-8-
REUNION TOUR

Friday
Miami Beach, Florida

Sam gave a two fingered wave at the crowd of paparazzi outside Rhean Warrick's stately beachfront home. Several of them demanded to know who he was, and Elena had never been so happy to be o the B-list. She and Nate had picked the networks they sold footage to very carefully so that they stayed out of the limelight. So while she had that vague 'you're someone we should know' vibe, Sam, with his easygoing nature, helped her blend in.

Sam escorted her up the set of stairs to the French doors that were propped open with a pair of potted palm trees and swiped a glass of champagne off a waiter's tray as they entered. "For you?" he offered the flute to Elena.

Elena grinned. "Such a charmer, Sam Drake. And no, thanks, one of us should keep a clear head through this." She glanced around the open foyer, looking for the host of the evening. "Warrick's a hard guy to miss, but keep an eye out for him."

Sam was surveying the open floor. "So what's the angle we need to play? How do we get on his good side?" he asked Elena, taking a sip of the champagne and grimacing. "Guy's got money for days but he skimped on the alcohol tonight," he said. "Cheapskate."

Elena smirked. "I think he spent it all on the self-promotion," she noted, gesturing around at the décor. There were more than one life-size standees of the Cheetah Tonic frontman around the room, each of the rocker in a large amount of animal print and things that glittered. Cheetah Tonics's album covers had been blown up and plastered around any open wall space. Disco tiles had been fitted to the floor into a large dance space, and a DJ was playing the band's greatest hits with a mix of 70s and 80s rock. Lights above them splashed in different colors, pulsing to the beat.

Sam wrinkled his nose. "Definitely not my taste," he admitted. "Right up Sully's alley though, no wonder he's half deaf. Let's hope my little brother can get in and out so I don't have to listen to the entire vinyl." He winked at his sister-in-law. "Besides, I'm with you much longer in that dress and I'm not responsible."

"You're lucky Nate went without earpieces tonight," Elena admonished Sam. The older Drake brother laughed, and pulled her onto the dance floor. At Elena's Look, he shrugged. "Easier to spot everybody from in the middle of everybody," he pointed out. "And we're blending in."

"Right," Elena rolled her eyes, but laughed as Sam pulled some disco moves, drawing her further onto the floor.

Outside, decidedly far from the middle of everything and very underdressed for a party, Nate waited for the Miami-Dade police officer patrolling the back fence to make his way around the corner before hopping the chain-link fence and ducking behind a lit water fountain. A breeze twisted its way through the back lawn of the property, sending a spray of sea air and what smelled like hibiscus wafting through the yard. The grass was wet, no doubt from a below-ground sprinkler system. He could feel it seeping through his jeans at the knees. He crouched in the back corner, waiting for the patrol to walk by again, and then ran across the grass until he made it to the shadow of the house.

He pushed his way through some kind of flower bushes, looking for his entry point. According to his wife, the collection was somewhere in Warrick's basement. "Typical showboating," she'd rolled her eyes. "The room looks like some medieval castle dungeon or something."

"Always the showman," Sully had grunted, and Nate and Sam had agreed.

He spotted an egress window buried in a fancy-looking rock garden and slipped his Swiss Army knife from his jeans pocket. "Next time," he whispered to himself, jimmying the window, "I get to wear the tux."

"I see our man," Sam whispered to Elena as a raucous applause burst from the audience. The two of them stopped in the middle of the dance floor and turned in the direction everyone else was facing, toward a large grand staircase that came down from the second floor.

The DJ struck up a hard-hitting tune with screaming electric guitar and heavy, 80s' style bass as Rhean Warrick made his grand entrance. The rocker had to be in his 70s, Elena guessed, with a gray ponytail underneath a cheetah-print cowboy hat. The shirt he wore was a shiny black silk with a cheetah-print coat, bell-bottom pants, and silver-tipped black cowboy boots. He flashed the crowd a wide smile full of pearly-white teeth, and a peace sign with his ring-laden fingers. "Gooood evening Miami Beach!" he crowed, his voice loud enough to carry without amplification. The crowd burst into cheers like they were at a rock concert.

Elena applauded politely, trying to keep her face neutral. She remembered how crass and belittling the rockstar had been the last time she'd interviewed him, as if he was still living in the 70s and the women's rights movement hadn't happened. "Could use that champagne right about now," she muttered to Sam through her tight-lipped smile.

"Fake it 'til you make it," Sam grinned back. "He's looking right at ya." Indeed, Warrick had been eyeing Elena since his pose at the top of the stairs, and Sam hadn't missed the way his green eyes had started at Elena's hips and moved up. Good thing I'm here with her, he though to himself as Warrick pushed his way through the crowd, greeting folks as he went. Nate would kill him.

Whoever had installed Warrick's windows must have known a thing or two about security. The window didn't want to budge. Sighing, Nate put his knife away and pulled his sleeve down to cover his face as he raised his arm and planted a boot through the glass. The glass shattered, and he slipped his way inside before someone spotted him. He landed on some insanely-plush carpet and wondered who installed carpet like that in their basement, but was glad that it cushioned and silenced his drop into the house.

"Now if I were a medieval dungeon in an art-Deco house, where would I be?"

"I know you!" Warrick thundered as he made his way to Elena and Sam. He offered a big hand to Elena and she shook it, plastering on what Nate called her 'media' smile, the one that she reserved for interviews and on-camera. He snapped his fingers, trying to recall the name of her show. "Uncharted History!" he exulted with a grin.

"That's the one," Elena nodded. "It's wonderful to see you again, Mr. Warrick."

"Oh, Rhean, please," the rocker countered. "My friends call me Rhean, and after our first interview," he said, his eyes drifting to the plunging neckline of her dress, "I'd call us friends, wouldn't you?"

Sam stiffened, ready to step in if he needed to, but Elena squeezed his hand.

"Rhean it is," Elena said smoothly, draping Sam's arm around her neck and dropping his hand near her necklace so he could fiddle with the jewel- and take away Warrick's visual. "I hear there's big news coming from you this evening?"

"Oh, world-changing," Warrick said, a hint of humor in his eyes. "That is," he added, "if you're a rock and roll fan over the age of say, 50."

"The classics never die, Mr. Warrick," Sam interjected, offering him the hand that wasn't around Elena's shoulders. "Sam Drake," he introduced himself. "S&S Salvage," he added.

"Modern day pirates," Warrick said, and Sam's toes curled inside his expensive shoes. "Kidding!" Warrick added with a grin. "Of course. Someone's gotta find it so Miss Fisher can film it, isn't that right?"

"Yep," Elena replied, "they do my dirty work." She put a little stress on the 'dirty', and Warrick's congenial facial expression faltered, before he quickly masked it with another grin.

"Well. Perhaps after my big news tonight, Miss Fisher, you'll want to follow something a little more lively around the world than some old artifacts." Warrick nodded to Sam. "If you'll both excuse me," he said, and disappeared into the crowd.

Sam looked down at Elena. "What a douchebag."

"And that happy persona's as fake as his teeth whitener," Elena agreed. She shivered. "Ugh I can't handle much more of being in the same room with his ego. Let's hope Nate has something on the chalice so we can get out of here."

Nate felt like he'd stepped into the Tower of London, or Trinity College, as he surveyed the room he was standing in. Unlike the opulent interior of the rest of the house, this floor was bare, laid with tile to look like a medieval castle floor. The walls had been textured and tiled in much the same way. Electric wall sconces looked like flickering torches.

"Elena wasn't kidding," he noted, looking around. Heavy, oak-finished and glass-fronted cabinets lined the room, reminding him very much of the Museo Maritime in Cartagena. "Holy shit," he breathed, walking around the room. Several of the objects were things he knew from popular culture. Under glass in the middle of the room, a piece of the chassis of "Little Bastard," James Dean's car; inside another locked cabinet under a low lamp, a painting of a little boy and a female china doll. Nate stepped up to a simple, three-legged wooden stool bolted to the wall and examined the placard mounted underneath it, then moved on to a silver vase sitting on a wooden stand.

"It's like Ripley's Believe It or Not down here," Nate whispered to himself as he examined Warrick's artifact trove.

"I believe you're a little underdressed," an accented voice noted from behind him. Nate froze, and turned around carefully, both hands in the air. He came face to face with Maria Dominquez, wearing a stylish red minidress and matching heels.

Nate's eyes drifted to her hand. "That ah, that nine mil accents the dress nicely," he managed to say.

Maria nodded. "Handbags and jewels are so cliché," she responded easily. "Might I ask what you're doing down here?"

"What, me?" Nate feigned confusion. "I mean, I'm on the security detail and got turned around. Miami-Dade PD. Hard not to get distracted by all this," he gestured around the room.

"It is quite the trove isn't it," Maria agreed, running her fingers over the top of a glass case containing an Egyptian ankh. "Not what you'd expect in the basement of one of the world's greatest musicians."

I don't know about 'greatest,' Nate thought, but kept his opinion to himself. "Yeah," he said instead, deciding to stick with his cover story. "So all this stuff, it's supposedly like, haunted, or cursed, or something?"

Maria nodded, her gun still remaining firmly aimed at his forehead from across the room. "As one might expect, Mr. Warrick is a bit…eccentric," she said. "Comes with the job description, I suppose."

"Ozzy without eating bats?" Nate offered, and Maria flashed him just a hint of a smile.

"In their heyday, Cheetah Tonic went on world tours, seeing many countries and performing for millions of devoted fans. And in each country, Mr. Warrick always made a point of learning the local myths and legends." She nodded to the car part. "They make for a hell of a story. And all good songs are really stories."

Nate wanted to argue that he couldn't hear the story in a Cheetah Tonic song over the screaming lyrics, but decided the 'devoted fan' in the room with him might not appreciate that. "So what made you a fan, Miss-"

"Maria," Maria introduced herself. Her voice got quiet and her eyes flickered to a point over Nate's shoulder. "It's the passion," she explained. "The work, put into the notes, into the lyrics. Mr. Warrick's devotion to philanthropy. You know, he recently gave over two million dollars to protecting the rainforest in Venezuela."

Nate jumped on it. "Venezuela? There was just a big earthquake there, wasn't there?"

She nodded. "I was there, in Caracas, when it happened. A terrible thing. The whole city shook. Millions of bolivars in damage."

He gestured to her. "You look like you made it out all right," he told her.

Maria voice was thoughtful with her answer. "I was…protected," she said simply.

"Can I get everybody's attention?" Warrick was standing in front of an actual microphone this time, instead of his booming voice. Elena grimaced at the grating sound of his voice now amplified over the entire room.

The crowd quieted, and Warrick smiled. "Hey, first off, huge thank you to everybody for coming out tonight!" He screamed it much as he might have to an arena full of concertgoers, and the room erupted, save for Elena and Sam, who stood near the back, surveying the crowd. "Seriously," Warrick said, his voice matching the sentiment, "thank you very much for being amazing supporters of my bandmates and mine's music, and charitable organizations, over the last thirty years." His voice cracked. "I know if the guys were still alive, they'd be profoundly, and deeply grateful." He paused, composing himself.

Elena rolled her eyes. "Sully was right," she whispered. "A showman to the end."

"Enough booze and drugs and no wonder everybody thought he was practically the Second Coming," Sam replied. "Guy's got charisma for days."

"Anyway," Warrick continued. "I just want to say thank you again, and now," he added, rubbing his hands together, his face lighting up, "I need to announce the big news you all came here for. As you know, this year is the 30th anniversary of our number one single, "The Devil's Own," and in celebration of that, I would like to announce that Cheetah Tonic is going back on the road!"

There was a gasp from somewhere, and confused murmurs rippled through the crowd. Warrick coughed, embarrassed. "Well, okay, not the entire band obviously, but starting on the 30th of this month, I'll be kicking off a Cheetah Tonic World Tour in the Canary Islands!" He grinned, as the gasps and murmurs turned to excited whispers. "All the hits that you loved, going around the world one more time! My thank you to all of you here and around the world for being the best damned fans in rock and roll!"

Applause ripped through the crowd. Warrick held up his hands and made a motion to quiet down. "And in every stop, our Spot the Difference campaign will donate 75% of all ticket sales to local charities, giving back, one stop-" here he paused, and gave an overexaggerated wink, "Or should I say, spot, at a time!"

That did it. The flashbulbs went off, the cheers erupted, the music kicked back in, and Elena reached for a flute of champagne, surprising Sam as she downed it in one gulp.

Nate felt the driving bass return through the ceiling as he stared at Maria Dominquez. "Protected?" he asked. "What, like, are you religious or something?"

Maria nodded, her eyes getting that faraway look again. "Or something," she said. "It sounds like the party has returned in full gear upstairs," she said. "I should let you return to your guard dog duty."

"Right." Nate nodded. "Yeah, I should do that." He moved to slip by her to the door.

"May I see your badge?"

Nate paused, one foot in the hall. "Sorry?"

"Your badge," Maria repeated, walking toward him again. "You are Miami PD, correct?"

Nate swallowed. Damn it. "Uh, yeah. Yeah, you know," he said, pretending to fumble in his pockets, "damn it, I think it might've fallen out somewhere, I should probably-"

He didn't see where it had come from, but a split second later, a loud, blaring alarm erupted throughout the house. Maria's nine millimeter was pointed at him, and Nate dove into the hallway as a bullet shattered the glass of the painting right next to the door he'd just been standing in.

Upstairs, the music came to a screeching halt as the alarm filtered its way over the sound of the speakers. Elena and Sam jumped in surprise at the sound. "Nate," Elena breathed.

"We should go," Sam said, taking her gently by the elbow and helping lead her into the crowd that was slowly filtering outside. He nearly ran into Warrick, who was helping guide traffic to the exits, two men in dark suits and one in a Miami-Dade uniform at his side, conversing in voices loud enough to be heard over the alarm. "Hell of a party, Mr. Warrick," Sam said again as they made their way past him.

The rocker narrowed his eyes at him. "Indeed. I'm sorry the evening has ended on such a sour note," he told Elena.

"That's all right, Rhean," Elena said sweetly. "I think you hit all the high notes. This evening was…illuminating," she added with a smile tossed over her shoulder as Sam ushered her outside.

Nate scrambled out the downstairs window and across the lawn. The alarm was a little muted in the backyard thanks to all the greenery. His hand reached for the fence to climb back over when something grabbed his foot and yanked him back to the ground. He hit the ground on his back, the wind knocked out of him.

His assailant wore a dark suit with an earpiece. Nate kicked up, catching the guy in the knee, then rolled onto his stomach and scrambled to his feet, throwing a sloppy punch that caught the suit across the jaw. The suit coughed and spit out a tooth, and Nate seized the opportunity to leap onto the fence, and pull himself over, before taking off at a dead sprint down the beach.

A car squealed to a stop right next to him and Nate whirled, ready for a fight. The back passenger door opened and Nate saw his brother's face. "Need a ride, little brother?" Sam offered with a grin. Nate leapt into the Uber driver's vehicle, spotted his wife up front with the driver, a young girl who didn't look older than twenty-five, and who looked slightly terrified.

Elena smiled at her. "Extra twenty percent on top of your fare if you forget you ever drove us," she offered.

The girl swallowed, and nodded. She stepped on the gas again, and Nate leaned back in his seat, breathing hard.

"How was your night?" Sam questioned him, and Nate barked out a short laugh.

"Scary."

Author's Note: More fun-filled randomness: all the 'cursed' artifacts from Warrick's creepy room are all based on real items in real life. The ones I referenced were "Little Bastard," "The Hands Resist Him," "The Busby Stoop Chair," and the "Basano Vase." All found in a mentalfoss article titled 10 Allegedly Cursed Objects Throughout History. A fun bedtime read ;)