Page 12 of Wild Idol

We stepped into the practice space as Styxx banged on his drum set. Dizzy noodled on guitar, and Crash thumped on bass. They worked up a new groove. Something I had never heard before.

It sounded good.

My phone buzzed with a call from Brenda. I swiped the screen and held the device to my ear. “Preliminary toxicology report came back.”

7

Istepped outside the practice room so I could hear. It was still loud in the hallway.

“She had cocaine, alcohol, and trace amounts of fentanyl in her system, mixed with some allergy medication,” Brenda said. “I’m going to list the cause of death as an overdose from multiple drug toxicity. Haley had depressed respiration. The diphenhydramine didn’t help anything.”

I frowned and shook my head. “Such a shame.”

“If somebody would have given her a dose of Narcan, she might still be alive.”

“You think she was still alive when they put her in the dumpster?”

“It’s quite possible,“ she said.

That gritted my teeth and flushed my cheeks. “So, it would have been impossible for her to send a text at 1:30 AM.”

“Given her condition at the time, I would say that would be highly unlikely. If she wasn’t dead already, she would have been non-responsive.”

“That means whoever dumped her intentionally sent a text to her best friend to throw off the timeline.”

“That would be my guess, but I’ll leave the investigative work up to you. “

I thanked her for the information, and ended the call, then filled JD in on the details.

“I’m guessing she overdosed at the Pearl Room,” Jack said. “That would be a hell of a lot of bad publicity. With the number of celebrities in that VIP room, it could be any one of them, or it could be club management.”

“Somebody snuck her out of the back entrance and dumped her at another club, then loitered around Beats and sent a text to Taylor.”

It was as good a theory as any at the moment.

I called Jessica, a waitress allegedly on shift at the time. It went straight to voicemail. I left a message and asked her to call me back.

When I called Korina, she picked up. “Hello?”

I introduced myself and said, “I’d like to ask you a few questions about the night Sable Fox was in the Pearl Room.”

“Eddie told me not to say anything to anyone. Sorry.”

“Who’s Eddie?”

“My boss. He owns the place.”

“Why doesn’t Eddie want you talking about it?”

“Look, I don’t know. I just serve drinks. He says don’t talk to cops, so I’m not talking to cops. Not without a lawyer.”

“Why would you need a lawyer?”

“See, this is why I don’t want to talk to you. You’re trying to make something out of nothing.”

She ended the call.

I called her back, but she wouldn’t pick up. I left a voicemail. “If you change your mind, please call me back. Haley was 17. She died of an overdose. We’re just trying to figure out what happened.”