“Yeah, I totally didn’t see that coming,” I say in a calm, collected voice.
“How did they get involved?”
I offer my best guess at this time. “I think Sebastian works for him. Or he did until he skipped town.”
“Do you really think he skipped town?”
“I’m trying to be optimistic.”
“What’s the pessimistic answer?”
I stay silent, which gives Paige the answer she didn’t want.
“Shit.” She grabs my drink and downs it.
“What this means is that Sebastian is—was—some low-level dealer who switched from Carmen to Yury Yury. That’s how Yury Yury knew about Tiffany and about us.”
Chester returns with our drinks—on the house. Paige downs her second martini. I grab my old-fashioned and start nursing it before she has a chance to claim it.
Paige takes a bite of her olive. “And he wants Elizabeth as a pawn in his drug war with Carmen?”
“Yeah. As if we didn’t have enough to deal with,” I answer, biting down on a cherry.
“Jesus,” she says. My stomach growls. “Now we’re caught in the middle of some drug war?”
“If we are, it’s still probably the least of our worries.”
Paige shoots me a look. “That’s comforting.”
Chapter 16
____◊____
IT’S MORNING. I LIE in bed, thinking about last night’s altercation. It’s not clear whether Yury Yury works for himself or for some larger organization. Either way, I start counting everyone I need to watch out for—drug dealers, Santa Muerte, the LAPD, and now the Russian mob.
I pull myself out of bed and head out to the living room. With no cause for alarm, I’m able to slide my door open without having to sing the Notre Dame song. Paige is in the loft, waiting for me. I’m not sure how long she had been standing there, but knowing her patience and resolve, I’m aware that it could have been all morning.
What strikes me is how she’s dressed—a black T-shirt, black pants, and black shoes. She looks like she’s going to a casual funeral. Then I notice she’s holding the same outfit on a hanger, presumably for me.
“What’s up?” I ask.
She pushes the hanger forward. “I need you to change.”
“What’s going on?”
“I found him, Darcy.”
I struggle to catch up. “Found who?”
“The judge.”
It takes me a moment, but I get there. Paige has figured out the redacted name of the judge on all the legal documents hiding her past.
“You were right,” she continues. “It’s not me I should have been searching for—it’s the judge! I thought about how you said it might be one judge on all those same documents. And I thought, ‘That’s weird—how many judges approve all those different kind of forms? There are all different courts—different judges.’ So I did another query. I wanted to know which judge did all three—name change, Social Security, and termination of guardianship.”
“And you found one.”
“And I found one. Get this—his name is Judge William Whitaker.”
I cock my head. “Whitaker?”
She nods vigorously. “I was four years old, and the court had to assign me a new name. He gave me his.”
I’m impressed. If I could convince Paige to abandon her high-salary, low-effort career, she could become one hell of a struggling private detective.
“Now,” she says, holding the outfit out for me, “I need you to change. And please don’t ask why.”
Paige and I have an understanding. “Please don’t ask” is the cue for unconditional friendship. It’s our way of saying, “The shit is about to go down, and I need someone by my side when it does.”
I grab the outfit and change in my room. Of course, I keep my jacket on. A plain T-shirt isn’t going to keep me warm. When I emerge, she grimaces at the jacket but says nothing.
“Can you at least tell me where we’re going?” I ask as we walk out the door.
“Bellagio Country Club.”
* * *
The Bellagio Country Club is a private club tucked away in the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains. Located off the meandering roads of Bel-Air, the property is a collection of Spanish-style clubhouses and includes private pools, tennis courts, and an eighteen-hole golf course. It’s the type of establishment where the elite have come to play since the Golden Age of Hollywood.
Normally, it would be impossible to gain entrance to this club unless you were willing to pay the two-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar initiation fee plus yearly dues. Or unless your best friend convinced you to pose as a member of the event staff for a private reception. So here I am, wearing a white apron over my black outfit—sans warm and cozy jacket—holding a silver tray of canapés for the wealthy and powerful citizens of Los Angeles. It’s a private luncheon on the deck of the main clubhouse, which overlooks the city from its rich and insulated perch. The day is clear and sunny, providing a view from downtown to the ocean beaches. Banners and signs mark the occasion—a fundraiser for some local politician running for reelection at the end of the year.
I move through the crowd, putting on my best smile and trying to pretend I actually care about my job. The appetizers clatter on the metal tray as I shiver from the unobstructed wind that sweeps through the hills. I’m on the lookout for one person—Judge William Whitaker. Not only did Paige find his name, but she also cyberstalked him and discovered he’d be at today’s reception. How she found that out she refuses to tell me, for my own legal protection.
“See him yet?”
I flinch and turn to find Paige behind me, holding an empty tray. She scans the crowd, looking at everyone but me.
“Don’t sneak up on me!” I reprimand her.
“Find me as soon as you see him.”
“Yeah, I know the…” Before I even finish my sentence, she’s gone.
Earlier, she sent me a text—a photo of the judge at another one of these events. He’s a good-looking man in his sixties with thick wavy silver hair on a face with
