Ms America and the Villainy in Vegas (Beauty Queen Mysteries No. 2) by Diana Dempsey

intersection with criminality. “Aren’t you sort of in trouble with the police over this trick roll stuff?”
    “Nah.” Cassidy gives a dismissive way of her hand. “Nobody reports it. They’re embarrassed. They’d rather just take their losses. Plus they’re afraid it’ll get back to their wives.” She pauses, then, “But now—”
    “You’ve got to be worried the cops are watching you now,” I say. “Because of Danny’s murder.”
    “I told you I didn’t kill him!”
    I have only Cassidy’s word on that. “And you’ve got all those stolen goods in your apartment. Like that TV and that Tiffany handbag—”
    “I told you those were gifts from Danny! Why don’t you believe me?”
    She doesn’t seem to understand that after these bombshell revelations, her credibility is not exactly sky high.
    “There is stuff I have to get rid of, though,” she goes on. “Like the stuff I got from Hans.”
    “Hans? He’s another trick you rolled?” I am impressed by my newfound ease with criminal lingo.
    “He’s the one who gave Danny the black eye. I rolled him Friday and he saw me the next morning with Danny. I knew it was a mistake to roll somebody at the Cosmos! Man, was he ticked off.”
    I frown. So Frank steered me wrong when he told me Danny got the shiner from a mishap lifting weights. If this guy Hans really was to blame, either Frank was lying to me or Danny had lied to Frank.
    Still, I feel bad for Danny. He gets slugged in the morning and takes a slug in the afternoon. “Just how mad was Hans?” I ask Cassidy.
    “I lifted more than the usual stuff from him. Like his Mac.” She shivers. “He was spitting bullets.”
    Interesting choice of phrase given that Danny was shot to death that very afternoon.
    “So Hans didn’t go to the cops, either?” Trixie asks.
    Cassidy shakes her head. “He’s married for one thing. And after he punches Danny, he says to me, That’s payback. He’s Austrian, you know,” she adds. “He sounds exactly like Arnold Schwarzenegger.”
    “So this guy Hans is staying at the Cosmos. Do you know his last name?” I’m thinking there can be only one Hans at my hotel, huge as it is. But I am concerned about the damage to my reputation if I make an inquiry of this nature at the front desk. There’s this man I’m trying to track down. I only know his first name …
    “I don’t do last names,” Cassidy says.
    Figures. “Do you know anything else about him?”
    “He’s in town for some convention.”
    “Do you know which one?”
    “One of the big ones at the convention center.”
    Helpful. “But he’s still in Vegas? His convention isn’t over yet?”
    “It just got started. He came in early ‘cause he had to fly such a long way.”
    Good. That means I have time to play with.
    My mind is working. I want to know more about Hans, just like I want to know more about Samantha St. James. And, actually, more about Frank. And Cassidy. With all this sleuthing ahead, it’ll be tricky fitting the Sparklettes rehearsals and cryotherapy treatments into my days. Not to mention spending time with my mom.
    Which reminds me. She and Shanelle have been at the Italian restaurant for a while now.
    I plot and plan briefly with Trixie. Once she scampers away—after a parting glance of disapproval at the Lady in Leopard Print—I point at Cassidy’s laden handbag. “I want you to hand over whatever tranquilizing drugs you’ve got in there.” I don’t simply say, Hand over the Restoril. I don’t want to admit I snooped in her medicine cabinet and saw it.
    Cassidy hems and haws but eventually hands it over. I’m glad because although I can’t stop her from continuing this fraudulent scheme of hers, I can make it harder.
    “And now we are going to the front desk and you are going to give them all the stuff you took from Robert and say he left it in your room and you want to get it back to him.”
    “I can’t. I don’t know his last name.”
    “You know his room