Homicide in High Heels (20 page)

He raised one of his sandy brows at me. "I
see," he said slowly. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his
slacks, coming around his desk to lean casually against the front
corner. "Always happy to do a favor for a friend, Maddie. You know
that. What can I help you with?"

"I need some information on John
Ratski."

"Ah. Our fist-fighting ballplayer," Felix
said with a smile as he moved around the desk to sit behind his
computer monitor. "I can't say we have tons of coverage on him.
I'll be honest with you, Bucky's usually our target. Ratski has
been mostly off our radar, until yesterday."

"Where you hit the jackpot," I mumbled.

Felix's eyes shot up to meet mine, and if I
didn't know him better, I'd say there was the tiniest hint of guilt
in them. "You know I don't write the news, love. I just report
it."

"Nice try. You had to know you were inciting
a celebrity feud with those photos of Dana and Ratski at
dinner."

"Ricky was pretty angry, huh?"

I nodded. "Angry enough to hit Ratski,
obviously."

"What did he say?"

I grinned. "No way are you getting a quote
out of me, mister."

He shrugged. "Can't blame a bloke for
trying."

That was debatable.

"Well, Ricky can't be too angry with us,"
Felix continued, switching computer screens. "He's exploding all
over the Twitterverse this morning. Right-Hook-Ricky is the top
trending hashtag at the moment."

I couldn't help a snicker.

"Followed closely by," he continued, reading
off his monitor, "Ratski-struck-again and Battle-Royal. If there
was any better press Ricky could get for his action star career, I
don't know what it is."

"Well, in that case, I guess I always have a
second career as a celebrity publicist," I joked.

"Sorry, love," Felix said, "but everyone
knows any real self-respecting celebrity has a gay publicist."

I opened my mouth to argue when I realized
he was right. I didn't know anyone who had a straight publicist.
"Listen, I need to know who else Ratski has been seen with lately,"
I told him. "Specifically, if he's been seen with any of the other
Baseball Wives
. Liz DeCicco or Kendra Blanco maybe?" I
paused. "Or possibly Lacey Desta."

Felix's eyebrow rose. "The dead girl?"

I nodded slowly.

"You think Ratski had something to do with
that?"

I bit my lip, hesitant to respond in the
affirmative. As I well knew, anything said in the presence of the
tabloid reporter was sure to end up public knowledge.

"I'm looking into several Stars
players."

Felix's eyes cut to mine, that questioning
eyebrow lifting again.

"Just to be thorough," I quickly added.

"Uh-huh." He still eyed me. "Well, we can
run a search through our archives." He slid his keyboard drawer out
and typed in Ratski's name. "I take it this is one of Ramirez's
cases?"

"Uh, sorta," I said, sidestepping the issue
of Ramirez's suspension.

"And how is the husband?" Felix asked.

The question was benign enough, but I heard
the sudden tightness in Felix's voice.

While Felix was my road-not-taken, I
sometimes wondered if I was his one-that-got-away. Shortly after I
married Ramirez, Felix started dating one of his junior reporters,
Allie Quick, who some had described as a younger, perkier version
of me. I'd encountered Allie a handful of times, and while part of
me wanted to hate her, another part of me sort of wanted to take
her under my wing. However, both parts often wondered if Felix was
dating
her
or me-light.

"He's fine. And Allie?"

"She's fine."

"Good. I'm glad."

Felix cleared his throat, breaking the
awkward exchange. "All right, I got a blank for Ratski and Lacey,
but I found four articles in last two months which mention Ratski
and either Liz or Kendra by name."

"That's promising," I said, getting up from
my chair and coming around the desk to peer at the monitor over his
shoulder. "What do they say?"

"Well, the first mentions the Stars shooting
a KPIX commercial in Burbank. There's not much to it, but if you'd
like to take a look…" Felix trailed off, pushing his chair back to
give me more room.

I quickly scanned the article but didn't see
anything to suggest the outing had been anything other than
straightforward Stars promo.

"And the next article?" I asked
hopefully.

Felix moved his mouse. "Ratski at a
restaurant opening."

I looked at the screen, seeing a photo of
the woman on his arm. Beth. Again a strikeout.

Felix must've seen the crestfallen look on
my face as he asked. "You know, it might help if I knew exactly
what we're looking for?"

As much as I wanted to play my cards close
to my chest, Felix was right. I was looking for a needle in a
haystack, and without his help that haystack was scattered over
millions of paparazzi hours. "I'm looking for anything that might
indicate Ratski was dating someone."

"Besides Dana?" Felix asked, a teasing note
in his voice.

"Ha. Ha. Very funny. Yes, besides Dana.
Clearly Ratski can't do much in Hollywood without one of your
reporters knowing about it, so I figured if anybody knew who he'd
been seeing, it would be you."

Felix nodded. "Well, I can't promise
anything. Clearly, if there was any hint of him having an affair
with someone else, we would have reported on it."

I was afraid of that.

"However," Felix went on. "I can have Cam
pull photos of Ratski from the last month or two and see if anyone
shows up with him more often than she should."

I figured that was about as good as I could
get. I stood. "Thank you," I said, sincerely meaning it.

Felix shook my hand, holding onto it just a
second too long before turning to the speakerphone on his desk
again. "I'll have Cam email you pictures as soon as she can compile
them. Might be a day or two though. She's following Bieber around,
and you know how unpredictable
that
can be."

I nodded. "Thanks again," I said before
turning on my heels and walking back to the
Informer
's
elevators.

* * *

I still had a couple of hours before the
party, so I pointed my car toward Melrose. It was unlikely Liz
would come right out and admit if she or Kendra had been having an
affair with Ratski, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to do a little
well-placed hinting and see how the reality actress reacted.
Besides, I was sort of regretting leaving that biased-cut blouse
there the other day.

Street parking was non-existent, so I opted
for the garage on the corner, driving to the absolute top before
finding a spot. I figured that jogging down the stairs in my
two-inch heels would be my workout for the day.

As I pushed through the glass doors of
Bellissima, I immediately spotted Blonde Number One and Blonde
Number Two helping other customers. Liz was behind the cash
register today, ringing up a purchase for a purple leather handbag
that I silently thought would go marvelously with my new kitten
heels.

"Maddie, what brings you here?" Liz asked
when she finished.

"I, uh, just wanted to see if my
manufacturer had spoken to your buyer yet?" I lied.

Liz's eyebrows drew together. "No, I don't
think we've heard from him."

Probably because I hadn't called him, but I
glossed over that.

"Oh, darn," I said, faking a frown of my
own. "I guess I'll have to put in another call." I paused. "Say,
how's Beth doing?"

"Beth?" Liz frowned.

I did my most sympathetic face—eyebrows
drawn, lips pursed, head tilted to the right. "I saw the pictures
in the
Informer
last night. It must be so hard to be faced
with proof of your husband cheating on you."

Liz snorted. "Yeah, like that's the only
time he did it."

Bingo.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that guy is always chasing some
tail. He even tried to hit on
me
. Can you believe that? His
teammate's wife?"

"No!" I said. Though I had to admit to
feeling a little deflated. If she was admitting he hit on her so
quickly, it was looking less and less like she and Ratski had
anything serious going on.

"Oh, yeah. That guy would have done anything
that moved. I'm pretty sure he hit on Kendra when he got drunk at
the Christmas party, and he was all over Lacey the first couple of
weeks she and Bucky were dating."

"Really?"

"Yeah, but I'm sure he struck out there,"
Liz said, echoing my earlier thoughts on the idea of the two of
them having any sort of romantic relationship. "Lacey said he was a
total loser. I guess that's one thing the two of us agreed on."

"But there isn't anyone special that you
know of? Anyone he was actually seeing?

Liz screwed up her face. "Not that I know
of. And, I mean, Ratski didn't exactly try to hide his
exploits."

Unfortunately, she was right. In fact, now
that I thought about it, Ratski hadn't seemed particularly worried
about being photographed out with Dana the other night. Which made
me even more curious about this affair that he was trying so hard
to keep under wraps.

"Poor Beth," Liz sighed. "The woman is in
complete denial."

"You mentioned that he hit on Kendra," I
said, backtracking. "Did she tell you this?"

Liz paused, uncertainty flickering in her
eyes as if not sure how much to say about the leader of the Wives
pack without her prior approval. "She might have mentioned it."

I took a leap of faith and leaned in. "You
know, between you and me, Kendra seems awfully controlling. I think
Ratski
might have dodged a bullet there."

"Ha!" Liz let out a short bark of laughter,
quickly covering it with her hand. "You don't know the half of it,"
she confided.

I grinned. "Oh, really?" I prodded.

Liz looked over both shoulders, as if Kendra
might magically appear, before leaning in close. "Look, you didn't
hear this from me…"

I shook my head, putting a finger to my
lips. "Of course not."

"…but Kendra told the producers what to say
to the police. She said if they didn't, she'd walk. I mean, talk
about controlling, right?"

Sadly I had a feeling Laurel and Hardy were
only too happy to take the producers' word for anything. "What did
she tell them to say?"

"Well," Liz said, getting a wicked twinkle
in her eye, "On the morning that Lacey died, we were shooting a
promo spot for the show. But Kendra was late."

"How late?" I asked.

"
Late
late. She always has an earlier
call time for make-up than everyone else, because, well, Kendra
takes the longest." She paused, leaning in to faux whisper. "She's
over
forty
."

I feigned a gasp while mentally calculating
just how many years I had left before hitting the age-of-no-return
in Hollywood.

"Anyway, make-up was totally freaking when I
got there because Kendra was nowhere to be found, and they knew it
was going to take forever to get her presentable."

"What time was this?" I asked.

Liz shrugged. "Our call time was at nine,
and the first anyone saw of Kendra was eleven."

"Did she say where she was?"

Liz waved her hands in the air. "She said
something about car trouble or some such excuse."

"Excuse?" I asked, jumping on the word.
"Where do you think she
really
was?"

Liz gave me the same big wide-eyed stare
that she'd given to Laurel and Hardy, blinking her false lashes
up-and-down. "Well, I really couldn't say, now, could I? But I know
that she made sure the producers left her call time out of the
segment she shot with the detectives."

As interesting as the information about
Kendra's lack of alibi for the time of the murder was, I found it
equally interesting that Liz was giving this information out so
freely. Why was she throwing her friend under the bus? Was she
trying to get Kendra in trouble? Or was she just trying to divert
suspicion from herself?

I was still trying to decide the diva's
motives when the bell over the front door jingled, and we both
turned to see Beth walk in.

"Speak of the clueless," Liz mumbled to me,
giving me a wink as if she and I were besties who'd just shared
juicy gossip. Then she quickly crossed the boutique, switching
gears to all-smiles as she gave air-kisses to Beth.

"Hello, darling! You ready for lunch?"

Beth nodded and gave Liz a big smile. One
that faded significantly when she saw me.

I gave a little wave. "Hi."

Beth narrowed her eyes. "What are you doing
here? Is Dana here too?"

I shook my head. "No. Just me."

The frown between her brows eased some, but
she still gave me the wary eye.

"I am so sorry about what happened. It was
all a big misunderstanding." A total lie. The only one
misunderstanding anything here was Beth. But as long as she
remained on my suspect list, I figured it was better to smooth
things over. "The press has blown everything out of proportion,
haven't they?"

Beth bit her lip and nodded in agreement.
"Yes, they have."

"How is your husband? Is his nose okay?"

My words had the desired effect as the
tension in Beth's shoulders released a little.

"He'll be fine. It's not broken, just a
little bruised," she conceded.

Liz cleared her throat. "Well, let me just
grab my purse and lock up, I'll be right with you, okay, Beth?" She
didn't wait for a response before flouncing into the back room.

Beth glanced after her friend nervously, as
if hesitant to be alone in the same room with me. Geez. It wasn't
as if
I
had hit Ratski

"Liz has some lovely designs here," I said,
trying to ease the tension in the air.