The Detective & the Pipe Girl

The Detective & the Pipe Girl Read Online Free PDF Page B

Book: The Detective & the Pipe Girl Read Online Free PDF
Author: Michael Craven
Tags: detective, thriller, Mystery
Jeep was at a light one block down Sunset. I put the Cobalt right behind him. I followed him for a bit, left on La Brea, right on Beverly. A couple miles later he parked. I copied him—parked ten spaces up on the same side of the street. Then through the glass of the Cobalt watched him head into the King’s Road Café. Coffee shop slash lunch spot. Hipster Heaven. Don’t even fucking walk in without the proper amount of irony. They should sell pencil-thin mustaches and pencil-thin cardigan sweaters at the door.
    I got out, got my slim jim out of the trunk, walked down to his Jeep, and broke into it.
    It took less than ten seconds. I looked inside for some headshots, figured he brought some to the audition. Found them. Right next to, you guessed it, some other headshots. A stack of black and white shots, no smile, his serious look, and a stack of colored shots where he sported a big smile that said: Hey, I’m a loose, fun, funny cat. I went color, looked at the picture, looked at the name on the bottom. Clay Blevins. Friendly-looking. Like I said—shaggy, curly hair. And, yeah, overweight. Charmingly overweight. The slacker friend. Perfect for the scene where the character is sitting on a couch, the remote control to the tube out of reach. And instead of getting off the couch and walking over to grab it, he grabs something within arm’s length, a nearby broom or rolled-up newspaper, to try and hook the remote and drag it over to himself, so he didn’t have to actually move.
    Not a judgment. Look, I’ve pulled that move. More than once.
    I looked on the back of the headshot, where Clay’s résumé was stapled. He’d done a few things. Couple sitcoms, some commercials, an indie flick or two.
    All right, Clay, time to introduce myself.
    I walked in King’s Road Café, pretending not to see him, but getting a look at him. Already seated, and now noticing up-close his wardrobe. Big old cargo shorts and a massive T-shirt. He was kind of gazing off into space. Contemplating his audition. Or maybe thinking about what porn site he was going to go to later. Or maybe picturing himself in a perfectly fitted tuxedo, with a sharp part in his curly hair, entering and then winning a tap-dancing contest. I really didn’t know.
    I grabbed a cup of coffee and walked over to his table.
    “Clay?”
    He looked up at me, smiled, sort of eager.
    “Yeah.”
    “Hey, man. I’m Tim.”
    He smiled. He was polite. Nice. He really, really didn’t want me to know that he had no clue who I was.
    I continued, “I work at Raleigh. I’m one of the casting directors. Came in at the end of the Friendship call.”
    He stood up and said, “Tim! Nice to see you, man.”
    “Yeah, you too. Nice going in that Bud Light spot.”
    “Dude, that dog could actually ride that bike. There was no CG.”
    “Ha!” I screamed. “So how’s things? What else is going on?”
    He started to give me the life-as-an-actor-in-Hollywood spiel. How you never know. How you just keep going day to day. How Johnny Depp was living in a tiny apartment one day and driving a Porsche the next. My eyes began to glaze over. Actually, that’s not true. It was much worse than that. I almost killed myself. I swear I did. I almost just ran out onto Beverly and threw myself in front of a bus. And let it rumble over me and tear me to shreds.
    I said, “Well, I hope you get the Friendship gig. Good to see you, man.”
    I started to bolt and then, casually: “Say, do you know Suzanne Neal?”
    “Yeah. God. She’s . . . Man, she’s just so hot.”
    I laughed. It was so honest. It’s like he couldn’t not say it.
    “I mean it’s just not fair,” he continued. “It hurts me. It hurts me to think about her.”
    Probably true, but moving into routine-ville now.
    “Yeah,” I agreed. “No doubt. I needed to talk to her after her audition today, but missed her.”
    “I didn’t see her today. I heard she was in though.”
    “What’s she up to these days? She
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