Death by Beauty

by Lord, Gabrielle

  ‘I’ll call him and explain,’ said Angie.

  Gemma called Kit and asked if they could come around.

  The three women sat down at the kitchen table and Gemma and Angie took Kit through everything they knew about the murdered women.

  ‘The young women who died or were attacked,’ Gemma said, ‘they’re all extremely beautiful. I mean outstandingly beautiful, not just the usual shiny youthful beautiful, but classic beauty beautiful. They could hold their own against any competition. And I saw a portrait of the sex worker, Brie. She’s another one – drop-dead gorgeous. Or was, when the portrait was done.’

  ‘He picks out the most beautiful women and destroys them,’ said Angie. ‘Beauty and the beast.’

  ‘Except there’s no redeeming transformation of the beast,’ said Kit. ‘This guy stays a beast.’

  Gemma thought of something and added, ‘I’m presuming it’s a him.’

  Angie nodded, slowly. ‘We need to keep the possibility open. What about a woman who’s really jealous of beautiful women?’

  Gemma shivered and said, ‘I suddenly thought of that phrase: “Cutting off her nose to spite her face.”’ She looked at her watch. ‘I’ll have to go soon. But Angie, the name Magda Simmonds. Does it mean anything to you?’

  ‘Yes. Sydney socialite, suicided. I read about her, and Sean Wright from our section was the one who did the job. Went to the house when the family found her. Why do you ask?’

  Sean Wright, Gemma thought, remembering ‘Mr Right’ from her serving days.

  ‘I’ve been asked to make inquiries – by her fiancé,’ she said. ‘He wants to know why she did it.’

  Angie sighed and turned to Kit. ‘What do you think about that, Kit?’

  Kit thought for a moment. ‘Sometimes there just aren’t any answers. That’s hard for people to accept. They think that if they can find out why it happened, it won’t hurt so much. It doesn’t work. Explanations don’t make it any easier.’

  ‘I’ve got a copy of her suicide note,’ said Gemma, ‘from when I visited her fiancé. She wrote that something terrible was happening; said that her fiancé could probably guess why she killed herself.’

  ‘Was he playing up?’ Angie asked.

  Gemma shrugged. ‘He could have been. He tried flirting with me. But that doesn’t fit with the rest of the note. Also, why kill the goose – if you’ll pardon the expression – who is about to provide you with a lot of golden eggs? Magda was a very wealthy woman.’

  ‘And the police are sure it was suicide?’ Kit asked.

  ‘As sure as anyone can be,’ Gemma replied. ‘No signs of violence.’

  ‘I could ask Ted for more details. He or one of his associates would have done the autopsy,’ said Angie.

  ‘She’d taken a huge overdose of Xanax,’ said Gemma. ‘No one knows where she got it. According to the evidence, she had a bath, got dressed in a gorgeous negligee, and then went to bed. The empty pill bottle was on her bedside table.’

  ‘The three dead women we are talking about sure didn’t suicide,’ said Angie, getting the conversation back on track. ‘Kit, I’m here for a bit of your profiling expertise.’

  ‘Why don’t you use one of those police psychologists?’ said Kit.

  ‘I prefer your insights, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Profiling’s lost a lot of its gloss over the last few years.’

  Angie nodded. ‘A lot of cops are very suspicious of profiling.’

  ‘They always were,’ Kit said.

  ‘But surely,’ Gemma said, ‘looking at the MO of a crime is helpful? This killer is telling us something in the way he operates. Kit, I remember you saying something, years ago, about how we reveal who we are in everything we do. That has to include killers, right?’

  ‘Speaking as a psychologist,’ said Kit, ‘my understanding of profiling is that it’s just another aspect of psychology. Of getting to know why and how somebody operates.’

  ‘Kit, I’m going to talk to the boss to see if we can bring you in as an investigative psychologist. I think he’ll like that phrase. Would you be willing to work for the police?’

  ‘As a consultant? Maybe,’ she answered. ‘I’ll think about it. What’s the pay like?’

  Angie grinned.

  CHAPTER 20

  Gemma and Angie pulled up outside the lush tropical entrance to Sapphire Springs Spa at about nine-thirty on Saturday morning. Angie had called the spa the previous afternoon to check that Dr Evans would be there on the weekend.

  Kit had offered to look after Rafi for the whole day. It would be the first time she and her nephew had spent more than a couple of hours together and she was nervous and excited when Gemma dropped him off.

  As Angie parked the car, Gemma rang Mischa but the call went straight to voicemail and she left a message, asking her to call.

  ‘Okay,’ said Angie as she slammed the car door. ‘We want to get a handle on what happened to Janet Chancy while she was here and what’s happened to her notebook.’

  They walked past the spikes of hanging orchids in their huge baskets on either side of the entrance, and the receptionist looked up as they approached.

  ‘Angie McDonald,’ said Angie, opening her warrant card over the desk. ‘I have an appointment with Dr Evans.’

  ‘I don’t think she is available just now. Please wait a moment and I’ll check.’

  The young woman made a call and after a brief conversation looked up at Angie. ‘She is currently over in the medical department, but she’s due back soon to see you. Please take a seat,’ she added, waving them towards the plush velvet lounges in a corner.

  Before they could sit down a commotion outside stopped them in their tracks. Gemma went to the door to get a better look. Dr Evans was running towards the foyer, her usually neat hair coming undone and her face contorted in anguish. Gemma ran outside, followed by Angie.

  ‘What is it?’ Gemma cried. ‘What’s happened?’

  Beyond Dr Evans’ running figure, Gemma noticed a heavy-set man approaching from the direction of the medical buildings, but he appeared to think better of this, and paused, then turned, hurrying back the way he’d come.

  As soon as Dr Evans saw the two women, she stopped running, smoothed her hair back and attempted a smile. ‘Oh dear,’ she said, ‘you’ve caught me at an awkward moment.’

  ‘Is everything okay?’ Gemma asked.

  ‘I’m perfectly all right,’ said Dr Evans, stepping briskly towards her office, straightening her suit, attempting another smile. ‘Sometimes the staff can be difficult.’

  Gemma and Angie looked at each other and followed her. This was not about difficult staff, thought Gemma. Something truly distressing must have happened.

  ‘You’re shaking,’ said Gemma. ‘What is it?’

  Reaching her office, Dr Evans seemed to morph into the cool, controlled administrator who’d greeted them on their first visit.

  ‘I’m fine. Just overworked.’ She managed to flash a tight smile. ‘In a matter of days we’re hosting the international cosmetic surgery conference. Our special guest is this year’s Miss Cosmetic Surgery Europe, Galenka Abramova. I’m catering for three hundred people. It’s been a nightmare getting it all organised – finding suitable accommodation in the area.’ Her complaining stopped and she changed tack. ‘Now, what can I do for you?’

  Blowing her nose, she took her place as elegantly as she could at the tidy desk. Gemma noticed the huge poster advertising the upcoming conference on the wall behind Dr Evans. It featured the guest of honour in a strapless evening gown that was clearly held up by her cantilevered breasts, piles of glossy hair tumbling down over her bare shoulders, and a face with features that reminded Gemma of Taxi.

  ‘Maybe you haven’t heard yet,’ said Angie, perching on a cream-puff chair, her notebook on her lap, ‘but the journalist Janet Chancy, who as you know was staying here recently, was murdered not far from here, and within a very short time of leaving these premises.’

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sp; Gemma watched Dr Evans’ face intently, seeking any information from the director’s response to Angie’s words.

  ‘I did – I heard something about that,’ she said, her eyes darting from Gemma to Angie. ‘I was very – shocked.’

  That much was true, Gemma thought. And you still are. Despite her smart suit and desperate attempt to restore her composure, Dr Evans looked like someone who’d just been told she had three minutes left to live.

  ‘This was the place she was last seen alive,’ Angie said. ‘Our missing-person inquiry is now a murder investigation.’ She looked down, consulting her notes. ‘You told us that Ms Chancy left here around eleven and someone saw her car driving away. Is that correct?’

  ‘Yes.’ Dr Evans nodded, looking surprised. Had she been expecting to be questioned about something else? Gemma wondered.

  ‘She left Sapphire Springs,’ said Dr Evans, ‘and later I read that her body was found several kilometres away, at a well-known lookout.’

  Gemma decided to press the advantage of Dr Evans’ discomfort. ‘The notebook, Angie.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Angie. ‘Her notebook is missing. She was an old-fashioned journalist who liked to take shorthand notes during her interviews. Apparently she never went anywhere without it. Do you know anything about that?’

  Dr Evans blanched. ‘Nothing at all. I saw her making notes on occasions during her stay here. She must have mislaid it.’

  The desk phone rang and she grabbed it. ‘Yes?’ She listened for a minute and Gemma wished she could hear what was being said on the other end of the line. Despite the Botox, Dr Evans’ eyes showed deep distress. ‘I can’t talk now. I have the police with me.’

  The way she leaned on the word ‘police’ was definitely a warning for the caller, Gemma noted. What the hell was going on here?

  ‘Dr Evans,’ Angie announced, ‘I can come back with a search warrant and a squad of police, or I can just have a quiet look around now. Which would you prefer?’

  ‘A search warrant?’ Dr Evans’ stricken eyes darted from one face to the other. ‘You want to search Sapphire Springs?’

  ‘That’s the plan. So, how would you like to do it?’

  The woman’s face clearly showed that she would not like it to be done at all.

  ‘You leave me no choice,’ she said shortly, standing up. ‘Of course, I will need to accompany you.’

  ‘Not necessary,’ said Angie.

  ‘Quite necessary,’ said Dr Evans, trumping her and holding up her security pass. ‘You won’t get very far without this. Besides, each cabin has a unique security code. And we must protect our clients’ privacy.’

  ‘I’ll want to search every unit and every room,’ said Angie. ‘We could be here for a while.’

  It took over an hour to search the rooms in the main building. They opened drawers, looked behind cupboards, under beds, checking every nook and cranny where a stenographer’s pad might have been left.

  Then they walked outside into a light drizzle, following a few steps behind Dr Evans as she headed for the cabin they’d searched on their previous visit.

  ‘What about those other cabins?’ Angie asked Gemma quietly. ‘We’ve only got her word concerning where Janet stayed while she was here. She might have stayed in one of the other cabins.’

  ‘You want to see all the cabins?’ Dr Evans said, when Angie caught up with her and made her request. ‘But I showed you the one that Ms Chancy used.’

  ‘All of them, please,’ said Angie, firmly.

  They started with the nearest one, cabin number one, and Gemma watched carefully as Dr Evans punched in the security code under the door handle. ‘C’ and then three numbers Gemma noted, the first being one. Dr Evans’ finger moved too quickly for Gemma to be sure about the other numbers.

  She deliberately lagged a little behind the other two as they made their way across the lawn so she could activate the video camera in her phone to capture Dr Evans’ action as she typed in the security code.

  There was some awkwardness when a heavily bandaged woman in cabin three had to stand aside while Angie and Gemma did a thorough search.

  By the time they reached cabin five, Gemma was fairly certain that the security code was very simple – ‘C’, presumably standing for ‘cabin’ then the number of the cabin followed by two other numbers. She could check this on her camera later, frame by frame.

  Inside, Gemma noticed a squashed mosquito on the wall above the bed and a tiny smear of blood under it. A fresh kill, Gemma thought. The blood is still red.

  She dropped to the floor to check under the bed and spotted something, a small object that glinted in the narrow space.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Dr Evans.

  ‘I can’t tell yet,’ said Gemma, flattening herself out. She scrabbled on the floor, searching the small gap between the base of the bed and the carpet, feeling around until her fingers grabbed a small, sharp object. She climbed to her feet and opened her hand. It was a golden arrow; the brooch was now missing the sharp pin that fitted into the clasp.

  Gemma blinked.

  Two disparate worlds collided.

  What on earth was Mischa Bloomfield’s arrow brooch doing here?

  ‘Do you know anything about this?’ Angie asked, as Gemma focused on Dr Evans’ reaction. The woman’s face, already stressed and ravaged from whatever had upset her earlier, wavered, but within a nanosecond her expression hardened.

  ‘I’m sure there must be dozens of trinkets like this around. Now, is that everything you want to see?’

  ‘We’ll need to take this with us, Dr Evans,’ said Angie as Gemma dropped the brooch into a plastic bag that Angie held out for her.

  ‘I want to talk to one of the doctors on the medical team,’ said Gemma, thinking of Magda Simmonds and her mysterious suicide. ‘About the DiNAH therapy.’

  ‘That can be arranged,’ said Dr Evans coolly. ‘In fact, you’re in luck. Here comes Dr Egmont now.’

  The large man Gemma had seen before, now wearing the classic white medical coat, had come out of the medical supercentre and was striding across the lawn towards them while having an animated conversation on his mobile. When he looked up at them, Dr Evans waved him over.

  ‘Dr Egmont,’ she said as he reached them, ‘allow me to introduce Detective Sergeant Angie McDonald and her assistant, Gemma Lincoln. Ms Lincoln would like to have a word with you.’

  ‘Yes,’ nodded Dr Egmont, his shrewd eyes studying Gemma’s face from hairline to jawline. He reminded Gemma of a wrestler who’d been famous when she was a teenager, a hulk nicknamed ‘The Crusher’.

  ‘I could help you lose ten years, Miss Lincoln,’ said Dr Egmont. ‘Little bit of work around the eyes and the jawline. Maybe a little something just here? Have you looking twenty-nine again. What do you say?’ He smiled broadly, perfect white teeth in a wide face, thick hair smoothed back and just the barest trace of an accent.

  ‘I say no thank you,’ said Gemma, flashing a smile. ‘I’m not here to inquire about cosmetic surgery for myself but about your work with your patients using the DiNAH therapy. You are part of the team that developed it, I gather?’

  The broad smile faded. ‘Yes,’ he said, drawing out the word, indicating his reluctance. ‘But you are aware that it is at the patenting stage and I am not at liberty to speak about it, except in the most general way.’

  ‘Could you at least tell me if the therapy has been linked to any contraindications? Such as depression? Sudden onset depression?’

  ‘I can’t possibly answer that question. Until the therapy is patented and tested by the usual regulatory bodies, that kind of information simply isn’t available. Also, DiNAH therapy has only been used in a handful of cases. We are very much at the experimental stage, a dynamic state – DiNAH is constantly being modified, improved. The number is too small for any reliable statistics to be drawn from them.’

  ‘You’re using these women as guinea pigs?’ asked Angie.

  ‘Not at all!’ Dr E
gmont laughed, showing his gleaming teeth again. ‘These women pay for the treatment and with our medical team they are pioneers in the new frontier. This is how surgery progresses. The use of the client’s own DNA in the creation of new blood and nerve growth factors is in its infancy. We told the women about the new therapy, the superior growth factor, described its benefits, explained that it was still in early development, and they elected to avail themselves of it. It’s very much their choice. I thought all you feminists were in favour of women being able to make choices. Of course, as you can imagine, it’s not for everyone. For a start, it’s extremely expensive, but the results are astounding.’

  ‘Someone I know,’ said Gemma, ‘who was researching DiNAH therapy, said to me, “It’s not what people think” – what could she have meant by that?’

  Dr Egmont drew himself up. ‘That’s not possible,’ he said. ‘No information has been released. Where did this friend of yours get her information?’

  ‘Right here, actually,’ said Gemma.

  ‘Tell her she’s mistaken.’

  ‘I can’t. She’s dead. She was murdered only a few days ago.’

  Dr Egmont swallowed. He glanced at his watch. ‘I’m afraid, ladies, you will have to excuse me. I have an urgent appointment to keep. Very nice to meet you.’

  He hurried towards the reception area and disappeared inside.

  ‘I must also get back to work,’ said Dr Evans. ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t help you find the notebook, but of course my staff will call you if it turns up.’

  After finding the brooch Gemma was keen to find Mischa. ‘Thank you, Dr Evans. You have been very helpful.’

  Angie was surprised at this but knew that Gemma must have had something on her mind if she was ready to wrap up the interview while they were still looking for the notebook.

  ‘Dr Evans,’ Angie said, ‘our investigations into Ms Chancy’s death have only just begun. We will speak to you again soon.’

  Back in the car, Gemma turned to Angie. ‘I want to drive straight to Mischa’s place. That little golden arrow is part of Mischa’s brooch, I know it. She was wearing it when she came to my place with you. I don’t like this at all.’