"Wait!" I called.

Now her voice was really distant. "It's also the sound of your private investigator's license failing to be renewed for lack of cooperat-"

"Hold it!" I shouted into the receiver.

Her voice came back on, this time at normal volume.

"Yes?" she said, her voice thick with innocence.

"You fight dirty," I said.

"I fight to win, my friend."

I grabbed a pencil.

"Spill it," I said.

Expecting a rat trap, I wasn't disappointed. The deceased Mr. Gra.s.so had on his person at the time of his death several forms of false identification portraying him to be Phillip Carmichael. Through the efficient work of the Grosse Pointe police department, an address belonging to the pseudo Mr. Carmichael was discovered. It was over the border from Grosse Pointe into Detroit proper. A fabulous piece of real estate comprised of two abandoned buildings, three abandoned lots, and a whole lot of garbage.

When I arrived, I could see why Gra.s.so had chosen to spend his free time at the stripper's house with a fridge on the porch. At least there was a fridge. This place, a single-story sagging house, was certainly on the condemned list along with a few ten thousand other properties the absentee Detroit government hadn't gotten around to clearing.

Ellen was already inside, another cop waited just outside the front door. I found her in the main room of the house, which held one duct-taped sofa, a couple dead rats and two worn out boxes. My sister stood over the boxes.

She pointed at the rats. "Couple of your P.I. colleagues?"

"Very cute," I said.

Ellen nudged a box with her toe. "Check it out."

I bent down and leafed through the papers inside. There were newspaper articles, letters, pictures and a few pieces of cheap jewelry.

"Notice what they all have in common?"

I had. They were all about Shannon Sparrow. Pictures of her concerts. Articles about her. Notes from fans. I a.s.sumed the necklace and bracelet had once been hers. Even though it was all in a couple of flimsy boxes, they were very organized and you could tell they'd been labored over. Someone had spent a lot of time studying these things. Obsessing over them, in fact.

"Her number one fan, apparently," she said. "The flame never died out."

I knew where Ellen was going with this.

"So you've got everything you need," I said.

"He was still in love with her. Obsessed with her. Had to have her."

I thought I'd help her along. "He dreamed about her in prison," I said. "Read about the wonderful Jesse Barre guitars and how much Shannon loved them, decided to kill Jesse, frame his old prison mate and present the guitar along with himself to Shannon."

Ellen nodded. "In the context of a sociopath, it works."

"Except for the mystery woman," I said.

"Could have been anyone," she said. "A girlfriend. A junkie friend. A neighbor. An innocent in the wrong place at the wrong time."

I shook my head. "You didn't hear the authority in her voice when she told Gra.s.so to just kill me. She's no innocent. There's more to it than Gra.s.so, Ellen."

She shrugged her shoulders. "You may be right. But he's dead. And for now, the case is eventually going to be closed."

"So why bring me here?"

She gave me a look of exasperation, like I was a kid who didn't appreciate a birthday gift. "I thought your client might like to know about this. And on the off chance that Gra.s.so wasn't working alone, and that there might be future violent episodes, you should know about this."

I looked at her. What a load of bulls.h.i.t. She had stopped doing me favors a long time ago. Unless I was in real physical danger, but even then she would still think about it.

"You want me to keep digging, don't you?" I said. "Not in an official capacity, but you think there's more to it, don't you?"

She raised her eyebrows and placed a hand across her heart. "Moi?"

Thirty-six.

The star innocently shaving her pubic hair was gone. I found Shannon Sparrow seated at a wrought iron patio table, holding a long-stemmed wine gla.s.s with her gently tapered fingers.

I'd tracked her down through Molly, the ambitious personal a.s.sistant who'd told me that Shannon was at a "friend's" house. I coaxed the address out of her by telling her that I had information I'd rather tell Shannon than my best friend, the reporter. Personal a.s.sistants apparently have a huge phobia regarding the press.

The house was another giant f.u.c.king monster along the lake. Made of stone, huge picture windows and a yard worthy of a pair of goal posts.

After being shown in, I was whisked to the rear of the house by a courteous manservant where I found Shannon and her entourage. Even among the group, she stood out. Whether it was her beauty, or the unconscious positioning of the other people around the person of power, I didn't know. But she was clearly the epicenter of the crowd, even if everyone went out of their way to act as if she wasn't.

I looked at Shannon. She seemed more pale than the last time I'd seen her. Her winegla.s.s was huge. A f.u.c.king fish bowl set on top of a tiny pencil of gla.s.s. It was a dark red, heavy with sediment.

Before I could even get a h.e.l.lo in, Molly arrived with a gray-haired gentlemen in a tasteful charcoal Armani suit.

"Ah, Mr. Rockne," the man said, extending a tanned hand. I shook it.

"Paul Kerner," he said. "Ms. Sparrow's attorney."

"One of many, I a.s.sume," I said.

He laughed. What a polite man. "I'm afraid Ms. Sparrow has nothing to say today."

"Under your orders?"

"The decision was mutual," he said.

Over his shoulder, I saw Shannon catch my eye and then look away. She took a sip of wine. Or was it more of a gulp?

I turned to Mr. Kerner. I have a confession to make. I never really had a problem with attorneys. In fact, I got a lot of clients from their referrals. Sometimes, though, you can spot a pinhead a mile away.

"Don't you think it would be in your client's best interest to shed some light on what's happened?" I said. "It will only help her both in the short and long-term."

Mr. Kerner pretended to debate the idea.

"I don't think so," he said.

I sensed the twin hulking shadows of the East German weightlifters. I turned and looked into the ham-like countenances of Erma and Freda.

"Mr. Rockne, I believe our business is concluded," Mr. Kerner said.

The entourage was watching. Shannon wasn't. She was now looking into the empty cavern of her winegla.s.s.

"I've got some information about her ex-husband she might be interested in," I said.

This brought Shannon's head up and an audible gasp from the hangers-on.

The shadows moved in closer.

"Business is concluded," Mr. Kerner said.

"It is time for you to go," said Erma or Freda. I turned to them, surprised that they actually spoke.

"p.i.s.s off," I said, sounding like a little kid on the playground who was about to get his a.s.s kicked.

Both bodyguards stepped back from me, always a bad sign. I can't resist putting on a little show for a crowd, but I didn't want to get b.i.t.c.h slapped in front of this many people. There's something to be said for private beatings. They're usually more painful, but much less humiliating. I especially didn't want to take a public thrashing administered by two women, if that was actually their gender.

Erma, or was it Freda, lolled her head to the side and I heard a bone crunch. I had a feeling the next ones to go would be mine.

"Hold it, hold it," a voice said from the back.

I looked over and Shannon was pouring wine into a gla.s.s next to hers.

"Come over here and sit down," she said to me. "You guys leave him alone.

Kerner had already left. I smiled at Erma and Freda. They were clearly not happy.

"We'll hook up later," I said, figuring it just might happen.

It was my first pop star party and to be honest, I was enjoying it. Before long, the place was crowded with people, music played from invisible speakers and my wine gla.s.s was empty, then full, then empty, then full. You get the idea.

And through it all, I talked with Shannon Sparrow.

"Thanks for saving me back there," I said.

"You seem like an honest guy," she said. "Besides, Erma and Freda..." she just shook her head.

"How come you stepped in as soon as I mentioned your ex-husband?" The words came out of my mouth a little clumsily. Not only was the wine thick with sediment, it was strong.

"When I think of...him...," she said, meaning Gra.s.so. "I want to f.u.c.king puke. And I don't mean a gentle upchuck. I mean I want to hurl from the depths of my bowels, I want to just gag and gag and gag..."

"I get the idea, Shannon," I said.

"He was sc.u.m. Pure sc.u.m. I was just too young to know it."

"We all make mistakes," I said.

"That was a doozy."

"Most mistakes are," I said. "When did you hear that he'd been killed?"

She just kind of shrugged her shoulders, obviously she never felt like she had to answer questions she didn't want to.

"He was shot, right?" she said.

"Couple times."

"Were you there?" she said.

"Yep."

Shannon slugged down the rest of her wine, her hand shook a little as she held the gla.s.s. She set the gla.s.s down and pulled out a joint from her front pocket. She tilted it toward me and I shook my head.

I was a regular Boy Scout.

Shannon looked for a light in her pockets, but came up empty. A woman appeared next to her, in her hand was a Bic with a substantial flame sprouting from the end.

"Are you the P.I.?" the woman with the lighter said.

"John Rockne," I said, holding out my hand.

She took it and said, "Memphis Bornais."

"I think we've met before," I said. "That's an interesting name. A little American south combined with a little, what, French?"

Yeah, I sounded a little stupid, but I never could hold my booze very well.

"Memphis is my songwriter," Shannon said. I nodded, studying her. Memphis had on red velvet pants and a chocolate brown lace top. The pants were bell bottoms and the sleeves had giant openings. Her age was hard to tell, could have been anywhere from late twenties to early forties. She had shoulder-length brown hair, fine features, and full lips. Kind of like a nicely aged Jennifer Love-Hewitt with a little more meat to her.

"Do you write all of Shannon's songs?" I asked her.

"Most," Shannon said. "All the ones I didn't write."