The chiming music from the carousel became distorted. The display of bright lights became dizzying.
“A crime of passion means someone probably knew her, Laurs. And if not, it was a bad society that killed Dhurra. She knew what she was doing. Taking risks. In the long run, by her talking to us, maybe she knew she could save more lives than she could have, ever, in any medical practice.
“Listen to me, Laurs. A man can kill a woman there for dishonoring him. Any time. Any place. Any reason he wants.”
“But she was on American soil. We should have protected her.”
Death’s putrid orifice once again came to stare me in the face. But this time I’d bargained with it. And I’d lost.
“She had no family. Her husband is dead. No children,” I offered Geoff.
Our wooden chariot glided up and down the slick brass poles. Relentlessly our Clydesdales pushed on, in circles, trying to reach to our unattainable destination.
“God, Geoff. I thought we were helping her. I thought our article would—”
“Would what?” Geoff broke in. “Change the world? C’mon, Babe. Hang in here with me.”
“The thing is Dhurra loved her life. She was allowed to practice some medicine and medicine was her life.”
“Operative words there. Allowed. And some. Dhurra couldn’t travel without a male escort. She couldn’t vote. She had no rights. Hell, she couldn’t even show off her beautiful face in public!
“All we did was let her tell her story, the way she wanted it to be told.”
Tears continued to stream down my face as our dear Clydesdales came to a rest. Geoff took over in an unexpected display of manhood, signaling the ticket boy to leave us alone for another ride on my chariot of gold.
The music cranked up again as our horses lifted their muscular bodies into mid-air. A spray of salty ocean water comforted my dry throat. A pesky gull honed in on my caramel corn but I was in no mood to share it.
I worried that I would have to postpone any plans to go to Tucson.
Geoff worried for me, for my friends, and for the future of CoverBoy. With an ashen face defying his black skin he told me now was the time to use the Voodoo potion.
Chapter Thirty-One
Friends & Foes
I ANTICIPATED A CALL from Brock. I didn’t expect his phone etiquette.
“You need your friends right now, Lauren, and what the hell do you do? You blow us off!”
“You’re compounding my morning headache and interfering with my ritual of experiencing pain.”
“Damn it. Damn you. Turn it over. Turn it over to God, or Buddha, or Mother Earth. Hell, I don’t care if you turn it over to Casper the Ghost. Just don’t turn anything over to that creep of a so called doctor.”
I shuffled in the seat of my Porsche, searching for comfort while at a complete stop on the 405 freeway. “Let me do it my way, Brock.”
“Wheres that sweet little innocent girl I met in grade school?”
“I thought you only remembered the bad girls.”
He continued pounding me with words. “What was her name? A cute kid with flaming red hair, green sparkling eyes, and even some freckles.
“I’ll tell you. Her name was Lauren Grace Visconti. She trusted everyone, including herself. She had no fears.”
“She also had yet to learn about the Lauren Visconti Curse,” I said.
“You’re making choices here.”
“I didn’t choose to be the product of rape.”
“Listen to me. You are a child of the universe. Innocent. Growing. Living and Loving. People die. Death is a reality in life. But what you’ve gone and done is given your heart and soul to it. Just think if you could cast out all that hurt and fear and turn it back over to the universe. I guarantee you there’d be more room in your heart. Your mom’s spirit never left you. She’s right there along with your dad and your fiancé, but you have your soul so cluttered up with angst they can’t reach you. They can’t reside inside you.”
“A woman is dead, Brock. Yet another woman I loved.”
“It’s your decision, Laurs. There are a whole lot of us walking and living and breathing, and we want to love you but there’s no room inside.”
FEAR IS NOT MY FRIEND. It can feel shaky or it can immobilize. It can be butterflies in your stomach or jagged slabs of concrete.
I knew a man waited for me inside my office. I knew why he waited. My first clue was his name was Wray. Detective Tom Wray.
The press hovered all over it like blowflies on fresh kill. Pretty much CoverBoy and Lauren Visconti were that kill. Only I could handle my own state of vengeful autolysis without their help, thank you very much.
Runway model slaughtered. Stabbed to death. Was it self-destruction? She allowed herself to be doped-up on cocaine and various other pleasures and was a target for the taking. CoverBoy ran the story.
Dr. A. D. ‘Dhurra’ Sulayman. From Afghanistan. A promising female physician. Murdered. Stabbed eighteen times.
An atrocious coincidence. A nightmare, but a coincidence.
Or maybe the detective was here about Payton. Of course!
I took one last deep breath, exhaled both butterflies and concrete, and moved my stiffened body toward the closed door.
Detective Wray introduced himself. For every way the joints in my body felt like they were made of shattered crab shells, Wray exuded Jello. Pudding, maybe. Chocolate pudding. African American. Nice looking. Dressed well. He could have been one of my star models except for the keloid scar running thick across his face from his left ear to his lip.
He caught my stare.
“I could have the scar removed, you know. Chances are it would come back. And plastic surgery is not my thing. Going under the knife scares me to death.’
No longer butterflies in my stomach, the blowflies were gaining weight as they ate away at me. Had Detective Tom Wray heard about my latest issue? It was at the presses. He couldn’t have seen the article on plastic surgeons. Exposed. I didn’t withhold a single shot at the doctors. Sukie’s camera lenses captured the likes of the Cat Woman. The Barbie Doll. And then she turned to the surgeons, themselves. Some of the more narcissistic ones even posed for her camera, almost as Helm’s had suggested. Almost naked. It was a killer issue.
So much for introductions. I didn’t need to say a word. I couldn’t say a word. I motioned to the deep-seating sofas opposite my desk.
I could relax. Or at least fake it real good.
I brought two glasses of water over to the table that would serve as crystal armor between us. A Feng Shui thing. He watched.
“How can I help you?” Did he hear the nervousness in my voice as I did?
“I won’t take up much time, Ms. Visconti. Get right to the point. That’s what we both need to do. But I’m trying to be the peacemaker here, if it matters to you.”
He was not irenic. Peace did not exude from the man. In fact, it was exactly as I knew our meeting would play out as he challenged every word I said with an arrogant half-smile. What I didn’t expect was for him to splay across my beautiful table the photographs of my runway model and Dhurra, both sliced into pieces and lying in pools of blood, with only the bones to still held them together.
My naïve runway model. My brave Dhurra. So many gashes across their magnificent bodies. I looked away, one moment from nearly barfing down my blouse or voiding on my skirt.
Wray didn’t wince. The barrage of questions commenced without pause.
“Do you have any idea why these two women would be murdered? You see, as far as I can tell they share only one thing in common and that would be you. You know I have to ask”.
I didn’t know. I didn’t say a word.
“Do you have any enemies, Ms. Visconti?”
Nothing. I had nothing.
“Come on. Give me something. You aren’t a tabloid. I know that. Me, myself? I respect your work. I like it. You’re doing good things. But your magazine may not settle in right with some folks.
“Ma’am?”
“Please call me Lauren. And yes. My magazine has and does evoke emotion. Mostly it’s positive. But, yes, we have our share of those who grow agitated with our stories. We stand by them. Every word. Every photograph. CoverBoy is no tabloid and far from it. And we sure as hell are no WikiLeaks. What we print is common knowledge if anyone would take the time to look and read and learn.”
His curled graying eyebrows arched. “If you don’t mind me saying, you sound like that’s a statement you’ve prepared for the press.”
“Maybe it’s a little canned, Detective, but it’s the truth. It’s not like this news isn’t preying on me. I’m deeply saddened.”
“Have you received any hate mail?”
“Even bloggers receive hate mail.”
“I take that as a yes.”
“I repeat, we get far more support.”
“But, what? What aren’t you telling me, Ms. Lauren?”
I closed my eyes. They sealed up with Superglue. I didn’t want to talk. Damn me. And damn him!
Detective Wray waited in silence. Did he feel my guilty conscience? You see, I felt my guilt. I, via an instrument I called CoverBoy, exposed real facts. Bad facts.
How I wished I could make this visit about Payton. How I wished he would have said he somehow got involved and was there to tell me I was right. No suicide. They had found the monstrous thing that had gunned down my beloved friend in her own home.
I returned to silence. Dead silence.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Under the Knife
DETECTIVE WRAY HAD my full attention. The thing about his keloid scar. The plastic surgeon. The stabbings. I got it. Maybe more so than I wanted.
The next issue was at the presses. I loved it. And maybe I would come to hate it.
We took the stories in-depth.
One of Beverly Hill’s finest surgeons had seventeen patients who had all endured at least eleven surgeries. And we did our research. They all walked through his door, first time, as the most near perfection of beautiful womanhood. It’s not as if they were going through a series of surgeries to correct a birth defect or a trauma to the physical body.
Maybe they weren’t made for the cover of Vogue, or Cosmo, or the likes, but they refused to believe they were nothing less than imperfection at God’s wicked wrath. They didn’t understand that Photoshop and the body parts stores were used for all the pretty movies, glossies, and advertisements.
I had already shed more light on the plight of anorexia, bulimia and cocaine as part of the runway model story. This was different. This was surgery. I included my personal recount of a friend whose mother had taken her to New York as a getaway-shopping excursion. The daughter took an early flight home, disgusted that she couldn’t fit into the clothes she so desperately wanted, while her mother stood at her side begging that a larger size would be fine. The daughter scheduled a tummy tuck for the following week. She died on the operating table.
And then there was that little ugly story about revirgination.
Chapter Thirty-Three
A Simple Sanctuary
THE BRASS KEY TURNED the inner chamber and the cylinder clicked open. Harlan Coal took a quick look over his shoulder and, seeing no one, slipped through the door that would automatically close and relock. He crossed the first narrow chamber lined with files and shelves stuffed with DVD’s and books. With a second key he unlocked another door.
“Ah, Armand!” Coal said. “You’ve found your way into my soul.”
“Not a place I really want to reside,” Armand answered.
The steaks sizzled on the Viking grille. A state-of-the-art exhaust system purified the air, removing any tale-tell aroma of a carnivore’s delight. It eliminated tobacco smoke, too. Or any other odd scents that might occasionally permeate the air.
“The girl. Visconti. I think you’ve got the wrong mark this time,” Armand said. He lit a cigarette and passed it over to Coal’s generous lips.
“She’s a fucking gold mine. I’ve been planning this one for years.”
“She doesn’t fit your profile. The profile you’ve crammed down my throat for ten years. She’s smarter than you, and as independent as you. She isn’t going to fall for your polarized mentality shit. And lonely? She knows way too many people.”
“Her friends are all our marks. And Visconti fits my profile just fine. She’s going through a difficult time. Her entire life has been a nightmare, at least so she thinks. She’s beautiful, sexy, and she’s fucking A-Bubba loaded. That makes her perfect. I have great plans for her.”
“She’s trouble.”
“Don’t insult me, Armand. Just cook me my goddamned steak.”
Coal sucked on his cigarette, putting it out just as the rare steak arrived at his table. He devoured the beef between sips of the Krug cabernet.
Armand cleared the plates, then followed Coal to the living area. He cut out four perfect lines of white powder across the shiny stainless steel cocktail table.
“We’ve got a problem with the Carly Posh home,” Armand said. “Her bug’s not working. That’s one more bad omen in this whole Visconti deal.”
“I’ll be the only omen around here. Send someone in when she’s not there. How hard can that be?”
“That’s the problem. She doesn’t leave the house.”
“Bullshit. She goes to work. She attends our sessions. And you make goddamn sure she never sees you! In fact you and all the boys. You need to stay the hell away from here.”
“You’re not paying attention. She’s not working, or if she does, she’s in and out with no schedule and we can’t rely on the time we’ll need. And she hasn’t been at the last several rallies.”
Coal laughed from somewhere deep within his looming skeleton. “I get it. I think we have a case of good old female jealousy. That’s all. She introduces me to Visconti and now she regrets the attention I’m giving her. I planned on this. I’ll take care of it in the morning.”
Coal left the living room, crossing to another open section of the capacious floor plan. Two locked doors afforded him all the privacy he needed. Here, within the confines of his sanctuary, walls were limited. He entered the master bedroom space. With a single remote control, the first button operated the tin ceiling tiles which would slide to reveal a bank of mirrors above the bed. The second button opened up the Velux skylights that flanked each side of the mirroring. There were no windows on any of the outside walls so the skylights provided a welcome relief of fresh air against a starry night, but only after the exhaust system had expunged any trace of the grilled steak and cigarette smoke.
A series of buttons cranked up the sound system. Limp Bizkit screamed their songs of obscenity. With a couple more buttons the lights dimmed and the bath began to fill with a flat gush of water that swished into the huge black marble basin like a mountainous Alps waterfall. The final button confirmed all doors were secure; the monitor would alert them if anyone was within ten feet of the first door. After all, Dr. Coal had an open door policy.
Coal rolled the nightstand drawer open and tossed the remote control into it. Next to where it tumbled lay the almost empty bottle of Rohypnol. His favorite drug of choice. The roofies would remove any trace of memory or flashbacks that might linger in the fog of his young boys doped-up brains.
Coal spoke with the low pitch of a finely tuned base guitar on steroid amplifiers, “Lauren Visconti will succumb to my mystical pipeline. I am the one that speaks a truth that will resonate with her and turn her into my favorite little ant. Not on the farm, of course. I’ll be buying her soul but she’s the one paying.”
Armand heard and answered. “I like that Carly cunt. I bet she’s a real bed thrasher.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Inconvenient Lives
MY PHONE RANG AT daybreak. With my shutters open, the sun cast a faint glow through the dismal bank of fog along the shoreline. I switched on my nightstand lamp in order to help wake my conscious mind. I read, Caller I
D. Italy.
“Mr. Helms, how kind of you to phone me back.”
“I’ve been called far worse than that, but call me Jack. I’m getting back to you about the kid. The missing kid,” he said.
“Payton’s younger brother. Mike Doukas.” I rubbed my eyes, but rather than the relief that comes with eight hours of sleep, they scratched as if I’d been on the beach in a windstorm.
“The last viable information on him, according to my guys, is a street address in New York. A flop-house of the worst kind.”
“The thing is this address is old.” Helms apologized. “About 800,000 children go missing each year, Lauren. You have runaways and parents that don’t give a damn. It’s a bad mix. You’ve got kids that don’t want to be found and in some cases don’t deserve to be. And you’ve got family secrets.”
“What kind of family secrets?”
“One in five girls and one in ten boys are sexually molested, most often by a family member. And of those, you’re lucky to get one in three to talk about it. It’s sorry statistics.”
That didn’t fit Payton’s family. No way. Not that I could imagine. But then again, the words were family secrets.
“Anything else I should know, Jack?”
“One more problem. If you do come up with hard evidence that indicates a death, that’s a whole different ballgame. The kids wind up in pauper’s graves, squeezed together and stacked on top of each other. It’s a real mess trying to unearth them.”
“Exhumation?”
“Fucking tough to get a court order, probably because it costs so much. They’re jammed in so tight and so deep there’s no telling who the lucky sonuva bitch is that’s on the top. And I doubt they know who’s on the bottom since they didn’t know who they were in the first place.”
Payton always had faith that Mike was still alive. Maybe she learned some piece of truth and the acceptance that he was gone was what did her in. New York? My god. None of us thought to look east of the Mississippi. “You said New York was the last official address on him. What else is unofficial?”
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