Shit. Bundy.
Not the real Bundy, of course. The guy I’d once been paid to set up for rape.
Getting him to try and rape me hadn’t been hard.
Getting out of there with my life after I provoked him and before the cops could get there to catch him in the act, had proven a bit more difficult.
I watched Bundy-boy look at me. I saw his eyes flicker down the dress to the high heels.
Unfortunately, he had seen me in a lot of make-up before.
His eyes shifted to Jake. I saw him take my brother’s measurements, as well.
I couldn’t help thinking Bundy was probably trying to decide if Jake was Nik, the guy who’d thrown him across the alley and probably dislocated his shoulder that night.
Just when I was about to nudge Jake myself, a guy in an expensive-looking suit walked up to Bundy and slapped him in a friendly, we’re-all-rich-guys-here-together kind of homo-erotic way. Bundy’s colder, more sociopathic look faded.
Turning in a blink, he smiled at the man who had accosted him, giving him the appropriate yes-I’m-confident-I’m-one-of-you look in return, right before he motioned the guy in the direction of the nearest coffee bar.
He spared me a final, threat-laden glance before he finished walking away.
Swallowing, I pushed the elevator call button again.
I found myself wondering if I should have brought the Glock, after all. Then again, where the hell would I have put it? I’d sooner give a loaded gun to Jake as hand one to a toddler.
I entered the first set of doors that opened in front of us, clearing my throat to get Jake to follow. Of course, in doing so, I interrupted where he’d been posing for another group of professionals in tailored suits.
I saw him smile back at an appreciative look from a forty-something exec type, a woman with a seriously aerobicized body, one she probably tortured herself a few hours a day to achieve, including an hour at lunch in the building’s downstairs gym.
The same woman looked at Jake like he was a particularly delicious piece of candy that she’d like to roll around inside her mouth.
And yes, watching that little back and forth gave me an involuntary shudder.
When Jake joined me inside the elevator car, he was practically gloating.
“I’m amazed you haven’t hunted this ground to death already, Jake,” I muttered, mashing my finger down on the button for the sixtieth floor.
Jake only grinned, attempting a nonchalant shrug as he adjusted his shirt collar in the mirror at the back of the elevator car.
“New crop every year, sweetie,” he purred unapologetically.
Sighing, I pretended I hadn’t heard that, leaning my butt against the brass railing in the back of the car, grateful to give my feet a break in the outrageously high-heeled shoes.
“We might have a problem,” I told Jake. “Do you have your phone on you?”
He handed it to me without a word.
I dialed Gantry’s number.
When he picked up, I quickly gave him the story with my Ted Bundy, along with a description, which I knew he already had. By the time I handed the phone back to Jake, I felt like I’d at least have back-up if needed. Of course, I didn’t really think Mr. Stockbroker Nutjob would try to waylay me in broad daylight, especially since I had absolutely no intention of going anywhere near the underground parking lot, but it didn’t hurt to have someone know where I was, anyway. Someone besides Jake, that is.
“Nik wants to come,” Gantry said to me before he hung up.
“Tell him no,” I said, then hung up before Gantry could.
As Jake slipped his smart phone into the back pocket of his designer jeans, I took note of the concern in his eyes and waved it off. “Don’t worry. Gantry knows about this guy. I just wanted him to know I’d been ID’d.”
Jake nodded, but I could tell from his expression I hadn’t reassured him much.
I could tell this, because for once Jake looked like a real person. He didn’t wear any of his kitschy personas, but watched me for clues as to how worried he should be.
“Is that the guy who––” he began tentatively.
“Yeah,” I said, blowing a curl off my cheek where it tickled. “Total psycho. But it’s cool, Jake. Seriously. Gantry says he’ll put a guy on him.”
Jake nodded, but I got the impression I still hadn’t reassured him much.
Just then, the elevator car pinged.
I looked up to realize we’d already reached the sixtieth floor.
5
Models, Missing Girls & Nik’s “Issues”
My brother and I got a few more looks as we walked from the elevators to the correct suite on the north end of the building.
Most of those people seemed to assume we belonged, though. I’m sure they were all well aware which company occupied that half of the sixtieth floor.
In fact, I really had to give my brother some credit, in that one area, at least.
We reached the correct door, which had an entire wall of frosted glass with Culare’s Modeling School etched on the front in large, swirling text, and walked inside without so much as a single eyebrow raised in our direction.
Even so, we weren’t totally invisible.
Well, Jake wasn’t, at least.
Inside those faux art nouveau doors, where I figured we’d both be dismissed as just two more sets of living wallpaper, my brother got winks and warm smiles, even from the receptionist, who was significantly cooler to me.
Well, until I told her who I was.
Her eyes widened in seconds, right before she looked me over, a faintly disbelieving quirk poised on her lips. She seemed to think better of voicing it, however, and instead leaned over an old-fashioned intercom speaker, one that looked straight out of Charlie’s Angels.
She hit the button on the side and spoke in a hurried, but almost hushed voice.
“She’s here,” the brunette with the Blade Runner hairdo said. “She brought someone with her. Should I send them both in?”
The response was crisp, brief and to the point.
“Yes, Clarice. Thank you.”
That time, when the girl looked up, she beamed at me, winking at my outfit. It occurred to me she thought it was some kind of deep-cover P.I. disguise, which almost made me laugh, until it occurred to me that it sort-of was.
“Come with me,” she said, her voice still conspiratorial. “Do you want coffee? Tea? We have low-calorie organic fruit juice?”
I saw my brother’s eyes light up at the last, but I waved the woman off. “We’re fine, thanks. Can you tell me your boss’s name, though?”
The woman’s eyes widened more, right before she let out a surprised laugh.
“It’s all over the front of the suite,” she said then, relaxing as if she’d just realized I was a real-live human, not some P.I. from an old crime novel. “Ms. Culare. Constance Culare...but no one calls her Constance.”
She said that like there might be dire repercussions if someone tried it.
“Got it,” I muttered, smiling a little in return.
Just then, the receptionist, whose heels were even more ridiculous than mine, although she navigated them about ten times better than me, opened another frosted glass door. That one had more of the old school charm to it, being surrounded by what looked like walnut wood trim.
I really was starting to feel like I’d just walked into an old Mickey Spillane novel, only instead of the dame coming to me, I was the dangerous dame.
Which made Jake my, I don’t know...poodle, maybe?
We were ushered in with minimal fanfare, and directed to sit in two leather chairs that faced a giant antique-style desk that looked to be made of the same kind of wood as the door frames, as well as the frames around the wall-length windows behind that desk.
The decor kept with that art nouveau style, down to a chair in the corner that looked like a genuine antique, with leopard face arm rests and a back designed to look like the branches of a tree. Posters of fr
amed starlet-types, probably models represented by the agency only done in more of a Marilyn Monroe or Greta Garbo style, decorated the white walls behind a low, leather divan against the opposite wall.
No wonder I felt like I’d walked back in time.
“Ms. Reyes,” the woman behind the desk said, standing with a small smile on her perfectly painted lips. Like the receptionist, she looked straight out of a forties fashion magazine, down to the neat suit and the even more perfect bun pinning back most of her soft, auburn hair. She was older than I expected, too, but still young.
Maybe late thirties. Early forties at most.
It was hard to imagine her married to a hockey player.
“I am so pleased you could come...” she said.
Her voice was surprisingly warm.
I got up from the leather chair long enough to shake her hand, feeling a bit out of my element with her manners as I motioned less formally towards Jake.
“My brother, Jacob,” I said. “I asked him to come with me, as he has more familiarity with your industry.”
I had a feeling I sounded like what I was, a working-class kid trying to sound like something I wasn’t. Reddening slightly, I cleared my throat, speaking in more of my normal voice.
“My contact didn’t tell me much about what this job entailed,” I said.
The woman nodded, looking out the largest of her two windows at the view.
I watched her eyes rest on the reflected light making patterns over the water of the Sound, and realized you could see the Space Needle from here, too, and pretty much all the way to Queen Anne. The view was stunning, once I let myself see it. Even so, my eyes returned to Ms. Culare as she sank down into the high-backed leather chair.
“Yes, well,” she said. “I suppose I should just show you.”
She motioned to the receptionist still standing behind our chairs, and I jumped, craning my neck around to look up at her.
I’d sort of assumed she’d left the room already.
I watched as she went to a low, old-fashioned table that stood just inside the glass doors, and pulled open a drawer I would have thought to be decorative. Seconds later, she returned to me and handed me a gaudy-looking flyer, which looked even more jarring in the minimalist and highly expensive and tasteful surroundings.
Jake leaned over towards my chair to look at the flyer with me.
Across the top, it read, “CULARE AGENCY’S INTERNATIONAL ‘FIND THE NEXT SUPERMODEL’ CONTEST!” in big, neon letters.
It had pictures of girls all over the front.
Girls with coiffed hair and doe-like eyes. Girls wearing low cut blouses and jutting their chins, smiling stiffly and striking awkward poses. Girls wearing so much make-up they might have been playing dress-up with their mother’s cosmetics. Most of them looked in the neighborhood of fourteen, maybe fifteen-years-old. A few might have been as old as eighteen.
A few might have been even younger.
Puzzled, I turned it over, looking for some kind of logo or other identifying mark, but it didn’t have one. It had a date under the contest announcement that had already passed, along with an email address.
Honestly, I couldn’t imagine this woman ever producing a flyer like the one I held in my hand. Even just touching it would probably seem dirty to her.
“What is it?” I said finally. “You didn’t make this, right?”
The woman arced a perfectly painted eyebrow in my direction.
“No, Ms. Reyes,” she said. “I did not.”
“So who did?” I said.
Ms. Culare let out a sigh, steepling her long fingers together fluidly. “I don’t know for sure. But I recognize some of these girls...” She pointed at the flyer. “Many of them did come here for one of our open auditions. All of them were denied positions at the agency, however.”
I gave her another puzzled look. “So...is that significant?”
“Well, yes,” the woman said. “Someone is claiming they work for me. I am telling you that they do not.”
I felt my frown deepen, even as I glanced at Jake.
I already found a theory forming in the back of my head, however.
One I didn’t like very much.
I didn’t want to voice it aloud, though, not until I’d given this woman her say. Despite the fact that Ms. Culare was making me ask every single damned question, rather than just volunteering information like a lot of people would have, I could tell she was dying to tell her story. A near fury emanated off her as she sat there, despite her composed expression and the tautness of her neat frame.
“Do you have a theory about what this means, Ms. Culare?” I asked carefully.
“A theory?” That anger shone briefly in her brown eyes as she met my gaze, almost as if she knew that I’d already guessed where this was going. “Why would I have a theory?” she said angrily. “I don’t know anything about this! I only found out about this three days ago...” she said, emphasizing the last by sharpening her words. “Three days. That is all.”
“You called my associate, Javier Gantry,” I pointed out. “Or called someone who knew how to get in touch with him. Gantry called me. You must have some kind of theory. Or suspicion. Otherwise this is just a business grievance...one you could easily take to an attorney.” I quirked an eyebrow back at her. “Of whom I’m sure you have several on retainer. If not an entire firm.”
For the first time, Ms. Culare aimed her stare directly at me.
I saw the intelligence in that gaze, and realized she’d only now decided to acknowledge mine. After a brief pause, her shoulders seemed to relax, right before she nodded.
“I have a theory, yes,” she conceded.
“You think he’s using your name to pull girls?” I said. “Where from?”
Ms. Culare gave me another of those shrewd looks.
“Chinatown mostly,” she said after another pause. “But white girls, too. Non-immigrants, I mean. Mostly from the southern part of the city.”
I nodded, that harder knot growing somewhere in the area of my chest. Pushing it aside, I handed the flyer to Jake.
“Do you know where they stage the auditions?” I said.
Ms. Culare shook her head, but I saw her eyes clear that time, and didn’t doubt her answer.
“No,” she said. “I don’t. Like I said, this was only just recently brought to my attention.” She looked at me then, her eyes hard. “One of the parents came here. Looking for her daughter. A parent. Can you imagine?”
I couldn’t really, but I didn’t bother to say so.
“How long had it been since she’d seen her daughter?” I asked.
“Four days, she said,” Ms. Culare answered me, again staring out the window.
Sighing, I leaned back in the chair.
“You know whoever they are, they probably won’t use your name again, right?” I said. “I mean, that’s the kind of scam you can’t repeat, when it involves stealing kids.”
She gave me a cold look. “I am aware of that, Ms. Reyes.”
“So what do you want me to do, exactly?” I said. “These kinds of gigs are usually organized crime. A lot of the time, it’s foreign. Russian. Lithuanian. Whatever. I don’t exactly have the firepower to single-handedly end sex slavery...as much as I might want to.”
The woman flinched at the term, but again her eyes met mine.
After another pause, she opened a drawer in her desk, and pulled out an envelope.
I’d seen a fair number of envelopes that shape in my life from jobs like this, but not one quite as fat as the one Ms. Culare now tossed in my direction.
“I want you to find out who gave them the names,” she said crisply. “They work here, whoever they are. I don’t want someone like that working for me...ever again. I want them in jail, if possible. If you can’t do that, at least provide me proof of their involvement, and I’ll handle it in my own way.”
I was already shaking my head, though, leaning deeper into the chair.
“You must kno
w how difficult that would be,” I said. “As soon as they see me sniffing around, they’re going to bail...or put a hit on me. Or you,” I added meaningfully. “Did you miss the ‘organized crime’ part of what I said just now?”
The woman’s brown eyes didn’t waver.
“I’ll double it, if you find out where they took the girls,” she said. “A city. A country...I don’t care. Anything that might help the authorities find them. Anything that might help their parents find them. I know it’s unlikely you can keep the agency’s name out of it entirely at this point, but at least we can be shown to have tried to help. I won’t have my agency’s name and reputation hijacked for...”
Her poised expression wavered.
“...This,” she ended coldly.
I watched her, doubtful, but she was definitely getting to me.
More so because I could tell this was personal for her.
Hell, maybe it was for me, too.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll take the job.” I looked at the money she’d thrown at me, tempted, then pushed it back towards her, remembering Gantry’s warning about field work. “Give me a few days. I may have to change my mind, depending on what my initial digging turns up.”
But Ms. Culare shook her head, pushing the stack of bills right back towards me.
“No. Take it. We can discuss terms of termination, when and if that happens.”
I hesitated. Looking at the fatness of that envelope a second time, I considered arguing again, then shrugged. “Okay.”
Pulling the wad of cash towards me, which I definitely didn’t want to count, at least not in front of her, I barely managed to stuff it into the sparkly purple handbag Jake forced me to bring. I could see from Jake’s eyes that he would have been more than happy to hold the envelope for me, but if I was stupid enough to do that, I had no business accepting money from anyone.
“All right, Ms. Culare,” I said as I finished, my voice still somewhat doubtful. “You’ve got yourself a detective...for today, at least.”
Crash Morph: Gate Shifter Book Two Page 7