BLACK to Reality (15 page)

“This is our band. If you don’t like it, leave,” Peter snarled.

“You know what? If that’s your attitude, then I’ll do exactly that. And you can scramble to find a replacement, who may or may not tolerate your idiocy. I’ll take my fat cat and my old ass and hit the road, and when I see you a decade from now playing some dive on the strip, I’ll honk as I drive by. Because that’s where you’re headed. Blow this season, and there won’t be a third one. You’ll be old news, and you know it. Again, I don’t care. My hopes and dreams aren’t dependent on winning this. But yours are. So my advice is to get off the high horse and start figuring out how to win, because otherwise you’ll just be two more also-rans in a town that mints ’em like peroxide blondes.”

Christina looked like her head was going to explode. Peter actually appeared thoughtful, as though his brain had finally caught up to his mouth. Black’s hangover eased as he sipped his coffee, and he realized that he actually didn’t care whether he stayed or left. He would find another client. Nina would fend for herself in defending her good name. Life would go on.

They were interrupted by the front doors opening. Sarah appeared, trailed by Lou. Sarah’s normally serious expression was even more so as she approached, and Black’s stomach did a little somersault.

“Good morning. Black, I’d like a word with you. In private.”

Black nodded and indicated the pool deck. “Step into my office.”

They walked into the morning sun, leaving Christina and her brother to chew on Black’s bombshell. When they reached the barbecue area, Sarah stopped and cleared her throat.

“There’s been a lot of discussion about how to handle your breaking the house rules. What you did was intolerable.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I explained my reasoning to Lou, and that’s my only defense. The guitar store’s not open on Sundays, so I had no choice.”

“I’m aware of your story. The problem is that even if I believe it, we can’t have people breaking rules because they think they’ve got a good reason.”

Black sighed. “Fine. Then I’ll make this easy. It’ll only take a half hour or so to get all my stuff packed and deal with Mugsy. If you want to film it, have at it, because I don’t plan to hang around any longer than necessary. Sorry things didn’t work out.”

Sarah grabbed his arm. “Let me finish. Simon and I discussed it, and I was in favor of booting you. Simon, on the other hand, felt you should have one more chance. I disagreed, but apparently your wife made a persuasive case in your favor. So you got lucky.”

Black studied his shoes. “Ex-wife.”

“From here on out you’re living on borrowed time. One more violation of the rules and you’re out. Oh, and this morning I heard from the head of the sound crew. He said you were hassling one of his men last night.”

“Love Jupiter got F-d on their monitor levels. I called him on it.”

“Mr. Black, let me make this as clear as I can. You’re not to interfere with the crew. You’re not to scold people when you feel they didn’t do their job. You’re to play guitar for Last Call. That’s it. Is there any part of that you find confusing?”

“You don’t care whether they got screwed?”

“It’s not that I don’t care – it’s that your job isn’t to play referee. The producers are satisfied that the performances were legitimate, so case closed. No more disruptions from you, do you read me?”

Black debated pushing it, but decided not to. He’d gotten a reprieve, courtesy of Nina, and he wouldn’t waste it.

“Loud and clear.”

Sarah appeared to soften. “Good. I hate having to be the hard ass. Just cut me some slack here, would you, and stop making things difficult.”

“Put like that, how can I say no?”

“I was hoping you’d play nice. Now, can we go back to making a TV show?”

“You bet.”

Sarah went off to her other duties as Black returned to the kitchen for a refill. Peter and Christina had gone to their room, so he was alone, Lou having also made himself scarce. A knock sounded from the front door. Love Jupiter’s manager entered and brightened when she saw Black.

“Mr. Black! You are who I need to see,” she said.

“Really? Well, today’s your lucky day.”

They sat at the dining table, and the woman leaned forward with her hands clasped in front of her. “Mr. Black, Love Jupiter asked me to make proposal to you.”

“A proposal? About what?”

“They want to buy Mugsy the cat. They love Mugsy.”

“Buy Mugsy?” Black’s eyebrows raised. “How much?”

“They told me authorize ten thousand US.”

“Ten thousand dollars? Are you serious? Where do you expect me to come up with that kind of money to get them to take him?” Black joked. The manager didn’t understand.

“We pay ten thousand US for cat.”

Black shook his head and looked at his watch. “I have to speak to the other owner, and she’s out of town. Do you have a phone number?”

The woman handed him a card with a number written on the back in blue ink. The rest of the card was in Korean. “We leave tomorrow. Flight in morning. You call today at hotel? Ask for Mrs. Kim at Airport Hilton.”

Black said his goodbyes and rubbed a hand across the dusting of beard on his chin. The world had gone insane. Someone was willing to pay to take Mugsy. Probably by the pound, based on the price.

He called Roxie, who picked up on the second ring.

“Hey, boss. Vegas rocks, if that’s why you’re calling.”

Black tried to ignore how happy she sounded. “I’m glad to hear it. But no, that’s not why.” He told her about the offer.

“Absolutely not.”

“Now, Roxie, we can go down to the shelter and find another stray, force-feed it marshmallows for the next five years, and it would be almost as big as Mugsy. Think about the ten grand, would you? For a stray cat!”

“He’s not a stray. He’s mine. I’m just letting you exploit him for your own selfish ends.”

“For which I’m endlessly grateful. But, Roxie – with that money, you could quit your job with the dragon lady tomorrow. Think about it. No more endless demands…”

“But no more Mugsy. I’m sorry, boss, no deal.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.”

“You sound like you have the flu. Did you stay up all night boozing?”

“You know me like the beating of your own heart, don’t you?”

“Try to rein in your substance-abuse issues, boss. It’s sad once a man reaches a certain age.”

“Tell it to Bukowski.”

“You seen any pictures of him?”

“Good point.”

He could hear Alex in the background, urging her to hurry up. She signed off, leaving Black feeling strangely empty. He was overwhelmed by a sense of fatigue and melancholy – no doubt the alcohol metabolizing out of his bruised system. After debating and rejecting the idea of a Bloody Mary in favor of a few more hours of sleep, he sat back and finished his coffee with a slurp, set it in the sink, and tottered up the stairs to where a gassy cat and his roommate slumbered like innocents.

Chapter 17

Cigar smoke hung over the poker table like a lead-colored fog as the dealer slid chips to the lucky winner. A squat man with a face like a toad sat chewing on the stub of a smoldering stogie, eyes roving over the half-dozen players with good-natured glee. He was cleaning up tonight, winning far more hands than he lost, a tribute to his natural superiority, he knew, and not his subordinates’ unwillingness to win too much. “Little” Sal Capelloni’s moods were famous for their propensity to change almost instantly, and nobody wanted to be on the receiving end of one of his unpleasant spells.

“Hey, Tommy, why the long face, huh? It’s been a good week, no? You can afford to lose a little, am I right or am I right?” Capelloni asked the man next to him, a well-groomed, dignified figure in his late forties who ran many of the legitimate businesses that fronted for the mob’s less savory enterprises.

Tommy Greco was a UCLA graduate with a business administration degree who’d become a mover and shaker in the entertainment industry. His stint as the head of a large record label had transitioned into ownership of a dozen production companies, as well as a minority stake in two film studios. He rubbed elbows with Los Angeles’ most powerful and influential, and had no police record – not even a parking ticket. He represented the new breed of mob entrepreneurs who’d taken over senior positions as the old guard retired or died, part of a group that had long ago understood that it was cleaner and easier to steal legally than to resort to the sordid tactics of their predecessors.

The mob left the more violent chores to its Mexican and Russian colleagues, whose reach inside the nation’s prisons and with the myriad gangs that ran the streets was far more extensive than their own. Over the years it had largely assumed a supervisory and supply role, taxing the respective newer arrivals like a church demanding its tithes, rewarding loyalty with larger territories and punishing dissension with deadly force.

Tommy was first and foremost a fixer, a problem solver in a business that depended upon liquidity and relationships. If you needed a film green-lit with funding in place over the weekend, Tommy was always available to make a deal, and he was equally willing to partner on ventures in television and music – always at favorable terms for his silent backers, of course.

Capelloni was one of the last of the old-school bosses, a street enforcer who had risen through the ranks to become the head of his family by the time he was fifty, a lofty position he’d occupied for over a decade, laundering funds through his underlings as he managed the seedier aspects of the organization’s trade – anything to make a buck from civilization’s appetites.

Tommy rubbed his eyes, tired after two hours of cards.

“Nah, it’s not that. It’s just I got a problem. A guy who helped me out with a thing last year has a problem. We were drinking last night over at the casino, and he was betting big and losing bigger, and he told me about the bind he’s in.”

“Does he want our help?” Capelloni asked, sensing an opportunity.

“No, he was just bitching. But he’s a good guy. He’s done us a lot of favors over the years, and he’s into us for a lot of money from his gambling – guy’s kind of a loser with the cards. But I was thinking it would be nice if we could help him. Might come in handy in the future, you know? And I got the feeling his problem could interfere with him paying us back.”

“What’s in it for us?”

“Not much besides goodwill.”

“Ha. Goodwill’s for second-hand clothes,” Capelloni cackled, using one of his favorite lines.

Tommy nodded, having only heard the joke several hundred times. “Yeah, I know. I was just thinking, it would be a small thing we could do, and it could guarantee we’d get paid. Everybody wins.”

“Who is this clown?”

Tommy told Capelloni, reminding him of how the man had assisted them in the past.

Capelloni was silent for several moments and then leaned back. “Well, hell, if that’s his only hang-up, it doesn’t seem like it would take much to make it go away, am I right?”

“It would seem so. But that’s more your call than mine.”

“I respect that you don’t want to get your hands dirty. You’re far too valuable to us to get into a pig-wrestling contest.” Capelloni paused. “Just get me the info, and then forget about it. Consider the problem solved,
capisce?
”

“I’m sure he’ll be very grateful.”

“Which you’ll use to our mutual benefit, right?”

“Of course.”

Capelloni looked around the table and puffed at his cigar as he held up his empty glass. “What does a guy have to do to get a drink around here?”

A gaunt man with a pencil-thin mustache rose from his position on the sofa at the far end of the room. He took the glass and got a new one, three ice cubes floating in an amber sea of Johnny Walker Blue tinkling against the crystal as he carried it back to the table.

Capelloni took a long, appreciative sip as he studied the faces of his entourage.

“Gentlemen – let’s play cards!”

Chapter 18

The following day was the beginning of a new week and, with it, another mindless challenge for team building – although the value of building a team with people you were going to compete against was lost on Black. It seemed like more of an excuse to get the females into swimwear than anything, which Black wasn’t opposed to.

This week’s event was another obstacle course, this time at a water park, with orientation and rehearsals scheduled for the following day and the big contest on Saturday. Tonight would be a group outing to a rock club, which was in turn an opportunity to have the women dress up in their sluttiest outfits and get drunk for the cameras.

Christina and Peter didn’t say a word to him at the orientation, and they couldn’t leave fast enough when it was over. They’d avoided him all the prior day, staying to themselves, which was fine by Black. He and Ed had gone to a movie that afternoon, finishing with a dinner of pizza and beer. Sylvia hadn’t answered her phone or returned his calls, and Black was inclined to believe that this time she was serious about the relationship being dead. However, there wasn’t much he could do from Malibu other than call.

After lunch, he rang Bobby to give him a progress report.

“So how’s the rock star doing?” Bobby asked.

“I’m okay, I guess. It’s depressing as hell to be around a bunch of kids trying to make it, though. I’ve been trying to put an exact date on when all my dreams died, but I’m having a hard time. I’m thinking the day the record company axed me.”

“And here you are, back again, taking the world by storm.”

“You don’t watch the show, do you?”

“Who’s got time for that crap?”

“Here’s the rundown. Nothing provable, but I think the last round was rigged.” Black told him about Love Jupiter.

“As you say, though, there’s no ‘there’ there. Just suspicion, am I right?”

“Unfortunately, yes.” Black shared his meeting with Rick.

“You think he was drugged?”

“It’s possible someone slipped him something. Which puts both the bass player and Rooster in the hot seat. Although the drummer told me that Christina was furious with him over banging the assistant producer, so she’s not completely above suspicion.”