The (Original) Adventures of Ford Fairlane by Rex Weiner

Author:Rex Weiner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rare Bird Books
Published: 2018-05-21T22:45:27+00:00

LOS ANGELES

Chapter 1

The Snatch

The sky over Chinatown was thick and heavy. The air smelled like Tommy Lasorda’s sweat socks. The sweet and pungent pork pawed at my intestines. We made too much noise walking across the empty parking lot. My hatband was too tight. I’d been in LA too long. Ronald Reagan was running for president. Blame it on the bossa nova. Blame what happened that night on a million wrong things.

Not, however, that I wasn’t doing my job.

As we walked toward the car, my hand rested on the Ruger in my shoulder holster. I kept the girl in my shadow. A couple of hours ago she was skidding across tables at Madame Wong’s eat-to-the-beatery, knocking over people’s drinks with her mike stand, and hiccupping a fair version of rockabilly. Now, in her leopard-skin leotard and red spiked heels she stepped silently beside me. If the lead singer of Wanda and the Whips was afraid, she wasn’t saying. My job was to get her home from the gig without a scratch and tuck the little blonde punk into bed.

I’d told the voice on the phone I didn’t bodyguard. I hadn’t given up a good job as head bouncer at Hurrah’s in New York City to go through all you have to go through to get a private detective’s license (#096422) just to be somebody’s babysitter. Besides, my time in LA was all booked up with pool lounging, beer drinking, and other heavy stuff. Call me tourist, okay?

The voice on the phone wouldn’t compute that input. “I’m her manager,” he huffed, “and I’ve invested a lot in Wanda. I’m sending her to London on her first European tour and I don’t want anybody to mess her up, especially that loser boyfriend of hers. He sweeps the studio for the Eagles. She’s going to be a star.”

“So’s the maid at the Magic Motel,” said I, winking at old Clara who was dragging the laundry off the floor of my room.

“But, you’ve got a responsibility,” he said. “You’re the only private eye in the rock business.” He then sketched a very big dollar sign for the nursemaid job. I asked him to double it. He did. I suddenly decided to become responsible.

The drive across LA was a piece of cake. By the time we hit Sunset, she had the FM dialed to Rodney’s show on KROQ. She was snapping her fingers to D-Day’s rendition of “Too Young to Date.” When I parked the car in the garage of the Chateau Marmont she wouldn’t let me switch off the ignition until the song was over.

On the way up to her room, I eyeballed every nook and crevice for hidden thugs. No such luck. The night clerk at the front desk gave us the once over. He was reading The Shining. Around the corner was room fifteen. Wanda’s manger chose it, he said because it was safely within sight of the front desk.

I turned the key in the lock, thinking of the six-pack waiting for me back at the Magic Motel.

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