Diva Las Vegas (Book 1 in Raven McShane Series)

by Caroline Dries

  I spent most of the rest of the day in a horizontal position digesting my breakfast and cursing myself for thinking crab legs, brine soaked eggs and chocolate waffles would be a combination my stomach was equipped to deal with. This is how Elvis must have felt all the time, I thought. Holed up in my high roller suite, I flicked on the TV and watched the stock market plummet for awhile. My booking agent doubled as a financial advisor, but he didn’t seem to be doing a very good job of it lately. Watching the market reminded me I needed to call him and fire his ass. I could get orthodontist convention gigs on my own.

  I considered just blowing the afternoon and sitting in the hot tub with a bottle (okay, two bottles) of room service champagne, but the thought of champagne in the hot tub reminded me I still had to deal with Cody Masterson. Or whoever else wanted me out of the picture. By 4:15 the maids were getting antsy to clean my suite, so I forced myself to leave for an hour. I decided to walk the half-mile to my condo to talk to the security guard.

  It was a sweltering fifteen-minute walk. I gratefully escaped the afternoon heat and approached the security stand in the center of my apartment building’s marble and glass lobby. The man working behind the desk was young, clean cut and recently shaved, with shiny medium-length black hair. From the look of him, I figured his shift had just started. I introduced myself as a resident and he responded in what sounded like a Russian accent.

  “And you were working here yesterday at this time?” I asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. Monday through Friday, same time. You are the one who called this morning about a break-in?”

  “Yes, I said.” I noticed his name tag read “Ivan,” and apparently Ivan and the security staff were more on the ball than I’d given them credit for. “Anyway,” I continued, “I’m wondering how someone could just walk in here and get into my apartment.”

  “I am very sorry about that, miss. We have been trying to upgrade our security systems, but there are just too many new residents all the time. It’s very possible that the intruder actually sublets a place from someone else. There are a few dozen condos for rent on the internet at any given time. All it takes is money. One month’s rent as a down payment.”

  “So no background checks, no credit checks, nothing.”

  “I’m afraid not, miss. Actually this was the request of several of our residents, who wanted to have the ability to rent out their places quickly and easily.”

  “Okay, but how could someone get into my apartment?”

  “We’ve looked into that. Your key is magnetically coded, so he would have needed to get a copy of your key from someone or have it made here in the building.”

  “Doesn’t sound likely,” I said.

  Ivan nodded. “Probably not. There is another way. Was the intruder an athletic person?”

  “Definitely. I was lucky to get away from him.”

  “Well, it’s possible to string a rope from another balcony and climb up or down to get to yours. There’s really no way to prevent that.”

  “I see. Thanks for your help.” It looked like I would be spending some more time at the Flamingo.

  Ivan asked whether they should file a police report, but I told him to hold off for now. I was trying to avoid creating too many waves, and a bunch of cops sniffing around would probably put an end to my investigation. I thanked Ivan again and took off.

  I decided to be paranoid and not head directly to work. If someone was still watching me, I didn’t want to make it too easy for them to find me. It was early rush hour, which meant it’d be hard to find a taxi on the street or in front of my building. I decided to head over to Caesars Palace and stand in their taxi line, and on the way I kept an eye out for anyone following me. Getting to Caesars on foot meant darting across several lanes of traffic going in both directions, and that made it almost impossible for anyone in a car to follow me. The taxi line was surprisingly short, and I caught one within minutes and had the driver drop me off at the Thai restaurant near Cougar’s.

  I sat at the bar and had a small curry pork dinner by myself. I was pretty thick-skinned, but on a Friday night I felt a little self-conscious eating alone. I rushed through my meal and got out of there. I wondered whether I was crazy to dance that night, but I wanted to stick to my normal routine as much as possible. And I hadn’t missed a Friday night in years. There’s no way I was going to let a little thing like attempted murder allow the younger girls to poach my regulars.

  The nice thing about my night job was that I could show up wearing just about anything, including a t-shirt and shorts from the discount rack at the Flamingo gift shop. I had a few leather outfits in my locker and I could always bum a g-string and shorts from someone.

  I was glad I went to work. Three of my regulars were in the house, and one of them wanted to share me with his out-of-town clients. I spent half the night being passed between about eight different Korean men, and each one shoved a C-note at me when I finished dancing for them. Very nice people, the Koreans.

  I was exhausted by one, but I didn’t get out of there until three. The Flamingo bed proved very comforting, and I slept late into the next morning.

  Chapter 18

  There’s nothing like a good night’s sleep to focus my energies and resolve. I had bummed around too much the day before, and when I finally woke around 10:30 I knew immediately that it was time to talk to Cody Masterson. As nice as the Flamingo suite was, I didn’t feel like moving in. I was determined to reclaim what had passed for my own life.

  I thought everything over during an extra long shower. As Jeff had pointed out, it was possible that more than one person wanted me off the case, or off the planet. If I had stumbled onto some kind a skim operation, that hornet’s nest might have nothing to do with George Hannity’s murder. Maybe Mel Block had had second thoughts and warned someone about what he told me. Or maybe Amy had tipped off people at the casino that Mike was asking about it. It didn’t seem too likely, though. Mel was dying and seemed to be on my side. And as the sole owner of the Outpost, Amy would be the one getting robbed by any kind of inside skim. Either way, it was disturbing that I had almost gotten killed and might not have managed to make any progress in solving the case.

  But it occurred to me that if Cody was behind everything, he was definitely going about things indirectly. He was relying on Phil d’Angelo to shut me down, and d’Angelo was using his security goons at the casino to get rid of me. Somehow, it seemed safer to go straight to the source—Cody himself—rather than try to untangle the web of people involved at the casino level. Cody seemed downright harmless in comparison to d’Angelo, Eddie Holman, and the Brawny man who’d tried to kill me.

  Talking to Cody was the kind of thing that had to be done in person. I debated whether to try to find him at his chateau in Summerlin or at his east side party house. His wife was still out of town with Holman, so I figured he’d probably have spent last night at the party house too. I got my car from the Flamingo valet and headed over to Cody’s half-built subdivision. On the way I stopped at a pharmacy and had some of my digital photos from the pool party Thursday night made into 8x10's. I studied them for a minute in the parking lot and sighed. Why were all the best looking men gay?

  Things in Las Vegas tended to look dramatically different under the desert sun than they looked at night, and I had more trouble than I expected retracing my route from two nights earlier. I eventually found my way, though, and as I approached the house I wondered whether Cody – if he was even there – would be alone. This time there were no cars in the driveway or out front.

  I parked directly in front of Cody’s house. I had decided the best approach was the one Mike had taken with Amy: pretend I was investigating some kind of embezzlement at the casino rather than the murder itself. There was no sense confronting him about that, at least for now.

  I walked up to the front door and rang the bell. Within seconds the door opened and Cody appeared in a white robe and sandals. He was giggling in a high-pitched voice, looking down
and fumbling for something next to the door. “I was wondering when you’d notice,” he said. When he looked up at me he stopped cold.

  “Hello,” I said. Obviously he had been expecting someone else. His face looked profoundly confused, as though he had just woken up from a strange dream. He continued to gape at me with uncomprehending wonder, like a baby seeing itself in the mirror for the first time. He said nothing.

  “I’m Raven McShane. I’m sorry to track you down like this, but I have some information I’m sure you’d like to hear about.”

  Still nothing. I wasn’t sure if his confusion was due to the appearance of a stranger at his door, or if it was due to the appearance of this stranger in particular. After all, if Cody had ordered me killed, I could see how he might be he might be a little confused at the moment. It was getting more and more awkward as the seconds ticked by. I smiled gingerly as I stood there while he tried to make sense of things. I tried my best to look nonthreatening.

  “iPhone,” he blurted out. After all the buildup, I had expected something a little more profound.

  “Sorry?” I wasn’t catching his drift.

  He looked sheepish. “My friend Lawrence left his iPhone here, and I thought you were him.”

  He turned and grabbed the white phone from a table next to the door and made a show of holding it up to me. At least he was speaking in complete sentences now, I thought. But there was still something of the cornered animal about him.

  “Mind if I come in for just a minute?” I asked. I whipped out my I.D. and stepped across the threshold. I decided to take advantage of his obvious confusion before he got himself together enough to object. He glanced at my I.D. without studying it. It seemed to perplex him even further.

  “Would you have any coffee?” I asked.

  “Um, yeah. Regular is all I have.” He was still eyeing me warily, as though I was a creature from another planet. I did my best to look like I came from a friendly one.

  “Perfect.” Regular coffee is what people from my planet drink in the mornings.

  While he went to make coffee, I insinuated myself into the center of the house and looked around. It smelled like fresh paint more than anything else. The home was sparsely furnished, but what was there looked like high quality stuff. The living room actually had a fairly masculine layout. Two oversized brown leather armchairs made an L with a massive tan couch, the focus of the room being what looked to be a sixty-inch flatscreen TV and sound system. Did the boys come over to watch football games and drink beer?

  Cody shuffled at half-speed and led me into the kitchen, where a faint smell of incense wafted through the air. The kitchen was something of a mess, with a dozen or so champagne and wine bottles clumped together in the corner of a large gray granite counter top. A few store-bought hors d’oeuvres lay uneaten on platters. I wondered whether the mess was from last night or from the party I’d stumbled upon two nights earlier.

  Cody methodically began the process of making coffee. He seemed more comfortable now that he had something familiar to do with his hands. He hadn’t said anything, and I took a seat on a stool and watched him while the coffee maker began gurgling. He was taller than I expected—I’d only seen him from a distance and half-submerged in his hot tub—and even with only sandals on he appeared about six-one. And despite being disheveled and unshowered, he still looked damned good. I had to remind myself for the hundredth time that he might be a murderer.

  Cody kept his focus on the coffee, watching it drip slowly into the pot. The brewing coffee made occasional burping sounds, but the continued silence added another dollop of awkwardness to an already weird situation. I began wondering what was wrong with him. It was one thing to be taken by surprise by an unexpected visitor, but I surprised people all the time. Usually people began acting unsurprised after about five or ten seconds. Cody was either extremely shy—a possibility I dismissed out of hand, since I didn’t know too many shy ex-exotic dancers—or something else was going on altogether. Maybe he had pressed a silent alarm and was just biding his time until his goons showed up to haul me away and dump me in Lake Mead. I wasn’t going to find out just sitting on a stool.

  “You’re probably wondering why I’m here,” I said. Stating the obvious seemed the best course of action. I got up from my stool.

  “A little, yeah,” he said. The coffee maker spewed out its last noisy burp of steam, and Cody poured us two cups. He turned to face me and made direct eye contact for the first time. When our eyes met, my knees almost gave out, and I grabbed onto the countertop for support. I had heard of women swooning before, but I thought that was something that only happened in Harlequin romance novels. For the second time in as many minutes, I reminded myself of his criminal past. I also remembered that he probably didn’t even like women. Even so, my hormones obviously didn’t make those kinds of distinctions. They were telling me to get him to the bedroom ASAP to begin spawning a dynasty of blonde half-Swedish supermen and women.

  When I recovered, I noticed that his deep blue irises were framed in pink rather than pure white. It was finally starting to make sense—I had just been too slow to catch on. Pink eyes, a dazed appearance, strange behavior. And incense. Cody had just smoked up. He seemed baked medium-rare or medium rather than well done, but he was definitely stoned. I was less sure of whether that was going to help me or hurt.

  I decided to press on, but I had no idea what I was going to say. “Like I said, I have some information I’d like to run past you that I think you will be happy to hear.”

  “Okay,” he said, taking a larger gulp of piping hot coffee than was prudent. He cringed and made a face like a toddler who’d just touched the stove. “Hot,” he announced.

  “I don’t think you killed George Hannity,” I said firmly. It was from left field, but I decided to go with my instincts.

  “I didn’t,” he said immediately, fixing his pinkish eyes on me again. He continued to stand next to the countertop cupping his coffee mug in his hands while I sat on one of the rickety bar stools. I could think of more comfortable places to talk, but I didn’t say anything.

  “The problem is, I also think you lied to the jury.” I was trying to keep my voice soft and nonthreatening.

  “Oh,” was all he said. Another big gulp of coffee. “Who did you say you were with?” he asked. His first push back.

  “I’m on my own, not with anybody. Professional investigator. I’m looking into the Hannity murder, which I don’t think you committed, but I need to make sure. I need you to be honest with me.” He began focusing intently on my words, as though some red flag was going off in the deep recesses of his mind. He was willing himself to concentrate and shake himself out of his pot-induced haze.

  “I thought all that was over forever,” he said. “You know, there was a trial and everything. Not guilty.”

  “I remember. But you probably know that a lot of people still think you did it, and I think I can help you clear your name.”

  “Why do you want to help me?”

  “I’m in the business of helping people,” I replied. I hoped it didn’t sound too corny. Luckily he dropped it.

  “And why do you think I lied?”

  I paused a few seconds for effect. “I have reason to believe that you and your wife might not have been together on the night of the murder.” I hadn’t meant it to sound so cop-like and official.

  Now it was his turn to pause. He gulped his coffee again. I sipped mine. It was undoubtedly the worst coffee I’d ever had. Did he forget to use a filter?

  “Okay, but you said you know I’m innocent, right?”

  “Yes,” I agreed. I never said I knew he was innocent, but that was a small point. I wanted to stay on his good side. “It’s just that your alibi has some problems in terms of, uh, certain factual discrepancies. If you can work with me on this, we can get closer to finding the actual killer.”

  “Well I didn’t lie,” he said. He set his coffee mug down on the countertop and began pacing around the ki
tchen.

  “Of course it’s possible you were mistaken about certain dates or events,” I said, trying to use a soothing voice. He continued pacing. I didn’t want to trot out my photographs of him and his pool buddies because trespassing and snooping around on his property did not exactly fit with the nice-girl angle I was trying to work. I decided to make an educated bluff instead.

  “Cody,” I began, “I know you weren’t with your wife on the night of the murder. The reason I know you weren’t with her is that I know you were with . . . someone else.” Cody stopped pacing.

  “I’m hungry,” he said. He opened the refrigerator and began rummaging around. I watched. It looked pretty bare inside: several more bottles of champagne and white wine, a carton of orange juice, and what looked like more hors d’oeuvres. It didn’t look too promising, although I knew if Cody had come down with a case of the munchies he could eat just about anything. Sure enough, he pulled out a half-tray of deviled eggs. He vaguely offered me some, but I waved them off.

  He ate the first one in two bites, and licked his fingers. He was not at all self-conscious, but self-consciousness wasn’t a quality one expects to find in a former male stripper. The second deviled egg met substantially the same fate as the first.

  “It’s been like three years. Maybe I don’t remember anything at all,” he said with a half-full mouth. It wasn’t a denial, and that was all the confirmation I needed.

  “The other person you were with,” I said, looking him in the eye, “wasn’t a woman, was it?”

  He picked out another egg and returned the plastic tray to the fridge. He was still moving deliberately, but I sensed he was beginning to come out of his haze. He reprised his deviled egg routine: two bites, chewing, licking of fingers. I cringed privately.