Honeymoon in High Heels (2 page)

I shot him a dirty look, but couldn't help grinning.  "Good.  Hands off the hula girls."

"'Ote'a girls," he corrected me.  "Hula is Hawaiian.  It's slower.  'Ote'a is the Tahtiain traditional dance."

I blinked at him.  "Wait - you've been studying up on the native dancing girls?"

Ramirez shrugged.  "There was a brochure in the suite.  It was something to read while I was waiting for you to get dressed." 

Three Mai Tais, two more courses, and one more group of dancers later I was feeling very happy, just the slightest bit tipsy, and like I had to pee a river.  I excused myself to go find the little girls room while Ramirez dug into another helping of mushy, grey stuff.

I felt my wedges slip a little on the polished wood floors as I made my way unsteadily around dozens of tables for two, toward the back of the restaurant where two little blue figures promised restrooms.  I did my business in the room with the figure in a dress on the door, b
u
t still felt a little shaky.  There was another door off the hallway, across from the restrooms, that was marked “exit”.   Figuring a little fresh air might do me good, I pushed through and was instantly greeting by a splash of warm, tropical air that smelled like flowers.  Everything here smelled like flowers.  I inhaled deeply, clearing my head.  The last thing I wanted to do was be too tipsy to enjoy the first night of my honeymoon with my husband.  Ramirez had even rested up for it! I had big plans for that hot guy and that hot tub in my room.

I took a few steps, rounding the side of the building, inhaled deeply, feeling my senses begin to return to normal.  I closed my eyes, listening to the sounds of the ocean hitting the shore just out of my eye-line, the rustling of the trees as a soft wind blew through.  I’m not sure how long I stood like that, but by the time I opened my eyes again, I felt much better.  Still a little on the “mellow" side, but clear-headed enough that I wasn’t in danger of twisting an ankle on my wedges.

I walked back to the door I’d come out of and tugged.  Only it didn't budge.  I tried again, but it was definitely stuck.  Great.  It had locked behind me.  I wrapped my arms around myself and trudged around the side of the building, heading back toward the front doors instead. 

Unfortunately, while we’d been watching the dancers inside, the sun had set, and it was pitch black behind the building.  Lights blazed along the path to the resort, but the alleyway wasn’t an area that tourists usually frequented.  I squinted through darkness, trying to make out the shapes in front of me.  I could see the building, a Dumpster (a practical eyesore that felt out of place in this tropical bliss), and a car parked off to the side of the building.  What I couldn't see, unfortunately, were the smaller shapes lurking in the shadows.  Which is why I stumbled right over one, barely catching myself on the side of the building before I face-planted into the concrete walkway.

I did a couple of deep breaths, then looked down at the ground to figure out what I'd tripped on.

It was soft, a dark shape, about five feet long, and covered in a woven tarp like the ones they’d used to drape around the stage.  And I would have left it at that, but at the very corner of the tarp I saw something sticking out. Something that did not look like garbage.  In fact, it looked a lot like hair.  Long, dark, silky hair.  I bit my lip.  I braced myself on the side of the restaurant and carefully lifted the edge of the cloth with one hand.

I’m pretty sure the scream that leaked from my lips could have been heard all the way back home in L.A. as I stared down at the “garbage” I’d tripped over.  Warm brown skin, long dark hair, one grass skirt and two strategically placed coconuts, sitting just belong a long, thin neck, which was currently a dull shade of blue, garroted by a flower lei pulled tightly enough to make her eyes bulge from their very dead sockets.

I’m not sure how long I stood there staring dumbly at the body, but I must have been screaming at least most of the time, as I vaguely registered several sets of footsteps pounding the pavement behind me.  Before I knew it, I was surrounded by restaurant patrons, gasping, yelling, and shouting for paramedics even though it was clear by the macabre features of the girl’s face that she was long past any medical help. 

A large, warm pair of hands clamped down on my shoulders, and I realized I was shaking.

“Maddie?” a familiar voice said calmly in my ear.

I spun around, immediately burying my face in my husband’s chest.  “I fink shes head.”

“What was that?” he asked, pulling my mouth out of his T-shirt.

“I think she’s dead,” I repeated, hearing my voice come out on a shaky whisper.

Ramirez looked past me to the body, which was now surrounded by both tourists and restaurant employees alike.  “I think you’re right.”

I buried my face in his chest again and let him lead me to a stone ledge a few feet away.  He sat me down, rubbing his hands up and down my bare arms.  “You gonna be okay?”

I nodded, taking in big gulps of floral scented air.  Just a few moments ago, it had smelled like a soft perfume, but in the wake of my sudden I-found-a-dead-girl nausea, it was cloyingly sweet and making my head hurt.  "I think so."

“Good.  Listen, you sit tight here for a minute.  I’m just going to go make sure someone’s called the authorities and no one’s moving the body,” Ramirez said, going into cop mode.

I nodded again, a little less shakily this time.

Ramirez paused.  “You sure you’re okay?”

I'll admit, part of me wanted to wail, “No!” and make him stay right where he was, rubbing my arms, which I’d noticed had broken out in creeped-out gooseflesh.  But I knew that was selfish.  With the crowd gathering around the body, it was clear someone had to take charge, and my husband was the best man for the job.

I cleared my throat, gulped down the nausea, and nodded again, making myself do it without shaking this time.

He gave me a tight grin.  “You’re one tough cookie, Springer,” he said.  Then quickly kissed the top of my head before being swallowed up by the growing crowd.

As soon as he was out of sight, I crumbled into a little ball again, putting my head between my knees to stop the spinning in my vision.

Here’s the thing: this was not my first encounter with a dead body.  Not even my second, I was sorry to say.  Trouble seemed to have a way of finding me, which was completely not my fault by the way.  Just dumb luck, I guess.  Not that I could complain too much.  My luck was a hell of a lot better than Dancing Girl’s was tonight.

But even though I had been confronted by death on previous occasions, it didn’t mean I was a fan of it.  If anything, the more I saw of it, the more scary it became.  As if any one of us could go at any moment.  Especially someone as alive as the Dancing Girl.  One minute she’d been shaking her unnaturally fast hips at my husband, and the next she was belly-up in an alley. 

I closed my eyes, blocking out the scene as I heard the faint sound of sirens approaching in the distance.  Who on earth would want to kill a hula dancer?  I mean, she had been annoyingly close to my husband, but I didn’t actually want to strangle her.

I took some more deep breaths, and eventually the sirens grew to screeching proportions and stopped just outside the restaurant, bathing the alleyway in red and blue lights.  Uniformed officers converged on the crowd, an immediate air of authority breaking through the chaos. They infiltrated the tight knit group surrounding the body, and as the crowd of lookie-loos dispersed, I could see them talking to Ramirez.  A few moments later, he broke off from the group of kahki-clad officers and came back to sit next to me on the ledge.

“So, I guess that whole no-work-on-vacation thing is out the window, huh?” I asked.

He put an arm around me.  “It’s not my case.  Clearly I have no jurisdiction here.”

I felt a small rise of hope, the first pleasant sensation I’d experienced since the Mai Tais.  “So, you’re involvement ends here?”

Ramirez stiffened, his eyes averting mine.  “Not completely.”

I knew it was too good to be true.  “What does that mean?”

“It means, I agreed to consult for them.  They don’t see a lot of homicides on the island, and they said they’d welcome my input on the case.”

“Fab.”

Ramirez turned to me, his eyes softer.  “I’m sorry, Maddie.  You know I didn’t plan this.”

I nodded.  I did.  And, part of me felt a surge of pride that he cared so much about a complete stranger that he wanted to make sure she had the best investigative team possible bringing her killer to justice. 

Part of me.

The other part was envisioning my romantic hot tub interlude turn into a pity party for one.

“Let’s get you back to the hotel,” Ramirez said, helping me stand on feet that I was glad to see were slightly more stable now.  “Then I’d like to come back and see what the ME says.”

I nodded, squelching down a mix of emotions. 

Day one of my romantic honeymoon down.  Chances of intimate hot tub interlude tonight: big fat zero.

*  *  *

“Ohmigod, and you just found her lying there?” my best friend, Dana, screeched into my ear.

I nodded at the empty cabana, then said into my cell, “I know.  It was pretty awful.”  Though, admittedly, a lot more awful for Dancing Girl. 

“You poor thing!” Dana sympathized.  “Did you scream?  Pass out?  Puke?”

“Yes, almost, and thankfully, no.”

“Dude, I’m so sorry.  What a way to start your honeymoon.”

No kidding.  But it was comforting to hear her sympathize.  Dana Dashel had been my best friend since seventh grade when we’d bonded over a mutual love of Rick Astley and mutual hatred of algebra.  Since then, our paths had taken different directions - mine toward the fashion district and hers toward Hollywood and movie stardom - but we’d always remained close.  And hearing her voice from four-thousand miles away warmed me faster than the sun shining down on my cabana beside the Island Paradise Village's executive sweetheart pool.

“Thanks.  I’m okay.  Just... a little lonely at the moment.”

“I take it Ramirez is out hunting for her killer?” Dana deduced.  I heard noises in the background, and someone calling fifteen minutes until camera, signaling I’d caught her on the set.

I nodded to myself again.  “Yep.  He says he’s just consulting, but he didn’t come back to the hotel room until three last night.  And he was up and out again at six.”

Dana paused on the other end.  “That doesn’t leave a whole lot of time for any honeymoon-type activities, does it.”

I shook my head in the negative.  “No.  It does not.”  Not that I ventured either of us was really in the mood last night anyway.  Seeing dead people was not my idea of a turn-on.

“Sucks,” Dana said.  “But, hey, you’ve got nine more days to show off  those lace teddies we bought at Vicky's Secret.  Plenty of time.”

“Actually, eight and half,” I corrected her.  But who was counting?

“So, who was the dead girl?” Dana asked.  “A hula dancer you said?”

“'Ote'a dancer," I corrected automatically.  "But, yeah, she worked at the resort.  Her name was Ahlia Ona.  A local girl,” I relayed, repeating the information I’d gotten out of Ramirez as he’d dressed and made coffee in our room's mini-pot at dawn that morning

“Do the police have any idea who might have killed her?”

“Unfortunately, no.  Ramirez is attending the autopsy today, then riding along with the police to question her family.  Apparently she has an aunt living on the island.”

“Married? Boyfriend?” Dana asked.  “You know, it’s always the husband who did it on
CSI
.”

“Ramirez said the police did question the husband first,” I told her.  “Last night.  His name is Aki, and he works as a fire dancer at the resort.”

“Fire dancer?” Dana asked, and I could hear her scrunching her ski-jump nose over the phone.  “What’s that?”

“Oh, it’s so cool.  These guys strip down to just these little loin cloth skirts and twirl these sticks like huge batons with fire on the end.  Very primal.”

“That's it.  I've got to visit Tahiti someday.” 

“Anyway, her husband, Aki, apparently had an alibi.  He was with the restaurant manager at the time she was killed.”

“Bummer,” Dana said.  “That would have closed the case quickly.”

“I know,” I agreed.

“I wish I could be there to help you,” Dana said.  Admittedly, Dana, along with our gaytastic friend Marco, had helped me help Ramirez to solve some of his cases in the past.  Not that Ramirez ever wanted our help, or even tolerated it at times, but we had caught more than one killer together.  Albeit sometimes by tapping into my amazing stores of dumb luck.  

However, from thousands of miles away, there was little Dana could do. 

“Thanks,” I said, meaning it.  “I wish you were, too.”

I heard a noise in the background again and someone yelling, “Talent on set.”

“Shoot.  I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go,” Dana told me.  “I’m doing a mascara commercial.  Not exactly high art, but it’ll cover my car payment for the next year.”