Try Darkness by James Scott Bell

his index finger. “What’s with all this nickel-and-diming now? There’s no future in that, not for you.”
    “And you know what’s for me, is that it?”
    “We’ve known each other a long time,” Al said. “We’ve worked together before.”
    “Yeah. Remember the Morocco suit?”
    “Sure,” Al beamed, as if he was proud of it.
    The Morocco case was a lawsuit fueled by two monstrous egos with enough money to thump their chests like twin Kongs. Arn Bunting, the billionaire oil man from Texas who had made inroads as a Hollywood producer. And Duane Dollinger, the best-selling author on whose novel the movie
Morocco
was based.
    The movie’s budget ballooned to a staggering $170 million. The critics massacred it. On opening weekend it took in a mere $18 million, finishing third behind the latest Pixar animation and a Will Ferrell comedy. The movie never got legs, even though it had two A-list stars for the leads.
    Dollinger threw a fit and blamed Bunting for the loss, which hurt Dollinger’s hope for a franchise based on his series character. Bunting shot back that Dollinger had abused his right of approval over the script. Seven writers had worked on it at one time or another, and Dollinger had hated them all.
    Our firm represented Dollinger, a sixty-five-year-old fireplug who told us he would keep on throwing money at us until he had cut off the two things that Bunting, as a man, would rather keep.
    “What I remember about that,” I said, “was the week Dollinger testified. Here was a guy who was living large in Arizona, had a loyal following, who messed up his own movie and was now spending his time in a spite fight. He wouldn’t settle. He wanted to get to a jury, tell his story. His greatest story ever, starring himself. And he had the money to do it and we gladly took it, didn’t we?”
    “And why not?”
    “I thought, as I watched this guy, what would it be like if he was just some average doofus who really got ripped off? He’d never be able to be here, to get the representation we could give him. Even if he was in the right. It galled me then but I pushed that aside. I wasn’t supposed to think about it. Well, I’ve been thinking about it. Money shouldn’t be the only thing that talks.”
    “You’re being naive now, Ty. In the law, costs and benefits are the only thing that matter. You can put a value on anything, and that’s the way it should be. It’s more efficient that way.”
    “Well, as the great philosopher Steven Wright once asked, if one synchronized swimmer drowns, do all the rest have to drown too?”
    Al just looked at me.
    “I don’t like drowning, Al.”
    “Wait a minute,” he said, now looking like he’d drawn that straight and was ready to go all in. “I see. You think there could be some connection between this chick’s murder and Orpheus. You really do, don’t you?”
    I said nothing.
    Al was happy to go on, tilting his head back as if telling a joke to a packed house. “Yeah! You got this idea you’re some kind of Bogart or something, and you’re gonna find a conspiracy. Yeah, Ty Buchanan, supercop.”
    “I want Depp to play me in the movie,” I said.
    “This is so funny except that it’s not.”
    “Then let’s get a serious offer on the table. Here it is. You instruct whoever is calling the shots at the Lindbrook to accept rent on behalf of room 414, and every other renter who makes the request. You have until four-thirty today to give me your answer. If it’s not the answer I want to hear, then I’ll be at the courthouse tomorrow morning when it opens for business and present the clerk with a complaint that names Orpheus and Roddy. Have I made myself clear?”
    Shaking his head, Al said, “Sad. Really sad.”
    “Four-thirty,” I said.
    “You have a tank of gas?” Al said.
    “What’s that supposed to mean?”
    “I think you’ll be taking a drive.”

40
    HE STEPPED OUTSIDE with his cell on his ear. I listened to the Ray Charles track, happy.