Ragged Point: Death on the Rocks

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Would you kill to save your wife from a Hollywood predator?
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PostScriptor
PostScriptor
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Copyright 2018, PostScriptor

— Saturday Afternoon about 3:00 PM, Ragged Point, California

"Robert. Come here and look at this."

"Margret," spoken in a weary voice, accustomed to spousal demands, answered. "I've just sat down on this very comfortable bench after wandering for hours along this fantastic trail with its spectacular views of the Pacific Ocean, cliffs and mountains. What is it that I have to see now?"

"Robert I want you to see this person, a man, washing about in the rocks down below."

"And, Margret, what is so remarkable about this man washing in the ocean?"

"He's not washing in the water, Robert. On the contrary, he's not moving; the ocean is doing the washing about. I think he may be dead."

With a sigh and groan, knowing after forty years married to his wife that simply getting it over with was always the best policy, Robert heaved his bulk off the bench.

Standing next to Margret he asked: "Now where is this man?" Margret answered: "look a little to your right down at the base of the cliff."

Robert observed for a minute before answering. "I think you are correct Margret, he does appear dead, or seriously injured."

"Robert, who should we call? The Coast Guard, or maybe 999?"

"Well...he's not actually out to sea. But I believe that the Yank's emergency services use '911.' I think they should be able to inform the proper authorities."

In the end 911 sent the proper emergency forces, including the Coast Guard, the fire department, the sheriff, CERT and ultimately the San Luis Obispo County Coroner...

— Friday, the Night before — 101 Freeway, San Luis Obispo

It was only 8:30 on a Friday night, but in the winter it's been dark for a couple of hours by then. I was driving home at a pretty rapid clip following my wife back to our home in Studio City. I'd tracked her and her boss down to the resort hotel at the top of Ragged Point. Normally I found it to be a beautiful, scenic place where visitors can look down hundreds of feet to the rugged, rocky coast of central California, between Cambria and San Simeon to the south and Big Sur to the north, up the winding, narrow, and recently closed, Pacific Coast Highway.

Now as my idiot wife is driving her boss's silver Bimmer back south, I just prayed that she wouldn't try to call me, and please God, don't let her drive so fast that she gets pulled over. Don't leave a trail, electronic or otherwise, for the cops to follow.

Betrayal, death and vengence in a single night. The sort of scenario that television scripts are made of.

{?}

I'm Arthur (usually just 'Art') Jensen and at thirty-five years old, I actually know what I'm talking about when I casually mention television scripts, because that is what I do. I'm a script writer for a production company whose name is familiar to anyone who has watched the many shows in the crime investigation genre. And before that, I wrote for the final season of the police procedural show that featured cops in L.A., New York, and Miami. I got a lot of screen credits for a guy as young as I am.

So I'm rich, right? No, not really. My wife and I are well off, but I'm paid a salary and am only one member of the team. Better than the old days, only because of the Screen Writers Guild got me started with a guarenteed base. But my wife, Linda, has to work too. Living in L.A. is expensive. Buying a house in Studio City, where we live, is exorbitant.

My dearest Linda — at least that's how I thought of her before tonight. She's a couple of years younger than I am, thirty-two, and a lot better looking. Even in jaded Hollywood, where every receptionist is an aspiring actress who was once Miss Kansas, Linda stands out. I can't tell you why that is so, it's just so. Linda is about 5' 5" — neither tall nor short — with a slim figure. Her boobs are big enough that you know she's a woman, but she isn't some sort of cow with huge mams. (I loved the line in 'Victoria' when she decided to engage a wet nurse to breast feed her children. "I'm a queen, not a cow!" God, I wish I'd written that!)

Her hair is dark, a very dark brown and straight only because she gets 'Brazilian Blow-outs.' I guess that means she gets her hair straightened, even though it sounds like some sort of kinky South American oral sex.

Need I mention that she has what I consider the perfect ass? And I get to see it naked all the time, so I really know. Her's is not so skinny that she looks like a boy from the back, but way short of the Kardashian blimp booty that Kim stole from the Goodyear people. Rounded, muscular, exquisite. That ass gets a lot of attention from males from ten to eighty years old when she shows up at the beach or pool in a bikini. And she doesn't even have to wear one of the risque suits, just a fairly conservative two piece.

But I think it's her face and especially her eyes that are what attract people to her when they meet her. Her features are just perfect. Her nose is not too short nor too long and is straight with just a little upturn at the end. She has the most photogenic nose I've ever seen on a woman who hasn't had a little touch-up from her local plastic surgeon. Her gray-blue eyes are on the large side which just grabs you when she is looking at you. Her lips aren't quite Angelina Jolie thick, but they are inviting, warm, always moist looking as if she is just waiting for a kiss. And when she smiles I try to accommodate her as often as I can.

If all women had a complexion as even and clear as her's, there would be a lot of cosmetic companies going out of business.

In truth, beyond all of the purely aesthetic beauty, Linda radiates kindness, intelligence and an internal happiness that everyone around her adores. I've been the lucky man married to her the past seven years.

Me? I'm glad that Linda is attracted to brains, wit and charm, because I'm no Brad Pitt. Not to say that I'm an ogre who frightens women and small children. I've got light brown hair and hazel eyes. I never had a problem with finding women who wanted to date (not infrequently, they asked me out.) But I'm no super hunk, at 5' 11" and weighing in at, well I'll just say I could drop ten pounds.

The 'formula' for these stories seems to dictate that I recite our history together, how we dated through high school, broke up in college, reconnected, and realized that we were soulmates. Well, in our case, not quite.

No, we met while Linda was auditioning for a part in one of the episodes of the police procedural that I'd written. Well, mostly me. Yes, my wife had been one of those unemployed actresses (pardon my redundency) who are the life blood of Hollywood — keeping the faces fresh and the wages low.

The part she was auditioning for had one speaking line — and the gaggle of young 'wannabes' were lined up around the block for it. Figuratively speaking. They were all sitting in a large room waiting until they were called to read the line, to impress the casting director (a 60-year-old friend of mine) who was so bored with hearing that one stupid line repeated over and over he was about to scream. But he kept a smile on his face and pretended to appreciate the emotional angst that the young women were putting into it.

I had actually wandered out to take a break and have some coffee. There amongst the highly made up, beautiful-beyond-the-ken-of-mankind's understanding, women, all deeply searching their innermost souls for the perfect way of saying, "I think I saw him running down that alley," was one island of peace and tranquility. That, it turned out, was Linda. She saw me and even initiated conversation.

"Are these things always like this? I mean, it's like a room full of people standing shoulder to shoulder, yet they are all alone! Beyond introspective. Isolated from humanity."

I smiled at her description.

"This your first time at a 'cattle call'?" I asked.

"Yeah. A friend saw the ad in 'Variety' and since she couldn't make it, I thought I'd try it out," she replied.

There was a brief pause as she looked around the room, while I ogled her.

"I think they all hate each other," she positited.

"You're right. They're all desperate for that big break that's going to make them a star."

She looked at me quizically? "What do you mean? It's just one stupid line."

I refrained from telling her that it was a stupid line that I'd written and was somewhat fond of.

"They all want to be the next Henry Winkler or Jeleel White."

"Who?" she innocently replied. I began to wonder why she was at this audition at all.

"You know, Henry Winkler who played this character 'the Fonz' and was supposed to be in a single episode of Happy Days — stole the show and turned it into a five or six year gig. Oh hell — he turned it into a career! Or Jemeel White, same sort of story — one episode as 'Steve Urkel' on Family Matters and he managed to steal every scene he was in. They loved his character and kept him around. So you never know."

"Ah! I remember those shows from when I was a kid. Yeah, I know who you're talking about now."

"Well, it was good talking to you? I'm Art Jensen, by the way," I said, trying to fish out her info.

"I'm Linda Bowen," she informed me, "It was nice talking to you, too. I think you're the only person in this room who would give me the time of day."

Then I walked back into the audition area.

"So, George. Did I miss anything?"

"Yeah. Hearing that line read twenty-five more times."

"OK, then lets change it up," as I hastily wrote out two more lines, "and call in Linda Bowen and have her read them."

He looked at me like I was nuts.

"Sure Art. You're the boss," he said, rolling his eyes before giving the order to his assistant.

Linda came in and George intercepted her with my hand written lines.

"These are different from the ones that they gave us out front," she observed.

"That's right. Genius here," and he pointed his thumb over his shoulder in my general direction, "changed it just a minute ago."

She looked at me a little irritated and then mouthed the words, "You didn't tell me!"

She read it through for a minute and said, "OK. I'm ready."

"Fine, Go ahead. Look straight at us as if we are the cops," George coached her.

"Are you after that guy who just ran by?" pause, then she pointed a finger and turned her head to look 90 degrees away from us, "He ran down that alley."

Then she looked at us and put her hands on her hips and became the face of the indignant citizen.

"Well — don't just stand there gawking — go catch him!"

Actually watching her body language as she said the lines, George and I had to laugh.

"Did I say it wrong?" she asked, a little upset by our laughing.

"No, no," I said, "You hit the nail on the head — and you really looked so indignant when you said, 'don't just stand there' that it made the line almost funny," I explained to her.

George looked at me, "Not a bad idea. A little comic relief in the middle of the chase scene?"

"I think it would work," I agreed.

"So should we just go with her?"

"Fine with me."

Goerge told his assistant to dismiss the other actresses, Linda got the role and I found my wife.

By the way — I managed to write small parts for her in three more episodes. But that series was over at the end of the season, so that was as far as it went.

After she'd shot that first scene, I asked her out before she could get off the set.

That was eight and a half years ago, and a little over a year later, just before Linda's twenty-fifth birthday, we got hitched. Despite my inclinations to elope off to Vegas and have Elvis perform the ceremony, we had a nice family wedding at a church and everything!

She did a few more acting gigs, and was still open to acting jobs, but the bug had gone out of her.

Not that she had abandoned the Hollywood scene -- just the cut-throat nature of getting the acting jobs, along with the miserable hours of waiting around on a set waiting for your scene to be shot with no place to sit (only the stars and the director get those folding chairs), wardrobe that provides shoes that are too small for your feet (and you're supposed to wear them all day), the heat of the lights and all of the million other irritating things that are the reality behind the cameras.

She wanted to go into the production end of the business instead.

For her it made sense. At USC (of course) she'd gotten her degree in business with a psych minor, as well as taking some of the film and acting classes. She actually understood the business aspects of the industry better than most of the people who were in the production end of the biz. Most of them were primarily schmoozers who conned people with money into 'investing' in movies and television shows. The chances of even getting your money back was about 2% at most. They didn't sell it that way. Glamour, glitz, rubbing shoulders with the A-list stars! Now there's a pitch.

She applied for a couple of slots and was hired as a production assistant. And NO it wasn't for the very famous guy who produced a long string of really excellent movies, marred only by the fact that he also thought that he was entitled to molest any women who wanted to work in Hollywood.

Not that it mattered too much — I mean there are/were dozens, if not hundreds, of other Hollywood types who had the same attitudes.

The production exec she was working for was a guy named Lester 'call me Les' Holder.

Before she started, I even checked around about him.

Les had been an actor himself. He'd been a recognizable actor, first on a couple of soaps filmed in New York, and then on a romantic comedy series shot on the Paramount lot in Hollywood. It lasted more than the requiste 100 episodes to be an attractive property for syndication and you can still see it every night on one cable channel or another, even 15 years after the series shut down. And between acting on the series and his residuals from the replays, Les was a pretty well-off guy. With a string of successful movies and television shows, he'd become a rich man. Not Silicon Valley rich, but he was definitely a 1% rich.

Like I said, he'd been an actor and sort of a 'leading man' type. He was about six-feet tall, had a handsome face (according to the women I talked to), and despite his age (I think he was 55 years old at the time) was still in good shape. He was also married, happily it was rumored, to a tall former model. She too was pretty hot — and maybe ten years younger than him.

While he wasn't in the same class as 'he who shall not be named', Les was considered a solid producer who regularly had one or two series in production at any given time.

I spoke with several of his ex-employees — all gay men, as it turned out — who told me that Les wasn't one of the monsters, and they had never heard of any of the women who they worked with complaining about him. He supposedly had told them that he didn't believe in shitting in his own back yard.

After doing my due diligence, I wasn't opposed to Linda going to work for ol' Les as many of the 'assistant to's' doing a lot of the grunt work for the execs.

Little did I know that he was, in fact, a snake in sheep's clothing. A wolf in the garden of Eden.

{?}

My first inklings that perhaps I needed to keep a sharper eye on ol' Lester came about six months later, at the Christmas party held by the company. I never quite understood that — most of the movers and shakers in the company were Jews, but I guess they were ecumenical about having parties for the holidays. A mystery. That, plus the fact that they always made their political donations to the Dems, while running their own businesses like the most skin-flint Republicans. Go figure. Gorden Gecko -- greed lives and thy name is Hollywood.

Anyway, so there I am at the party while Linda is making the rounds doing her social schtick when someone sits down in the chair next to me. None other than Mrs. Lester, the trophy-wife ex-model. Damn, she rocked — all fixed up for the party. She may have been pushing 45, but she looked at least ten years younger.

"You're Art, aren't you? Linda's husband?"

"At your service, ma'am. Husband, and screen writer extrodinaire."

She grinned at me, 'Yeah, I've heard. Seriously, I've heard that you do good work."

"Thank you so much. At least it pays for the mortgage. OK — now let me know, what do you want, plying me with such flattery!" I said with a laugh.

Her face got a lot more serious suddenly.

"I wanted to have a quiet word with you about your wife. Well, really about Les trying to have a fling with your wife."

"Huh?" I said, taken aback. "I thought he didn't piss in his own soup?"

"He doesn't normally, but I get a feeling that there's something about Linda that seriously attracts him," she replied.

"Hey — here in Hollywoodland there's always the bait, the quid quo. But Linda isn't interested in acting. I mean, what, leading lady in a series, or something? Frankly, she doesn't have the chops for something like that. And I say that despite loving her beyond belief."

"No, no, not that. That would be too tranparent even for a sweetie like Linda."

I nodded at the unspoken observation: 'sweetie' was a euphemism for 'gullible.'

"No, but there is one of the other exec's is retiring in a couple of months and I think he's dangling that position in front of her," she explained. Then she started to get up.

"Nothing's happened so far (and I keep him on a tight leash.) But he could try and go off the reservation. All I'm saying is: keep your eyes and ears open and if your gut starts to feel queasy — don't ignore it."

"If you don't mind my asking, it sounds as if you and Les don't get along in quite the storybook fashion that evenyone assumes?"

Barbara looked somewhat pensive before answering, "I don't know what to say. I love Les, but throughout our marriage he's been a serial philanderer. And that takes it's toll over time. The first time I found out I was so hurt, but he promised that he would never do it again. I think what he really meant was, 'I'll be more careful so you don't find out. But that never works in Hollywood. It's too small a place and there are always people who can hardly wait to whisper how they saw Les with some young actress going to into a room after lunch at the Beverly Hills Hotel."

I just nodded at her, so she continued on.

"You can't understand how that hurts me. He comes home to me, but when he has the chance, he screws some younger, more beautiful, sexy twenty-year-old model or actress. Look, let's be honest — OK, I know that I'm still looking pretty good and I work hard at it. But every time he has a 'late meeting' I sit there wondering if this will be the night when he comes home and tells me that he dumping me for someone else. I have no self-confidence anymore. And I won't go the tit-for-tat route and find someone to have an affair with. I still respect my marriage vows. So far."

I was truly curious, "So why don't you divorce him? At least then you could go on in your life and try to find a man who would love to have a loyal, smart, great-looking woman like you."

"Ah!" she replied, "There's the rub. It's called a pre-nup, and I signed it when I was young and foolish. If I were to divorce him, for any cause, I walk out pretty much impoverished. I hate to sound so materialistic, but I enjoy the life I lead and I'm too old to think that I still have a chance to compete in the entertainment world with those bimbos. And, except for his periodic screwing around on me, Les is actually a good husband. He's affectionate, kind, interesting and lots of fun. I know it's TMI, but he's also the best sex that I've ever had, and before we married when I was actively modelling, I had quite a lot. So I know whereof I speak," she concluded with a slight smile.

I just nodded silently.

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