Bare-Naked Lola (A Lola Cruz Mystery) (11 page)

He seemed unsure as he glanced back toward the court, mulling it over before making up his mind. “Sure thing, baby. Hold that thought.” He jogged down the court, said something to one of the moppers (who turned to gawk), then he jogged back.

He snatched my hand and pulled me into the tunnel after him. “What’s your name, baby?”

What was with all the baby stuff?
He
was the baby in this equation. “Lola. What’s yours?”

“Josh.”

I pulled my hand free. “Well, Josh. Impress me. Why do they keep it so off-limits?”

“Scandals and stuff. Gotta protect the players.” We walked side by side until he stopped short in front of the door to the locker room. “This is it.”

Like any pro sports team, Royals players had had their share of accusations lobbed against them. Drugs. Gambling. Women. I hadn’t been able to dig up any dirt on any of the dancers yet; the players were next in line.

“Can we go in?” I asked, wondering how I could get rid of him so I could search the lockers real quickly. Maybe I’d get lucky and find a stack of ready-to-deliver envelopes piled in a corner somewhere.

“Nah.”

“Oh.” I frowned. “Well, that’s not much of a tour. I’ve never been this close to someone who actually
knows
famous basketball players.”

Josh puffed up like a peacock, full of his own importance. “Well,” he said, “maybe for a quick minute.”

He pushed the door open, poked his head around the corner to check out the room, and, when he was sure the coast was clear, let me pass.

My heart pounded. It was only a locker room, but getting caught wasn’t on my list of things to do tonight. Cubbies with the players’ belongings lined the walls and a buffet spread far superior to the one in the dancers’ locker room spanned two rectangular tables. Cases of bottled water were stacked in one corner, beside a soda machine, vending machine, and a closed door along another wall.

“This is it?” Despite the buffet, I expected more bells and whistles for a championship-contending basketball team.

Josh spread his arms wide as he turned around in a circle. “What d’ya mean, ‘this is it?’ This is the Royals’ locker room. It’s fan-freaking-tastic.”

I walked by the cubby lockers, checking each one as surreptitiously as I could.

No envelopes.

No paper.

No writing instruments.

No big surprise.

I peeked through the window of the door next to the vending machine. Linens. “What’s over there—?”

I broke off as Josh clamped a hand on my shoulder and spun me around. He crashed his mouth against mine, gripping my shoulders with his icy hands.

“Thtop!” Instincts kicked in. I hauled my knee up, slamming my foot down a split second later, landing squarely on his toes.

He screeched, pulling back. I threaded my arms in between his to knock his hands away and slapped his cheek. “What the hell are you doing, Josh?”

He held his palm to his face, hopping on one foot. “What d’ya mean?” His eyes turned glassy. “
You
wanted to come in here.”

Son of a bitch. “Right, to see the locker room. Dude, I’m way too old for you. And, uh, let me enlighten you. Girls you hook up with don’t want to be groped the second you get them alone. Whatever happened to getting to know someone before exchanging spit?”

He looked me up and down, still clutching his reddened face. The cocky attitude had been replaced by eighteen-year-old confused frustration. “But you’re dressed like…like…” He waved his hand up and down at my body. “Like that. And you’re hot.”

Pobrecito.
It wasn’t cool to mess with a teenager’s libido. “Wanting a tour is not code for something else,” I said. “Bit of advice, Josh. These dance costumes are a uniform. And even if a woman is dressed…er…suggestively, that’s not a green light that she’s game for a hookup.”

Josh just stared at me, hurt and dumbfounded, but I didn’t have time to give him any more mini lessons on how men should respect women. I resumed my quick search. I walked briskly through to the showers, glanced at the urinals and toilet stalls, and passed by another door. “What’s in there?”

His shoulders slumped, his face morose, but he answered. “Doctor’s room. Trainer uses it to work on the players. There’s a hot tub for therapy.”

I peered through the glass…and froze. We weren’t alone. The trainer, Steve, was talking with someone, his back to the window, the other person out of my range of view.

I quickly retreated back to the main part of the locker room, thankful Josh and I hadn’t been discovered. Victoria and Lance wanted me to investigate, but they couldn’t let on they were okay with me breaking ranks—not to mention leaving the tunnel and scoping out the locker room. If I were busted, the wrath of the
real
Victoria would come hammering down on me. It would have to.

“Thanks for the tour, Josh,” I said once we were back in the main corridor. “You’re a great catch. Just give a girl a chance to see it.”

I waved, then raced back to the tunnel.

The dancers were scattered in the opening. Selma was spooked, her black eyes like liquid pools in the midst of her creamy skin.

“Are you okay?” I asked, squeezing in between her and Cassie.

She said, “Yeah,” hesitantly as Cassie whispered, “Where’d you go? Victoria’ll have a conniption if she finds out you left the tunnel.”

“Had to use the restroom,” I said, the lie rolling off my tongue. Being a detective meant I was getting pretty good at blithe little fibs as cover stories. I’d be saying a truckload of rosaries when this case was over.

Selma clutched the envelope in her hand. I leaned closer. “Is it…?”

She fanned the envelope. “It can’t be for me.
I
haven’t done anything.” She peered back through the tunnel as if someone back there
had
done something and she knew all about it.

“Isn’t there a name on it?”

She flipped the envelope around. “Nope. Nothing.”

I pried it from her fingers and scanned the letter, touching it only by the corners.
You can’t hide the truth forever.

It was definitely different than the others. “What truth? You don’t know what it’s talking about?”

Selma’s face had paled and her voice cracked like a pubescent boy’s. “I h-have n-no idea.”

I didn’t believe her. I was beginning to think that she had some other secrets under her sparkly sequined halter top.

A high-pitched whistle came from the stands. Selma’s cheeks flared red and she turned her back on the fans.

“Do you get recognized a lot?” I asked. I got the feeling she really wished she could be in hiding rather than exposed for all to see at this game.

“All the time. Even when it’s six in the morning and there’s only one person in the store, someone always seems to know who I am. I wish I’d never done that reality show.” She flicked her head toward the enormous scoreboard and the four gigantic TV screens mounted above the sections of stands. “Our faces get plastered up there. That’s why Victoria says to never go out without makeup. Sometimes I just want to quit, you know?”

Standing on the other side of me, Cassie batted at my arm. “It’s time. Let’s go.”

I tucked the letter behind Victoria’s stool, straightened my outfit, and pumped my arms to get energized.

Jennifer skipped to her place in front of the line and counted. “One! And two! And three! And four!”

Three-and-a-half minutes later, sweat poured out of my pores and I knew why the dancers doused themselves in perfume. At the first opportunity I raced back into the dressing room and put Selma’s letter into my duffel bag. Then I borrowed Jennifer’s cologne, spraying into the air like I’d seen the girls do, walking through the falling mist. A few other dancers milled around the room, snacking from the buffet table before halftime. I took a stem of grapes, popping one in my mouth as I headed back toward the tunnel.

I finished my grapes, and a short while later we performed our last dance. We showered and I changed for dinner. I’d searched the crowd for Rochelle, but if she’d come to the game, she hadn’t sat with the girlfriends or the wives. She was in a weird
limbo
state, existing somewhere between the two realities.

I had no chance to investigate any further. Too many people lingering postgame. Another day. With any luck, I’d have a brilliant idea by then. Or I’d find the arena empty and a slew of clues just waiting to be discovered.

I zipped up my brown platform boots and fastened the floral blouse that crossed over into a
V
at the neckline and tied at the side. I scrunched my hair in between my fingers to let it air dry the rest of the way, packed up my duffel, and wandered around the room.

More of the women smiled at me. Baby steps. If only my mother were here with a fresh batch of flour tortillas, I’d be in on the
chisme
in a second. They wouldn’t be able to stop sharing the gossip with me.

The corner of a white envelope poking out of a bag caught my eye. I stopped short. Was it an old message, a new one, or something else entirely?

Nicole walked up behind me, raven hair glistening, the gap between her low-rise jeans and her half shirt equal to the dance outfit we’d just changed out of. “Can I help you with something?”

Of course it would be her bag. The one dancer who I was pretty sure had a stash of lemons in her bag—which she sucked on every time she saw me.
Pues
, maybe not the
only
one, but definitely the worst one. Swallowing, I tried to think of a plausible lie that could get her to rifle through the duffel. “I was hoping to see the earrings you wore after the last game. They were really cool.”

She frowned, pulling her hair back behind her shoulders. “Which ones? I don’t remember.”

They
had
been cool, and I remembered thinking so. Now I racked my brain for the details, gesturing near my own ear as if I could make them materialize. “They were dangly, with a small square on top, and a bigger square under that, then a big circle. I think there were beads on them.”

She snapped her fingers, her pouty red lips curving up. “Oh yeah. I dig those. I got them at this funky shop downtown.”

“Do you have them with you? I’d love to see them again,” I added, being sweeter than my mother’s
buñuelos
.

She hesitated, and for a second I thought my buttering up was going to be a bust. But then she moved to her bag and pulled the zipper open the rest of the way. I bit my lip as the sides flapped down and the envelope slipped deeper into the duffle. I bent down to peer inside while she rifled through what seemed to be the entire beauty section of a drugstore. If she weren’t a Royals dancer, Nicole could have been a traveling cosmetologist.

She took out the clothes on top, two toiletry bags, the envelope, a huge ring of keys, and finally a jewelry bag.

I tried to get a closer look at the envelope, but it was buried under the other items she’d dropped. She unfolded the trifold bag, revealing an array of enormous silver earrings, including the ones I’d mentioned. “Here they are,” she said, holding them up for me to see.

The sparkling silver caught my eye. They really were fantastic. I took them and held them to my ear. She seemed to be warming up to me, so I kept chattering as I faced the mirror. “What’s the name of the shop where you got them?”

“Vintage Things, off of Twenty-second Street.”

Talking vintage clothing had brought out a bright side in Nicole’s personality. She spent the next few minutes telling me everything about the store’s eclectic fashions, right down to every single item she’d ever bought there. Pretty soon I was salivating to go on a shopping spree.

But it would have to wait. I had a case, and that took precedence over everything else. “They’re cool.” I gave them back and said, “Let me help you clean this up.”

She tucked the earrings back into the jewelry bag while I gathered the toiletry bags and then the envelope, surreptitiously turning it over to see the back. It was smaller than the others. More like an invitation.

“I’ll take that,” Nicole said, pulling the envelope from my hand just like I’d slipped Selma’s from her.

I summoned my acting skills again. “Is there a party? I heard there are some great ones after games sometimes.”

“Don’t believe everything you hear,” she said, her sour mood back. She tucked the envelope into her bag, I added the clothes on top, and she zipped it up.

In the blink of an eye, she threw her bag over her boney shoulder and was out the door.

So much for building camaraderie.

…

The dancers had arranged to get together at a Howe ’Bout Arden restaurant. More food. They were bottomless pits.

Trainer Steve and his brother waved to me as I wheeled my bag down the corridor. The team’s leopard mascot, complete with a royal blue, gold-trimmed cape, jumped in front of me, wiggled his body, and spun around. I careened back, nearly falling on my behind. I managed to skirt around him, checking over my shoulder to make sure he wasn’t following me, the rascal. He wasn’t. I was in the clear.

As I rounded the corner, I ran smack into Jennifer. Not literally, but close. She leaned against the wall by the exit door, her packed duffel next to her.

“Are you coming?” I asked, stopping to talk to her.

She winked. “After a while.”

My spidey senses went on alert. What was that wink about? “I’ll wait with you,” I said.

She sauntered down the hallway, throwing her hand up in a dismissive wave. “No, no. Don’t wait for me. I’ll be there,” she tossed over her shoulder.

Hmm. Jennifer was up to something, and I wanted to know what. I dawdled on my way out the door. Finally, just as I was at the exit, I caught a glimpse of three Royals players heading toward her. One of them stopped while the other two kept walking my way.

“Hi,” I said a few seconds later, moving out of their way.

One of them, Number 23, I think, held the door for me so I could maneuver my case through it. “Any time, baby.”

I forced myself not to scowl as I moved outside, trying to see through the two enormous men, but Jennifer was gone and the other ballplayer was, too.