“Um, what was that you said about Dieber being in mourning?” asked Chase.
She slowly hitched up the jaw that had dropped and stared at the scene. In light of the recent death of one of the pop star’s bodyguards, this all seemed very inappropriate and more than a little disrespectful. “Maybe this is the way he deals with loss?” she tried lamely.
“Yeah, right,” Chase grunted. He clearly wasn’t buying it, and frankly neither was she. “Let’s go outside and have a chat with our chief mourner,” he suggested.
They stepped out onto the deck, and mingled with the raving crowd. The music was loud and Odelia recognized it as part of a remix of Dieber songs by the world’s top DJs. She actually had the same compilation on her phone, and enjoyed listening to it at the gym.
Now she doubted if she’d ever be able to enjoy it in quite the same way again.
A freakishly muscular young man bumped up against her.“Hey, babe! Wanna get nekkid with me?”
“No, I don’t want to get ‘nekkid’ with you,” she snapped, and ignored Chase’s grin.
“Wanna do some blow? Snort some coke?” the guy asked, a strange gleam in his eyes. She recognized the gleam. He was clearly high on the stuff he was hawking.
Chase held up his badge.“Police. Get lost, buddy.”
In spite of his state of inebriation, the guy got the message and took a hike.
“Nice wake,” said Chase. “I’m sure the family of Ray Cooper will be thrilled.”
Odelia merely shook her head. And that’s when she spotted the man of the hour. Charlie Dieber was seated in a lounge next to the pool, stroking… “Harriet!”
“Huh?” Chase asked.
“Look—it’s my mom’s cat.”
He looked where she indicated, and muttered,“Well, I’ll be damned. It’s Diego.”
Diego had belonged to Chase’s mom, before she’d offloaded him on her son when her health didn’t allow her to take care of him herself. And since Chase was bunking with Uncle Alec, and was rarely home, he’d asked the Pooles to look after the orange cat.
Odelia hurried over, and saw that all her cats were present and accounted for: Brutus, Dooley, Max, Harriet and Diego. Even Clarice was there, the feral cat Max had befriended.
And she’d just joined Charlie when she heard him say, “I’m adopting you, beautiful.”
“No, you’re not,” she said, and snatched Harriet from the singer’s paws. “This is my cat,” she said. “Or at least my mother’s.”
Charlie gave her a grin.“Hey, babe. Wanna get nekkid and jump in the pool with me? I’ll bet you’re one hell of a swimmer.”
Chase took out his badge again and flashed it in the singer’s face. “Wanna get nekkid with me, douchebag? I know some great wrestling moves.”
Charlie held up his hands.“Chill, dude. I’m just trying to have some fun.”
“You’ve got a strange idea of fun—stealing someone else’s cat.”
“Hey, I wasn’t stealing anyone’s cat. I just like cats.” He smiled. “I like to call them my Dieber Babes.” He gave Clarice’s fur a stroke. “Isn’t that right, babe?”
Clarice emitted a soft purring sound that Odelia had never heard her produce before. She looked different, too. Less mangy.
“How much do you want for the Persian?” asked Charlie now. “I want her. And what the Dieber wants, the Dieber gets.”
“I’m going to have to disappoint you, Charlie,” Odelia said, becoming indignant now. “Harriet is not for sale.”
“She isn’t, huh? How about the orange one?”
“That’s my cat,” said Chase, “and he’s not for sale either.”
“Oh, he’s a he, huh? My bad. Yeah, I don’t do dudes, only babes.” Charlie darted a quick glance at Brutus and Dooley, but didn’t seem to deem them worthy of inclusion in his harem either. “So I guess it’s ‘peace, out’ from me then, suckers.” He held up his index and middle finger, kissed them and stalked off, moving in an awkward swaying motion. He was wearing his cap with the bill backwards, and baggy pants that showed a good deal of crack. Odelia shook her head. Suddenly she wasn’t so sure if she still wanted to be a Bedieber.
Chapter 11
Odelia and Chase finally sat down with Carlos Roulston, the person in charge of security. Roulston was easily twice the size of Chase, who was by no means a scrawny chicken himself. Roulston’s head was shaved in an intricate pattern that reminded Odelia of Egyptian hieroglyphs for some reason, and his skin was tanned to a tawny leather, his broad features stoic and unsmiling. Here sat a man who wouldn’t be trifled with, she felt.
“Terrible business,” the security professional intimated. “Ray was a great guy. Real team player.”
They were seated in the coolness of the security head’s office on the first floor. Like the man himself, the office was no-nonsense—just a desk, a couple of chairs, a small salon with coffee table and two couches, and a wall-mounted cabinet that may or may not have contained the small arsenal Charlie Dieber’s security detail presumably had at their disposal. What struck Odelia was that there were no pictures of Charlie anywhere in evidence.
“So what can you tell us about threats?” asked Chase, leaning forward. “Has anyone made any threats against Charlie’s life in the recent past?”
“Dozens. There’s a lot of nutcases out there, Detective, I don’t have to tell you that. The moment you become famous and people write about you, the crazies come out in droves.”
“You mean, like, letters, emails, social media, what?”
“All of the above.” He opened a desk drawer and took out a file folder and placed it on the desk. Odelia opened it and found herself looking at a pile an inch thick of letters, cards, napkins, beer coasters, pictures, screenshots… She picked out a few and read the scribbled messages. ‘You’re a dead man, Dweeber.’ ‘I’m coming for you, singer boy.’ ‘We all hate you.’ ‘You’re Satan’s spawn and Jesus will wipe you out in the coming apocalypse.’
Roulston cracked his knuckles.“Like I said. There’s a lot of crazies out there.”
“Anything that sticks out?” asked Chase. “Anyone in particular you think might have come after your employer?”
“If you’re asking me if anyone has called in and claimed responsibility for the attack, no, they haven’t. And frankly I don’t expect them to, either. This is some loner crackpot. A loner crackpot with a gun. Have your people determined the type of weapon that was used?”
“Colt Cobra,” said Chase.
Roulston frowned.“The .38 special. That’s a short-range weapon. I would have thought he was shot from a distance. Sniper style.”
“No, it would appear that the killer was fairly close. Ballistics places the shooter at no more than ten feet.”
Jefferson brushed his hand across his bristly buzzcut, a confused frown on his face.“Ten feet, huh? That means the shooter was in the crowd. For some reason I thought he was on the roof, scoping us out. Did you talk to the people closest to where Ray was shot?”
“We’re still interviewing people. We also confiscated their phones and have downloaded all digital imagery taken at the scene.”
“And?”
“So far nothing.”
“That’s weird. Someone must have seen something.”
“There were dozens of people present, Mr. Roulston,” said Odelia. “It’ll take us a little time to talk to all of them, and cross-reference the witness reports.”
There was a knock at the door, and four more people entered, three men and one woman.“I want to introduce you to my team,” said Roulston, getting up. “Team, this is Detective Chase Kingsley—in charge of the investigation—and Odelia Poole. She’s like the Rick Castle addition to the Hampton Cove Police Department if you will.”
“Only I’m not a writer,” Odelia quipped.
“Too bad. You could have worn one of those bulletproof vests with the word WRITER written across the front and back,” said Roulston. “I want you to meet Luca Elrott, Toby Mulvaney, Jason Nugent and Regan Lightbody. They were all part of the close protection team this morning. I had more people out there, but they were in charge of crowd control.”