CoverBoys & Curses (7 page)

Chapter Nineteen

The
Bad Seed

IT
WASN’T GEOFF AND HIS
heebie-jeebie
voodoo that
bothered me, nor did I expect it to rescue me. It was my life. Never mind that
I gave thought to my watch at six o’clock that night. Stuck in traffic and already
running a half hour late for my haircut, I finally called to cancel the
appointment. I barely had time to get home and prepare my first real meal at
the new house.

The
steaming sauce of garlicky oil, tomato, carrot and basil came to a gentle boil
as I slid in the
Osso
Bucco
, then
placed the heavy lid on the casserole dish and shoved it into my virginal oven.

Sterling
strode in juggling a bag of fresh bread and a bottle of Silver Oak cabernet. We
uncorked the wine and took our plates out to the deck.

The
temperate evening air held just a hint of salty breeze coming across the
Pacific waters. The beach was quiet but for the token Frisbee chasing Golden
Retriever in the distance, accompanied by a chattering of white gulls.

“This place
is perfect for you, Lauren.” Sterling refilled her wine glass. “But how are
you, really?”

“Cut
right to the chase, huh?”

“I’m not
over Payton. I know you aren’t. It seems like there’s a hole in the whole.”

Tears
wanted to rise to the occasion but I denied them. “It’s the Visconti curse. You
know my background.”

“That
you’ve lost loved ones? Big deal.”

“It’s
more than that. My DNA matches a spineless woman who managed to survive a
violent rape. That means half of me is the seed of a rapist. I can’t get that
fact out of my head.”

Sterling
gulped down the red liquid and set the balloon glass back down on the table. “So
we’re back to the fact that you’re adopted. And you were loved. What is your
self arguing about now?”

She
surprised me sometimes. Inside the body of a bimbo was an intuitive soul. Smart
as hell, too.

I curled
the edges of my napkin, purposely avoiding eye-contact. “Look at my life.”

Sterling,
my friend but an outsider. She would think I had everything going for me, but
the truth was I had nothing. I had no family. I had no love, and if I loved it,
it would die. And that’s because I’m the heir to the devil. Yes, the devil and
his sixes had crossed my mind, although I had no idea what it might mean for
me.

I
continued what felt like a soliloquy, “I’m the bad seed. Sometimes I feel him.
I feel the evil soul of Nathan Judd residing inside me.”

Sterling
hadn’t heard his name in years. Nathan Judd had died when his victim, my mother,
fought back with a blow poke. The authorities had ruled the death self-defense
with the agreement to cover up the adoption of the child conceived in violence.

Unsure
of where the conversation had left to go, I removed myself and grabbed the
Couvossieur
from
the newly stocked bar. The sun had set, and the cool air began to engulf us. I
lit the small gas fire-pit. Shifting back into my chair, I was aware of the
strain I’d brought to the evening. It seemed lately I managed to ruin most good
moments.

Sterling
hesitated, then reached into her pocket. “I’m sorry. I just don’t know what to
do with these.”

Payton’s
keys to her house. We’d never been instructed how to return them.

“I’ll
hold on to them. Maybe call her mom,” I said. I walked inside, pulled out the
box we had taken from Payton’s home and placed them inside.

“I
shouldn’t have dumped them on you.”

“Why
not?”

“The new
surroundings are great, Lauren, but they won’t heal what’s inside of you.
You’ve had a lot of loss in your life, this much I know is true. Maybe you
should consider some professional counseling.”

I heaved
back onto the chair. “Seems like a popular notion these days.”

“I’m the
worst one to offer advice, but I think you need to get hold of your priorities,
and it doesn’t seem like it should be business. And just so you know, we’re
your family. Me and Carly.

“You’re
all I have left in the world.”

And I’d
fear for my life if only I were them.

Chapter Twenty

Celebrations

DR.
HARLAN COAL COULD always shake off the flu-like symptoms his body endured after
a night at a good baseball game. It was worth it, he thought. A cocaine celebration
well deserved. All of his community homes had sold for full asking price. None
of his clients, or buyers, or patients, or whatever he decided to call them,
had the good sense to haggle over his inflated sales price. Exorbitantly
ridiculous, even by Hollywood Hills standards.

There
wasn’t a space unsold for his therapy sessions, either—all booked out months in
advance. And he’d be juggling his next book tour after he finalized the deal
with his new publisher. Of course the publisher didn’t know that he wasn’t
going to sign books in some damn storefront. And in certain states where the
threat of his being exposed loomed too large to risk. He’d be holding seminars
where attendees would get a free book for the steep price of admission, of
course.

An
appointment he anticipated with alacrity dragged on for forty minutes before
his patient finally got around to asking him what he wanted to hear. He cleared
his throat and excused himself for a moment. In his private bathroom he took a
cold washcloth to his face, then breathed. He took a tissue to his nose. A
little blood. No big deal. Just a little too much baseball. He studied himself
in the mirror, then returned.

“I’ll
squeeze her in, Carly, but only as a favor to you. You know I’d do anything for
you. You said her name is Visconti? How do you spell it? And her first name?”

I
ENTERED MY BUILDING through the lobby’s brass and glass doors and crossed to
the bank of elevators. The center cab opened and three little elderly ladies
decked out in Rodeo Drive hats and matching handbags stopped short their chattiness.
All three raised their eyebrows to me as I waited for them to exit the
elevator, as if I should have apologized for my intrusion.

I’d
closed on the sale of my building and had bought out all the tenant leases
except for one. The cranky geriatric psychiatrist on the tenth floor refused to
be bought out of his lease, no matter my offering price for any inconvenience.
It made me wonder what the difference was between a geriatric shrink and every
other Hollywood mind-guru. I guess I really didn’t want to know the answer.
Mostly the doctor kept to himself, and mostly his clients did the same. Still,
I felt like I was the outsider.

Closing
my private office door now on the top floor, I willed myself into a capricious
state of mind. I’d self-prescribe that for my over analytical mind.

CoverBoy
sales looked promising, given
the inclement market. Subscriptions were up seventeen percent over our
predictions, and just as Queen Geoff had speculated, we discontinued our
discounted launch prices on advertising. There were no complaints from our
growing list of advertisers, unless we were out of units to accommodate them.

I wasn’t
going to let Geoff’s constant warnings ruin my day. We had run a story about
the model. And we were going to run many more, if the fates would allow. Our
articles were provocative. We had the glistening abs thing going, but we did
the real stuff in investigative journalistic reporting. Sometimes we got flack.
Sometimes we even got hate mail. I was aware this would not change. And I stood
firm. We documented every word we printed.

Even our
critics seemed to back off. We had a good format. We conducted concrete
interviews. We didn’t sensationalize. We told the truth. Sadly, the truth was
often sensationally sickening.

CoverBoy
ran these stories next to
pictorials depicting what women wanted to see. Real men in real situations.
Some male models wore extravagantly expensive suits, a few were almost naked
and with visible arousals. Our top models were in their twenties, but we filled
bountiful pages with men far older, including a seventy-three year old swimmer
who wanted us to show all of him. Sukie did a
‘Women of
Rylstone
’
thing at the last
moment, strategically placing a life preserver in front of his family jewels.

We had
plenty of female portraitures, too. Real women. We had one rule that shocked
the women’s media world. Sukie did touch-ups and used filters, but no
photograph received digital enhancement. No body shop parts, either.

Our
formula worked.

The hate
mail kept coming in. No surprise, this month it came from the top model
agencies, their owners and their talent agents. They didn’t like our inference
that cocaine diets were a prescribed means to fame on the runway. We didn’t
infer, anyway. We reported the facts.

Chapter Twenty-One

The
Centre

CARLY’S
NEW HOME looked nothing like her mansion in Bel Air. One fourth of the square
footage. Far less opulence. Nothing more than a Mexican kitchen and I knew she
loved to cook. I choked back the shock, relieved to see she still surrounded
herself with a few personal treasures, including a worn leather chair and a few
framed photos. Other than that, the place was a Shaker style of barren.

I asked
Carly to show me her house before my introductory meeting with Dr. Coal. I
hoped it would calm me down, but in spite of the lovely grounds, the warm
reception, and Carly’s rapturous state of mind in her new home, something
didn’t feel right.

Me. And
a shrink. That wasn’t right. It wasn’t a Visconti thing to do.

“Some of
the homes are co-ed. Some are more like bunkhouses,” Carly said. “There are a
few families on the south side where the play equipment is. Stuff like that. If
there’s any pressure around here it’s in not sharing your home, because they’re
all sold and so many people want to live here. I need my privacy. I paid for
it.”

“Privacy?
With no locked doors?”

“You
noticed. Ultimately it’s about respect,” Carly added.

“Respect?”

“Spatial
respect and respect of property. The people want to live here. There’s even a
waiting list. It’s hard for me to put into words, Lauren, but they’re like
family to me. The family I never had. I have all the privacy I need, but I also
take comfort in knowing so many wonderful people live and hang out around
here.”

Carly
explained that there were only a couple of locked doors on the entire
compound—none in the privately owned homes. Most of the public areas had no
doors. Screens here and there stood as the only sentry to protect interiors
from critters or inclement weather. As I crossed the grounds toward the
building where I would be meeting Dr. Coal, the structure unfolded with open
archway after archway. Gateways, Carly called them.

ARRIVING
ON TIME, I wasn’t sure what to do. Knock on the wall? Give out a ‘yoo—hoo’? The
inner passages seemed inviting enough. I walked in.

I’d
already endured a series of involved oral interviews from staffers at The
Centre. A written questionnaire seemed to be the length of a novella by the
time I completed it. Apparently, I was applying for therapy. Apparently, I had
passed the test.

From
what I knew of him the barren room personified his platform for both his
community and the successful practice he’d created. Polished Santos wood floors
gave way to his small wooden desk and chair—quality pieces but in a plain
minimalistic style. In lieu of the traditional therapist’s sofa, a variety of
aged
dhurrie
rugs dominated the floor space and
pillows scattered recklessly across the floor. The lighting was natural,
enhanced with a few full-spectrum bulbs. A faint and unobtrusive scent of
chamomile and cypress lingered. The few notable extravagances were a pair of
woodcarvings—lions standing guard over the open space, a large altar framed by
white candles, and a most unusual statue on the desk.

“Go
ahead. You can touch it. Almost everyone does. It seems to attract people like
a Buddha’s belly,” Dr. Coal said as he entered the room from behind me.

“It’s
one of a kind. The ivory elephant is the symbol of good luck when his trunk is
lifted that way. He’s setting sail in the small wooden rowboat, the lowliest
form of transportation on the high seas, and he knows he’s a hefty load. That
symbolizes faith.”

I didn’t
touch the sacred ivory, but my fingers glossed over the rich detail of the
carved stone base. “And the marble?”

“Lapis
lazuli, actually. The gemstone of powers and hidden energies. And either the
artist knew that, or he was just happy to find a blue rock that resembled the
ocean waters.” He extended his hand. “You must be Lauren.”

I
expected L.A. opulence, and I definitely expected the good doctor to be dressed
in no less that a silk suit and alligator shoes. Tie—optional. Instead he
greeted me himself, without a receptionist. Not even a receptionist’s desk. As Carly
had told me, there were few doors, not even to mark the entrance. He was
dressed in a casual Ralph Lauren beach look, with a white gauze shirt flowing
over white cotton drawstring pants, and leather sandals on his feet.

Aware I
might have been staring, I darted my eyes back to the statue. “Very informal.”

“Does
that concern you?”

“No. Not
really.”
A breath of fresh air
.

MOON
BLADE SLATHERED the counter with a coat of fresh blood. It didn’t matter for
now where the blood came from. Insatiable, the copper tang of the blackened
pool of liquid would make do to make the evening right.

           
The
Macarta
black-handled Damascus skinner, along with a
Springsteel
and an assortment of fine daggers, remained tucked away in their sanctuary.
Rebuilding energy. Strengthening their pulse.

           
Soon. Very soon.