Undercover In High Heels

I yawned and was about to slip my key in the lock when the toe of my ballet flats came up against something. I looked down at the top step.

Then froze.

Another package. A plain brown box, the top taped neatly down, just like the last. Instinctively I reached into my purse for my canister of pepper spray. Not there. Damn! I’d left it in pseudo San Francisco. Instead I looked over both shoulders and down the street, as if the punk who’d left it here might still be watching, waiting for me to find the remains of another unfortunate victim of speeding on the PCH.

I weighed my options. I could just leave it there. Pretend I hadn’t seen it. I could chuck it in the Dumpster behind the building.

But as morbid as it seemed, I was curious.

Gingerly, I reached down and pulled off the tape.

Grooooooooss!

My stomach churned as I stared down at his present. He’d escalated to dead birds tonight: a pigeon with a bent wing and tire treads through his midsection. Only this time, there was a note sitting on top of the mangled carcass. With visions of bird flu dancing in my head, I reached inside my purse and pulled out an old Taco Bell napkin, draping it over my hand as I held my nose and picked up the paper.

Then I really felt my stomach lurch, white dots dancing before my eyes as I scanned the page.

I should have killed you when I had the chance.

Chapter 8

My gaze whipped wildly from side to side as if I expected the bogeyman to jump out of my neighbor’s agapanthus bushes. I kicked the box of roadkill aside, fingers fumbling as I tried to fit my keys in the lock. I was shaking so badly it took me two tries before I realized I was trying to unlock my front door with my Jeep keys. Finally I got the right one in, but by this time I was in serious panic mode.

I was a fashion designer. I drew little bows and sparklies on toddler shoes. Who would want me dead? How did they know where I lived? Had he been following me? What did he mean, when he had the chance? Was he watching me right now, waiting for another one? I pictured that poor little birdie with tire treads across its midsection and felt faint.

I quickly shut and locked the door behind me, making sure my metal security chain was fastened. Only, in the face of a crazed killer with big-ass tires, the chain looked awfully small and pathetic. I grabbed a chair and stuffed it under the doorknob for good measure. Then I found my hair dryer and, wielding it like a club, searched the rest of my apartment for any sign of bad guys. Luckily, the only thing I found lurking in the shadows were some dust bunnies that spoke of my less-than-stellar skills as a housekeeper.

Once I was sure I was alone, I grabbed my cordless phone. My hands were still shaking as I dialed Ramirez’s number. Three rings into it I was starting to work into a panic again that maybe he wasn’t there, maybe the bad guy would come back, maim me, kill me, and stuff me in a cardboard box, all because Ramirez was still too pissed off at me to pick up my call.

“Ramirez here.”

I did an audible sigh of relief. “Oh thank God. I got a bird. A pigeon, I think. Or maybe a sparrow. I’m not sure. But it had tire tracks! Just like the squirrel.”

I think I heard him sigh on the other end. “Okay, what’s going on this time, Maddie?”

The way he said this time was like a mother showing up for the bazillionth time at the principal’s office. Was I that predictable?

I took a deep breath and tried to calm down, lest I became a caricature of myself.

“I got a death threat at my apartment.”

This got his attention. “From who? Is he there now? Are you okay?”

“Yes. No. I mean, I’m fine.” Sort of.

“What happened?”

As I told him about the roadkill presents I’d been getting, and the last one with its menacing message, I could feel Ramirez tensing on the other end. “Look, I’m going to send a patrol car over to watch your place tonight.”

Which should have made me feel better. Only I realized as he said it that I’d been kind of hoping he would come over. The fact that he was sending a patrol car instead spoke volumes to the fact we were so not to the “ups” yet.

“A patrol car?”

He must have heard the disappointment in my voice. “Look, Maddie, I’ve got the captain and the DA breathing down my neck twenty-four/seven. I can’t deal with this right now, too.”

I felt a lump form in my throat. He thought I was something that had to be dealt with. Ouch.

“Right. Fine. I understand.”

“The patrolman will keep an eye on you.”

“I said it was fine.”

Ramirez sighed deeply into the phone. “You’re not doing that girlie thing where you say it’s fine but really you’re pissed off, are you?”

“No!” Yes!

He paused again. “Okay, I’ll be right over.”

“You know what? Don’t bother. I’m fine by myself.”

Another deep sigh. “Jesus, Maddie, don’t do this to me right now.”

“To you? I’m sorry, I thought I was the one who just got a death threat via bird guts!”

“So let me come over.”

“I said I’m fine! What, you think I can’t take care of myself? You think I need you? I don’t need you. I’m fine!” Never mind that I was wielding a hair dryer as a weapon. There was no way I was going to let Ramirez think I wanted him here when he so obviously didn’t want to be here.

I slammed the phone down in its cradle. Then picked it up and slammed it down a couple more times for good measure.

I stared at the kitchen chair barring my door. The truth was, I was so not fine. I was still shaking (though part of that could be from anger at this point), and the thought of spending the night alone barred up in my apartment, wondering if some maniac was lurking just outside the window with more animal carcasses, left my insides whimpering like a five-year-old.

I grabbed my phone again and called Dana at the Actor’s Duplex. Unfortunately, I was informed by Daisy Duke that she’d just watched three episodes of Magnolia Lane and, thanks to Chad’s shirtless scenes, was headed off to the nearest SA meeting. I left a message for Dana to come over once her inner beast had been tamed.

I hung up, sudden silence permeating my tiny studio. I flipped on the TV to distract myself, watching images of the Sunset Studios fill the Entertainment Tonight screen. The hot topic of the day was that the police now suspected that someone on the studio lot was the killer. Mary Hart even speculated that it could be another member of the cast. I watched as images of Blake, Ricky, and Margo flitted across the screen. Last but not least was Deveroux Strong. They’d captured an image of Deveroux coming out of a trendy boutique in Hollywood wearing tight leather pants and a formfitting turtleneck. He was carrying a large pink shopping bag and standing just a little too close to his “personal bodyguard.” Felix was right: it was no national secret that this guy was gay.

The next image to grace the screen was Mia’s face in a montage of shots: outside her Bel Air home, in Versace at the Emmys, on vacation in the Bahamas. I wondered again if she’d really been the target. Veronika’s secret pregnancy put a whole new twist on things. Maybe the killer had taken advantage of the press surrounding Mia’s letters as an easy scapegoat. Despite what the police thought, it would have been simple for anyone to walk into wardrobe and help themselves to a pair of panty hose. Hell, Margo was in and out of there with costume jewelry at least fifteen times a day.