"Actually-"

"Forget it, Sammy. TV's the only way to go. They're taking chances the studios won't, and even though syndication's not the honeymoon it used to be, it's still a serious game. Think you can write me up a treatment- one or two pages? Let's say by next Tuesday?"

"Sure," I said, "but I want to discuss some story elements with you first, make sure we're talking the same language."

"Story," he said dismissively. "You're the writer. Give me good and evil, some conflict, resolution- maybe some martial arts. Networks are ripe for martial arts, nothing decent since Kung Fu. Musicians and nudists and evil. 'Course they couldn't be shown nude, but you'll find some way to let everyone know they're buck naked. Like a sly wink, know what I mean? But respectful of the human body. Something women can get behind. Good and evil. The characters arc, but they maintain their basic good-bad nature. The more I think about it, the better I like it."

He rubbed his hands together and stood. "You got thirteen fucking minutes for the price of five, Sam."

"You see Mellors as the evil lead?" I said.

"If you make him white."

"Can you tell me anything more about him that would flesh out the character?"

"Nasty piece of work. Like I said, he hated women, called them manipulative bitches. I took him in, after Sanctum closed. Gave him a job because I felt sorry for him. He was working on a book, couldn't finish it."

"Writer's block?"

"Money block. Writer's block was Lowell's game. Talk about big talk, no action. Anyway, Denny came to me begging because he knew I was a soft touch. Broke- he'd depended on Lowell. He was writing this novel, gonna be the greatest thing since Moby Dick if he could only finish it. Being a liberal do-gooder, I gave him a job with my company in return for first refusal on the manuscript."

"What kind of job?"

"Idiot work. Business Affairs office. Writing memos, filing contracts, xeroxing. The idea was to free him up to write. Then one day he waltzes in, announces no more book, it's a screenplay now. The story lends itself to that form. Fine, makes my life that much easier. I wait six months, then six more."

He walked to the bookcase. Eyeing the shelves for a second, he pulled a thin unmarked volume out of the middle, opened it, put it back, and removed another one, even thinner.

"This is what he gives me."

I took the folder. Bound in brown, marbled cardboard. The title page said:

THE BRIDE A Screenplay by Denton W. Mellors

"Take it home," said App. "I like you, but you're outa here. Got a meeting."

I folded my notes and put them away. App tossed the script I'd used for a writing board back into the trash. We walked to the door.

"I haven't been able to locate Mellors," I said. "Any idea what happened to him?"

"Who the fuck knows? After I told him I couldn't use that piece of shit you're holding, he cursed me out, threw a chair- broke some pre-Columbian pieces- and left. Last I saw of him, thank God. Scared the shit out of me. First time I hired a bodyguard."

We left the office and walked down the postered hall past the empty reception desk. He opened a glass door and held it.

"Nice meeting you, Sammy- what makes you run, ha ha. Let's both of us do some serious thinking about what we want out of this, write something up, and then we can break some bread. Let's say Wednesdayish. Lunch?"

36

I walked over to the Century City shopping mall, found a café with private booths, and sat down to coffee and Denton Mellors's script.

Not a complete script, it soon became clear. Just a five-page triple-spaced summary, what App had called a treatment.

THE BRIDE

We open upon a man watching a woman undressing. From his face we see he is a homicidal maniac, but handsome and muscular. The kind of man women gravitate to.

He holds a boning knife. It is nighttime. The moon hits it and it glints.

The maniac gets up from his crouch and cuts through a sliding glass door. The woman is in the shower, soaping herself up. We see soap on her breasts and her vagina. She is masturbating, enjoying it.

The maniac flings open the shower door. The woman screams as the maniac rapes the woman anally, then fillets her.

The maniac removes his clothing, showers in the woman's shower as the body still lies there. Then he gets dressed and drives home to his marital bed. His bride is young, beautiful, clearly virginal. She loves him madly. He is the love and lust of her life.

The maniac and his bride engage in foreplay and the maniac makes tender love to his innocent young bride: he is capable of great sensitivity when the situation calls for it. As she comes, thunderously, the camera cuts to juxtaposed faces of the bride and the maniac's other savaged women- all of them his chosen. The bride's prolonged, cataclysmic orgasm alternates with their anguish. To the maniac, it is all music…

I managed to finish the rest of it, resisting the temptation to stow it in the garbage.

Instead, I took it home and called Milo the minute I got through the door. But he wasn't at the station and I had to content myself with leaving a message at Blue Investigations.

I tried Lucy in Brentwood. Phone off the hook, probably sleeping again. Checking in with my service got me one message: Wendy Embrey wanting to talk about billing problems. That irritated me, and I didn't bother to copy down her number.

I got a beer from the fridge and watched a couple of surfers struggle to master infinity.

Mellors's treatment screamed in my head like a car alarm.

He and Lowell and Trafficant drawn together not by art but by hatred of women.

Discovering common interests.

Slaking their needs together the night of the party.

Lowell shutting down the retreat less than a year later.

New use for his acreage?

Another type of cemetery?

Robin came home in a great mood and we ended up in bed. I tried to keep the bad pictures out of my head, wondering if I'd be able to make love.

When the time came, I did the right things but my mind was still elsewhere, firing like a strobe light.

She fell asleep quickly, but I found myself itching to get up. I lay there for a long time, not moving.

"Restless?"

"Maybe I'll get up and take a drive or something."

She started to sit up but I kissed her forehead.

"Rest."

"Is everything okay, Alex?"

"Just one of those jumpy nights. You know me."

"Sometimes I wonder," she said. But she closed her eyes and pursed her lips. I kissed them and touched her eyelids with my fingers. She gathered the covers around her head and curled up.

I sped past Broad Beach, Zuma, the Colony, Carbon Beach. La Costa.

One very bright light shone above the Sheas' house. Two proto-Malibu cars were parked along the highway in front: a Porsche bathtub roadster and a Corvette. Between them was an elderly Olds 88 that looked vaguely familiar. I pulled up behind the Corvette and was walking to the front door just as it opened and a man backed out, stumbling.

I thought I heard a voice from inside the house, but the combined roars of the highway and the ocean drowned out the words.

The man approached the house again and I got close enough to hear a woman's voice.

"Go away! I'll call the police!"

The man shouted, "Just you-"

"Out! Get the hell out! I'll call the police!"

The man stopped and folded his arms across his chest. "Go ahead, Gwendolyn. Tell them you're a murderer."