Second only to porn star karaoke night at Sardo’s Grill and Lounge, a big Hollywood
stripper funeral showcases an awesome display of local talent. Strawberry
Margarita’s luscious bunch of mourners hadn’t come all the way here to sell their bodies any more
than their clientele of entertainment industry power players meant to sell
their souls.I definitely didn’t notice too many studio suits on deck -- but plenty of law enforcement brass blubbered heartfelt condolences into the news cameras. "She was Hollywood's daughter." "Another innocent victim of another victimless crime." "Our citizens deserve better, with or without their panties on." I don’t know, maybe cops and working girls share a kind of stupid friendliness towards death. It's the same few crazy kids playing either side of a dangerous game, where the winner has to die to gain any real career traction.
If a horny Brentwood groom needed a girl to jump out of a cake that night, he would have to go with an amateur. The pros stood in a seriously long line to place a hand-crafted chocolate strawberry cake pop on the casket containing the dismembered body parts formerly known as Rita.
The salute was among the many personal touches imagined by Sally "Pemba" Pembroke, once a legendary Beverly Hills madame and now our top party planner. She'd been enlisted by E! Style Network to create the dream Hollywood sex industry funeral of the century. Rita's no longer estranged mother had auctioned off exclusive rights to the event for an undisclosed cash sum. Rumor had it she would also receive a brand new Super Duty Ford F-250 in exchange for throwing herself onto the hood of the hearse -- and holding on to lead the twilight procession into Forest Lawn. 
"Think the old lady can stay sober that long?" the captain asked under his breath. He'd sidled up behind me, chomping on a strawberry scone with tequila butter. That Pemba was freaking fierce with an edible metaphor. "What are you doing here?" I shot back. I hadn't laid eyes on the double-crossing traitor since he stashed me away in Baja and scrammed. "A memorial is for people who actually knew the deceased."
"Who said I didn't know her?"
"Of course you did -- Rita as much as said so. God, how could I have been so stupid to trust you about anything?" In the corner I spotted Bad-Ass Muñoz, that boob of an arresting officer whose butt I'd covered without a word of thanks. He was splitting a pink bagel with someone who bore a striking resemblance to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. "She warned me about the kind of dirty stuff that goes on with you guys."
"Quit being so dramatic." A roving stripper quartet, who'd have been just as good with their pants on, serenaded us with a chorus of "Lovely Rita" by The Beatles. "I ran Vice for sixteen years" the captain said, flipping the girls a dollar. "I have friends in very low places." He grabbed a plate from a passing dessert tray. "Have you tried the Salted Margarita Pie? Delicious."
"Why did you dump me in Mexico without a word?" I spat back, lowering my voice amidst a checkerboard of sobbing lap dancers hopped up on meth. Pemba had asked the mourners to wear either black or white and avoid vinyl, rubber and safety pins."I had to work," the captain said. "I said I'd come back for you."
"I can take care of myself, you big jerk. Do you have any idea how long it takes to cross the border on a public bus? I practically got fingered by the Federales!"
"Hope they didn't find any diet pills up there." He just loved how startled I looked -- knocking back an Absolut Framboise shooter to prove it. "Anything you want to say about your your little prescription drug ring? Now would be a good time."
What I wanted to say was Rita is dead! She's dead, in forty-six known pieces, right over there in that big white box. And I'm terrified, because I don't really know what happened to her, or why -- and God, please tell me neither do you. Tell me you're a good guy, or even if you are a bad one, just say so, I can take it. Lock me away in some cold, dark mausoleum, where we're the only two people left alive. Slam me up against a marble slab covered with wilting flowers and raised gold letters stamping words of undying love in red welts on my skin. Cuff my wrists, bite my neck, kiss my lips bloody -- hurt me hard enough and long enough to teach me I can still feel something, anything -- as I surrender, breathless, under the weight of your protection.
I didn't say any of that, though. "I'm tired of doing all the talking," I informed him instead. "If I've become so inconvenient, how about I ask your wife for an update on the case?" I tossed that ridiculous candy-coated tribute on what was left of my friend and tried to disappear into the crowd. By then Pemba had ushered The Brothers Johnson onto the pulpit to perform "Strawberry Letter 23," and there wasn't a dry-eyed pole dancer in the house. The captain managed to grab my elbow. "I've been meaning to ask how well you knew Rita's landlord," he said. "Fat guy, very grabby."
"Doesn't ring a bell." Except for the time I flashed the old pig my undies, and he begged for three-way sex with me and Rita in lieu of several thousand dollars in back rent. "I find it very hard to believe you and he never met," the captain said. "Given that you're the last known person to see him alive."