Games Divas Play (A Diva Mystery Novel) (25 page)

“What are you talking about, Sean?” Terrence asked. “We want to talk about the
letters.”

“The letters!” Sean shouted as he fought to keep back the angry tears welling up in his eyes. “I can’t believe you guys are here harassing me, and Marcus King’s the one that murdered
Kalinda.”

“Look, calm down, Sean,” I said, trying to start over. “We just want to find out what happened. Let’s start from the beginning. Why were you sending the e-mails, and why were you using Kalinda’s
computer?”

“Why should I tell you two anything? The cops don’t believe me, and you guys won’t
, either.”

“Sean, we’re just looking to clear up some things, so the more cooperative you are now, the easier it will be down the line,” Terr
ence said.

“I told the cops everything I knew already, and they didn’t believe me. They believed that lying son of a bi
tch King.”

“What exactly did you tell the police, Sean?
” I asked.

“Tell us everything and start from the beginning,” Terr
ence said.

I could see that Sean was really getting worked up and was probably going to shut down on us a
ny minute.

“Who are you, anyway?” Sean asked, suddenly turning to me. “Are you with the district attorney’s off
ice, too?”

“No, my name is Nia Bullock, Sean. And I’m a
reporter.”

“Are you writing a story on Kalinda?” he said with a tinge of hope in
his voice.

“Not exactly, Sean. But I can tell you cared about your friend Kalinda a great deal. How long were you all
friends?”

“We moved in together her senior year to save on rent. She was a great friend and such a nice person. She was just as beautiful on the inside as she was on the
outside.”

“It sounds like you guys were good friends. Did things between you and Kalinda ever go further than that?” I asked. Maybe the roommate got jealous of the relationship with Marcus and killed her in a jea
lous rage.

“Are you kidding?” Sean snorted. “As you can see, we’re kind of the poster couple for Beauty and the Geek. Kalinda and I were just friends. Would I have liked for it to have been more? Sure. But I knew that was never going to happen, so I settled for having her as a friend. I didn’t have many of those around campus since I spent most of my time in the comp
uter lab.”

“So why didn’t Kalinda move out after she graduated last year and landed a job dancing with the Phoenix Lasers?” Terre
nce asked.

“Those dancers don’t make shit. I made more at my summer internship
at Google last summer than Kalinda made in her first year. She thought it was going to be all glamorous dancing and being on TV, but it was a lot of hard work, and she had to deal with a lot of rules she did
n’t like.”

“What kind of rules?
” I asked.

“The dancers weren’t allowed to date the players, and if someone found out that they were, the dancer would immediately be fired. Kalinda complained about that rule because she said the players were always coming onto her and some of the other girls. She said some of them were kind of cute, but she didn’t want to lose
her job.”

“Did she like her job?
” I asked.

“Yeah, she did. She loved to dance and liked the attention
she got.”

“Did Kalinda get a lot of attention?” Terrence asked. “Did that bother you, Sean?” I could tell he was picking up on my thought that maybe this kid had been jealous and afraid Kalinda was going to
leave him.

“Look, I know what you’re thinking. The police thought the same thing in the beginning, but I’m not some crazy jealous stalker dude who killed my roommate because I was in love with her. Did I care about Kalinda? Yes. But I’d never
hurt her.”

“So what do you think happened to Kalinda?
” I asked.

“About two months before Kalinda died, she started seeing some new guy. She was real secretive about it, which was unusual for her because she was always pretty open about who she was seeing. I met other guys when they came to the apartment, or I’d hear her talking on the phone with them or she and her friends would talk about them when they’d come over. But this new guy? Nothing. Whenever I asked her why she was being so secretive, she’d say she couldn’t tell me. Her Facebook status, which usually said ‘In a relationship’ when she was seeing someone, was changed to ‘It’s complicated.’ Then one day I was taking out the trash and saw her getting into a black Porsche Panamera with dark tinted windows and flashy rims, and I assumed she was seeing some rich married guy who didn’t want his wife to
find out.”

“You didn’t see the driver or anything else?” Terre
nce asked.

“Nope, like I said, the windows were tinted. I did see the license plate, though, and I remember it because I have a photographi
c memory.”

“Did you ever see the c
ar again?”

“No, not that car. But another time I saw her getting into a Mercedes with tinted windows, and I memorized that plate
as well.”

“Anything else in your mind that made this relationship stand out from the rest?” Terre
nce asked.

“Well, t
he gifts.”

“What gifts?” Terrence and I asked
in unison.

“You saw how Kalinda looked. I mean, it wasn’t unusual for guys to buy her stuff, but this was on a whole other level. She started coming home with expensive jewelry, fur coats,
and shit.”

“Why didn’t the police try to track down those p
urchases?”

“Well, you see, that’s the thing,” Sean said leaning forward. “Two days after Kalinda’s body was found, someone broke into our apartment and stole all th
at stuff.”

“Did they take anything else?
” I asked.

“No, the only things missing were from Kalinda’s room. They didn’t take any of my computer equipment, the TV, PlayStation, or
anything.”

“What did the police say?” Terre
nce asked.

“Yeah, and how are you tying this all to Marcus King? You said she knew there was a policy against dating players, and that she didn’t want to lose
her job.”

“Well, the day Kalinda went missing, it was Friday, and she said she was going away for the weekend with the mystery guy. She thought things were getting pretty serious. She didn’t know where they were going. She said he just told her to pack for warm weather and meet him at the airport that afternoon. So when Monday came around and no Kalinda, I’m thinking maybe they decided to stay a little longer. Then Tuesday came and one of the other dancers called me and said Kalinda didn’t show up for practice. So then I started to worry, and I called th
e police.”

“And Wednesday the body was found,” Terrence said, completing
the story.

“Yeah, Wednesday the police came to the apartment and said they needed me to come down to the medical examiner’s office and ID a body,” Sean said, his voice choking up with emotion. “I couldn’t believe
what that monster had done to her body. How could someone do that to anothe
r person?”

“I’m very sorry, Sean. I know it had to be hard for you to see your friend like that
,” I said.

“Yeah, but what came next was much worse. The cops asked me a lot of questions, and at first it seemed like they were trying to finger me for the murder, but I got crossed off the list once they confirmed that I was at the annual Hackers United convention in Las Vegas that weekend and there were several witnesses who saw me there. I told them they needed to find this guy she was dating. I recalled the license plate numbers I had seen, broke into the DMV mainframe, and found the cars’ register
ed owner.”

“Who was it?” I asked, holding
my breath.

“The great Marcus King,” Sean said. “I gave the cops the information, and they said they’d look into it, but then they came back a few days later, claiming Marcus had an airtig
ht alibi.”

“What was it?” Terr
ence said.

“He was playing the Dallas Panthers at an away game that night,” Terrence said, flipping through his copy of the po
lice file.

“But what about the break-in to your apartment and the stuff you said was stolen?
” I asked.

“They didn’t believe my story about all the gifts King had bought her. If that stuff hadn’t been stolen, they could have gone back to the stores and found out who made the purchases. I didn’t have any proof beyond some photos she had taken of herself in the mink jacket and a necklace that she had posted on
Facebook.”

“Anything else unusual about the break-in?
” I asked.

“No, nothing really. This is a pretty safe neig
hborhood.”

“Are you sure?” Terrence pushed. “No strange faces in the neighborhood around the time Kalinda dis
appeared?”

“Well, not to profile or anything, but a couple of days before the break-in, I thought I kept seeing the same large Hispanic dude in front of the building waiting in his car. I think it was a black Nissan, but I didn’t see t
he plate.”

“Did you tell the police?” I asked as I rummaged in my bag to locate a photo of Carlo. Terrence had confirmed that Carlo had rented a black Nissan Maxima from Hertz when he landed in Phoenix two days before Kalinda w
as killed.

“Of course I did, but those lazy assholes brushed it off. Not that I could blame them. It’s Phoenix after all, so the description of ‘Hispanic guy in a car’ doesn’t really take you
too far.”

“Is this the man you saw watching you from the car?” I asked as I placed the black-and-white photo of Carlo in fron
t of Sean.

“Uh, yeah, I think so. I mean, he had sunglasses on, but I’m pretty sure that’s him,” Sean said as he looked closely at the photo. “Who is
this guy?”

“Don’t worry about that right now,” Terrence said as he took the photo from Sean and gave it back to me. “Look, the only thing we can tell you at this point for sure is that Marcus King did not murder Kalinda and you need to stop harass
ing them.”

“Did that man you just showed me kill Kalinda? Maybe he was working for King,” Sean exclaimed, unwilling to let go of his theory about his friend
’s murder.

“Leave that to us to figure out, Sean,” Terrence said. “But trust me when I say you should leave Marcus and Vanessa Ki
ng alone.”

“Well, I’m not sorry for what I did. That bastard deserves to fry for what he did to Kalinda,” Sean said as his face began to turn red and he raked his bony fingers through his curly hair in fr
ustration.

“Sean, listen to me,” I said. “The police are right. Marcus King did not murder your friend.
Trust me.”

“OK, then what do you want from me? Am I in trouble?” Sean whined. “Are the Kings pressing
charges?”

“Look, if you promise not to send any more threatening e-mails or text messages, then we’ll talk to the Kings
,” I said.

“So why did you start sending those messages?” Terre
nce asked.

“After the fucking cops refused to follow up anymore, because it was my word against King’s, I leaked some information to some of the local papers, hoping they’d investigate, but aside from a few gossipy stories about King possibly sleeping with Kalinda, nobody picked up the trail until you guys showed
up today.”

“So you started sending those messages to Marcus and Vanessa because you thought he’d gotten away with murder,” I said. “We know how you sent the text messages and e-mails, but how’d you get the notes delivered to the
ir homes?”

“There are underground hacker networks full of people who will deliver stuff for the right fee,” Sean snorted. “Look, Kalinda said they were getting serious, and she wanted to marry him. But this King guy was already married, and there’s no way he was ever going to leave his wife and kid for some dancer. Even I k
now that.”

“So you think Marcus King killed Kalinda when she saw that King wasn’t going to leave his wife?” Terrence said with a raise
d eyebrow.

“Kalinda was used to getting what she wanted. She definitely wasn’t used to guys telling her no. I think maybe Kalinda threatened to tell his wife or something, and he flipped out. And then he put her body out in the desert, hoping no one would
find it.”

“Sean, we appreciate all your help. Like I said, Marcus King didn’t kill your friend. Stop sending the messages before you get into some trouble that you can’t hack your wa
y out of.”

“Feel free to reach out if you think of anything else that might be helpful,” Terrence said, handing Sean
his card.

“Are you around the rest of the weekend in case we have more questions?” I asked, turning the knob to open
the door.

“Yeah, I’m around all weekend. I’m working on my senior project,” Sean said as he placed the card in the pocket of his bag
gy shorts.

“Good, we’ll be in touch if we have any further questions,” Terrence said as he stepped out of the cramped apartment and into the sunshine with me and slipped on his s
unglasses.

“Please find out who killed Kalinda,” Sean said as he leaned against the doorjamb, squinting in the sunlight as he looked down at the pool full of people having fun in the cool water. “Whoever did this deserves to pay for what they did to m
y friend.”

CHAPTER 19

Laila

F
resh from the shower, I stood in front of the mirrored closet in my W hotel suite and admired the view. Then I stretched out on my stomach on the bed, naked except for my Prada python platform sandals and a diamond-studded belly chain. I thought about all the wonderful things that were going to happen tonight and the insurance policy I was creating as I took a deep drag on the joint Darryl had given me earlier to relax. My fingers skipped along the tops of my breasts and moved slowly down toward the moisture between my thighs. W
et. Ready.

I heard the knock on the door and called out to my handsome visitor to come in. I had left the door ajar so that I would be lounging, ready and waiting. I kneeled in the bed, my hands on
my knees.

Marcus strode purposefully into the bedroom. I hadn’t seen him in weeks, and my whole body ached for him to be inside me. He was dressed in a black Tom Ford suit, black shirt, and black tie with huge diamond cuff links at the sleeves. His perfectly smooth chocolate skin glistened. His hair was freshly lined and his facial hair neatly trimmed. His eyes were deep dark pools framed by long silky lashes, and his lips were full and juicy and eager for my kiss. Unable to wait any longer, I began to crawl toward him on the bed, my hair falling into my eyes. I knew how he loved seeing me b
eg for it.

“Hello, baby,” I drawled huskily, my voice deep with desire. “I’ve mi
ssed you.”

“Laila, we need to talk,” Marcus said as he picked up the robe that lay across the settee at the end of the bed and tossed it at me. “Put on some clothes. I don’t have m
uch time.”

He walked back into the living room. Confused, I climbed down off the bed and wrapped the silk robe around my body, then followed him into the main area of my suite. I came up behind him and wrapped my arms around his waist; letting the robe fall open, I pressed my body against his. I was sure he could feel my heat through his clothes. My hand began to slide down the front of his slacks, reaching for the long, hard chocolate treat I couldn’t wait to slide into my mouth. He pulled away from me and then turned around to face me. He looked like he was steeling himself to say
something.

“Marcus, baby, what’s wrong? Aren’t you happy to see me?” I smiled as I opened the robe and let it fall to the floor in a silky r
ed puddle.

“Look, I came here to tell you that it’s over,” he said in a tone I had never heard before. He ran his hand across the top of his head. “Things have gotten out of control. I have to focus on my career and my marriage. I can’t afford any more dist
ractions.”

“Distractions?” I said, putting my hand on my hip, the diamond belly chain cutting into my skin. “Is that all I am to you? A dis
traction?”

“Look, baby. This is the way the game goes. We had fun, but now I’ve got to go back to real life. I’ve got to get focused back on what matters and take care of
business.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Maybe Darryl gave me some fucked-up shit and the weed was making me hear things. I stepped forward again and dropped down on my knees in front of him, my hands desperately clawing at the silver YSL belt buckle on h
is slacks.

“Laila, get up,” he said, pulling me up from the floor by my elbows and leading me over to the sofa to sit down. He didn’t sit down n
ext to me.

“I don’t know how else to say this. We’re done. It’s over. Now, look, Kareem is going to contact you in a few days and take care of you. We had fun while it lasted and there’s no need for you to walk away empty-handed.” And with that last little insult, he kissed me on the top of my head and headed out
the door.

When the door to the suite closed, Darryl burst out of the mirrored closet in the bedroom and came out into the living room with his video camera dangling from
his hand.

“What the hell just happened, Laila?” he asked, looking back and forth between me and the door. “I didn’t catch anything on tape. What happened to the wild, crazy sex tape I was going to record and leak to the press in case we n
eeded it?”

I slumped down on the floor next to my robe and said three words I had never said in my entire life: “He dumped me.” Tears began to fall as my body was racked with huge sobs. Where the hell did I go wrong? What happened, and how did Kareem double
-cross me?

“Look, stop crying,” Darryl said as he put his camera on the table and helped me stand. He grabbed the robe from the floor and wrapped it around my naked body. He led me back into the bedroom, and I sat o
n the bed.

“I’m going to take care of this. We’re going to get this money. Trust me.” Darryl took his cell phone out of the back pocket of his baggy jeans and placed a call. When the person on the other line picked up, Darryl began to speak to them rapidly i
n Spanish.

“Pull yourself together, Laila. It’s time to move to plan B,” Darryl said as he slid the phone back into his pocket and sat beside me on the bed, strokin
g my hair.

“Plan B?” I asked, looking up at him, mascara mixing with my tears and running down
my cheeks.

“Yep, you know real gangstas always have a plan B. And your boy D just called in the
cavalry.”