Grab the Groom
CHAPTER ONE
Movements traceable by the ghostly glow of her cigarette, Mabel DeVine hovered in the chill air. “A ‘reality’ show? Coming here?” She paused for a long, deep drag and ruefully shook her translucent white-blonde head. “Déclassé hogwash brought by magic into the dismal dwellings of morons, now to be staged in my house?” Twin streams of smoke gusted from her nostrils. “Dead or not, I can’t let that happen!”
Once upon a time, she’d been The Divine DeVine, siren of the silver screen, toast of Hollywood, her signature ciggie holder always on her left middle finger. Now, as she floated above the manor house, perched high on the cliffs of Normandy, her thin-penciled brows spiced with bitterness, she was a spectral figure, gossamer in the moonlight.
Waves crashed against rocks below, heralding a storm blowing down from the North Sea. Tossing the loose end of a trailing scarf over her shoulder, Mabel wailed a haunting crescendo, “Ohhhhhhhh, ohhhhhh,” movie-ghost noises designed to drive the living mad with fear. The cry was interrupted by a rumbling smoker’s cough. “Ohhhhh…kah, kahhh, kah…ohhhh!”
She disappeared into the tumble-down turret of the ancient convent at the far end of the manor. The only sounds then were the surf, the wind, and a distant, but distinctly undainty loogie being expelled behind stone walls.
Her image blurred, the molecules of incandescent ectoplasm scattering like a pyrotechnic display, then reassembling into a flapper, complete with glittering headband across her platinum blonde hair. “In my day, the audience dressed up in their Sunday best, just to see me on the screen. No words needed—my face expressed the emotions. Thank goodness there was no television then, no people lounging in undergarments, their couches covered in stale taco chips and nacho cheese. And to watch what? Stars of the silver screen? No, just ordinary hoity-toity skanks…” She shrugged. “…maybe pretty enough, but it’s all baloney. No story, no actors. And certainly, no reality!”
She sighed, wishing the dead nuns would exorcise the intruders, but all they did was mumble prayers, day in and day out. Not a damn thing else. Hell, they ignored her completely, as if she were an interloper!
Twisting herself into a screw of smoke, Mabel spiraled down to the manor house, boring through the wall. Once inside, she resumed her ghostly form, drifting past the maids, their swollen feet up, lounging when they should have been cleaning. Watching Grab the Groom dubbed in French—the very show coming to Mabel’s home.
She floated up the stairs to the only occupied bed chamber, where a young woman was unpacking a suitcase. Mabel lingered, just a puff of dust against the pale gray wall, before passing through the woman’s body.
The young woman shivered. “Friggin’ drafty old dump!” she said to herself. “For fuck’s sake, Diana, what have you gotten yourself into?” She resumed sorting through clothes, unaware she was no longer alone. Selecting a dress, she turned to the mirror, admiring her image.
Mabel, however, was not impressed. “Look at her, all big tits and hips like a broodmare. Can’t hold a candle to my body. I was elegant. Sleek as a greyhound. In my day, the men fought over me!” Pouring herself through the air, she waved her hand extravagantly, dropping sparks on the floor to die like fireflies. “Forget it, toots! No one will ever be the star I was!”
Far away across the sea, five-year-old Hortensia’s tall, beautiful mommy slammed a pair of fuzzy sleepers into a half-packed suitcase. “I’m warning you—give me even an ounce of grief, and you’ll be sorry. Go get dressed right now.”
Hortensia groveled on the rug, begging, “Please, please, puh-leeze, don’t make me wear those pink shorts… Summer’s over! School’s already started!”
Mommy shot her an angry look. “What is wrong with those absolutely adorable shorts? Anyway, it’s not jeans weather yet—didn’t you say it’s so hot the sun burns your head and that’s why you stay inside for recess?”
Hort could tell what Mommy was thinking, because she’d said it often enough: Recess on the very fancy playground of your very expensive school.
Hort would have loved to be with the others, out on the jungle gym or flying high on the swings. In all the time she spent wearing the teacher down with pleading, she had never told the real reason she drew alone in the art room—what the other kids called her: mostly the names of large, clumsy animals.
Shorts made things worse when it came to teasing. “But they’re so tight,” she whimpered.
Mommy shook her head and held up the horrid pink-flowered outfit. “It’s all that greasy stuff my mother makes you. If you get fatter…” Mommy sighed deep, like her heart was breaking, all because of Hortensia. And then some muttered Spanish words Hort didn’t understand. Without seeing her grandparents, her Spanish was getting spotty, but Hort knew that Abuela loved her so much she couldn’t stop cooking her favorites. Everything she made tasted so good! Hort could have as much as she wanted. which was why she wasn’t allowed to visit her grandparent’s almond farm anymore.
Mommy couldn’t understand what it was like to love food so much. She only ate things that were good for you. Worst was the kale smoothie that looked just like the algae growing in the fish tank, the one the housekeeper refused to clean. The pet fish were dead, anyway, drifting upside down.
Mommy took lots of good care of herself, always buying new dresses and getting her hair done. As Hortensia’s used-to-be best friend Alicia said, “Your mommy looks like Barbie.”
After she tossed Hort’s clothes in the suitcase, Mommy packed her own outfits for a trip on her new boyfriend’s boat. He didn’t want Hort to go with them. She’d begged and begged to be sent to her grandparents, but Mommy said, “It’s time that son-of-a-bitch father of yours did his share.“
“But I don’t know him.” She tried to keep from whining.
“You’re going.” And that was that.
When Hort realized there was no use protesting, she squeezed herself into the shorts and the matching top that rode up over her belly. And then she scraped a bunch of the algae from the fish tank and put it in the blender when Cook made Mommy’s breakfast. One of Hort’s True Beliefs was that getting even was only fair.
The next thing she knew, she was in the back of a limo, her thighs oozing out from her shorts like the lard her abuela squished into masa.
Though the limo was air conditioned, her bare skin stuck to the leather seat. When she lifted a knee the sound of her sweaty skin pulling away from the leather was like ripping open the Velcro on her sandals. The fff-thip-thip-thip-thip was interesting, diverting her from worrying. It hurt a bit, but still she lifted one leg then the other, over and over. Fff-thip-thip-thip-thip!
After about twenty fff-thips, the driver’s eyes in the rear view shot to her. She locked on his gaze, inserted one finger as deeply as possible into her left nostril, and dug vigorously. His eyes returned to the road.
Hortensia looked out the side window, just in case her father appeared. She’d seen only one photo of him, the only one that hadn’t been ripped to shreds. He was almost as pretty as Mommy.
How could he be Hortensia’s daddy? Someone had to have brought the ugly in.
Brad Hudson stood at the window of his office, hands in the pockets of his jeans. The sidewalks below his L.A. office were emptier than usual. There wasn’t even a derelict pushing a stolen Von’s shopping cart with the trash bag-shrouded detritus of a wasted life. In the record heatwave, the only things moving were cars driving by on Sunset Boulevard, the sunlight glittering on their metal shells, like the carapaces of very expensive beetles.
He squinted, tilting his head. The new angle distorted the traffic’s faint reflection, simulating the opening of Bosch. Only the wailing horns were missing. How much had the creative geniuses behind that sequence cost? “You know, Irwin,” Brad said to his partner, “Bosch, now that’s class.”
“Ah, yes,” Irwin also longed to put out that kind of intellectual shit, but, what with the writing and giving actors time to learn lines, it would cost more than they could manage. As producer, Brad had to keep firm control over expenses and delays, or the new streaming network wouldn’t work with them again. Their sweet contract would be void. Grab the Groom might then be dead in the water.
“Classy.” Irwin didn’t give up dreams easily.
“We can’t afford to give a crap about class, not yet. Maybe what we do is trashy, but it’s what the public wants.”
Unlikely as it seemed, one day American tastes could become more BBC-ish, but until then, Grab the Groom could go on year after year, bringing in a steady income. Best of all, the contestants worked for free, hoping to win a man and a quarter-million-dollar prize—a mere pittance compared to paying actors each time they appeared, plus residuals forever. Actors were trained extortionists. Give them a career-making role and they’d thank you by jacking up their demands.
And then, Brad’s reward: the girls out in the hall, flashing ballooning breasts and long bare legs that went from the hem of their tiny skirts to the inevitable platform stilettos. Stretching and yawning with nervous energy during the competition, revealing teeth whitened until they let light through, they fluttered, birds worrying they’d be ordered to fly away.
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Keeping them waiting would jump-start their rivalry, and rivalry, especially petty backstabbing, was reality TV’s bread and butter. Tomorrow, once the last selections took place, the girls would be en route to their new location: Normandy. The show’s crew would help them settle in. The Groom would remain tantalizingly hidden away, that very fact, the mystery of him, stirring the pot.
Brad and Irwin, the director, accompanying the most important investors, would arrive later by private jet.
Down on the street, a limo slowed. At the sight, Brad jerked forward, banging his nose on the glass. His head bounced back. “Ow!”
The car sped up, turning at the intersection.
“Your kid here?” Irwin had been fretting that her arrival would disrupt their schedule.
“Not yet.” Brad’s voice broke as if he had reached adolescence.
Irwin sighed. “Come on, little boy, buck the fuck up. You’ve got to act glad to see her. You know, acting like a dad.”
Bosch still keening in Brad’s head, the L.A. traffic still flowing by, disordering his thoughts. He’d never wanted to be a daddy, not if “daddy” meant being saddled with the care of an actual child. The money for those damned expensive schools—and to keep his exes quiet—was painful enough.
Without knocking, Brad’s uber-competent assistant Suzanne entered. Her flat-footed walk, flat-chested body, and forlorn demeanor made Brad wince, and she knew it. She didn’t waste time flirting.
“The last one’s waiting.” She shifted her iPad from hand to hand. “She’s pissed all the others have been vetted.”
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