by Lee Goldberg
Amanda gave Steve a look. "And I hear two plus two equals five now, and that the laws of gravity have been suspended, too."
"Thanks for the support," Steve said.
"Stop by the path lab in the morning," Amanda said. "I'll have a report ready for you both."
She trudged into the bedroom to start her work. Mark rubbed his hands together, though Steve wasn't sure whether it was to get the blood flowing or signal that he was anxious to get to work.
"So," Mark said. "Where to now?"
CHAPTER THREE
Steve withstood the temptation to use his siren as he drove himself and his father south along the traffic-choked Pacific Coast Highway to Sunset Boulevard, which they followed east as it snaked around the Santa Monica Mountains towards Mandeville Canyon.
"Who are the victims?" Mark asked.
"Cleve Kershaw and Amy Butler, an actress."
"How do you know she's an actress?"
"She was a great-looking woman in her twenties who lived in LA," Steve said. "It would be unusual if she wasn't an actress. But she was also in bed with Cleve Kershaw, and if that wasn't enough, she had a Screen Actors Guild card in her wallet."
"All you had to say was that she had a SAG card," Mark replied.
"The explanation was more fun," Steve said. "And I wanted to see if you had any idea who Cleve Kershaw is, and you don't."
"Should I?"
"Only if you paid the slightest bit of attention to what's happening in popular culture."
"I have a basic working knowledge," Mark said, "as I do of many things."
"Okay, name the friends on Friends," Steve said.
"He was on Friends?" Mark replied.
"No," Steve said. "I'm making a point."
"Not very well," Mark replied.
Steve sighed with frustration. Mark turned to glance at the view so his son wouldn't see his smile.
"Cleve Kershaw is a movie producer," Steve replied wearily. "And he's married to Lacey McClure."
"The actress?"
"At least you've heard of her," Steve said.
"Actually, I haven't. I was just guessing."
"She's one of the top female action stars in the world," Steve said. "How could you not know that?"
"Do you know who Dr. Paul Quarrington is?"
"He's one of the most gifted heart transplant surgeons in the world," Mark said. "How could you not know that?"
Steve glared at his father. "She's been in the news a lot."
"So has Dr. Quarrington."
"Do you want to hear about who we're going to see or not?"
Ordinarily, Steve wouldn't have minded Mark's gentle teasing, especially considering that he'd kept his dad in handcuffs for so long at the crime scene. But the fact his father didn't realize just how big this case was, and what a media feeding frenzy it would create, taxed what little patience Steve had left.
"Of course," Mark said. "Please continue."
"They've done three movies together, Lacey starring, Cleve producing," Steve said. "They've all been modest hits, but not nearly as big as her home video was last year. That's why she's been in the news so much."
"What was so special about the video?"
"It's Lacey starring, Cleve producing, only this time in the privacy of their bedroom. Or so they thought. The XXX-rated tape was stolen by somebody on the construction crew remodeling her house who went off and sold a million copies of it over the Internet. Lacey and her husband immediately sued to stop the distribution."
"Did she win?"
"Depends on how you look at it. The judge ruled in her favor, but the tape has already been duplicated countless times all over the world. It's still available in streaming video on hundreds of adult websites, and frame-captures have been posted all over the Net. And you can get pirated CD-ROM, DVD, and video copies on just about any street corner," Steve said. "But she got a tremendous amount of free international publicity. She's come out of it looking like a sympathetic victim to some and a sex symbol to everybody else. As long as she's not truly mortified by the whole thing, it's a no-lose situation for her. Kind of makes you wonder if the tape was actually stolen."
"The tape must have made someone millions of dollars," Mark said. "Has anyone followed the money?"
"The gossip magazines tried but the website that sold the tapes is hidden behind a bunch of shadow companies and operates out of someplace in Eastern Europe."
"How is her marriage?"
"Judging by what we've seen today," Steve said, "not good."
They turned off busy Sunset Boulevard into Mandeville Canyon, driving under a canopy of old oaks and sycamores. On either side of the street, vast residential compounds were hidden behind imposing gates and tall, vine-shrouded walls.
Steve drove deep into the canyon before turning off into a short driveway that faced a thick, polished wood gate. A security camera on the tall adobe wall, aimed down at them, affording whoever was watching a clear view of the driver.
Steve rolled down the window and leaned out to press the buzzer, then waited for someone to answer on the speaker. A moment later a woman's voice, raspy in a worldly, provocative kind of way, offered a suspicious and not the least bit welcoming hello.
"I'm Lt. Steve Sloan, LAPD." Steve held his badge out the window so the camera had a clear shot of it. "I need to speak to Lacey McClure."
"Regarding what?" the voice asked.
'That's between me and Ms. McClure."
"How do I know you're really a police officer?" the voice asked.
"Call 911, tell them a man identifying himself as Lt. Steve Sloan is outside your door," Steve said. "Have them call me and confirm my location."
Steve sat back in his seat and waited.
"She's cautious," Mark said.
"She's smart," Steve said. "Stalkers have become as clever as they are insane. They'll use just about any ruse to get past a star's gates."
A moment later, the LAPD dispatcher called on Steve's radio to confirm his location. He responded with Lacey McClure's address. He'd barely returned the microphone to its cradle on the dash when the gates yawned open like the doors of Oz.
What lay beyond the gates was decidedly less grandiose than the Emerald City, but no less impressive, at least as far as real estate value was concerned. The driveway curved through a lush garden and over a burbling stream to a rambling, low-lying ranch-style house bathed in the dappled light of overgrown eucalyptus and redwood trees. In the San Fernando Valley, the same house on the same acre would have cost under a million dollars. But here, nestled between Pacific Palisades and Brentwood, it was easily worth five times as much.
Mark emerged from the car and glanced over at the corral behind the house. There were no horses, but there was plenty of horsepower. A perfectly restored '64 Mustang was parked in the center of the corral beside a vintage '70s Chevy Nova and a bright yellow Hummer. The barn doors were ajar, just enough to reveal it had been converted into a gym and work-out room.
Steve was approaching the front door of the house when Lacey McClure stepped out to meet them. She had the easy, catlike gait of someone acutely aware of her own physicality. She wore a tight black tank top and loose-fitting, gray shorts, her hair slicked back and wet. It struck Mark as a calculatedly casual look designed to accent her muscular shoulders, slender neck, and long limbs. Her facial features were sharply defined, her gaze intense enough to boil water. The energy she exuded was palpable. On camera, Mark assumed it translated as simmering sexuality. But in person, it was like being in the presence of a lion ready to pounce on a zebra. Mark was glad he wasn't wearing stripes.
Steve started to badge her again, out of habit, but Lacey waved it away dismissively.
"I've seen it," she said in her distinctive, throaty voice. "They told me on the phone that you're a homicide detective."
"That's right," Steve said, stumbling over his words a bit.
He liked to think of himself as incapable of being starstruck, of being completely immune
to the powers of celebrity. But it wasn't being in the presence of someone famous that affected him, it was her beauty. She was even more striking in person than on-screen.
Lacey glanced at Mark who, having never seen her before, wondered if the camera diminished the intensity of her gaze or magnified it.
"Who's he?" she asked.
"I'm Dr. Mark Sloan," Mark said. "I'm his father and a consultant to the police."
She turned back to Steve, appraising him. "The news must be pretty bad if you thought you had to bring a doctor along. Is he here for you or me?"
"Maybe we should go inside," Steve said.
"You can tell me what you have to say right here," she said, almost defiantly.
People usually needed to sit after receiving the news he was about to deliver, to absorb the impact and gather their wits again. But if she wanted it now, he'd give it to her.
"Your husband was shot to death at your beach house this afternoon."
She blinked once, hard, but otherwise her gaze and her stance didn't waver. "Was Cleve alone?"
"No," Steve said.
"Was he with a woman?"
"Amy Butler, an actress. She was killed, too," Steve said. "Did you know her?"
"No, but I'm sure she was young and beautiful," she said in an offhand way, simply commenting on the obvious, without any bitterness creeping into her voice or expression.
Lacey glanced past them both to the stream, not that there was anything to see happening there. Mark figured she just needed a place to rest her gaze while she considered the news. She didn't appear to be trying to cope with what she'd heard; instead the expression on her face was more analytical and detached. There wasn't any hint he could see of any emotional distress or shock in her demeanor.
In his years as a doctor, Mark frequently had the sad task of delivering tragic news to people about their loved ones. He'd never seen a reaction quite like this.
"You don't seem very upset," Mark said.
Lacey looked at Mark as if acknowledging his presence for the first time. "Maybe I'm just a very good actress."
"I'm sure you are."
She kept her gaze fixed on him, a hint of amusement in her eyes. "Did you expect me to collapse when I heard the news? Is that why you're here?"
"I'm here because I discovered the bodies," Mark said. "I live a few doors down from your beach house."
"It's my husband's beach house now," Lacey said. "He's been living there for a while. It's not public knowledge, but we're separated. We were planning on getting a divorce in a few months."
"Why were you waiting?" Steve asked.
"Thrill Kill is coming out next week," she said. "We didn't want news of our marital problems to eclipse the promotion of the movie. The first weekend of release can make or break a film. We both agreed, for the good of the movie, that it was best to keep our separation a secret."
"What were your marital problems?" Steve asked.
"I don't see how that's relevant," she said.
Steve looked at her incredulously. "Your husband was murdered in bed with another woman and you don't see how your marriage is relevant?"
"You don't think that I killed him, do you?"
Steve shrugged. "Where were you this afternoon around four o'clock?"
"I'm in production on a new movie, Kill Storm. It involves a lot of night shooting. I didn't get home until late this morning. I've been here all afternoon, sleeping."
"Alone?"
"Yes, alone," Lacey said indignantly. "I didn't kill my husband or his lover, Detective. But I know who did."
CHAPTER FOUR
The interior of Lacey McClure's house was what LA designers like to call "upscale ranch," with plenty of rich leather furniture, dark wood beams and cabinets, and large, reddish-brown terracotta tiles on the floor.
Lacey sat in the center of a couch that could easily have accommodated a dozen people and sipped from a large bottle of Glacier Peaks mineral water.
Mark and Steve sat in two matching, sloped-back leather easy chairs inspired by Adirondack outdoor furniture. The Sloans faced Lacey across a huge, hand-hewn wooden coffee table with legs thicker than railroad ties and a surface area equivalent to a king-sized bed.
The setting made it clear to Mark that Lacey McClure was a woman who didn't welcome intimacy, who liked to put more than a little distance between herself and others. It made her detached reaction to her husband's brutal murder a bit easier for him to understand.
"Cleve owned a dry-cleaning business in New Jersey and was one of the investors in my first movie, Bloodbath Day Camp for Girls, a low-budget slasher pic," she said. "I was just one of the horny kids who got killed by the ax-murderer, but Cleve was sure I was going to be a star. The amazing thing was, he wasn't just trying to get me into bed. He really believed it."
"What does this have to do with who killed him?" Steve asked.
"I'm getting to that, Detective," she said with an edge to her voice. "Cleve fell in love with the movie business. After Bloodbath Day Camp he couldn't go back to dry cleaning. He took out a loan against his business to finance another film for me to star in. I played a sweet preschool teacher who's actually an ex-CIA assassin with amnesia. When her enemies find her, she rediscovers her forgotten skills and kicks some ass."
"Good Morning, Miss Killer," Steve said, for Mark's benefit.
Lacey allowed herself a tiny smile of pride. "The movie was a huge hit. After that, Cleve sold his business and convinced me we should move out here. He became my manager, my producer, and my husband."
"In that order?" Mark asked.
"Not in my mind, maybe in his," Lacey said. "I truly loved him. But he became more interested in me as a business than as a wife. He was away or on the phone all the time, lining up financing, meeting with distributors. The business, that was his mistress. So, like any wife, I got real interested in what was distracting him from me. I hired a private detective to follow him and an accountant to go over the books. And I didn't like what I found."
She nervously picked at the label on her water bottle, flicking the shreds onto the table. After a long moment, she looked up, her face tight with anger, which made Mark wonder whether she'd needed the time to get her feelings in check or to get into character for a performance.
"I discovered that Cleve was using my movies to launder money for the Mob," she said. 'They were the ones who loaned him the money to make Good Morning, Miss Killer. They were the ones who bought his dry-cleaning business so we'd have the cash to get started out here. On my next two films, they put up money for foreign distribution and, in addition to getting a percentage of the box-office gross, he paid them an up-front 'convenience fee' of $300,000 in cash for the opportunity to do business with them."
"You didn't know anything about the arrangement before?" Mark asked.
"Of course not. I concentrated my attention on staying in shape, learning my lines and hitting my marks. I left all the business to him," Lacey said. "When I found out what he was doing, I confronted him with it. He didn't deny a thing, said it was how business is done. It made me sick. So I walked out on him. Personally and professionally. I refused to do the next movie he'd set up. I'm doing Kill Storm for Pinnacle Studios, which is financing the whole thing themselves. Cleve is a producer on it in name only."
Steve sighed with impatience. "I don't see what this has to do with your husband and a young actress getting murdered in your beach house."
"A month ago, Cleve came to me. He was desperate. He said his friends in New Jersey were outraged. I had to do the movie and pay the convenience fee, or they'd make things very unpleasant for us. I told him that was his problem, not mine." She paused for a moment, picking at the last remnants of the label on her water bottle. "I guess he was right."
"You think the Mob killed your husband?" Steve asked.
"Isn't it obvious?" she said. "They were making a lot of money from my films. Now they aren't. Who else are they going to blame for that?"
"They co
uld blame you," Mark said.
Steve glanced at his dad and got up from his seat. "Excuse me for a moment, I need to make a call."
Lacey watched Steve go outside, then she turned to Mark. "Do you really think I could be in danger?"
"If your theory is true," Mark said, "I suppose it's possible. If you're worried about hit men coming after you, you might want to hire some bodyguards for a while."
"You say that as if you don't believe me."
"I'm not the one you have to convince," Mark said.
"I've got the accountant's report," she said. "It's all there."
"If you were really concerned about your films being used to launder money for organized crime, why didn't you go to the police or the FBI with your evidence?"
"I play an action hero on film, Dr. Sloan, I'm not one in real life. I have no desire to take on organized crime," Lacey said. "And I wasn't about to go public with the fact that all my movies were financed by the Mob. Can you imagine what that would do to my career?"
"I guess we'll find out soon enough," Mark said. "It's all going to come out now."
Her eyes widened and, for the first time since he'd met her, Mark saw some emotion in her eyes. It was fear.
Steve came back in, carrying a black bag. "Ms. McClure, I've just been granted a telephone warrant by the court to search this house. A copy of the warrant will be delivered to you in a few hours."
"Why?" Lacey McClure said, rising to her feet, her face reddening in anger. "I told you what happened."
"You gave us one explanation, and it was dandy." Steve set his bag on the coffee table, unzipped it, and took out a pair of rubber gloves, which he put on as he spoke. "The thing is, your husband was killed in bed with another woman. The most likely suspect is you."
"But we were separated," she said. "I don't care who he was sleeping with."
"I've only got your word that you were separated," Steve said, taking some damp, white swabs from a container in the bag.
"It was a secret," Lacey said. "I told you why."
"And even if it's true, it doesn't mean you weren't upset about him sleeping around," Steve said. "I'd like to see your hands."
