glass furniture. Sheets of Lexan were bolted to the inner surfaces of conspicuous windows. Invisible, unless you knew to look.
The décor expressed all the high-tech efficiency clients craved.
This afternoon, Work Land was silent, every message and e-mail cleared during the drive. He loved operating as a solo act.
Checking one of three fax machines, he was pleased to find a freshclear copy of Rory Stoltz’s driver’s license, courtesy an illegal search by a source at DMV.
Hundred bucks. Ka
-ching
.
Folding the page neatly, to keep from creasing the subject’s face, he headed upstairs to Play Land, worked out in his gym, showered, whirlpool-bathed, shaved.
Feeling loose and confident, he sauntered, stark-naked and swinging a key ring, down a subtly lit, plum-carpeted hallway toward what had once been a rear bedroom.
The space was guarded by a security-hinged door of fiery teak. An ebony silhouette of a top-hatted boulevardier graced the center of the wood. Aaron unlocked and stepped in.
The same teak covered the walls and the coffered ceilings. Recessed lighting set off billiard-table-green carpeting. The twenty-by-eighteen room was sectioned by double-height, industrial-quality, stainless-steel racks he’d snagged at a bargain price from Carlyle and Tout when the Brentwood haberdasher went under.
The left side was devoted to suits, sport coats paired with harmonizing slacks, and topcoats he rarely used. Though his favorite, a charcoal-brown, cashmere/mink-blend Arnold Brant by Columbo, sometimes got put to work when he lowered the Porsche’s top on windy winter nights.
On the right hung sport shirts and casual jackets arranged by hue, forty-two pairs of neatly pressed jeans with an emphasis on Zegna, a dozen Fila velour workout suits—no, thirteen.
The rear wall was mostly dress shirts. Lots of Borelli, but some Brioni, Ricci, Charvet, Turnbull, Armani Black Label. Flanking hooks held belts and ties, each cravat paired with a harmonious pocket silk. Ringing the entire room above the racks was teak shelving bearing clear plastic boxes containing sweaters and shoes, the latter identified precisely.
Magli Olive Suede Wingtips. Paciotti Black Buckle Loafers. Edmonds Cordovans
.
About half of the clothing still bore tags.
Aaron walked among his treasures, fingertips grazing silk, Sea Island cotton, merino, cashmere, alpaca.
He stopped at the Columbo. Cashmere and mink, nothing like it. He loved that coat.
Ten minutes later, he’d made his pick for tonight.
What the well-dressed man dons when sitting on his ass for protracted periods of tedium came down to a loose brown linen shirt-jacket with four flap pockets, tailored to conceal his 9mm, beige cargo pants of the same carefully rumpled fabric that provided another quartet of compartments, cream silk socks, butter-soft pigskin Santoni driving shoes.
By four p.m., he was back in West L.A., sitting in the girlie-cute front room of Liana Parlat’s girlie-cute condo off Overland. Liana, always friendly, seemed especially happy to see him, and he wondered if some of her gigs had dried up due to the writers’ strike.
She served him coffee and home-baked white-chocolate chip cookies and offered him a share of the Lean Cuisine lasagna she was just about to nuke. Aaron declined the food but finished three cups of Liana’s always excellent Kenyan. She put dinner on hold and sat opposite him, perched like the lingerie model she’d once been, on the edge of a Louis XIV repro chair done up in puce brocade.
Still gorgeous at forty-one, the mop of black hair glossy and carefully layered, the flawless ivory skin allowing her to pass for late twenties, Liana had the charisma and talent to be a movie star. After fifteen years of failure, she’d settled for the anonymity and respectable income of commercial voice-overs.
Freelancing for Aaron supplemented her retirement fund.
They’d begun as lovers, continued as friends and occasional business associates.
The décor expressed all the high-tech efficiency clients craved.
This afternoon, Work Land was silent, every message and e-mail cleared during the drive. He loved operating as a solo act.
Checking one of three fax machines, he was pleased to find a freshclear copy of Rory Stoltz’s driver’s license, courtesy an illegal search by a source at DMV.
Hundred bucks. Ka
-ching
.
Folding the page neatly, to keep from creasing the subject’s face, he headed upstairs to Play Land, worked out in his gym, showered, whirlpool-bathed, shaved.
Feeling loose and confident, he sauntered, stark-naked and swinging a key ring, down a subtly lit, plum-carpeted hallway toward what had once been a rear bedroom.
The space was guarded by a security-hinged door of fiery teak. An ebony silhouette of a top-hatted boulevardier graced the center of the wood. Aaron unlocked and stepped in.
The same teak covered the walls and the coffered ceilings. Recessed lighting set off billiard-table-green carpeting. The twenty-by-eighteen room was sectioned by double-height, industrial-quality, stainless-steel racks he’d snagged at a bargain price from Carlyle and Tout when the Brentwood haberdasher went under.
The left side was devoted to suits, sport coats paired with harmonizing slacks, and topcoats he rarely used. Though his favorite, a charcoal-brown, cashmere/mink-blend Arnold Brant by Columbo, sometimes got put to work when he lowered the Porsche’s top on windy winter nights.
On the right hung sport shirts and casual jackets arranged by hue, forty-two pairs of neatly pressed jeans with an emphasis on Zegna, a dozen Fila velour workout suits—no, thirteen.
The rear wall was mostly dress shirts. Lots of Borelli, but some Brioni, Ricci, Charvet, Turnbull, Armani Black Label. Flanking hooks held belts and ties, each cravat paired with a harmonious pocket silk. Ringing the entire room above the racks was teak shelving bearing clear plastic boxes containing sweaters and shoes, the latter identified precisely.
Magli Olive Suede Wingtips. Paciotti Black Buckle Loafers. Edmonds Cordovans
.
About half of the clothing still bore tags.
Aaron walked among his treasures, fingertips grazing silk, Sea Island cotton, merino, cashmere, alpaca.
He stopped at the Columbo. Cashmere and mink, nothing like it. He loved that coat.
Ten minutes later, he’d made his pick for tonight.
What the well-dressed man dons when sitting on his ass for protracted periods of tedium came down to a loose brown linen shirt-jacket with four flap pockets, tailored to conceal his 9mm, beige cargo pants of the same carefully rumpled fabric that provided another quartet of compartments, cream silk socks, butter-soft pigskin Santoni driving shoes.
By four p.m., he was back in West L.A., sitting in the girlie-cute front room of Liana Parlat’s girlie-cute condo off Overland. Liana, always friendly, seemed especially happy to see him, and he wondered if some of her gigs had dried up due to the writers’ strike.
She served him coffee and home-baked white-chocolate chip cookies and offered him a share of the Lean Cuisine lasagna she was just about to nuke. Aaron declined the food but finished three cups of Liana’s always excellent Kenyan. She put dinner on hold and sat opposite him, perched like the lingerie model she’d once been, on the edge of a Louis XIV repro chair done up in puce brocade.
Still gorgeous at forty-one, the mop of black hair glossy and carefully layered, the flawless ivory skin allowing her to pass for late twenties, Liana had the charisma and talent to be a movie star. After fifteen years of failure, she’d settled for the anonymity and respectable income of commercial voice-overs.
Freelancing for Aaron supplemented her retirement fund.
They’d begun as lovers, continued as friends and occasional business associates.
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