Page 26 of The Perfect People

“Chanti Baby!” Jelly yelled back, barreling down the stairs, scooping up the smaller woman and swinging her around in a circle as they hugged.

The huge security guys around them all stepped back quickly to avoid being clipped by wayward feet, apparently used to this sort of thing. Jessie and Susannah walked down the stairs and waited out the production, which lasted surprisingly long. When Jelly finally put Chantilly safely down on the floor, the singer turned and faced them. Her smile was gone and her stern expression indicated she was all business now.

“Detective Valentine, Ms. Hunt,” she said, nodding civilly but not extending her hand, “my name is Doreen Chantilly Mace. As I’m sure you heard, I was the one who pressed for Homicide Special Section to get involved in investigating Shasta’s murder.”

“Jelly mentioned something about that,” Jessie acknowledged.

“Well,” Chantilly said, speaking so quietly that they could hardly hear her, “you should also know that woman was like a mother to me, way more than my real one ever was. When I moved here from Oakland at seventeen with nothing but four hundred and twenty-two dollars and a voice, no one gave me a shot. The only people interested in me didn’t want to hear me sing, that’s for sure. I got lucky when I met her. She believed in me. She helped me hone my craft and my image. She taught me to trust my instincts and not to take any crap. She wasn’t all cuddles and hugs, but she got the job done, and she was always there for me. So now I’m going to be here for her. I’m not going to let this stand, you hear me? I’m not going to let her murder go unavenged!”

By the time she was done speaking, her voice had risen from a near whisper to a crescendo, filling up the entire room. She stared at the two of them with eyes blazing, pumped up on her own righteous fury.

“It’s clear that this is very personal for you,” Susannah said, though her tone suggested she wasn’t bowled over by Chantilly’s speech, “but in the LAPD, we don’t operate based on vengeance. Justice is our guiding principle.That’swhat we can promise you.”

“Call it what you want,” Chantilly Mace said dismissively, “whatIwant is an update on the status of your investigation. Your unit was called in this morning. The sun’s fixing to set in the next hour or so. I could record a whole album in that time. Tell me you’ve made some progress.”

Jessie could feel Susannah stiffen beside her. Being given instructions by any civilian was bound to rub her the wrong way, but when they came from someone who carried herself with such a sense of egotism, even if it came from a place of genuine concern, it was going to amplify the rawness.

“We’re very sorry for your loss, Ms. Mace,” Jessie said, doing her best to smooth over the rising tension, “and we certainly understand your desire to know what happened to someone you were so close to. Anyone in your position would feel the same way. But you surely understand that in an ongoing murder investigation, we simply can’t share everything we know without compromising the case. But we can assure you that we’re pursuing every avenue available to us. Along those lines, maybe you can help us. If you’d be willing to answer a few quick questions—?”

“Are you accusing her of something?” the harried blonde next to Mace demanded angrily, stepping forward.

Jessie looked at her in confusion, then at the singer, who seemed on the verge of getting offended too.

“What—no,” she said quickly. “We just thought that you might have some unique insight into Shasta that we don’t, considering your long history together. Maybe you’d know if there was anyone who might want to harm her, anyone she mentioned being afraid of?”

Mace’s face briefly took on an expression that Jessie couldn’t initially identify. Only when the singer opened her mouth to respond did she realize that it was a muted variation of shame.

“Here’s the thing about Shasta,” Mace explained, “she never talked to me about her troubles. That’s what made her such a great manager. She always stayed focused on mine. You probably think that makes me selfish, that I never asked about what was going on in her life.”

Jessie was about to offer a bland reply but before she could, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Susannah shrug. It took everything she had not to visibly wince. She saw that Chantilly Mace had noticed it too and it was clear that she didn’t appreciate the gesture. Her brow furrowed and she seemed to coil even more tightly than she already was. Then Drake Breem stepped forward.

“People on the outside don’t always understand what makes a relationship between two folks tick on the inside,” he said quietly, his tone suggesting personal experience with the subject. “It sounds like you and Shasta had a symbiotic, synergistic thing going on that seemed to work for both of you. Who’s to judge how people connect, am I right?”

Jessie wasn’t sure if Breem believed everything he said or if he was just playing up his surfer vibe to serve as a peacemaker. Either way, she was impressed. Chantilly seemed to be as well.

“See,” she said, looking around at her collection of hangers-on, “bargain bin silver fox here gets it.”

Upon hearing those words, Jessie found her patience for the star suddenly wearing thin. She’d put up with a lot of rich, famous jerks while pursuing cases, but rarely had she encountered such random, undeserved cruelty from a person whose persona was all about a hardscrabble, “fight the power” everywoman making good.

Chantilly seemed oblivious to how her comment had been received. To his credit, Breem simply smiled, as if the jibe had made no impact on him at all. When the woman continued on, he said nothing.

“So I answered your question about Shasta,” the singer said, “which I know was really just a way to distract me frommyquestion, but it didn’t work, so here it is again: how close are you to catching this bastard?”

Jessie looked over at Susannah, worried she might explode. But the detective had a surprisingly calm expression on her face, all things considered. When she spoke, her voice was equally restrained.

“Ms. Mace,” Susannah said, “despite what you may think, we don’t answer to you personally. We are trying to solve a crime and we simply won’t reveal information about our investigation to you until we release it to the rest of the public. Until then, you’re welcome to get updates from Jelly’s social media feeds.”

Chantilly Mace’s face twisted into a grimace that Jessie had never seen on TV or on the cover of a magazine. She leaned forward and pointed her finger at Susannah as she replied archly.

“Let me tell you something, girl. I didn’t come all the way down to this backwater beach town to get the runaround from anyone, definitely not from some top-heavy tart who looks like she’s about to leave here any minute because she’s got a stripper gig at a bachelor party in the valley later tonight. I had your giraffe partner over there brought in special on this case. But you should be on your knees thanking me for this assignment. Otherwise you might be on your knees somewhere else, you follow? I can break you with a snap of my fingers—both of you, to be honest. So start talking, you brunette Barbie bitch!”

Jessie rested her hand gently on Susannah’s forearm, partly as a show of support, but mostly as a stop sign. She didn’t want her partner to make a mistake she’d regret. If anyone was going to do that, it would be Jessie.

“Snap your fingers,” she said softly.

“What did you say to me, you mutant Amazon?” Chantilly demanded angrily.

“You said you could break both of us with the snap of your fingers,” Jessie said, stepping forward, “so let’s see you back up those big words, Doreen. I’d love to see you try.”

---