scanning the contents but seeing nothing except paper towels and the occasional Kleenex.
Next I moved to the farthest stall and opened the door, looking behind the toilet and in the sanitary napkin bin. Nothing here, either.
I went to each stall, checking every corner, except for one that was being used. Whoever was in there must be wondering what I was doing. But it certainly wasn’t worse than what she was doing: talking on her cell phone while she did her business.
I was washing my hands when she finally emerged. I wasn’t going to go in there while she was still here. She had one of those little Bluetooth things stuck in her ear, and she gave me a nasty look as she flitted out without washing her hands, as though I’d been purposely listening to her conversation.
Like talking out loud to a person who wasn’t there was supposed to be private.
When the door had shut behind her, I stepped into the stall she’d just vacated. Nothing in the sanitary napkin bin, thank goodness. I peered around the back of the toilet. Nothing there, either. So my great idea was all for naught.
I turned to leave, and the door swung shut slightly. The hook for a coat or a purse caught my eye. I hadn’t checked behind any of the doors because I’d held them all open as I looked in the stalls.
Going back to the furthest stall, I quickly checked out the doors. I’d looked at all of them except two when three older women came through the door, laughing and talking. I skirted into one of the stalls and shut the door, pretending that I was here for the same reason they were.
On the back of the door hung a bag. A clear plastic bag with some paper towels in the bottom. It looked as though it were one of the plastic bags that filled the trash bins out near the sink. Someone had snagged one and brought it in here. Clearly the cleaning woman had done what I had: left without checking behind the door.
And whoever had left the bag there had dropped more trash into it: a long, red wig and a pair of stiletto heels. On top of those were more paper towels, but I wasn’t sure they were there to disguise what else was in the bag. They were covered with a swirl of colors. As though someone had taken makeup off with them. A lot of makeup.
Maybe makeup that had been applied to look like a dragon tattoo.
I knew I shouldn’t move it. There might be fingerprints or something. Granted, since I’d touched the door, my fingerprints were there, too. And probably not the only ones that didn’t belong to the woman who’d changed her appearance to get away from Jeff.
I wondered if she’d realized after talking to him that maybe he knew me, maybe he was on to her, and that’s why she skedaddled.
I was also sure now that this couldn’t be Ainsley, since her red hair was for real and not a wig. I’d seen her just out of the shower, after all. But somehow, thinking that my impostor was Ainsley hadn’t bothered me quite as much as knowing that a total stranger was pretending to be me.
I had another new dilemma, too. I needed to get Tim over here and make sure no one moved that bag. Which meant I was going to have to camp out in here. Fun.
The women who’d come in left, laughing and looking back at me once or twice because surely I was a little nutty to be hanging in the ladies’ room. No kidding.
Since there was no one else in here, I poked my head out the door and saw Jeff standing sentry not too far away.
“Hey, there,” I said, not too loud, but loud enough so he turned around.
A smirk crossed his face. “What are you doing?” he asked.
I beckoned him to come closer. “I found something. I need to call Tim and have him come over here. Get the stuff.”
“What is it?” He took a step closer to the door, looked like he was going to come in.
I put my hand up. “You can’t come in here.”
“Anyone else in there?”
“Not right now.”
“Then why not?” He pushed the door in farther and stepped inside. “Wow,” he said, surveying the environs. “Fancier than a men’s room-that’s for sure.”
I didn’t want to get into it.
“So where is it?” he asked,
He was here; I figured that I might as well show him, then get him out as soon as possible. I pushed open the stall door.
“Behind the door,” I said.
Jeff Coleman stepped inside, and the outside door swung open. I reached for the stall handle and slammed it shut.
Two girls probably no more than twenty-five sauntered in. They wore tight jeans, shirts that rose up above their bellies to show off their belly rings, and flip-flops. They had been chattering to each other but fell silent when they saw me.
“Are you okay in there?” I asked through the door.
“Mmmm.” His tone was deep, but there were women who had low voices, and as long as he didn’t actually say anything, we’d be okay. And then he made some sort of sound like he was getting sick. Great. He was totally getting into his role.
The girls were staring, and I shrugged sheepishly. “Too many cocktails,” I felt compelled to explain.
One of them, the one with the long brunette tresses that had to be extensions and way too much makeup for this time of day, grinned. “Don’t we know about it,” she said conspiratorially. “We’ve been up all night partying at that Cleopatra’s Barge and then some other party over at a nightclub at the Flamingo. We love Vegas. We’re from Arizona. We go to Arizona State. Where are you from?”
I totally did not want to become BFFs with these two girls. I had more pressing things to worry about, like Jeff Coleman pretending to have the dry heaves in the stall and needing to call Tim to come over and shut this place down to look for clues.
But I didn’t have to actually have a conversation, it turned out, because they were doing just fine on their own and didn’t much care whether I answered or not. The second girl, a blonde with brown eyes and the longest lashes I’d ever seen, starting going on about some cool guy they met at “the Barge.”
I pulled my cell out, not caring if I was being rude. I don’t think they noticed.
“Kavanaugh,” I heard my brother say.
“You have to come over to Caesars,” I said. “It’s really important.”
“Everything’s important to you, Brett.”
The girls had gone into stalls now, and I stepped outside, leaving Jeff Coleman alone in there. He was just going to have to deal.
“Listen, Tim, Jeff met a woman at Cleopatra’s Barge last night after we all left. She had red hair and a fake dragon tattoo on her chest and she said her name was Brett Kavanaugh.”
“I already talked to him about that.”
Right. He did. “I’m outside the ladies’ room now, near the bar, where she ditched a wig and shoes, and it looks like that dragon was just makeup she removed with paper towels. The bag with this stuff is hanging on the back of a stall door.”
“You say you’re there now?”
“Jeff’s in there watching it.” As soon as I said it, I realized I should’ve lied and said, yes, Tim, I’m in there now. But it was too late.
“Coleman’s in the ladies’ room?”
“Please, Tim, I didn’t want to move the bag. There might be fingerprints.”
“You’re watching way too much
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Can you get here?”
