Undercover In High Heels

wrath of Ramirez if he caught me here, sans babysitter.

I shoved Jasmine into the passenger seat, hopped behind the wheel, hastily brushing broken glass off the seat, and put the Miata into reverse, squealing out of the parking lot just as two cop cars, lights blazing, rounded the corner.

Jasmine looked pale in the seat beside me. So pale that her foundation stood out on her cheeks like poster paint. I wasn’t entirely sure she wasn’t about to hurl.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

Jasmine turned and did her best Evil Barbie, squinting her eyes and hissing through her teeth. “Okay? Okay! No, I’m not okay. I just got shot at!”

“Yeah, I know. I hate it when that happens.”

“I changed my mind, ” she said, pink slowly seeping back into her skin. “I so don’t want to be an Angel.”

We rode the rest of the way into Bel Air in silence, Jasmine periodically wincing and re-paling as wind ripped through her shot-out windows, me periodically looking in the rearview for SUVs driven by crack heads.

Luckily none appeared, and twenty minutes later we were sitting outside the gated home of Margo Walton.

I hit the intercom button and waited as a man’s deep voice buzzed over the speaker.

“Yes?”

“Hi, I’m Maddie Springer. I work with Margo.”

Nothing.

“I, uh, wanted to see if I could talk with her?”

I waited as he did the strong, silent routine again.

“Please?”

Finally: “Hang on a minute.”

He clicked off and I let the Miata idle, hoping Margo was in a chatty mood. I tried to peek around the wrought- iron gates, but all I could see from here was a winding, gravel-lined drive leading into a grove of strategically placed oak trees, planted, no doubt, specifically to keep nosy people like me guessing.

“How much do you think a place like this costs?” I asked.

Jasmine shrugged. “I dunno. Ten mil?”

I shook my head, marveling at the thought that a woman worth ten million dollars in prime California real estate would show up to work wearing plastic Crocs. I guess money can’t buy fashion sense.

Just when I was beginning to think the gatekeeper had forgotten about us, the intercom buzzed to life again. “All right, you can go on through.”

As if by magic the heavy iron gates in front of us slid back, allowing entry. I put the car in gear, tires crunching as we wound toward the center of the property. The drive was flanked by long expanses of green lawn, punctuated here and there by blooming flower beds and the occasional fountain with a naked Greek god spurting water from completely inappropriate body parts.

Finally the drive ended in a roundabout in front of an enormous plantation-style home. Immediately I thought of Gone With the Wind, but to my knowledge Bel Air wasn’t known for its historic cotton roots. Large white columns flanked the brick steps leading to an oversize wooden door. Ornate moldings covered the cornices, and a long white balcony stretched the entire length of the upper floors.

It was official: I lived in the crappiest place in all of L.A.

I parked the dwarfed Miata near the front steps and stared up at the building.

“How many B movies did you say she made?”

“At least fifty in the U.S. Maybe more overseas. I heard she even had a short stint as a German pop star in the late nineties.”

And here I thought I knew everything there was to know about my favorite TV stars.

“So…” Jasmine said, her eyes darting to the imposing front door. “You really think Margo might have done it? Killed two women?”

I shrugged. “Maybe.”

Jasmine’s throat bobbed up and down, a little of that pasty look returning to her cheeks. “Know what? Maybe I’ll just wait in the car.”

“Suit yourself.” I opened the door and hopped out, my heels crunching on the white gravel leading up to the steps. I rang the bell and heard elegant chimes echo throughout the home. Two beats later the door was opened by a young Asian woman in a gray uniform.

“Hi, I’m Maddie Springer?” I said. Only it sounded more like a question. I’ll admit, growing up around Beverly Hills, I wasn’t easily intimidated by wealth. But being faced with a real, live uniformed maid right of out a Merchant Ivory film was something I wasn’t accustomed to. I nervously tugged at my hooker outfit.

The woman was obviously a pro, and if she wondered why a woman in spandex and clashing pumps, driving a Miata that looked like it belonged to Bonnie and Clyde, was standing on her employer’s doorstep, she didn’t show it. Instead, she did a slight nod of her head and motioned for me to come in. “Please follow me, ” she said in softly accented English.

I did, as she led the way down a narrow hallway to her right. I was glad she had her back to me as we walked, because I was pretty sure I was staring with an intensity that bordered on rude as I took in Margo’s decor.

It was like I had walked into a Hollywood museum. Every square inch of wall space was occupied by large, framed movie posters, most of which had either the words sorority or slasher or both in the title. I recognized a younger version of Margo, minus the overzealous face-lift, gracing half of them. Most were films I didn’t recognize; some were even done in foreign languages-Japanese, German, Spanish.

As the maid led me into a large room at the back of the house, the feeling of being in a showplace increased when I noticed that everything was encased in plastic. And I mean everything. The sofas were wrapped in the kind of covering seen on my Irish Catholic grandmother’s virgin living room set she purchased at Sears in 1957. Plastic display cases took up every available surface, displaying things like vases, jewelry, teacups, and even a stuffed ferret. Along a black-lacquer mantel sat a collection of trophies-one of which I picked out as a Golden Globe. I took a step closer. Best Supporting Actress in a Drama, 1997. Ouch. Been a while since Margo had appeared on the big screen.

“Miss Margo will be right with you, ” the woman told me, then disappeared back the way she had come.

I took the opportunity to browse the museum. Of course, the first stop was the ferret. (What can I say? I’m curious like that.) A brass nameplate on the case said: MR. BOBO, FROM SORORITY STRANGLER 7. I looked at Mr. Bobo, permanently suspended in midleap inside his plastic tomb. Creepy.

I moved on to the next case, which held a huge pair of ruby-colored earrings. The case read: WORN BY MAGDALENA IN THE SLASHER COED RETURNS. The rest of the cases were similarly marked, all holding memorabilia, it seemed, from Margo’s various film efforts. I paused next to a case from The Campus Killer, which held a pair of black silk pumps embroidered with little emerald butterflies down the sides.

“Gorgeous, aren’t they?”

I snapped my head up to see that Margo had entered the room.

“I wore those as Eleanor Swift, sophomore at UCLA and the Campus Killer’s third victim.”

I nodded. “They’re beautiful.” Personally, I thought it was a shame they were stuck behind plastic. Shoes like those deserved to be worn. Fleetingly, I wondered what size they were…

“My death scene in that one was superbly written. The killer slit me across the throat right here.” She made a line from ear to ear with her forefinger. “God, I was cleaning fake dye out of my hair for a week, there was so much blood. Did you see that one?” Margo asked

I shook my head. “No, sorry. I must have missed it.”

Margo shrugged. “Oh, well, it was a straight-to-video. Great reviews in Sweden, though. Please sit, ” she said, indicating a low love seat.

I did, my spandex dress slipping awkwardly on the plastic surface.

Margo sat opposite me. She was dressed in a maroon skirt, black blouse, and sheer black stockings that swooshed together as she crossed one leg over the other. Though I was pleased to see a pair of classic black pumps on her feet and not the rubber Crocs.