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I spun around, blushing, as I grippedas she hurried away

“Not funny, Parker!” I yelled “No girls allowed in the boys’ room!”

CHAPTER 43

A FEW HOURS LATER, after I was allowed to put on sorabbed so west toward LA

It was a long, strange sort of trip froe of the Mojave Desert, then up and down through the San Gabriel Mountains I didn’t spot one yellow cab or dirty-water-dog/tube-steak cart on any of the blocks Actually, there weren’t even any blocks

As we neared the LA city limits, Parker pointed out the spot in El Monte where the two LA County detectives had been gunned doith automatic fire

I couldn’t believe it There was a Burger King on the corner, beside a furniture store, and a car dealership across the street It looked like your typical suburban strip It definitely didn’t

look like a war zone

As we drove closer to don LA, I sat looking out at the blue sky and pale now in the hazy distance off to ht I had actually been to LA once, the su a bunch of Stanley Kubrick filotten it into our heads that ould come out here, find work, and become either screenwriters or directors

What happened instead was that we got depressingly drunk for three days in a row in a crummy, run-down motel near Hollywood Boulevard, found no work, and eventually had to have our parents wire us hteen-year-olds brilliant?

Watching the glittering don LA skyline come into view in the forward distance, I just hoped my second visit to La-La Land would prove more successful

The task force HQ was set up at the LAPD’s Oly located on South Verhborhood business district The inally been housed at the LAPD’s Hollywood Station, but the paparazzi and ul King Killa Leonard and pop singer Alexa Gia, had been such a nuisance, they had decided to move

Upstairs, in a conference rooents Bob Milton and Joe Rothkopf The veteran agents couldn’t have beenus up They’d already dragged in some desks from somewhere and placed them in the corner, with a couple of computer monitors

Agent Rothkopf was placing a file about the Mob-boss killing in Malibu on ered in Co my watch A semiliquid one from the looks on their red faces

Parker had already given e federal presence DEA, ICE, and even the ATF, but senior detectives from LAPD’s Major Cri the show And didn’t let anyone forget it, apparently