Death by Devil's Breath Read online

  “You don’t know that.”

  “But, Nick. What if—”

  “No.” He refused to listen and it didn’t matter anyway, since Yolanda picked that moment to walk back in. She gave me a prescription for painkillers that I knew I wouldn’t fill and written instructions about how to take care of the wound, and when she was all done, she said I could go.

  Since he wasn’t listening to me anyway, we were all the way back to the RV parked near Creosote Cal’s before Nick and I spoke again.

  He tossed his car keys down on the table. “No wonder Bernadette hates you.”

  I dropped my denim hobo back on one of the vinyl-covered benches next to the built-in table and rummaged around in the cupboard—one-handed since my left arm throbbed—for the box of chocolate cupcakes I knew I’d stashed there, and when I found it, I ripped into it and sat back down.

  “Better than pain pills,” I told Nick.

  He glanced over the ingredients listed on the side of the package. “I’m not so sure about that.”

  “Well, at least I can’t get addicted.” I finished one cupcake and reached for another.

  “I’m not so sure about that, either.” With one finger, Nick pointed my way. “You have . . .”

  White gooey frosting. I could feel it on my chin. I swiped a hand over my face.

  Nick shook his head.

  I swiped again.

  “You’re missing it by a mile.” He leaned across the table and brushed his hand over my chin. “Better,” he assured me.

  I wasn’t so sure. Because suddenly, the spot where his fingers rested felt as if it were on fire.

  I am usually cool, calm, and collected when it comes to guys, but all of a sudden, I was at a loss for words. “Cupcake?” I squeaked.

  Nick cupped my chin. “Let’s skip the cupcakes and the preliminaries.”

  Was he talking about . . .

  I gulped at the same time I glanced over Nick’s shoulder toward my bedroom.

  Was he talking about what I thought he was talking about?

  A slow smile inched up Nick’s lips. “Let’s get right down to business and talk about what you were doing at the Love Chapel in the first place.”

  His touch might have been hot, but it was incinerated beneath the fire of the anger that flared up inside me. “You’re going to tell me to mind my own business.”

  “Well, look what happened!”

  “What happened had nothing to do with me talking to Reverend Love. It was a what-do-you-call-it. A crime of opportunity. Bernadette followed me when I left the hotel. She saw her moment and she took it. I bet if you check with Reverend Love, you’ll find out that there was some kind of problem with that sign. They were just installing it, you know. I bet it was loose. Or it needed to be fastened better or something. What happened to me has nothing to do with me asking Reverend Love about Dickie.”

  “What Reverend Love knows about Dickie isn’t any of your business.” The RV isn’t exactly spacious, and Nick’s voice ricocheted around it like rifle fire. He poked a finger in my direction. “I just found out this evening, Maxie, the detective in charge of Dickie’s case just told me . . . they figured out what killed Dickie. It was a poison called datura. It’s a native plant, grows pretty much everywhere. It would be simple for someone to pick some, dry it, then use it on a victim. We’re dealing with someone evil, someone who doesn’t care who gets in the way. For your own safety, you need to keep out of things that don’t concern you.”

  “You”—I poked right back—“need to get your priorities straight. You’re supposed to be head of security for the Showdown so you should be concerned with Showdown business so why don’t you go . . .” I made a shooing motion toward the door. “Go slap the cuffs on Bernadette. Or grill her under a bright light. Or do whatever it is you cop types do when you know you have a perp and you have to get her to confess.”

  “Perp!” Nick hopped to his feet. “For all we know, the sign was faulty and the wires just snapped at the perfect moment.”

  “Perfect?” I jumped to my feet, too, and fists on hips, stared him down. “So now you’re saying that the sign falling was a good thing? Because I was the one under it? Now you’re saying—”

  “So there I am working my butt off and you two are sitting here eating cupcakes?” Sylvia stomped through the door and proved what I’d always suspected of her. She’s delusional. We weren’t sitting. And we weren’t eating cupcakes. In fact, Nick and I were toe to toe, shooting death rays at each other.

  Sylvia was oblivious. “Thanks for coming back to the Palace and relieving me, Maxie.” She yanked open the refrigerator and took out a head of lettuce and a couple tomatoes. “I didn’t even have a chance to get dinner.”

  “Uh, bandage!” I held up my left arm. “Stitches. Attempted murder!”

  Sylvia rolled her blue eyes. “Yeah, right. Whatever.”

  By this time, Nick was already out the door. He didn’t bother to say good-bye.

  Sylvia grabbed a bowl from a nearby cupboard and threw a sidelong look in my direction. “What happened to your arm?” she asked.

  I am not often at a loss for words, but in that moment, I was struck dumb. Rather than deal—with Sylvia’s insensitivity or Nick’s hardheaded attitude—I stomped out of the RV and slammed the door behind me.

  A couple minutes later (I hung back to make sure Nick was nowhere around), I was back in Creosote Cal’s. I avoided Deadeye, closed at this late hour, and instead, headed into the casino. Sure, I remembered what Yolanda had told me about not mixing painkillers and alcohol, but like I said, I had no intention of taking any painkillers. For now, I knew a beer would do the trick, and it might help calm the irritation that bubbled in me like hot lava.

  I’d just slid up on a bar stool and was waiting semipatiently for the bartender to finish up with the already drunk young guys at the other end of the bar when my attention was caught by a man out in the lobby who looked vaguely familiar. Fifty or so. Washed-out hair that had once been sandy. Wide nose. Weak chin. It wasn’t until I also noticed his silver belt buckle studded with turquoise chips that the pieces fell into place and I remembered George Jarret, the man I’d found snooping around outside Dickie’s dressing room the day of the murder.

  Bad timing, because I never did have a chance to order that beer.

  Instead, I crossed the bar and went out to the lobby, and making sure to stay far enough back so he wouldn’t notice me, I followed George Jarret.

  All the way to Dickie Dunkin’s dressing room.

  The crime scene tape was gone from the doorway and the door was closed, but it was clear from the start that George wasn’t going to let that stop him.

  He tried the knob.

  Locked.

  George took something out of his pocket, slipped it into the lock, and jimmied it. The next time he tried the door, it popped right open. He looked left and right, and I ducked behind a wall just in time to avoid being seen. Sure that the coast was clear, George went into Dickie’s dressing room and closed the door behind him.

  CHAPTER 12

  Ten minutes later, George Jarret emerged from Dickie Dunkin’s dressing room with a stack of photos of Dickie tucked up under his arm.

  I will admit that while this was mildly interesting, it was not the bombshell I’d been hoping for. The first time I met George, he told me all he wanted was an autographed picture of Dickie. It looked like he was actually telling the truth.

  As disappointing as this was in terms of my investigation, I was not about to let it stop me. I waited until George had disappeared back the way he’d come and slipped into the now empty dressing room.

  Like all of the performers I’d been in touch with lately, Dickie had a dressing table with a mirror in front of it and a chair pulled up to it. There was a scattering of jars on the table, one of face powder, one filled with some g
oo guaranteed to remove age spots, one that was apparently where Dickie kept loose change. I spilled it out and counted. One dollar and seventy-nine cents.

  There were three plaid sport coats hanging on a nearby rack, and I went through the pockets and found nothing but a pack of gum and a roll of antacids.

  At the door, I took one last quick look around. There was nothing even mildly interesting in Dickie’s dressing room, nothing that spoke of his life (other than his bad taste in clothes) and certainly nothing that explained the terrible way he died. In fact, it was all so ordinary and so boring, I couldn’t help but wonder why George Jarret had spent ten minutes in there to begin with.

  I was still turning the thought over in my head when I slipped back outside and started through the lobby. That was when I saw Carmella, one of the ladies from the costume shop, heading out the door. She waved, I waved back, and I thought about the Chili Chick.

  I knew that Yancy was performing that night and that his show was sold out. I also knew that the costume people stuck around until the last show of the night was over, and eager to see how the repairs on the Chick were going, I skirted the auditorium and went around backstage. From there I could hear Yancy’s piano, and I stopped for a moment and let the music wash over me. It was a slow, bluesy song, with a bass that crawled along my spine and wormed its way deep down inside, and when Yancy started singing, I caught my breath.

  Take that, Dickie Dunkin. And Hermosa and The Great Osborn, too. Oh yeah, take that. Because blind or not, Yancy Harris was one heck of a talent, and with his sold-out show, I was sure he’d be standing at Reverend Love’s side on Sunday for the big wedding ceremony.

  I waited as long as the song took, then scooted down a hallway filled with hanging costumes. I stuck my head in the first open door and waved to two ladies who sat in front of sewing machines.

  “Is the Chick done?” I asked.

  The first woman was ninety if she was a day, a tiny thing with about a million wrinkles and a bent back, and she took off her reading glasses before she looked up. “Finished it a couple hours ago,” she assured me. “I left it with Elaine. You know, over there.” She jabbed one scrawny finger across the hallway.

  It was Elaine’s job to make sure all the performers had the costumes they needed, and she was easy enough to find. She sat behind a wide counter, her feet propped up next to a computer screen and a copy of People open in front of her.

  “Chick?” I asked.

  Elaine grinned. “They did a great job, didn’t they? Glad I took before and after pictures so I can show them to Cal. He needs to know how good we are at what we do.”

  “I’m glad. So . . .” I glanced around. There was a cocktail waitress’s pseudo-sexy cowboy outfit nearby, a long and very pink shiny gown next to it that was just tacky enough for me to guess that it belonged to Hermosa. “Where’s the Chick?” I asked Elaine.

  She swung her legs off the table and stood, glancing toward an empty rack. “I guess somebody picked it up. If it wasn’t you, it must have been your sister.” Elaine bustled around to my side of the counter. “I know the costume was here when I left for dinner. And it was gone when I got back. It was nice of your sister to get it for you.”

  Nice? And Sylvia? Both in the same sentence?

  I wondered what Sylvia was up to and twitched the thought away when Elaine waved me closer. “We’ve got a sign-out log. Come and look. Oh.” She squinted and gave the log another careful look. “What did you say your sister’s name was?”

  I told her.

  “Well, this is written kind of sloppy, but it sure doesn’t say Sylvia. It looks like . . .” Elaine lifted the book so she could tip it to the light. “You sure you haven’t been drinking, honey?” she asked me. “Because I’ll tell you what—according to the log, the Chili Chick costume was picked up by one Maxie Pierce.”

  * * *

  Sylvia was hilarious.

  At least, she thought so.

  In keeping with her opinion of herself, I figured she’d bust a gut when I stomped into the RV and did a quick-and-dirty search of the place. “So . . .” My breaths coming in short gasps, I got back to our combined kitchen/living area. “Where did you stash her?”

  When she pretended she didn’t know what I was talking about, and I gave her an abbreviated (and expletive rich) account of how I’d gone looking for the Chick and couldn’t find her, Sylvia froze at the sink where she was cleaning up her dinner dishes. Now she turned to me, her jaw slack. “What do you mean, the Chick is missing?”

  I am not an eye roller. I mean, not like Sylvia. But let’s face it, if an occasion ever called for it, this was it. I rolled with wild abandon. “You can quit fooling around, Sylvia. If you expect me to dance as the Chick tomorrow, I need the costume.”

  “But I don’t have it.” She dried her hands and hurried over, and before I knew what she was going to do, and so could back out of her reach, she grabbed my hands. “This is terrible!” she wailed.

  And I thought I was a decent actress?

  I yanked my hands out of Sylvia’s grasp. “All right, I get it,” I admitted. “You’re pissed because I didn’t get back in time for you to take a dinner break. You’re getting even. Point taken, lesson learned, and all that jazz. Now quit messing around and tell me what you did with the Chick.”

  I wasn’t sure how she managed, but Sylvia even got her peaches-and-cream complexion in on the act. She looked a little green around the gills. This time when she grabbed me, she dragged me over to the table. She plunked down on one bench and urged me to sit on the one opposite.

  “I swear, Maxie, I don’t have the Chick. Somebody must have stolen the costume.”

  “But no one even knew the Chick was getting repaired. Just Nick and you and me.”

  “And whoever spray-painted the costume in the first place.”

  The why was as murky as ever, but suddenly, the who was as plain as day. I ground my teeth together. “Bernadette!”

  Sylvia’s perfectly bowed lips twisted. “You think?”

  “She tried to kill me tonight.”

  To Sylvia’s everlasting credit, she did not question this. Instead, she reached for her phone and hit one of the numbers on speed dial. “Nick,” she said while she waited for him to answer. “We’ve got to tell him the Chick’s been stolen.”

  I agreed.

  That didn’t keep me from wondering why Sylvia had Nick’s number stored in her phone. Or why my half sister suddenly cared so very much about what happened to the Chili Chick.

  * * *

  Nick took all the information and assured us that he’d get in touch with both hotel security and the Vegas police to report the robbery.

  I—for about the one-hundredth time—told him he didn’t have to bother. We could just march over to Bibi’s Bump and Grind and have it out with Bernadette.

  “It makes sense, doesn’t it?” I demanded, and not for the first time. “It’s one of those things you cop guys call a . . . a whatever you call it. You know, like when you profile a serial killer. The fact that the Chick is missing says something about Bernadette’s mental condition, and her emotional state, too. It would make perfect sense for her to swipe the Chick. The woman is a nutcase! And . . .” Just in case Nick had forgotten, I laid a gentle hand on my left arm. “She did try to kill me.”

  “Maybe, maybe, and maybe.” Nick actually had taken notes after he arrived at the RV and Sylvia and I explained what was going on. He flipped his notebook closed. “It’s not like I have any jurisdiction,” he explained. This, he had already said, but I guess he thought the way I was jumping around meant I needed the reminder. “We’ll take care of it.”

  “And by then, who knows what Bernadette might do to the poor Chick!” The scenes flashed before my eyes, each more terrifying than the last.

  The Chick hanging off the front car of one of those crazy Vegas roller coaster
s.

  The Chick, roasting over an open fire.

  The Chick, locked in that closet with all those flickering candles and the pictures of Jack.

  I shook away the thought before it could derail what little self-composure I had left. “You know she’s got it, Nick.”

  “I can go talk to her.”

  “And I can come with you.”

  Really, he didn’t have to look at me that way.

  Nick reached into his pocket and pulled out one of those gaming cards that activate the machines in the casinos. “Go play some slots or something,” he said, pressing the card into my hand. “Relax.”

  “You mean, stay out of your way.”

  “I mean, relax.” He folded my fingers over the card and left the RV.

  “Well, he’s got a lot of nerve,” I grumbled.

  “That’s not all he’s got.” When I turned to her, I saw that Sylvia was staring at the door, a smile on her face.

  And I mean, really, I should have to put up with that? After the hogwash I’d just put up with from Nick?

  Rather than think about it, I grabbed my purse and headed out of the RV and back into the casino. In Vegas time, the night was still young, and don’t think I forgot that I owed myself a beer.

  A couple minutes later I was settled in at the bar, a chilly one in front of me, watching The Great Osborn do a card trick on the other side of the room. No doubt he’d decided to pick up a few extra bucks, and maybe sell some tickets to his show the next night while he was at it, by shmoozing with the bar crowd. He was decked out in his tux and that silly blue cummerbund of his. At least there was no sign of the Afro.

  Hermosa was there, too, enthroned at a table on the other side of the bar, her diaphanous green gown spread out around her so that she took up one entire side of a booth. Maybe she hadn’t sold as many tickets to her show as she would have liked. Or maybe she was thinking about Dickie Dunkin and (go figure) getting all mushy. Either way, there was an empty glass in front of her and a fresh drink next to it, and the way the light above her table cast a glow on her, I swore her cheeks were wet. Even as I watched, an elderly guy in a golf shirt and khakis sat down across from Hermosa and ordered drinks for the two of them, and her expression brightened considerably.