“That must be some ring,” Jack added mildly.
“It is,” Peter confirmed. “In fact, when we left the restaurant, a couple of shady-looking men followed us. I think they intended to rob us.” Then he smiled and put an arm around Carlotta’s shoulder. “But we outsmarted them.”
“Really?” Jack asked, sounding amused. “How’s that?”
“We ducked into a costume shop—”
“It doesn’t matter,” Carlotta cut in with a dismissive wave. “The point is, we lost them.”
Peter’s phone rang. He pulled it from his belt clip and checked the screen. “Excuse me, I need to take this.” He gave her an apologetic look, then moved toward his dressing room as he answered the call.
Carlotta gave Jack and Coop a grateful smile. “Thank you both for coming.”
“No problem,” Coop said.
Jack looked at Coop. “What was it Wesley said? That when Carlotta crooks her finger, we come running?”
Coop gave a little laugh. “I think that was a joke, Jack.”
“The joke is the room you and I got stuck with compared to this one,” Jack said, nodding to the view the corner windows afforded. He briefly swung his gaze to the gigantic mussed bed that sat on a raised portion of the room, like a stage, complete with spotlights.
“The hotel gave us an upgrade,” she murmured, irritated. Her sleeping accommodations were none of Jack’s concern. “So Wes was on the same flight?”
“And his roommate,” Coop said.
Carlotta made a face. “Chance came, too?”
“And Hannah.”
She grinned. “Hannah is here?”
“She’s back to that Goth getup,” Jack said.
“Yeah, what happened to Uptown Hannah?” Coop asked.
“You might not want to mention her other, um, persona,” Carlotta said. “She doesn’t want Chance to know. They’re kind of…dating.”
Coop’s eyebrows rose. “Hannah is dating Wes’s chubby roommate?”
“I know,” Carlotta said. “There’s no accounting for taste.”
“You said it,” Jack remarked in a way that made her think he was talking about her and Peter.
“Speaking of congratulations,” Carlotta said to Coop. “Did Jack tell you he’s going to be a father?”
Coop blinked his eyes wide. “What?” He looked at Jack. “That’s huge. Who—I mean…wow.”
Jack’s smile was tight. “Liz Fischer.”
“Oh?” Coop extended his hand. “That’s great, man.”
Jack accepted his handshake. “Thanks.”
But Carlotta regretted saying anything—it wasn’t her news to share, and it sounded spiteful. And hadn’t Jack come all this way to help her? “Jack—”
“Let’s get this show on the road,” Jack said, then drained his glass. “I talked to the local police and they gave me copies of their files, but I want to take a look at the crime scene myself. Mind if I use your room phone to call hotel security to meet us there?”
He was already moving toward a phone on the wall next to the bar, so she didn’t respond. She set down her unfinished drink and pushed it away, feeling contrite.
Coop gave her a little smile. “Last night had to be quite a scare.” He caught himself. “Finding the body, I mean.”
“Yes.” She cast about for a way to relieve the tension that shrouded the fussy room. “I wonder what happened to Wes. Peter said he was on his way up.”
“That’s my fault,” Coop said. “I saw an Atari arcade and showed him how to play some of the classic games. When I left he was still going.”
“That sounds harmless enough.”
“Is he staying out of trouble?”
“Barely,” Carlotta said. But she’d take that. Heaven knew she didn’t need any more trouble this week.
Chapter 5
WES PLAYED THE VIDEO GAME for a few minutes more after Coop walked away. When he was sure Coop wasn’t coming back, he sent a text, then turned and strolled through the lobby and out the door, past the fountains and the terraced flower garden, past the flamingo pond and a giant stone sculpture of a tiger, to the taxi drop-off area marked with international flags. As instructed, he stood in front of the flagpole flying the Switzerland flag.
He people-watched to pass the time. Vegas definitely attracted an oddball assortment of residents and visitors. It was almost as if everyone who didn’t fit in anywhere else on the planet, came here to fit in with other misfits.
Present company included, he thought wryly.
Taxis were running nonstop, depositing wave after wave of people returning from the dinner hour. A muscle head wearing a skullcap emerging from a cab caused Wes to do a double-take. From a distance, the guy looked like Leonard, his probation officer’s boyfriend. Then he shook it off—Leonard was on his mind because of his conversation with Mouse yesterday about who’d offed the headless guy in the morgue.