Gladyss of the Hunt by Arthur Nersesian

way!”
    â€œWell I’m sorry, but I’m not letting you do this alone,” he replied.
    â€œYou’re not letting me?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “What exactly do you think you’re going to do?”
    â€œI’ll report you. I’ll call Farrell and tell him what you’re doing.” Typical macho control shit.
    â€œI can’t believe you’d even consider . . .” My anger paralyzed me, and I couldn’t say another word.
    â€œLook, I care about you, as your friend as well as your partner. You can date whoever you want. I fully respect your private life. But you’re playing detective now, going undercover on a date with a murder suspect without back-up . . . If I did something like that, I like to think you’d care this much about me.”
    It was difficult to be angry with him when he put it that way.
    â€œTell you what,” I compromised. “I’ll call you before I go on the date, and then after I get home to let you know I’m okay. How’s that?”
    â€œYou’re not going to sleep with him for his DNA sample or something crazy like that?”
    â€œHell no! How can you ask me that?” He knew I was a virgin, and now he had the gall to imply I was a slut?
    â€œFrankly, since New Year’s I’ve realized I don’t know you at all,” he said coolly.
    â€œI’ll call you before and after,” I said, which was more than he had done. “We’ll let it go at that.”
    That evening, after my yoga class, I had intended to ask the Renunciate about my mini-Kundalini moment outside the hotel. I specifically wanted to know if wishing for something positive, something selfless, could actually facilitate realizing that thing. Then I realized I’d never even told him I was a cop, and that it could turn into a much longer, messier talk. I went home and at some point during the fifteen minutes that I listened to Maggie while she ate my salad, I idly asked her what she knew about Crispin Marachino.
    â€œHis real name is Chris Maron,” she began and proceeded to download his bio from the web site in her brain: “He was a high school dropout who worked as a video store clerk by day and wrote scripts at night. When his mother, who was in the production department at Paramount Pictures, showed one of his scripts to an actor who was big in the 70s, the guy loved it. Marachino agreed to let it go for peanuts, provided he was allowed to direct it. Crime Noir was a big hit. Thirty million opening weekend. His second film, Slim Jim , broke even; his third film, Killers In Love , bombed. Noel Holden had small roles in all three films. Now he’s starring in Fashion Dogs , which premieres in a few weeks.”
    â€œWhat do you know about Venezia Ramada?”
    â€œSilicone D-cup bimbo. Born Vanessa Ramone. Granddaughter of Ronnie Ramone, the founder of the multinational candy manufacturer. She met Crispin at the Hollywood nightclub Vespers. He proposed to her on the dance floor and decided to make her his next big discovery. Then a month later, on the set of Fashion Dogs , she went crazy for Noel Holden.”
    â€œWhich is probably why she was such a bitch to me.”
    â€œOh God,” she said. “You didn’t fall in love with Noel, did you?Tell me you didn’t!”
    â€œI know this sounds bizarre, but considering O.J. Simpson and Robert Blake . . .”
    â€œNeither of them were found guilty,” she shot back before I could finish my thought. Maggie must’ve been the last kid in class who believed in Santa and the freakin’ Easter Bunny. She swore Michael Jackson was repeatedly being framed.
    â€œI’m supposed to go to some party with Noel.”
    â€œYou what?”
    â€œHe invited me to the pre-premiere party.”
    â€œBut he’s dating Venezia!”
    â€œIt’s all just show.”
    â€œHe asked you on a date?”
    Her