Detective Perelli eyes me. “Still, it was a good tip.”
I preen. “Anything more on the counterfeit-money guy?”
“We got confirmation he fled the state. We’re after him. A few other leads I’m pursuing, too.” I’m concluding she won’t be sharing those with me when a black-and-white rolls to a stop in front of her and she gets in. “I appreciate what you’ve done and all, Happy, but I don’t want you getting more mixed up in this. It’s nasty.”
“I’m being careful.”
“Until you got a gun and a badge, you gotta steer clear. I mean it.”
I watch the cop car roll away and imagine having a gun and a badge. Just like Pop did.
Maybe better. He never got to work Homicide.
I’m in a good mood as I hail a cab. Soon I’m gaining entry to Samantha’s gated community. I spy a flatbed tow truck on its way out, transporting a cream-colored Cadillac with a pink interior, pink doggie carrier, and smashed windshield.
I’m wondering if the “funny noise” Samantha referred to on the phone was the sound of glass breaking. Was she so frazzled by the Tarot card’s revelations of treachery and dishonor that she went on a chardonnay bender and made the mistake of getting behind the wheel?
I tell the cabbie to keep the engine running and trot up the curving path to Samantha’s manse. No sooner does my fingertip leave her doorbell than she barrels out of the house and past me down the path, Pucci in her arms. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” she pants, flying toward the street.
“We can’t take Pucci to lunch!” I protest.
“I can’t leave her in there!” Samantha shrieks.
“Why not?” I race after her. “What’s wrong?”
I get my answer when we’re almost at the curb. I hear a bellow behind me and spin around to see a dark-haired thirty-something male hurtling down the path in my direction. That wouldn’t be so bad if he weren’t swinging a crowbar over his head.
“Brandon, no!” Samantha screams.
“Get back in the house, Mother!” he yells.
Not a moment’s hesitation on her part. She scampers right back up the path. I hear the front door slam shut.
“And you!” He points at me with one hand and swings the crowbar in an extra wide arc with the other. I’m just about concluding that it wasn’t white wine that did in the Cadillac’s windshield when my cabbie apparently begins to fear for his own vehicle. He guns the engine and peels off. That is unfortunate because I would prefer a few tons of steel between me and Brandon St. James. Desperate, I take cover behind a palm tree.
Brandon approaches with a menacing glint in his eye. “Don’t come around here anymore, you hear me? I don’t know what you’re up to but I want it to stop!”
“What’s your problem? You don’t want your mother to have friends?”
“She doesn’t need friends like you!” He takes a whack at the palm tree.
I cower behind it. My strappy sandals are styling but they are not designed for outrunning crowbar-wielding maniacs.
“I see you sniffing around here one more time,” Brandon yowls, “and I’ll charge you with harassment!” He gives the palm tree another whack for good measure and then stomps away.
When I finally get a cab—as the company that got me here has decided to cease ferrying one Happy Pennington around the greater Las Vegas area—a thought takes root in my brain.
Samantha St. James may not have what it takes to commit murder. But I bet her son Brandon does.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“Maybe,” Shanelle says, slicing into her Chicken Marsala, “Danny was blackmailing Samantha because he had something on her son.”
Since we couldn’t agree on what we wanted for lunch, we’re at a buffet. Given that this is Vegas, the selection is humungous. The hostess who guided us to our table boasted that over three hundred dishes are prepared fresh each day.
“In my day we’d call that Brandon a hooligan,” my mother says. “So maybe that thug Danny did find something on him.” She ingests another item from her plate, on which are loaded quite a variety of selections.
“You’re getting your money’s worth, Mrs. P,” Trixie observes.
“You got that right,” my mother mumbles, her mouth full. Petite though she may be, at a buffet my mother takes “all you can eat” to heart.
I bite off some bacon. “I can’t imagine any son wanting his widowed mother involved with a man like Danny.”
Trixie takes a break from her Panang curry. “I think it’s weird that Brandon doesn’t want his mother to have friends. Even nice people like us.”
Though we’re not nice through and through where Brandon’s mother is concerned. After all, I am investigating her for murder.
Just the same, after meeting her hothead son I’m worried about her. On my way back to the Strip, I phoned to make sure she was okay. She answered and whispered to me that she was. I plan to check on her again later.
“Brandon may not know half of what was going on between Danny and his mother,” Shanelle points out. “Can you imagine how ticked off he’d be if he knew about the Cadillac?”
“Or that his mother gave Danny access to her accounts?” I slide herbed omelet into my mouth. Yum. “I keep coming back to how Samantha said she could never forgive herself for what she did to Danny. And how Danny would have been better off never knowing her.”
Shanelle eyes me. “That making more sense to you now?”
“What if Samantha knows that Brandon murdered Danny? Or suspects it? She might think Danny would be alive today if she hadn’t introduced him to her son.”
“Yes!” Trixie slams her lemonade glass down so hard the cutlery on our table rattles. “Imagine how guilty she’d feel? And don’t forget what the spirits told her in the Tarot card reading. Remember how the first card was the Seven of Swords? That reveals hidden dishonor. Like, for example, a member of the family murdering somebody!”
“There was that reversed card, too.” Shanelle frowns. “Didn’t that have to do with families and money?”
“The Ten of Pentacles card.” I do recall it, with the ten gold coins. “It had to do with inheritance problems if it was reversed.”
“And it’s sure as heck an inheritance problem if your son murders somebody he thinks is making off with his inheritance. It all adds up!” Trixie screeches so loudly that diners at nearby tables glance our way.
Oh, dear. How pathetic is it that we’re using a Tarot card reading to help solve a murder? My cell beeps with a new text. I see it’s from Cassidy.
“You’re as bad as Rachel,” my mother harrumphs, “with your phone at the table.”
“Sorry. But it’s from Cassidy.”
“What does she say?” Trixie wants to know.
“It’s more info about that guy I saw her with at the volcano. Apparently he’s an audio engineer for Ziana.”
“The pop singer?” Shanelle says.
“What guy?” Trixie asks.
I provide an explanation. “Anyway, he works at a recording studio in town.” I wonder why Cassidy is suddenly spilling this. But I’m glad she is.
“I’ve had enough of this murder business,” my mother puts in. She glares at me. “You and your fascination with sickos. Just like your father.”
He and I do have that in common. I swipe my mouth with my napkin. “We won’t talk about murder for one second while we’re getting our mani/pedis, Mom.”
“You made that appointment late enough so I can go to the Liberace Museum, right?”
“The appointment’s at 5. I can’t believe you still have things to see there.”
She does not favor that remark with a reply. I rise to my feet. “Ladies, there’s something I want to do. I’ll catch you later. Mom, I’ll meet you at the spa.” I give her a kiss on the cheek and slip Shanelle enough cash to cover our two lunches.
The Audio Spirit Recording Studio is yet another cab ride away. The one-story building doesn’t look like much from the outside bu
t inside it’s plush, with low lighting, cushy furniture, a flat-screen TV, and framed gold and platinum records on the walls.
Travis Blakely sure has a fun job. Ziana is a big deal. It so happens she’s been playing Vegas all year.
I push open the glass entry door and pause in the reception area. It’s totally quiet. No one is manning the front desk. Scads of people must be in the building because the parking lot is jam-packed. To my left, a carpeted corridor beckons invitingly.
Time to be bold.
The corridor circles around the interior of the building. On the left side are small rooms crowded with mysterious equipment. I can’t figure out why there’s nothing to my right until I walk a few yards further and realize that the center of the structure must be taken up by the control room.
I halt. Now I hear voices ahead of me. And music. Ziana’s music, which of course I recognize. Everybody knows it. Well, maybe my mom doesn’t. Ziana is not a contemporary of Liberace.
It occurs to me that Ziana may well be here, mere yards away, recording a new blockbuster hit. I can’t barge in on the recording session, though. I would run a high risk of being thrown off the premises and then would get nothing out of Travis Blakely.
I linger in the corridor, far enough away so no one can see me. I spy backstage passes to the Ziana show on a table in one of the small rooms and, never shy, claim a few. It’s fun listening to the session, to the music starting and stopping, to the comments and suggestions. After a while, things seem to wind down. Voices get louder. I can tell people are edging closer to the corridor. I bow my head over my cell and send a few fake texts, trying to create the impression that I have every right to be present.
A broad-shouldered man in a sport jacket strides past. I feel his eyes but don’t look up. A number of other people, mostly men, move through the corridor as well, none of them Ziana. I glance up whenever a woman walks by, hoping in vain to glimpse the star. One blonde does seem familiar but I can’t place her.
Eventually the flow slows to a trickle. I still haven’t seen anybody who looks like Travis. I sashay forward and pause at the entry to a room that has one of those big audio consoles we the uninitiated associate with recording sessions. Only two guys are still around and one of them is Travis. I recognize him from when I saw him with Cassidy.
I approach him and hold out my hand. “Hi. I’m Happy Pennington.”
He shakes my hand without enthusiasm. “We got business, you and me?”
“I was hoping I could talk to you for a bit.”
The other guy brushes past. “That’s what they all say,” he leers, and leaves Travis and me alone.
Travis leans back against the console and crosses his arms over his chest. He’s not a bad-looking guy: my age or thereabouts, average height with a lanky build and a reddish-blond mustache. He’s wearing jeans but no cowboy hat. “What do you want?”
I’m thinking I need to warm him up before I delve into the Danny questions. “So how long have you been working for Ziana?”
He frowns. “Why you interested in her? Who are you, anyway?”
“I’m a friend of a friend. And aren’t most people interested in her? She’s a huge star. I was hoping I’d luck out and see her.”
“She goes out the back way. So people like you don’t luck out.”
I guess I deserve that. “Did she record a new song today?”
“We didn’t record today. We were listenin’ to tracks.”
“Really? Boy, it sounded to me like you were recording.” I’m about to delve into that further when Travis grabs me by the arm and starts to manhandle me out.
“I got work to do,” he says. “You gotta get outa here.”
I try to dig in but I don’t even manage to slow our progress. “I didn’t have the chance to tell you that you and I have a couple friends in common.”
“Yeah, well, that’s just dandy.” He opens the glass front door and pushes me out. “Have a good day.” I watch him turn the lock and walk back the way we came.
I got a big fat nothing out of that encounter. There’s nothing for it but to hail yet another cab.
I get back to the Cosmos in time for my mother’s return from the Liberace Museum. She’s bearing a shopping bag. “You bought a souvenir?” I ask.
She reveals a black duffel bag emblazoned with Liberace’s smiling image and the phrase The King Of Bling. All rendered in sequins, of course. “On sale,” she crows.
I can truthfully report that I’ve never seen anything like it.
“There’s something else I saw today that I liked. In the piano exhibit.” Very carefully she cuts the price tag off the duffel bag with her couponing scissors. “Did you know that it was that fire that Mario told you about that forced Liberace to switch from having a lit candelabra on his grand piano to an electrified one?”
“I did not know that.”
“You learn something new every day. At least some of us do,” she adds smugly. “Anyway, the piano room had a portrait of Liberace’s beloved mother, Frances Zuchowski. It started out as a photo but then was painted. Probably to add vibrancy.”
“Probably.” She’s going somewhere with this.
“I would not mind if you hung such a thing over your own mantelpiece.”
“The gift shop has portraits of Liberace’s mother for sale?”
She narrows her eyes at me. “Do not be a smart aleck with your mother.”
Soon thereafter we repair to the Cosmos spa for our mani/pedis. That is, a mani/pedi for me but only a mani for her. My mother has long held the conviction that no one but her podiatrist should feel up her feet. Frank is not in evidence.
We’re in the relaxing-to-let-the-polish-dry phase of the operation when I hear a female scream from somewhere deep in the spa. My mother, the only other person in the nail-treatment room, throws me a look of concern. More distant screeching ensues. A man hollers, Oh my God! Seconds later a woman shrieks to call 911. A ruckus of pounding feet follows after that.
By now I’m pretty concerned myself. For one thing, after Mario’s ghost story I’ve gotten really good at imagining the Cosmos Hotel devoured by flames and none of us able to escape. I rise from my spa chair, my toes still spread in the post-pedicure separator thingies. “Stay here,” I instruct my mother and hobble into the corridor.
The spa is a maze of hallways with treatment rooms on both sides. I see no smoke. I sniff the air and smell no fire. Emboldened, I waddle in the direction of the commotion. Actually, I’m not sure I’m any more awkward with the toe thingies than I am in my stilettos.
I peer down a hallway that ends with a door to the reception area. Through the door’s etched opaque glass, I can make out people racing back and forth. Most of the treatment-room doors are closed but one is open.
I force myself to creep toward it even though I have a bad feeling. I do not want to see what I fear I’m about to see.
I steel myself to look in the room. When I do, my heart does a somersault, after which it starts pounding like a jackhammer.
There is a slim brunette woman on the massage table, her face down in the U-shaped cradle, the bottom half of her naked body covered by a white sheet.
Well, it used to be white. Now it’s really bloody.
Because there’s a knife sticking out of the woman’s back.
CHAPTER TWENTY
The short brunette hair, the size, shape, and youth of the body … even minus the cigarette tray I feel sure I know who this is.
But I must confirm it.
Telling myself that detective work does not allow for squeamishness, I move toward the head of the massage table, bend down, and peer up at the face peering down in the face cradle. Indeed it is Cassidy, her eyes wide open and surprised-looking, a trickle of blood running from her mouth. In my heart I knew it was Cassidy but now I know it for sure.
I reel backwards and slam into the credenza across the room. I didn’t see this coming. How lousy an investigator am I? I regarded Cassidy only as a suspect bu
t it turns out she’s a victim.
Now here she is dead.
In the spa of the Cosmos Hotel.
Where Frank Richter is employed. As a masseur, as a matter of fact.
I take a few deep breaths to steady myself and decide what to do next. It’s past the point where I can help Cassidy—not that I ever tried that hard to—but I can make sure my mother is okay. And I can ascertain whether Frank is present and accounted for.
I have a moment of panic when I can’t find my mom but soon locate her in the reception area, where all the spa clients have been assembled until the cops show up. I tell my mother in hushed tones what I saw.
“I’ve had enough of this murder business!” she hisses. “When is it gonna stop? And where is that swindler Sally Anne was supposed to marry? Isn’t it his job to give massages here?”
“Don’t jump to any conclusions,” I say, even though my brain has made exactly the same leaps my mother’s has.
I do gather from the reception-area chatter that it wasn’t Frank but a masseuse named Ginger who was to give Cassidy her massage. Apparently Ginger led Cassidy to the treatment room and then left her in private to get ready. When she returned, Ginger saw exactly what I did: a woman who no longer had any use for a soothing earthly ministration.
I approach the reception desk. “Is Frank Richter here?”
“I’m here.” Frank enters the reception area through the door I peered through earlier and points a finger at my face. “Don’t give me that look. I’m sick of people thinking the worst of me.”
I try to change my expression, which I hadn’t realized was condemnatory. “Do you know anything about what happened?”
“Nothing. Not a damn thing.”
“It’s so hard to fathom Cassidy getting a massage here. She can’t afford these prices.”
“I comped her. You seen how stressed she is lately?”
I guess my expression reverts to what it was before because again Frank jabs a finger in my face. “You’ll stay out of this mess if you know what’s good for you.” He stomps away.
Detective Perelli arrives moments later at the head of a phalanx of cops and sets about her interviews. My mother is released after a perfunctory back and forth. I suspect the moment she’s back in our room, she’ll buckle down to some restorative couponing.
Ms America and the Villainy in Vegas (Beauty Queen Mysteries No. 2) Page 15