CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
By the time we get close to Mario’s, the crocodile has gone from seven feet long to ten feet long and it probably had at least two hundred teeth and I think I heard it hiss as well as cough and when it lunged it came to within inches of my nose.
Okay, maybe I got to exaggerating a little but who can blame me? Now that I’ve escaped that fetid reptile, I’m giddy.
“Are you sure it was a crocodile and not an alligator?” Shanelle want to know.
“I’m not sure.” I pull out my cell phone, always helpful in a crisis. “Crocodiles have pointy snouts rather than U-shaped ones. Check. Crocodiles are lighter in color. Check. Mine was lightish green.”
“Moss green or more of an asparagus?” Trixie inquires. “Not seafoam.”
“Definitely not seafoam. More of a laurel green.”
“Sort of a camouflage color,” Shanelle says. “Makes sense.”
“Especially since crocodiles hang out in murky water trying not to be seen.” I shudder. I might have ended up spending some deeply unpleasant time in murky water myself. And now my stiletto is in the very belly of the beast. Poor adored shoe!
Shanelle drives the Durango into Mario’s gated community. “By the way, I spoke to somebody who’d seen Peppi at one of those parties.”
“So did I!” I cry. “The person I talked to said Peppi had been to several of them, which leads me to believe she wasn’t being roped into it.”
“That’s more evidence she was back to being the wild child,” Shanelle says.
“Maybe she needed money for her drug habit,” Trixie suggests. “Or to pay for her part of Sugarbabies.”
“Maybe she’s the one who thought of the name Sugarbabies,” Shanelle says. “Because if she went to those parties, girlfriend might have been one herself.”
“Maybe you’re right,” I say. “It’s always so hard for me to imagine Peppi having money problems but Paloma might have withheld cash from her if she was afraid she’d use it to fund a drug habit.”
When we arrive at the house, Mario’s silver Z8 is on the driveway. My heart rate ramps up though not as much as when I saw the crocodile looking at me the way I look at a steak and baked potato. We find Mario at the kitchen island working on his laptop and nursing a whisky and soda. He’s wearing jeans and a white button-down shirt open at the neck and with the sleeves rolled up. He looks his usual dashing self if a little tired.
It’s unnerving to see him. Before he left, he and I fought—over Mariela, over Consuela, and over my investigating. And now I have more negative things to relay about his daughter. He doesn’t seem the type but he may well blame the messenger.
He leaps to his feet when he sees me. “What in the world happened to you?”
“How about we explain while we clean her up?” Shanelle suggests and we all tromp to the bathroom she and Trixie share to cleanse my scrapes and dab me with Neosporin. In the morning I’ll be retelling my story a third time to Pop and Rachel. Jason will have to hear it too at some point. I don’t want to think how he’ll react.
I return to the kitchen after I change from my bandage dress and one stiletto to pajamas, two slippers, and about half a dozen bandages.
“That was a little worse than the macaw on Oahu,” Mario remarks.
“You’re not kidding.” I shed a little blood in that incident but never feared for my life. I pass on Mario’s offer of a whisky and opt instead for chocolate chip ice cream. I serve myself two whole scoops. Tonight this beauty queen deserves a special treat. Shanelle joins me and Trixie goes for the hard stuff.
A few minutes later, the two of them leave Mario and me alone. They know he’s eager to hear what happened with his daughter in his absence.
I tell him about Mariela’s shenanigans. He explodes. “Are you kidding me? Have sex
and
film it? For all the world to see? I can’t believe she’d do that!”
“Remember, Mario, when it came down to it she didn’t do it. The boy even said he didn’t think she’d go through with it.”
Mario can’t stop shaking his head. He’s so upset he doesn’t know what to say. I feel so bad for him. I know how betrayed a parent feels when their child does something they couldn’t have imagined.
“That’s why Mariela wanted to stay here,” he tells me. “She knew that if she were home with Consuela she wouldn’t have been able to get away with this.”
I agree with Mario’s reasoning though I’m not convinced Consuela is that effective a guardian.
“Not that I’m blaming you, Happy,” he goes on. “I’m not at all. Mariela was not your responsibility.” He exits the kitchen. “I’m going to get her. Please stay here.”
It’s the second time tonight I’ve received that directive. This time I’ll oblige.
It’s a sullen Mariela who shuffles into the kitchen. Even though she’s in her father’s presence, tonight she does not morph into her sweet alter ego. She cocks her chin at me. “Does she have to be here?” she asks her father.
“She deserves to hear your explanation, too. Now spill it.”
Unwisely, Mariela sticks to her argument that many celebrities have sex tapes and hence she needs one as well. “Celebrities who are just like me. Paris Hilton. Kim Kardashian. They have famous fathers too but didn’t get started till they had sex tapes. I wasn’t going to do much on it,” she offers but, no surprise, that claim does not appease her father.
He throws out his hands. “Why are you so obsessed with being famous?”
“You’re famous,” she retorts. “You must’ve wanted to be.”
“What I wanted was to be in the entertainment business. Do you know how many acting classes I took, Mariela? Do you know how many casting calls I went out on? I’m working all the time to perfect my skills. Even now. That’s what you have to do. You have to work at your craft. Then, if you’re very good and very, very lucky, then maybe someday you’ll be famous.”
“This is a shortcut,” she insists. “And I need one! Because that audition is in just a few weeks.” She thrusts out her lower lip and Pouty Mariela emerges. “I thought you’d understand.”
Mario throws me a look of frustration.
I’m not getting through to her,
it says. No, he’s not.
“Who’s the boy?” he asks her. “I have to talk to his parents. Or your mom does.”
Even after numerous entreaties, she refuses to say. I keep mum although I do know his first name.
“Needless to say, you’re grounded,” Mario concludes.
“No!” she shrieks. “Why? We never even made the tape!”
“You were going to. That’s why.”
She sulks. Then she mutters: “You can’t really ground me anyway.”
Mario set his hands on his hips. “Why not?”
“Because who’s going to make sure I don’t go out? You’re going to be traveling again and she’s going to be gone”—she waves a dismissive hand at me—“and Mom’s always with—”
“Mom’s always with who?”
Mariela zips her lips and glances at me. On this, too, I remain silent. It’s not for me to inform Mario that the mother of his child is catting around with a married man. Although I can’t deny I would take a certain satisfaction in imparting that information.
“With who, Mariela?” Mario demands.
Then it all comes out and I don’t have to say a thing. “Hector,” Mariela mumbles.
“Hector who?”
“Hector Lopez Nieto.”
Recognition dawns in Mario’s dark eyes, followed by shock. “The son of Don Gustavo?” Hector is well enough known that no doubt Mario is aware he’s married. As Jasmine once said, in some ways Miami is a small town.
Mariela goes on. “It was Hector who told Mom about the pageant. ‘Cause you know his sister was supposed to judge it. Oh my God, the pageant!” she wails. “Am I grounded from that, too? I really need to win it now!”
Mario continues to wear a stunned expression. “That’s off the table.”
“No! Mom will be so mad! She really wants me to win that pageant and I wasn’t supposed to tell you about Hector!”
Oh, boy. I watch Mario’s jaw clench. “Upstairs,” he orders his daughter. “Now. Go to bed.”
She throws me a look of hate then disappears from the kitchen.
“Did you know about Hector?” Mario asks in a quiet voice.
I nod. “It’s not really my business.” Except insofar as it heightens Consuela’s motive to want Peppi dead.
“Do you know who the boy is?”
“I heard Mariela say his name.” I hesitate before I repeat it, though I agree that Mario must talk to his parents. “Theo.”
“I know the one.”
We lapse into silence. Then, “I’m so sorry, Mario. I know all of this is very hard to take.”
“I can’t believe what’s coming out of Mariela’s mouth.”
“She’s got some growing up to do—”
“The ideas she has”—he throws out his hands—“this gibberish about celebrity! I thought she was smarter than that. And Consuela—”
Yes. Consuela. I’m sure she’ll blame me for all this. But I’m not sure she’ll get away with it. “It’s late,” I say. “And it’s been a long day.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through all this, Happy. But I’m so glad you’re here. And so relieved you’re okay. If something had happened to you—”
That hangs in the air as we look at one another. I get the feeling he’s about to say more but then he looks away. “Sleep tight,” he says.
I do. I don’t like fighting with Mario—I don’t like fighting with anybody—and I’m much happier now that we’ve made up. And while I hate to see him disillusioned about his daughter, it’s better he have a clear-eyed view of her. That’ll make him a better parent. Nor will I complain if all this gives him a more realistic view of Consuela, too.
I don’t see Mario or Mariela in the morning. The rest of us sit out on the chaise lounges by the pool rehashing a watered-down version of my crocodile story and gobbling the bagels I procured after my pepper-spray purchase. Boy, was that a smart buy. And it was Jason who prodded me into it.
“I hate to leave this house,” Trixie says, “but I am excited the pageant is finally here.”
“Let me drive you to Paloma’s, Rachel.” I’m wearing my paint-splatter-print wrap dress, which is just long enough to hide the scrapes on my knees. “Maybe she’s simmered down enough to talk to me.” And if I’m really lucky she’ll allow me access to Peppi’s cell phone and laptop.
An hour later I find out I was dreaming. At Paloma’s door, her housekeeper waves Rachel inside but shakes her head at me. “Señora would like you to go away.”
I plead and grovel but it gets me nowhere. I’m forced to give up. I can only hope Rachel will succeed when she intercedes with Paloma on my behalf.
Maybe all the crashing together of brain cells that I did the prior afternoon is good for something because I do get an idea as I cruise past Raoul at the guard gate. “You know the lists you have every day of who’s allowed in to each house? Do you still have last Friday’s for the Lopez Famosa house?”
“I should. Let me see.” He finds it. “You want me to read off the names?”
I’m glad I made friends with Raoul. “If you don’t mind.”
None of them mean a thing to me until Raoul reads the name Jasmine Dobbs.
