Death by Pantyhose (27 page)

An uncomfortable knot began to form in my
stomach.

Did Hank know Regan? He couldn't possibly
be her hit man, could he? Wimpy little Hank?

But now, as he began walking toward me, he
didn't look so wimpy anymore. In fact, in the
glow of the street lamp, he looked sort of scary.

I told myself I was being ridiculous, that my
imagination was in overdrive. It was just Hank.
Sweet, harmless Hank. Allison probably sent
him over with Vic's copy of Sugar Buns.

"Hey, Hank." I force myself to smile.
d

"Hello, Jaine."

He had the same look in his eyes that Prozac
gets right before she pounces on her rubber
mouse.

I knew then that I wasn't imagining things.
Something told me to run for my life. Which is
exactly what I did. But Hank was faster than me.
A lot faster. I didn't get very far when he
grabbed me from behind.

"Get back in the car, Jaine. We're going for a
ride. "

I figured I'd better do what he said. Especially
when he rammed the cold hard butt of a gun in
my back.

ank grabbed me roughly by the shoulders
-and shoved me over to the Mercedes.

It was amazing how strong he was. What happened to the endearing wimp who was afraid of
water bugs?

He pushed me in through the passenger door
to the driver's side, then slid in next to me on the
Mercedes' old-fashioned bench seat-all the while
jabbing his gun most disconcertingly in my gut.

"Start the car," he ordered.

I reached in my purse for my car keys and felt
my can of Aqua Net. For an instant I was
tempted to blast him with it, but I couldn't risk
it. Not with his gun just inches away from several
vital internal organs.

So I obediently took out my car keys and
started the car.

"Where are we going?" I asked, as the car
sputtered into action.

"To the beach. Take Olympic Boulevard to
the ocean."

My knuckles white on the steering wheel, I
started driving. I didn't know exactly what was
in store for me that evening, but I had a feeling
it was going to end with my obituary. Hank wasn't
forcing me out to the beach at gunpoint to take
in the scenery.

I prayed that traffic would slow us down. But
traffic was lighter than I'd seen it in years. The
cars were zipping along with nary a snarl.

Needless to say, the Mercedes wasn't doing
much zipping.

"Where'd you get this piece of junk?" Hank
sneered. "Mercedes of Baghdad?"

"It's a rental."

"What a clunker. Too bad you won't be
around to demand a refund."

My stomach curdled. It looked like I was right
about that obituary.

"So you figured everything out," he said, his
gun still firmly lodged in my side. "Allison told
me about your phone call. You know, you're not
nearly as clueless as you seem."

I would've been insulted at that crack if I
hadn't been so busy being terrified.

"Vic blackmailed Regan into being his agent.
And as if that weren't bad enough, the bastard
expected her to marry him, too. So I agreed to
knock him off for her."

"But why?" That was the one thing I didn't
understand. "To get him out of the way, so you'd
have a shot at Allison?"

"Allison?" He sounded puzzled. "I didn't do it
for Allison. Sure, I'd like to get her in the sack
some day, but I wouldn't risk my neck for her."

"Then why did you do it?"

"For a movie deal, of course."

"A movie deal?"

I blinked in disbelief.

"I sent Regan my script, and she liked it. She
promised she'd sell it to a major studio, for at
least six figures. But first, I had to do her a little
favor and bump off Vic."

He said this as casually as if Regan had sent
him out for Chinese chicken salad.

"Let me get this straight. You were willing to
kill for a movie deal?"

"Oh, grow up, Jaine," he said. "This is Hollywood. It wouldn't be the first time."

And you know something? He was probably
right.

"Originally I was going to kill him with my gun,
but when Dorcas made that big scene at the club,
I figured why not grab a pair of her pantyhose and
make her the prime suspect? Nobody even noticed
when I lifted a pair from her prop bag; they were
all too busy watching her trying to strangle Vic.

"Afterward, I played the part of the lovestruck
platonic friend and invited Allison to stay at my
place. A brilliant idea, if I do say so myself. She
was the perfect alibi. I waited till she fell asleep,
then drove over to the bungalow.

"I told Vic I was there to get some of Allison's
stuff. He didn't suspect a thing. He let me in
and went back to packing his suitcase. I waited
till his back was turned, then whipped out Dorcas's pantyhose and strangled him. Sure, he put
up a struggle, but in the end, I won."

I turned and saw a smug smile on his face.

"And the good news is, he suffered. If anyone
deserved to, he did."

My mind was reeling. Did Hank honestly
think he was the good guy in this scenario?

"I got back home and tumbled into bed,
never dreaming that Allison would be going out
to the bungalow, too. That wasn't supposed to
happen. I gave her a sleeping pill to put her out
for the night, but she never took it. It turns out
she doesn't approve of Western medicines."

By now we were out on the coast highway heading north toward Malibu, and Hank began brace
ging about how he was going to star in his own
movie.

"I'm one hell of an actor," he said, scratching
his chin with the butt of his gun. "I had everybody
convinced I was the original 99-poundweakling.
You dopes all thought I was scared of my own
shadow."

And I, of course, had been the biggest dope
of all.

"I could've beaten Vic to a pulp that night at
the Laff Palace, but I had to play the part of the
coward. And it worked. Nobody thought I had the
nerve to commit murder. And certainly nobody
thought I was strong enough to overpower Vic."

I remembered the exercise machine in his
apartment, the one he claimed he never used.

"You don't really use that Bowflex of yours as
a coat rack, do you?"

"Are you kidding? I work out seven days a
week. I've got muscles as hard as granite.

"Feel this," he said, shoving his arm in front
of my face.

It made me sick to touch him, but I felt his
arm, and it was indeed solid with muscles.

He admired his own arm for a bit and then
continued with his story. He was loving every
minute of this.

"I wasn't the only one acting. Regan was play ing her part, too-pretending to be crazy about
Vic, and then faking a broken heart when he
died. Remember that day you stopped by to see
her? Regan wasn't mourning. The two of us
were celebrating; that's why the bottle of wine
was out. When we heard you coming up the
walk, I ran and hid in her bedroom."

He giggled at the memory, a high-pitched,
strangely girlish laugh that, for some reason scared
me almost as much as his gun poking in my side.

"Everything was going along so beautifully
until you started nosing around. At first we just
meant to scare you-"

"By loosening the gear stick on my car."

"Exactly. "

"But then you figured out the truth. So now
Regan wants me to get rid of you."

"What about Allison?" I asked. Thanks to me,
she knew the truth, too.

"I'll probably have to kill her," he said, with a
sigh. "Which is a pity, because I like her a lot."

My stomach lurched. Poor Allison. If only I
hadn't made that phone call.

"We're almost there," he said. `Just a bit more
to go."

We were out in Malibu now, and the traffic
was still unusually light.

When we pulled up at a stoplight, I looked
over at the family in the car next to us: a mother
and father up front and two towheaded kids in
the backseat. How I envied them their freedom,
their long lives ahead of them. I wondered
where they were going. To the movies? To get
ice cream? Or were they simply on their way
home to nice comfy beds?

If only I hadn't taken up this ridiculous pri vate detective hobby. If only I'd listened to my
mother and gotten married again, I could be living somewhere in the valley watching Must See
TV, nagging my kids to do their homework, instead of driving off to what was sure to be a most
unpleasant death.

Just then the woman in the next car rolled
down her window and gestured for me to roll
down mine. Then she held up a map.

Obviously they were lost and needed directions.

"Ignore them," Hank said, ramming the gun
in my side. "Or I'll blow your guts out."

My first instinct was to obey him, of course.
But then I wondered: Would he really blow me
away in front of a car full of witnesses? Would he
be crazy enough to take that chance? And even
if he did, what did it matter? He was going to kill
me in a few minutes, anyway.

So then I did the bravest thing I ever did in
my life:

I rolled down the window.

"Help!"~

I meant to shout but my voice came out in a
terrified squeak.

"Call 9-1-1! This man is going to kill me!"

I cringed, waiting for an explosion from
Hank's gun. But nothing happened. My gamble
had paid off.

Far from being alarmed, though, the woman
smiled.

What the heck was she smiling for? Did she not
understand the words this man is going to kill me?

Apparently not.

"Sprechen zie Deutsch?" she asked.

Oh, cripes. They were German tourists.

"Don't you speak English?" I wailed.

"English? Nein." She shrugged with that maddening smile on her face.

Hank, turning in another bravura performance, ruffled my hair affectionately and
laughed, like I'd been kidding around. Then, as
soon as the light turned green, he kicked my
foot off the brake pedal and rammed down on
the accelerator.

"You crazy bitch," he muttered as we sped off,
burning rubber.

Taking no chances, he spent the rest of the
short ride with his foot on the gas pedal and his
non-gun-toting hand on the steering wheel.

Minutes later, he steered the Mercedes off
onto a deserted cliff.

I looked out at the ocean, black and forbidding under a starless sky, and heard the surf
pounding on the rocks below.

"Here we are, Jaine," Hank said. "The end of
the line."

He took the keys out of the ignition and got
out of the Mercedes.

`Just a little precaution," he said, jiggling the
keys, "so you won't try anything funny, like runicing me over."

Then he walked around to the driver's side
and put his gun up against my left temple.

"Okay, jai-tie. I've written a little scene that
you're going to star in. In case you haven't already
guessed, it's a tragedy. You're going to lose control of your car and crash through the guardrail
down into the ocean. Better get it right the first
time, because there are no retakes."

"Don't do this, Hank," I begged. "Don't you
realize what's happening? You're taking all the
risks, and Regan's getting away with murder. What if she doesn't get you a movie deal? You're
screwed. You can't go to the cops, because
you're the one who did the dirty work."

"Maybe I can't go to the cops," he smirked,
"but I can tell the world about Sugar Buns. I've
got leverage."

"Exactly. What if Regan doesn't like you having
leverage? She hired you to get rid of Vic. What if
she hires someone else to get rid of you?"

"Oh, come on. She'd never betray me like that."

"For crying out loud, Hank, she's an agent.
They eat betrayal for breakfast."

For a moment I saw a flicker of doubt cross
his face. But then it was gone, and his jaw tightened with determination.

"Forget it, Jaine. It's not going to work."

He held out the car keys.

"Either you start the car and drive over the
cliff, or you get your head blown off. And this
time I'll really do it."

I could tell by the look in his eyes that he
meant it. This time, there were no German
tourists on hand to witness the event.

"So what's it going to be?"

A cold watery death sounded dreadful, but
having my brains blown out wasn't exactly a ride
in the wine country, either.

With trembling hands, I took the keys.

My mind raced frantically. There had to be
some way out of this horrible mess. And then I
looked down and saw it: the glove compartment
door. It was still on the floor where I'd tossed it
the other day.

That was it. My way out.

Pretending to fumble, I dropped the car keys.

"Sorry," I said. "I'm so nervous."

`Just pick them up," Hank sighed impatiently.