Hollywood Deception

by Gemma Halliday

  But he stopped midsentence.

  We both froze at the sound of a door opening softly nearby.

  My eyes met Shane's, the panic I felt mirrored there.

  "We need to go," I said. "Now." I shoved Shane's mask back on, doing the same to my own.

  Shane nodded and shut the windows he'd been working in. We both tiptoed to the door. I cracked it open and peered out at the corridor.

  "Anything?" Shane whispered.

  I shook my head. "No."

  I took my boots off and shuddered at the thought of what I might be stepping in on the bare floor. But if someone other than us was in the building, they'd definitely hear the clack of my heels as we ran back to the garbage chute. I tamped down the urge to gag at the feel of the grimy floor beneath my feet as we slowly pushed through the door to the warehouse and felt our way along the dimly lit walls.

  We reached the chute opening without incident. Once there, Shane hefted me up into the stinky corridor, and a moment later I was sliding down the chute much faster than I'd climbed up it. I landed in the dumpster with a thud. Something cold and moist squished beneath me again, but I ignored it. I struggled to get to my feet, but it was useless, as a second later Shane flew out of the chute and landed right on top of me, knocking the breath out of my lungs.

  "Sorry, Allie," he apologized in a rush.

  All I could do was grunt in response as he tugged me into a standing position.

  Shane jumped over the rim of the dumpster, landing on his feet on the pavement.

  Just as I heard someone opening the chute door from inside the warehouse.

  Crap. We'd been made.

  I quickly jumped down, landing hard on my bare feet. Then we took off running as fast as we could across the parking lot and down the road toward where I'd parked the car. My feet protested with every step on the hard gravel, but I didn't dare waste time putting my boots back on. My Bug came into view, and while the sight of my car was a huge relief, I wasn't about to celebrate a victory until we were far away from Sunshine Sanitation and whoever was chasing us.

  Shane slid across the hood of the car Dukes of Hazzard meets Hello Kitty style and jumped inside the passenger door. I followed suit and started the ignition, whipped a U in the road, and floored the accelerator. We shot down the road, leaving a trail of dust behind us as we sped away from Sunshine Sanitation and toward safety.

  We pulled off our masks and tossed them over our seats into the back, but neither one of us spoke until we reached the freeway. My eyes ping-ponged between the road and the rearview mirror, half expecting to see a vehicle chasing us at top speed. But all I saw was the normal L.A. traffic.

  "Are we being followed?" Shane asked. If I didn't know better, I'd say there was a note of excitement in his voice.

  I shook my head.

  Shane was quiet for a moment. Then he started laughing. "Oh, dude, that was close. What a rush!"

  I wished I could say the same. I had a feeling it would take me a week to calm my frayed nerves back to normal.

  "I'm sorry I put you in all that danger for nothing," I told him, sincerely meaning it. While I'd always known the plan had had a hint of harebrained in it, being actually chased through the warehouse had brought the reality of how illegal we'd been acting crashing home.

  "I'm not." He grinned, really looking like he was enjoying this. "And it wasn't totally for nothing. I mean, we know you were right," Shane pointed out. "Someone at Sunshine was emailing with Bobby."

  "Yeah, but we don't know what they said."

  Shane shrugged. "True."

  "And we don't know who that someone was."

  Shane's grin widened. "I do."

  I did a double take. "Excuse me?"

  He shrugged again, looking way too pleased with himself. "I said I couldn't read the emails. I didn't say I couldn't see who they were addressed to."

  I punched him in the arm. "Spill it," I commanded. "Was it Ritchie Mullins?"

  Shane frowned. "No. Who's Ritchie Mullins?"

  I shook my head. "No one. Never mind," I mumbled, only mildly disappointed. "So who was Bobby emailing?"

  "Some guy named Sal Bukowski."

  I perked up. The name didn't ring any bells, but the initials sure did—SB. I tried to think back over the names I'd seen in the company's roster, but I couldn't remember a Sal. Though, I'd gone through a lot of names and profiles that day. It was possible I'd skimmed over him.

  "So, what's our next step?" Shane asked, pulling me out of my thoughts.

  "My next step is a hot shower and a gallon of scented body wash to get rid of this smell," I told him.

  Shane's eyes glazed over, and I feared he was picturing me showering.

  "And your next step," I said, hopefully harshly enough to knock the image out of his head, "is to go home and forget I ever dragged you along on this trip."

  "Fat chance of that, babe. This was the most fun I've had all year."

  "We've really got to talk about this 'babe' thing. It's not cool."

  Shane just grinned at me.

  "Seriously. I've got a boyfriend." Maybe. "And he's sure not happy about the flowers and teddy bears and stuff."

  "A little friendly competition never hurt anyone," Shane replied, still grinning.

  I shook my head. "No. It's not a competition. No competition, Shane."

  "Whatever you say, babe."

  I gritted my teeth, reminding myself he was just a child. It wouldn't be right to hit a child.

  We rode the rest of the way in semi-silence—me contemplating just who Sal Bukowski might be and what his connection to Bobby was, and Shane loudly chewing on a fresh stick of cinnamon gum. When we pulled up to Shane's house, he got out and tossed his backpack over his shoulder.

  "Thanks for the awesome date, babe!" Shane said.

  "That was so not a date. It was…" Trespassing? Breaking and entering? Illegal hacking? "…work," I finished lamely.

  "Right." He winked at me.

  I rolled my eyes. "Get some sleep. And call me if you need anything," I added. Even though he was perfectly old enough to be home alone, I felt a little responsible for him after the sketchy escapade we'd just pulled off.

  "You know I will," he said with a grin before he stepped away from the car.

  I was afraid of that. I turned the car around in the middle of the street and drove home.

  As soon as I opened the door and stepped inside my apartment, Mr. Fluffykins took one sniff of me and sprinted to the bedroom.

  "It's good to see you too," I called out.

  I couldn't blame him. I smelled like an outhouse in the summertime.

  I dropped my poor boots beside the door, my purse on the sofa, and then trudged the short distance to the bathroom. Mr. Fluffykins was hiding beneath the blankets on the bed. I looked down at my clothing now that I could see myself in decent lighting, and cringed. My clothes were ruined. I pulled them off and reluctantly tossed them into the trash. I tied the bag shut to keep the stench from permeating the clean air in my apartment.

  An hour and three shampoos under nearly scalding hot water later, I stepped out of the shower feeling a little better and a lot less stinky. I grasped an end of my hair and brought it to my nose. I couldn't tell if the stink was burnt into my nose or if my hair still held a subtle aroma of garbage plant. I hoped it was the former. I so did not want to explain to Felix in the morning why I reeked of Sunshine Sanitation.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  First thing the next morning I was hard at work at my desk with my best friend, Google, running down every bit of information the internet held on Sal Bukowski. Thanks to three more shampoos that morning and a healthy dose of English Garden body mist, I'd left the stench of the past evening behind me. Even if I did smell just a tad like a Glade PlugIn now.

  Luckily, Felix had come nowhere near close enough to smell me this morning. A curt nod of his head through the glass wall of his office was all I'd received as I'd come in fifteen minutes early and plunked myself d
own at my desk. Apparently I was getting the silent treatment. I tried to pretend it didn't bother me and focused instead on the case at hand.

  Sal Bukowski hadn't turned up in my research on company officers the day before because he wasn't technically an officer of Sunshine Sanitation. He was listed in their directory simply as a "consultant." As hard as I tried to find out what he consulted with them on, that info seemed to be nonexistent. As was any social media presence or personal info. Sal had a surprisingly small digital footprint. Which, in itself, was a tiny red flag.

  Had Sal been consulting on something underhanded at Sunshine? Maybe illegally dumping chemicals? Had Bobby found out, and Sal bumped him off? It was a fun theory, but I had nothing to back it up. I also had no idea how Ritchie Mullins fit into all of this. Or even if he did. I guessed it could be just coincidence that he happened to work for Sunshine Sanitation. I mean, a facility that large had to employ hundreds of people.

  "What is that smell?" I looked up to find Tina hovering over my shoulder, a bundle of papers in her hand and a look of disgust on her face.

  I felt my cheeks heat. "Nothing. I don't know what you're talking about."

  "It smells like someone spilled perfume or something." She looked down at the rug, checking for stains.

  "I don't smell anything," I lied.

  Tina shot me a yeah, right look.

  "Did you want something?" I asked, quickly minimizing my search window before she could get a look at what I was doing. No way was I going to let her sneak a peek at the name I'd worked so hard to get last night. Even if it wasn't turning up any smoking guns.

  Tina crossed her arms over her chest. "Yeah. Felix told me I had to share the autopsy reports with you." She looked like she wasn't happy about it either.

  I, on the other hand, felt a little glow of warmth in my belly. Felix might be giving me the silent treatment, but at least he wasn't totally leaving me out in the cold. "What did they say?"

  "Read 'em yourself." She handed the papers to me.

  "Thanks," I said, meaning it.

  She shrugged. "Nothing new in there." She paused. "At least nothing I didn't already know."

  With that subtle dig, she walked back to her desk.

  I quickly scanned the first couple of pages, trying to read between the medical jargon. Pretty standard as far as I could tell. As had been obvious at the scene, Bobby had died of a single gunshot wound to the head. Postmortem indicated that he'd had a slightly enlarged liver, had broken his wrist sometime in the last ten years, had eaten pasta and red wine as his last meal, and was otherwise a fairly healthy thirty-six-year-old male. Tina was right. Nothing particularly interesting in the pages.

  Feeling another dead end brewing, I quickly scanned the rest of the papers. The only interesting fact I found was that Bobby Baxter's name on the official documents was listed as Robert Baxter Smedfield. Apparently he'd dropped the "Smedfield" for Hollywood purposes. I didn't blame him. Robert Smedfield didn't have half the appeal as Bobby Baxter.

  I tapped my pen on the top of my desk, taking in that info. If Bobby was really Robert Smedfield, did that mean that his wife was really legally Marilyn Smedfield?

  I typed her name into my search engine. Amazingly, several hits came up. Including one in the Internet Movie Database. I blinked at the screen, clicking the link and seeing an image of a slightly younger version of Marilyn dressed in a bikini, wielding an ax, on a movie poster for Bad Babes in Boston II. Apparently Marilyn Smedfield had enjoyed a short-lived career as a B-movie actress when she'd first married Bobby.

  I thought back to our conversation by her hotel pool the other day. I'd thought her grief had seemed genuine enough then, but knowing now that she was an actress… I glanced at her list of credits again. In addition to two Bad Babes films, she'd also had walk-on roles in a couple of TV cop dramas and had shot a sitcom pilot. Not exactly Shakespeare, but that didn't mean she couldn't easily fake a few tears.

  I pulled out my phone and texted Shane. Has Mrs. Baxter come home yet?

  I aimlessly browsed IMDb as I waited for his response. Five minutes later it buzzed in.

  Don't know. Sorry. In trig class now.

  I glanced at the time. Just past noon. I did a quick search for the number of the Grand Hotel and Spa, and a few seconds later was connected with the front desk.

  "Grand Hotel, how many I direct your call?"

  "Could you please connect me with Marilyn…Smedfield's room?" I asked, mentally crossing my fingers. If she was avoiding the paparazzi, maybe she'd checked in with her real name.

  "I'm so sorry, but it looks like Ms. Smedfield checked out this morning."

  "Thanks," I said then quickly hung up, grabbed my purse, and headed for the elevator.

  I stopped only long enough to hit a drive-thru taco place before winding my way up the hill to Marilyn's.

  The iron gates to her drive were closed, but I noticed that her BMW was parked out front. The grieving widow was home. I drove to the end of the block then flipped a U-turn and parked on the other side of the street in front of Shane's house. I popped open my glove box and took out a pair of binoculars, training them on the windows of the Baxter house. I wasn't sure what I expected to see, but I had a feeling that Marilyn wasn't going to just let me in for a chat.

  Through an upstairs window, I spied the housekeeper, Marta, making a bed, fluffing pillows and shaking out sheets. Downstairs it appeared the front rooms were a living room and some sort of office with bookshelves lining the back walls. Both were empty. Finally I spotted Marilyn through an upstairs window. She looked like she was in a bathroom, putting on makeup. Maybe going out? Maybe to celebrate her newly single and filthy rich status?

  Yes, I was totally reaching. But the more I thought about it, the more I wasn't totally buying her grieving widow routine.

  I watched Marilyn apply copious different makeup layers for a few more minutes before my arms got tired, and I dropped the binoculars. I finished the last of my tacos, wadded up the papers, and popped a breath mint before picking up my binoculars again. Marilyn had left the bathroom. Crap. I quickly scanned the other house windows, hoping to get a glimpse of her. The car was still in the driveway. It wasn't like she could have left.

  I was still trying to track the elusive Mrs. Baxter when another car rolled down the street next to me. I felt my heart rate pick up when it stopped at Mrs. Baxter's gates. I whipped my binoculars toward it, trying to make out the occupant.

  It was a plain beige SUV—nothing terribly notable about it. I caught a peek at the driver as he leaned out the window to talk into the security microphone mounted at the gate. Male, maybe late twenties. Dark hair in a stylish, close-cropped look, nice sturdy jawline dusted with just enough stubble to be sexy. He was wearing sunglasses, so it was impossible to see his eyes, but when he leaned one tanned arm out the window, I got a glimpse of his impressive triceps. I felt my hopes pick up. Was this the hottie all that makeup had been for?

  After a couple of seconds the gates opened, and Hottie drove through, pulling his car in behind Marilyn's in the drive. I zoomed in on him as he got out of the car and walked around to the back and opened the tailgate…

  And pulled out a pool net and a toolbox full of chemicals.

  Right. Not a hot liaison—just the pool boy.

  I let out a breath of frustration as I watched him walk around the side of the house, tools of his trade in hand, and got a clear view of his T-shirt, which read: Davies Pool Maintenance. I scanned the binoculars back up at the house and spotted Mrs. Baxter in the study window now, chatting on the phone with someone as she sat behind a desk. Clearly she had about as much interest in her pool boy as Felix did in me lately.

  I was beginning to think I'd just wasted an entire afternoon for nothing, when my phone rang, making me jump in the silence of my car. I dropped the binoculars and glanced at the readout. Shane.

  Even though I knew he was at school, I guiltily glanced up at his house as if he could somehow sense I was th
ere. "Hello?" I answered.

  "Hey, it's me."

  I cringed that he thought we were on an "it's me" phone basis already. "Hi, Shane."

  "I've got some info for you on that name we found last night."

  I sat up straighter in my seat. "You did? How?" I'd spent all morning trying to find something on Sal Bukowski, and all I knew was that he didn't tweet, friend, or snapchat.

  "DA's office records."

  "How did you—" I stopped midsentence, feeling guilt wash over me. "You hacked into the district attorney's office!?" Instinctively I lowered my voice and looked over both shoulders, as if the DA could somehow have my car bugged.

  "No! Geez," Shane huffed into the phone.

  I let out a sigh of relief.

  "One of my buddies did it for me."

  Ugh. "I don't think we should be talking about this on the phone."

  Shane chuckled. "Seriously? You are, like, paranoid."

  "I am, like, not into going to jail."

  "Relax. I told you I didn't do anything illegal. Hackensack09 did."

  "That's your buddy's name?"

  "Online handle."

  "Clever. Hackensack because he's a hacker."

  There was silence on the other end then: "Uh, he lives in New Jersey."

  I shook my head. "Whatever. What did this Hackensack guy find out?"

  "How about this? Pick me up from school, and I'll tell you all about it."

  As reluctant as I was to spend more time with Shane and encourage any sort of crush he had brewing, I really did want to know what his hacker friend had found. "Text me the address," I told him, shoving my binoculars into the glove box and starting my engine.

  Half an hour later we were at a coffee shop across the street from Washington High School. I was thoroughly enjoying a blueberry scone and an afternoon latte pick-me-up, and Shane was slurping a strawberry smoothie as he let me scroll through a list of documents his buddy had "borrowed" from the DA's office records on Sal Bukowski.

  "Wow," I couldn't help letting out. I was beginning to see why Sal had almost no internet presence. At least half of the documents I was reading had black sharpie over the words, redacted information. Though, enough of the gist came through in the list of charges that had been brought against the guy and subsequently dropped. Bribery, extortion, money laundering. "This guy has his fingers in everything." I shook my head and looked at Shane.