Who Killed Jenny Schecter? Ch. 11

Chapter 11 All About Eve

Lauren swung by to pick up Carmen at her mom's house at 8 a.m. They ate breakfast at a hole-in-the-wall Hispanic cafe on North Broadway in Lincoln Park where Carmen had waited tables in her high school and college years. She had remained friends with the owners, Ramon and Rosita Florio, and their family and staff, and stopped in whenever she was in LA. On her recommendation Lauren had the chilaquiles con huevos verde, and the café de la olla, sweet and hinting of cinnamon, was out of sight.

When they were done they picked up Shane at Alice's apartment at 9. This was a compromise between early-birds Carmen and Lauren wanting to get started early, and Shane wanting to sleep in until noon. Predictably, Shane was barely awake and still in her underwear, and they waited in Alice's living room while Shane got dressed and chugged a cup of coffee. Lauren, at Carmen's suggestion, had built the wait into their schedule. They got to the studio at 10, and were in Adele's trailer in an alley behind a sound stage at 5 after 10, for a meeting set for 10 a.m. Adele entered the trailer at 10:20; Lauren had built that delay into the schedule at Shane's suggestion. If you showed up on time, it meant you weren't important. A minion had told them to make themselves at home in the trailer and offered water or coffee, which they declined.

"Hey, sorry I'm late," Adele began, "Story conferences can be clusterfucks. You know how writers are."

You might have murdered one, Carmen and Lauren both thought, although neither said anything. Lauren smiled and flashed her badge. "Sgt. Lauren Hancock," she said, "and this is Carmen Morales. You know Shane, of course."

"Shane," Adele said, shaking hands. "Good to see you again."

"Adele," Shane said, cool.

"Sit down everybody. Did Tabitha offer you water or coffee? Okay, good." Adele stuck her head out the trailer door and they heard her say to someone, "Tabs, I'm parched. Can I get a cucumber water with lime, please?"

Adele sat herself down in a swivel captain's chair across from the couch where Lauren and Shane sat; Carmen had taken the other captain's chair. "So. Why are we here? I heard you're investigating Jenny's murder again."

"That's right," Lauren began, having agreed to be the lead this morning. "We have pretty good reason to believe Alice didn't do it, so we're taking a fresh look at it. There were lots of leads and lots of motives and suspects who never got properly tracked down."

"So this is like an episode from the Cold Case files," Adele said.

"Sort of, but not that cold, actually," Lauren said. "Maybe only mildly chilly. One of the avenues we want to pursue are the stolen film negatives from Lez Girls."

"Nike Stevens stole them, right? That's what Aaron told me. It wasn't Jenny, after all."

"Right, she did. And probably was the one who planted them in the attic of Jenny and Shane's house. You're aware they were discovered there the evening of Jenny's murder, correct?"

"Yes, that's what I heard. And you think there's a connection."

"That's what we're looking at, yes."

"Pardon me for being a little ... um ... undiplomatic, but why didn't the police look into it at the time?" Adele said.

"For the simple reason Alice confessed," Carmen interrupted Lauren. She was doing a slow burn inside and needed to let off a little steam. She had never met Adele, but had heard plenty about her from Jenny, and afterward from Tina and some from Alice. She was thoroughly prepared to hate Adele on the spot, and was pleased to find out that's exactly how she felt. But she was so aware of it she knew she had to modulate her voice and body language. She was doing so now.

Lauren jumped in. "Carmen's right. Alice's confession knocked a thorough investigation into a cocked hat. Alice had nothing to do with the negatives or the movie, and there was no reason to spend any more time on it, so nobody did. It was nobody's fault, well, nobody except Alice. But yes, we're now trying to fix that oversight. So what can you tell us about the negatives?"

Adele shrugged. "Not much. I heard about them being missing right when everybody else did. I mean, you know, Aaron and Tina. I was in a meeting with some promotion and advertising people in a conference room down the hall from Aaron's office--" Tabitha came in and put Adele's glass of cucumber water on her desk and exited silently -- "There was a lot of coming and going in his suite, and everybody could hear some yelling. Pretty soon Tina came in, I guess Aaron told her to get her ass in there, and then more yelling, and she stomped out. After my meeting I went to the set, they were dismantling it, and found Tina. 'What the fuck was THAT all about?' I asked. She told me the negatives were stolen, and that Aaron had accused her of taking them. She was pretty angry. You should have heard her."

"We did hear her," Shane said quietly. Everybody laughed.

"You talk to Aaron?" Lauren asked.

"Sure, right after Tina told me. I mean, that was my movie, you know? I took over from Jenny--"

--Right after you stabbed her in the back, Lauren, Carmen and Shane all thought simultaneously --

"—so I was really pissed."

"What did Aaron say?"

"That the negs were 'unaccounted for.' That was what he said, 'unaccounted for.' I said, 'You mean stolen, right?' He said, 'Fucking A, stolen.' I said, 'Tina says you said she did it.' He says, 'Yeah I said that, but now I think about it, I'm pretty sure she was set up.' So I say, "By who? That cunt Jenny?' Sorry, but that's what I said. He says, 'I don't know. Maybe. I've got the security office investigating it.' I say, 'Now what?' He says, 'Go back to work, keep doing what you were doing. We've got to assume we'll find them, get them back, buy them back, pay the extortion, whatever it takes. Let me worry about it. You keep on with the post-production. Oh, and don't talk about it to anybody just yet, until we know exactly what happened.'"

"He said that? Pay the extortion?"

"Sure, he said it. Why?"

"Just curious," Lauren said. "I mean, it indicates he had an idea already about why they were stolen."

"Well, maybe," Adele said. "But it's the first thing popped into my mind, too. Somebody stole them and we were gonna get a ransom demand for them."

"You never thought anybody would take them so they could destroy them?"

"To tell you the truth, no, that never crossed my mind. Somebody or other suggested it, but I never gave it a serious thought. I figured it was either about money or revenge, or a combination. I mean, if it was Jenny who took them, I can see her having both motives, money and revenge. Right?" She held her hands apart as though that much was obvious.

"Jenny was really pissed that you replaced her, got her fired and kicked off the lot," Lauren said, very matter-of-fact.

"Well, yes. And I know where you're going. It makes me a suspect."

"Yes, it does."

Adele shrugged. "So ask me what you want. I didn't kill her, if that helps. But remember, she was mad at me, I wasn't angry at her."

"Not until you thought she stole your movie."

"Jenny's movie," Shane said quietly. Adele looked at her but ignored the comment.

"What I did I did for the good of the project, the movie, and for the good of the studio," Adele said. "To be perfectly frank, Jenny was out-of-control, and her fucking Niki Stevens and doing it all so publicly was really going to hurt us, as well as tarnish if not ruin Niki's career. So yes, sure, I know what you're thinking, I plotted and schemed and got her kicked off the set and out of the studio. Yep. I plead guilty. Did it. You nailed me. But see, what's why I didn't kill her. I won, she lost. So there was no point to killing her. To be even more blunt about it, her getting killed just made a small, containable scandal into a much bigger, uncontainable one. Her murder made a huge mess. Before, it's just extortion or ransom, Aaron quietly forks over the money, we get the negs back, life goes on. Can you find any possible reason why I, of all people, would have wanted a police investigation into a murder? I mean, shit, come on, girls."

Carmen thought about strangling Adele, never mind there was a cop in the room. Maybe Lauren would look the other way for a few minutes, ignore the gurgling sounds as Adele's face turned purple and she died. But Carmen kept a straight face. For a dollar, Shane would have slit Adele's throat and pissed down her neck, never mind there was a cop in the room.

"Do you have an alibi for that evening," Lauren asked.

"Sad to say, no," Adele said. "I mean, I was home alone. Watching TV, working on a new movie, pre-production stuff. But no alibi." She shrugged again, fuck you, Officer Hancock.

"The murder was a Sunday evening. You were working?"

"Carmen, you can explain," Adele said.

Carmen inhaled, let her breath out. "She means movie people are workaholics, they work on stuff twenty-four, seven, three sixty-five."

"You had the TV on? You remember what you watched?" Lauren asked.

"Not really, no. I just have the TV on for background noise. 60 Minutes, that was on, I think. That lezzie show on Showtime, sometimes I watches that to see who's fucking who. I think it was near the end of its season. Whatever it was, I don't remember it. Sorry."

"Aaron transferred you to become an assistant producer, is that right?" Lauren asked. "What's that entail? What does an assistant producer do?"

"Again, Carmen was a PA, she can tell you. 'Assistant producer' is really a kind of meaningless, catch-all title. Sometimes they just give it out and it doesn't mean anything. But basically I report to Aaron, and he gives me stuff to work on. Location scouting and arranging. Running some production meetings, scheduling, coordinating with departments like wardrobe and make-up and sets, craft services, whatever needs doing. Sometimes script consulting, sometimes I do some second unit producing and even directing, I was second unit director on Malibu Zombies. I know, a shitty movie, but somebody's got to do the work, you know, and that's how you build your portfolio and learn your craft. I'm kind of Aaron's troubleshooter, too, I run odd jobs and stuff. Eyes and ears. Administrative assistant. Gal Friday."

Studio snitch, Carmen thought. Studio bitch, Shane thought.

"How'd you hear about Jenny's murder?" Lauren asked.

"Aaron called me out of a meeting first thing Monday morning. 'My office, right now,' he says. 'We got a shitstorm.' I go to his office and there's five or six people in there, watching TV, a breaking news story, West Hollywood murder, lesbians, fired studio director, blah blah. You all probably saw it, too, it was all over the news for a day or two."

"Did you go to the memorial service?"

"You fucking kidding me? Jenny's posse was there, Shane, Carmen, Tina, Bette, all of them, they'd have torn me limb from limb if I showed up," Adele said. She looked at Shane and Carmen. "I mean, no offense, guys, but you would have, right? I wasn't exactly welcome. Aaron and William went, and some other studio suits."

Shane just looked out the window of the trailer. "I wasn't able to be there," Carmen said.

"Point taken" Lauren said. "Tell me what was in your head at the time. What did you think, back then? And what do you think now?"

"About who killed her?"

"About everything. Who killed her, and why. About the stolen negatives. Who do you think are good suspects? Tell what you're thinking right now."

"Right now? I hate to say it, but I think there's one good suspect in this room right at this minute."

"Fuck you," Shane whispered, not even looking at Adele.

"Shane didn't do it," Lauren said crisply. "So who else? Niki Stevens?"

"Oh, sure. She's a candidate. That's one fucked-up girl. I'm not sure she's smart enough to kill anybody, she's usually too drunk or stoned. But if she did it, it must have been right after an AA meeting or a drug test, before she had a chance to re-load."

"What would have been her motive?"

"Crazy people don't need motive," Adele said. "It could have been a minor passing whim. A bad mood. A thrill. There's snakes inside that girl's head. And don't forget her posse. Could have been one of them, doing it based on a casual idea that flitted across Niki's brain for an instant. It's hard to tell or be specific."

"I understand she's in rehab at the moment."

"Last I heard," Adele said. "I think she has rehab on retainer and speed-dial. Maybe this time it'll fix what the previous four or five rehabs couldn't."

"Did you ever sleep with her?" Lauren asked.

Adele hooted. "Fuck, no. Are you kidding? Ah, no. How can I say this? Ewwwwww."

"You ever sleep with Jenny?"

"No, never," Adele said, suddenly brought to seriousness.

"Why not?"

"Mutual lack of interest," Adele said. She kept eye contact with Lauren. Shane never took her gaze from the window. Adele was on the verge of saying, "I don't like sloppy seconds," but realized both Shane and Carmen would probably kill her on the spot before Lauren could draw her gun.

"You know Jenny didn't steal the negatives," Lauren said, deliberately jumping back and forth from topic to topic.

"That's what Aaron said."

"Why do you think Niki did it?"

"You're asking me to read that woman's mind?" Adele asked, smiling. "That's like, you know. Impossible."

"She made it look like Jenny did it. Framed her."

"Yes, that's what I heard."

"Got any idea why?"

"Beyond extortion, you mean? Or revenge? To get back at Jenny, I guess. God knows what Jenny did to deserve it. God knows, there was plenty of foreplay."

Lauren let that go. "Let's talk about Tina as a suspect."

"Suspect how? Killing Jenny or stealing the negatives with Niki?"

"Either one."

"Nah, no way. Neither."

"Why not?"

Adele swiveled back and forth in her captain's chair while she thought. "Let me put this politely. I like Tina, I thought she did a good job on Lez Girls. She has good management skills. But, here's where I'm hesitating. Tina lacks a killer instinct. I'm not talking about murder, I just mean business, studio politics, handling people, especially actors and writers and directors, you know? She's good, I'm not saying she isn't. But I'd like to play poker against her. I'd call her bluff every time. I don't think she's tough enough. So no, she wouldn't kill anybody. She doesn't have it in her." She turned to Carmen and Shane. "Guys? You agree? Did I say anything you don't agree with?"

Shane never looked away from the window, and Carmen's face was stone.

"Have you ever been to Jenny's house?" Lauren asked.

"Couple of times. Three times, I think. Once I gave her a ride home when her car was in the shop, twice to drop off some work."

"Were you ever inside the house?"

"No, never."

"Never been in Jenny's bedroom?"

"You're shitting me. No, never."

"Do you have a police record?" Adele stiffened. "Well? I can find out with a simple phone call."

"Some stuff when I was a teenager. Stupid kid shit. One drunk driving, six years ago."

"Nothing else?"

"I dated Charles Manson and I'm a spy for the Chinese. No, nothing else."

"How much did it cost to make Lez Girls? How much did the studio lose?"

"Cost was about four point seven million, and change. It would have cost a lot more, but it was never finished. Never edited, virtually no post-production costs, no promotion. I have no idea what's on the books."

"Why not? You were the director, at the end."

"Sure. But even directors don't see the books. Carmen, help me out here. Studio accounting practices are ... how can I put this?"

"Creative," Carmen said. "Whatever paperwork and cost figures anyone would have showed Adele wouldn't mean anything. She could be telling us the God's honest truth about finances and costs as she believes them to be, and be completely honest and sincere and truthful, and still be wrong by 500 percent. Her numbers could be one hundred percent accurate down to the penny, and still be different from what the books say by, oh, seven hundred percent."

"Right," Adele said. "Exactly." She turned to Lauren. "That one knows her stuff."

"It's why we keep her around," Lauren said, "that and her mom's cooking. Tell me about Aaron and William."

That surprised Adele. "Aaron? What do you want to know about him for? And William is some kind of money guy. They call them angels in this business."

"Is he?"

"Is he what?"

"An angel. You ever sleep with him?"

Adele burst out laughing and swiveled in her chair a full three hundred and sixty degrees. "Now you are just playing with me. You ever see him?"

"You make an excellent point," Lauren said. "Ambitious young women never fuck ugly old men just to get their money, especially in a place like Hollywood. I withdraw the question. You ever sleep with Aaron?"

This time Adele kept it simple. "No. I never slept with Aaron. To be perfectly truthful, I don't even know what his orientation is. According to rumor, he's divorced, but from who or what I can't say."

"Come on, there must be studio gossip."

"Sure there's gossip, but I've got to tell you, it isn't very good. Kind of boring, and very poorly sourced. Look, he's a power guy, and into money, like William is. He plays his cards close to the chest, he's not a skirt-chaser or a boy chaser, for that matter. Whatever it is he likes, he does it far from public view. You ask me, he never has sex with anything, even sheep, but that's just an uninformed wild guess. People often think the movie industry is all about sex. It isn't. It's just another power game."

"Good to know. He likes money and power. Would he or William kill for it? Or hire somebody to kill for it? In their eyes, at least for a little while, it looked like Jenny cost them four point whatever million dollars. Yes? No?"

"That's an accounting question, as far as I'm concerned," Adele said, "and I don't know much about accounting. I'm told the movie cost four million whatever. Did it come out of their pockets? I have no fucking idea. Did they write it off? Was there some kind of insurance? Was it financed by somebody else? Were there other investors besides William? That's all way, way above my pay grade, Detective Hancock."

"One last question. When the shit all hit the fan here, Aaron pretty much cleaned house, am I right? So how did you keep your job?"

They all saw anger flash across Adele's eyes, and then as rapidly as it came it passed. They were impressed with her self-control. "I kept my job because I'm good at it," she said, "and in my own way, I'm loyal, and Aaron knows it. Am I a bitch, a snitch and a backstabber? Sure. But I'm Aaron's bitch, snitch and backstabber. Even apart from that, I earn my pay, every day, twenty-four, seven, three sixty-five, and not on my back or my knees. Any more questions?"

"You want to be head of this studio someday. That's not a question."

"Exactly right. It's not a question, just a fact. And if I'm not head of this studio someday, I'll be head of some other studio. And I'm going to do it without fucking somebody to get that job. I'm going to get it because I earned it, doing every shitty job that comes along that teaches me some new skill, some new piece of how a studio operates, and learning which people know their craft and which ones are phonies and incompetents, who is reliable and who is a flake."

"Fair enough," Lauren said. "So tell me, what did you think of Lez Girls. As a movie, as a project you worked on."

Adele turned her head and thought for a moment. "Self-indulgent script, but it had potential, it had good bones. Straight ingénue from the Midwest comes to Hollywood, discovers she's lez, finds a home in this highly improbably group of beautiful, glamorous, Rodeo Drive clothes horses, proceeds to destroy herself and those around her with all kinds of excess. A classic Hollywood morality tale, if you think about it. Scarface with dykes, and Jenny is Al Pachino."