#3 Hollywood Crazy: A Holllywood Alphabet Series Thriller Read online

  HOLLYWOOD CRAZY

  MZ Kelly

  Note from the author

  This book, like all the Hollywood Alphabet Series novels, contains an interesting Hollywood fact or quote from a famous movie star. As you read, look for the fact or quote, and then look for details about how to win valuable prizes at the end of this book. Contests are updated regularly, it’s easy to enter, and the prizes are great!

  Also in the Hollywood Alphabet Series:

  Hollywood Assassin

  Hollywood Blood

  Hollywood Dirty (coming soon)

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Thanks for reading

  Contests…. Giveaways…Freestuff

  Sneak peek

  CHAPTER ONE

  “Ohmygodyeeees ...”

  Okay, so it’s not really a word. It’s more like an expression of feelings and sensations that were the result of being on the grounds of a magnificent Hollywood estate, pretending that I was a southern with a man under my hoop dress.

  I guess I’d better explain.

  My name is Kate Sexton. I’m a cop. I was invited to the Gone with the Wind housewarming party by LA’s mayor, Madison Caine, and my boss, Tom Reed, LAPD’s Chief of Police. The invitation came after my recent success at ending the murder spree of a mad woman who attempted to kill her superstar sister.

  The estate, called Eastlake, was reminiscent of a southern plantation. It was purchased by Caine from the heirs of the recently deceased movie producer, Conrad Harper. There were several dignitaries at the party, including wealthy political donors, a senator, a dozen Hollywood stars, and a dog named, Bernie.

  The dog, my canine partner, had become something of a celeb de jour, since he was instrumental in bringing down the bad guys in my last two cases. Bernie took a bullet and recently got a Medal of Valor for his actions, but now had other things on his mind.

  My four-legged hairball partner, who’s bloodline consists of some German shepherd ancestry and possibly a genetic contribution from Cousin Itt of the Adams Family, is about to become a father, thanks to a doggy-style romp with Mack Mackenzie’s black lab, Thelma.

  Mack’s a private investigator who I have explicit fantasies about, even though I’m dating Jack Bautista. The PI and I have had dinner a couple of times, but it seems unlikely that our relationship will ever get beyond discussing custody arrangements, since we consider ourselves canine grandparents-to-be.

  I’ve started to wonder if all the attention Bernie’s been getting lately has gone to his head. It could be that my partner has forgotten his humble origins and has started believing he’s some kind of super breed of canine species. My big dog probably doesn’t realize it, but there’s already a scientific name for his biological classification—horndog.

  Speaking of horndogs, I should probably explain about the man under my pink hooped fountain of satin and lace. Jack Bautista used to be an LAPD cop, like me, but now works for homeland security. We have an on-again, off-again relationship, mainly consisting of us doing sexual calisthenics when he’s in town and then me wondering if I’ll ever see him again.

  Jack and I had taken a break from the party after leaving Bernie with Chief Reed, who was happy to do a doggy style show and tell for the mayor and his friends. We’d strolled through the lush grounds of the estate before coming across a secluded gazebo.

  I’d spent a small fortune on my dress and almost three hours in my brother’s salon with hot rollers, a curling iron, and enough mousse to turn my sometimes frizzy brown hair into ringlets of southern sophistication that fell around my face and neck.

  I was pretty happy with the hair and dress, except between the hoop dress and the mountain of hair, I felt big—big that is, as in a Rose Parade float kind of way. I’d barely resisted the urge to wave to the others at the party like they were spectators attending my procession.

  Jack and I had settled in on a bench beneath the gazebo. We’d spent a few minutes admiring the expansive grounds, before Jack started feeling nostalgic and explained that, as a boy scout he’d received a merit badge for his camping skills. One thing had led to another and Jack ended up demonstrating his talents by playing man in the tent. That’s when I suddenly became religious, started speaking in tongues, and praising the almighty.

  “Holysweetgezohyes,” I said, along with a few other things, and then closed my eyes, moaning. When I finally opened them again, I froze in mid-orgasm. Someone was coming up the path!

  “Jack, someone’s coming,” I whispered.

  “I know,” I heard him say from down below. “Just relax and let it happen.”

  “Isn’t it a lovely evening,” an elderly woman said a few moments later as she and her date came up the walkway toward us.

  I tried to remain calm, barely stifling a couple of hallelujahs. “Yes,” I squeaked as the couple walked over to where I was sitting. “It’s quite warm—for February.”

  I folded my hands together, pushing down my dress and trying to send a message to the man who, like a parade float driver, was still busy shifting the transmission under my hoop dress.

  After introductions, during which I learned that the couple had been married fifty-one years, Edith said, “You look beautiful, my dear, and I so love your dress. It’s really quite...”

  “Oh…geeeezzz!” I squealed, cutting her off.

  The float driver hadn’t gotten the message and was revving the engine again, causing a momentary ruffle of petticoats and lace. I suppressed a moan, coughed, and ran a hand across the dress, trying to cover up what I’m sure had not gone unnoticed. For the first time in my life, I prayed that I wouldn’t have an orgasm.

  “Your dress is quite divine,” Edith finally added, her brow furrowing. She stared at me for a long moment before turning to her husband, Bob.


  I tried to control myself but started praising the lord again. “Oh my God...” I stifled the outburst and looked at the couple. “The dress...it’s very special to me. It might sound strange, but wearing it...it’s like a religious experience.” What the hell was I saying? I must have lost my mind.

  Edith exchanged looks with Bob again and then bent down to me. “Is everything all right, dear? Are you in some kind of distress? I have a cell phone. I can call 911, if needed.”

  “No, it’s just that every now and then I dress up like a southern debutante, go out in public, and have sex.”

  Okay, I didn’t say it. Instead, I said, “No, I’m fine. I’m just excited...” I stifled another moan and my voice took on a high-pitched edge. “I mean, I’m...happy...it’s such a wonderful evening...it’s just great to be alive.” Geeze, why didn’t I just start singing, Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah?

  Edith lowered her voice and reached into her purse. “Are you on medication? Sometimes drug reactions can cause your symptoms. I once took a hormone replacement medication that gave me gas.”

  I heard my driver chuckle somewhere beneath the parade float.

  “No, I’m not on drugs and I don’t have gas,” I said before another squeal slipped out. I silently cursed the man under the float.

  Edith glanced at Bob again, before looking back at me. She pulled the phone out of her purse and whispered, “I’m going to call 911 right now, dear. I think maybe you’re trying to give me a secret signal.” She glanced around the grounds, then back at me. “Maybe you’re being stalked.”

  Now I really did need divine intervention. I imagined my fellow officers responding to the scene and finding Jack under my dress. I’d had enough.

  “Edith, listen to me carefully,” I said. “Put your phone away. I am not in distress. I am not having a drug reaction or gas pains. And I am not being stalked. I am having an orgasm because there is a man under my dress having sex with me.”

  The elderly woman’s eyes and mouth all grew wide at once, giving her an expression that was something between fascination, titillation, and horror. She turned, took Bob’s hand, and they almost ran down the path together.

  I was in the middle of giving my float driver his pink slip when my phone rang. I immediately recognized my best friend Natalie’s British accent. “Kate, sorry to bother you. You’re probably having the dog’s bollocks and all at your party, but we need your help. There’s been a murder.”

  “What? Where are you, Nat?”

  “Mo and me are workin’ security for the Michael Clinton wedding. It’s up on Sunset Place.” My friend paused, catching her breath. “It’s the wedding couple. They’re both dead.”

  After getting a few more details, I ended the call, pushed Jack out of my dress, and in my best southern accent said, “There’s been a murder, dahlin’. I’ve gotta go.”

  Jack reluctantly came up for air and ran a hand through his tangled brown hair. I looked into his smoky brown eyes, as he borrowed a line from Margaret Mitchell and said, “Just so you know, Scarlett, you should be kissed often and by someone who knows how.”

  I stood up and said, “In case you haven’t noticed, Rhett, we’re way beyond kissing.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  After calling my partner, Charlie Winkler, I notified dispatch and had them send patrol units to the address Natalie had given me. I then had Jack drop me and Bernie off at the crime scene, cursing the fact that I hadn’t brought a change of clothes.

  We met up with Charlie in front of the home where Natalie reported the crime had taken place.

  “It’s just another homicide, Kate,” Charlie said. “You didn’t have to get all gussied up like you’re trying to be a movie star or something.”

  Chunky Charlie tries to be funny when he’s not busy being a human locust and devouring anything that crosses his path. He’s old enough to be my father, with thinning brown hair and a moustache that he’d recently dyed to impress his girlfriend.

  Lately I’d been worrying about my partner’s weight and blood pressure. His health problems, the stress of raising his sixteen year old daughter, Irma, and having sex—yuck—with his new girlfriend, Wilma, all appeared to be taking their toll.

  “Figured with my middle name I might as well start dressing the part,” I said.

  Charlie sometimes teases me about my name. I was born, Kate Hedwig Sexton. My dad, having been a big fan of old Hollywood, gave me Hedy Lamarr’s given first name. During her lifetime, the now deceased movie star had the good sense to shorten her name to Hedy. I was just thankful that only a few select people knew that I was also a Hedwig.

  After a brief marriage to a man named, Doug Witherspoon, I’d taken back my maiden name. The only thing I’d gotten out of the crummy marriage was ruined credit and the memory of seeing my ex, an assistant DA, screwing his secretary in an interrogation room while a video recorder was running. The recording had made the rounds of every LAPD precinct, and I had been relentlessly needled about my choice in men.

  The fallout from the video made me sometimes wonder why I’d decided to become a cop. My dad was also an LAPD officer, killed off duty when I was only four. He was gunned down in a local park. The crime was never solved. In some ways I knew that I was probably symbolically pursuing the ghost of my father’s killer.

  Pearl Kramer, a retired black chief of detectives who’d come out of retirement part-time, had been called by our lieutenant to meet us at the crime scene. He met up with us at the front door where the uniforms were waiting.

  I gave everyone the official explanation about the mayor’s party and my dress, just to get it out of the way, before asking for details of the crime.

  “The groom’s name was Michael Clinton,” the younger of the two uniforms said, glancing at some notes. “He and his bride, China, were found dead in an upstairs bedroom about forty-five minutes ago.” He looked up from his notepad. “It looks like a murder-suicide.”

  “Guess the honeymoon’s over,” Charlie said, unwrapping a candy bar.

  The older of the two cops was handsome with silver hair that made him look like he belonged in one of those erectile dysfunction ads. He told us our new boss, Lieutenant Edna, had radioed that he would be at the scene within the hour.

  Captain Skully, my previous supervisor, was found dead in his office a few weeks after making false accusations that I’d compromised the last investigation by talking to the press. Despite my homicidal thoughts, the captain’s death had been determined to be from natural causes.

  “Who found the bodies?” Pearl asked.

  “The wedding planner, a Marley Jenks,” the ED cop said. He made eye contact with all of us before adding, “Just so you know, everyone’s pretty freaked out in there.”

  The home was a contemporary multilevel structure, consisting of steel and glass rectangular boxes that cascaded onto one another and down the hill. The main portion of the house sat at the highest point of the street, overlooking the city. From watching a few of those TV real estate shows, I guessed that it was in the eight to ten million dollar price range.

  As I walked into the residence, I realized that my carefully styled ringlets of hair were starting to unravel. I’m tall with green eyes, even features, and olive skin. I’m usually at least half-way presentable, but I wondered how anyone was going to take me seriously at a murder scene dressed like something out of the civil war. I decided to hang my badge around my neck for identification purposes, at the same time knowing that the entire ensemble was ridiculous.

  I had one of the uniforms take Bernie as Charlie and Pearl left me and went upstairs to check out the crime scene. I then met up with Natalie in the great room where dozens of guests were milling about.

  Natalie is not only my best friend, but she and Mo, a former pimp—yes pimp—are my roommates. They’d started a private detective business a few months back called, Sistah Snoop, and had been hired to provide security and assist with planning for the wedding.

  After commenting on my attire, Natali
e said, “Mo’s standin’ guard outside the upstairs bedroom with the coppers where the bodies are located.”

  Behind her there was a lot of crying and groaning. One of the guests, a woman who looked like a long-haired Mick Jagger with a lot of plastic surgery, appeared to be on the verge of hysterics.

  “Mo thinks it might’a been a case of rough sex,” Natalie continued. “But I think that’s a bunch of codswallop. The groom, that’s Michael, was a wankhead who always had his landin’ gear up, look’n for a hanger. Maybe China decided she’d finally had enough.”

  My beautiful blond-haired friend has her own colorful variation of the English language thanks to a rough upbringing with a hard-living father in Great Britain.

  “How well did you and Mo know the bride and groom?” I asked.

  “We’ve been help’n Marley, she’s the wedding planner, prepare for the big day for a couple a months. China, the bride, was a real sweet pea. The wedding was at sunset out on the lawn and the couple was supposed to leave on their honeymoon at nine.”

  Natalie lowered her voice, motioning to the guests behind us. “A bit of a rumpus has been going on here since the bodies were discovered.” She motioned to the Mick Jagger stick figure. “The BM is ‘bout ready to shit her cookies.”

  “BM?”

  “Bride Mama. She’s been off her tits, slammin’ down doubles since the ceremony.”

  No sooner had Natalie made the comment than the BM, who Natalie introduced as Linda Warner, stumbled up to me. In a voice that sounded like a drunken version of the wicked witch from The Wizard of Oz, she said, “Arrre...yooou ‘n...chaarge here?”

  “Yes, I’m with LAPD,” I explained.

  She gave me a once over, nearly falling over as her gaze moved down and took in my outfit. “What’s with...the queeen bee...costume?”

  I explained about my dress, the party, and then said, “We’re going to check on things upstairs, Mrs. Warner.” I tried to focus on a face that was bordering on a clownish mess of implants, fillers, and smeared makeup. “As soon as I know something definitive, I’ll come back and talk to you.”