I shrank back as I heard Mack emerge from the pod. A few minutes later, I made out a flash of naked white flesh as it streaked past me to the front door. I expected to hear the hotel room door opening. Instead, I heard nothing. A second later, the mound of flesh was back and standing right in front of me. Only an inch of wood stood between me and a killer.
Nothing like standing in a peewee-sized closet hiding from both security and a lip-syncing country music criminal mastermind to sober a girl up. This was such a bad idea. I was literally caught between a rock (god) and a hard place. Where was Security? I’d rather be permanently banned from the W than dead.
I instinctively sank farther into the closet, as if giving myself an extra ten seconds to live would help. The closet door opened and I went on the attack. Eyes closed, I charged. I couldn’t get up much speed in less than a foot, but it was better than nothing. My momentum pushed Mack back. He let out a sigh as he hit a wall.
I turned toward the exit and opened my eyes. The security bar was still on. I needed to change that. Pronto. I’d just gotten it disengaged when I felt hands around my waist, pulling me back. My clothed back came in direct contact with wet skin. “We meet again,” a voice whispered in my ear.
A voice that sounded suspiciously like the one I’d heard in the Man in Danger 3: Man in Serious Danger red band trailer the last time I went to the movies. I looked back and made direct eye contact with Todd Arrington. A Todd Arrington wearing nothing but a towel. He spoke again. “We really need to stop running into each other like this.”
Who was he telling?
The door to the hotel room opened and Todd and I were face to face with two security guards and the Rock the Float rep. I didn’t know who was more surprised. Todd finally let me go. I tried to sidestep a guard to exit the room. No such luck. He had me before I could escape. His touch was nowhere near as gentle as Todd’s had been. The guard spoke first. “Mr. Arrington, we’re so sorry for the disturbance. Do you know this woman?”
“No,” I said, before he had a chance to. I didn’t care if I was incriminating myself. The last thing I needed was Todd telling people he knew me because I’d broken into his house and interrupted some innocent role play between him and a possible prostitute.
“Didn’t think so. Would you like to press charges?”
Todd looked at me. “That won’t be necessary.”
The guard looked disappointed. This was clearly the highlight of his day. I briefly imagined him sharing the story with his wife over the mashed potatoes and chicken she served for dinner, overembellishing so that he broke into the room and took me down just as I almost attacked the famous movie star. “You sure?”
Todd nodded and the security guard pulled me out the door. I glanced back in time to see Todd give me a wave. “See you soon,” he mouthed.
I sincerely hoped not. As we left, I saw the security cameras shoved every few feet in the ceiling—something I really should have noticed earlier. Blurg. We passed a cluster of people. And at the center? Mack Christie. Maybe it was the lingering effects of the alcohol but at that moment, I didn’t care about a confession. I just wanted him to know. Know I was on to him. Know I wouldn’t let him get away with it. Know he was going to go to prison. As we made eye contact, I smiled and said one word. “Anani.”
There was no physical reaction, but the eye-to-eye combat ended as quickly as a low-rated canceled TV show. That was enough for me.
The guards made a big show of parading me through the Gifting Lounge instead of a more celeb-friendly private exit. People openly gawked as I was dragged by. I’d never been more embarrassed in my life—if you didn’t count five minutes before when I’d broken into Todd Arrington’s Sensory Deprivation Tank session, falsely accused him of murder, and hid in the world’s most easily found hiding place. Even two-year-olds knew to check the closet first.
We were midway through the lounge when I realized my eco-friendly gift suite bag was still waiting along with Shine at Global Nails. My mind flashed on Emme’s birthday gift. “Can I get my stuff please? I left a bag.”
“You’ll be all right,” the guard said. “And so we’re clear. You are not to set foot on these premises again. Ever.”
I bit back a question about whether my photo would be posted at check-in like some Most Wanted poster. I honestly was afraid of the answer. We kept walking and were almost to the door when we passed Sienna. My bestie looked in my direction, then quickly looked away to grab another pair of retro sunglasses. I couldn’t blame her. She obviously wasn’t done shopping yet. I just hoped she picked up a few pairs of Focals so I could still give one to Emme.
I was deposited outside the front entrance, where I dutifully waited twenty minutes for Sienna to finally join me. The good news? She had, in fact, gotten my bag. When she’d gone to find me at the nail booth, Shine told her I’d gone to the bathroom thirty minutes prior and had not returned. Shine didn’t think much of it—having attributed my absence to perhaps eating too much dairy.
Sienna readily agreed. She’d recently read that 75 percent of all black people were lactose intolerant, which caused her to immediately remove all forms of milk products from our condo. I was okay with it. As long as she didn’t take away my gluten. It obviously kept me from getting drunk and making bad decisions involving would-be murderers.
If only it could help me solve Lyla’s murder. The Voice had been rude, but she’d also been right. I needed more. There was no way anyone was letting me within throwing distance of Mack Christie, so Confrontation Part 2: Electric Boogaloo was out. It would have been nice to have the email from Viv mentioning the threat. But I didn’t, thanks to drafts, which meant I needed something better. Viv herself.
When we got home, I opened my laptop. What I needed to write required more than just thumbs going to town on a small touchscreen. I titled the draft: “Anani is dead.”
Overdramatic? Not at all. I laid it all out. How Lyla was Anani. How she was brutally murdered. How Junior killed himself. And, finally, how Mack Christie was the one behind it all.
I’m going to stop him but I need your help. You need to come forward with what you know. If not for Lyla, then do it for yourself. Before you end up just like her. Your life is in danger. And the only way to protect yourself and put a stop to this is to come forward with what you know.
Please.
Then I shut my laptop and waited.
There was no word from Viv the next morning, which meant I had two choices: refresh the inbox religiously or go visit my boyfriend.
I ended up doing both, tempting the traffic gods by checking Gmail on my phone at every stoplight. It may have been the first time ever I appreciated LA traffic. By the time I made it downtown, there was still nothing. I’d forgotten my parking lot key fob so I parked on 12th Street smack-dab outside Omari’s building, then took the elevator up to his apartment. I found him eating breakfast. Shirtless.
“There she is,” he said. It was as if he’d already forgotten about our conversation yesterday. Blurg.
As much as I wanted to forget myself, I couldn’t. Sienna was right. I needed to talk to him about how I was feeling.
“What do I owe the pop-up visit?” he asked.
“We need to chat. But first, you need to put on a shirt.”
He smiled. “Oh, it must be a serious convo if it requires clothing.”
I said nothing, just waited as he grabbed a shirt from the dryer and put it on, all the while willing myself to not chicken out. When he finally sat back down, I launched right in. “It bugs me that the entire world thinks you’re dating Toni.”
It took him forty-three seconds to respond. I counted. “Okay … ” he said.
That was it. Just okay. Blurg. I waited him out and after another thirty-four seconds, he spoke again. “You know there’s nothing I can do about that, Day.”
“You can tell people it’s not true.”<
br />
“Is it really that important?”
I waited a beat, then finally said one word. “Yes.”
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll call Nina.”
I wasn’t expecting him to cartwheel to get his phone or anything but I would have appreciated a little more enthusiasm. It was clear he still didn’t see the big deal but was doing it because I wanted him too. I was going to have to be fine with that.
I said nothing as he selected a number and put it on speaker. Nina answered before the first ring even had a chance to finish: “You weren’t there yesterday. Dayna was, though.”
Fudge. I probably should have factored my minor little incident involving Todd Arrington and Mack Christie into my plan. Nina was going to snitch on me. It took every ounce of restraint not to grab the phone and throw it out the nearest window. Instead, I focused my energy on plastering an innocent smile on my face and brainstorming scenarios about why I’d been permanently banned from W hotel.
“I didn’t get to talk to her much,” Nina continued. “There was an incident involving a drunk groupie trying to have sex with Todd Arrington. They found her in a hotel room with him. Of course, he was half naked. They escorted her out of the hotel before I could find out any more.”
This was how things got misconstrued. In less than twenty-four hours, my drunkenly confronting Todd Arrington because I thought he was Mack Christie had morphed into a groupie drunkenly seducing Todd Arrington and getting him out of his artfully ripped jeans. Not saying the actual scenario was any better. But still. I’d take it.
“Sounds like that was for the best,” Omari said and I nodded vigorously. “Listen, I want you to issue a statement that Toni and I aren’t dating.”
Crisis averted. I smiled. For the first time ever, I wanted to see Nina’s face. Her jaw had to be on the floor. To her credit, she didn’t scream out “No!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” though I was sure she thought it. When she finally spoke, her voice sounded calm. Too calm. “I thought we don’t comment on your personal life.”
“We don’t comment on true stuff. This one’s a lie.”
“If this is in reference to that Gus article, I spoke to him about it,” she said. “He assured me it won’t happen again. Let’s just hold off on any statements right now. If we don’t say anything, it’s bound to get lost in awards season coverage.”
To his credit, he rolled his eyes. “Just issue the statement.”
I was pleased. Nina, however, was still not ready to go down without a fight. She didn’t care that the match was already over. “Look, can I be honest with you? Just for a sec. Normally I’d totally agree, but you know you’re up for that part in the new Spike Lee movie. It’s good to have your name out there.”
“Issue. The. Statement.”
There was a pause. She had to be debating what tack to try next. So far, she was zero for two. “Fine. Will do.”
It sounded like Nina had given up, but I knew her better than that. It wasn’t a concession. It was a retreat. She’d just lick her wounds and come back stronger than ever. I’d be ready.
He hung up.
“Thank you for breaking up Tomari.”
I was being playful but he turned serious. “I know you think I don’t care who people think I’m dating. It’s not that. I don’t want our relationship to become a cute nickname. Our dates to be likes on Instagram. Our vacations crowdsourced by people who think we should have gone to this place instead.”
“I get that,” I said, because I did. “You can take your shirt back off now.”
I was about to say more when my phone beeped.
“Aubrey?” Omari asked.
“He doesn’t text. It can wait,” I said, but threw a quick glance at my phone anyway. What if it was Viv?
If I’d hoped Omari didn’t notice my throwing lustful looks and not at him, I was disappointed. “Check it,” he said.
“You sure?”
He gave me a quick peck and headed upstairs to the bedroom. I checked to see which app had sent the notification. Someone had indeed logged into the Viv3000 account. My heart beat faster—the technology equivalent of watching a horror movie. Except instead of what was waiting in the closet, I wanted to know what was waiting in drafts. Viv had to help me—without her I had nothing. Geppetto would be as free as Pinocchio immediately after he’d lost his strings.
I sat down and forced myself to log in. It took the inbox forever to load. And when it did, I immediately wished it had taken much longer.
It was empty. Viv had deleted the draft altogether.
I’d messed up again. Pushed too hard, again. Too fast. And I didn’t know how to fix it. This was my one connection to Lyla’s source. Much like that messy impulsive drunk sext you immediately regret sending to your ex, all connections to Viv was now in the ether, with no hope of getting them back.
Fudge.
Aubrey would know what to do. I hoped he wasn’t as tired of my rookie mistakes as I was. It was a convo I wanted to have in person, which meant that I needed to head to Los Feliz.
I ran upstairs to give Omari a quick goodbye, then headed to my car. But when I put the key in the ignition and cranked the engine, nothing happened. I’d just paid to get the car fixed. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I was this close to repeatedly banging my head against the steering wheel when I heard the knock. Apparently I’d left my window cracked.
“Want me to jump you?” The voice was male and as melodic as a black preacher forty-five minutes deep into his Sunday morning sermon.
I looked up. He didn’t look like a preacher, more like the guy that caused you to go to church in the first place to repent or secretly ask God for a reason to repent. He was tall and a sturdy that couldn’t be bought by spending six days at the gym with skin a warm, deep brown so flawless I suddenly understood writers’ obsessions with describing black people as food and drink. The suit was as flawless as the skin tone, a perfectly tailored creation someone had to have created just for him. It was all-black everything, from the jacket and shirt down to the shoes.
“Thanks, but I don’t need any help,” I said.
He didn’t bother to bend down. Of course, that didn’t stop him from smiling at me, a lopsided grin that nevertheless lit up his entire face. “You sure? Because I’d love to jump you. You know, if you wanted me to.”
I most certainly did not. “I don’t take help from strangers. That’s like rule number one in kindergarten.”
“I’m Z. So one, we’re not strangers. And two, I think the first rule is listen to your teacher.” He motioned for me to open the door and that’s when I noticed the cufflinks. They were purple squares, with as many boxes as a Bingo card. Strange.
I forced myself to look away from them as I spoke again. “I don’t get help from people who don’t even know my name.”
“That another thing they taught you in kindergarten, Dayna?”
He said my name like we’d known each other for years. We hadn’t.
Here’s the thing about fame—fleeting or not. People know you. Or at least think they do. At the height of my Chubby’s celebrity, immediately after the Super Bowl commercial and the Today show appearance, I’d get “Hey Dayna”-ed at least once a week. Omari already had it worse. When he was out, people called his name from across busy restaurants and even busier streets.
It was possible that this Z, who had appeared like a fairy godmother in my time of need, was a fan. Surprisingly, I still had a few of those. Only thing was, he didn’t seem like the type to watch TV at all, much less commercials. And that made me more nervous.
Here was a stranger who knew my name. Who knew where my boyfriend lived. Who knew where I’d be and when. I was a woman—a black one at that—and I was alone on a street in downtown LA. If I went missing, I’d be lucky if the news even noticed. I’d have to hope someone tweeted my pic and it somehow went viral. Th
at would be my only chance of escaping from the hole in Z’s basement. I made a promise to myself I would not put the lotion in the basket. No matter how melodic his voice was.
I was contemplating it all when he spoke again. “Viv wants to talk to you.”
Viv? Wanted to talk to me? He really should have started with that. I went from scared to excited. Wondered where he or she was. I looked around and still saw no one.
“Come get in the car,” Z said.
To my credit, I did not in fact get in the car. At least not his car.
“I’ll follow you in a Lyft.”
And that’s exactly what I did. My driver was named Jamal. He smiled at me as I got in. “You didn’t put where we’re going.”
“I don’t know.” I pointed to the Mercedes that Z got into. “Just follow that car.”
Jamal did as told. He didn’t say anything at first, just kept glancing at me in his rearview mirror. Finally he spoke. “Did we go to high school together?”
There it was.
I decided for once to be honest. “The black chick in the Chubby’s Chicken commercials? That was me.”
“Yes! I loved that phrase of yours. Don’t think so, b—”
I cut him off. “Please don’t say it. You’re gonna give me flashbacks.”
He laughed. Ice broken, we followed Z as Jamal regaled me with stories about how much he loved his wife and two kids. Their pictures—and there were a lot of them—were adorable. In between oohing and aahing over Jamal’s twins, I texted Sienna and Emme what was going on and then immediately enabled the Do Not Disturb function on my phone. I didn’t need either of them telling me it was a bad idea. I already knew, which is why I’d made sure to bring my pepper spray.
We followed Z as he stayed on 12th Street and headed east. We were heading to the Fashion District, an area I’d practically lived at during my pre-fame days. Then we turned down a street I didn’t realize existed. That didn’t bode well. At all. Just where did this Viv live and why couldn’t we have met at one of the coffee shops he or she loved so much? I was glad that Sienna, Emme, and I had enabled share your location on our phones.
Hollywood Ending Page 18