I drum my fingers on the table in front of me as I choose my words. “A friend of mine was there that night. I haven’t heard much from him since. I’m wondering if you bumped into him while he was there.”
“What’s his name?”
“Maddox Hathaway.”
She gasps, and then the sound of a thud. She must have dropped her phone.
Pia saw him all right.
A few seconds later her voice comes through the receiver again. “Sorry. I dropped the phone. But yes, I saw Maddox that evening. It’s not a night I’d easily forget.”
“Why?”
“Well, I’d seen Maddox a few weeks earlier. He was hot at the craps table. The two of us… We spent the night together. With Seraphina.”
Damn. Turns out I’m a double Eskimo brother with Maddox.
We both date within the same sphere. It was bound to happen sooner or later.
“You there?” she asks.
“Yeah, I am.”
“I hope that’s not upsetting to hear.”
“No, of course not. We’ve had our fun, and it’s not like I expected you to remain chaste in the meantime.”
“Of course not.” She chuckles. “But anyway, the night of the fifteenth, Maddox was in the Diamonds section of the club. Playing Blackjack. Naturally, I said hello.”
“But he had a date with him that night.”
“Yes. Apparently he’d been hot at the Blackjack table the night before as well. Rouge christened him and his lady friend the King and Queen of Diamonds.”
“Interesting.”
Mr. Night mentioned a similar thing happening. Must have been a big deal if both he and Pia remember it.
“Yeah, and here’s the kicker. I got into something of a tussle with Her Majesty.”
I nearly drop the phone this time. “Wait, what?”
“Yeah. That little bitch he brought that evening. She tackled me to the floor, just for a few harmless flirtations.”
“You must be thinking of someone else. Alissa would never?—”
“Oh, but she would, Harrison. And it was out of nowhere. One minute we’re playing Blackjack, the three of us together, and the next minute I’m on the ground fighting for my life.”
“I happen to work with Alissa. She’s a nurse at my hospital. There is no girl who is more level-headed and rational than she is.”
“I’ll admit she didn’t seem the type. It was like something shifted in her suddenly. Rouge had just entered—she usually gets people’s panties in a bunch. Maybe she pissed Alissa off or something. I could tell there was some sort of weird tension between them. But anyway, yeah, she just threw herself at me. And then when Chet took Rouge to one of the curtained-off rooms to discuss something, she simply got up, dusted herself off as if nothing had happened, and made a beeline toward the Hearts section.”
The Hearts section? That’s where Bianca works. Maybe she would have seen something that night… I can call her and?—
Wait.
Oh, shit.
Bianca’s dressing room and her stage aren’t the only things in the Hearts section.
