Ellen Hart Presents Malice Domestic 15: Mystery Most Theatrical. Karen Cantwell
Still, she had to give him props for staying in character.
She looked past Shane. At the end of the block, Smitty signaled her. A sense of relief flooded her body. He’d gotten her note.
“Quit flapping your gums.” She jerked her head toward the jail door. “Go on.”
Shane didn’t budge.
Sanchez stepped his considerable bulk forward. “You heard the lady.”
Rusty laughed. “Dude, did you not hear? She just declared her love for Slim, you moron. And to think you caught me counting cards. I’m losing my edge.”
Sanchez sniffed. “Never much cared for the sheriff, that’s all.”
Cassidy motioned with the gun and Shane backed into the jail.
Rusty wrapped up the show. “Ladies and gentlemen, you’re witnessing the very first time a saloon girl arrested a lawman.” The crowd erupted in applause as Cassidy followed Shane into the building. She lowered the hammer, but didn’t dare lower the gun until he was in the cell. Sanchez scooted around her and locked the cell door.
Cassidy placed her hand on Sanchez’s thick arm. “Will you give us a minute?”
Shane leaped at the bars, gripping them so tightly his knuckles whitened. “Don’t leave me here, Sanchez. She’s crazy.”
“Geez, what am I going to do, shoot him?” She rolled her eyes. “I’ll be out for the autograph session in a couple minutes.”
Sanchez headed for the door. “Holler if you need anything.”
“Will do.”
After he’d left, she stepped closer to the bars. The cloth purse hanging from her belt swayed and the contents jingled in the quiet. She turned the pistol over in her hands. So pretty. Potentially so deadly.
“This is kidnapping, you know.” Shane rattled the bars. “I’ll have you arrested.”
“Not if you meet with an unfortunate accident first.” She shrugged. “Of course, I don’t know how I’d live with myself if you came to harm.” Darned if she didn’t hear sarcasm again. She really needed to work on that. “Why’d you do it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Have it your way.” In one smooth move, she raised the pistol, drew the hammer back, and took the slack out of the trigger.
He threw himself onto the metal cot and curled into a ball, wrapping his arms around his head. “Don’t shoot! It’s loaded. Please.” He started to cry. “You didn’t even give us a chance. We would have been great together. Please. Don’t shoot.”
“You’re an idiot.” She pulled the trigger.
Click.
He flinched, and then looked up in disbelief.
“I wouldn’t waste a bullet on you.” She shook her purse over the desk and the brass rounds rolled across the surface and clinked as they fell to the floor.
You’ll be regretting them words ‘fore too long. If he thought he could have gotten away with it, she had no doubt he’d have loaded real bullets in his own gun. Instead, he’d loaded them in hers, and then waited for her to shoot her boyfriend.
“Did you really think I wouldn’t do a safety check? Not notice you fixed the cylinder? Shined the darn thing until it was spotless?”
“It’s my word against yours, stupid.”
Cassidy pulled out the desk chair, and sat. “That’s the difference between us. My word means something.” She leaned back in the chair and pointed to the surveillance camera in the left corner above the door.
“You ever hear of Kate Warne of the Pinkerton National Detective Agency?” She noted his blank expression and added, “First female detective—eighteen fifty.” She crossed her ankles. The granny boots had grown on her. “Or how about Phoebe Couzins, the first woman appointed as a U.S. Marshal? Still nothing? F.M. Miller? She rode alongside her male counterparts as a Deputy Marshal in Texas.”
“What’s your point, Nellie?”
Smitty escorted two deputies into the jail.
“My name is Cassidy.” She smiled at the newcomers. “And I’m here to tell you there’s a new sheriff in town.”
MARY-ALICE IMAGINES HER LIFE AS A MOVIE, Karen Cantwell
Mary-Alice knows agents. She knows “the face” and
“the line.” She’s een and heard them often enough.
Maybe this time she’ll do something about them.
OPENING SCENE, EXTERIOR PRISON YARD - DAY
An unforgiving August sun beats down on me as I shuffle in the gravel yard. Someone, somewhere shouts, “Where’s Mary-Alice? I’ll get her for this!” Maybe I should be worried, but I’m not. I’m wearing orange these days, same as all the ladies around me. My life since that day in 1986, well, it hasn’t been easy, but what are you gonna do? Keep going, I guess. Keep shuffling along.
DISSOLVE TO FLASHBACK, INTERIOR, AN OFFICE
I’m leaning back in the over-stuffed chair, but nothing about me is relaxed. No amount of fluff can cushion the blow that feels inevitable at this point. I consider the knife in my purse and wonder if I have the nerve to follow through.
His name is Cyril Broadstone and he has small, slimy hands. I don’t know that for a fact because he didn’t have the courtesy to shake mine when I entered, but I figure they’re slimy. Like the rest of him. Like all of them. Talent agents. The mosquitoes of L.A. are soul-sucking nuisances. But without one, sorry folks, no ticket on the Tinsel Town Express.
A colossal desk separates us. I don’t know a thing about wood so maybe it’s cherry or oak or redwood. The thing is polished to a high sheen and seems as big as a coffin—that’s all I know. He fidgets mindlessly with a cheap retractable pen while inspecting the résumé on the back of my headshot. The pen clicks open and shut, open and shut, open and shut. I scan the framed movie posters on his walls, all current films: Back to the Future, The Breakfast Club, Top Gun, Pretty in Pink. Below the Pretty in Pink poster is a film still of James Spader, autographed, Be real. Jimmy. I have no idea if Cyril represents actors in these films or not, but on closer inspection of the Spader still, I realize Cyril has matched Jimmy’s wardrobe piece for piece and feathered his hair in the same manner.
Finally, the pen is dropped, the headshot is dropped, and he clasps his hands in front of him on the coffin-desk. And, as expected, Cyril gives me the face. The problem with the face is, it’s always followed by the line. See, I’ve been in chairs like this before, in rooms like this before, with postered walls like this before, in front of self-important dogs like this. All before.
The scenario goes as such: after the requisite résumé inspection, agent takes a moment, then puts on the face. The lips are pressed thin, the eyes go a little soft around the edges, three concerned wrinkles form on the forehead. It seems the face is meant to ease the impending agony.
Once agent has assumed the face, he or she delivers the line. It’s always the same. There must be a manual out there where agents practice and repeat until perfect: “Listen…” (Long pause, sometimes a bit of a sigh thrown in to feign sympathy.) “I’m not going to sugarcoat it for you.”
So anyway, Cyril gives me the face. I brace myself for the line. I picture the knife in my purse. It’s sharp. It’ll do the job.
He winces. “Mary-Beth. Not the best name. Have you considered changing it?”
Knocked dumb by surprise, but relieved that