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When no one answered, Cleo stuck her hand into the geranium planter next to the door and felt around the edge. No key. She rubbed the dirt from her slender fingers.
“No key?” Alec echoed her thoughts like he had a direct pipeline.
She scowled at him and got a smirk in return.
When she pulled her phone from her purse, he asked, “Calling Jada?”
“You should have been a detective. It’s a crime you waste those powers of deduction at a tabloid.”
“If I were a detective, would you answer my question?”
She released a put-upon sigh as she closed the connection and started dialing another number.
“Who’re you calling now?”
He was the nosiest man in the world. She made him wait a few seconds before she said, “Annaliese.”
“That’s a long shot. If she’s in jail―”
“Hi, honey,” her mom said.
Apparently, she wasn’t in jail.
Cleo turned away as though she could exclude Alec from the conversation, even though she knew he heard every word she said. Hell, she wouldn’t be surprised if he found a way to tap her phone so he could hear both sides of the conversation. “Where are you? No one’s at the condo.”
“What are you doing there?”
“Jada called and said―” but her mother was already talking to someone else—Jada presumably—so Cleo waited. Impatiently.
Arranging bail on a murder charge usually took time, if you could get it at all. Nor did cops let prisoners have phones. So Jada had gotten it wrong. Cleo should have known.
Annaliese came back on the line. “We’re at the casino. Jada’s working tonight. I’ll meet you in the cantina after the show starts.”
The cantina inside the casino was a staff favorite. “I’ll see you there.” Cleo stuffed the phone back into her purse. She’d give anything if Alec weren’t there, but she doubted there was a chance in hell she could get rid of him. “Come on, Dick Tracy.”
They got in the car and headed back to the Strip. He tried to find out what was going on, but she couldn’t tell him what she didn’t know.
Sebastian’s death hadn’t hurt business. El Dorado was swarming. A TV truck was parked outside when they drove past the entrance on their way to the parking garage, a cameraman focused on a woman holding a microphone with the casino in the background as they taped her report.
Inside the casino, it sounded like a zoo at feeding time.
“You can book a room while we’re here,” Cleo said as they walked onto the main floor.
“Don’t you mean, ‘we can book rooms’?”
“Yes, of course. That’s what I meant.” She’d even do it, if that was what it took to shake him. It might even be for the best. If she didn’t stay at her mother’s, she stood a better chance of keeping Annaliese and Alec apart.
They were almost past the gaming tables when someone called her name.
A ginger-haired man wore a welcoming grin over the white shirt, black pants, and black vest emblazoned with the casino’s logo. He was either setting up or shutting down because the blackjack table he stood behind was devoid of customers.
Robbie Jorgenson. Great. The curse of being from Vegas was you always ran into people you knew.
She gave a half-hearted wave, hoping she’d get away with that, but Robbie circled the end of the table and came toward them. “Hey, Cleo.” He topped his greeting with a hug, swaying side to side as though a simple embrace wasn’t enough. Her return hug was tepid.
“Hi, Robbie.”
He stepped back, still grinning. “Long time no see.”
“Yeah, it has been a long time. How are you doing?”
“Comme ci, comme ca. You know how it goes. Mary and I are expecting our third.”
Was she supposed to know who he’d married? She didn’t. “Congratulations.”
Behind her, Alec cleared his throat. “Oh, Robbie, this is Alec Ramirez. Alec, this is Robbie Jorgenson. Robbie and I went to school together.”
“Yup. Proud graduates of Bonanza High.” Robbie shook Alec’s hand.
“Congratulations.”
Was Alec congratulating Robbie for the coming child? Or was he being snarky and congratulating him for graduating? She wouldn’t put it past him to get in a subtle dig.
“Koblect’s death doesn’t seem to have hurt business any,” Alec said.
“Nope. If anything, it’s better than usual,” Robbie said. “Lots of looky loos coming in.” He turned back to Cleo. “You going to be around a while?”
“A day or two maybe. We’re on our way to meet Annaliese.”
Robbie colored. He always had blushed easily, and mentioning her mother was a guaranteed way to end the encounter.
“Well, then, I’ll let you go.” He shifted his attention to Alec. “Hope you have a good time while you’re here.”
“I’m sure I will.”
Cleo started off, walking at a brisk clip past banks of ringing slot machines, hoping it would keep Alec from commenting. They were almost to the showroom when she heard her name again. Damn, damn, damn. She turned, almost running into Alec.
He caught her by the shoulders to keep from being bowled over.
A tall, leggy blonde dressed in tight, black stretch pants and a gray off-one-shoulder top materialized to Cleo’s left, grabbed her from Alec’s hands, and crushed her in the kind of hug one got from long-lost friends. “It’s so good to see you.”
Before Cleo could hug back, the woman who had once been her mother’s best friend thrust her to arm’s length. “I heard you were in town a while back, but you know . . .”
If she had to run into someone else she knew, she was glad it was this woman. “Yeah, I do. How are you, Willa?”
“Oh, I’m the same as ever.”
She was tall and, even though she’d been retired for ten years, still had a dancer’s lithe body. Cleo couldn’t remember the woman’s natural hair color. Today, it was an unlikely shad of blonde that reminded her of daffodils. An inch-long purple feather lay on her shoulder. A smaller one clung to the hair near her temple, as though she were molting, and glitter sparkled on the back of her hand.
“And you.” Willa poked Cleo as if Cleo might mistake who she was talking about. “With your big career. Writing for The Sun. Nominated for a big award.”
Alec stood behind her, waiting, she was sure, for her to tell Willa she’d changed jobs, but she couldn’t do it. Instead, she said, “I wasn’t nominated. The paper gets the nomination, not the repo―”
“But it was your story. Everyone kept saying, ‘Can you believe Annaliese’s little―’”
“Uh, yeah. I’m sure they were all stunned I made good.” She hadn’t meant to sound rude. Or bitter. But she’d had to cut Willa off and the words popped out. Time to steer the conversation away from “Annaliese’s little girl.”
She could practically feel Alec wondering what was wrong with her.
“What’s the scuttlebutt about Sebastian?” Cleo asked.
“Oh, lord. It’s awful, isn’t it?” Willa pressed her hand to her chest, fingers splayed. “No one’s talking about anything else. The rumors are crazy, you know?” Her voice dropped as though she were sharing secrets. “I heard someone say he overdosed on Viagra and it caused a heart attack.” She cocked her head and looked vaguely off into the distance. “Or was it an aneurism?”
Alec made a noise like a suppressed cough. Or like he’d choked on the urge to laugh.
“I don’t think Viagra can cause heart attacks,” Cleo said, “or aneurisms.”
“Really? I always figured there had to be some consequences since men never seem to have enough blood to run both their heads at once. Well, whatever.” Willa’s hand fluttered in the air. “Rumor also says he was with a couple of women. He always was one for the ladies, so that doesn’t surprise anyone. But you know that since Annaliese used to date him.”
Yeah. Dating. That wasn’t what Cleo called it. “How’s everyone taking his death?”
“Aside from having something to talk about, everybody’s wondering who’s going to take over. The girls are all nervous that whoever it is will decide showgirl revues are passé and they’ll be out on the street. It wouldn’t be good for me either.”
Cleo’s head bobbed in a sympathetic nod. “Change is scary.” She should know. The changes she’d just made in her own life only reinforced how much she hated it.
“So who’s this?” Willa asked, looking Alec up and down.
Cleo heaved a mental sigh. “This is Alec.”
Willa gave Cleo a meaningful look, complete with eyebrow cock. “New boyfriend?”
Now that was a scary thought. Cleo fought down a shudder. “No, Alec is a colleague.”
“Oh, at The Sun.” Willa extended her hand.
“No,” Alec said, “I―”
He was just a few words away from blowing Cleo’s pretense out of the water. He smirked at her as if he was going to enjoy this. She closed her eyes and waited for the ax to fall. It didn’t come. What was he waiting for? Then she heard him say, “I’m a stringer. Cleo’s being kind enough to show me the ropes.”
Her eyes flew open. His gaze was on her, with something that looked suspiciously like sympathy on his face.
“A stringer?” Willa asked.
Alec pulled his gaze back to Willa. “Yeah. I work freelance. Like Cleo did before The Sun snatched her up.”
“So you’re here on a story?” Then Willa’s voice quieted, as though she’d just made the connection. “You’re covering Sebastian’s death.”
“Uh, yeah,” Cleo jumped in, hoping she didn’t look as confused as she felt. Why hadn’t he blown her cover? “We’re doing some preliminary legwork. You know. Seeing if there is a story.”
Willa winced. “You won’t use that crack about the Viagra, will you? That’s just . . . you know. Nothing. You know how this place is. Gossip Central.”
Cleo heard herself laugh. “No, I won’t use it.” But it was exactly the kind of headline she could envision on The Word’s banner.
Willa made a show of wiping her brow. “Whew. I gotta remember who I’m talking to before I shoot my mouth off.”
“Don’t worry, Willa,” Alec said. “You’re among friends. But you’re right. You need to be careful.” His gaze flicked toward Cleo before settling back on Willa. “I’ll bet there are folks here from those nasty tell-all tabloids. You can bet they’d run with the Viagra angle.”
Cleo yanked on his arm, and he fell back a step. He’d been kind moments before—not that she needed or wanted his kindness—but now he was back to tormenting her. “I’m so glad we ran into you, Willa, but we’re meeting Annaliese.” She stepped back, drawing Alec with her.
“Oh, yeah. Sure. I’ve got to hustle anyway.” Willa glanced at her watch. “If I’m not back with Liz’s favorite brand of sparkling water before the first number is up, she’ll have a tizzy fit, you know?”
Cleo stopped and Alec bumped against her, but she barely noticed. “Liz is working tonight?”
“Oh, yeah.” Willa’s nose wrinkled as if her tone wasn’t enough to tip Cleo off that she thought Liz lacked even a basic level of class. “And she’s playing the grieving widow for all it’s worth. I guess it slipped her mind their divorce is going to be final next week.” She stopped for a moment, a stunned look crossing her face before she corrected herself. “Was going to be final. I guess it really hasn’t sunk in yet, you know?” She looked at her watch again. “I gotta run. Don’t be a stranger.” She flung her hand up in a quick wave and headed for a concessionaire off the main room.
~***~
Alec fell into step beside Cleo as she turned toward their original destination. “So how do you know Willa?”
Her jaw tensed as though she didn’t want to answer, but she had to know he’d ask. He was a reporter. It was his job to be nosey.
“She used to be a showgirl. Now she’s a dresser. She also helps take care of the costumes.”
“That would explain the feathers and the glitter,” he said.
She put on a burst of speed, and he lengthened his pace to keep up.
“And Liz would be Elizabeth Morrow, who was about to be the fifth ex-Mrs. Koblect?”
“Yes.” Cleo turned into a cafeteria-style restaurant off the main room. She stopped just inside the door, looking, Alec presumed, for Annaliese. He stopped beside her and swept his gaze over the room, challenging himself to pick the outrageous woman he’d talked to on the phone out of the crowd.
Several women sat at tables, mostly in pairs or with a man. The only woman sitting alone was a tall, skinny blonde. If that was Annaliese, he was going to be severely disappointed.
Then he spotted a tall woman with shoulder-length dark hair standing with a forearm braced across the top of the cash register, one hip cocked, talking to a younger man behind the counter.
She wore tight jeans over a black scoop-neck dancer’s leotard that molded to the perfect body he’d imagined after hearing the sexual undertones of Annaliese’s voice—oh, who was he kidding? There hadn’t been anything remotely subtle about her sexuality even on the phone.
Her pose oozed the kind of sex appeal possessed by women who couldn’t help it. He was sure Helen of Troy had stood that way at every opportunity.
The cashier said something, and the woman threw her head back and laughed. This was no silvery tinkle, but a full-throated, bass-dulcimer laugh. If she wasn’t Annaliese, she should be.
Beside him, Cleo sighed heavily.
The woman was too far away to have heard, but she looked up as though she had. And then she smiled that same broad smile as Cleo’s, confirming their genetic bond.
She gave the cashier a finger wave and cut through the tables, heading straight for them.
“Hey, baby,” Annaliese said as she closed in on them.
Cleo waved half-heartedly. Her back was ramrod straight when Annaliese embraced her.
“You didn’t need to come all this way,” Annaliese said.
After a moment’s hesitation, Cleo returned Annaliese’s hug.
Then Annaliese turned toward him. Even in flat shoes, she was close enough to six feet tall, he wouldn’t want to split hairs over the difference. “And I’m going to take a chance that you’re Alec.”
“And you, of course, are Annaliese.” He couldn’t have stopped himself from smiling at her even if he’d wanted to.
“The one and only.” She flashed Cleo’s grin at him again. The one that took over the bottom half of her face. The one he was still waiting to see for real on Cleo.
She brushed his proffered hand aside and hugged him, her full breasts flattening against his chest. Oh, yeah. Wars were fought over women like her.
“You didn’t tell me he was Latino.” She spoke to Cleo over his shoulder. “Such a good choice.”
“He’s not a choice. He’s a coworker.”
Annaliese released him, stepped back, and gave him the once-over. “Work’s a great place to find romance.” She winked at him. “It’s important to know the guy has a steady job.”
Cleo released another put-upon sigh. “So what’s the story? Was there bail?” Her voice lacked any warmth.
“Sweetie, they only set bail when they arrest someone. I wasn’t arrested.”
Cleo thawed marginally. “But . . . you were at the police station, right? Jada said you were arrested.”
“No, they asked me to go in for questioning. As a party of interest.”
“Why would you be a party of interest?”
Alec shook his head in dismay. This aggressive tone couldn’t be Cleo’s normal style, or she never would have gotten the quotes that had made her almost-Pulitzer story so distinctive.
“Because I was the last person to see Sebastian alive,” Annaliese said.
That’s promising, Alec thought, perking up.
“Come on.” Annaliese turned. “Let’s grab a table.”
“Wait,” Cleo protested. “You can’t just drop a bomb like that and walk away.”
Alec silently agreed.
“Coffee first.” Annaliese led them to the coffee station and snagged a black cup large enough to double as a soup bowl with El Dorado emblazoned on it in gold from underneath the counter and poured coffee into it. One of the waitresses glanced at them. Annaliese waved a greeting and got a nod of acknowledgement in return.
Cleo grabbed a standard white cup from a stack next to the coffee machine and poured herself a cup. Alec followed suit.
Annaliese set her coffee down on an isolated table in the corner.
Alec couldn’t help admiring the smooth lines of her body when she pressed her palms against her lower back and arched. A quick breath hissed in through bared teeth, then she sat down and sipped her coffee.
“Ah, that’s better. The coffee at the police station was god-awful.” She took another sip, then focused on Cleo. “So first things first. No one’s going to get arrested for murdering Sebastian because Sebastian wasn’t murdered.”
“But they’re saying―” Cleo protested.
“Of course they are. Murder sells papers. Sebastian drowned.”
“In his bathtub,” Cleo said.
“Yes, well . . .” Annaliese shrugged. “He was drunk.”
“You told me he’d quit drinking.” Cleo’s tone held a hint of accusation.
Annaliese frowned. “You know how he was. He’d dry out, then go on a week-long binge. He’s been doing that for ten years.”
“But you said he was doing well.”
“He was. Two years. I thought it was going to take this time. I blame Liz. She played head games with him, telling him her lawyer found a loophole in their prenup. She’s got a real man-eating shark for a lawyer, so that worried Sebastian for a while.” If her shrug was meant to imply indifference, she didn’t quite pull it off. “The abstinence must have played hell with his tolerance. He didn’t seem that bad when I got there, but he got sloppy drunk fast.”
“But you weren’t there when he drowned, right?”
“Of course not. When I realized how drunk he was, I tucked him in and left.”
“What about Jada? Where―”
Alec held up his hand to interrupt. “Wait. Let me get this straight.” He pointed at Annaliese. “He was drunk enough that you put him to bed, but sober enough to get back up and take a bath? That doesn’t sound right.”
Annaliese shrugged. “I’ve seen Sebastian power nap before when he was drunk. He comes out of it still drunk but functional.”
“That’s true,” Cleo said. “I’ve seen it too.”
Alec eyed her. Her Vegas connections were far better than he’d imagined. “So he woke up, decided to take a bath, ran water into the tub, got in, and drowned?”
“He’d run a bath before I got there. The water might still have been hot enough to entice him, and it’s a spa-sized tub.”
Well, hell. Maybe Sebastian Koblect’s death wasn’t murder. Not that he couldn’t pull a story out of Koblect accidentally drowning in his own tub. It just wouldn’t be the story he was hoping for.
“Why were you there?” Alec asked.
“I stopped by to tell him I wouldn’t have the money for him until Monday.”
There was a tidbit Cleo hadn’t shared. Annaliese needed the money to pay Sebastian.
“You couldn’t have told him that on the phone?” Cleo asked.
“Yes, I could have, but I didn’t want him to think I would just have another excuse on Monday. If I told him in person, he’d know I was on the up-and-up.”
“But the police wouldn’t be interested in you if you’d just called,” Cleo said.
Annaliese picked up her cup, as though she needed something in her hands to keep her from reaching across the table and thumping Cleo. “It’s not as though I knew he was going to pick that particular evening to drown himself, now is it?”
The sharp, hostile silence that followed needed to be broken before it set down roots. “What did you tell the police about why you were there?” Alec asked.
The tension in Annaliese’s body eased. “I told them I’d stopped by to talk about the way the show’s being run, which did come up. Briefly.” She shot a pointed look at Cleo as though emphasizing her honesty. “Liz has been picking on Jada. Now if Liz were the one who’d turned up dead, they’d have more than ample cause to come knocking on my door.”
“Liz Morrow?” Alec asked.
Annaliese nodded.
“What does she have to do with Jada?” Alec asked.
“She’s Jada’s dance captain,” Annaliese said.
“And that means . . .?”
“It’s her responsibility to make sure all the dancers on her team know the routines and perform well.”
“And you think Sebastian could make her stop bullying someone because he was married to her?” Alec made a disparaging noise. “Because husbands, especially about-to-be ex-husbands, have so much influence over their wives.”
Annaliese smiled crookedly. “They do when their exes are hot to get back on the gravy train.”
“But you said she’d found a loophole in the prenup,” Alec said.
Annaliese laughed. “That’s what she said before the judge ruled, but she is wife number five. Sebastian’s lawyers have had a lot of practice writing ironclad prenups. Besides, at this late date, I’m not sure it would even matter.”
“Ah.” Alec drew the syllable out. “Have the cops questioned her?”
“I’m sure they have,” Annaliese said. “Don’t they always question the spouse?”
Alec made a mental note to follow up on that. “How long will the coroner’s report take, do you think?”
“I don’t know. How long do those things normally take?” She flapped a hand, dismissing the question. “Whatever. I expect it won’t take long. Sebastian is―” Annaliese’s lips compressed as she reconfigured her thoughts. “He was an important man in this town.”
“How’s Jada handling all this?” Cleo asked, finally sounding like something other than a harridan.
“Pretty well actually, considering that being detained by the cops is a little more intense than having your phone go dead.”
“I thought you said they were just questioning you,” Cleo said.
“They were, sweetie, but if you think you get to take a break to reassure your lover when they’ve got a dead casino muckety-muck on their hands, you don’t know Vegas cops.”
“Was Danny Bonner with you?” Cleo asked.
Annaliese shook her head. “You’re as bad as Jada. Can you imagine? She called Dan―” She frowned. “You told her to call him, didn’t you? She wouldn’t have thought of that on her own.”
“Of course, I did. She told me you’d been arrested.”
Annaliese rubbed her temples and sighed. “Okay, so it would have been reasonable if that were true. But you should have known Jada was overreacting.”
“I couldn’t take the chance. And I didn’t have the opportunity to think it through. Everything came at me so fast. I’d just heard about―” Cleo’s breath hitched. She cleared her throat and tried again. “About Sebastian.”
Alec couldn’t see Cleo’s eyes, but the expression in Annaliese’s was one of shared grief.
“It’s true then,” Cleo said softly, as though surprised to discover she hadn’t grasped that fact before. “Sebastian’s really dead.”
Annaliese’s lips compressed as she nodded.
Cleo looked away first, her gaze shifting toward the corner near the ceiling, light reflecting off her moist eyes. Alec stared at her with the dawning realization that this wasn’t just a story for her. It wasn’t just about Annaliese’s involvement. Sebastian was someone she knew. Someone who meant something to her.
He went all goosebumpy at how close she was to this story. How close that brought him to the story.
“I know you’re disappointed there’s no story, but you don’t have to leave right away, do you?” Annaliese’s question sounded casual on the surface, but her tone reminded Alec of his mother and how she always hoped his visits home would last longer than they did.
Cleo’s gaze locked onto her finger where it traced the lip of her cup. “It’s a new job. A different style of writing. And I don’t want to look like I’m trying to take a vacation on the company dime already.”
She was going to have them out the door in five minutes if he didn’t do something to stop it. “Are you kidding?” he said. “You can blame me. I’m not flying into Vegas only to turn around and go home. If there’s no story, I at least want to hit a craps table.” He was already the fry cook in hell as far as Cleo was concerned, so he didn’t really need a good excuse, and the reporter in him wasn’t budging until that coroner’s report came back. Nigel would expect no less. If they were lucky, there’d be something in the report they could build on.
“Good.” Annaliese beamed. “You can both stay at the condo. The bed in the guest room is all made up and Cleo knows where everything is―”
“Uh, wait.” Cleo gave Annaliese a slow-down gesture, her palms down, fingers spread. “Alec and I are not sharing a bed.”
He nearly sprayed coffee across the table. What had he missed? How did his staying in the guest room equate to sharing a bed with Cleo? Unless there was only one extra bed . . .
Ignoring his response, Annaliese hiked an eyebrow. “Why not?”
Cleo rolled her eyes, giving Annaliese the kind of look teenagers gave dense parents. “Because we’re not.”
When Annaliese’s gaze shifted to him, Alec figured she was about to ask if there was something wrong with him that he didn’t want to sleep with Cleo.
He certainly wouldn’t complain about the chance, but it didn’t seem advisable to say that. Cleo would probably come at him with a straight razor intent on gelding him.
Before Annaliese could question his virility however, Cleo said, “The paper is bankrolling him. He’ll be fine in a hotel.”
He tensed. Hell, no. He wasn’t about to let Cleo make an end run around him. She’d be collecting information from every source in Las Vegas while he was adjusting the air conditioning in his room. No way was she getting the home court advantage without him there, supervising her closely. Not when Annaliese had offered the means to stay close to her. “I can sleep on a couch or even the floor―”
“Nonsense,” Annaliese said, her tone turning harsh. “My dear Cleopatra, you were raised to have better manners than to push a guest out the door when there’s room for him with us—and that bed is plenty big enough for two—but if it bothers you that much, you can sleep on the couch.”
He nearly bit his tongue in two to keep from laughing. Cleopatra? That wasn’t anywhere in her bio. No wonder she was slumping as though she’d like to slide right under the table and disappear into the floor. Even if they didn’t get a story out of it, the trip was worth it just for that tidbit of personal information.
“You’re grownups,” Annaliese continued. “There’s no need for Alec to be uncomfortable. I trust you’re both adult enough to keep to yourselves. If that’s what you want. But I think you’re being ridiculous.”
Cleo braced her elbows on the table and buried her face in her hands. Alec didn’t think she was praying. Unless it was for lightning to strike him dead.
Annaliese’s eyes shifted to meet his, the corners of her lips lifting in a satisfied smile. Then she winked, as though they were conspirators in some grand scheme, and he realized she knew exactly what she was doing.
He was willing to bet the farm Cleo knew too. Which meant, if he touched her in this bed Annaliese wanted them in so badly, he’d probably draw back a bloody stump.