Undercover in High Heels

by Gemma Halliday

  Officer Mustache didn’t know where to look, his gaze ping-ponging between the players straight out of a madcap British comedy.

  Some days I loved my family.

  “Let’s go.” I grabbed Jasmine by the sleeve, and we slipped out the side door, making a beeline for the garage. Jasmine unlocked a tiny yellow Miata and hopped behind the wheel. No wonder she existed on a diet of vitamin water and Tic Tacs. Any bigger and there was no way she would have fit in her toy car. I dove into the passenger seat and ducked down, crossing my fingers as she pulled out of the garage, backed into the street, and punched it down the road. I waited for the sound of sirens to follow us. I held my breath, counting to four-Mississippi before I peeked my head up.

  “Coast clear?”

  “Yep.” Jasmine nodded, her eyes shining. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she was enjoying this.

  I pulled out my cell and dialed Mom’s number, telling her thanks for the rescue and that I owed her one—the “one” being dinner at her house next week with her, Faux Dad, and my Irish Catholic grandmother. But considering I’d just asked her to help me escape police custody, I figured it was a fair request. (Besides, my steady diet of Chinese takeout and Hamburger Helper was, I admit, getting a little old.)

  We sped down the 101 into Hollywood, making a left on Cahuenga until we reached the address Felix had given me. Jasmine killed the engine in front of a large, split-level ranch with a yard full of garden gnomes. The windows were covered in chintz curtains, and the front door was adorned with a big heart-shaped wreath made of pink silk roses. Didn’t exactly scream murderer in bright neon.

  “You sure this is the right place?” Jasmine asked.

  I looked down at my hand and doubled-checked the address. Granted, after my great escape, I’d sweated some of the street name off, but the number was still visible enough. “This is it.”

  She shrugged. “I guess it takes all kinds.”

  I followed her up the rose-flanked pathway to the front door, nerves starting to build. I admit that the idea of coming face-to-face with a cold-blooded killer did more than a little to creep me out. Not to mention the fact that I’d just done a high-heeled striptease for him. I looked down at my pumps and blushed. If he made one reference to licking anything below the ankle, I was so out of here, killer or no.

  Jasmine gave the bell a ring and we waited while it echoed inside. Two beats later the door opened, and I got my first glimpse of BigBoy78.

  My jaw dropped, and I stared in disbelief.

  Deveroux Strong’s frame filled the doorway, his broad shoulders clad in a baby blue sweater with skintight white leather pants beneath. He wore alligator-skin black ankle boots, and one diamond stud winked at me from his left earlobe.

  “Hey, Maddie, ” he said, a big white smile flashing across his tanned face. Then he looked behind me and spotted Jasmine. At first his eyes went big, as if he’d seen a ghost (or a fifty-foot billboard come to life), and then his cheeks turned a red to rival Rudolph’s shiny nose as he realized why we were here. “Oh.”

  “Yep, that’s him. That’s the guy I saw Veronika bring home, ” Jasmine said, jabbing me in the ribs.

  Deveroux gave a fleeting glance at my pumps, then, if it were possible, blushed even deeper. “Uh, look, I can explain.”

  “You were dating Veronika?” I sputtered, finally finding my voice. Theories tumbled one over another in my head, making me question whether we’d made a mistake after all.

  Deveroux looked nervously from side to side. “Maybe you’d better come in.”

  I nodded, mutely following him into a neatly decorated living room just a little on the floral side for my taste. Deveroux sat on an orange, hibiscus-printed sofa set next to a lilac-covered armchair, and gestured for Jasmine and me to take the petunia-studded love seat. (Okay, a lot floral for my taste.) The only thing breaking up the garden of furniture was a small black TV set in the corner, tuned to Inside Edition. I sank down onto the petunia seat, crossing my legs selfconsciously, as Dana’s dress rode up my thigh.

  “You’re BigBoy78?” I asked.

  Deveroux went red again, his blush spreading all the way to his blond roots. “Look, it’s not what you think. I’m not into that porn stuff. I just…I just have a thing for feet.”

  “I noticed, ” I mumbled, tucking my heels underneath me.

  “Specifically Veronika’s feet?” Jasmine prodded. She leaned forward in her seat, her heavily lifted eyes intent on Deveroux’s face. For how badly I’d had to bribe her to get here, she was really getting into this questioning-a-suspect thing. Any second now I feared she’d pull a spotlight and a billyclub from her leather clutch.

  He nibbled at his lip. “Yeah. Look, not that it makes any difference now, but Veronika and I were…well, kind of an item.”

  “Wait—I thought you were gay?”

  Deveroux put one hand on his leather-clad hip and tilted his frosted tips at me. “What makes you think I’m gay?”

  Hmmm…

  “Okay. So, you’re not gay.”

  “No, I’m not, ” he said emphatically. Then picked at a stray piece of lint on his sweater. “That’s just a vicious tabloid rumor.”

  “And you were dating Veronika?”

  He nodded. “For the last four months. We met when she started working on Magnolia Lane and began dating soon after that.”

  “And soon after that started logging on to my site to watch her, ” Jasmine piped up.

  The blush worked itself into an all-out five-alarm fire across his forehead. “Look, it’s perfectly normal for a man to enjoy a woman’s feet. Feet are the most beautiful part of a woman’s body. Ancient cultures have revered women’s feet for thousands of years. It’s not weird!”

  Not wanting to aggravate a potential killer, not to mention relive my moments as a foot whore, I changed the subject. “How serious were things between the two of you?”

  “Very. We were both going to leave the show at the end of my contract. One more season. We were…” He paused, a watery look in his eyes, and sniffed hard. “We were going to get married.”

  “Married?” Jasmine spit out. “She never said anything like that to me. And she had a six-month lease!”

  I shot her a look.

  “Deveroux, did you know that Veronika was pregnant?” I asked.

  He nodded, his eyes tearing up in earnest. “She told me just last week. I was so exited. We were going to get married and move to Oregon. My sister’s got a big place up there near the coast.”

  “Oregon?” Jasmine yelled. “Why, that sneaky little…”

  I gave her a quick shot to the ribs.

  “Veronika was okay with leaving the show?”

  Deveroux nodded. “It was her idea to move away—away from all the Hollywood types. In case you hadn’t noticed, the set can get kind of wild at times.”

  Understatement alert.

  “Anyway, ” he continued, “she said she was coming into some money soon and we could put a down payment on a place near my sister.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Money?” I asked, remembering how little Dana said stand-ins made. “What kind of money?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. She wouldn’t say. But she said she’d been working on something and her investment was about to pay off.”

  “Investment? That’s what she called it?”

  He nodded.

  I turned to Jasmine.

  “Hey, don’t look at me, ” she said. “My girls get free room and board from me, but that’s it.”

  I wondered. Veronika hadn’t struck me as the kind to put her pennies into stocks and bonds. Granted, I hadn’t known her that well, but the fact that she was playing strip Go Fish for rent didn’t speak to a bank account bursting with extra funds.

  Which left one alternative.

  Blackmail.

  I worded my next question carefully. “Deveroux, was Veronika particularly close to anyone on the set? Anyone who might have shared, say, a secret with her?”


  His white-blond eyebrows (perfectly waxed, I noticed—wait till I told Felix this guy was straight!) drew together. “Well, she did have coffee with Kylie a couple of times.”

  My ears pricked up. Coffee? Or a confession where Kylie let slip a deep, dark secret worth killing Veronika over? I had to admit, I had a hard time putting the perky cheerleaderesque Tina Rey in the role of homicidal maniac. But stranger things had happened.

  “But, ” Deveroux continued, “Veronika was really careful about keeping her personal life separate from her work. She was worried that if someone on the set found out she worked for the Web site, they’d fire her. I mean, despite the drama in the script, our core demographic is Middle American housewives. It’s one thing to have scandalous story lines, but an actual scandal like working for a porn site…well, that wouldn’t fit the studio’s image.”

  He turned to Jasmine as an afterthought. “No offense.”

  She shrugged. “None taken. You paid for my last two photofacials.”

  Deveroux blushed again.

  “No one else she was particularly close to on the set?”

  He shook his head. “Why do you ask?”

  I hesitated to tell him my theory. But then again, I was quickly running out of suspects and at this point didn’t have much to lose. “Do you think it’s possible that Veronika may have been blackmailing someone? Maybe someone on the set?”

  “No. No way!” Deveroux vehemently shook his head. Then he stopped. He gave a little sigh and slumped his shoulders forward. “Maybe.”

  “And she never mentioned anything to you?” I asked again.

  “No, just that she was coming into some money soon.” His eyes got that watery look to them again. “You think that’s what got her killed? I mean, we didn’t have to move to Oregon. We could have stayed here.”

  I rose and gave him an awkward pat on the shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

  He nodded, sniffling loudly. “Excuse me, I need to find a tissue, ” he mumbled, and slipped out of the room.

  I sank back onto the sofa, my mind whirling with possibilities. If Veronika had been blackmailing someone on the set, it would have given them ample reason to want her dead. How easy would it have been for a blackmailer to lure Veronika to Mia’s trailer under the guise of more money, then stage the death to look like Mia’s stalker?

  But it still didn’t explain Dusty. Or Mia’s threatening letters. Was it possible that it was all a coincidence? That Veronika really had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time? What if Veronika had been waiting to meet the blackmailer at Mia’s trailer, but the stalker had gotten to her first? I had to admit, instead of explaining anything, this new development just added one more piece to the confusing puzzle that didn’t seem to fit in anywhere.

  I was flirting with that headache again when the television piped up from the corner.

  “That’s right, Tom, we’ve received breaking news about the Magnolia Lane Murders.”

  Jasmine and I immediately turned our attention to the screen as a slim, African-American reporter came on, holding a microphone. The backdrop of the Sunset Studios Central Park, still cordoned off with crime-scene tape, was laid out behind her.

  “We go now to Marcia Blanding at the scene, ” a voice just off-camera said. “Marcia?”

  The reporter sprang to life, lifting her microphone to her cherry-painted mouth. “Thank you, Peter. As you know, we’ve been following this story all morning, bringing you updates on the latest death on the set of the popular television show Magnolia Lane.”

  I winced as the camera moved left, showing a group of crime-scene technicians in slick windbreakers combing the area.

  “Now it seems, ” Marcia went on, “that star Mia Carletto’s poisoned penman has struck again. We learned just moments ago from Miss Carletto herself that she has received another death threat. We come to you live from the impromptu press conference just outside her trailer on the Sunset Studios lot.”

  I leaned forward in my seat, my eyes glued to the television as Deveroux wandered back in the room.

  “I’m sorry; I just—”

  “Shhhhh, ” I commanded, waving him off as Mia’s face filled the screen.

  Reporters surrounded her. To her right stood her publicist, a thin, redheaded woman in a tailored black suit. To her left, the ominous presence of Ramirez, arms crossed over his pecs, his eyes ever watchful of the crowd pressing closer to Mia. For a second I had the tiniest prickle of guilt at giving my babysitter the slip, but it was quickly shoved to the background as Mia began to speak.

  “Thank you all for coming, ” she said, her voice evenly modulated and booming over the assembled crowd.

  “Are you all right?” one of the reporters shouted to her, shoving a Channel Two microphone in her face.

  Mia sighed loudly, her eyes downcast. “Physically, I am unharmed. Though, emotionally, the day has taken its toll on me.”

  “Where did you find the latest note?” a representative from Cable Twelve asked.

  “This morning I arrived on the set to find this note in my trailer, pinned to my pillow, ” Mia said, holding up a piece of plain white stationary.

  “What does it say?” shouted Channel Two again.

  Mia’s bottom lip quivered momentarily. Then she cleared her throat, lifted her head, and began to read from the paper. “ ‘Veronika and Dusty were only the beginning.’ ” Her voice faltered, fear clearly evident on her pinched features as she continued. “ ‘You’ve eluded me thus far, but no more. I will have you, Mia Carletto. Make no mistake about it, ’ ” she said, looking directly into the camera. “ ‘You’re next.’ ”

  A frenzy of flashbulbs went off, the reporters practically peeing their pants over this kind of news. I could see Ramirez’s posture tense in the background as the clamoring mob of newshounds surged forward. Mia’s publicist put an arm around her, ushering her back into the trailer as questions flew through the air one after another, ranging from “Are you hiring a bodyguard?” to “Who does your hair?”

  “Mia knows how to work a crowd, doesn’t she?” Deveroux asked, dabbing at the corner of his eye with a tissue.

  I had to agree, the moment had been played for maximum effect. On the other hand, death threats did tend to be dramatic all on their own.

  “I think she’s had work done, ” Jasmine said, picking at a long, red fingernail. “Did you see her eyes? Wider than the aisles at Barneys.”

  I refrained from pointing out that Jasmine’s own eyes weren’t exactly a product of nature. Instead, I thanked Deveroux for his time (carefully making my feet as inconspicuous as possible), and left, taking the rose-lined pathway back to Jasmine’s Miata.

  “Well, so much for Veronika’s mystery man, ” Jasmine said, shifting the sports car into gear. “So, do we track down Kylie next, or what?”

  I turned to her. “We?”

  “What?” She gave me an innocent look and shrugged. “This Charlie’s Angels thing is kind of fun.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but thought better of it. She did, after all, have the car.

  “Okay, fine. Let’s go question Kylie.”

  Luckily, I had it on good authority (Star magazine) that Kylie spent every Monday morning at the Kitson Boutique on the trendy Robertson Boulevard. Twenty minutes later, Jasmine was circling the block to find parking and I was scanning the racks for Kylie’s perky blonde head. I spotted her holding a vintage style T-shirt up to her ample chest in the mirror.

  “Hi, Kylie! Wow, what a coincidence. You shop here too?” I grabbed a studded belt, trying to look like a casual shopper as she spun around.

  It took a second for recognition to dawn in her eyes. “Oh, yeah. You’re the new wardrobe girl, right?”

  I nodded. “Uh-huh. Maddie.”

  “Riiiight. Sorry, I totally forgot your name. When I’m on the set, I tune stuff like that out. I have to be in a total concentration zone. You know they expect me to have all my lines memorized? Like, every week.” She turned back to
her reflection. “What do you think of this shirt?”

  “Very cute.”

  She wrinkled her ski-jump nose. “You think? I don’t know; is it too young?”

  Considering Kylie still looked like she should be shopping in the kids’ section, I decided that question was rhetorical. Instead, I got right to the point.

  “I guess you heard about Dusty this morning?”

  Kylie dropped the shirt and spun around. “Ohmigod, like, too totally sad, you know? I can’t even believe someone could do that. Way random.”

  I hesitated to tell her just how un-random this was shaping up to be.

  “I heard that you and Veronika were close. All of this must be so hard on you.”

  Again Kylie did the nose-scrunching thing. “Um, sorta, I guess. We did lattes a couple of times. But she was kinda weird, you know?”

  I cocked my head to the side, fingering a fur-trimmed jacket. “Weird how?”

  “Well, she just kept talking about this guy she was dating and how they were gonna get married and move to Oregon. Oregon, of all places! I mean, I so did not get that fascination. There’s, like, not even any cool malls there. And it’s, like, totally rainy ’n’ stuff. Way FUBAR, if you ask me.”

  I watched as she picked up another T-shirt: LITTLE MISS GIGGLES.

  “So, um, was that all you and Veronika talked about?”

  Kylie gave me a sidelong glance in the mirror. “I guess. Why?”

  I picked up the belt again, trying to feign casual. “No reason. Just wondering if she might have confided something in you. Something that might help find who killed her.”

  Something sparked in the back of Kylie’s eyes, and for a moment I thought I saw a glimmer of intelligence cross her face beyond her Tina Rey character. “Don’t the police think Mia was the real target?”