by Misa Ramirez
“Thank you, Mr.—”
“Steve. Just Steve.”
Just Steve, who knew all the cheerleaders. “And I’m Lola.”
He pushed the other man forward. “And this is my brother, Larry.”
Larry barely acknowledged me before glancing down the line of dancers.
Steve gave an all-encompassing wave. “Girls. Break a leg, each and every one of you.”
“Thanks, Stevie!” The women reached their hands out to Steve as the men passed by, almost as if he were a movie star.
I raised a questioning brow at Cassie.
“The team’s trainer,” she told me.
The way she hesitated made me think she was about to say something else. Like were they really brothers?
“Season ticket holders. They sit right next to the owner’s seats,” Cassie added.
So they were VIPs. Before I could find out any more, Victoria’s voice drifted down the line. “Ready, ladies?”
The team let out a collective woo-hoo!
Victoria adjusted her headphones and held up her index finger, telling us to wait. After another few minutes she gave a succinct nod, her gaze traveling down the line, and said, “One, two, three…go!”
Adrenaline surged through my body as I jogged out onto the dimly lit court. Strobe lights and the pulsing beat of the music throbbed right along with my heart. The crowd in the arena was charged. Their energy zipped in a flurry around the court and I felt ready. As ready as I’d ever be.
We spread out, six of us on one side of the court, the other six on the opposite side. We bounced from one foot to the other, extending pointed toes as the Royals’s names and numbers were called out to the cheering crowd, spotlights illuminating their lean, muscular, massive bodies. The team gathered in a circle, breaking a moment later to even more raucous cheers.
The dancers lined up and Cassie leaned in close to me. “Never seen one up close?”
I snapped my jaw back into place. “Nope.”
“Check out Number Fifty-one.”
I searched the back of the jerseys and saw the leopardlike body of the player Cassie was staring at. Charcoal skin. Tattoos snaking up one arm and down the other. Bald—in a sexy way. “Uh-huh.”
“Gorgeous. He’s a rookie. Had a slow start but now he’s running circles around the others.”
I was pretty sure lust had Cassie thinking that Number 51 could leap tall buildings in a single bound.
Who knew? Maybe he could.
The announcer asked the audience to rise, remove their caps, and listen while the “Star Spangled Banner” was sung a cappella by a local college music major. The Royals and the opposing team lined up on the court, hands over their hearts.
“What about Twenty-Three?” I asked, noticing his heavier physique.
“Doesn’t play as much ’cause he’s slower.” She fanned herself with her hand. “But he’s hot. Hell, they’re all hot. Why else would I take this gig? I’m going to get me one of them.”
My eyes still searched the crowd—as if the letter writer, or a delivery boy, would be glowing red—as I talked to Cassie. “You’re on the dance team to get close to the players?”
Her response? A wink.
So she wasn’t one of the smarter ones.
The crowd erupted as the singer’s voice stretched an octave and sang, “O’er the land of the free.” Were they cheering because America was free or because she hit the note? I couldn’t tell.
Jennifer turned on cue from Victoria and led us back through the tunnel.
It was a whirlwind after that. I trailed after the girls into the dressing room for a quick outfit change. I followed what Jennifer did, stripping off my halter top. The big difference? She didn’t cringe at the crisscrossed duct tape across her chest. I shuddered at the tape across mine. But then again, after a few years, she had to be used to it.
Good God, in a million years, I’d never have imagined myself in this situation.
Jennifer slipped into a tight navy camisole, then slid a shimmering silver scarf-blouse on top of it. I followed suit, adjusting the gaping neck, then changed into the jazz pants—which were more stretchy than I’d originally thought they’d be, but I was still sure were actually made for a child.
Jennifer re-applied her lipstick and so did I. Some of the girls scarfed down food from the buffet table. I walked by and did a double take. The Rice Krispies Treats had vanished.
“They’re always the first to go,” Jennifer said, following my gaze.
I didn’t believe in diets, and I had no problem eating dessert first. But I sure never would have pegged the cheerleaders as free-for-all eaters. “I just thought they would eat salads and fruits.”
“We do. But we also like our sweets.”
Or maybe they had a nasty thing called bulimia. That was something I didn’t want to investigate.
We headed back to the tunnel and spent the next ten minutes hovering behind Victoria until a timeout was called.
One of the players, buckled over in pain, hobbled past us, the team trainer by his side. They stopped midway past the line of dancers and Carrie reached out to him. “Stevie, what happened?”
Steve breezed by, taking the player by the arm and helping him along. “Minor injury. No worries, ladies. He’ll be fine.”
“Is it bad?” Cassie said, and I got the impression that she wouldn’t mind playing nursemaid.
I followed them with my eyes. Cassie’s admission that she was on the team only to snag herself a hot ballplayer had my brain working. Rochelle seemed to have landed herself one in Michael Brothers. What if the other players didn’t like the dancers breaking the rules? Or what if…I gave myself a mental head slap. ¡Por supuesto!
It could be a player or a disgruntled wife behind the notes. Of course, that was a hypothesis—one I’d have to flesh out more.
The letter came in the third quarter. A fresh-faced ball boy jogged through the tunnel, an envelope clutched in his hand. Without a word he handed it to Geneva, a dancer who hadn’t needed duct tape to prop up her cleavage, with legs about a mile long.
“Hey,” I called, trying to catch the ball boy’s attention, but he disappeared as play started on the court again. I scoured the perimeter of the arena, but every single person seemed focused on the game. No one was paying any attention to Geneva.
She flipped the envelope from front to back as if she were searching for some indication of who it was from. She hadn’t been at the meeting at Camacho’s, so she didn’t know what Manny had said about not opening the envelope and minimizing touching it to preserve the fingerprints. It seemed like Victoria and Lance hadn’t relayed that information, either, and being undercover meant I couldn’t very well tell her.
Geneva ran her finger under the flap and pulled out a rectangular sheet of paper identical to the ones I’d seen in the conference room at Camacho’s. She read the message, and with a puzzled face, flipped over the sheet.
As casually as I possibly could, I edged toward her just as she turned to Nicole, the dancer standing next to her. “I got one.”
Nicole’s eyes bugged and her lips parted. “Shit, really? Says the same thing?”
I seized the opportunity to butt in. “What’s wrong? What’s it say?”
The message behind Geneva’s scowl was clear: I better mind my own business. She crumpled the paper and tossed it to a passing waitress.
“No!” I reached for it, but the waitress scurried off to deliver a drink to one of the high-priced seats.
Damn. I’d been going for a super-smooth pluck off the waitress’s tray. Utter fail. Even worse, they’d noticed.
Geneva and Nicole stared at me.
“What’s wrong with you?” Nicole, the only other Hispanic dancer on the team, snarled. There was no Latina camarad
erie for her. In fact, she seemed to have the most disdain for me, her expression turning to a scowl whenever I was around.
“I thought you tossed that by mistake. I can go grab it back for you.” I cringed at how bad the lie was, but I had no choice but to go with it. I started to walk past them, keeping an eye on the waitress, but she disappeared into the crowd.
Victoria’s voice was like a rope pulling me to a stop. “Line up,” she said, followed by a quick succession of claps. “Time to wow the crowd with some Black Eyed Peas.”
The music blared in the arena and Jennifer led the dancers back out. I fell into line, searching for the waitress as I left the tunnel. No luck. She was gone, and short of Dumpster diving in all of the arena’s garbage bins, I doubted I’d ever find the note Geneva had crumpled and thrown away.
The clue had slipped right between my fingers.
Chapter Six
I spent the next day tracking down Rochelle Nolan, the woman who’d quit the Courtside Dancers. Finding her address—a sprawling custom home out in Granite Bay—was easy. Getting past the security guard for the gated community wasn’t. I’d brought along my poor, neglected Boxer, Salsa, and poor, neglected Reilly for the company, but now I was wishing I’d come sola. It would have been easier to try to sweet-talk my way past the guard if I’d been by myself.
Reilly, with her newly colored orange hair (to celebrate autumn, she’d said) and slinky black leggings paired with a colorful patchwork swing blouse, filled me in on all her Neil chisme. She didn’t leave out a single detail. Not one. By the time we reached Granite Bay, my eyes had glazed from too much information.
Salsa panted from the cargo area of the CRV as I drove, her tongue hanging out the side of her drooping mouth. What if I had to sneak in? How was I going to do that with Reilly and Salsa in tow? ¡Ay, caramba! What had I been thinking?
“I know, baby,” I cooed, glancing at her in the rearview mirror. “I’ll take you for a run later, promise.”
“What now?” Reilly asked, twirling a strand of her hair.
“You and Salsa can wait here while I try to find a place to hop the fence,” I suggested.
She wagged her finger at me, looking for all the world like she was going to say, “Uh-uh, no you didn’t.” But instead she said, “You’re loca. Loca. First of all, I did not come all this way to the ritzy part of town only to sit in the car with your dog. No way. If this is how the other half lives, I wanna see it. Like up close and personal. And second of all, I want to see what kind of woman lands herself a professional basketball player. I mean, it didn’t work out so good for Vanessa Williams, if you know what I mean, and what about Kobe Bryant? ’Course that’s the Lakers, so that may be the problem, but I think they’re all serial cheaters. I mean, what about Wilt Chamberlain?”
“But look at Lamar Odom—”
Reilly wagged her finger at me. “Oh no, don’t even get me started on Lamar and Khloe. They’re bucking the odds.” She rapped her knuckles on the car’s plastic interior. “Knock on wood.” She kept talking, as if I hadn’t interrupted.
“So if your girl…Rochelle, right?” I nodded, and she went on, working herself into a tizzy. “If your girl Rochelle landed herself one of the few monogamous players out there, I just want to take a gander at her, entiendes? You cannot make me stay out here. Uh-uh. No way.”
“So what about climbing the fence?” I asked her, but I knew the answer. Exercise wasn’t one of her favorite pastimes. Yes, she was usually game for any sidekick P.I. duty, but that didn’t mean she was willing to risk her freedom by breaking into the gated community in broad daylight.
“Uh-uh, no way,” she said again, and then she flashed me a flirty grin. “I save my athleticism for my teddy bear.”
Salsa’s floppy ears perked up, but I peered at Reilly and said, “¿Qué dices? No, no, no. T.M.I.”
She shrugged. “I’m just saying…”
“A few months ago you were head over heels in love with Antonio. Don’t you think you’re moving a bit fast with Neil?”
Her mouth gaped open. “No way, chica! When you know, you know. Antonio was a diversion. He was eye candy. Nothing but a one-night stand—”
“But you didn’t have a one-night stand with him!”
“Your brother is smokin’ hot, Lola, but Neil? Neil is the real deal.” She winked and added, “He knows just what to do.”
“¡Ay, ay, ay!” I muttered, shaking my head. The girl had it bad. “I just don’t want you to be hurt.”
“Don’t worry about me. I’m good. You just worry about Jack. What happened to him, anyway?” She turned in her seat, staring at me as if I were Jennifer Lopez. “Oh no! You didn’t break up, did you? Oh, tell me you and Jack are together.”
I patted the air with one hand. “Cálmate.”
She rolled down the window of my CRV, sucking in a deep breath. “I’m calm,” she said, turning back to me. “Now, tell me.”
Poppies growing on the side of the road gave me an idea. I turned onto Auburn Folsom Road and headed back the way we’d come, searching for a grocery store. “We’re not together,” I said, “but we’re not not together.”
Salsa whimpered in the back as Reilly harrumphed. My peanut gallery. “Um, what does that even mean?”
Buena pregunta. “Good question,” I answered, and then debated how to answer. “I told you about the Sarah thing. She’s like a disobedient child. Her family keeps coming to get her, but then she goes off her meds and sneaks away—”
“To Jack,” Reilly finished.
“Exactamente.”
“And he takes her back, or what?”
“No.” To his credit. I knew he was trying to cut ties, but the girl was crazy. “He’s kicked her out.”
“So what’s the problem? You know he’s into you.”
Leave it to Reilly to cut to the chase. I gripped the steering wheel, wishing I could avoid the question. In the rearview mirror, I met Salsa’s melancholy eyes. She scooted forward, resting her jowls on the backrest of the seat. Sweet girl. She thought she was human, and sometimes I wondered just how much she really understood.
“Come on. Spill it.”
But I didn’t have to, at least not quite yet. I spotted a Bel Air Market and whipped into the parking lot. Saved by the grocery store. The Indian summer had finally given way to cool autumn temperatures, so I cracked the window and left Salsa in the car to hold down the fort. Sixty dollars later, I owned a lovely flower arrangement, and five minutes later we were heading back to Rochelle Nolan’s gated community.
“Clever,” Reilly said, holding onto the flower vase.
“It’s worth a shot.” We’d come all this way. To go back to Sacramento with nothing to show for our time wasn’t going to earn me any P.I. points at the office.
“So,” Reilly said after a spell. “Nice try, but what’s the answer?”
Damn. She was nothing if not dogged. “What was the question?”
“That Jack Callaghan is into you, so what’s your problem? Have you, you know”—she lowered her voice, as if there were children in the car who she didn’t want to hear—“done the deed?”
Any good Catholic girl would have blushed at that question. I was a very good Catholic girl. My mother would’ve been proud. “Híjole, Reilly. What kind of question is that?”
“Curious minds, and all that.” She grinned like she thought she knew the answer.
Which she didn’t.
“Pues, truth?” I finally said.
“¡Sí, sí, sí!” She angled herself more toward me, as if I were going to give her all the down and dirty details of Jack and me.
Only there were no down and dirty details.
“No.”
There. I’d said it. If only there were a few flies in the car she could catch with her open mouth.
> The flowers started lilting right. “Wait…what?”
“Reilly!”
I grabbed for the vase, but she managed to straighten it before the flowers fell out, never even blinking. The girl was single-minded. “But you were with Sergio, and—”
I threw up my hand, stopping her short. I did not need a rundown of my past sexual exploits. “¡Cállate! With Jack, it’s different. Ever since high school, I knew—”
“Lola. This isn’t high school.”
Boy, did I know that. When I was a nubile sixteen-year-old, Jack was the sexiest teenager I’d ever laid eyes on. Pero now? At thirty-one, he was downright irresistible. How I steered clear of him on a continual basis was a mystery. “If it’s going to happen, I just don’t want there to be any baggage.”
Reilly, the newly anointed relationship expert, scoffed. Scoffed! “There’s always baggage, right? Take Neil. All his contacts, like the DMV girl, and the courthouse girl, and the Caltrans girl? Not just friends. Uh-uh. They’re all exes. He’s got loads of baggage, but he’s still the right one for me.” She paused, the flowers listing again, a momentary frown crossing her lips. “Pretty sure he is, anyway.”
“That’s my point,” I said, turning onto the gated drive of Rochelle’s development. “If it’s going to happen, I want to know for sure. I don’t want to wonder.”
She shook her orange-haired head. “You never know for sure. You have to take a chance every now and then.”
As I rolled down my window, I glanced at Reilly, wondering when she had become the voice of reason in my romantic life.
…
Reilly squealed as the security guard opened the gate and waved us through. “I can’t believe it worked!”
“Yeah, easy.” Some security station. Either the guard was horrible at his job, or they had loose rules about delivery people coming in and out. Either way, it didn’t give me confidence that paying top dollar to live in a gated community was worth the extra money.
We wound through the rolling hills of the neighborhood, searching for the address I’d found for Rochelle. The sprawling estates with their waterfalls, fountains, cobbled driveways, and turrets made me feel like I was on a movie set rather than in a suburb of Sacramento. So this was how the rich lived.
