Ringer (29 page)

Purity stubbed out her cigarette on the side of her chair. “BTW, if you need extra room, peeps, I volunteer to take one for the team and stay behind.” Her comment was ignored.

“Gina, you haven’t any luggage. What will you wear?”

“Who needs to wear much at the beach?” Gina threw up her hands. “Sometimes I like to just wear nothing at all. It’s very liberating.”

“I’ll drink to that.” Purity toasted the air with her coffee. “FYI, your limo disappeared overnight. What’s up with that, Gina?”

“My cousin Tony slept in it because he had to drive home to his wife last night. They have a baby girl that keeps them up all night. He’s a limo driver, too. We switch off.” Gina turned and put a hand on Grant’s forearm. “So, Robbie, is your jet big enough? Can we fly to Cabo with you?”

Grant patted her hand and flashed his toothy white smile. “Absolutely positively.”

“This is most generous of you, Señor Grant.” I dropped my napkin on my plate and stood. “After all Gina has been through on your behalf, your help in furthering her acting career is most appropriate, and I am sure she will be most grateful. I will gather my things.”

“How about a swim?” Gina beamed at Grant but tugged my pant leg under the table, signaling me. About her swim? Ah! Grant would have to take his shirt and shoes off. I would then be able to search them, and we would be able to see if he was wearing the ring, or if he was reluctant to take his shirt off.

Dixie looked at her watch. “Honeybun, it’s getting late, and the plane is waiting.”

“My plane, my pilot, my crew.” Grant slid his chair back. “There are suits in the cabana, Gina. Should be one your size, or close to it.”

Gina giggled strategically and sashayed off to the cabana.

“I’m liking this girl more and more.” Purity snickered under her breath, while continuing to peck away at her phone with her thumbs.

Just who was Purity texting? What was she discussing? Perhaps during the previous scene we can scroll Purity’s conversation with Skip down one side of the screen while the rest of the scene plays out in live action. I could not find this technique in the screenplay book, so do not know if it is an innovation, but how else are we to capture on film what she was texting?

Skip: Working hatchet murder story. Wassup?

Purity: @ El Rollo w Morty last nite

Skip: U hook up?

Purity: LMAO vry fny

Skip: Out L8?

Purity: Not 2—Bobbie here w Dixweed whn we got home, Morty w a brunette

Skip: Get out WTF?

Purity: I was saved by Morty, grl saved Bobbie, same attacker

Skip: U dint rel8 this last nite!

Purity: I dint meet this grl til L8R

Skip: So this grl came home w Morty n hooked up?

Purity: YGAGA m9—Morty came 4 a ring from Bobbie, grl involved

Skip: ??? ring

Purity: spooky old relic magic ring w a curse

Purity: If u can bleeve it, Bobbie and Morty r now discussing God vs Devil over bfast

Skip: Put conv on the phone so I can hear

Purity: no time—ring went bang smhow

Skip: I cant follow this—whut?

Purity: Bobbie had sacred ring, relic, belonged to church in la paz, Morty sent here to get it

Purity: B gave ring to M but it blew up

Purity: Hly sht! Taking me to mex rehab! NFW!!!

Skip: When?

Skip: Hello?

Purity: fck—going to Cabo like NOW, Morty 2

Skip: U, Bob, Dix, Morty?

Purity: LMAO. Grl coming too, Dix iz pissed!

Purity: ROTFLMAO grl sez dznt need clothes, Bobbie in heat

Skip: when do u leave??? I will come down

Purity: come! Mi8 b big story, catch Bobbie fckg grl Dix freaks

Purity: Morty joker in deck, and I have a plan

Skip: grl name?

Purity: gina, limo driver, actress

Skip: last name?

Purity: dunno CUL8R n cabo

We see Purity’s screen as she exits her messaging center and logs on to her Web browser. In the Google search box she types:
INBOARD BOAT ACCIDENTS EXPLOSIONS
.

CHAPTER

FORTY-TWO

SKIP’S BOSS AT THE
DAILY
Post
—the wiry balding man in a sweater vest—was perched at his computer in a small, immaculate office with a narrow window view of another office building. He was typing extremely fast, studying the screen intently.

“Boss?” Skip knocked on the door frame as he stepped into it. “I worked that Mexican story for Bent pretty good, but—”

The boss kept typing. “Pretty
well
.”

“—something has come up with Purity, something big. I need to get to Cabo San Lucas ASAP.”

“Shut the door, have a seat.”

When both were accomplished, the boss swiveled mechanically away from his computer and eyed Skip cautiously. “You’ve done well with the Purity story, but circulation thinks the story is wearing thin. Some in the industry are joking that we’re in bed with Purity. Are you?”

“What? No!”

“Word around here is that you’re actually sleeping with her.” The boss held up a hand. “Not that there’s
necessarily
anything wrong with that. That’s a terrific way to stay on top of that story, if you’ll excuse the pun. What’s wrong is that it is beginning to show. Her antics are overexposed. We’re taking a break from bedding with Purity to find something for the readers to panic about. You’ll work the Mexican story, see if we can find us a serial killer. If not, take assignments from Bent until you do find a serial killer that the readers can worry about. Readers don’t worry about Purity.”

“Work for Bent?”

“Until you find a story you can sink your teeth into.”

“Boss, I’m telling you, something big is coming off in Cabo. Grant is there with Purity, and it looks like Papa Bear has found himself some sort of beach bunny. Meanwhile, there’s some sort of business with Grant and a magic ring that’s a holy relic that the church is trying to get back. Anyway, Purity is bound to pull a really big stunt. I just gotta get down there.”

“Did you hear anything I said, Skip?”

“Well…”

“Did you?”

“I did, yes, but…”

“Beach bunnies? Magic rings? Purity crashes a Porsche into the Cabo San Lucas marina? That’s TN2.com celebrity gossip.
Daily Post
is slap and tickle, Skip. We tickled them with Purity for a while, now it’s time to slap them with a hatchet-wielding Mexican immigrant psycho killer. Purity might manage to kill herself somehow a couple months from now. We’ll get back on her then. Get out of my office.”

Like a machine, the boss swiveled back to his computer and began clacking away.

Out in the hall, the camera follows Skip as he walks slowly back to his cubicle and slumps down into his chair.

He wiggled his mouse. The computer screen came back on with one of the police sketches of Paco. Skip stared at the picture a moment, then lurched forward, moved his mouse around, and clicked his way to a Web site called Last Minute Travel.

CHAPTER

FORTY-THREE

PAN ACROSS THE SUNNY EAST
Hampton airport runways and a small propeller plane taking off. Keep turning the camera until you come to Gina and me behind a fence at the airport’s drop-off, the limo fifty feet behind us. You can see Gina is now wearing a colorful bikini top under her little black dress, and her hair is up and obviously post swim.

“I checked, the ring was not in his shoes or his shirt,” I whispered.

“He’s got it on him,” she hissed.

“On him? He was only wearing swim trunks.”

“On him.” Gina pointed down at her own lovely groin.

“There?”

“He’s got it tucked under his nut sack.”

Behind us, the limo trunk opens, and we see Grant and Dixie help Paco out of the trunk. El Cabezador was now in black pants, white shirt, and red vest. They stealthily huddle Paco off-screen.

“Impossible! How do you know this?”

“How do you think?”

“You…”

“I goosed him. Don’t look at me like that! How else were we to make sure he didn’t have it on him?”

“So it is tied with string, or what?”

“I didn’t exactly give him a Brazilian, Morty, I’m not sure how it’s held there. String?”

I laughed. “Gina, I think I love you. That is amazing. You know, you really are fantastically deceptive—and you sure as hell have him on the hook!”

“I’m deceptive when I need to be.” Gina dropped her sunglasses and favored me with her sapphire eyes, the kind that make men buy diamonds. “How about you?”

“I think you know me a little bit by now, yes? I am probably one of the more brutally honest people you will ever meet, especially with women. Honesty and trust is what makes me a good lover.”

She raised her sunglasses, a devilish smile rippling across her most succulent lips. “An
awesome
lover.”

Purity appeared next to us in shorts, low moccasins, shirt, and bikini top, her braids jutting out to either side of a Panama hat. Aviator sunglasses and cigarette completed her ensemble. Following her into frame is a nervous young paralegal in suit and tie.

“Morty! Turn around!” Purity held up a document and a pen. I turned.

She slapped the Ultravibe Media contract up against my back and began furiously signing page after page. “The paparazzi aren’t here yet, but it’s only AMOT. Let’s roll.”

CHAPTER

FORTY-FOUR

I THINK THE BEST WAY
to capture the flight to Cabo would be as a vignette.
Screenwriting: Yes You Can!
mentions this as a way to accelerate the storytelling without skipping over certain details that may be important or amusing. It is done without dialogue, usually to the accompaniment of music, which we haven’t discussed yet at all for this movie. There is much for me to relate in this story, and little time, so I have not been able to fully embellish my tale, though I am sure that the choice of music depends on whether you wish to have somebody like John Williams or Lalo Schiffrin write an original musical score or you intend to use Top Forty hits off the shelf. I perhaps am not entirely qualified to choose music, as I am not what you would call a music buff. I do not even own an MP3 player and those little white earplugs. However, when I think about traveling to Mexico, how could I not think of the instrumental music of Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass? This is merely a suggestion, but I would think “Tijuana Taxi” or “Spanish Flea” would be ideal for this vignette. If you do not know these songs, they are catchy, and include horns like one would find in a mariachi band. So cue the Herb Alpert.

The Gulfstream jet ripped down the runway and sliced into the Hamptons summer sky. The jet’s interior was spacious and like a living room that happened to have luxurious swiveling leather seats bolted to the floor. Gina sat at the window on the right side, me next to her, Dixie across the aisle from me, and Grant next to the window on the left. Purity was in the seat behind me, sleeping with her sunglasses on, curled in a fully reclined seat.

Meanwhile, Paco, in his red vest, braced himself in the jet’s galley. His yellow eyes studied the liquor bottles, the Perrier, the glassware, the wine cabinet and chilling champagne.

In the passenger cabin, we all unbuckled our seat belts. Dixie got up and went to the galley. She gave Paco instructions, pointing to the same features of the galley that he had been studying. The task of waiter did not seem to faze him, but he lifted his Santa Muerte amulet from his shirt and said a quick prayer that he perform the task of making cocktails adequately.

Dixie returned to her seat, making pleasantries across the aisle to me while Grant flipped pages in the
Wall Street Journal
. Gina studied the terrain below the jet with interest.

Paco strode purposefully down the aisle and bowed to Dixie. He listened to her order, Grant’s, mine, and then Gina’s. Purity declined any beverage and rolled over and went back to sleep.

In the galley, Paco found the ice, but the cubes were frozen into a mass. Out came his blood-rusted beheading hatchet, and ice chunks flew about the galley as he hacked away to free the cubes.

In the main cabin, I was politely listening to Dixie, but looked down when an ice cube came bouncing up the aisle.

In the galley, the cocktail steward hacked limes to pieces, cramming the wedges and ice into three large water glasses. Then he picked a bottle at random and sloshed a cup of dark liquor into each glass.

I continued to listen politely to Dixie when a champagne cork zipped up the aisle, bounced off the fuselage, and landed in my lap. Nobody saw this but me.

Paco appeared with a rolling drink cart, the champagne bottle overflowing. He handed Grant, me, and Gina the gargantuan cocktails, which he’d chosen to garnish with a tree-sized stalk of celery. Wiping out the champagne glass with the corner of his vest, he poured Dixie a glass of bubbly before retreating to the galley.

Dixie smiled apologetically and explained that Paco was new.

We all tasted our drinks with interest.

There seemed to be some unique flavor that we could not identify.

CHAPTER

FORTY-FIVE

OUR CAMERA PROVIDES US WITH
a wide shot out over a sea of tourists. They are standing in a serpentine line for Mexican customs at the cavernous Cabo San Lucas International Airport.

Zoom in on our troop: Grant and Dixie, me and Gina, Purity last and by herself. We are flanked by luggage.

Medium close-up of Grant and Dixie—she whispers to him, “I’ve got it, sugar.”

“Hm?” Grant’s mind is elsewhere, probably on Gina and how she cupped his balls in the pool.

“We send Morty a note from Purity asking him to meet her at the Ramparts, at night. We send her a note from Morty asking
her
to meet
him
at the Ramparts, same time. This puts them together. We just have to adjust the timing so that Paco arrives first, Morty second, and Purity third. When Morty arrives, I’ll be dressed as Purity and lure him into the shadows, where Paco will be waiting to club Morty, knock him out, and plant evidence on him once Purity comes. I will hide up on the path to the villa and wait for Purity to pass me, to make sure she’s headed to the Ramparts. Once she passes me, I’ll come meet you on the yacht, while Paco does the dirty deed, makes it look like Morty did it, and joins us on the yacht, where we’ll set sail, pay Paco, and drop him off somewhere else. Morty will awake and go back to the villa and report the murder but try to claim he didn’t do it, yet all the evidence will implicate him. Case closed!”