I hated leaving Laurette alone with that brute, but I had to respect her wishes. If at any time she got in over her head, I was confident she would call me.

I slid into my car, hooked the seat belt in place, and turned over the engine. Suddenly blasting through the car stereo speakers was the original cast recording of A Chorus Line. Track Three. "At the Ballet." Look, I never claimed to be straight. As I started backing out of the driveway, the front door of the house flew open, and Juan Carlos stalked out. He circled around the hood of the car, and marched up to the driver's side window. I put my foot on the brake.

He tapped lightly on the glass, and motioned for me to roll it down. I complied, wondering what it was he wanted.

"Before you go, I just want to say something," he said in a low, gravelly voice.

"What?" I turned down the volume until the cast of A Chorus Line faded into silence.

Juan Carlos closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and then slowly opened them again. They were full of loathing. A shiver went up my spine.

"I don't like you following me around, Jarrod."

"Look, I thought you might be sneaking around on Laurette, and I was wrong. I already told you that. End of story."

"No. That's not the only reason. You think I had something to do with that guy Teboe's death. Well, I didn't."

I didn't answer him.

He put his hands on his hips, the frustration rising in his voice. "Why do you think I'm hiding something?"

"I don't think you're hiding something," I said evenly. "I think you're hiding a lot of things. Good night, Juan Carlos."

Before I had a chance to take my foot off the brake, he grabbed a fistful of my shirt and yanked me forward. The window was only halfway down, so my head barely made it through. The tip of the glass pressed against my neck, cutting off my air, and I gasped. The more I struggled, the harder it was to breathe.

Juan Carlos pushed his face up close to mine until our noses touched. "If you don't disappear, you and I are going to have big problems. I mean it, Jarrod. Your NBC pilot won't be the only thing dead."

Between gasps I managed to get out, "Let go of me."

"When I'm good and ready," he said, spittle forming at the corners of his mouth.

I grabbed the door handle, wrenched it up, and swung open the door with all my might. It slammed into Juan Carlos's groin, and he instantly released me. He fell back, falling into one of Laurette's immaculately kept rosebushes. I tumbled out of the car, grabbing my throat with my hand, coughing and trying to catch my breath.

Juan Carlos was on his feet in an instant, wild with fury. I was on my hands and knees. He reared back and, with a sharp boot, kicked me in the solar plexus. I rolled over, clutching my throbbing gut and curling up into the fetal position.

He stood over me. I could hear him chuckling under his breath. That really pissed me off. I lay there, sprawled on the ground, just like Richard Dean Anderson in this one particular MacGyver episode in the late eighties when I guest-starred as the son of a tough, bull-headed Army general who was physically abusive to me. When MacGyver befriended me, and began a crusade to free me from my father's beatings, the general decided to teach MacGyver a lesson for interfering in his private affairs. It was one of those very special episodes with a message, and the climax unfolded on a mountaintop with the general (ably played by Dean Stockwell) kicking the shit out of adorable Richard Dean Anderson. With the hero curled up and barely conscious, the general leaned down to inspect his handiwork. He rolled him over to make sure he was out. That's when MacGyver's fist shot out and slammed Dean Stockwell square in the face. If it worked for MacGyver, it could work for me. So when Juan Carlos knelt down to see if I was ready to give up, the back of my hand connected with his upper lip with a loud smack, and he screamed, reeling back. As I've said many times before, there's nothing more brutal than smacking an actor in the face. It's like cutting off the fingers of a painter.

I thought it would bring this brawl to a halt. It only served to enrage Juan Carlos even more. He threw himself at me just as I climbed to my feet, and the two of us hit the freshly mowed lawn hard. The blows were fast and furious, and I raised one arm to block them as I nailed him like a punching bag with the other.

Suddenly I felt a sharp jab in my lower back. And then another. And another. Someone else was hitting me.

I heard Laurette shrieking behind me. "Stop it! Stop it, both of you!"

Juan Carlos let go of me first. Whatever was whacking me was walloping him too. We both looked up, dazed, to see Laurette hovering over us, a crazed look in her eye, armed with a broomstick. "If you two don't leave each other alone, I'm calling the police myself! If the neighbors haven't done it already!"

Juan Carlos and I, both smarting from the unrelenting blows, slowly and with great effort stood up. Neither of us helped the other. And we didn't raise our heads to face Laurette. We kept them down, like two dogs that have just been caught making a mess.

"I don't want to know what started it," Laurette said, "or whose fault it was. I just want you, Juan Carlos, to get your ass inside and go to bed, and I want you, Jarrod, to get in that car and go home."

We both did as we were told. As I got back in the Beamer, I saw Laurette standing motionless in the doorway as Juan Carlos brushed the blades of grass off his pants. She was there to make sure I didn't try running over her husband on my way out of the driveway.

As I backed out, Juan Carlos disappeared inside. Through the kitchen window I saw him grab a cold Diet Coke from the fridge and place it over one of the welts I had left on his right cheek.

I had no idea how things had gotten so out of hand. And with my friendship with Laurette already on life support, I was afraid this little altercation might be the deciding factor for her to pull the plug. But I wasn't sure. I was only sure of one thing. This scuffle with Juan Carlos was only the warm-up. It didn't take my psychic friend Isis to tell me we would clash again. And one of us probably wouldn't walk away the next time.

Chapter 10.

"Why didn't you call me? I would have been over in a flash and beaten the shit out of the bastard," Charlie said, popping a piece of chicken tikka into his mouth. We sat on the floor around our glass-top coffee table in the den surrounded by half-empty cartons of white rice, vegetable curry, and lamb vindaloo and crushed tin foil that had once been wrapped around meat samosas and onion bajji before we'd made short work of them. It was our weekly Indian food and DVD night. Just the two of us. We would unload our individual dramas of the week, make plans for the weekend, watch a popcorn flick, and more often than not, cap off the evening with some hot sex. Tonight was Charlie's turn to pick the movie so the James Bond movie Die Another Day starring Pierce Brosnan and Halle Berry played on our widescreen TV. After a week of chasing down LA's lowlifes, Charlie didn't want to tax his mind too much, so a light-action romp was the perfect way for him to unwind.

Halle had just wandered out of the surf in an eye-popping orange bikini revealing enough to stop even two gay men in mid-sentence. We stared in awe as she sashayed up the beach and began a conversation with 007.

Charlie finally tore his eyes off the TV and returned his attention to me. "It's not too late. I can go over there and haul his ass downtown for assault."

I shook my head. "No. Laurette's mad at me enough as it is. And it's not like he didn't have somewhat of a reason."

There was no point in hiding it from Charlie anymore. I told him all about the pact I had made with Laurette to find out if Juan Carlos was the dishonorable louse I feared him to be.

Charlie, ever the patient boyfriend, listened as I prattled on, and remained silent after I'd finished. I knew he was ticked off. But it was more out of concern for my well-being. It was always about that. And sometimes I felt I really didn't deserve such a catch.

"He could've really done a number on you," he said finally.

"I can take care of myself. Two years of scene combat classes, baby."

"That's fine if he takes a swing at you, but what if he decides to drop a little poison in your Diet Rite like he did with Austin Teboe."

"You know what?" I said. "We have no proof that he had anything to do with that. And for once, I'm going to let the police up in San Simeon do their job. I'm through with Juan Carlos. It's none of my business."

Charlie threw his hands up in the air and exclaimed, "Finally! A breakthrough!"

I playfully slapped him lightly on the cheek. "Bastard."

He tapped the back of my head with the palm of his hand. "Freak."

On the TV, Halle and Pierce were going at it big time. Lots of bare skin and thrashing about in a fluffy white bed somewhere in Cuba. That was all we needed. Charlie and I lunged at each other, both determined to try again after our aborted lovemaking attempt the night before.

Facing each other, both of us swelling with good old-fashioned lust, we ripped off our shirts as we locked mouths, anxious to make up for lost time.

The doorbell rang.

"Ignore it," I said as I worked to unhook my belt. "Probably just a Jehovah's Witness."

Snickers, who had been hovering near the coffee table, hoping one of us might drop a succulent piece of chicken tikka that she could snatch up in her teeth, tore out of the den, barking at the top of her lungs as she scampered to the front door.

This time, I pushed Charlie down on the couch, ran my fingers through his forest of chest hair, then tugged open the zipper on his jeans and set about devouring him.

The doorbell rang again. And again. And again. Snickers was in a frantic state, running back into the den to summon us, and then darting back to the front door. Between the unrelenting doorbell and our nearly rabid dog, we both knew our night of hot, passionate lovemaking was doomed to failure. Charlie zipped up. I threw on my shirt. We both headed for the door.

Laurette stood on the front stoop; her SUV was parked three whole feet from the curb and angled halfway into the street. She was obviously in a hurry.

"Laurette, I'm so sorry. I don't know what to say. Things just got out of hand," I said.

Charlie put a comforting hand on my shoulder from behind. "He feels terrible. Just now, we were discussing how he should apologize."

I glanced at Charlie, who stifled a smile.

"Oh, who cares about that?" Laurette said as she pushed her way in and headed for the kitchen. "You got any Scotch?"

After pouring herself a drink and settling down in the red diner booth, Laurette got right to the point. "I got a call right after you left. From Larry Levant."

Nothing. Neither Charlie nor I had ever heard of him.

"The director. Made a big splash at Sundance last year for his documentary on the gay porn industry called Give 'Em Head, Harry.

"Sorry I missed it," said Charlie.

"Anyway," Laurette said. "He's been in preproduction on his new movie for months now. It's a low-budget horror movie. But smart, you know? Not one of those straight-to-Showtime pieces of shit. He had raised most of the money through independent sources, but was still about a million short, and just today the rest of the financing came through. Some big mucky-muck in South Florida who wants to be in the movie business."

"Is Larry Levant a client of yours?"

"No," she said, a teasing lilt in her voice. "I represent the actor who he desperately wants as his leading man."

My heart skipped a beat. I had been so down after my NBC pilot tanked in testing. Not one audition had come my way. Not even for an under-five-line bit part on 7th Heaven. And now, was Laurette excited because she had finally done her job and snared me a leading role in a promising independent film?

"Me?" I said.

"No. Juan Carlos."

This was either a mean-spirited joke on her part or bitter revenge for brawling with her husband on her front lawn. "You came all the way over here to tell me that?"

"Of course not," she said. "Larry's a big fan of yours. And there's a supporting role we both think you're perfect for. Frankly, I think it's more interesting than the lead."

Agents always said that. I wasn't about to fall for it.

"You'd play a single dad camping with your son," she said. "Going through a bitter divorce. Fighting for custody. At your wit's end. Things couldn't get any worse. And that's when you're stalked by a homicidal maniac in the woods."

Actually it sounded like a meaty part. One I could make a meal out of if someone let me. "I've never played a wounded single parent."

"You die twenty minutes into the movie, but you're in almost every scene up to the point where you get an axe in the back of your head."

"Sorry, Laurette. He's not going to do it."

I froze. Who had said that? It sounded like my boyfriend Charlie. But he knew I would psychologically torture him senseless if he denied me a richly deserved acting gig.

Laurette and I both stared at Charlie, waiting for some kind of explanation for such a sweeping, dictatorial decision.

"You heard what she said, Jarrod," Charlie argued. "Juan Carlos is playing the lead, and I think we've strongly established that you two don't get along."

"In this business, that's not a deal breaker," Laurette said.

"Well, I don't think it's a good idea for you two to spend three months on a film shoot together."

"But you heard Laurette," I said. "I die after the first twenty minutes. I'll be there two, three weeks tops."

"Why put yourself through that?" Charlie said.

"Because it's a job," I said, pouring myself a Scotch. "And we both know how few and far between those have been lately."

"I just don't think it's a good idea." Charlie was adamant. But I had no intention of letting this opportunity slip through my fingers.

"But the director is a fan. He really wants me to play the part. How can I compromise his vision by saying no?" I was the King of Bullshit when I had to be.

Charlie chuckled. "Come on, babe. Can't you see Laurette is playing you? I think you're a terrific actor, but seriously, do you really believe this big director only wants you for the role? There's something else going on here."

Actors, especially former child actors, live to be the center of attention. And sometimes they can float above the realm of reality, and simply exist inside their own heads. As much as it angered me that Charlie was yanking me back down to earth from my blissful fantasy of being indispensable and one of a kind, he had a point. Larry Levant insisting I play an important role in his new film was akin to Steven Spielberg crowing that he could do Saving Private Ryan only with Corey Feldman. Laurette was scheming, and she had just been exposed.

Charlie and I looked at her, and she caved immediately. "All right, all right. Larry owed me a few favors, so I talked him into giving you a part in the movie."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because you haven't worked in a while, and I was feeling guilty about not getting you more work."

I was ready to buy it, but Charlie wasn't. "And?"

"And because Juan Carlos got a phone call while he was on the computer, and when I went into the office to get my checkbook so I could pay a few bills, there was an e-mail up on the screen from a woman in Florida."

" Domini que?"

"I don't think so. It was someone else. But obviously a woman. And they've clearly known each other awhile. She didn't write her name or anything, but the note had a very strong sexual connotation."

"What the hell does that mean?" I said.

"There was a lot of dirty talk," Charlie answered.

"Oh."

"This woman clearly has feelings for Juan Carlos," Laurette said. "And she's still very much in his life. But to what degree, I don't know."

"What does that have to do with me playing a part in Larry Levant's movie?"

"Isn't it obvious? She wants you to be on location to make sure Juan Carlos doesn't fool around behind her back with this mystery woman," Charlie said, folding his arms, satisfied the case was closed.

I turned to Laurette. She had no fight left in her. Everything was on the table, and there was nothing she could do about it. She was just betting on the fact that my ego would outweigh my common sense. Good bet.