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pretty, very stupid girl.
     

 
Chapter 5
Floating in the Deep End
     
    “For fuck sake, isn’t anyone going to take him out of the water?” Cici’s voice cut through the heavy silence of the night.
    Nikki’s insides crumpled. Her aunt’s voice pierced her like an arrow. Nikki sat on the chaise lounge and pressed her fingernails into her palms. The pain in the soft flesh of her hand centered her and drew her attention away from Jeb’s body which floated in the pool behind her. A burst of evening breeze flickered the flame of the candle on the table in front of her. She should have stayed at Adam’s place. She should have stayed home. Maybe she should have stayed in Tennessee. Nikki closed her eyes. She should have never moved to LA.
    “Cici, please.” Howard Abromowitz, round and doughy with wire-rim glasses too small for his pallid face, placed his arm around Cici’s shoulder. “The officers must take every precaution to secure evidence.” Twin chicken legs, fish-belly white, stuck out from Howard’s running shorts, and a faded USC Law sweatshirt covered his watermelon-shaped belly.
    Nikki pulled her gaze from the flickering candle flame. Detective Weitz sat opposite her. His hair was short and reddish with waves across the top. His face was full of pudge, but his body was lean. He wore khaki pants, a blue button-down shirt, and a windbreaker. A black notepad was open and lay on his knee. The other detective crouched beside the pool. Nikki glanced over her shoulder as he pulled himself upward from the pool deck. His hair was black, his eyes liquid blue, and he had a sharp-angled jaw beneath full lips. He was thicker, muscled, and he moved like there was strength beneath his clothes. He walked from the pool toward Nikki. His eyes roamed up from her high heels, over her legs and skirt, to her face where their gaze met. His gaze bounced from Nikki to Aunt Cici. Everyone looked at Nikki’s Aunt Cici. The weight of her aunt’s arm dropped onto her shoulder. Tears rolled down Nikki’s face, and she pressed her fingertips into her eyes.
    “We have to get her out of here.” Cici’s tone was that of a woman used to being obeyed. She looked from one detective to the other.
    “We don’t want the press to realize—”
    “The press is already here,” the dark-haired detective said.
    Not many people interrupted Cici.
    “This is Detective Dragatsis,” Detective Weitz said and nodded his head toward the detective with the ice-blue eyes, the detective who didn’t smile or nod but had the courage to interrupt one of the world’s biggest stars.
    “Dragatsis, Dragatsis,” Cici mumbled under her breath and crinkled her brows. “Do you have a brother? An agent at CTA?”
    A muscle twitched in Detective Dragatsis’s jaw. “I do.”
    The sharpness in Aunt Cici’s eyes grew softer. Nikki had witnessed this same phenomena when introduced to actors and directors and writers and producers and studio executives—anyone in entertainment. Having a family member in the Business gave you a pass. Aunt Cici relaxed, hopeful that Detective Dragatsis was versed in the rules of the Hollywood Club.
    Detective Dragatsis directed his gaze away from Aunt Cici, away from Howard, and toward Nikki with her arms wrapped tightly around her chest.
    “Miss Solange—”
    “Nikki,” she whispered. “Please… just call me Nikki. It’s easier—people get confused and absolutely weird when you use the name Solange.”
    “Nikki,” Detective Weitz said, “found Mr. Schmaltzer.”
    Dragatsis nodded. “Did you know Mr. Schmaltzer well?”
     “I…” Nikki sighed and closed her eyes. “No,” she said. “He asked me to read Boundless Bound , the script that he’d written.”
    “He probably wanted you to be in it,” Cici said. She raised her eyebrow and passed judgment on her own speculation as if it was a hard truth.
    “I don’t act.” Nikki said. “I don’t want to.”
    Aunt Cici stiffened.
    Nikki glanced up from the