Walking Dead Man

As X-rated stars descend on the Beaumont Hotel, someone takes a shot at its owner

Terrified of flying, Beaumont Hotel owner George Battle hasn’t seen America in seventeen years, instead spending his days on the Riviera, counting his money. But pressing business calls him back to the United States: a seven million dollar investment in the latest epic directed by Maxwell Zorn, king of highbrow celluloid smut. It’s the kind of motion picture that even an old man will want to oversee personally.

As Zorn’s outlandish entourage swarms the illustrious hotel, Battle takes residence in the penthouse suite of his infallible manager, Pierre Chambrun. On his first night there, a bullet splinters the headboard just inches from his face. Was the shot meant for him or Chambrun? The Beaumont’s top brass must tread lightly. Die, and the Beaumont dies with them—a blow from which the jet-set will never recover.