Page 77

“Hush, Gort.”

Everyone quiets down as the news goes local. There was another massacre in Laurel Canyon. Five dead. All beaten to death. No one saw anything.

What the fuck is wrong with that place?

I should have seen it coming with the Three Stooges the other night. A massacre is nothing new out there. You could fertilize all the farms in the Central Valley with the bodies buried in Laurel Canyon.

In the sixties, when the young and the beautiful from music and movies ruled the roost, they dumped hapless shitheads who OD’d at parties there when it was too risky to call an ambulance. In earlier, classier days—­the twenties through the forties—­well-­connected stars could call a manager or agent who’d arrange a discreet disposal of human waste by studio security. Not that they’d necessarily need it. There was always been plenty of room to bury an unruly spouse with the help of a lover or two.

The Army Air Corps even built a base at the top of Wonderland Park Avenue in 1941. It was transformed from an air defense site into a military movie production house, but rumors still persist that they ran experiments on some of the hippie locals. Mostly MKUltra-­style acid tests. Dose enough innocents and you’re bound to end up with a few bodies, and who knows how to get rid of bodies better than the army?

Cops have always loved the canyon. In the old days, they’d drive mobsters high up into the hills and dump them into the ravines. Let the coyotes have them. A lot of gangland hits went down out there too. For a while it was Bugsy Siegel pulling the triggers, then, after a sniper splattered his brains all over his Beverly Hills mansion, it was Mickey Cohen’s turn. He was a professional boxer in his youth and knew how to use his hands. After him, Johnny Stompanato got to run a little mayhem through the Sunset and the canyon. Of course, no one could prove anything. There were accusations of murder, but nothing came of them. In the end, Siegel got shot for his Las Vegas sins. Johnny Stomp was knifed to death by Lana Turner’s daughter. And Cohen was put away for tax evasion.

Laurel Canyon hosted a thousand random deaths over the years. The still unidentified Jane Doe number 59 was found with 157 stab wounds. Aging star Ramón Novarro—­“Ravishing Ramón” in happier times—­was murdered by a ­couple of not very bright rent boys. In the late twenties, Samantha Bach, a rising MGM starlet, was wasted by her producer/lover Irvine Lansdale. The killing was a kind of proto–Black Dahlia affair. Like the B movie before the big feature. Bach was found propped up in bed, pale and lovely, not a drop of blood on her, but with her heart and eyes resting on a bedside table.

Laurel Canyon still beckons generation after generation to its promise of the good life, its movie-­star frisson, and faux-­rural splendor. Most of the current show-­business creeps and money-­shuffling assholes who roam its hills and trails smile down at the suckers below in Hollywood, never knowing or caring that they’re gazing out over one big graveyard.

And now some New Age Nazis were beating the shit out of the locals. Anywhere else I’d be surprised. But not there.

From outside the store comes a series of pops, like a string of firecrackers, only the sound is too low and flat. I shove Vincent and Kasabian to the floor and yell, “Candy, get down!” before taking a dive myself.

Bullets tear up Max Overdrive’s front wall. One shatters the edge of the big screen. Kasabian squeals “No!,” more afraid of losing his screening room than catching a slug in the face. Vincent is flat on the floor spread eagle, like a pinned butterfly. Not too dignified, but he’s new at the duck and cover game and doesn’t grasp the necessity of keeping some shred of dignity while hunkered down, scared shitless. For example: you don’t want to be found dead, say, head down and ass in the air, ostrich-­style. That’s guaranteed to give the crime-­scene squad the giggles as they zip you into a body bag, and who wants to leave the world a funny corpse?

Finally, the shooting stops, but not before the last bullet blows apart the Gentleman Jack, an innocent bystander.

When the room goes quiet, I jump up and head to the door. A blue Honda Civic is idling at the curb. I head outside. Reaching behind my back for the Colt, I realize it fell out of my waistband when I hit the floor. Still, I’m mad enough that when the Honda pulls away, I run after it, hoping to catch it before it reaches the corner. I can’t recommend this method of chasing down bad guys. It’s not subtle or a good use of your adrenaline.

Plus, when the banditos decide to back up and run you over—­like they seem to be doing right now—­you’re standing in the street like a side of beef with a glow-­in-­the-­dark target painted on your brisket. I take a few steps back toward the store, but the car keeps gaining speed.

Gunfire pops over my shoulder and the Honda’s back window explodes. Candy runs up with her 9mm blazing. The Honda squeals to a stop, then takes off in the opposite direction. I grab Candy and pull her into the shadows at the side of the store, hoping the neighbors haven’t moved back to town so they can call the cops on our little O.K. Corral.

I hold Candy in the dark for a ­couple of minutes. She’s vibrating with animal rage, her body in the transition state between regular Candy and her Jade form. I’ve never seen a full-­on Jade with a gun, and I’m not sure I want to. Soon she calms down and folds up the pistol. I let go of her and we walk around to the front of the store. There are more than a dozen bullet holes in the walls, but not a single shot through the glass.

“Here’s why,” Candy says.

Some clever boots has painted ED on the window, so the angel’s tag now reads KILLED. Next to that is a squiggle that looks like a left-­handed monkey painted it with his right hand. But if I squint at it hard enough, I can make out the emblem of the White Light Legion. Turns out these guys might be murderous Nazi shitheads, but they’ll need some community-­college art classes before they take over the world.

The paint is still wet, so Candy leans on my arm and smears out the letters and emblem with the sole of her boot.

When we get inside, Vincent, always the good guest, is soaking up the spilled whiskey with paper towels. The Colt is lying by the edge of the counter. I pick it up and put it back in my waistband.

Vincent stops wiping the floor and looks up.

“Was all that because of me?”

I look at him on the floor on his hands and k

nees, wet towels in one hand and a confused look on his face. I’ve never seen an angel so out of his element.

“I don’t know. We ran into them the other night. It could be you, or it could be on us.”

“How did they find you?” says Kasabian. “I mean, am I going to have to crawl around the store like a goddamn schnauzer waiting for round two?”

“That’s a good question,” says Candy. “How did they find us?”

“I turned on the car lights the other night. Maybe one of them saw the license plate.”

“That would lead them to Julie, not us.”