Death by Beauty

by Lord, Gabrielle

  What the hell was inside it? Too late, Gemma wished she’d seen more.

  ‘I didn’t! I didn’t have time to—’

  ‘Who are you? I’ve made some inquiries about Gerri Westlake and I keep running up against a brick wall. Gerri Westlake seems to have no friends. Gerri Westlake seems to have no credit rating, she doesn’t even have a bank account. I can’t find out where she lives.’

  Gemma tensed in anticipation. This guy’s been doing his research, she realised. I should have anticipated this.

  ‘I’m surprised you’ve gone to so much trouble. Why would you check me out like this? I feel quite frightened by such scrutiny.’ Maybe, she thought, picking a fight is the easiest way out of here. She wanted to get out of the confined space of his study but he was still blocking the doorway.

  ‘I think I should go,’ she said. ‘Your behaviour is unforgivable. Dinner should be indefinitely postponed.’

  ‘I want to see your ID. Give me your wallet.’

  Hell, the key to his office is still in it, she thought, as she answered, ‘You have no right to ask me this. Please stand aside and let me leave, Angelo.’

  ‘Not until I know who you are. You’re a cop, aren’t you? Some sneaky little undercover cop. I want to know why you’re investigating me. And why they’ve set the dogs on me.’

  Gemma spread her hands in appeal. ‘There is no need for this overreaction. Of course I’m not a cop. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I came here at your invitation, I strayed into your study and yes, I glanced at a few things and noticed a folder on your desk. And now you’re accusing me of all sorts of strange things, Angelo. I find your behaviour alarming. And I’d like to leave. Now.’

  He didn’t budge, his bulky body blocking her escape.

  ‘You’re a friend of my wife. She sent you here.’

  ‘You’ve got a wife?’

  ‘Give me your wallet.’

  ‘No. You lied to me. You’ve got a wife!’

  ‘Give me that wallet!’

  ‘No way! You have no right!’

  He took a step closer, roughly snatching the wallet out of her hand. ‘This isn’t about right, sweetheart. This is about doing what you’re told.’ The menace in his voice was unmistakable and his face was twisted into a snarl. This was the real Angelo Tolmacheff, Gemma thought. The man who was plotting the murder of his wife. The man who had some connection with a fleeing sex worker, a woman who’d had a narrow escape from murder herself … and the vampire.

  He stepped forward, leaving a narrow route to the foyer. Gemma did a quick situational calculation. Despite her boast to Mike, it had been some time since she’d practised any fancy moves. Looming closer, Tolmacheff hissed, ‘Who are you?’

  Gemma made a split-second decision. She hurled herself against him using her body weight and surprise to unbalance him. He yelled and stumbled, but quickly righted himself, almost knocking her off her feet, punching out with an arm that she ducked easily. She wrenched back her wallet from his other hand, then kneed him as hard as she could. She heard his harsh roar of pain and rage as he crashed to the floor.

  She was out the door and racing across the foyer to the front door before he had time to recover.

  Fear and adrenaline propelled her until she was back at her car, fumbling with the keys, jumping in and screeching away from the kerb.

  She checked in her rear-vision mirror to see that Tolmacheff was coming after her, hobbling like something out of a horror movie towards his car. She didn’t have time to be scared; she needed all her energy to lose him. She headed down to New South Head Road, skidding through a just-changing red light, then swung a hard left and raced away from the intersection. Another glance in the mirror showed her that Tolmacheff hadn’t made it through the intersection and was blocked by a car in front of his. She relaxed just a bit, swinging another sudden hard left just in case. After driving about a kilometre, she swung right and found herself heading for Charing Cross. She parked in a lane near a cafe, dashed inside and sat down to catch her breath. She ordered a cup of tea and called Mike.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked urgently at the sound of her voice.

  ‘I’ve blown it with Tolmacheff,’ she said. ‘At least Gerri Westlake has. He sprung me looking at something on his desk. He knows where his wife is staying. He’s obviously been investigating me while I was investigating him. If he finds out who I am, I’m in trouble.’

  She gave him a rundown on what she had found at Tolmacheff’s office, of her confrontation with him and her narrow escape from the house.

  ‘Gems. Come home. If you’d listened to me—’

  ‘Don’t start.’

  After a pause he asked, ‘So what connection do you think Tolmacheff has with these women from the brochure?’

  ‘Not sure yet. That’s what I’ve got to chase up. Angie’s looking into Perestroika Enterprises – could be a modelling agency? I’m wondering if maybe these women worked for him. But in what capacity. Maybe they’re all sex workers like Brie. At this stage, I’m only guessing.’

  ‘Gemma, please just come home. This is getting deadly serious. And I mean deadly.’

  ‘Mike, I’ll be home soon. Promise.’

  She heard his angry sigh from the other end of the line just before he hung up.

  CHAPTER 25

  As Gemma started her car to drive home, a call came through.

  ‘Ambrose Cobcroft, Gemma. Apologies for the time of my call, but I found something that might interest you. Could you drop by my place sometime?’

  Gemma looked at her watch. Her pulses were quietening. ‘How about now? I’m not too far away.’

  He hesitated for just a moment. ‘Fine,’ he said.

  She was soon in Cobcroft’s smart apartment. On the dining table were the remains of two half-eaten meals.

  ‘I hope I haven’t interrupted you,’ said Gemma, glancing at the dishes.

  ‘Not at all,’ he said. ‘I meant to have them cleared away before you arrived. My dinner guest left early.’

  As he swept past carrying the plates to the kitchen, Gemma picked up the faintest trace of perfume – ‘Songes’.

  ‘Let me guess,’ she said, with a smile. ‘Your dinner guest was Yvonne Creswell?’

  He stopped in his tracks as he emerged from the kitchen. ‘How on earth did you know?’ Then quickly covered his unguarded question. ‘You’re very good at your job.’

  ‘I’m pleased you think so.’

  ‘Drink?’ he offered, heading towards a tray of crystal decanters on the polished cedar sideboard.

  ‘Scotch-and-ice, thanks,’ she said, ‘with a dash of water. You mentioned on the phone you had something to show me?’

  He poured two drinks, vanished into the kitchen for ice and water, then reappeared and handed her one. ‘Cheers,’ he said, tinkling his glass against hers. ‘I’m sorry Yvonne had to leave. She mentioned you’d had a chat with her. She mentioned too, that you had shown her the suicide note.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Gemma. ‘Yvonne pretty much told me the same things that you did. That Magda had everything to live for – that she was on top of the world. That she called Yvonne, possibly drunk, to say—’

  ‘No, no. Not possibly drunk. Impossibly. Magda almost never drank prior to the cosmetic surgery, and afterwards not at all. It was completely verboten to anyone on the DiNAH therapy. There’s no way Magda would have been drunk.’

  ‘Magda’s speech was slurred, Yvonne said.’

  ‘Whatever was causing that wasn’t alcohol. No way. She must have already been affected by the drugs she’d taken to – to …’ He couldn’t finish the sentence.

  ‘What did you want to show me, Ambrose?’ asked Gemma finally, letting the silence hang between them while sipping her scotch.

  ‘These,’ he said, putting his glass down and going to the sideboard. ‘I found them in Magda’s bedside drawer. I almost threw them out while I was clearing out her things.’

  He passed Gemma a small glass pill bo
ttle containing several capsules. ‘It’s from Sapphire Springs Spa.’

  ‘I thought clients had to go back to the spa for the therapy,’ said Gemma, reading the handwritten label: ‘DiNAH Growth Factor. Take only under managed medical supervision. Must not be removed from premises at Sapphire Springs Spa.’

  ‘I was under the impression that DiNAH was always kept very tightly under wraps,’ she continued, ‘so that no one could discover what it was until the rights to produce it were finally secured.’

  ‘Magda clearly broke the rules,’ he said.

  Gemma turned the small bottle around in her hands, thinking that with a wedding to organise Magda might have decided that taking two days out of every week to go to Sapphire Springs was time she didn’t have. Somehow, she’d purloined her own supply.

  ‘I’d like to take this,’ she said. ‘I have a contact who can run a few tests on the capsules, separate the components and deliver a report on what’s in them.’

  ‘Maybe there’s some component that causes sudden mood swings or depression?’

  ‘My thoughts exactly,’ said Gemma. ‘And if that’s the case, no wonder the team that’s responsible for creating DiNAH don’t want anyone to know about it.’

  After taking possession of the small bottle and assuring Ambrose that she’d call him as soon as she found out more about the drugs, Gemma finally headed home.

  ‘I was really worried, Gemma,’ Mike said, when she walked in. ‘I thought you were coming home when we talked.’

  ‘Sorry,’ she said, almost tripping on Rafi’s wooden train as she went into the living room. The place looked a mess, she thought, with Mike’s work piled up on the dining table and Hugo’s gear strewn around the floor and the lounge. ‘I did a couple of things on the way. I have to try to get hold of Delphine Tolmacheff again, then I’ll fill you in.’

  Delphine’s mobile was still switched off, so Gemma poured herself a glass of water and a weak scotch-and-water and told Mike about her visit to Ambrose Cobcroft. ‘I’ll ask Lance at Paradigm to test the samples. I’m convinced there’s something in that therapy that’s very dangerous – so dangerous that they don’t want anybody to know about it. And that Janet was killed because she discovered what it was. DiNAH therapy costs over a million dollars. It’s a goldmine, and ridiculously secret. We’re incredibly lucky that somehow Magda Simmonds was able to smuggle some of the stuff out.’

  ‘You think that the medical team at Sapphire Springs is involved in some kind of criminal activity? A cover-up?’

  ‘I know it sounds a bit unbelievable. It’s such a well-known health resort. But think about it: it only takes one or two of the team to be capable of this sort of thing. The other staff might not have any idea what’s going on.’

  ‘Whatever happened to Hippocrates and “First, do no harm”?’

  ‘Millions of dollars, that’s what’s happened.’ Gemma swallowed the last of the scotch before continuing. ‘What I need to do is talk to someone who really knows about DiNAH—’ She picked up her phone and went straight to Google.

  Mike stood beside her and Gemma pointed to the screen. ‘Maxine Wentworth. She was one of the first, if not the first, to receive the DiNAH therapy three years ago. She’s a great-grandmother and look at her! You’d think she was thirty-five. She’s the one. I need to talk to her.’

  ‘So tell me again about what happened at Tolmacheff’s?’ Mike asked.

  ‘He caught me snooping. He was furious, but I got away.’

  ‘You make it sound very simple.’

  ‘That’s pretty much it,’ she said. ‘I told you I can take care of myself.’

  ‘So it was a waste of time,’ he said, ‘putting yourself at risk like that. Now he’ll really wonder who you are.’

  ‘He thinks I’m an undercover cop.’

  ‘You hope he does. It mightn’t take him too long to work through the list of female private detectives,’ he said. ‘We just don’t know what he’s capable of, Gemma.’ He looked at her, shook his head, then walked out.

  She called Wentworth Thoroughbred Breeders. A recorded message gave her several options and she left a message inquiring about contacting Maxine Wentworth.

  Wearily, she stood up and went into the bedroom to look in on Rafi, who was sound asleep, one fist clenched against his cheek, his other hand softly on top of his woolly bear. She checked the grille at the window – it remained locked as usual – and then she opened the gun safe, taking the Glock 27 out of its box and turning it over in her hands before replacing it, relocking the safe and gently kissing her son, then tiptoeing out of the room.

  Hugo hadn’t been there when she got home, and when she went to bed she lay awake worrying about him. This is crazy, she thought. Worrying about Hugo is not really my job; he has two parents who are supposed to be doing that – but are almost certainly not. Then her mind jumped to Mischa Bloomfield. Rafi’s contented grunts as he slept couldn’t distract her from the treadmill of thoughts running in her wakeful mind. She wondered where Mischa was now, and who the friend was who had picked her up so fortuitously. Gemma would lean on Angie to hurry along the search for the owner of that car.

  Mike came in an hour or so later, then around 2 am she heard Hugo fumbling at the front door and got up to let him in.

  ‘Hugo! Where the hell have you been?’

  ‘Sorry I’m so late,’ he whispered, tiptoeing in behind her. ‘I had dinner with Dad. And I sort of went to sleep on the couch. I didn’t want to be there in the morning when his girlfriend wakes up.’

  ‘Okay. Now go to bed.’

  ‘Night, Gemma.’

  ‘Sleep well, Hugo.’

  ‘You too.’

  But she couldn’t. Dark, foreboding dreams troubled her all night, and it was a relief to finally wake from a restless sleep to Rafi’s polyphonic conversation with himself in the dim dawn. She reached over to the remote on her bedside table and turned on the feed from the security camera. The front garden area around the window was dark and quiet. She switched it off.

  CHAPTER 26

  With Rafi crawling through the apartment, hauling himself up alongside one of the chairs around the dining table and staggering around it until he plopped back down on the floor, Gemma poured herself a coffee and joined Mike, who was already eating breakfast.

  He looked at her as she sat down. ‘We need to talk,’ he said.

  Hugo, at the sound of the voices, crawled out of his doona and quietly dragged it into the operatives’ office and closed the door. Now, the two of them sat opposite each other at the table, Gemma looking past Mike’s head to the blue sea, with its slight chop running away from the nor’-easter.

  ‘What about?’ she asked, bringing her attention back to Mike’s face.

  ‘The same problem. This apartment, Gemma. It’s too damn small. We need a bigger place to live. I’ve downsized a lot, but this place is still too crowded. I’ve got everything I own crammed into my office; I have to work on the dining table because the desks in the front office are piled with my things. I come back here and try to work in the living room and find Hugo’s stuff everywhere. I told you – I want to live with you and Rafi, but the way things are is just not working for me.’

  ‘Hang on,’ she said, frowning. ‘We haven’t got the money to move into a bigger place. When I bought this place, there was only me.’

  ‘But now,’ he said, ‘you’ve got a baby, a full-time man and an occasional juvenile delinquent living here.’

  Gemma knew he was right but couldn’t offer any solutions.

  ‘Hugo might have to go.’

  ‘But he’s only staying here for a few days,’ she said.

  ‘It’s been almost a week. And the holidays run for another week.’

  ‘Can you be patient just one more week?’

  ‘I’m getting sick of hearing myself say the same things over and over. You don’t listen, Gemma. You’re so taken up with everything else. Can’t you see we need more space? Rafi will be running around soon.
There’s just no room. Not to mention the dangerous cliff out there past the bushes.’

  ‘I can’t do anything about it right now,’ she said, getting up and gathering the breakfast dishes and carrying them to the sink.

  ‘And there’s another thing.’

  There would be, she thought.

  ‘We don’t make love anymore. I’m often out at night. And you’re tired – understandably,’ he added. ‘We don’t seem to have any time to ourselves.’

  He was right. She’d been so busy, so immersed in her son, in throwing herself back into work, that sex was the last thing on her mind. ‘Mike, I know. I thought I’d be easing back into work, instead of having an avalanche hit me. And then with everything …’

  ‘And I’m not at all happy about you taking on the Tolmacheff case. He’s a dangerous man. You shouldn’t be taking risks like this. You have a small son who needs you.’ He paused a moment, before continuing. ‘And I’d better say it, because it’s on my mind. I really don’t like your re-involvement with Steve Brannigan. I don’t think it’s wise.’

  Gemma sighed. ‘Mike, I know there’s a lot going on at the moment. But soon these cases will be wrapped, and I won’t take on any more for a while. Okay?’

  Mike shrugged. ‘What else can I say but “okay”?’ He stood up. ‘I’d better be going.’ But he didn’t. Instead, he turned and asked, ‘Gemma, do you love me?’

  ‘What sort of question is that?’ she asked, trying to make light of it.

  ‘The sort of question that requires an answer, not fobbing off.’ He looked at her with his steady grey eyes. ‘Do you?’

  ‘Of course I do,’ she said, flustered. ‘You’ve been so good to me and Rafi and—’

  Impatiently, he brushed her words aside. ‘You make me sound like some sort of benevolent fund.’ He paused but she didn’t respond.

  ‘I have to go.’

  He didn’t kiss her goodbye.

  Later in the morning, Gemma called Lance at Paradigm Laboratories. ‘Gemma Lincoln here, Lance. How are things?’