Chapter 9A

Palm Springs, California
November 11, 1988
5:24 PM

"Wow," Helen said as the limousine came to a stop in the circular driveway at 210 Jacinto View Drive. She was looking out the window at the huge house that towered above them. Even though the sun had just gone down, bringing an inky twilight to the desert city, she could see enough to be quite impressed.

"That is a big motherfuckin' domicile," Jake agreed, managing to combine a Nerdlyism with a Mattism and successfully pull it off.

The house in question was three stories tall and spread out over the better part of an acre of land. It stood out from its neighbors by virtue of the fact that it was considerably larger — not that the other houses were small — and it was of modern architecture instead of the classic Spanish or Southwestern architecture that was the norm in this neighborhood.

"It has to be close to ten thousand square feet," Helen said as the limo driver came around to her door to open it.

"Actually," Jake said, "it's ninety-two hundred square feet, not including the detached garage."

"How do you know that?" she asked.

"Greg is one of those guys who likes to give you the specs on everything he owns."

"Oh," she said. "I see."

Her door opened and she stepped out onto the stamped concrete of the drive. Jake stepped out right behind her, carrying a canvas shopping bag he'd kept separate from the rest of their baggage. Both were dressed nicely. Helen was wearing a black, sleeveless cocktail dress that showed off her bare back and a generous amount of her ample cleavage. Dark nylons covered her athletic legs and a pair of three hundred dollar heels adorned her feet. Jake was wearing a pair gray slacks, a white dress shirt, and a gray dinner jacket.

The driver closed the door and turned to them. "I hope you enjoyed the ride," he said to Jake. "After you make entry to Mr. Oldfellow's residence I will coordinate with the household help in order to deliver your luggage and your golf clubs to their proper places."

"Thanks, Tim," Jake said, calling him by the name he'd introduced himself as back at the airport. He pulled a twenty-dollar bill out of his jacket pocket and handed it to him.

"And thank you, Mr. Kingsley," Tim said, making the bill disappear without even looking at it.

Jake and Helen walked up a small path and mounted the polished marble steps that led to the front door. The house belonged to Greg Oldfellow, Celia Valdez's fiancé. He had purchased the property thirteen months before for $1.2 million and had torn down the thirty-year-old house that occupied it. He had then spent another $1.8 million building the structure they now stood before. Construction was completed four weeks ago and Greg — who only planned to winter here — had moved in the week before. He had not yet held his official housewarming party but had invited Jake and "that girl you've been seeing" over for a weekend stay to check out the house and to play some golf at the country club it overlooked.

"I'm a little nervous about this, Jake," she whispered to him. "I mean, I'm about to meet Greg Oldfellow and Celia Valdez. This is kind of a new experience for me."

"They're just ordinary people," Jake said.

"Really?"

"No, not really," he said. "They're mega-rich superstars with egos even bigger than this house and they like to belittle anyone who doesn't have as much money as they do."

She looked at him, aghast.

"Just kidding," he said with a chuckle. "They're actually pretty down to earth people for celebrities, especially Celia. That's why I associate with them."

"You're an ass," she said, slapping at his shoulder. She did seem to feel better, however.

Jake rang the bell and an instant later the nine foot double doors swung open revealing a tall, middle-aged man dressed in a traditional butler's uniform. He bowed politely to them.

"Mr. Kingsley," he said. "Ms. Brody. Welcome to Oldfellow Manor. Mr. Oldfellow and Ms. Valdez are expecting you." He held his hand toward the entryway, inviting them to come in.

"Thank you," Jake said, allowing Helen to step inside first. He followed behind her. The entryway featured marble flooring and had several pieces of modern art hung on the wall. They followed the butler into a large, open area. Hallways led off in several directions and two spiral staircases led upward to a second floor overlook.

"Nice pad," Helen said with a whistle, her eyes taking in everything at once.

The butler led them through a set of oak doors into an entertainment room that was at least sixty feet by fifty. Here, the flooring was of meticulously polished hardwood. Modern leather furniture was arranged near a large screen television. A bar took up one portion of the room and a glittering chandelier hung from the vaulted ceiling. Soft, classical music played from hidden speakers. Celia and Greg were sitting at the bar, both sipping from a drink.

"Mr. Kingsley and Ms. Brody have arrived, sir," the butler said formally.

Greg and Celia both stood. Greg was dressed in a pair of tan slacks and a navy blue dinner jacket with a tie. Celia wore a maroon cocktail dress that was considerably less revealing then Helen's but did manage to cling quite alluringly to her curvy figure.

"Thank you, Jim," Greg said to the butler. "Could you see to their luggage, please? I'm sure the driver is anxious to get back to other duties."

"Of course, sir," Jim the butler said. He gave another little bow and then disappeared through the door through which they'd entered.

Greg and Celia walked over to them, both smiling.

"Jake," Greg greeted, holding out his hand for a shake. "It's nice to see you again. How the hell have you been?"

"Livin' the dream," Jake said, shaking with him.

Celia came up next and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek. "Thanks for coming out," she said. "I think we're going to have a great weekend."

"Me too," Jake agreed. He turned to Helen. "Greg, Celia, this is Helen Brody. I'm sure you've read all about her in your local celebrity news columns."

"Those rags," Celia said, rolling her eyes to the ceiling for a moment. "I hope you aren't letting all that publicity get to you, Helen."

"I try to just take things a day at a time," Helen said.

"That's the way to do it," Greg said, holding out his hand and shaking with Helen. "It's very nice to meet you."

"Thank you," Helen said. "It's nice to meet you as well."

Celia, who was a hugger, didn't just settle for a handshake. She put her arms around Helen and pulled her against her. Helen seemed a little surprised by the affection but quickly warmed to it, returning the hug.

"You've got yourself quite a handful with Jake here," Celia told her. "You know that, don't you?"

"That's something else I have to take one day at a time," she said.

Celia and Greg both laughed.

"I'm sorry we're late," Jake said. They were supposed to have arrived at five o'clock. "The flight took longer than expected."

"What's up with that?" Greg asked. "I thought when you flew your own plane you didn't have to worry about flight delays."

"Yeah," said Celia. "What happened, Helen? Was he absent the day you were teaching about how to calculate your ETA?"

"Oh, I calculated my ETA down to the minute," Jake said. "I came into Palm Springs airspace right on schedule at 4:16 PM. What I didn't know was that every Tom, Dick, and Harry would also be flying into the airport at exactly the same time. We had to circle in the landing pattern for almost twenty minutes while nine other planes landed in front of us."

"Hell, I could've told you that," Greg said. "Everyone knows not to try to fly into Palm Springs on a Friday afternoon."

"You could've told me that," Jake said, "but you didn't."

"You should've told the tower who you were," Greg said. "I bet if you would have let them know you were Jake Kingsley they would've bumped you up in the list. What's the point of being famous if you can't take advantage of it once in a while?"

Jake could tell that Helen was appalled by the suggestion that air traffic control could be influenced by one's status. "I guess it didn't occur to me," he said with a shrug. "Anyway, we're here. And I brought some wine for dinner. I didn't know what we were having so I brought a Napa Valley Merlot and a French Sauvignon Blanc. If we're having white meat, you might want to get the Blanc on some ice pretty soon."

"Carmen is preparing duck breast with a fig and port sauce," Greg said. "The Blanc will go perfect with that. Let's give you two a tour of the house. When we go through the kitchen you can drop it off with her."

"Sounds like a plan," Jake said. He reached into his bag. "I also brought these for you, Celia." He pulled out a CD copy and a VHS tape of In Action.

"Your live album," she said, taking it and looking at the cover. "I heard it was almost ready for release."

"You get it a week before anyone else," Jake said. "They've released a few copies to the radio stations but it won't be in stores until the eighteenth."

"I can't wait to watch the tape," she said. "I've never caught you guys in concert. I hear it's something to see."

"I'm not as fond of the video as I am of the album," Jake said. "The video lacks continuity. It's a hodgepodge of concerts instead of one continuous one. Some of the clips have Darren on the bass and some have Charlie. And in almost every song, we're wearing different clothes." He shrugged. "It's not bad though, and it did a decent job of capturing the basic essence of our shows."

"Any backstage shots?" Greg asked hopefully, earning him a playful punch on the shoulder by Celia.

"Some," Jake said with a chuckle. "But not the kind you're hoping for."

"Damn," Greg said.

They toured the house, Greg leading them through every nook and cranny of it. It took the better part of forty minutes to see everything and it was as opulent and decedent as Jake had suspected it would be. The kitchen was huge, large enough to provide meals for a medium sized hotel and with a pantry that could store enough food to survive for six months after a nuclear holocaust. There was a ballroom complete with discotheque lighting and a professional sound system. There was a movie room that resembled a small theater, complete with raised seating and a Dolby equipped projection system. There were five secondary bedrooms that each had their own bathrooms and Jacuzzi tubs. There were two master suites, each equipped with fireplaces, hot tubs, waterfalls, and views of the fifth fairway of the Mojave Springs Country Club. Since Celia would someday take up residence here, there was a library set up with all of her music collection and all of her musical instruments. The walls here were soundproofed so she could compose in solitude. Outside, was a huge swimming pool and hot tub combo. To run the house, Greg had hired three permanent servants. There was Tim the butler, Carmen the cook, and Vanna, the maid (a sensually attractive blonde of about twenty-two who wore a traditional maid's outfit). In addition to these three, there was Randolph, the forty-two year old retired Chicago police officer, who served as Greg's bodyguard and security specialist. He had his own office and bedroom in the mansion where he monitored the take from the sixteen cameras that covered virtually every square inch of the property (Randolph had been the one to push the button that admitted the limo through the wrought iron gates and onto the grounds).

"It's impressive," Jake said when the tour was finally complete. "I think I could live here if I had to."

"I've never seen anything like it," said Helen, whose lower middle-class upbringing had left her numbly awed by the display of wealth she found herself in the midst of.

"It'll do for a winter home," Greg said off-handedly, as if he was barely managing to tolerate it. "What I'm really looking forward to is building my summer home in Bar Harbor. I've started looking into the acquisition of property there but I haven't found anything that suits my needs just yet."

"Be diligent," Jake advised. "I'm sure the right piece of land will just jump out and grab you at some point."

"My thoughts exactly," Greg said, completely missing Jake's gentle sarcasm.

Celia caught it, though. She chuckled a little and shook her head in amusement.

Greg checked his watch — it was a top-of-the-line Rolex — and said, "We've got another twenty minutes until dinner. Anyone up for a pre-dinner cocktail?"

"Now you're talkin'," Jake replied.

They returned to the entertainment room and sat down on the leather couches, Jake and Helen on one, Greg and Celia on the other. Jim, the butler, appeared as if by magic and asked for their drink orders. Jake asked for a rum and coke. Helen requested a whiskey sour. Celia and Greg both requested "the usual".

"Very good," Jim said, heading to the bar where he began mixing.

"So, Jake," said Celia. "I know I'm putting you on the spot here, but you haven't told me what you thought of our new album yet."

Jake inwardly winced. He had hoped that this wouldn't come up. La Diferencia's latest album, Caress Of Warmth, had been released two weeks before. Sales had so far been dismal and the album's first single, a record company written tune called Kiss Me Goodbye, was not doing very well either. Radio stations were not giving the song much airplay and it had not even debuted on the Hot 100 list yet, something that every other La Diferencia single had done within two days of release. Celia had given Jake an advanced copy of the album about a month ago, handing it over with the disclaimer that she wasn't really proud of the contents.

"Well," Jake said, "I listened to the album a few times."

"And?" she asked.

"Well... what can I say?" he asked. "I try to be honest in all things relating to music. I didn't much care for it."

She nodded as if she'd been expecting this. "I didn't much care for it either," she admitted. "And it seems like the public feels the same way. We haven't even sold sixty thousand copies yet."

"I listened to it too," Helen said. "Your voice sounds as pretty as it always has."

"Thank you," Celia said, patting her leg. "My voice just couldn't carry this one though. Like I told Jake a few times before, our fans have grown up but our music hasn't."

"That's part of your problem," Jake said. "The biggest part is that your record company exerts too much control over your music. Those songs they wrote for you..." He shook his head in consternation. "They're just... I won't go so far as to use the word 'horrible', but they're pretty bad. It's almost like they're doing a parody of the earlier stuff they wrote for you that was successful."

Celia nodded again. "I was ashamed to sing most of them," she admitted. "Kiss Me Goodbye? Awful lyricism. Some of the campiest lines I've ever been given. Caress Of Warmth is almost as bad."

"I did like the lyrics of the three songs that were yours," Jake said. "You sang two of those to me that night we had our little jam session, remember?"

She giggled. "I remember some of that night," she said.

"Jam session?" Helen said, raising her eyebrows a tad.

"It was the night before the Grammy awards back in February," Celia told her. "Jake and I were both out on tour and they were flying us in to make an appearance at the ceremony. We ran into each other at DFW and I told Jake they were putting me up in some cheap hotel. He invited me to stay the night at his place instead. Elsa made us dinner and then we spent about three hours getting drunk and singing our unrecorded material to each other." She looked at Jake fondly. "God, I was so hungover at the awards the next day."

"Me too," Jake said. "I was afraid I was gonna throw up on the red carpet when I got out of the limo."

"You never told me about that, Jake," Helen said, her eyes probing a little into his.

Jake shrugged. "It never came up," he said.

"It's very fortunate that word of where Celia was that night never leaked out," said Greg, who was obviously not all that amused by the story either. "Can you imagine the stories that would've been circulating in those gossip rags?"

"We were careful," Jake said. "I got her over to my place like she was a spy slipping into an iron curtain country."

"You do have a very devious mind when you want to," Helen said.

"It's part of the siege mentality that goes with being a celebrity," Celia said. "I'm sure you're starting to get a taste of it, aren't you, Helen?"

"Yeah," she said. "Every time I go to work or out shopping there's some photographer or reporter trailing after me. It does get kind of old."

"The public has a right to know," Greg said bitterly. "That's their favorite line. I had too much to drink once out at a club and ended up throwing up in the parking lot. The next week there were pictures of me barfing in the American Watcher."

"At least they never caught you naked on a boat with Mindy Snow," Jake said.

"I saw those pictures," Celia said. "You guys weren't naked. You were wearing matching swim suits that looked like black lines."