I paused. Katrina could be in any one of them. A woman in a heavy scarf stood at the mirror, applying lipstick. An executive type in a blazer and A-line skirt was adding tap water to a bottle full of powered drink mix. And a teenager with spiked hair was washing her hands.
Behind them, flushing, paper being rolled.
I ducked down, checking out the shoes in the first stall. Loafers. Not our girl.
I duck-walked down the line, peeking under the doors of each closed stall. Sandals. Uggs. Flip flops. Pumps.
Then I hit pay dirt.
Hot pink cheetah printed platforms.
I stood and put my ear to the door (incurring a funny look from the executive type at the sink in the process). Silence.
"Katrina?" I asked.
Nothing.
"I know you're in there."
Again, silence.
"You can't hide forever."
Still no response.
"I know you stole the shoes-" I started, but before I could finish, the metal door slammed open, hitting me squarely in the nose.
"Uhn." I staggered backward, pain exploding behind my eyes as the full force of Katrina's dancer body slammed into me while she bolted past.
I recovered just in time to grab a handful of her tank-top, yanking her backward.
She yelled, a short yip, stumbling on her platforms and twisting to the right. She pushed me backward, into the bathroom stall. I tripped, falling butt first into the toilet.
"Ew!" I cried, feeling the back side of my skirt get soaked. I jumped up, regaining my footing, just as she made a break for the door.
I scrambled after her, and flew out of the restroom just in time to see her pull open a service door next to a taco restaurant, disappearing behind hit. I chased after her, my wet skirt slapping against my thighs. I slipped through the service door to find myself in a long, slim corridor, with several doorways leading off in both directions.
I paused, listening to my own breath echo off the concrete walls. No footsteps. No sign of Katrina.
"Katrina?" I yelled, the silence deafening. I took a tentative step forward. Then another.
I was halfway down, when a blur of cheetah flew at me from a doorway.
"Uhn." I heard myself grunt as the weight of her body took me down to the floor. But this time I held onto her, arms wrapping around her middle as she tried to wiggle free.
"Let go," she screamed at me.
"No way. You have my five-hundred and thirty-nine dollars."
She paused, her eyes narrowing. "What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about the money you sold the stolen DWC shoes for on eBay!"
Katrina sucked in a breath. "You're bargainbaby49?"
"I am, and you're busted."
"Hey, I was conducting a legitimate sale," she protested, wriggling in my grasp. "If you have an issue with it, contact eBay."
"A sale of items you stole," I pressed, holding tight. "Irina got you onto the Dancing with Celebrities, then you stole wardrobe items to sell on eBay."
"I don't know what you're talking about," she protested.
"I think you do. I also think your sister found out about it, and you killed her."
"No!" Katrina shouted, breaking from my grasp and struggling to her knees.
"Yes!" I yelled, pulling at a handful of her hair.
She grunted. "You have it all wrong, you stupid beetch," she said. "I didn't steal the items. Irina did."
I'll admit, that tidbit threw me. So much that I involuntarily loosened my grip, allowing Katrina to struggle away and gain the upper hand. She lunged at me again, straddling me on the ground. One cheetah platform sailed toward my jugular. I reacted without thinking, shoving my purse between her heel and my throat just in time.
"Why would Irina steal from her own show?" I choked out.
"She needed the money."
"What they were paying on DWC wasn't enough?" I asked, turning to the side, and slipping out from under her foot. I scrambled to my hands and knees.
"No!" Kat shouted, her hand shooting out to get a grip on my ankle. "Irina didn't see any big money unless she won."
"Which is why she was trying to rig the votes," I added, puzzle pieces falling into place.
"It was a stupeed idea," Katrina said, using her favorite word again. "Too risky. The producers were bound to find out. And Vladimir agreed with me."
"Vladimir Muskavo," I said, kicking at her hand with my other heel. "So you were working together?"
Her face scrunched up. "Working together? No!" She spit on the ground and cursed in Russian. "He was a snake, a fiend, the worst kind of man."
I kicked free, getting as far as my knees before Katrina pounced again, growling under her breath as she grabbed me from behind.
"I don't get it then," I said, straining away from her. "If you weren't working with him, what was your connection to Vlad?"
"Irina and I had to get out of our hometown. You have no idea what it's like there. Where we come from, women are dogs. They can marry American or be prostitute. That's all."
While it sounded horrible, I had a hard time conjuring up sympathy for her while she had her arms wrapped around my throat. "But you did get out. Two years ago," I said, quoting Irina's official bio.
I felt Katrina nod behind me. "We did. We paid big money to a man to smuggle us out of the country."
Puzzle piece! "Vladimir." He wasn't smuggling stolen goods out of the country, he was smuggling people in.
Katrina nodded again. "We paid him a large sum of money to get us into the country through Canada. He provided us with new names, passport, everything we needed to make it look like we belonged here."
"But that was two years ago," I pointed out, twisting to my right, breaking her grip to face her. "Why was he here now?"
Katrina pulled away, panting. "Because of my stupeed sister," she said. Then she spit on the ground again. "She has some big idea to be a famous dancer. She goes on TV. Lets the whole world see her!"
"Including Vladimir," I said, starting to get the big picture.
"Yes. He said that if we didn't pay him more money, he would turn her in to immigration, and they would send us both back to Russia."
"So that's when Irina came up with the idea of fixing the votes to win the money."
Karina shook her head. "Yes, but Vlad wanted money now."
"So when trying to fix the votes didn't pay off soon enough, Irina started stealing items from the set to sell," I said.
Katrina nodded. "This was my plan," she said, beaming with pride. "People will pay big money for TV memorabilia."
"So what went wrong?"
Her eyes flashed. "Vlad was greedy. We sold one item and gave him the money, but he wanted more. He said we had to bring him to set to steal things. He said he could make big bucks smuggling all kinds of equipment off the set and selling to Canadian production companies."
"But Irina was against it, and they argued," I concluded.
"She knew the producers would figure it out. That's why he must have killed her." Then Katrina lunged at me again as if I acting out that very thing.
I sidestepped her, taking the brunt of her weight on my shoulder as she slammed us both against the wall.
"You confronted Vlad about killing your sister?" I asked.
"Yes. But the coward denied it."
"So you killed him."
She looked up, eyes still flashing. "He killed my sister! I was entitled to revenge!"
I gulped. Clearly.
"And when I started asking questions, you hit me on the head," I said.
"I just wanted to scare you off. I needed more time"
"Time to get money to leave the country. You were going to sell the last item you had, then take the cash and flee."
"I was." She paused, eyes penetrating me. "I am," she corrected.
Before I could stop her she shoved me backward hard enough that I fell on my butt, skidding on my wet skirt along the cold floor. Then she turned and ra
n, full tilt, toward the glowing red "exit" sign that led outside.
I scrambled to my feet, but as I watched her sprint to the door, I knew I was too far away to catch her. By the time I got there, she'd be gone, disappearing into any one of the waiting taxis, and on her way to any one of a dozen different ways out of the city.
I followed after her, praying she tripped, praying she couldn't catch a cab, praying anything I could think of that involved her not getting away as I watched her slip through the exit, the door shutting with a thud after her.
But for once, someone up there must have been listening.
Because as I pushed through the exit a minute later, I ran right into a huge crowd of paparazzi on the sidewalk with cameras in hand, flashes going off in every direction.
And at the center of it stood Katrina, shielding her eyes at the onslaught.
"I'm not Irina," she protested over the sound of questions being fired at her from every direction.
"Did you fake your death?"
"Are you having an affair with Ricky?"
"Did you set him up to take the fall?"
"Who does your hair?"
"Leave me alone!" Katrina yelled, fighting to make her way to a waiting line of taxis at the curb.
But I was faster this time. I shoved through the crowd and grabbed Katrina by the arm.
"Gotcha," I told her, grinning from ear to ear.
For once, the paparazzi saved the day.
Chapter Nineteen
An hour later I was sitting on a bench at baggage claim, watching the police question Katrina. As soon as I'd had her in hand, I'd flagged down a security officer outside the claim area and told him to call Ramirez with information that his wife had caught an international criminal. I figured that would get his attention. The officer had, and, within minutes, LAPD were swarming the airport. Which had done little to calm the frenzied paparazzi and even less to reassure the crowds of travelers. It would be a miracle if we didn't make the six o'clock news.
Dana had caught up to me about the same time the police had arrived, out of breath and followed by a small band of groupies. Apparently word had spread like wildfire that Dana Dashel was at the Burbank airport, looking fabulous and signing autographs, and all paparazzi within a three freeway radius had descended upon the airport. Luckily for me, right about when Katrina had tried to make a break for it. Then, seeing who they all thought was Irina, the paparazzi had first peed their collective pants, then mobbed her with their cameras. Which is right about when I'd arrived on scene.
For once, I was thrilled with the press. Especially since, as I browsed on my phone, I noticed that Dana was showing up on every tabloid website on the front page... looking absolutely fabulous in her gown. If this didn't make up for the Crocs, I didn't know what did.
"Is he gonna be mad?" Dana asked, sitting on the bench next to me.
I turned in the direction she was indicating: a small office where Ramirez had Katrina handcuffed and awaiting transport to the county jail for processing. My husband hadn't had a chance to do more than glance my way when he'd arrived on scene, instead focusing on Katrina. (Who, by the way was so pissed off at the reporters that she'd been yelling in Russian non-stop.) Fearing the worst, I'd texted Mom and Mrs. R to take the kids home. I didn't want them to have to witness their dad murdering their mom.
I nodded. "Oh, yeah. He's gonna be mad."
"I'm sorry."
"Thanks. But it was inevitable he'd find out sometime. I can only hope he's at least a little grateful that we did help solve his case."
Dana nodded. "Well, even if he isn't grateful, I, for one, am." She gave me a hug that was so fierce it almost cracked a rib. From outside the baggage area, I saw more cameras going off, transmitting the scene to tabloids around the globe.
As if on cue, the door to the small office opened, accompanied by the sound of Russian cursing, mixed with an English expletive here and there. Ramirez emerged, his eyes scanning the room, then narrowing into dark, dangerous slits when he found me.
I gulped, feeling the weight of his stare like a ton of bricks.
"Uh-oh," Dana whispered beside me.
No kidding.
Ramirez made purposeful strides across the room and in an instant was standing right in front of me.
"Maddie." He said my name in a flat monotone that gave no clue to the emotion behind it.
I did a little one-finger wave. "Hi, honey."
The eyes narrowed further.
"Uh, maybe I should just go wait for you over there..." Dana trailed off, sliding from her seat and making for the vending machines in the corner. Outside a mob of photographers followed her, still snapping photos through the windows.
I cleared my throat, shifted from cheek to cheek on my seat, felt my upper lip begin to sweat.
"So, the twin did it, huh?" I asked, my voice high and squeaky with false casualness. "Who knew, right?"
Ramirez crossed his arms over his chest. "Apparently you did."
I bit my lip. "Okay, see, here's the thing. I totally didn't mean to investigate behind your back, it just kinda happened. You know, sort of like the way you arrested Ricky behind my back."
"Springer..." he growled in warning.
"But this isn't about what you did," I quickly covered. "It's about what I did. Which was wrong. And I'm sorry. I should have been above board with it all. I shouldn't have lied and snuck around. But you have to understand that Ricky needed me. And I couldn't just sit back and do nothing, so I'm really, really, really sorry that I was investigating on my own, and I'm so sorry you were in the dark about it."
Ramirez stared at me for a long beat. Then he finally said. "Well, I wasn't completely in the dark."
I paused. "Wait, what do you mean?"
Ramirez shot me a look. "Jesus, Maddie, I am a detective."
Mental forehead thunk. "So you knew what I was doing all along?"
"I had a suspicion," he confessed, sitting down on the bench beside me.
"Why didn't you say anything? Yell at me? Try to stop me?"
He shrugged. "What would the point have been? You were going to investigate anyway, right?"
"Probably," I confessed.
He cocked his head at me and shot me that look again.
"Okay, yes, totally."
"Right. It would have been wasted breath on my part to try to talk you out of it. Besides, I knew you wouldn't do anything to endanger the kids."
"I didn't. They were totally at home when I got this," I assured him, pointing to my nose.
The corner of his mouth quirked upward in the beginnings of a smile. "I was going to ask what happened there. I think your silly putty is falling off."
I turned to catch my reflection in the glass behind me. Sure enough, the mondo-strength cover-up was peeling off in flesh-colored chunks. Fab. And this was the face the paparazzi were filming?
"I suck so badly," I told him. "I'm so sorry I lied to you."
"I'm sorry, too. But I get it," he said, nodding. "I should have put more in faith in you from the beginning. I know you're not stupid. If you were in real trouble, you'd call me for help. And, well, in all honesty you're not half bad at solving this sort of stuff."
I blinked. "Could you repeat that?" I asked.
"What?"
"The part about you saying I rock at solving homicides. I'd just like it to go on record. Officially. Maybe even in writing on a plaque to hang above the bed."
He grinned. "Very funny, Springer."
I shook my head. "I never thought this day would come. You're actually condoning me butting into your investigations."
He frowned and held up a hand. "Whoa, let's not go that far. But let's just say that I've learned there are certain times in a marriage when the best thing you can do is keep your mouth shut."
I couldn't help the ear to ear grin that spread across my face. "I couldn't agree more." I grabbed him around the middle, snuggling into the crook of his arm for a long, lingering hug.
"
I'm sorry I investigated behind your back. It won't happen again," I said.
I felt Ramirez chuckle, a deep rumble that reverberated way down in his chest. "Yes, it will."
"No, I-" I started to protest.
But he cut me off. "But, I'll forgive you then, too." He popped a kiss on the top of my head. "Just like you forgive me for being a little overprotective at times. I should know by now that you can take care of yourself."
I bit my lip. "Most of the time," I added, feeling bruises from my confrontation with Katrina already forming. I looked up at the office where she was still waving her arms and yelling. "So, is she talking?" I asked, gesturing toward our suspect.
Ramirez nodded. "Oh, yeah. Talking up a storm. Only problem is it's half in Russian. We're getting a translator now."
"She told me she killed Vlad." I paused, watching his eyes for a glint of recognition. "The Russian smuggler in the hotel."
He nodded. "I had a bad feeling that one of those blondes seen at the scene might be mine."
"Sorry." I said "Again."
"We recovered a gun in the dumpster behind the hotel. The serial number was filed off, but CSU did find a partial print. If it's Katrina's, it shouldn't be hard to match."
"Which reminds me, some more evidence should be arriving at our house via overnight shipping soon."
Ramirez shot me a look.
"It's best if you don't ask."
"You're gonna end up creating a whole mountain of paperwork for me, aren't you?"
"Am I wearing out the word 'sorry' at this point?"
He grinned, a full-fledged thing that took over his face. "You're getting there."
"Will it help if I tell you what Katrina confessed to me?"
"It wouldn't hurt."
So, I did, relaying the entire conversation. "Katrina said she killed Vlad because he killed Irina," I ended with.
Ramirez nodded. "That jives with what she's been screaming in there, too. We'll compare the hairs left at the scene to Vlad's. It should be easy to tell if they're a match."
I cut my eyes to the office, where I could see Katrina waving her hands as she shouted about something. I felt a frown burrow between my eyebrows. "You know, there's still just one thing that doesn't make sense to me," I said.
Danger in High Heels Page 16
