This Girl for Hire Read Online Free Page A

“I want this girl.”
    â€œWell, have her!” Decker blared back. “Just get her out of my sight. And keep her out of bathing suits!”
    I changed my clothes, signed a six-week contract at four hundred a week, then left with Sam Aces.
    â€œWhat’s wrong with Decker?” I asked.
    Aces grinned. “High blood pressure. I don’t blame him for getting mad. You must have raised his reading at least twenty degrees.”
    â€œWhat about Swanson? I thought he was going to hang around for the contract-signing business?”
    â€œHoney,” Aces said patiently, “there’s one thing you’ll learn about Swanson. The minute the sun goes down he heads for the nearest bar.”
    â€œAnd where would that be?”
    â€œJust around the corner. You know, the place I told you about. The Golden Slipper.”
    I said good night to Sam, warned him to stay away from orange juice and then walked to the Golden Slipper. It was a ritzy little place with an ornate front and a bar that was as dark as the bottom of the River Styx. I signalled the bartender and ordered a martini. Two seconds later I was joined by the Golden Boy himself, flexing and snorting.
    â€œHello, baby,” Swanson laugheddrunkenly. “I hardly recognized you in clothes.”
    I smiled half-heartedly. “Thanks for the contract, Mr. Swanson.”
    â€œDon’t thank me. Thank Sam Aces, the miserable bastard. He brought you in.”
    â€œYou don’t like Mr. Aces?”
    â€œThat’s exactly right, sweetie. In fact, I hate his guts.” He took a big gulp of his drink and leaned against the bar for support.
    â€œI don’t see how you could feel like that,” I said. “He seems like such a nice guy.”
    Swanson bit hard on his teeth, scowling angrily. “Why that dirty son-of-a—” He stopped, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. “What’s it to you?” He banged for another drink. “You make a lot of observations for a blonde walk-on with no talent but plenty of chest muscle. What’s your name?”
    â€œHoney West.”
    â€œWhere’d you get that handle, in burlesque?”
    â€œIt’s on my birth certificate, Mr. Swanson. No middle name. I was never in burlesque.”
    He gave me a knowing look. “Baby, you really missed you’re calling.”
    â€œNow you’re making the observations, Mr. Swanson. Why don’t you like Sam Aces?”
    â€œYou writing a book?”
    â€œMaybe.”
    Television star, Bob Swanson, winner of last year’s award for best male performer, slugged down his fresh drink, wiped off his mouth with theback of his hand and grinned drunkenly. “Okay, put this in your first chapter, baby. You ever hear of an actor named Herb Nelson?”
    â€œSure—”
    â€œHe’s dead,” Swanson interrupted. “Murdered. You must have read about it in the papers. You want to know who did it? Sam Aces, that’s who. And he’s going to kill me next. You understand? That is, if I don’t get him first!”
    â€œThose are pretty strong words, Mr. Swanson,” I said. “Why would Sam Aces want to kill Herb Nelson?”
    â€œI don’t know.” He answered quickly as if he knew but didn’t want to put it into words.
    â€œSecond chapter,” I said, staring at my martini. “Why do you think he wants to kill you?”
    â€œPower. I got too much power and Aces doesn’t like it. There’d be no show without me. Aces can’t stand it. He’d like to blow my brains out.”
    Bob Swanson talked exactly like the frustrated guy he was supposed to be. Prior to Herb Nelson’s death I’d spent several hours digging into the muscle man’s notoriously unspectacular past. He had migrated to TV from motion pictures after a sporadic career as a temperamental child star and an even more-impossible-to-work with postwar jungle hero. From that