by Rob Thomas
“That’s not what I’m saying. Look, let’s sit down, okay?” She knelt on the dust-colored carpet.
Grace stood still, her breath shuddering, her fingers clenched in her hair. Then, after a moment, she sank down onto the mattress, covering her face with her hands.
“I’m sure you must be shocked,” she mumbled, her voice muffled. “Everyone expected this from Lizzie. From me, not so much.”
Lizzie Manning had been two years behind Veronica in high school, peroxide blonde and notorious. Lizzie hadn’t exactly passed the Purity Test. But Veronica hadn’t known her well enough to judge.
Grace pulled her hands away from her face, staring down at her knees.
“All I wanted was to earn my tuition.” Her voice was almost a whisper, directed at the carpet. “I’ve wanted to go to Hearst since I was fourteen years old. I saw their production of Saint Joan with my English class, and…I’d never seen anything like it before. I’d done a few children’s theater plays, but this was real. It was art, not just a chance for some coddled little divas to get in the spotlight and help Mommy and Daddy impress the local culturati. So when I got older and started looking around at schools, I was determined to go to Hearst. Not that it mattered which program I preferred. I couldn’t have afforded any of the ones I was looking at.”
Veronica nodded. “And I guess it’s not surprising your parents didn’t step up. Beckett probably didn’t strike them as a very effective witness for Christ.”
Grace laughed bitterly. “You saw what they were like when I was eight. After Meg died they got worse. Before that Mom had held out against some of the crazier shit Dad wanted to do. I mean, at least she wouldn’t let him withhold food or beat us bloody. But after, she was worse than Dad was in some ways. I guess she figured if they’d had more control over us she never would have lost Meg and Faith.
“I left the day I turned eighteen. I wasn’t even done with my senior year, but I moved out and slept in my best friend’s guest room for a few months. By that time I don’t think they’d have paid for college anyway. They were going on and on about how it was my duty to marry a good and godly man and start churning out a Quiverfull.”
“A Quiverfull?”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s a thing in ultra-Christian circles. You know: ‘Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them.’” She hugged her knees to her chest. “The point is, a woman’s job is not just to have kids but to bust ’em out like a popcorn machine. And you don’t need a degree for that.
“Anyway, I…I went ahead and applied to Hearst, even though I knew by then I couldn’t afford to go. I thought if I got in, I could figure out the money part later. Well, I got in. But I couldn’t get any financial aid, because they took one look at how much money my dad makes and determined I was ineligible. I wrote a bunch of letters trying to explain that I didn’t have a relationship with my parents anymore, but it didn’t do any good.”
“Okay,” Veronica said, her voice as neutral as she could keep it. “But, Grace. I don’t want to sound judgmental…”
“Why didn’t I take out loans, or get a job in the library?” Grace finished the obvious thought. “I want to be an actress, Veronica. A stage actress. A classical stage actress. When do you think I’ll be making enough to pay those loans back?” She shook her head. “I knew what I wanted, and I decided to do what I had to do in order to get it.”
Veronica nodded. That, at least, was something she understood.
“So, yeah. I started working. I did some research first—there are actually a ton of blogs out there written by call girls. I e-mailed a few for advice and spent the last of my money on a designer dress. I set up a website, and the responses started pouring in.” She grabbed a pillow from her mattress, fidgeting with the tassel. “It was easy as that. I earned enough for a whole semester in a month and a half. And the truth is, until that night, it wasn’t even that bad.” She shrugged lopsidedly. “Most of my clients were actually…not awful. I’m not trying to candy-coat it or anything, but it was so much better than living with my parents. It was better than marrying some Bible-pounding asshole and letting him run his hands all over me just because it was God’s will. I specialized in role-play, did a lot of ‘Girlfriend Experience.’ Which meant that a big part of my job was eating oysters and drinking wine.”
Veronica didn’t say anything. She just watched Grace, and waited.
“I’m telling you this so you’ll understand that there’s a big fucking difference between my job, and what happened to me that night.” Grace’s eyes flashed. “Because I didn’t ask for that to happen to me.”
“I never said you did,” Veronica said. “I didn’t come here to throw anything in your face. I came to get some answers. But you knew all along Miguel Ramirez didn’t rape you. So why did you accuse him?”
A pale pink flush rose across Grace’s nose. She took a deep breath.
“I was telling the truth when I told the cops I didn’t remember the attack. I didn’t. I still don’t. I remember walking into the stairwell, and then—nothing. I saw the laundry guy’s picture on the front page of that mug shot tabloid they leave at all the convenience stores. It said he’d been deported, that he’d been working at the Neptune Grand. So I thought: Well, this could be my chance to get enough money to finish school. They’re not going to send Navy SEALs into Mexico to bring him back. And once he’s been tipped off that he’s a felony suspect, he’s not coming back on his own.”
Grace, suddenly looking disconsolate, gestured around her barren little room. “God, you must think I’m total scum. But look, what you see here is all I’ve got left. I can’t work anymore. I mean, I can’t even go on a real date without having a panic attack. I sold my dresses, all the designer crap, all the jewelry. It’s mostly gone to medical bills. And tuition is due in three weeks.”
“So you accused an innocent man of rape?” Veronica tried to keep the edge out of her tone, but it was difficult.
“Like I said, he was already in Mexico. But if they did somehow manage to track him down for a swab he’d be exonerated by the DNA evidence. I could just say I’d been wrong, that I was confused.” Her voice had a pleading note to it. “All I wanted was the money. I didn’t want anyone to get in trouble.”
Veronica felt her temper rising again. She bit it back, fighting for control. “You obstructed the investigation. You sent the cops—and me—off on a wild-goose chase.”
A tear dropped loose from Grace’s eye, but she smeared it away, almost angrily. “So my attacker would be in jail now if I’d just told the truth? Yeah, right. You know what the cops do if you report a rape when you’ve been working? They lock you up for solicitation. They have a big laugh about it. Then they fine you and they send you home. I know other girls who’ve been through it, Veronica, and not a single one of them has gotten a conviction. There’s even an online forum where girls post about bad johns, to warn each other. Because they all know the cops won’t protect them.” She gave Veronica a hard look. “Tell me the truth: Did the cops seem ready to charge the guy you found with rape?”
Veronica didn’t answer right away. She thought about what Leo had told her—that the district attorney wouldn’t touch it, that his captain would rein him in. All because the victim was a prostitute. Would it have been different if Grace had told the truth from the start? Instinct—and the memory of Don Lamb laughing Veronica out of his office twelve years earlier—told her no.
“I don’t blame you for not trusting the cops. Especially not in Neptune. And I know you don’t exactly have good reason to trust me. But I really want to get this guy,” Veronica said. “And to do that, I need your help. I need to know details about your work, and what you remember from that night. But more than anything else, I need to know that what you’re telling me is true.”
Grace finally looked up. Her lip trembled,
but when she spoke her voice was steady.
“Yeah. Okay. I’ll help.”
Grace went into the bathroom to wash her face. Then she poured two glasses of water from a Brita—Veronica noted that it was the only thing in the fridge besides three single-serve tubs of yogurt. She handed a glass to Veronica and sat back down on the edge of the mattress.
“I don’t remember what time I got the call. It was kind of last-minute, I know that—sometime early Thursday night. We talked for about twenty minutes. He said his name was Dan.”
Veronica nodded. That matched Bellamy’s story. “What’d you talk about?”
“My rates, his preferences.”
“Preferences?”
“I did a lot of role-play,” Grace explained. “Sometimes it was just sort of banal. Naughty nurse, naughty schoolteacher, naughty maid. But some guys are really specific. You know, like, he’s the president and I’m a Russian spy trying to get the nuclear codes out of him. Or I’ve got hypothermia in the mountains of Nepal and he’s the strapping mountain guide who’ll do whatever it takes to warm me up and save me. I had a Princess Leia wig I used for two different clients. One wanted to be Han Solo. The other wanted to be Jabba the Hutt.”
Veronica closed her eyes for a moment. “Well, that’s an image I’ll never be free of.”
Grace shrugged. “You wanted details. Anyway, I always did a pre-appointment screening on the phone so I knew explicitly what the client was asking for beforehand. That way I could turn down anyone asking for something I didn’t do, without making it awkward for them or scary for me. This guy, Dan—or Mitch, I guess—he didn’t want anything that crazy. He just wanted me to be submissive. Didn’t want me to meet his eyes or talk above a whisper. But I’ve had a few guys ask for that, and none of them gave me any problems, so it didn’t set off an alarm bell.”
“Was rough sex ever part of the package?” Veronica asked.
Grace shook her head. “I had one regular customer who I let spank me. We had enough of a relationship that I knew I could trust him. But that was it. I didn’t do any BDSM stuff. If that’s what they asked for I’d refer them to a specialist.”
“So Bellamy didn’t ask for anything violent? No hitting, slapping, anything like that?”
“Not on the phone. He said he just wanted me to play meek and mild.”
Veronica shifted her weight on the carpet. “Okay. What do you remember about the session itself? Could you identify Bellamy if you saw him?”
Grace exhaled loudly. “I really don’t remember anything after the bar. I wasn’t lying about that. I remember going into the stairwell and starting down the stairs. And somewhere in there my memory just kind of…fades out. I must have at least gotten to the guy’s room, but I don’t remember it. I remember this, like, bodily sensation of being knocked down. And I remember something clenching around my throat. But they’re really disjointed memories—I don’t remember it as part of a chain of events.” She took a sip of water. Veronica could tell how hard she was fighting to remain steady and matter-of-fact. “Then there’s nothing else until I woke up in the hospital, three days later.”
Veronica nodded. It had been the same for Keith after his accident. He remembered talking to Jerry Sacks in the car outside his house, but he’d never been able to recall the crash itself, or the first days afterward. Brain trauma’s a bitch.
Grace continued. “I just kind of panicked when I woke up and realized the cops were asking questions.” She looked down. “If I hadn’t been injured so badly, I might not have even reported it. But I didn’t really get a choice in the matter; my body was a crime scene. The docs had the police in there before I even woke up. I knew they’d be looking at the surveillance footage, talking to the staff, and they’d know I was around the Grand all the time. All I could think to do was make out like I had some high-powered sugar daddy I wouldn’t name. I figured that’d sound better than telling them I was an escort.” She sighed and looked toward the single window. The yellow light in the parking lot flooded through the pane. “I’m sorry. For all of it. For lying. For not being able to remember more. I mean, I know it sounds strange. Who’d want to remember something like this? But I really, really wish I could. Because not knowing what happened is so much worse.”
Veronica hesitated for a moment. “I know. Trust me, I know.”
Grace’s pale blue eyes widened. For a moment neither of them spoke. Then Grace leaned forward and, surprisingly, grabbed Veronica’s hand.
“That’s the whole truth. I promise. And I’ll do anything I can to help you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Veronica went straight from Grace’s apartment to Mac’s building and pulled out her phone before starting up the stairs. It was almost eight. Logan would be home, maybe fixing dinner, or walking Pony. She jotted him a quick text.
Then she took the stairs two at a time up to Mac’s apartment. Mac opened the door before she even had a chance to knock.
“What happened?” Mac asked. “Did he confess?”
Veronica had called her on the way, saying only that she needed her help. Now she stepped into the apartment without preamble and asked, “How hard is it to retrieve a website once its admin has taken it down?”
Mac shut the door. “Well, most stuff on the Internet gets cached. It’s pretty easy to find. If you really want to make a website go away there are ways to do that, but most people don’t bother. It’s kind of a headache.”
Veronica threw her jacket on one end of the oversized sofa. The rugs and curtains had bright, geometric prints, and the air smelled like chai from the teashop downstairs.
“I need to find a webpage for someone named Chloé Huston.” She pulled her laptop from her bag and handed it to Mac. “It would have been taken down in late March or early April.”
“Sure,” Mac said, her brow furrowed. “What’s this all about?”
“Best to just show you, I think. And uh, be warned—there’s probably going to be some adult content on there.”
Mac blinked, but didn’t comment. She sat down on the sofa, opened the laptop, and started to type.
Working late with Mac always felt vaguely collegiate. They ordered pizza—half olive oil and eggplant for Mac, half cheese and pepperoni for Veronica. She hadn’t eaten since before San Diego, and was surprised at the surge of energy she got from righting her blood sugar. Before long she was pacing the living room, trying to determine what their next step should be, while Mac worked steadily at her computer.
It was an hour and a half before she found anything.
“Respect to the girl. She covered her tracks pretty well,” Mac said, exhaling loudly. “But I’ve got the site up if you want to take a look.”
Veronica sat next to her. On the screen, a black-and-white photo depicted a young woman sitting demurely on an outdoor terrace in a lace dress with a plunging neckline. Her face was turned away from the camera to gaze off over the city, but Veronica recognized Grace easily enough. There was a studied elegance in her posture.
Cursive script across the top of the page read Chloé Huston. Beneath that, in smaller font: Your fantasy come true.
“ ‘Welcome to my world, gentlemen. I’m ready to share it with you,’ ” Mac read out loud. “ ‘Refined, sophisticated…looking to share romance and adventure with generous, discerning men…enjoys intelligent conversation about art, music, philosophy, and spirituality’? ” She looked up at Veronica. “What are we looking at?”
“Grace Manning’s alter-ego,” she said. “Or, rather, her former alter-ego.”
“She’s a hooker?” Mac gasped.
Veronica took the laptop from Mac and kept reading.
I’m a cosmopolitan but approachable paramour who can provide a natural, satisfying girlfriend experience, whether we choose to go out or stay in. I also specialize in different kinds of role-play. I can make your dreams come to life. Contact me for details.
“Nope,” Veronica said. “She was a high-end escort. Trust me. The
re’s a difference.”
A gallery section had a collection of photos showing Grace, always looking away from the camera or with her honey-blonde hair obscuring her face, in a variety of provocative positions. Standing in front of a window in a corset and knee-high stockings; lounging chest-down on the deck of a sailboat wearing nothing but a bikini bottom. One showed her from the chin down, sprawled in a tangle of sheets.
The pictures were more pin-up than porn, and shot beautifully. But looking at them turned the pizza in her stomach into a leaden lump. Because you’ve seen the “after” pictures. Because you’ve seen her when someone took away all this care and control and turned her into a victim.
Veronica clicked on the section of the website marked “Donation” and scrolled through the pricing list. “Chloé Huston” charged $500 for an hour-long “interlude.” A two-hour “cocktail date” was $800; a four-hour dinner was $1,500. Other fees may apply. Mac’s eyes went suddenly wide. “So all that time we spent trying to find her ‘boyfriend’…”
Veronica put a hand on Mac’s arm. “I’m sorry, Mac. I guess Charles was one of her regulars.”
“Jesus,” Mac said. She took the laptop back from her and stared at the website. A mix of shock and disgust registered on her face as she scrolled through the information. “Oh, great. She likes fine dining and walks on the beach. I’m sure they have that in common.”
Veronica cleared her throat. “Mac, I hate to intrude on this reverie, but have you perchance checked out a vibrant little online salon called The Erotic Critique?
“The Erotic…?”
“Critique,” Veronica said, stressing the eek to help Mac with the spelling. “It’s like Yelp—but for lonely, horny fellas.”
When Mac gave her an incredulous stare, she shrugged. “Hey, hardboiled, remember? I’m on personal terms with the seedy underbelly.”
Mac typed The Erotic Critique into her search bar. The site launched, and a helpful intro explained the service. Customers could type in their parameters to find the perfect girl, or could simply browse through names, clicking on profiles to see descriptions and reviews. Veronica had once used it to try to help a client track down a prostitute who’d sold the GFE role a little too well.