“For sure. Who is it, anyway?”
“Ever heard of Jimmy Stoma and the Slut Puppies?”
Young Kyle shakes his head no.
“Well, it’s Jimmy solo,” I say, “only he’s dead now.”
“Bummer.”
“How about a singer named Cleo Rio? You know who she is?”
“I can’t remember what song she does, but I caught the video a few times. My girlfriend calls her Princess Pube.”
“What’s your girlfriend’s last name?”
“Cummings.” Kyle knits his brow. “Why are you writing it down?”
“Because if you don’t marry her,” I tell him, “I intend to fly back here and propose myself. She sounds like a winner, Kyle, and winners won’t come along often in this ragged sorry life. And don’t think you’re something special just because you can hit a hanging curve or turn a hot double play. You’re not careful, you’ll go home Christmas break and find out young Shawna’s engaged to some buck-toothed surfer named Tookie. Now, promise you won’t let that happen.”
His eyes flick bewilderedly from me to the notebook. “Stick with me, son. I’m a trained journalist.”
“Okay,” he says finally. “I promise.”
Improper lane-changing etiquette has resulted in two drivers pulling out semi-automatics and inconsiderately shooting each other in the diamond lane of the interstate. The traffic jam is epic, and by the time I reach my apartment in Silver Beach it’s one-fifteen in the morning. Emma is asleep behind the wheel of her new Camry in the parking lot. Quietly I wake her and lead her upstairs, where I prop her in a chair, place a cup of decaf in her hand and make her listen to “Shipwrecked Heart.”
She says it’s good. “But—”
“The answer is yes, she wanted it badly enough to murder him. Remember, Emma, this is supposed to be her big follow-up hit. She’s already promised it to the label—a title cut, co-written with her famous ex-rocker husband. But Jimmy says, ‘Sorry, darling, this one’s mine,’ and all of a sudden Cleo sees her Grammy going down the bidet… ”
I’m so wired, so stoked by what Tito Negraponte told me, that I’m yammering at Emma like some hyper-caffeinated auctioneer. “Cleo’s under incredible heat to put out an album before people forget who she is. That’s the record business—blink twice and you’re over. There’s no ten years down the road, or even five years down the road. Not anymore. Plus, Cleo knows she’d better come up with a new pose, something that makes her look like a sensitive artiste instead of just another big-eyed anorexic brat.”
“This song’s not exactly her style,” Emma says. Like every other human under thirty, she has seen the widow’s stripteasy performance of “Me” on MTV.
“Cleo’s ‘Shipwrecked Heart’ won’t sound anything like this by the time Loreal gets through with it,” I explain. “He’ll muck it up with synthesizers and a brainless dance mix, but so what. Cleo doesn’t care about the music, she cares about the sell. In her head she’s already storyboarding the video.”
Emma flinches. “I can see her now. A scantily clad castaway on a long, deserted beach… ”
“Bingo. Problem is—and this was painfully obvious at the funeral—she can’t do the song until she learns the song. And she can’t learn the song until she gets her hands on the recording—”
“But that’s not the only reason she wants it,” Emma cuts in.
“Right. What we found on Jimmy’s boat is your basic smoking gun.” Even if Cleo got a copy and dubbed her own vocals, she couldn’t release it as long as the master is floating around. If Jimmy’s original ever surfaced, Cleo would be on the next train to Milli Vanilli-ville. Toast.
Because stealing from your dead spouse is not cool, even in the music industry.
“So now,” Emma says, “Cleo’s hunting down everyone who might have the hard drive, or know where it is—you, Jay Burns, Jimmy’s sister, even this Tito guy. And the other bass player probably would’ve been next, if he hadn’t run.”
“That seems to be the scenario.”
“Question is, how do we get all this in the paper?” Emma is sounding more and more like a serious news editor.
“First, I’ve got to make sure we’re right,” I say, “and I’ll know that in about twelve hours.”