Chihuahua Confidential

by Waverly Curtis

  “Where are you going to dinner, Geri?” he asked. “Spago? Nate ’n Al’s?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Felix made the reservations. But you’re not going with us.”

  Pepe hung his little head. He tipped his head to one side and stared at me out of those big brown eyes. “But I am your partner.” He is so good at looking sad. Perhaps he learned that from the telenovellas he watched.

  “True,” I said. “But it is illegal for a dog to be inside an establishment where food is served.”

  “An unenlightened society!” he declared. “In France—”

  “I know,” I said. I had heard his stories before about going to France, but now I didn’t believe them. He was my dog. He had never been to France with Caprice. And maybe someday he would accept that reality.

  “Look,” I said, kissing him on the top of his velvety head. “I’ll bring you back something in a doggy bag. How’s that?”

  “Humph!” Pepe could be quite expressive in his disdain. He turned his head to the side and laid it on the bedspread. “Doggy bags are for mere perros.”

  Felix had chosen a restaurant that was situated in a house in one of the canyons with a terrace that looked out over the Pacific Ocean, a vast darkness now that the sun had set. The patio was lighted with orange and red and pink lanterns. Candles flickered in orange glass holders on the tables. The scent of sagebrush and the briny smell of the ocean mingled in the air. The effect was magical.

  Felix greeted the owner, a glamorous-looking blonde, with a hug and two kisses. I recognized her as an actress I had seen in several of my favorite TV dramas. According to Felix, he had worked with her on a movie. She introduced us to the chef, a shy Frenchman who was also her husband, and sent a complimentary bottle of champagne to our table.

  “Have you seen your family yet?” I asked Felix after we were seated. I knew he had grown up in L.A. and had moved to Seattle only within the past year.

  “No, it’s been such a whirlwind since I got here,” said Felix. “But I was planning to stay over an extra day after the filming is over and see them. I’d love for you to meet them.”

  Wow! Was this moving too fast? But then I had taken him to dinner at my sister’s house on our first official date. “Sure,” I said. “I’ll have to check with Rebecca. She flew us down here, and I’m not sure what arrangements she made to get us back to Seattle.”

  “How is she doing?” Felix asked as the waiter brought us a plate of appetizers: celery rémoulade for me and some seared scallops for Felix. He knew that Rebecca’s husband had only recently passed away.

  “She seems to deal with grief by staying busy,” I said. “She’s at the rehearsal hall before we get there. She spends all afternoon at the soundstage, overseeing every little detail. She’s the MC during the filming. And at night she does meetings, trying to come up with a new twist that will help keep the show interesting.”

  “Like bringing me down,” said Felix.

  “Yes, I guess that’s a common trope in reality TV shows,” I said. “I hope it wasn’t too awkward.” I still didn’t know if he had heard me call him Ted.

  “What was she doing hiring an animal activist to be a choreographer?” he asked after polishing off one of his scallops, followed by a big sigh. He offered me the other one on the tip of his fork, but I waved it away. I don’t eat shellfish. I did offer him a bite of my celery rémoulade, which was silky and flavorful. It was delicious with the champagne.

  “I don’t think she knew he was an animal activist at first,” I said, casting back in my mind for clues. “But in the end she must have known.” I thought of that conference I had interrupted in her living room.

  Felix shook his head. “So he was pretending to be a choreographer?”

  I felt called upon to defend Ted. “He had been a dance instructor at one time. We got some of our highest scores on the dances he choreographed.”

  “Yes, but the whole invisible partner thing was Rebecca’s idea,” Felix said.

  “It was?” I was shocked.

  “Yes, she told me about it when she was prepping me to go into the room,” Felix said.

  That was disappointing. And here I thought it was Ted who was so observant about my longing for a partner. Had he been instructed by Rebecca to flirt with me just for the cameras? It was a distinct possibility.

  The waiter appeared with the bottle of wine, a Pinot Noir that Felix had chosen to go with both our meals. He had ordered the short ribs served on polenta with a tomato confit and pea shoots, while I was having cod, lightly baked and served with figs, artichokes, and fennel.

  For a while we were both too busy tasting all the various elements on our plates and trying them out with sips of the wine. Then he asked me about the last few days. And I started talking. I told him about the package for Jimmy G and how Jimmy G had come down from Seattle to try to find it. I told him about how Pepe and I had discovered the show was rigged. I described Pepe’s concern about Siren Song.

  “Did you ever get the results of that test on Siren Song?” I asked as the waiter cleared our plates.

  “Oh, that’s right,” Felix said. “Alice left me a voice mail earlier. I should probably call her back.” He got up and excused himself. He came back at the same time as the dessert, but nothing could sweeten the sour look on his face.

  “What’s wrong?’

  “Alice has been at the hospital with Ted. He recovered enough so they could cart him off to jail. Alice is pretty upset. She says anyone who loves animals as much as he does could not kill a human being.”

  “That makes some kind of sense,” I said. “But his love for animals seemed so excessive that maybe he could harm a human if he thought that person was going to harm an animal.”

  “Is that true for any of the people who died?”

  “I don’t think Nigel had anything to do with animals, except for his dog being missing. And Jake was there to protect the animals on the set. But Ted hated him because he said he didn’t do enough.”

  “There’s been tension between PETA and the Humane Society. PETA doesn’t think the Humane Society does enough, while the Humane Society thinks the PETA folks are too radical.”

  “Still, it’s hard to see how that would turn into murder.”

  We were both silent for several minutes. Felix stared down at his gelato. I toyed with my panna cotta. I thought I knew what was wrong. Maybe Felix still had feelings for Alice. Maybe that was why he had rushed down to Los Angeles when Rebecca invited him to the show. And now it was obvious to him she was developing feelings for Ted.

  “So what’s bothering you?” I finally asked.

  “Geri, I have some bad news,” he said.

  My stomach turned. Which was not so good considering all the delicious food I had just eaten.

  “What is it? Is it about Siren Song?”

  “That’s part of it. Alice got back the results of the drug test she did. Siren Song tested positive for steroids.”

  “That would explain why she was acting so aggressively and why she smelled so different to Pepe.” I took a bite of my panna cotta. Felix did not pick up his own fork.

  “There’s more, isn’t there?” I asked.

  “I don’t know how to tell you this.” His eyes were dark. With pity? With compassion?

  “What?”

  “It’s Pepe.”

  “What about him?”

  “Alice got results from the registry she checked. Pepe is registered.”

  “How can that be? You said he wasn’t registered.”

  “I’m sorry, Geri. There are four different registries. I checked three of them. Alice checked the other one.” Felix reached across the table and took my hands in his. “Pepe belongs to Caprice Kennedy.”

  I stared at Felix and shook my head. “No, it can’t be.”

  “I’m sorry, Geri. I know how hard this must be for you. You love him so.”

  “Then how could he have ended up in a shelter? Wouldn’t they have checked hi
m for a chip?” I was desperately seeking a way out of the nightmare.

  “Sometimes they miss these things. Or maybe they checked the wrong registry. Like I did.”

  I stared at him, my mind working frantically. Was there any way out? Maybe I didn’t have to tell Caprice. Maybe I didn’t have to tell Pepe. Only Felix would know. Actually I’d have to break up with Felix because I couldn’t bear to be around him. I couldn’t live with the knowledge that I had misappropriated a dog. But I couldn’t bear the thought of living without Pepe either.

  Chapter 28

  Needless to say, our date did not end well. When the evening started, I had hoped it would end with Felix in my bed. Instead it ended with me kissing him good night in the parking lot. I watched Felix drive away with tears running down my cheeks, then tiptoed up the back stairs to my room.

  Pepe was asleep, curled up on one of the pillows, with the TV on. I thought he might wake up when I entered, but he didn’t even stir. Which was maybe for the best. He would know right away that I was upset and would want to know why.

  All along I had been afraid that Pepe really was Caprice’s dog. Now I knew the truth. How could I give him up? How would he react when I told him? But I realized I was being selfish. Caprice obviously loved him as much as I did. And she had so much more to offer. How could my small condo in rainy old Seattle ever compare to her mansion and staff of caretakers in balmy Beverly Hills?

  And that was just it, I thought. It was the life he’d been accustomed to before spending his few short weeks with me. If I really loved him, I’d have to do the right thing no matter how much it hurt. But I could wait to tell him, maybe until after the competition was over. I didn’t want to get him too distracted on our last day. And the truth was, I wanted to enjoy one more day with him.

  I went to turn the computer off, and when I hit the mouse, a video started playing. Pepe had figured out how to use the webcam and had posted a video of him in the hotel room. He was barking away. It almost seemed like he was talking. His inflections and expressions made you think you could understand what he was saying.

  For the first time, I saw what other people probably saw when they saw my talented dog. Was it possible that’s what he was doing all along? And was I just interpreting his very animated yips and yaps to what I wanted to hear? Which was that I finally had a partner, someone to care for me and protect me, someone who would love me with no reservations.

  It was bittersweet: going through our morning routine, knowing it was for the last time. The special twist for this last day was that Rebecca had decided both teams were going to do the same dance: a tango. So we had only half as much time as usual with our choreographer. But that was fine. After running through our routine for a while, we had enough time to help Jimmy G with his scheme to get his hands on the MetroLand Studio logs.

  His plan was crude and simple, rather like Jimmy G himself.

  He positioned me and Pepe near the MetroLand main gate and told us to wait until a car approached. Then my job was to distract the guard by approaching and asking him a question. Meanwhile, Pepe ran out in front of the oncoming car and pretended that it hit him, rolling off to the driver’s side, yipping and howling in faux pain.

  “Oww! My leg is broken like a chicken bone!” he screamed at the top of his lungs. “And my head is cracked like an egg! It feels like castanets are going off inside it!”

  The driver naturally got out of the car to see what he could do. I dashed over and started crying about my poor dog. And, as we hoped, the guard left his post and ran to Pepe’s side to try and help.

  Jimmy G darted into the empty guard shack and swiped the logbook while the guard was distracted. He was in and out in a flash.

  “Oh, I am feeling better now,” said Pepe when he saw that Jimmy G had made his score and was safely out of sight.

  I picked Pepe up and told the driver and guard, “I think he’s better now.” I patted Pepe’s head. “Aren’t you, little amigo?”

  “I deserve an Oscar!” Pepe said.

  “Are you sure?” the guard asked me.

  “Positive,” I said, strolling away with my dog.

  “And a Golden Globe, too,” said Pepe.

  A few minutes later, we were outside our soundstage, sitting on a bench with Jimmy G while looking over the logbook’s pages.

  “Good plan your boss came up with, huh?” said Jimmy G.

  “Without my thespian talents, it would have been a fiasco,” said Pepe.

  “Did it ever occur to you that the guard will quickly notice that the logbook is gone?” I asked my boss.

  “No, Jimmy G didn’t think of that,” he said.

  “Well, I think you better get it back before they start searching the lot for it,” I suggested.

  We pored through the pages. The guard book was just a standard composition notebook with ruled lines. To the left was the date and time, and on the next line the name and affiliation of the person. For instance, I was happy to read my name: “Geri Sullivan, Soundstage 13, Dancing with Dogs participant.” I wondered how Ted was listed and I paged back to the previous day. He was listed as “Ed Galliano, Soundstage 13, Dancing with Dogs choreographer.” So he must have created a fake ID.

  “Did you find the name of the package delivery service?” Jimmy G asked.

  I had completely forgotten what I was looking for. I paged back a few more pages. “Here’s an entry,” I said. “For Hollywood Parcel Service on Wednesday at five p.m.”

  “Jimmy G was already here on Wednesday,” he said. “Are you sure that’s right?”

  “It says, ‘Soundstage Thirteen, package for Luis Montoya.’”

  “Maybe they deliver a lot of packages to the studios. Check for Monday. That’s the day you called Jimmy G.”

  I paged back to Monday. “Yes, here it is again. Around three p.m. Hollywood Parcel Service, Soundstage 13, delivery for Geri Sullivan.”

  “Well, there you go!” said Jimmy G. “Hollywood Parcel Service. Jimmy G’s going to go check them out.”

  “And give the logbook back to the guard,” I told my boss. “Just tell him you found it lying on the ground. Pepe and I have to go get ready for our final performance.” In more ways than one.

  Chapter 29

  As soon as we walked into the soundstage, Pepe was on high alert.

  “Something is wrong, very wrong,” he said.

  “Another murder?” I asked.

  “No, not a murder. But almost as bad. Someone has made Caprice very sad.”

  He went running off in the direction of the special lounge where the judges congregated when they weren’t actually in the judges’ box. Rebecca was standing over Caprice, who was curled up on the sofa, with her face in her hands.

  When she looked up as we entered, I could see her skin was blotched red and her eyes were puffy. She had been crying hard, for a long time. “I just can’t go on!” she said. “I’m just too stressed out.”

  “You have to go on,” Rebecca said, waving the paper. “Your contract says you must complete all five days of work to get your payment.”

  “I don’t care about the payment. How can you even talk about money at a time like this?” Caprice’s voice was screechy.

  “Plus we can assess punitive fees to cover the cost of replacing you and reshooting all of the judging scenes,” said Rebecca.

  “How can you expect me to work when my precious dog has been kidnapped?”

  “Kidnapped? Does she think you kidnapped me, Geri?”

  “Hush! I think she’s talking about Princess.” The Papillon, usually in Caprice’s handbag or on her lap, was conspicuously absent.

  “Yes! My Princess! My precious Princess Pepe!” Caprice wailed. She didn’t even seem to notice my poor Pepe, who went running over to comfort her. He leaped into her lap and tried to lick her chin. She stroked him idly with one hand while dabbing at her eyes with the other.

  “My dog was kidnapped and I didn’t break down!” said Rebecca.

  “You
r dog was kidnapped?” Caprice looked up, startled.

  “Siren Song was kidnapped?” Pepe asked, his ears twitching.

  “When?” I asked.

  “A few days ago,” Rebecca said. “And did I start crying like a baby? No! I got a dog to replace her and went right on with the show.”

  “I told you, Geri,” said Pepe. “That dog was not Siren Song. That dog is an imposter.”

  “How did you replace her?” I asked.

  “I found a similar dog in Orange County, who already knew how to dance. I had to dye her fur a little to make her look more like Siren Song.”

  So Pepe was right. Why was he always right? So annoying.

  “So it was Siren Song that Miranda could sense at the murder scene!”

  “Yes, I guess so,” said Rebecca.

  “Well, then maybe the murder was related to the kidnapping,” I suggested.

  “I told you so,” said Pepe.

  “It’s possible,” said Rebecca. “At any rate, when I got the ransom demand, I informed the police. They are looking into it. I trust they will get my dog back. Meanwhile I did what I had to do to keep the show going.”

  “Geri! This is serious!” said Pepe. He jumped off Caprice’s lap and ran over to me. “We must rescue Siren Song.” He looked back at Caprice. “And Princess, of course.”

  “And that’s what you should do,” Rebecca continued, turning back to Caprice. “Inform the police and let them handle it. Pull yourself together for the judging. You only have to be on camera for an hour.” She gave Caprice the once-over. “You should get yourself into makeup. You look awful.” And she marched out of the room.

  “I can’t call the police!” wailed Caprice. “The kidnappers said if I called the police, they would kill my poor Princess Pepe.”

  I saw Pepe wince every time Caprice used that name. Still he was determined to help her.

  “Offer our services, Geri!” he said.

  “When did this happen?” I asked.

  “This morning,” said Caprice. “Jennifer was walking her around the block and a van drove up. A guy jumped out, shoved Princess into the car, and took off.”