Hollywood Notorious: A Hollywood Alphabet Thriller Series (A Hollywood Alphabet Series Thriller Book 14) Read Online Free PDF Page A

stood, at the back of the room, it was all blue hairs and bald heads, sitting like an elderly jury ready to pass judgment.
    “Our lawyer just got here,” Natalie said, standing and pointing at me.
    Natalie was in her early twenties, blond, and gorgeous. She was a native of Manchester, England, where she’d spent her formative years with a truck driving father. The experience had left my friend with a colorful vocabulary and an attitude that held nothing in reserve.
    All heads turned in my direction, as Maude Finch stood and said to me, “I heard you’re a cop, not a lawyer.”
    Bernie whined, maybe thinking I should give a speech like one of those talk show celebrity lawyers.
    “This is Kate Sexton,” Mo said. “She’s our representative when it comes to legal matters.”
    My heavyset African-American friend was also on her feet. Mo was big and loud, and sometimes prone to physicality, if the situation warranted it, and sometimes even when it didn’t.
    I suppressed images of her putting Maude in a headlock as I walked to the front of the room and Mo continued, now demonstrating that the knowledge of a few legal terms can be a dangerous thing. “We demand us a writ of habeas corpus. And, believe me, this room looks like it’s full of a bunch of corpses.”
    “Can you please explain what’s going on here?” I said to the president of the residents’ council before my friends could offend everyone again.
    “What’s going on here,” Maude said, “is an eviction proceeding. You, your friends, and that vicious dog of yours have three days to vacate the premises.”
    “Or what?” Natalie demanded. “You can’t just put us out on the street.”
    “You can go live in a shelter with the rest of your kind,” Maude said. There were several shouts of encouragement, supporting her position.
    “We got rights,” Mo said. “We want due process. Tell ‘em, Kate.”
    I tried to keep my voice even. “According to Madeline Dupree, who rented our coaches to us, our units are grandfathered in, without any age or pet restrictions. You can’t evict us without just cause.”
    Natalie started clapping. “Listen to the lady or she’ll throw all your old asses in jail for violating our rights.”
    “And we’ll sue for pain and suffering,” Mo added, “We’ll end up owning this park and all your coaches.”
    That got the crowd going. Several people stood up and claimed they were going to counter sue for slander. A shouting match then ensued, with Maude and her cohorts claiming they were going to hire their own lawyer. Mo then got into the legal war of words with them and said they were guilty of something she termed property malfeasance .
    “You’re nothing but a bunch of old torts,” Natalie said, putting her own legal spin on the battle, even though I doubted that she knew the difference between a tort and a tart.
    The verbal scrum continued for another twenty minutes before Maude Finch made her pronouncement, “You have three days to vacate the premises. In the meantime, we will be forced to seek legal recourse.”
    “That’s the only kinda intercourse you’re gonna get,” Natalie said, wagging a finger at Maude. “I’ll bet you haven’t been laid since the pyramids were built.”
    I rounded up my friends and said to them, “Let’s get out of here before we get drawn and quartered.”
    We were in my front yard, a small patch of grass with three faded pink flamingos, when Harv stopped by. “Just so you know, Maude means business. Her nephew is Mean Gene.”
    “Who?” I said.
    “Mean Gene the suing machine. He has those ads on TV.”
    Natalie’s voice pitched higher as the realization struck her. “You mean the ones where Gene and his attack trained Chiweenie growl at the camera and tell the viewers they’re gonna get rich by suing their neighbors?”
    “That’s him,” Harv confirmed.
    I looked at Natalie. “A Chiweenie?”
    “It’s a cross between a Chihuahua and one of them wiener dogs,”