Hollywood Secrets (23 page)

Only I saw nothing.

I was just about to give up and go back inside when I heard the roar of a motor. Trace must have heard it too, as we both whipped our heads around in unison toward the left. An alley lined with green Dumpsters hugged the side of the building, its width filled with a tall woman in a mini skirt and a Belinda Carlisle wig on a motorcycle. She gunned the engine and race out of the back lot, down the neighboring street.

Sinking feeling realized.

“
I have a bad feeling we may have been ditched,” Trace said beside me.

Gee, ya think?

Chapter Sixteen

We stared at the spot where the motorcycle had been, its exhaust still hanging in the air. Both of us were silent as it sunk in that our only lead had just taken off.

“
I’m gonna kill him.” Trace clenched his fists at his sides.

“
Never trust a guy dressed as Belinda Carlisle,” I said.

“
I’m gonna tear him limb from pantyhose-clad limb.” And from the way his “gangster movie tough guy face” had slid into place, I kinda believed him.

We went back into the club and spent the rest of the evening questioning the remaining Go-Go’s. But apparently no one knew specifically where Carla was staying while she was in town for this gig. All we could gather was that she was staying with a friend – either Amy or Annie, depending on who you asked - off the strip.

In lieu of a better plan, we went back to our room at the Cowboy Cabana.

I booted up my laptop. If there was any way to find this Carla, the
Informer
’s databases were it. I typed the name “Amy” in the directory of phone numbers in Vegas. Of course about a million popped up, but I narrowed it down to those living within a mile radius of Las Vegas Boulevard.

Great. Only half a million left.

I leaned back on the bed, blowing out a big puff of air.

Trace, on the other hand, seemed to be wired, pacing back and forth across the hotel floor like he was going to wear a hole in the carpet.

“
Don’t worry. We’ll find it,” I said, amazed at how reassuring my voice sounded despite my lack of real conviction.

“
Right. Sure.” Though he didn’t sound any more convinced than I was.

Okay, so we’d hit a little dead end. Maybe we needed to go at this whole thing a different way. Maybe instead of complying with the bad guys’ demands, we should be trying to figure out just who these guys were.

I pulled up a Yahoo! search screen. “What was the name of the car company you said you used the night of the awards show?” I asked.

Trace rattled it off. “Arrive in Style. In West Hollywood.”

I typed the name into the search engine box. Two seconds later I had a list of hits and clicked on the first one, taking me to the company’s website. I highlighted the phone number and dialed, putting my phone on speaker so Trace could hear. Four rings in, someone picked up.

“
Arrive in Style car service, how may I help you?” a nasally, female voice inquired on the other end.

“
Hi, my name is Cameron Dakota. I’m Trace Brody’s assistant,” I said, going with my previous lie.

“
How may I help you, Ms. Dakota?”

“
Trace used your car service last Friday for an awards show arrival. I need some information about the car he was driven in.”

“
Okay, just one moment, please,” she said, and I heard the sound of a keyboard clacking in the background. A minute later she came back on the line. “Yes I see that Mr. Brody ordered a car to drop him off in Hollywood outside the Palms Theater. The car was a Lincoln, black, wet bar in the back.”

“
That’s it,” Trace said.

“
Can you tell me who the last person before Trace to use that particular car was?”

There was a pause on the other end. “I’m sorry, I can’t give out our clients’ names.”

Right. Of course not. I bit my lip. “What about the driver of the vehicle? Can you tell me who that was?”

“
Certainly.”

A few more clicks, then she responded with, “Paul Haverston. He’s been with us for years.”

“
Years, huh?” I felt my hopes fading. If he valued his job, the driver wouldn’t be giving out personal client info any easier than the woman on the phone. Still, I had to ask. “Would it be possible for me to speak with Paul?”

“
I’m sorry he’s not available right now. He’s driving another client.” She paused. “Was there a problem with the car?” she asked.

“
No, it was fine,” I reassured her. “We just…” I paused, racking my brain for a good reason Trace might be so inquisitive. “He… could smell someone’s cologne lingering in the car. And it was such a great scent that he wanted to know what it was so he could purchase a bottle for himself.”

Trace raised one eyebrow, a grin spreading across his face.

“
Oh,” the woman on the other end of the phone said. “I see. Well, I wish I could help you, but again, company policy is to protect the privacy of our clients. I’m sure someone of Mr. Brody’s status understands. I mean, for all we know, you could be a member of the paparazzi digging for a juicy story, right?”

I cleared my throat.

Trace bit back a grin.

“
Right. Sure. You never know, huh?”

“
Exactly,” she agreed. “But I’ll ask our driver about the scent when he gets back in. Maybe he can shed some light on it for you.”

“
Great. Thanks,” I mumbled.

“
Cologne, huh?” Trace said when I hung up. “Nice call.”

I blushed, pretty sure it was wrong to be so pleased by his praise over my dishonesty.

“
I hope that wasn’t a comment on my scent,” he said.

I felt my blush deepen. “No!” I said, a little too loudly. “I mean, no, it’s fine.”

“
Fine? Hmm. Not exactly a rave review.”

“
I mean, it’s nice. Really nice. You smell great.”

He grinned. “You’re blushing.”

I ducked my head. “No I’m not.”

“
It’s cute.”

I crossed to the thermostat on the wall, partly to check if my scorching temperatures were internal or external and partly just to have something to do other than sit there and blush like a dweeb.

“
Unfortunately,” Trace said, apparently oblivious to the sudden heat wave in the room, “your excellent deceptive work doesn’t get us a whole lot closer to the identity of our mystery men.”

“
You know,” I said, thinking out loud as I sat back down on the edge of the bed, “if we couldn’t get the name of the previous clients out of the company, chances are the bad guys couldn’t get your name out of them either.”

Trace grinned. “The ‘bad guys’?”

“
Well, what do you want to call them?”

His grin widened. “Let’s go with bad guys. It’s cute.”

“
That’s twice in one night I’ve been cute. You better watch out or I’ll give Jamie Lee a run for her money.”

Trace raised an eyebrow. “I’d like to see that.”

Oh God. There went that blush again.

I cleared my throat. “Anyway, it seems unlikely the company would give your name to the…”

“
Bad guys,” Trace finished with a smile. “Okay, so they can’t get my name. And that means…?”

“
It means – how did they know it was you who rode in the limo after them? That you were the one that picked up the flash drive?”

He raised both eyebrows. “Good point, tabloid girl.”

“
Thank you. So let’s assume the ba-” I stopped myself.

Trace raised an expectant eyebrow.

“
Our unknown assailants,” I switched.

He grinned at me again.

I tried to ignore it. Not an easy task when he’d had years of practice making women the world over swoon with that same set of pearly whites.

Instead, I shifted a little farther away from him. “The unknown assailants get to wherever they’ve been driven, and they realize they’ve lost the drive. They call the car company looking for it. The company checks the car – no flash drive. Our bad guys have to assume that whoever was in the car after them must have taken it. So how do they find out it was you?”

“
They must have seen me in the car. Easy enough thing considering the amount of cameras on me as I arrived that night.”

I sat up straighter. As far as I knew, Trace’s car had not been shown on the red carpet pre-shows. And I knew pretty well, having been glued to them all for any glimpse of Trace or Jamie Lee. While my tabloid status hadn’t actually garnered me an invite to the red carpet, I still had my Wedding Watch duty to report on the event the next day (a.k.a. to speculate on the happy couple’s status and couture).

I relayed this info to Trace. “So,” I concluded, “these guys must have been at the event in person. Would that be possible? I mean, that the car would have had time to drop them off at the event, then double back to pick you up directly afterward?”

Trace nodded, the look in his eyes suggesting that the little hamster on his mental wheel was picking up speed. “It
is
possible. I drove down from Malibu to Decker’s place earlier in the afternoon. The limo was just to make a showy entrance, so we really only rode in it for a total of ten minutes from his place to the awards.”

“
What time did the car pick you up?”

“
Ten to six.”

I raised an eyebrow. I knew the awards show had started at six on the dot.

“
The bigger name you are the later you arrive,” Trace explained. “At least that’s what Decker says.” He winced. “Said,” he corrected himself.

Since I didn’t really have any words of comfort, I glossed over the verb-tense gaffe and focused on the lead at hand.

“
Let’s say the car drops the bad guys off at the event, then takes ten minutes to swing by Decker’s and pick both of you up. That sounds totally doable.”

“
So we’ve narrowed it down to the guest list at the awards show. That’s what, only a thousand people?”

I slumped back down in my seat. “Two actually.”

“
Great.”

I opened my mouth to attempt something reassuring when my cell rang out from my pocket. I pounced on it, hoping maybe the Arrive in Style lady had changed her mind.

“
Cameron Dakota?” I answered.

“
Hey, Cam. It’s Allie.”

The tension drained out of my shoulders. “Oh. Hi.”

It must have drained out of my voice, too, as Allie answered back with a, “Well, gee, don’t sound so enthused to hear from me.”

“
Sorry. I was just expecting a call from someone else.”

“
Who?” she asked, and I could fairly hear her jumping into journalist mode.

“
No one important,” I hedged. “What’s up?”

“
Okay. Um, well, some guy just called here looking for you. He left a message.”

“
Who was it?”

“
That’s the weird thing. It was clearly a guy’s voice, but he said to say it was ‘Carla.’”

The tension returned with a vengeance, and I hit the speaker button to let Trace in on the call.

“
What did he say?” I demanded of Allie.

“
Um, well, it was kind of a strange message.”

“
Hit me.”

“
He said that he has the item you’re looking for. And, if Trace would like, he can purchase it for a hundred thousand.”

“
Dollars?” I asked, fairly choking at the amount.

“
I guess.”

“
Sonofa-“ Trace started.

“
Who was that?” Allie piped up on the other end. “Was that Trace?”

I swatted Trace on the arm. “No. It was no one important.”

“
O-kay.” Yeah, she believed that about as much as she believed the Loch Ness Monster was going to rise out of the water for a photo op with Big Foot. “What’s this item? What is Trace selling to this guy?”

“
Nothing important,” I quickly shot back.

“
Right. Nothing.” She may be the queen of co-eds, but even she wasn’t stupid enough to believe that. But luckily she was smart enough to know it was all she was getting out of me.

“
Was that all he said?” I asked.

“’
Carla’ said he’d meet you at the lion enclosure at the MGM casino tomorrow at 1:00PM, and you could purchase the item then.”

I motioned for Trace to hand me a pen, and I wrote the name of the casino on the back of a leftover room service napkin.

“
Thanks, Allie.”

“
So… does this mean that you guys are in Vegas?” she asked.

“
Uh, sort of.”

“
What are you doing there?”

“
Nothing important.”

“
Right.” She blew out a breath, and I could tell she was not entirely enjoying being my secretary with no chance of a story as payment.

Which reminded me…

“
Hey, exactly how did you end up taking this call from Carla? Shouldn’t it have gone to my desk?”