especially at one hundred fifty dollars a day plus expenses.
I almost slept through the most important day in the investigation.
If Lauren Parkus hadn’t been in such a hurry coming out of the gate at ten A.M. , and if she hadn’t cut off a Lincoln, and if the old geezer driving it hadn’t honked at her long and loud to show how angry he was, I wouldn’t have woken up. I’d have still been sitting there waiting for her to come out when she came home later that afternoon.
But the guy did honk, I woke up, and I was able to follow her. We headed south again on the Ventura Freeway, getting off in Calabasas and taking Malibu Canyon towards the sea.
It’s a real nice drive through the Santa Monica Mountains, with lots of charred trees and blackened earth from the annual wildfires to look at. You also pass some dramatic gouges and gashes in the hillside from the seasonal mudslides. It’s not the place I’d pick to build my secluded mansion, but I’m not a rich movie star or studio executive.
When we hit the Pacific Coast Highway, she turned left towards Santa Monica, traveling south along the beaches.
It’s amazing how beautiful the ocean is, especially when you consider it’s just a giant toilet that’s been used by millions of people and never been flushed. There’s only a few months out of the year when stepping in it is actually hazardous to your health. The rest of the time, you’ll just get a rash that we let the tourists think is sunburn. But despite its variable toxicity, the sea along the Southern California coastline is always nice to look at and that’s got to count for something.
Lauren took the off-ramp up to Ocean Avenue, but instead of going into Santa Monica, she surprised me by making a hard left onto the Pier.
I was surprised for a lot of reasons, but mainly because it was such a cliché. Once again,
Mannix
got it right, or maybe we just can’t help but imitate it. Maybe the clichés and conventions are so ingrained, they’ve become instinctive behavior.
In old TV cop shows, people are always having their clandestine meetings in decrepit warehouses and abandoned amusement parks. I guess since most of the decrepit warehouses in LA were converted to soundstages, and the last abandoned amusement park was paved over decades ago, the Santa Monica Pier was the perfect compromise.
Beyond the landmark carousel, the Pier has all the allure of one of those traveling carnivals that set up for a weekend or two in a vacant field or shopping center parking lot. The big attractions are a Ferris wheel, a rinky-dink roller coaster, and a noisy pinball arcade where old Pac Man machines go to die.
I didn’t know much about Lauren Parkus, but I was willing to bet she hadn’t picked this spot, which already told me a lot about the person she was going to meet. Whoever he was, he wasn’t in her class.
He was in mine.
Lauren paid the ten bucks and parked behind the arcade and near the ticket booth for the rides. I parked two rows over, across from her, so I could see her face. She sat in her car for a moment, looking at the line of weary Hispanic nannies waiting for tickets, pushing elaborate strollers full of plump, white kids dribbling drool and snot onto their Izod polo shirts and Guess overalls.
I wondered what she was thinking and snapped a few pictures on the chance I might see the answer on her face later, under a magnifying glass.
After a few moments, Lauren put on a pair of sunglasses and got out, carrying a large purse. She’d dressed down for this, wearing jeans and a big, untucked blouse loosely buttoned over a blue t-shirt.
She walked slowly and deliberately towards the rides and I followed a few yards behind, trying to look inconspicuous, which wasn’t easy without a kid, a stroller, or a date. I pretended to take pictures, like I was a tourist who loved seedy amusement parks.
I was pretty excited, and nervous, too, because I could feel that I was coming up on the big moment I’d been
I almost slept through the most important day in the investigation.
If Lauren Parkus hadn’t been in such a hurry coming out of the gate at ten A.M. , and if she hadn’t cut off a Lincoln, and if the old geezer driving it hadn’t honked at her long and loud to show how angry he was, I wouldn’t have woken up. I’d have still been sitting there waiting for her to come out when she came home later that afternoon.
But the guy did honk, I woke up, and I was able to follow her. We headed south again on the Ventura Freeway, getting off in Calabasas and taking Malibu Canyon towards the sea.
It’s a real nice drive through the Santa Monica Mountains, with lots of charred trees and blackened earth from the annual wildfires to look at. You also pass some dramatic gouges and gashes in the hillside from the seasonal mudslides. It’s not the place I’d pick to build my secluded mansion, but I’m not a rich movie star or studio executive.
When we hit the Pacific Coast Highway, she turned left towards Santa Monica, traveling south along the beaches.
It’s amazing how beautiful the ocean is, especially when you consider it’s just a giant toilet that’s been used by millions of people and never been flushed. There’s only a few months out of the year when stepping in it is actually hazardous to your health. The rest of the time, you’ll just get a rash that we let the tourists think is sunburn. But despite its variable toxicity, the sea along the Southern California coastline is always nice to look at and that’s got to count for something.
Lauren took the off-ramp up to Ocean Avenue, but instead of going into Santa Monica, she surprised me by making a hard left onto the Pier.
I was surprised for a lot of reasons, but mainly because it was such a cliché. Once again,
Mannix
got it right, or maybe we just can’t help but imitate it. Maybe the clichés and conventions are so ingrained, they’ve become instinctive behavior.
In old TV cop shows, people are always having their clandestine meetings in decrepit warehouses and abandoned amusement parks. I guess since most of the decrepit warehouses in LA were converted to soundstages, and the last abandoned amusement park was paved over decades ago, the Santa Monica Pier was the perfect compromise.
Beyond the landmark carousel, the Pier has all the allure of one of those traveling carnivals that set up for a weekend or two in a vacant field or shopping center parking lot. The big attractions are a Ferris wheel, a rinky-dink roller coaster, and a noisy pinball arcade where old Pac Man machines go to die.
I didn’t know much about Lauren Parkus, but I was willing to bet she hadn’t picked this spot, which already told me a lot about the person she was going to meet. Whoever he was, he wasn’t in her class.
He was in mine.
Lauren paid the ten bucks and parked behind the arcade and near the ticket booth for the rides. I parked two rows over, across from her, so I could see her face. She sat in her car for a moment, looking at the line of weary Hispanic nannies waiting for tickets, pushing elaborate strollers full of plump, white kids dribbling drool and snot onto their Izod polo shirts and Guess overalls.
I wondered what she was thinking and snapped a few pictures on the chance I might see the answer on her face later, under a magnifying glass.
After a few moments, Lauren put on a pair of sunglasses and got out, carrying a large purse. She’d dressed down for this, wearing jeans and a big, untucked blouse loosely buttoned over a blue t-shirt.
She walked slowly and deliberately towards the rides and I followed a few yards behind, trying to look inconspicuous, which wasn’t easy without a kid, a stroller, or a date. I pretended to take pictures, like I was a tourist who loved seedy amusement parks.
I was pretty excited, and nervous, too, because I could feel that I was coming up on the big moment I’d been
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