Neil McMahon - To The Bone

Finally, there were photographs – several of her face, both full on and in profile, others of her nude upper body, and a few close-ups of her breasts. Another set of images, computer-generated, appeared to be the projected results. These showed the breasts enlarged, shapely, prominent. They also showed a modified face, with nose and cheekbones sculpted into graceful lines – eliminating the hint of coarseness Monks had noticed.

It seemed that the planned makeover on Eden Hale had only started.

He looked again at the discharge form, under method of payment. It was checked CASH.

Monks stacked the sheets and put them back into the folder. There was no suggestion of anything other than that Eden had left here healthy. He hadn't really expected there to be. Any possibility that the records had been altered was extremely unlikely.

He walked back to the desk and gave Gwen the file.

"I'm sure you get told this a lot," he said. "I've seen your face many times. TV, magazines."

She raised a hand and pointed, with a voila gesture, at the room's photo display of nudes.

"Yes?" she said, with just a hint of a smile now – a model advertising something intimate. "It seems like you've gotten a pretty good look at the rest of me, too."

"I'm an admirer of beauty," Monks said.

Her expression changed subtly, with a flicker of pleasure passing across her eyes before they lowered. It was a shameless thing to say, Monks knew. But, even calculated, it gave him a pleasant shot of electricity.

He'd spent a fair amount of time last night, during those sleepless hours, remembering his clear sense that Julia D' Anton had known Eden Hale, and that Gwen had wanted to hide it.

He did not want to confront her. It was probably nothing, and he would probably never see her again. But just in case there turned out to be some little scratch on D'Anton's Teflon surface after all, Monks wanted to keep Gwen Bricknell friendly, willing to talk.

"I'm glad we were able to help you, Dr. Monks," she said, her gaze returning to meet his own. "If there's anything more I can do, let me know."

Monks drove to North Beach, following Stover Larrabee's directions to a meeting place. Today, that place was a beat-up blue van with on the spot plumbing lettered on the side, parked on Stockton, a couple of blocks north of Columbus. Several lengths of copper and PVC pipes were strapped to the rack on the van's top. The back was filled with scarred toolboxes and bins of fittings. A couple of pairs of greasy Carhartt overalls hung from hooks.

That was all cover. The van was also outfitted with camcorders, telephoto equipment, a parabolic microphone, bugs and sweepers, and a full set of lock picks.

Larrabee was hunched forward with his forearms over the steering wheel when Monks got in. He had a pair of Leica binoculars in his lap. A small TV set with the sound off was playing the Today show. A couple of crossword puzzle books and paperbacks lay on the floor, along with a thermos of coffee and a trucker's jug to urinate into. The van was positioned to give a good view downhill.

'Tucking surveillance," Larrabee said. "Every time I take one on, I swear, never again."

It was only midmorning, but the streets were already happening, with crowds cruising the cafes and souvenir stores. With the warm weather, there was much flesh on display. Obvious tourists tended toward shorts and tank tops or T-shirts of the I'm with Stupid variety. Local skin was likely to be pierced or tattooed, and topped by hair of colors not found in nature. It occurred to Monks that this was an alternative plastic surgery, for those on tight budgets or who wanted to make a more radical statement.

"What's the venue?" Monks said.

"This guy comes to me. Ernesto, he's Panamanian, a little hotheaded. He's got some bucks, and a good-looking wife. But he goes to a business convention, and meets another babe he decides is the love of his life. Comes back home and tells his wife he's leaving her. This all happens within a week, now.

"So needless to say, his wife, she's Latina, too, she goes ballistic, and she goes out and picks up a musician, a guy who lives down there" – Larrabee pointed at a row of apartment buildings downhill – "and fucks him. He's ten years younger than her, but it seems to actually take – it's been going on a couple months now.

"Meantime, the husband starts to realize that maybe the new babe isn't it after all. He decides he wants his wife back, but she tells him to piss up a rope. On top of that, he figures he's going to lose his ass in the divorce. So he hires me to follow her and photograph her with her guy. That way, he can claim she's the one who broke up the marriage."

"He can?"

"If he can get divorced in Panama, which is what he's planning, maybe," Larrabee said. "I don't particularly care. He's paying me a thousand bucks a day plus expenses. But sometimes, I get involved in this kind of idiot shit, I think of a lot of other ways I could have made a living." Larrabee shook his head, face wry. "So? What's going on with you?"

Monks brought him up to date. When he finished, Larrabee turned off the TV. He put the binoculars to his eyes and focused on the building where Ernesto hoped to catch his wife and her paramour in flagrante delicto.

"Has it crossed your mind that this might not have been an accident?" Larrabee asked.

Monks blinked. "You mean murder? No. Not really."

"I'm just putting together what you've told me," Larrabee said, still scanning through the glasses. "She was a healthy young woman; she shouldn't have died. The DIC thing is very mysterious. Dr. Kasmarek thinks it could have been caused by a toxic substance, but it would have to be an unusual one – like, somebody deliberately chose it so it wouldn't be identified. She was alone the last several hours, and dopey, so it would have been easy to slip it to her."

He lowered the binoculars again and slouched back in his seat.

"And it sounds like those women at the clinic know more than they're telling," he said.

"It's still a long way from there to murder."

"This girl was not exactly Suzy Creamcheese," Larrabee said. "Not criminal, but money trouble. I ran quickie background checks on her and Dreyer. Bad credit reports, and they ran out on their rent in a couple of places down in LA. I keep wondering where she was getting all that money. Paying cash for the city's most expensive plastic surgeon."

"You think she could have been blackmailing somebody?"

"All I think so far is that there's several things that are off," Larrabee said. "What do you say we go take a look around her apartment?"

"A look for what?"

"Just a look. I doubt we'll find anything. It's a place to start, is all."

"Her fiancé said there were no chemicals – nothing like that."

"You can't take that guy's word for anything. Remember, he was the last one with her."

"It doesn't make sense that he'd have wanted to hurt her," Monks said. "He talked about her like she was his bank account. He was outraged that he'd been ripped off."

"You never know. Could be he's smarter than you're giving him credit for, and that's what he wants everybody to think. Maybe she was cheating on him, or costing him money some way he couldn't get out from under."

"You're not figuring on breaking in, are you?" Monks said warily. He had helped Larrabee do so in the past, and it had scared the shit out of him.

Larrabee grinned. "Relax. Her boyfriend said the building had a super, right? For a doctor and a private investigator – I'm betting he'd open it up."

"What about the lady you're supposed to be surveilling?"

"I've already got several photos of her and this guy together on the street. I was hoping maybe they'd get frisky this morning and leave the shade up, but there's nothing happening in there." Larrabee shrugged. "Ernesto wants more, that's another thousand bucks."