Mayhem in High Heels (16 page)

At least, she had been before Ricky. Apparently Ricky and monogamy worked for her, for which I was eternally grateful. (My midnight "Maddie, I'm such a bad person because I just slept with Mr. Blank and Mr. Blank in one night" calls had significantly decreased.)

However thanks to her many hours in the arms of rock stars, Dana knew her way around the backstage at just about any venue in Los Angeles.

And the Inca was no exception.

She pushed her way through the mob to a spot on the far side where a small staircase led to a level just below the stage. A big guy with bulging forearms stood there, an earpiece in his ear, sunglasses covering his eyes even in the dim horror house lighting.

Dana held up the backstage pass around her neck and he silently stepped aside, opening the door for us. A line of groupies behind us shouted, "No fair!"

I couldn't help feeling just a little cool.

We followed a corridor to a big room full of tables of pizza and beer, reams of wires and amplifier cords and guys in black jeans, flannel shirts, and backwards baseball caps skittering every which way.

A particularly large one in a black hat with a green pot plant painted on the brim and sporting a belly that looked like he was due in June spotted us right way.

"Dude, Dana!"

He grabbed Dana like she was a ragdoll and spun her around.

"Hey, long time no see," Dana responded once he'd put her down. "You remember Maddie. Maddie, Mort, my old roomie.

"Hi," I said, raising a hand in greeting.

"'Sup, dude?" Mort said, nodding my direction by way of greeting.

I took it to be a rhetorical question as his bloodshot eyes immediately went back to Dana. Or, I should say, her cleavage.

"Dude, you look good. Watcha been up to?"

"You know. Same old."

"Well, whatever you been doing, keep doin' it." He cackled at his own joke, showing off a row of teeth that didn't see much time at the dentist.

"I was wondering if it would be possible to talk to the band?" I asked him.

I was half afraid I was shouting, as that ringing was still echoing in my ears. But if I was, he didn't seem to notice. Or maybe he was just permanently deaf from one too many nights on the road.

"Yeah. Totally. They're chillin' in the green room. You wanna meet 'em?"

I nodded.

"Cool. Follow me, dude," he said. He grabbed Dana's hand and steered us down another corridor.

I heard them before we saw them. Loud laughter and female screeching, punctuated by the occasional song verse, poured out into the hallway as we approached an open doorway on the right.

As we entered the green room (which, by the way, was actually a dingy gray) the first thing I saw was vodka bottles. Lots of them. Mostly empty. A faint sweet scent hung in the air, like Mrs. Rosenblatt's incense burner, and a thin haze of smoke drifted near the ceiling. I tried to take shallow breaths, remembering my one not-so-swell encounter with pot in high school when I'd spent two hours giggling like a maniac, then polished off every box of Duncan Hines cake mix in the house.

The band--along with a generous helping of girls in miniskirts and tube tops--sprawled on a pair of sofas that looked like they'd been salvaged in a Dumpster dive. Dana paused, adjusting her bra upward and her top downward before we approached.

"Rockin' set tonight, Alex," Mort said to the one in the kilt.

"Thanks, man," he responded, doing some sort of complicated handshake thing with him.

"Dude, this is Dana. She used to live with me, man."

"Right on!" the singer replied. He turned his attention to Dana, holding out a hand. "Hey."

"Hey. You guys are great."

He grinned like he already knew it. "Thanks."

"This is Maddie," she said gesturing to me. "We heard about your band from Gigi. Gigi Van Doren," she said, stretching the truth just a little.

I watched the lead singer's face closely for a reaction, but only the same slightly stoned one stared back at me. "Cool."

"Did you know her?" Dana probed. "Gigi?"

He shook his head. "Nope." He turned to his band mates. "Hey, any of you guys know a Gigi?"

The guy in the leather pants stood up, almost toppling over the brunette hanging on his arm in the process. "What about her?" he asked.

"I'm a friend of hers. Or... was..." I said, correcting myself. "Maddie."

He nodded. "Hey. Spike."

"You knew Gigi, Spike?"

He nodded again. "Yeah."

"You were dating?" I asked, realizing I was going to have to be direct with this guy. Though whether it was grief or vodka creating the one-word answers, I wasn't sure.

"Yeah, we went out," he said.

And as I got a closer look at him, I could see why Gigi had been drawn to him. He had jet black hair that curled a little near his ears. Uncommonly vivid blue eyes and small piercings in each ear that gave him a bad boy look while still being approachable. In addition to the assets highlighted by his tight leather pants, thick muscles ripped along his forearms and chest, contained by a loose-fitting black tank showing off biceps that made me check the corners of my mouth for drool. Intricate dragon tattoos snaked down both of his arms. All in all, Rock God personified.

"I'm sorry for your loss," I said.

His eyes darkened, hitting the floor. "Yeah."

"How long had you been seeing each other?"

"A few months," he said. "But it was serious, you know? I mean, we like felt a total connection right away."

I shot a quick glance back at his displaced brunette.

"For real," he said, following my gaze. "Look, I may hang with the groupies a little now and then, but with Gigi and me it was the real deal."

"I can't help but ask - she was a bit older than you, wasn't she?" Dana said trying to put it as delicately as she could that they were a virtual odd couple.

Spike grinned. "Hey, I dig mature girls," he said. Then glanced my way.

I threw my shoulders back, thrusting my barely B's a little higher. Hey, I was
not
mature.

"Anyway, she was generous," he continued. "She didn't mind throwing a little money my way now and then, you know. It's tough when you're just starting out. We've got all kinds of studio expenses and stuff. She was a doll about pitching in now and then."

"Ah," I said. Sugar Momma. "When was the last time you saw her?" I asked.

He bit his lip, his eyes turning watery before hitting the floor again. "Last week. We went to dinner."

"Not since then?" I asked, stopping myself just short of asking if he'd been her mystery meeting on Saturday.

He shook his head, black curls bobbing around his ears. "We had a gig last week. At some fundraiser in... uh... hey?" he called over his shoulder to his band mates. "Where the hell were we last week?"

"Topeka, man," the guitar player answered around an armful of redhead.

"Yeah, right. Topeka. It was a benefit for the library there. Those Kansas dudes were real cool."

I felt my best lead quickly slipping away. Topeka was a far cry from Beverly Hills. "When did you get back?" I asked, grasping.

"Last night. Night before. I dunno. It's kinda like a blur, ya know?"

From the number of empty bottles littering the room, I could see why.

"How were things between you and Gigi?" I asked.

His head snapped up. "Why? What did she tell you?"

I bit my lip. "Uh... I'd rather hear your side of it first."

He sighed deeply, rubbing his hands up and down his thighs as if I was making his palms sweat.

"Look, I... I'll be honest, I'm not sure how things were between me and Gigi. I was totally into her, you know? Like, I'd fallen hard."

My troubles seeing the two of them as a serious couple must have shown on my face as he continued.

"I know what you're thinking. And, yeah, neither of us set out to fall in love. But we did. At least... I did."

The way his eyes shifted away, I got the feeling there was a whole lot more to the statement.

"She didn't return your feelings?"

He let out a deep sigh. "Look, we'd been going through a rough patch and I wanted to let Gigi know how I felt. When we went to dinner last week... well... I proposed."

I raised one eyebrow. "As in marriage?"

He nodded.

"And what did Gigi say?" Dana asked.

"She said she needed some time."

"Ouch."

"Yeah. Tell me about it," he sent me a rueful grin.

"So, after she had some time? What did she say?"

He took a deep breath, pursing his lips together. "Nothing. She... I didn't talk to her again until she..."

Was murdered.

I put a hand on his arm, genuinely feeling awful for the guy. "I'm so sorry."

He nodded. "Thanks."

"You mentioned you and Gigi were going through a rough patch?" Dana asked.

He blew a long breath out toward the ceiling. "Yeah. We were. But, look, it totally wasn't my fault. I didn't know."

"What wasn't your fault?" I asked, trying to follow.

"Okay, a couple weeks ago I think I'm gonna surprise Gigi by taking her out to lunch. I go to that wedding place of hers, but the chick at the front desk informs me she's with a client. You know the one - blonde, totally big boobs. Hot?"

I nodded. That seemed to be the general male consensus about Allie.

"Anyway," he went on, "I figure, might as well pass the time. I start talking to her. Turns out she's a music fan, so I offer her a couple tickets to our next show. That's when Gigi comes out and sees me talking up her assistant."

"She was jealous?"

"Dude, not even the word for it. She was really pissed."

"What did she say?'

"Nothing then. But after, at lunch, she was totally all over me about it. I said I was sorry, that I'd never even look at the chick again, that I was just trying to be friendly. But she was like on the warpath, man."

"What happened afterward?"

"I bought her flowers every day for, like, a week." He smiled at the memory. "Finally, she calmed down. But, like I said, I wanted her to know that she was the only woman for me."

"Are you sure all you did was talk to Allie?" Dana asked, popping one hip out as she eyed the brunette behind him.

"Dude, I swear on my life. I was totally faithful to Gigi." He paused. "I think she knew it, too. But, well, seeing me with Allie, she just went off. If it had been anyone else, I'm sure she wouldn't have thought twice about it."

"Because Allie is so hot?" I asked, really getting tired of that broken record. Geeze, just cause a girl's got enlarged memory glands.

He grinned. "Sure she's hot. But that wasn't what set Gigi off. What set her off was she thought I was hitting on her daughter."

Chapter Twelve

I felt my jaw drop open as my rusty mental wheels started to turn. "Allie was her daughter?"

Spike nodded, his eyes solemn. "Sucks, right? If I knew, I totally would have steered clear of the chick. I mean, I was in love with Gigi, you know?"

I shook my head, wondering why Allie hadn't mentioned this. Granted, it did explain the hero worship she'd exhibited and the deep grief she'd seemed to be experiencing. But if Allie was her daughter, that added a whole new layer to the puzzle. Maybe Allie had had a falling out with her mother? Over money? With the kind of dough Gigi was raking in, I could see Allie being resentful about her starving student's apartment.

On the other hand, maybe they'd fought over Spike.

I took a long look at the musician. He was a co-ed's dream, no doubt about it. Maybe Allie had been jealous of her mother? Maybe Gigi had been angry at Allie, too. Maybe they'd fought, and in the heat of the moment, Allie had stabbed her mother.

Had the hot blonde been playing me all along?

"Do you know if Allie and her mother got along?" I asked.

Spike shook his head. "Sorry, no idea. That day was the first I'd heard she even had a daughter. Gigi said she didn't tell people because she didn't want them knowing she was really old enough to have a grown kid. She fooled me. I had no idea how old she was. Not that I cared. Gigi was beautiful. Nature took real good care of her, ya know?"

I knew. Though I had a feeling it was more Dr. 90210 taking care of Gigi than nature.

"Did Gigi blame Allie? For flirting with you?"

He sucked in a deep breath, his eyes going to a spot past me. "I wouldn't say she was flirting. Maybe just kinda friendly like. But, in her defense, she didn't know Gigi and I were going out. Gigi kept our relationship real on the down-low. After the tabloids raked her over the coals with her divorce last year, she didn't want anyone butting into her personal life."

I didn't blame her. I knew firsthand how it felt to be raked by Felix.

"Dude, your brunette's getting cold," the bass player called, hailing Spike over.

Spike looked over his shoulder at the groupie in fishnets and short-shorts. Only the look in his eyes was more sad than lustful.

"Look, I don't know what else I can tell you," he said. "I loved Gigi, plain and simple. Life won't be the same without her." With that, he sauntered back over the sofa and grabbed a stray vodka bottle, downing a generous swing.

And by the way the brunette's cleavage failed to gain his attention as we ducked out of the room, I was inclined to believe him. Whatever might have gone on between him and Gigi, the poor guy was visibly heartbroken.

"So, what do we think of Band Boy?" I asked, once we were out of earshot.

Dana shrugged. "Cute. Sad."

I nodded. "But he
did
have motive."

"You think?" she asked, wrinkling up her nose.

"Well, if Gigi declined his proposal, chances are that would be the end of his music bankroll. I mean, we really only have his word she didn't say no."

She nodded. "True. But he was in Topeka."

"Maybe. They seemed a little hazy on when they actually got back."

"Good point," she conceded. "So, what now?"

"Now? I wanna go home, soak in a long bath, and wait for my ears to stop ringing." I turned to make for a bright green exit sign at the end of the hall.