Unwanted Company - Barbara Seranella (4 page)

"Yeah," she heard him say "We're on
the way. All set on your end?" There was a moment of silence,
then he said, "You just worry about you. "

The Beverly Wilshire Hotel was built in a section of
Beverly Hills where no freeways run. To get there, she headed up big
Santa Monica Boulevard, past the Mormon Temple, with its golden
steeples and acres of perfectly trimmed grass. The lavish expanse of
green amidst the teeming streets of West Los Angeles was as
impressive a testimony to the section's wealth as anything else. As
she passed the block-long black wrought-iron fence surrounding the
grounds, she read the sign posted near the sidewalk. THE CHURCH OF
LATTER-DAY SAINTS it proclaimed.

Latter-day Saints.

She pictured angels catching the last train to
heaven, waiting till the last minute to leave earthly temptations
behind. Better latter than never, they were saying.

At Wilshire Boulevard she hung a right, past Wilson's
House of Suede on the corner of little Santa Monica and Wilshire. The
six-lane thoroughfare was crowded as usual. No matter what time of
day it was, the road never seemed wide enough to accommodate the
never-ending stream of jaguars, Mercedes, and Rolls Royces as they
headed for the pricey restaurants and the exclusive showrooms of
Rodeo Drive. When they arrived at the entrance of the Beverly
Wilshire, with its baroque facade and thick brass railings, Raleigh
Ward did wait for the white-gloved valet to open his door. "You
going to be okay?" he asked her before he jumped out. "I'll
be back in fifteen."

"
I'll be here," she said.

The doorman told her she couldn't congest the
entrance and would have to circle the block.

"Didn't you see who that was?" she asked.

His cocky expression wavered for an instant.

She made a derisive noise through her teeth and shook
her head in disgust. "Only the owner of this hotel."

He studied her for a moment, then moved a cone and
let her wait unmolested in the hotel's circular driveway. Ten minutes
later, Raleigh returned with a plump, bald man. The second man's
polyester pants flared at the hem, and the points of his shirt collar
nearly reached his pockets. She was no fashion expert, but she knew
which decade it was.

The first words out of Mr. Disco's mouth were, "Where
are the whores? You said we'd have broads." He had a European
accent-something Slavic,

Raleigh looked pained. "We're going to pick them
up now."

The address on North Gower turned out to be an
apartment complex. The entrance to the parking lot was blocked by an
electronically operated, twelve-foot iron gate. Security cameras were
mounted on the complex's light poles. Raleigh had Munch punch the
numbers 1-0-3 into a 10—digit keypad. She heard a phone ringing,
and then a woman's voice said hello.

"It's us," Raleigh called from the
backseat.

"
Pull up to the left," the woman said. The
gate slid open. The women who emerged from Apartment 103 were
long-legged and buxom. Munch wondered how they managed to move so
effortlessly in their four-inch spikes and short, tight skirts. Both
women carried tiny purses and no coats.

"Now we'd like to see some nightlife,"
Raleigh said. He looked over at the bald guy. "Show us the
hottest, hippest club in L.A."

"
I know just the place," Munch said. She
pulled out into the street with one hand on the Thomas Guide, already
thumbing to the page that showed the dense grid of streets that make
up metropolitan Los Angeles.

Twenty minutes later, they arrived at the Stock
Exchange—a New York-style dance club and bar complete with a
tuxedo-clad doorman standing guard under a silk awning. The guy was
huge. well over six feet, with a tiny ponytail and a superiority
complex. Raleigh's bald friend slipped her a twenty and told her to
get them past the velvet rope.

She pulled up in front of the club. When she stopped,
she was aware of the people in line trying to see in through the
limo's tinted windows. Someone called out, "Hey, my car's here."
Like he was the first joker to come up with that line. She ran a
brush through her hair and got out of the car. The doorman raised
half an eyebrow. With the twenty folded in her gloved hand, she
approached him, stopping short at the edge of the red carpet that
extended out onto the sidewalk from the club's door. They leaned
toward each other until his lips hovered over her ear.

"
How many?" he asked.

"Four," she said as she slipped him the
bill. He nodded. She returned to the limo and opened the door to the
passenger compartment. Raleigh and his companions eased themselves
out. He patted her arm, and said, "We're going to be a while. "
He glanced nervously up the street "Where will you be?"

"
I'll keep an eye out for you," she said.
"This is my gig. Don't worry. Have a good time."

He answered her with a look that seemed to say she
had suggested something ridiculous, then entered the club with his
party.

Munch parked the car in the underground parking
structure next to the club and climbed into the back of the limo to
survey the damage. It wasn't terrible. She washed out the glasses
they had used and filled them with fresh cocktail napkins that she
folded so as to show off the company logo. The phone was still on.
She pushed the recall button and wrote down the phone number he had
called. She'd been burned too many times not to take as many
precautions as possible. just last month she'd collected on a
deadbeat plumber who owed her two hundred dollars. The run had begun
as a two-hour dinner date for which the plumber paid in advance with
cash. Then he and his date had started drinking and directing Munch
to cruise all over the county. The plumber swore he'd pay her the
next day. Multiple calls to the guy's work had produced no results.
Then she tried calling the number the guy called from the limo. When
she asked for the plumber, the woman said she was the wife and asked
what was this about. The wife was not the same woman who'd made nasty
with him in the back of the car. Munch made up some quick story about
working on the guy's van and needing to talk to him about additional
repairs. The wife promised to give the plumber the message. The very
next day the guy paid.

After putting the phone back into its niche, she
restocked the ice compartment with mixers and wiped down the chrome.
Satisfied, she returned to the cab and settled down with a paperback.
Two hours later, the book no longer held her interest. In the warm
quiet of the car, the day's fatigue was catching up with her. She
wondered if they served coffee inside the Stock Exchange. They must.
She also needed to use the bathroom. She put down her book, pulled
her gloves back on, locked the car, and headed up the garage ramp.
The doorman turned his head halfway in her direction as she
approached.

A long line of hopefuls still waited to get into the
club. The doorman regarded them with contempt as they smiled gamely
at him and hopped from foot to foot, trying to get a peek inside.

The only way to impress Mr. Ponytail, she knew, was
with indifference. She leaned against the wall and stared at nothing.
The standoff lasted fifteen minutes, then Mr. Ponytail did the only
cool thing left. He unhooked his velvet rope and nodded her in. She
passed him, acknowledging his graciousness with a slow blink, knowing
better than to smile outright. She might need to get in there again
sometime.

Inside the club, the walls throbbed with music.
Quarter-sized rainbows thrown from a rotating disco ball jiggled
across dancers' faces and bodies. Black-and-white Bogart movies
played on the twenty-foot walls, providing a backdrop for several
go-go dancers who gyrated on catwalks.

When she emerged from the bathroom, she spotted
Raleigh-baby leaning against the bar. One of the women they had
picked up in Hollywood was dancing pelvis to pelvis with another man.
He watched them with pursed lips. Mr. Disco and the other woman
leaned over her purse, sniffing coke, it looked like. Raleigh noticed
Munch and waved her over.

"What you need, doll?" he asked.

"
Coffee."

Raleigh beckoned to the bartender, shouted in his
ear, and a cup of coffee appeared on the bar top. Munch sipped
gratefully. Raleigh watched his date for another couple of minutes,
then turned back to Munch. "Get the car," he said. "We're
leaving."

She looked at him uncertainly, wondering if he meant
to leave the women behind.

"
Get the car," he said.

By the time she had the car positioned at the
entrance of the club, Raleigh, the bald guy, and the two women came
rolling out. They asked to stop at a liquor store for supplies, then
Munch delivered the party back to the address in Hollywood. One of
the women jumped out of the back and punched a few numbers on the
keypad. The electronic gate slid open. Munch waited until the woman
was back in the car, then slowly pulled into the driveway.

"
I'll be right back," Raleigh said.

She watched him climb the stairs with the other
three. Soon light filled the window of the apartment. Through the
thin curtains she could see the four of them walking around. Raleigh
returned to the car minutes later and told her to drive a couple of
blocks, then pull over. The privacy partition went up. Over the
microphone she heard the tones as he punched another number in the
car phone.

"
All set," he said. "Later."

She heard him mixing himself a drink the ice hitting
the tumbler, the hiss of a soda bottle opening, the glug of the
decanter emptying.

She waited for him to roll down the window that
separated them and give her instructions. Instead he made a second
call.

"
It's me," he said. His voice softened. If
his head hadn't been lolling in the corner, near the mike, she would
have missed his next words. "Please," he said in a tone
that embarrassed her to overhear. "I just want to talk to you."
A moment later, the privacy partition rolled down.

"Take me home," he said.

On the drive back to Culver City, he was quiet. She
checked on him periodically through the rearview mirror, expecting to
see him passed out. But every time she looked, he was staring out the
window. When they turned onto his street, he finally spoke.

"
I've got a proposition for you," he said.

"
What's that?"

"
We got a six-hour ticket going. That's what?
Two and a half bills?"

"Two hundred and seventy-six plus the phone
charges."

"
All right. You got a head for numbers. I like
that. How 'bout you write me a receipt for . . . How much is eight
hours?"

"
Three sixty-eight plus the phone charges."

"
All right. Make the bill close to four hundred,
don't make it an even number. We'll still end now, but I'll give you
three bills. I'm talking cash."

"
I don't know."

His voice was heavy from the whiskey. She glanced at
the liquor decanters and noted that he and his guests had drained all
three.

"
I'm going to need a car off and on for the rest
of the week, maybe longer. Did I mention that?"

She pulled up in front of his building, next to a
streetlamp that would give her sufficient light, and pulled out her
receipt book. "Do I make this out to you or your company?"

"Just leave that part blank."

She heard the rear door open and wondered if he was
going to try to skip out on her. A moment later he was at her
passenger door. She cleared her map off the seat just before the door
lurched open and he let himself down heavily on the plush velour
upholstery. For just an instant his coat lifted up and she saw a
leather holster on the back of his belt. Her pen moved quickly across
the pad. The sooner this evening ended, the better.

He sighed heavily, filling the compartment with his
whiskey breath. She looked over at him, thinking she might make some
small joke to lighten the moment.

Instead she found him staring at her in a way that
stopped the words forming in her mind. The despair emanating from him
staggered her. His head drooped from his shoulders. As he looked over
at her, his lower lids sagged open, showing the parts of his eyeballs
where they curved under. To call them the whites of his eyes would
have been a misnomer. Those orbs of his were completely red, more
than she would have believed possible. Beyond tears. He'd have to
feel a whole lot better before he could cry.

She knew that because she recognized the place where
he was. A person never forgets that place, not if they've ever been
there. How it feels when things just keep getting worse and you never
seem to die.

The Program called it incomprehensible
demoralization; that pretty much summed it up.

She saw that in Raleigh Ward, in the dull gape of his
mouth. It was in his eyes, too, that unmistakable expression that was
both glazed and naked.

She also knew that there was a safeness in that
place, that bottom. If it didn't feel so bad, you could look around
and take comfort in the fact that you were invulnerable.