Gemma Halliday - Fearless in High Heels

“Baby Jeopardy!” he announced. “I’ll call out a question, and the first person to shout out the answer, in the form of a question,” he added, “wins. Everyone ready?”

I sat up straighter in my chair. I had read What to Expect When You’re Expecting at least three times, cover to cover. I’d even memorized the first two chapters of What to Expect the First Year. This one I could do.

“What,” Marco asked, reading off of a little yellow index card, “is the age at which babies first learn to crawl?”

“What is two!” I shouted out.

Mom turned to me. “Years?”

I bit my lip. “Um… months?” I said, though it came out more of a question.

Mom looked down at Baby-So-Lifelike with something akin to sympathy in her eyes.

“Sorry, that’s incorrect,” Marco said shaking his head. “Anyone else?”

My cousin, Molly, raised her hand. “According to the American Academy of Pediatricians, most babies hit that developmental milestone between the ages of six and ten months. So, what is six to ten months?”

“Correct!” Marco said. “Very impressive honey. One point for the woman with the fabu bob.”

Molly preened in her seat.

“No fair,” I mumbled under my breath. “I haven’t gotten to that chapter yet.”

“Next question,” Marco announced. “At what age do babies get their first tooth?”

I wisely stayed silent on this one, letting my cousin, Molly, shout out an answer again. “Most pediatricians agree that children will get their first deciduous tooth between the ages of four and seven months.”

“Correct!” Marco said. “But you didn’t phrase it in the form of a question.”

Molly’s face fell.

“Okay, next question. How long do most pediatricians recommend you breastfeed your baby?”

“What is twelve months!” Mrs. Rosenblatt shouted out this time.

“Correct!” Marco said. “One point for the lady in the fashionable muumuu!”

“Wait,” I said, leaning toward my mom. “Didn’t he just say that babies get their first teeth at four months?”

Mom nodded.

“And then we breastfeed for another eight months?”

She nodded again.

My nipples cringed. Suddenly feeding The Bump pea-puke baby food didn’t sound like such a bad idea after all.

Three hours, two party games, and one cake shaped like a stork later, I was just cleaning up the last of the balloons when Ramirez walked through the front door. He stopped dead in his tracks, staring at the mounds of pink and blue colored tissue paper.

“Surprise baby shower,” I explained. “So not my idea.”

He walked over to the pile of baby gifts leaning precariously against the sofa. “We get anything good?”

“A Boppy, a Bumpo, and a Tommee Tippee gift basket.” I paused. “I don’t know what any of those things are.”

Ramirez grinned. “I like your new look,” he said gesturing to my torso.

I glanced down and realized Baby-So-Lifelike was still attached to me. Oddly enough, I had kind of forgotten about her. Maybe the carrier wasn’t such a bad thing after all.

“Mom said I need practice.”

He nodded. “Good idea. I remember the ficus.”

I rolled my eyes. “Geeze, it was one little plant.”

“Three, if I recall.”

“I’m practicing, okay,” I said, gesturing to the doll strapped to my mid-section. I paused. “So, you gonna start with the yelling now?” I asked.

Ramirez let out a long sigh, then sank into the sofa. “I probably should. It’s getting late, and we have a lot of ground to cover.”

“Very funny,” I countered, sinking into the sofa beside him. Though, the fact he was teasing me was a good sign. “You know it’s not my fault, right? I mean, we just found her like that.”

Ramirez shot me a look. “Uh huh. And what were you doing there in the first place?”

“Nothing,” I said, though I noticed my voice rose about an octave. “We just wanted to talk to Becca, that’s all.”

“Instead you found her dead body.”

“Sorta?”

“And,” he added, “your prints were found all over her apartment. You want to explain that?”

I bit my lip. “Not really.”

“Maddie…”

“Okay, I was at her place the other day. The door was unlocked, so we kind of stepped inside. And maybe looked around a little. But Becca wasn’t there, I swear it.”

He ran a hand over his face. “You know, between the death threat you gave Alexa and the fingerprints at Becca’s, it’s becoming a full time job convincing my captain that my wife isn’t involved in these murders.”

I bit my lip again. “Sorry?”

He shot me the look again.

“Really, really sorry?” I amended.

He let out another deep sigh. “Just stay away from my crime scene from now on, capiche, Springer?”

I nodded. “Capiche. So, we’re cool?” I asked.

He gave me a tired smile. “We’re fine, Maddie.”

Fine. Not exactly the most passionate term to describe a relationship. But I figured at the moment fine was the best I could hope for.

“I’ve got some reports to go over tonight,” he told me, getting up from the sofa. “Any party leftovers?” he asked hopefully.

“There’s the stork beak still left on the cake.”

He grinned. “Perfect,” he said, then ducked into the kitchen with his briefcase full of papers.

Though, for once, I didn’t mind being neglected in favor of paperwork. Because if those reports were what I thought they were, I fully intended to do a little paperwork of my own the second he left them unattended.

* * *

“Flunitrazepam,” I told Dana and Marco the next day in the reception area of Fernando’s salon.

“Fluniwhatnow?” Marco asked.

“Ruffies,” Dana supplied. “Date rape drug.”

I nodded. “That’s what was in Becca’s system. A whole lot of it, according to the M.E.’s report that I read last night. Enough to put down an elephant, let alone a hundred pound woman.”

“So, whoever killed Becca drugged her to death?” Marco asked.

“And also drugged Alexa,” I added, triumphantly. “After Ramirez fell asleep I snuck a peek at her report, too. We were right. She was drugged first, then drained of blood.”

“Which explains why she didn’t struggle,” Dana added.

“And, also why there was no blood at the scene. Flunitrazepam inhibits blood pressure, so it would have been easy to puncture her neck, lean her over the toilet, then let her blood drain and flush it away.”

“Assuming he didn’t drink it,” Marco put in.

Dana and I did the simultaneous eye roll thing again. We were getting pretty good at it. Almost completely synchronized this time.

“Okay, so the killer drugs Alexa, kills her, then the night of the party he follows Becca and drugs her, too?” Dana asked.

I shook my head. “No. That’s the genius part. I did a little googling and found out that the drug doesn’t kick in until a full thirty minutes after the victim ingests it, and it doesn’t take full effect until two hours afterward.”

“So whoever killed her must have spiked her drink at the party,” Marco said.

I pointed at him. “Bingo. All he had to do was make sure she drank the stuff, then he’d likely be nowhere near the body at the time she actually died.”

“So it was Sebastian!” Marco said. “I knew it.”

“Goldstein was at the party, too,” Dana pointed out.

“Yeah, but what are the chances he’d drug her, providing himself with a great alibi, then actually drive her somewhere and wait to watch her die? It defeats the purpose of using the time-released drug.”

I nodded. “Good point. Okay, so let’s assume that it was Sebastian. Let’s say the girls were blackmailing him over something that happened at the parties, and he kills Alexa at the club, making it look like one of her vampire-wanna-be lovers did her in.”

“Then when Becca comes nosing around for pay-off money to keep quiet about the murder, he spikes her drink,” Marco continued, “knowing that by the end of the night, she’ll be dead, too.”

“Perfect!” Dana agreed. “Now all we have to do is prove it.”

“What we need is to find the murder weapon,” I decided.

“Uh, Mads? The guy’s fangs are in his mouth,” Marco pointed out.

I shot him a look. “I meant the drug. He clearly kept it around after he killed Alexa. Maybe he’s still got some squirreled away somewhere now.”

“And, if so,” Dana said, “it’s probably at his place right now.”

“Which means we need to find it, quickly, before he gets rid of the evidence.”

“So we break into his place?” Dana asked.

I shook my head. “We don’t need to. I called the girls’ agent, Bowman, and he said that Sebastian is having another party tonight.”

“Perfect!” Dana said.

Marco did a deep sigh. “Fine. But we need to swing by my place after work so I can change into my turtleneck.”

We left Marco to finish his shift at Fernando’s, promising we’d pick him and his turtleneck up later that evening. Then Dana went back to the Sunset Studios lot to score us more vampire attire and three pairs of fangs, and I went home to a) pee and b) eat. Only the second I walked in the door I was ambushed by my mother and Mrs. Rosenblatt.

“Why is my grandchild home alone again?” Mom asked, pouncing on me as she cradled Baby-So-Lifelike in her arms.

I looked down at my Santana bag. Crap. I’d forgotten to take the doll out of the carrier last night.

“Sorry. I forgot,” I mumbled, pushing past her toward the hall bathroom.

“Forgot?” her voice followed me. “You can’t just forget a baby, Maddie!”

I shut the door, giving my eyes a good three-sixty the second I was out of her sight. “I forgot the doll. I won’t forget a real baby.”

“You are failing at practice, young lady!” she shouted.

I ignored her, instead moving to do my business. But as I looked down at the toilet seat, I realized that wasn’t going to be possible. There was a bulky plastic arm wedged between the tank and the lid, holding it firmly shut. I tried lifting it, but it wouldn’t budge.