CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I greet dawn’s early light as one frustrated beauty queen. Danny’s encrypted file remains as tightly locked as the liquor cabinet in a rehab hospital. It’s so early both my mom and Jason are fast asleep. I throw on my Juicy Couture tracksuit—which I’m pretty sick of after wearing it all week—and head out the door.
There must have been a shift change because it’s a different armed guard who follows me downstairs. It’s also a different Starbucks barista, who raises an eyebrow at my bodyguard but asks no questions. That’s typical in Sin City, I’ve discovered: there appears to be a universal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy. She dispenses my cappuccino, which I down with an egg white, spinach, tomato, and feta wrap.
I’m thinking I’d best call it quits with the pastries. I’ve been breaking all my rules with my high-calorie eating here in Vegas. All we beauty queens know that the right thing to do is choose winning behavior every day, for the simple reason that small choices become habits and habits become destiny. I don’t want my destiny to be thunder thighs. My excuse has been the Sparklettes fat-burning rehearsals. But those are a thing of the past. I’m flying home today. The real world awaits.
Yesterday, when I was first recovering in the hospital, I was so ready to go home. And in many ways I still am. I miss Rachel and my house and even my 9 to 5 workaday routine. But my business here feels unfinished in a way it didn’t 24 hours ago. Then I thought Frank Richter was the killer and it was only a matter of bringing him in. Now I don’t know who the killer is. He, or she, is still out there. Free. Perhaps only one elusive password away.
I am thinking how much that burns me when I get a semi-frantic call from Jason. “Where the hell are you? Is the guard with you?”
“I’m fine! I’m at Starbucks. He’s here.”
“Why didn’t you wake me up to come with you?”
“Because you were sleeping so soundly. And I’m fine! I have the guard with me.” I have to tell him I’m fine three more times before he accepts it.
“I’m going on a quick run. Do not let the guard out of your sight.”
The guard is right behind me as I drag myself toward the elevator bank to return upstairs. I go past a digital billboard advertising the
Forever Yours
wedding chapel here in the Cosmos where Sally Anne and Frank almost got hitched. Their particular ceremony is not being promoted—no surprise—but the ad does feature a photo of the mirrored Rolls Royce upon which Sally Anne perched to meet her groom.
That Rolls Royce reminds me of the similarly mirrored Rolls owned by Liberace, which now holds pride of place in his museum. And which features, at least according to one Hazel Przybyszewski, the license plate 88 KEYS.
I halt. A few other vehicles come to mind. Samantha’s creamy Cadillac and the twin Caddy she gave Danny.
Danny had the silliest license plate
.
One of those designer ones, you know? It read 1 Hot 1
.
I zoom into an elevator as if my butt is rocket-propelled.
“Everything okay, Ms. Pennington?” the guard asks.
I jab the button for the eighteenth floor. “Maybe better than ever.”
Minutes later I’m in my room with my laptop booted up. I put my theory to the test. “Yes!” I raise my arms high, like a football referee after a field goal. “Yes!” Danny’s license plate is indeed the code for the encrypted file. I’m in.
Out of the corner of my eye I see my mom sit up in bed wearing her blue flannel nightgown with the white collar. Her light red hair is squished on one side of her head.
“What the heck business you got waking me up like that?” she wants to know.
“Good news, Mom! Good news.”
“Where the heck is that Jason?”
“He went for a run.”
She grumbles briefly then eases out of bed to shuffle to the bathroom. My eyes never leave the computer screen. I troll through the paltry contents of the file. One line is a Hotmail address followed by a lengthy string of letters and numbers that I am hoping is the password to the account.
A few minutes later I find out that it is and begin to skim the contents of Danny’s In Box. In the days since his murder, there’s nothing but spam. Before that, there’s no spam. Danny deleted all of it, apparently. All he retained are emails from two senders. Paypal. And Mickey Rose.
Mickey Rose?
Who the heck is Mickey Rose?
Did someone I’ve never even heard of try to kill me?
I click on the most recent email. Phrases jump out at me.
This is the last payment I’ll make. Don’t push me too far. I’ve had just about enough.
I lean back in my chair and let out a breath. I’d say this is pretty conclusive.
Which means …
I found it. I can’t believe it but I found the person Danny was blackmailing. Who probably killed him and Cassidy and tried to kill me. Mickey Rose. That’s really good to know. But the question remains: Who the heck is Mickey Rose?
And there’s another question, too. What did Danny have on Mickey Rose that made the guy cough up a hundred thousand smackers? And then most likely resort to murder? It had to have been BIG.
My mother calls from the bathroom that she expects me to accompany her to church. I grunt something noncommittal then stand up and open the drapes. It’s sunny and bright, a whole new morning in Las Vegas. The morning of the day I’m set to leave.
The only problem is I’m not ready to go.
Who the heck is Mickey Rose?
I gaze down at the Strip, at the crazy garish skyline hiding a million secrets, large and small. I get an idea and return to my laptop to launch an Internet search on MICKEY ROSE LAS VEGAS.
The first hit is a Wikipedia listing. My eyes alight on the phrase
American musician and record-producer …
I’m not sure I breathe again until I finish reading about Mickey Rose. I almost fall off my chair when I see the acts he produces.
Ziana is on the list.
This has to be our man. Travis Blakely must know Mickey Rose since Travis works as Ziana’s audio engineer. I bet the two of them aren’t BFFs because I would guess Mickey Rose to be much higher in the world than Travis Blakely. Yet one thing is clear: there is a link between Mickey Rose and Danny Richter and that is Travis Blakely.
In the most recent photo of Mickey Rose that I can find, he’s middle-aged and stocky with dark hair. I wonder if he was in the recording studio when I was there. I don’t know anything about the music biz so I have no idea if he would have been. If they were only listening to tracks and Ziana wasn’t recording, as Travis said, probably not.
I call Detective Perelli to bring her up to speed.
“Fantastic work!” she cries. “You wanna join the force?”
Okay, she said it in jest. It still makes me feel good.
“We’ve been trying to get our hands on Blakely since yesterday,” she goes on. “Somebody filled in for him at the Ziana show last night.”
Maybe it was Travis and not Mickey Rose who pushed me into the cryogenic chamber and conked Frank on the head. Maybe Travis didn’t go to work after his unsuccessful attempt on my life because he needed time to plan his next effort. That possibility shuts me up.
Detective Perelli fills the silence. “Obviously now we’ll go after Rose, too. I’ll keep you informed.”
As the call ends Jason returns from his run. He drops a kiss on my head then steps onto the balcony to let the fresh air cool him. “You feel okay?”
“I feel fine.” Apart from terror every time I think about it, I am suffering no ill effects from my prolonged bout in the cryogenic chamber. Even the rosiness in my skin has abated. “You know that thing I was trying to figure out last night? I finally did.”
Jason comes back inside. “Does that mean you know who pushed you into that chamber?”
“Sort of. I mean I’m not positive but now we have a pretty good idea.”
“We?”
“Me and Detective Perelli.”
“You’re leaving it all up to her now, right? No more investigating.”
“No more,” I repeat, but I only half mean it.
The puzzle isn’t entirely solved. We may know who Danny was blackmailing but we don’t know why. Nor do we know who shot him or stabbed Cassidy or tried to kill me. That’s a lot of unanswered questions.
My mother shakes her finger in my direction. “You are going to church with me, young lady. You got a lot to be thankful for.”
“That’s true.”
“I’m going, too,” Jason declares, and I know why. He thinks I’m still in danger. And until a killer is in custody, I am.
Jason returns to his room to shower and I change into what I consider a church-appropriate outfit: the pearl gray dress I wore to Danny’s wake. Faster than you can lose all your money at the crap tables, we’re at church.
Our Lady of Perpetual Souls is a Catholic church of the contemporary variety, all glass and steel and concrete. Personally I prefer old-school construction when it comes to churches but I can see that might look out of place in a desert community.
We sail all the way up to the front row because my mother will have it no other way. Maybe she wants to make sure she gets points for attendance from the Almighty.
Growing up in a practicing Catholic family, I know the Mass by heart. I know when to stand, kneel, sit, donate, sing, remain silent, greet one’s neighbor—I’ve got it down. So does Jason. I give serious thanks for the fact that I’m still alive but after that my mind does wander. And since I have no blackmailing sins on my conscience, I really shouldn’t be concentrating on that particular transgression. Yet I do.
What in the heck did Danny have on Mickey Rose? And what did Travis Blakely have to do with all of this? Was he his boss’s henchman?
We come to the end of the Mass and launch into the final hymn, “Holy God We Praise Thy Name.” As we do so I commit the sin of snideness because I cannot help thinking how much better our area would sound if the woman behind us put a sock in it. Her voice is painfully off-tune yet she’s raising it to heaven with stunning abandon. I am always conscious of not foisting my own pathetic vocal efforts on my fellow churchgoers. Why can’t other people do the same? Why do people who can’t sing—
I clamp my mouth shut as a realization dawns.
Oh. My. Gosh. I’ve got it. By God I think I’ve got it.
I think about it more, and the more I think about it, the more right I think I am.
The hymn ends. I turn and smile at the woman behind me, who smiles back.
I owe her one.
