Sweet Little Lies

by Bianca Sloane

  PROMINENT CHICAGO ATTORNEY MURDERED

  Wife sought for questioning

  CHICAGO—Attorney Mark Monroe, 33, was found dead in his Gold Coast condominium Saturday night of an apparent stab wound. Police are looking for Monroe’s wife, former supermodel, Kelly Ross, who was last seen leaving their home Saturday morning. Police have not given a possible motive for the killing.

  Roy skimmed the rest of the article. It went over Mark’s background, his career, and a little about Kelly. Roy leaned back, stunned. His brother. Dead. Why hadn’t he gotten a phone call?

  Granted, he and Mark hadn’t been close for several years, but that was still his brother. He’d never even met his wife, although Roy remembered seeing her on TV and in magazines from when she was a model. Mark had been home one summer from college, and he and Roy had been at Mr. Jackson’s little corner store one day, goofing around. There was a picture of Kelly on the cover of some magazine, and Mark had let out a low whistle and picked it up, mesmerized. He said he’d like to get with her one day. Roy had laughed and said she didn’t want his scrawny ass. Mark had just smiled and said she hadn’t met him yet. Of course Mark always got what he wanted, so Roy was only a little surprised when, years later, his brother had told him his prophecy had come true.

  Roy’s phone rang. He pushed back from the table and went to answer it. “Hello?”

  “Yes, is this Roy Monroe?”

  “Speaking.”

  “Mr. Monroe, this is Detective Didi Martin, Chicago PD. I am calling to—”

  Roy cut her off. “You’re about a day late and a dollar short. I already saw in the paper that my brother is dead.”

  Didi paused before she continued. “I’m sorry, Mr. Monroe. Given your brother’s high-profile status, it was hard to keep it out of the press before we could notify you.”

  Roy sighed. “Listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go off. It’s just that you don’t expect to read in the newspaper about your brother being killed.”

  “I understand, Mr. Monroe. I hate to ask you this, but as the next of kin, we need you to come down to Chicago to do a positive ID for our records and make arrangements for the body. We also need to ask you some questions.”

  Roy let out a heavy sigh. “Guess if his wife killed him, you can’t ask her to do it.”

  Didi was silent for a moment. “How soon can you come, Mr. Monroe?”

  Roy sighed again. “I’ll be there this afternoon.”

  He hung up the phone, sat down at the kitchen table, and cried.

  Stood Up…

  Sam Gordon was furiously tapping his Mont Blanc pen against his mahogany desk. Kelly Ross was standing him up. Mark Monroe’s death had led every newscast this morning and was splashed all over both of the city’s daily papers. Sam looked at his watch again. She was supposed to have been here an hour ago. Fuck her. He stood up, grabbed his briefcase, and turned out the lights.

  Let her drown.

  •

  Kelly hated these far-out suburbs.

  Everything looked the same, and there were no discernible landmarks, meaning you wound up going in circles. It was like being out in the country. Her GPS was broken, and as much as she hated to, she had to pull over at a gas station to ask for directions. Finally, she located the house and made the block once before she parked a few houses away and turned off the car.

  Like all the homes in Olympia Fields, the house was beautiful. It was two stories, with a carefully manicured lawn and a gold Lexus parked out front. She was still in shock. How could Mark have gotten away with all this without her noticing any of it? Was he just that good at covering his tracks?

  Or was she just that stupid?

  She was debating. Should she knock on the door and confront Geneva Monroe, or should she just wait? Wait for what? She wasn’t sure.

  She sighed, tired and realized she was hungry for the first time since this nightmare began. On the way back to the city, she’d stop somewhere. She thought about Sam Gordon waiting in his office to talk to her. Well…he’d just have to wait a little bit longer. She sighed again and looked back in the direction of the house. Just then, the door opened, and a young boy came out, followed by a woman.

  It was them.

  Mark’s family.

  Even from a distance, Kelly could tell the little boy was Mark’s son. He had his sloping nose and high cheekbones and even walked like Mark. Kelly felt her heart ram against her chest. She was captivated by him; he was simply precious. Any resentment she might have felt toward him melted in that instant. She pegged him to be about nine or ten. His Bulls cap was turned backwards, and he wore baggy jeans, a Bulls jersey, and a pair of black Nike’s.

  Could have been any ordinary kid.

  Except he was Mark’s kid.

  The woman who had followed him outside was yelling at him about something. Kelly turned her attention to the woman.

  “Oh, hell no,” Kelly groaned to herself as she drank in the appearance of Geneva Monroe and realized everything she’d suspected about her was true and then some.

  For starters, she must have weighed close to three hundred pounds and had attitude written all over her. She had one hand on her hip, and the other was waving around her head like she was skywriting. She pointed one long purple acrylic claw in the direction of her son, who was pulling a garden hose from around the side of the house. Her complexion the color of a dull penny, Geneva wore a short black skirt that hugged her tree trunk legs and a snug red tank top that strained against her numerous rolls of fat. Even from the distance, Kelly could see her nails had all kinds of designs airbrushed on them. She wore a crimped hairpiece that was some kind of yellow color Kelly guessed was supposed to match the brittle and brassy golden color of her real hair.

  Kelly felt sick. This was who Mark had been carrying on with? Had married? She just…she was…nasty. She was just a nasty-looking, foul-ass ‘hood rat who Kelly couldn’t understand for the life of her…How on earth did Mark get tangled up with this woman? Geneva didn’t fit who she knew Mark to be. Kelly stopped herself. What had she been saying earlier about double lives? But still…this was nuts. Absolutely nuts.

  The little boy was ignoring his mother and had gone about the task of watering the lawn. As she watched the little boy concentrate so intently on his duty while his mother continued to wail like a banshee, Kelly felt herself well up again. She and Mark would never have children. She would never have his babies. She had wanted at least two, preferably two girls, just like she and her sister. It would never happen.

  Finally, Kelly couldn’t take it anymore. She had to get out of there. She started up her car and pulled away. As she drove by the house, she tried to slouch down so they wouldn’t see her. Once she was past the house, she looked in her rearview mirror and saw that Geneva was still very much engrossed in yelling at her son. She continued to drive aimlessly, unsure of what to do next. She was just stunned. Now that she’d seen her and the boy…damn.

  She pulled off to the side of the residential road she’d been traveling and put her head down in her hands. All she could see was Mark and that woman. Kissing each other, him telling her how sexy she was. Kelly pounded the wheel in frustration before she gripped it. She felt like throwing up again and had to open the car door quickly to do so on the side of the road. As she wiped her mouth, she thought she might cry but was amazed to discover she just didn’t feel like it.

  Maybe she was all cried out.

  Mark’s phone jangled from inside her purse, which was on the seat next to her. She held her breath, afraid to answer it, before reaching over to see who it was. She was relieved to see Shelia’s number. She closed her eyes and swallowed as she held the phone to her ear.

  “Shelia.”

  “Kelly? Where are you? No, don’t tell me. At least tell me you called Sam Gordon.”

  “Shelia,” she repeated again, feeling dark laughter about to overtake her. “He was married. Mark was married.”

  “What?”

  “Marri
ed. He wasn’t just having an affair, he was married.”

  “You’re kidding,” Shelia whispered.

  “And Shelia,” Kelly paused, struggling with what to say. “They have a son together.”

  “Are you sure? Like one hundred percent sure?”

  “Oh yeah. I saw him—them. He looks just like Mark; there is no question who he belongs to. His name is Mark Monroe, Jr. Precious little thing too.” Kelly sniffed and swallowed, the gritty taste of vomit still lingering on her tongue. “I don’t think he takes after his mother.”

  “Wait. You saw them?”

  “I had to, Shelia. I just…I just had to know.”

  “Please tell me you talked to Sam Gordon.”

  Kelly let out an exasperated laugh. “I called him. Was supposed to meet him at his office. Then she called…Mark…and I just…I had to know…” She let her voice trail off.

  “Kelly, the police were here. They wanted to know if I knew where you were.”

  “Shelia, I’m going to jail for the rest of my life. Not only was my husband cheating on me, he was married to this woman, and with a child on top of all that. Who the hell is going to believe that I killed him on accident?” Her voice broke as she struggled to maintain control.

  “Sweetie, calm down. We’ll figure a way out of this.”

  “How could he do this to me? I thought he loved me. He…said he loved me…” Kelly’s voice cracked as the tears she thought were gone surged once more.

  Shelia was quiet for a moment. “I don’t know.”

  Kelly sighed, feeling tired. “Look, I have to go. Figure out what I’m gonna do.”

  “Call Sam. Please. Turn yourself in.”

  She was silent. “Bye, Shelia.”

  She hung up the phone before her girlfriend could say anything else. She didn’t know what to do so she just drove, unable to shake the image of the happy little family out of her head.

  The Hunt Continues…

  Hanson had been staring at a picture of Mark and Kelly Monroe for at least a half hour. There was no denying they were a good-looking couple. Everyone he had talked to all said the same thing: they were very much in love and very happy together…the perfect couple. Hanson still couldn’t figure out why Monroe was stepping out on his wife…well, he’d never figure out why men cheated. He’d married his high school sweetheart right after graduation, and he just fell more in love with her each day.

  Of course, he had a bigger problem than worrying about a husband cheating on his wife. They’d been staking out both airports, all the train and bus stations and had plastered Kelly Monroe’s picture all over the Internet. She hadn’t used a credit card, not even an ATM.

  She’d vanished.

  Hanson’s back teeth assumed their position against the gnarled cap of his pen as he shifted his attention to the stack of background material he’d collected on Kelly Ross Monroe, hoping it might provide some clues.

  Kelly Ross had grown up upper middle-class in Evanston, the eldest of two girls. Her sister, Stacy, was an interior designer in New York, and her mother had taught at Regina, while the father had been a big executive with Sara Lee. Apparently, that’s how Kelly had caught the modeling bug. At the age of twelve, she’d appeared in a print ad for the company and was hooked. She convinced her parents to let her try modeling around town, and they’d agreed as long as she kept her grades up. She did them one better by graduating high school at sixteen and the next day packed her bags and headed to New York to become a model. Her parents told her she had a year to make it in the business or she would have to go to college. Within six months, she’d landed the cover of Glamour magazine.

  She became one of the most sought-after models in the industry, gracing the covers of every major fashion magazine and prancing down runways from New York to Paris. She had entered that prestigious club of “no last name needed,” becoming an institution in the industry. Aside from being a favorite of top designers and magazines, she was a spokesmodel queen, signing lucrative deals for everything from perfume to shoes, even grabbing the brass ring of modeling and signing a contract with Bella Cosmetics, becoming its first black spokesmodel in the process.

  She was most famous for “the bikini,” as it had come to be known. She’d signed a deal with renowned jeweler, Melina, to promote its hundredth anniversary. After a month of breathless billboards and print ads featuring only Kelly’s face and a date asking the question, “What will she be wearing?,” she flew over New York City suspended in a Plexiglas cage dangling from a helicopter, clad in four-inch stilettos and a bikini made entirely of diamonds. She was dropped off in the middle of a huge birthday bash in Times Square to a flurry of photographers and onlookers. Melina had gotten more publicity than it had dreamed of, and Kelly, at the tender age of nineteen, went into the stratosphere. Further adding to her cachet, she’d seriously dated international movie star Patric Pierre for four years, becoming a tabloid regular and favorite target on the paparazzi’s most-hunted list.

  At the age of twenty-four, Kelly got off the runway, saying she wanted to step down before she got kicked off. She continued her spokesmodel gigs and did a few magazine covers but had decided to start her own cosmetics company and turned her attention to that endeavor. She moved back to Chicago and, at the age of twenty-eight, started Runway. With its focus on women of color, it wasn’t long before it was one of the most successful cosmetics companies in the country.

  Almost four years ago, she met Mark Monroe, and nine months later, they were married in a lavish ceremony at The Drake. They were superstars in Chicago, particularly given Kelly’s past, moving in that very special crowd that lent the city that very special air of sophistication.

  Hanson turned his attention to the stack he’d collected on Mark, and it was fair to say his background was altogether different.

  “Hardscrabble” was probably the best way to describe his childhood. He was also the oldest of two children, born to a housewife and factory worker in East St. Louis. His younger brother, Roy, was now a machine operator in Indianapolis. The father had died of a heart attack when Mark was thirteen, and young Monroe found himself as the man of the house. Despite the hardships, his mother had insisted he stay in school, and he was an excellent student. He earned a full scholarship to Champaign-Urbana, pre-law, and went to Tulane for his law degree. He joined a small firm in New Orleans, and it wasn’t long before Bell, Banks, and Crawford took notice and offered him a position with its Chicago office. He soon became a major fixture on the Chicago scene, landing high-profile athletes as clients and cutting them lucrative deals.

  He’d been known as quite the man about town—well, playboy really—but from all reports was down for the count when he met Kelly Ross. They were extremely wealthy, although the lion’s share of the money belonged to her. They had homes in New York and London and appeared to take lavish vacations. In short, just like everyone had said, they seemed to be the dream couple.

  Hanson leaned back against his chair and turned his attention to the whiteboard behind his desk where he’d reconstructed the timeline of the crime. He had the security tapes from her condo building pulled, and they corresponded to everything witnesses had told him. Kelly Ross had glided through the lobby of her building for her nail appointment at approximately nine-fifteen Saturday morning. She met Shelia Stevens for lunch around eleven-thirty and stayed until around one. Mrs. Stevens said they’d left each other around three after shopping, and she came sauntering back in around three-fifteen. He saw her pacing the service elevator, running for her car in the garage and peeling out towards…who knew where.

  His conversation with the doorman on duty that day had been a wash. Turned out he was just the relief guy and didn’t know Kelly, although he admitted he’d taken more than a few smoke breaks since it had been a slow day, so he said it was possible Kelly and whoever the other woman was could have come and gone and he wouldn’t have known. Hanson studied the tapes looking for the other woman and was waiting for the building manager
to get back to him with a look-see, since the relief guy had no clue.

  Now, Mark Monroe…where’d he been yesterday? The security tapes showed him getting in his car around eleven and coming back around five. He was an attorney, they worked damn near twenty-four hours a day, so he’d probably been at the office. He’d need to double-check that. So between three-fifteen when Kelly got home and five, when Mark arrived, she had discovered her husband’s affair, packed up his suitcases, and found time to pour a glass of wine. Then they argued, and she stabbed him and fled a short time later.

  Hanson continued to stare unseeing at the whiteboard when he heard his partner, Didi, come up behind him.

  “Roy Monroe said he’ll be down later today to do the ID. Meanwhile, Kelly Ross was spotted at the Sunshine Inn in River North last night.”

  Hanson snapped out of his reverie and popped up out of his chair. “You drive.”

  The pair crossed out of the station quickly and got into the Ford Taurus sedan parked in the garage.

  “So, what do you think?” Didi asked.

  Hanson shook his head as he looked out of the car window. “Wouldn’t be the first time a husband stepped out on his fox of a wife. What’s funny though is that no one has anything bad to say about him. Like, you mention the possibility of him cheating and people just laugh. I mean he had this reputation before they got married, so it would make sense. But every single solitary person says he was nuts about his wife.” He paused and turned to Didi. “I mean usually, someone knows something, right?”

  Didi chomped on her gum. “I gave up trying to figure out why men cheat after my ex’s fifth affair. Sometimes, I think they’d do it in the mud.” She smiled at him. “Present company excluded.”

  Hanson rolled his eyes. “We need to find out who this woman is. There’s gotta be something there. You get a trace on Shelia Stevens?”