Death of a Blue Movie Star (Rune 2)

Suddenly he stopped and turned. He spoke as if the words were lines in a high school play and he was an actor of Nicole's ability. "I know I didn't call like I said I would. And you don't have to, if you don't want to. But I was thinking, tomorrow night--it's my day off--maybe we could go out."

What a place to ask her out on a date! A bombed-out porno theater.

She didn't give him time to be embarrassed about his delivery. She smiled and said, "Ah graciously accept yo chahming invitation. Nahn, shall we say?"

He stared at her, totally lost.

Rune said, "Nine?"

"Oh, sure. Good."

And smiling while he tried not to, he walked back into the theater, banging a plastic evidence bag against his leg.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Rune spent the day assembling the reels of exposed footage for the House O' Leather commercial and stuffed it, along with the editing instructions, into a big white envelope.

Sam picked her up at L&R and drove to a postproduction house, where the technicians would edit the raw footage into a rough cut. Rune dropped it off with instructions to deliver cassettes to L&R and the client as soon as possible, even if it meant overtime.

Then she said, "Okay ... work's done. Time to party. Let's go to the club." And she gave him directions to the West Side piers.

"Where?" Healy asked dubiously. "I don't think there's anything there."

"Oh, you'd be surprised."

She gave him credit--he was a sport.

Healy put up with the place for a couple of hours before he managed to shout, "I don't feel quite at home here."

"How come?" Rune shouted.

He didn't seem sure. Maybe it was the decor: black foam mounds that looked like lava. Flashing purple overhead lights. A six-foot Plexiglas bubble of an aquarium.

Or the music. (He asked her if the sound system was broken and she had to tell him that the effect was intentional.) Also he wasn't dressed quite right. Rune had said casual and so she'd dressed in yellow tights, a black miniskirt and--on top of a purple tank top--a black T-shirt as holey as Jarlsberg.

Sam Healy was in blue jeans and a plaid shirt. The one thing he shared with most of the other clubbies was a pair of black boots. His, however, were cowboy boots.

"I think I got it wrong," he said.

"Well, you may start a trend."

Maybe not but he wasn't being eyed like a geek, either, Rune noticed. Two pageboy blonds lifted their sleek faces and fired some serious "Wanna get laid?" vibrations his way. Rune took his arm. "Sunken cheeks like that, you see them? They're a sign of mental instability." She grinned. "Let's dance some more." And began to gyrate in time to the music.

"Dancing," Healy said and mimicked her. Ten minutes later, he said, "I've got an idea."

"I know that tone. You're not having a good time."

Healy wiped his forehead and scalp with a wad of bar napkins. "Anybody ever dehydrate in here?"

"That's part of the fun."

"You sure like to dance."

"Dancing is the best! I'm free! I'm a bird."

"Well, if you're really into dancing, let's try this place I know."

"You're pretty good doing this stuff." Rune drank down half of her third Amstel as she continued to move in time to the music.