefs. A motley crew of dudes in snap-backs, skinny girls with statement glasses, and Williamsburg types sporting Dust Bowl workboots wandered about with neon yellow cocktails as waiters passed hors d’oeuvres.
While Cat went to check her hair, I inhaled half a dozen pigs in a blanket. My mother had canceled our usual Sunday brunch, and I hadn’t eaten all day.
“Try saving some for the rest of us,” I heard someone say.
I spun around. “Pee Chee.” I finished swallowing. “Nice to see you again.”
She looked almost chaste in a chartreuse satin slip dress, fishnets, and a crystal eagle necklace that took up most of the real estate on her ample chest.
“Don’t bother,” she said. “Miles is impressed with you, but I’m not buying.”
“What makes you think I’m selling?” I asked.
“Cheeky.” She reapplied her vermillion lipstick. “I’m going backstage to give Maya some moral support.”
“I didn’t know you two were close,” I said.
“The things you don’t know,” she sighed.
“Who was that?” Cat handed me one of the signature cocktails.
“Miles’s enforcer,” I said.
“Phyllis,” said Cat.
“Pee Chee,” I said, taking a sip of my cocktail.
Cat tried her drink, then wrinkled her nose. “Nope. That’s definitely Meyer lemon.”
I shook my head. “The woman’s name is Pee Chee. Like the folders.”
“If her name is Pee Chee,” Cat asked, “why does she have an ankle tattoo that says ‘Phyllis’?”
Excellent question.
Just then they removed the velvet ropes, and everybody filed past the dwarf palms into the auditorium, which was filled with dozens of round tables covered with white cloths and flickering candles. We cruised around for a while trying to find Miles, then hemmed and hawed about the best place to sit.
“Excuse me?”
I turned around. It was the infamous Destiny D-Low. I recognized her by the vertiginous headwrap and razor-sharp cheekbones. “Y’all are welcome to join me over here.”
The man sitting next to her—a dead ringer for Harry Potter, if he were gay and black—exclaimed, “Sweet Jesus! You’re Dreama!” Then he broke into a rousing a cappella rendition of the song that had stolen my life.
Cat patted my hand, then gave the man a nudge. “Sh. It’s starting.”
The curtain parted to reveal a Rockefeller Center–sized Christmas tree strung with silvery tinsel and flickering white lights. Instead of an angel on top, however, there was Sam-I-Am holding a plate of green eggs and ham. Then the music came up: “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch.”
Maya Duran tiptoed onto the stage. She was dressed as a foxy Cindy Lou Who in a skin-tight pink onesie and blond wig with red bows, and in her arms was a large red ornament ball, which she used to excellent effect as she stripped off her garments to the wailing horns of the beloved Christmas classic, now ruined for me forever, by the way.
Cat whispered, “Where’s Miles?”
Another excellent question.
Next up was “Cherries in the Snow,” a sexy homage to the classic Revlon shade. The climax consisted of Maya slithering to the top of a twelve-foot tube of lipstick, rubbing herself against it, then shimmying down wearing nothing but a smeared kiss on her inner thigh.
“Girl’s a professional,” said Destiny. “That shit isn’t easy.”
I signaled the waiter for another drink, then turned to Cat. “Luke bought me a Lil’ Mynx for my twenty-first birthday.”
Cat nodded. “The Cadillac of stripper poles.”
Destiny said, “I met Luke Cutt at the VMAs once. He was a pussy.”
I said, “Yeah, he couldn’t get it up.”
Cat nearly spit out her drink.
“I’m talking about installing the pole,” I said. “It’s ten feet long.”
Destiny raised an eyebrow. “Size matters, honey.”
In the next number, Maya was done up like a silver-screen goddess. She preened in front of a heart-shaped mirror, then dropped her white satin robe and sashayed over to a glass tub. As it filled with water she traced imaginary lines over her breasts, popped bubbles with her nails, and shed her marabou-trimmed panties and bra. Then she got in and lathered her X-rated bits. When she was done, she played peek-a-boo with her towel. As she exited stage left, the crowd erupted in catcalls.
I turned to Cat. “So? Is Maya the girl you tattooed? The stripper formerly known as Carmen Luz?” I handed her my opera glasses and she peered through them.
“Same hair, same skin, same body type,” Cat said. “The face looks about right. But there’s no way to be sure from this distance.”
So much for that idea.
Suddenly, there was a commotion as two people made their way up to a table in the front.
Miles and Pee Chee, just in time for Maya’s closing number.
Which was called—pithily—“Suicide.”
First came a home movie of a little girl projected on a screen. Then, the haunting vocals of Lana Del Rey’s “Young and Beautiful.” Finally Maya appeared, hair pulled back, face scrubbed, wearing jeans and a white T-shirt. As the flickering image of the little girl gave way to increasingly quick cuts of burns, flashes, and scratches on the reel, Maya paced the stage, taking picture after picture of herself in a doomed attempt to catch the attention of an unseen lover. As the minutes passed, she began to move more and more frenetically, shedding more and more clothing until, stark naked and breathing hard, she crawled across the floor, picked up a gun, and shot herself in the chest.
You could have heard a pin drop.
Then the audience burst into applause.
“She has it,” Cat said. “That thing. That juju.”
Destiny nodded. “You can’t buy that shit, you can’t learn it, and you sure as hell can’t fake it.”
It was true. Everyone knew it. Maya was going to be a star. But then, something strange happened.
Maya didn’t get up.
Then “Young and Beautiful” started to play again.
Lana Del Rey sang about cake and diamonds and having seen the world, and Maya just lay there.
Lana Del Rey sang about pretty faces and aching souls, and Maya still wasn’t moving.
Then the song broke off, the lights came on, and the audience rose to its feet.
And that was when we all knew.
Because under the bright lights there was no mistaking Maya’s unblinking eyes.
It was real.
The gun, the bullet, the blood.
Maya Duran was dead.
Chapter 7
Or would have been dead if the bullet hadn’t missed her heart by half a centimeter. I didn’t think I believed in miracles, but when I woke up the next morning and checked Daily Mail, then TMZ, then E! Online, I wasn’t so sure. Maya had made it through the night. But what a night it had been.
The bullet had shattered into fragments, one of which struck a major vessel, causing her to lose massive quantities of blood. On the way to the hospital, she went into shock. They gave her four transfusions, then patched up her insides during a grueling five-hour operation, and when it finally started to look like she was out of the woods, she’d gone into cardiac arrest. Twice. But time after time, Maya came back from the dead.
Everyone said she must have had a lot to live for.
A few days later, she was moved out of intensive care and into a room on a private floor, with no access to guns, knives, sharp objects, chemicals, ropes, or cords. Not that she was in any condition to do herself further harm. For the time being she was being kept under total sedation. The doctors were guarded about her prognosis, but Miles was hopeful. He’d called me after she was settled and asked if I’d come visit. He’d consulted with a specialist in Eastern medicine who’d said it was essential to cultivate the qi field around Maya through motivation, stimulation, and affirmation. How could I say no? He’d just described my genetic legacy.
The entrance to the hospital was thronged with news vans, reporters, and seedy-looking paparazzi. So much for Maya’s private life. A member of the hospital staff validated my parking ticket, then escorted me up to the sixteenth floor, where Miles was waiting.
He looked like hell. Noah after the flood.
“Thanks for coming,” he said. “Nobody else could find the time.”
“What about Pee Chee?”
“She doesn’t do hospitals.”
“Sorry you’ve been here all alone.”
“People are assholes. They think bad luck is contagious.”
“I thought you weren’t cynical,” I said.
“Maybe I’ve changed.”
Or maybe we don’t know who we are until the proverbial shit hits the fan.
Miles shook his head. “Listen, this whole thing is so fucked up. I have no idea why she did it.”
“She didn’t leave a note?” I asked.
He shook his head.
“Look, she’s alive,” I said. “That’s all that matters.”
Miles led me down the hallway to room 111. He knocked once, then pushed open the door.
It wasn’t exactly your ordinary hospital room. The walls were the color of champagne. The carpet was seashell pink. Cut brass lanterns cast shimmering nets of light. In one corner was an antique vanity draped with a coral and white botanical print, and in another, a slipper chair upholstered in a fluffy white flokati. And in the very center of the room was a huge gilded bed in the shape of a gondola. That was where Maya lay, pale and fragile, her eyes closed, her arms by her sides.
“I don’t want her to feel confused when she wakes up,” Miles explained. “So I moved all her stuff from home. Including a goddamn mountain of clothes she bought at Neiman Marcus the day before her show and never even had a chance to take out of the bags. That gown she’s wearing? The nurse had to remind me to cut off the tags.”
“You don’t do things halfway, do you?” I pointed to the open window, which looked onto the palm-fringed Hollywood Hills and the blue sky beyond. “That’s some view.”
“Yeah,” he said bitterly. “It’s like we won the fucking lottery.”
“Knock, knock.” A woman in a white uniform appeared. “I need to get a pulse.”
I froze in place. Waited. Listened. To Maya’s ragged breaths, the muted beep of the heart monitor, Miles cracking his knuckles, the nurse’s pen scratching on paper.
“All done.” The nurse left the room.
I let out a sigh.
“Good thing I’m a Buddhist,” Miles said, pulling out his prayer beads, “or I’d be raging like an animal. I want to kill someone.”
“Miles—”
“Don’t say it. I just want you look at her.” Miles fixed his gaze on his fiancée. “She’s so young.” He shook his head. “And so beautiful.”
I pulled a chair up to the other side of the bed, sat down, looked at her. Even with her eyes closed, she was lovely, her short dark hair thick and glossy, her features tiny and perfect.
And then I saw it, beneath the fluttery sleeve of her gown.
A large tattoo of a pink lotus flower.
Well, that pretty much made it official.
Maya Duran and Carmen Luz were the same person.
This was the obvious moment to return the photo I’d stolen from Miles’s wallet. And to tell him what I’d found out about the woman he was planning to marry. But what had I found out, really? That she’d changed her name from Carmen Luz to Maya Duran? So what? That she had a past? Who didn’t? That a couple of years ago someone had given her a black eye? Maybe she’d walked into a door.
“She looks like Sleeping Beauty,” I said.
“Too bad I’m not fucking Prince Charming,” Miles answered. “I kissed her, and she’s still out cold. Joke’s on me, I guess.”
I stared at him.
“Sorry,” he said. “I don’t mean to lay my personal shit on you. You’re just easy to talk to.”
Like I said, it’s in the D.N.A.
Miles took a seat on the edge of the bed. “This thing’s cursed. I should have never bought it for her.”
Apparently, the gondola bed had a long and checkered history. Originally, it belonged to a French dancer who died of Spanish flu because she wouldn’t allow the surgeons to perform a tracheotomy and scar her neck. After her death, it was purchased by Paramount Studios, who used it as the centerpiece of Norma Desmond’s boudoir in Sunset Boulevard. One year later, it made it to the collection of Lili St. Cyr, the last queen of striptease, the “Anatomic Bomb” who seduced millions of strangers while barely surviving ten abortions, six marriages, obscenity charges, a heroin addiction, and multiple attempted suicides.
Maya Duran idolized Lili St. Cyr.
“Maya’s bubble bath dance the other night was vintage Lili,” Miles explained. “So was that damned suicide dance. In Lili’s version, the girl jumps off a ledge. Maya wanted to use a gun. I didn’t like it, but she never listens to me. Still, I watched her pull the trigger a thousand times. There was a muzzle flash, but she didn’t die! She got up and we went out to dinner! Who wouldn’t have assumed the thing was a goddamn replica? I’m telling you, somebody’s got to pay for this, but I don’t know who to blame. Toxic parents? A fucked-up exotic dancer from the 1950s? Fate?”
Seems to me he’d left a couple of names off of his list.
Mine, for starters.
I mean, I show up at a house in Glendale where Maya Duran once lived, ask a couple questions about her alter ego, Carmen Luz, and the very next day the woman tries to kill herself?
And what about Miles? Why wasn’t his own name at the top of the list? If the person you loved had just attempted suicide, would you give yourself a pass? I don’t think so.
I think you would take a long, hard look in the mirror.
I think you would struggle over what you could have done differently.
I think you would rend your clothing and tear your hair and curse the very day you were born.
Miles wasn’t doing anything of the sort.
Suddenly, the door opened, and a woman stepped into the room.
Miles pawed anxiously at his beard. “Doctor.”
“Could I have a few minutes with our patient?” she asked.
He went pale. “Something wrong?”
The doctor walked over to check one of the bags hanging from the IV pole. “Exactly the opposite. We’re going to give it the weekend, then we’re going to ease up on the sedation. I’m thinking Wednesday, Thursday at the latest, Maya should be talking and walking. And if all goes well, she’ll be going home soon after that.”
