Hollywood Hills Read Online Free PDF

the toffee-nosed accent was legit or something the art dealer affected for L . A .'s west-side nouveau. Raleigh had spent nearly six months bumming around Europe as a young man and had lived in London for a summer, waiting tables at a bistro. He'd even considered affecting an Oxbridge accent like Nigel Wickland's when he'd been in the catering business but decided that it could backfire if his customers found him out. They liked their phonies to be less obvious phonies around these parts.
    "What'll you have?" Julius Hampton said to the art dealer, and Raleigh noticed that the old man's bony hands were trembling most of the time. It was hard for him to hold a martini glass anymore without spilling it.
    Nigel Wickland ordered a banana daiquiri and chatted with Julius Hampton about the bargains now available at the Wickland Gallery. Raleigh Dibble figured he knew the Nigel Wickland type well enough. The west side of L . A . was full of them. Given the ar t d ealer's obvious ego, the gallery would of course bear his name. And even though a man as old as Julius Hampton would be an unlikely prospect for a sale, Nigel Wickland seemed compelled to chat him up about the treasures to be had just a few blocks away on Wilshire Boulevard. Raleigh figured that the art dealer was constantly chumming the waters in case any of Julius Hampton's less grizzled friends or neighbors was ever tempted to take the bait.
    "The bloody recession is forcing people to sell for indecently low prices," Nigel told them, and signaled to the waiter for another round when his glass was still half full.
    Boozer, Raleigh thought, but then reminded himself that in the gay bars everyone seemed to drink more to bolster their courage for encounters that were often risky.
    It was then that Nigel Wickland said, "Have you been to the Brueger house since Sammy passed? I sometimes wonder how Leona is really holding up."
    Old Julius Hampton cackled and said, "The merriest of widows is dear Leona. I understand she sometimes dates a filmaker named Rudy Ressler when he's not molesting children at UCLA, where he lectures at the film school. He's one of those people who make cheap indie films that probably go straight to DVD."
    Raleigh had been impressed many times by his employer's knowledge of the movie business as well as any other business that was peculiarly relevant to Angelenos. Like his father before him, Julius Hampton had made his fortune as a real-estate developer, and the Hampton brokers bought and sold to real Hollywood names on a regular basis, not to second-raters like Rudy Ressler. As Julius Hampton and Nigel Wickland chatted about people they knew in common, Raleigh excused himself and went the restroom.
    While Raleigh was gone, Nigel Wickland said, "Nice chap. Seems competent."
    "Very," Julius Hampton said, with just enough drink in him t o g ossip. "His catering business failed some time ago and he's eking out a living now. He's basically very honest but he got in some tax trouble with Uncle Sam back then. Had to spend some time locked up in federal prison. I have a PI do a background on everyone I hire. I've never questioned Raleigh about his past even though I know a lot about it. I can tell you that he cooks like Julia Child."
    "The poor fellow," Nigel Wickland said. "That is certainly a spot of bother to live down, isn't it? Still, many people around here have had similar problems with the IRS. That doesn't make him a criminal."
    When Raleigh returned from the restroom, Nigel Wickland started paying more attention to him than to Julius Hampton. Raleigh didn't sense that it was a gay thing. It just seemed that Nigel Wickland wanted to learn about his work history. Nigel asked if this was his first job as a butler/chef. And he seemed very interested in Raleigh's former catering business, saying he thought he remembered Raleigh's employees catering some soirees at the Wickland Gallery. Raleigh thought that was just bullshit until he remembered that Nellie had