Undead L.A. 2 (16 page)

Helter Skelter
, Benjamin thought to himself.
 

The last time he was at that location he'd simply been male talent, a stud for hire relying on a bottle of pills to keep him at full attention long enough to get the scene done. There were guys he knew who used to use the needle, shooting Caverject into the base of their penis before shooting a scene to keep their erection, but he was never one of them. Viagra and Cialis had changed all of that for good. Not that he had trouble getting or maintaining an erection under normal circumstances. That's what people didn't understand about porn. It wasn't about being aroused. It was about being rock hard and ready on a moment's notice to get the shot, no matter how many hours you'd been waiting to do your scene, or how long you'd been on set under those blazing hot lights. Back then it had been hot all the time and his shitty Honda Civic didn't have working air conditioning. Benjamin laughed to himself as he remembered that it had been at the tail end of July, during the sweltering Valley heat wave. The temperature gauge inside his jalopy had reached 112 degrees. He remembered because he took a picture of it with his iPhone and posted it on Facebook after the shoot was over. It was always hot during the summer in the Valley. He recalled praying for shoots in Malibu from June until the end of September, but rarely getting them.

That's what my father used to call Murphy's Law,
he thought, picturing him in his orange jump suit in the visitation room at the prison. He'd been fourteen at the time, and if he was being honest with himself he'd been particularly vulnerable at the time and in need of a father figure in his life. His mother would argue in hushed tones, hurling insults at him in between complaints about their current state of affairs as the homeless family of a convicted murderer, despised and turned away by friends and family alike. Benjamin just sat quietly watching the smile on his fathers face grow as his mother got more and more wound up.

It was as if he was happy he didn't have to come home to deal with her anymore
, Benjamin mused,
as if he was better off in prison than at home with us.

When the time had come to end the visitation he'd blurted out the only question on his mind, the one that had been burning a hole in his chest ever since the judge had stolen his father out of their lives, the sound of the gavel ringing with finality.

“Why are you leaving us? What did you do, Daddy? Why can't you just come home with us?”

“Murphy's Law,” he'd said with a shrug, the guard pulling him away before he could explain himself further. It was the last time he'd gone to see his father. He had no idea if he was still in prison, if he was dead or alive, or if he'd found out yet about his new profession and all the wealth it brought.

Then again, if he had known, he would have gotten in touch with me by now,
Benjamin thought.
He'd be asking for a handout for sure. I hope they never let him out. I hope he rots behind bars and dies there, sad and alone and filled with guilt at abandoning us.

He pulled up into a shaded parking spot under a tree and shut the motor off. Benjamin had come to drop off one of his girl’s ID's, a task he normally relegated to one of his drivers, but it was a burden he took on in an attempt to meet a new girl he'd been hoping to poach from a rival agent. The girl, Jaymee Pink, had huge potential, but needed guidance and management that her current representation could never give her. Benjamin knew the people she'd need to work with to cut a path straight to the top of the business. He wasn't going to leave until he'd “accidentally bumped into her” and made his case. Instead, he found himself bumping into an annoying, short, bald 'suitcase pimp' intent on convincing Benjamin to sign his wife.

The only thing guys like that are good for is carrying their wife's suitcase,
Benjamin thought.
That's how they got the nickname. And this one isn't even good for that.

He'd seen it countless times since he’d started in the business: overly eager boyfriends and husbands of female porn performers who hung around set annoying everyone with their uselessness, and endlessly running their mouths off in-between takes. A 'suitcase pimp' was a curse on set, hanging around offering opinions on everything from what the next shot should be to the stud his wife should work with. Once he'd seen a hapless director allowing one to direct part of his wife's scene and even call out changes between sex positions. Benjamin despised them on principal. He'd never asked anyone for a handout and he couldn't understand how a grown man could stand around holding his wife's panties while other guys had sex with her, and not feel like a worthless loser.

He'd been making a beeline for the director in the kitchen when Boris accosted him.
 

“I've been trying to reach you about my wife joining your agency,” he said, his thick Russian accent making the words nearly impossible to understand. “But you haven't been returning my calls, bro.”

Benjamin stared at him, gobsmacked by his gall and complete lack of shame. He couldn't have made it more obvious that he'd been blowing Boris and his wife off, but clearly not responding wasn't going to get the job done. The combination of his heavy-lidded eyes set against the soft folds of baby-like skin and big drooping ears made him look like a sinister version of one of Snow White’s seven dwarfs, more than a grown man.

Yeah
, Benjamin thought.
He would come right after Dopey. We could call him Sneaky.

“Hey, Boris,” yelled the director, Mike Hunt, looking up from adjusting his camera settings. “What are you doing here? Your wife was finished yesterday. Did my production manager tell you she was needed both days? I will kick his lazy ass if he did.”

“No,” Boris replied, looking deflated. “I was in the neighborhood so I just dropped in to say hello.”

Mike shook his head, stifling a laugh with the back of his hand.

“Sorry buddy, but this is a closed set,” he informed him. “Our talent for the day gets spooked real easy, so we told her we'd keep the crew to a minimum. It's just gonna be me and a PA in there. Once lighting gets set up we're kicking them out, too. Any other day you could hang, but right now I've gotta ask you to leave. Sorry, man.”

“No problem,” Boris hissed, trying his best to hide his embarrassment. He turned back to Benjamin, but was interrupted again.

“Benjamin,” Mike shouted. “Glad you made it. I've only got a few minutes to talk if we're going to keep on schedule. Let's head up to set.”

Without saying another word, the director turned and climbed the spiral staircase to the second floor. Benjamin hurried after him, leaving a deflated-looking Boris behind. When he got to the top of the stairs he saw Mike standing near the bay windows of the master bedroom looking out over the San Fernando Valley.

“There he goes,” Mike said, not turning around, his eyes locked on Boris as he headed back to his car, shoulders slumped, head down in shame. “The coast is clear.”

“Thanks for getting me out of that,” Benjamin said. “That guy's been all over me lately. He called my office ten times in the last week trying to schedule an appointment.”

“Frankly I'm surprised he bothered showing up again,” Mike confessed. “He was a real pain in the ass yesterday. If he wasn't trying to get a girl to sign up with him as a manager he was trying to use his wife to lure them into having a three-way with him. He's a pest. Too bad his wife is so hot. After today's little stunt I'm going to make it clear he's not welcome on set anymore. Ugly little fucker creeps the girls out.”

“Good luck with that,” Benjamin said, handing the director copies of his clients missing IDs and her current test.
 

“It's a long drive out here just to hand me some paperwork,” Mike said with a knowing smirk. “You wouldn't be here trying to meet Jaymee and steal her away from the competition, would you?”

The instinct to lie kicked in, but he fought against it. He'd come to learn over his time in the business that often the bold approach was the one most respected and got the best reward.

“Would you be opposed to introducing us if I was?”

“Not at all, my friend,” Mike said, his smirk blossoming into a full-face grin stretching ear to ear. “I'm not a big fan of her current representation to be honest. Too many conflicts. Jaymee has the potential to go supernova, but that's not gonna happen if she stays with some fly-by-night modeling agency who can't keep her bookings straight.”

Benjamin felt himself relax, knowing now that he was on track to getting his way. Nothing in the world made him happier.

“I also wouldn't be opposed to collecting a finders fee of some sort for making the introduction and talking you up, of course.”

So it's a business deal he's after
, Benjamin thought. He'd come to expect it, and he was rarely disappointed. Most outsiders viewed the business as one cohesive entity with its own set of rules and guidelines, when in reality it was more like the lawless Wild West with everyone on the take, always looking out for what they could get for themselves. Benjamin didn't mind. It made the terrain easier to navigate.

“What did you have in mind?”

“I was thinking that rather than ask for a cash payout I might just get a month off from agency fees,” Mike suggested.
 

“What if she doesn't want to sign?”

“She will,” Mike assured him. “We've been seeing each other on the down low. Don't repeat that. I don't want my wife to find out. I've already laid the groundwork for you by telling her all the big stars go with you. So, do we have a deal?”

“Sounds like you've got it all worked out,” Benjamin smiled. “It's always a pleasure doing business with you.”

“Great,” Mike shot back. “Then follow me.”

True to his word Mike talked Benjamin up to Jaymee, telling her she'd be crazy not to switch agencies and sign her life away. Benjamin explained how things worked under his management, while the stunning starlet with the perfect B cup breasts silently drank in his promises of fame and fortune with her big, crystal blue eyes. Within a half an hour he was leaving set with the ink still drying on her newly signed five-year contract. He was halfway down the 118 freeway when he got the call from David Lord about Jezzabella quitting. By the time he got to the 405 and the 101 he'd already talked to Cherry Haze and confirmed with David that she would be the replacement.
 

“Tell her to hurry, but be careful,” Lord suggested. “There is a lot happening downtown today. They're announcing the verdict in Jenna's murder trail, so the streets are full of fans and media people, and there is a street fair as well. I saw about a million food trucks when I got down here at six this morning. They were all getting off at the same exit, blocking traffic.”

“Don't worry,” Benjamin assured him. “She lives down there. She should be walking onto set any minute now.”

“And make sure she brings her current test,” David reminded him.
 

“I'll bring it by myself right now,” Benjamin promised. “That is, if you don't mind me visiting set.”

David hesitated for a moment before replying. It was no secret that Benjamin had made enemies along the way. On a show as big as Raw Blue he was bound to bump into several people who'd love to see him dead or in jail. The last thing David needed was a distraction derailing his big show. Still, saying no to Benjamin was a decision that came with consequences, like being cut off from his stable of top tier talent. Benjamin had been more than happy to make examples out of people who crossed him along the way, power tripping on anyone he perceived had slighted him. He'd run several girls out of the business, along with a handful of new directors who thought they could go behind his back and sneak scenes with his girls without paying him. The last thing a successful director working with a big company needed was Benjamin as an enemy.

“No,” David said at last, the stress clearly audible in his voice. “That's cool. Just keep in mind it's a big show and we need to stay on schedule. I’ve gotta go. See you when you get down here.”

David hung up before Benjamin could respond.

“See you soon,” Benjamin called out to the empty air. There were several girls on the shoot he planned on introducing to Donna and Kevin. His day just kept getting better and better.

***
 

David Lord sat behind the bank of video monitors and sound equipment he'd affectionately nicknamed “video village,” going over changes to the thick script. His shaggy black shoulder length hair had already taken on a slightly oily hue from too many days of shooting with little or no turn around time between one days wrap and the next days call time. His lucky t-shirt featuring a pin up model-gone-zombie, with the words DEAD GIRLS ARE EASY, was soaked through in the pits with sweat. He changed it out for one bearing a JUMBO'S CLOWN ROOM logo, slamming down the remains of a sugar free Rockstar energy drink in the process. He emitted the nervous energy of a man headed to the gallows looking for one last chance at his escape.

If I had known how much drama this show was going to be, would I have passed on it?

A twenty-year veteran of the industry, he could honestly say he'd seen just about everything that could go wrong on a show—and so far this shoot had blown them all away. When he got the offer to helm Raw Blue for Hive Mind, he could barely hide his excitement. For years he'd toiled in the trenches, starting as a camera man and editor and working his way up from there to arguably being one of the biggest producers and directors in the business. He'd shot gonzo titles in the beginning, low budget shows where the cameraman talks to the girls while filming them stripping down and showing off their naughty bits before having wild sex with a stranger. He was good at it. Unlike some of the creeps who almost seemed to enjoy freaking the girls out or making them uncomfortable, David made them feel both relaxed and sexy. He believed it was part of why his scenes came out better. They were hotter because the girls could really let themselves go and forget he was even there.