Runner-up 5

Carmen hung up with Lopez and looked around her apartment. Smashed-in door, broken flower pot, stained carpet -- she would be evicted for sure if the manager came around. But there was no time for spring cleaning. She had to focus on the necessities.

She stripped down to her skivvies, tossing her dirty, blood-streaked clothes into a pile on the floor. The blood belonged to someone else, she recalled with some satisfaction. She wondered what happened to the bleach-haired gorilla who had attacked her. Hopefully he was chilling in the county morgue.

Carmen sized herself up in the bathroom mirror. Not bad. The body, though a little bruised and scraped up, could still rock it. Jumbo would approve. She slipped on a clean T-shirt, jeans and flip-flops. She stuck Falco’s package in her purse and headed out to her car.

Carmen lived alone, had no family nearby, and no time for boyfriends. Jumbo, sad to say, was the only consistent man in her life. But at the club, she had a tight circle of girlfriends who looked after each other. Sure, they gossiped and fought. But Carmen knew she could count on them in a pinch. The girls shared a common trait: They were all survivors. And right now, Carmen could use some backup.

She sped down to Jumbo’s and found a parking space behind the trash bins out back. It was late afternoon and the party crowd hadn’t shown up yet. The only customers in the house were regulars -- those lonely guys who came for the lunch buffet and never left.

She went in the back entrance and ran smack into Jumbo.

“You’re early,” he said, scratching his belly. “I don’t want ya punchin’ in.”

“I won’t.” She tried to push her way past him, but his big frame blocked her path like a fallen tree trunk.

“We got a sketchy one out there,” Jumbo said, jerking a fat thumb toward the showroom. “Be on your best behavior.”

“Aren’t I always?” she said, smiling sweetly.

Jumbo grunted, stepped sideways and let Carmen squeeze past him.

In the dressing room, a beautiful redhead was painting on makeup. Feather boas, police uniforms and schoolgirl outfits hung on racks. The place smelled like someone had spilled a drum of Calvin Klein’s Obsession on the floor.

“Hey Mandy, can you go with me to Dodger Stadium, like right now?”

“Sorry honey,” the dancer said, not looking away from her mirror, “I’m on in five. But I think Summer is wrapping it up.”

“Thanks,” Carmen said. She left the dressing room and climbed the stairs to the back of the stage. She peeked through the curtains and saw Summer twirling upside-down on a pole. That was normal. But something else caught Carmen’s eye, two figures moving around in the dark audience. She squinted through the bright stage lights.

She saw Frankie, Jumbo’s muscle, trying to get his arms around a tall man who had rooted his feet to the floor. Carmen heard shouting, and then words in a language she didn’t understand. German? Then a spotlight swooped over the two men, and her heart nearly stopped.

Blond hair. A bandage on his neck. Murderous intent. Not only was Carmen’s would-be assassin not in the morgue, he was here, in Jumbo’s Clown Room. Looking for her.

Damon Feldmeth is a commercial real estate broker “who enjoys cooking waffles for his sons on Saturday mornings.”