Spying in High Heels

meet him.”

Lucky. Right. Lucky she wasn’t swimming face down right about now. Which brought me back to her current whereabouts…

“So, is Bu – uh, Myrtle here today?”

“Oh, sure. She’s just finishing a scene in studio two.” Blondie indicated a pair of doors to her right.

I cut a look to the doors. I had an unnerving feeling that was where the orgies took place.

“Um, do you mind if I wait here until she’s done with her, um… scene?” I asked.

“Sure, no prob.” Double D grinned and indicated a pair of padded chairs along the wall. I sat down, glad that the front office seemed to be soundproofed.

Ten minutes later the red light above the door shut off and a sound like a fire alarm blared through the building. I must have jumped as Double D reassured me, “That means they’re done shooting. It should be safe to go back there now if you’d like.”

“Thanks.” I stood up and pushed through the double doors, hoping Bunny had robed.

The studios of Big Boy weren’t pretending to be anything other than a Valley warehouse. Walls were covered in rusted metal (and not the chic rust of Fernando’s, but the real kind caused by years of corrosion), large pipes ran along the ceiling and the floor was a cracked concrete. The only break in the industrial look were the three-walled rooms made of painted plywood that were supposed to resembled bedrooms. At least that was my guess by the enormous beds scattered through the warehouse.

A group of people were huddled around one. Luckily, they seemed to be dispersing, men winding up lengths of cable and women wearing silky looking bathrobes, with slightly mussed bedroom hair. I felt my cheeks growing hot as I averted my eyes.

I recognized Bunny right away from her photographs with Greenway in the L.A. Informer. She was sitting on a stool by a plywood bedroom, cigarette between her acrylic nails as she watched the grips check the camera. She was my height, but about five pounds slimmer and filled with enough silicone that she might topple over at any second. I had a hard time picturing her hauling Greenway’s body all the way downstairs and out to the Moonlight’s dumpsters. Still, no stone unturned.

“Bunny Hoffenmeyer?” I asked.

She looked at me with a disinterested stare. “Yeah?”

“Hi. I’m Maddie, uh… Ramirez.” Okay, why I gave her that name, I didn’t know. But for some reason I didn’t want her to know who I was really was. At least not until I knew if she owned a gun.

“Hi,” Bunny said, blowing smoke up toward the ceiling.

“Hi. I, uh, I was wondering if I could ask you some questions about Devon Greenway?”

Her eyes clouded. “Why?”

Why. Very good question. “Well, I uh, I’m from the L.A. Informer and, uh, we’re doing a story on Greenway’s death. We wanted to include some interviews from those close to him.”

Bunny still looked dubious, so I tried to sweeten the pot. “We’d love to include some pictures, too. It would be great exposure for you.” No pun intended.

Bunny straightened in her chair at the mention of pictures. “What do you want to know?”

Did you kill him? But I figured blunt wasn’t the way to go. They always finessed the suspects a little first on Law & Order. I put on my best finessing voice. “I heard you and Greenway were close.”

She smirked. “You could say that.”

I had a feeling I was going to regret this next question. “How close?”

Bunny raised an eyebrow. “I fucked him occasionally, if that’s what you’re asking.”

At least she didn’t mince words.

“Right. So, when was the last time you, uh… saw Greenway?”

She took a long drag from the cigarette. “Last Thursday.”

I perked up. Thursday had been the night Richard canceled dinner with me to meet Greenway. I wondered if Bunny had been there.

“What did you do?”

“We had dinner at Le Petite’s. This totally expensive French place on Ventura. Then he had to meet his lawyer. Some Ken Doll in a suit.”

Hey! That was my Ken Doll she was talking about. But, I had to admit, now that she mentioned it, Richard did resemble Ken a little. Perfect plastic facade – hollow on the inside. Ugh.

“Do you know what the meeting was about?”

She tiled her head and scrutinized me. “I dunno. Some business shit. What did I care?”

I felt my bubble of hope deflating. Even if Porn Star Barbie had been present at Richard and Greenway’s meeting, I doubted any of it would penetrate her silicone filled head.

“So, you haven’t seen him since Thursday?”

She blew out a slow stream of smoke at the ceiling. “No. I broke it off with him.”

“Really? Why?” Honestly Greenway and Bunny seemed like a perfect fit.

“Cause I found some chick’s thong in his pocket.”

“His wife’s?”

Bunny smirked again. “Honey, wives don’t wear shit like this. This was a leopard print, mesh thong. He was fucking someone else.”

I’m pretty sure my eyes strayed to the bed where Bunny had just finished her scene. I had a hard time believing she was a stickler for monogamy.

“Hey, this is just work,” she defended. “I fake it at work. What Devon and I had was the real deal. And if he was sticking his real deal to some other chick, I didn’t want any part of it.”

Fair enough.

“Any idea who the thong belonged to?”

Bunny smirked again. “Some slut. I think he was meeting her for nooners, ‘cause he never answered his phone around lunchtime.”

“So, just for the record, where were you last night?” Even though Bunny was slipping down my list of suspects I figured it didn’t hurt to be thorough.

“Here. Shooting a scene for Babes in Boyland.”

Ugh. A porn pun. “Okay. Well, I, uh, don’t want to take up any more of your time.” I reached out to shake her hand, then thought better of it, not knowing where that hand had been. Instead I waved a little good-bye as I turned and headed for the reception area.

“Hey wait a minute!”

I spun around. “Yeah?”

“What about the pictures?”

Right, pictures. “The photographer will be out tomorrow,” I lied. Gee, I was getting better at this. “Thanks again.”

Back in my Jeep, I pulled out my Suspects list again. I wasn’t entirely convinced Porn Star Barbie wasn’t my blondie, but I was having a hard time picturing her hacking into Greenway’s accounts and transferring twenty million to unknown whereabouts. She hadn’t struck me as the sharpest crayon in the box. I added, “leopard thong, nooners” under “blonde in heels.” Hmmm… Bunny was right. She did sound like a slut.

I was just merging back onto the 405, watching the sun sink into a hazy, glowing orb below the hills, when my cell phone rang. I glanced down at the number. Faux Dad. Oh crap, what did I forget now?

“Hello?”

“Where are you?”

“On the 405. Why?”

“Good. Cause your mom’s at Beefcakes already and she’s starting to worry about you.”

D’oh! I slapped my forehead with my palm. Beefcakes. “Right. I was just on my way there.”

Faux Dad heaved a sigh of relief into the receiver. “Good. ‘Cause for a minute there, I thought maybe you’d forgotten again.”

“Who me? Never.”