resist sending her picture to her hometown local paper, for which I forgive her, even though it was dumb.’
‘They all said I was trash and wouldn’t amount to a hill of beans. Well, I showed them.’
‘Yes, you did, baby doll. You sure showed them. So basically what I’m saying here, Bruce, is that whatever we do we are going to get caught damn soon now, and when we do I guess we have a higher than average chance of getting fried in the chair.’
Brooke gurgled at this from her position on the carpet. A gurgle that could be roughly translated as saying, ‘The sooner the better, pal.’
Wayne ignored her. ‘And that, Bruce, is where you come in.’
‘What do you mean? What can I do?’
‘We need you, Bruce. You’re going to save our lives.’
‘You’re our saviour,’ Scout added. ‘That’s why we came to you. You can make it different.’
‘Give them what they want, Bruce. Anything – just give it to them!’ This was from Farrah, for whom hope continued to dawn. Was it possible that they would be able to buy their way out of this? And did Bruce have insurance for holdups?
‘I don’t know what they want!’ Bruce shouted at her. He swung back to Wayne. ‘What do you want? Tell me, I’ll give it to you, whatever it is.’
‘We need an excuse, Bruce.’ Wayne said.
‘What we’re looking for here is someone else to take the blame.’
Chapter TwentySeven
Down on the lawn the news reporters were repeating over and over again what little information that they had on the situation: ‘… the Oscarwinner… the Mall Murderers… the beautiful model/actress… the cute teen… the estranged wife…’
Their reports were punctuated on air by rerun footage from the previous night: Bruce on the red carpet… Bruce, standing on legs of fire, accepting his Oscar… Bruce dancing with Brooke at the Bosom Ball.
Then it was ‘back to the studio’, where the anchor men and women solemnly repeated the whole thing ‘for those of you who’ve just joined us’: ‘… the Oscarwinner… the Mall Murderers… the beautiful model/actress… the cute teen… the estranged wife…’
After this, the studio anchors threw back to the reporters on the ground. ‘And let’s go back to the Delamitri mansion, to see if there are any further developments.’
‘There have as yet been no further developments,’ replied the reporters on the ground. ‘All I can tell you is… the Oscarwinner… the Mall Murderers… the beautiful model/actress… the cute teen… the estranged wife…’
‘In that case,’ said the studio anchors, ‘let’s turn now to our panel of criminal psychologists and showbusiness experts.’
In TV studios all over LA, and indeed all over the country, hastily summoned ‘experts’ were bundled into their seats, having been hurriedly powdered down, miked up and handed their cheques.
‘Exactly what in your opinion is going on in there?’ the studio anchor asked the experts gravely.
‘Well, this is a classic case,’ the experts chorused, ‘many aspects of which are discussed in my latest book, which is of course available in all good bookshops.’
Chapter TwentyEight
Wayne and Bruce stood together, staring out of the window at the instant city below. There were a hundred rifles trained on Wayne, but, unless the police could be sure of hitting Scout as well, no order to fire would be given.
‘Someone to take the blame?’ Bruce asked. ‘What the hell do you mean, someone to take the blame? Some kind of magician, who can explain that the whole thing was an optical illusion and that actually someone else shot all those people?’
Bruce was feigning astonishment, but in the back of his mind a terrible suspicion had dawned.
On the floor, over by the drinks cabinet, Brooke coughed. Maybe she was trying to say something, maybe she was just coughing.
‘This woman has to have a doctor,’ Velvet pleaded. ‘You have to let her have one.’
Wayne swung his gun towards Velvet, suddenly angry again. ‘Listen, I did not ask that bitch to threaten my baby, OK? She is in this dire situation by her own choosing, on account of the fact that she pulled a piece on my girl. So shut the fuck up, because me and Bruce are talking here. Or maybe I should shut you up. Huh?’
He advanced a step towards the girl and raised his fist. Velvet burst into tears.
‘If you hurt her,’ said Bruce, ‘I swear that whatever you want from me you will never get.’
‘You’ll do what the fuck I tell you to, whether I bust this bitch’s head or not.’ Wayne ’s mood swings really were most alarming.
‘Please don’t hurt me,’ Velvet sobbed.
‘There’s no need to go beating up on no little girls, Wayne,’ Scout remarked. ‘It’s beneath you.’
‘This ain’t no little girl, precious pie. Kids’re born old in Hollywood. Why this little slut musta spent more money already in her few short years than your sweet momma woulda earned in fifty lifetimes. She
‘I’ve told you,’ said Bruce, ‘you’ll get nothing from me if you hurt her.’
Wayne lowered his fist slowly. ‘I want you to know, Bruce, that I am minding the wishes of my baby here and not yours. Because I can assure you that you will do whatever I tell you to do, whether I hurt your little girl or not.’
Bruce seized upon the point. ‘And what is it you want me to do?’ He was almost begging. He had to know the worst, deeply fearful of it though he was. Fearful because in truth he had already guessed.
‘I want you to plead on our behalf. I want you to speak up for us and save us from the chair.’
‘Plead on your behalf? You’re crazier than I thought. You really think my word’s going to save you from the punishment you deserve? You’re guilty as Hitler.’
‘Sure we’re guilty, if by that you mean we done all the stuff they say we done, but that ain’t the point, is it? Not these days. These days, no matter how guilty you are, you can still be innocent.’
He had lost them. They all stared at him, all except Scout, who had hold of one of her feet and was inspecting her toenails.
‘For instance,’ Wayne explained, ‘like that spick chick who cut off the guy’s pecker, right? She was guilty for sure, she never denied it. She cut off that of boy’s manhood and threw it out of a car window. Do you see that bitch in prison, huh? Is she breaking rocks in the hot sun? No, I don’t think so, because although she was guilty she was innocent too. In America you can be both.’
Scout looked up from her toenails. ‘That’s right, she done it, but she was innocent and I agree. That bastard beat up on her and he done raped her too. He got his, and I hope she used a rusty knife.’
Wayne winced. ‘Now, Scout, you know that you and me disagree on this issue. Personally, I don’t see as how no woman can get raped by her husband, on account of the fact that he is only taking what’s his anyway. What’s more, I think that any Mexican bitch who cuts the dick off an exUnited States Marine who has served his country should rot in a hole.’
‘She was abused.’
‘If you think a man’s abusing you, honey, you leave him. You do not cut his dick off.’
‘The court agreed with her.’
‘The court was a bunch of lesbians and faggots.’
Scout made a sulky face and returned to her toenails.
‘Yeah, well, whatever,’ Wayne said, ‘we’re getting off the point here. What I’m saying is, right or wrong, the greaseball bitch walked free. She done it, she said she done it, she was glad she done it, but she walked. Guilty
