All the Lucky Ones Are Dead by Gar Anthony Haywood

crayon.”
    â€œBut you say he may have had the opportunity to commit the crime, if nothing else?”
    â€œThat’s right. He was here in L.A. the night the Digga died. He’d been on the Coast for three weeks, shooting a video, I believe.”
    â€œThen he’s back in New York now.”
    â€œAs far as I know.”
    Gunner nodded, then asked Joy if the Digga had really been staying at the Beverly Hills Westmore to write, as Benny Elbridge believed.
    â€œFor the most part, yes,” Joy said.
    â€œAnd the other part?”
    â€œHe was there to chill out. Do some reading, swim in the pool …”
    â€œGet jiggy with a couple of ladyfriends other than his wife?”
    When Joy just stared at him blankly, Gunner told him about the two women the Beverly Hills Police Department’s Kevin Frick had said the Digga entertained in his hotel room only hours before his death.
    â€œOkay. So he had some company,” Joy said simply.
    â€œWere they friends of yours?”
    â€œFriends of mine? Why would they be friends of mine?”
    â€œYou were his manager. Some managers might consider that sort of thing just another service within their purview.”
    â€œNot this one. My clients do their own pimping. Any more questions?”
    â€œJust a small one. There was a freak in a bronze Lexus pulling out of the parking lot as I was pulling in a few minutes ago. Almost tore my car in half, and looked disappointed when she didn’t. She wouldn’t be a friend of yours, would she?”
    Joy frowned, as if the question were the one he’d least wanted Gunner to ask. “That would’ve been Danee,” he said.
    Gunner didn’t know why, but that was exactly what he’d thought Joy would say.

f i v e
    F OR THE COST OF ONE NIGHT AT THE B EVERLY H ILLS Westmore, a man could fly from L.A. to New Orleans and back and still have change. Some considered it the premier luxury hotel in Los Angeles, and anyone who’d ever set foot on its grounds would be hard-pressed to argue the point. Set back from the northeast corner of Sunset Boulevard and Beverly Drive, behind a fortresslike wall of green landscaping, the Westmore was an old, Spanish-style monument to comfort and overindulgence that catered only to the rich and famous.
    As Gunner was neither of these things, his Tuesday afternoon visit to the historic hotel was his first, and most likely last. But that was all right with him. He had lived this long without having his tea served from a sterling silver tray, and he could go right on doing so.
    He had made the trip in order to talk to the security man named Crumley, who, Kevin Frick said, had read the Digga’s alleged suicide note along with Desmond Joy. But Crumley—whose first name turned out to be Ray, not Rod—wasn’t there. Tuesday was his day off.
    â€œYou should’ve called ahead,” his supervisor said. He was a middle-aged, potbellied white man wearing an illfitting version of the security staff’s blue blazer. His name was Bob Zemic, and he greeted Gunner’s arrival with all the hospitality of a border patrol officer.
    â€œI thought I’d surprise him,” Gunner said.
    â€œLooks like you surprised yourself. What’s this all about?”
    When Gunner told him, Zemic scowled and said, “You wouldn’t be trying to make a case for liability here, would you, Mr. Gunner?”
    â€œNot at all. Should I be?”
    â€œOnly if you enjoy wasting time. The hotel did everything that could have possibly been done for Mr. Elbridge, I assure you.”
    He had said “Mr. Elbridge” as if the rapper had no more deserved such lofty recognition than a bug he might scrape from his shoe.
    â€œI’m sure that’s true,” Gunner said, filing the man’s obvious distaste for the Digga away for future reference. “But like I said—liability isn’t my interest here. I only came by to hear Mr.