Nevada Barr - Naked Came The Phoenix

Even the jaded Detective Toscana was mesmerized as he watched Lauren Sullivan sweep into the room in her flowing purple robe. She was astonishingly beautiful. Toscana was careful to pay attention to the details of the movie star's appearance. He knew that when he got home Mary Elizabeth would be pumping him for information on her favorite screen star.

"Yeah, babe. She was gorgeous."

"No, honey. She didn't have any makeup on, but she still looked great."

"I couldn't be sure, sweetie, but I think that hair color is her own."

Mary Elizabeth never missed a Lauren Sullivan film. As often as she could, his wife dragged him with her to the movies. Toscana would sigh and groan as if he was going along only to please his wife, but the truth of the matter was that he found Lauren Sullivan easy on the eye and enjoyed her acting. He and most of the men in America, he'd wager.

Now, in his makeshift squad room, the object of so many fantasies sat across the table from him. He watched Lauren as she glanced at the postmortem pictures of Claudia de Vries that were tacked onto the wall. She quickly averted her gaze, but not before Toscana saw her wince in repulsion.

"Do you mind if I smoke?" asked the detective routinely. Not waiting for her answer, he lit up.

Lauren sat quietly, waiting for the questioning to begin. Her graceful fingers played absentmindedly with a strand of hair that had fallen from the loose bun she had pinned to the top of her exquisite head.

"How is it that you came all the way to Virginia to Phoenix Spa, Miss Sullivan? I would think there are plenty of other spas you could have chosen that would have been more convenient for you."

Lauren shrugged. "I guess I could have gone to Canyon Ranch or Palm Springs. They are certainly closer to LA. But as you may have observed, Detective Toscana, I've just had some plastic surgery done, and I wanted to go someplace where I wouldn't be tripping over people I know from Hollywood. I wanted privacy and peace."

"Well, you certainly haven't gotten the latter here, have you?"

"No. Unfortunately, I haven't. And with those reporters prowling around outside, I'm afraid I might not get the former either."

Briefly, Toscana wondered what it must be like always to have people watching you. Not being able to take a walk in the park or run into the drugstore without someone gawking at you and telling friends that you bought a laxative. There was a price to fame. Suddenly, he was very grateful for his relative anonymity.

"Have you been to this spa before, Miss Sullivan?"

"Yes, sir. Several times."

"So you knew Mrs. de Vries?"

"Yes. I knew Claudia quite well." She had already decided that she might as well tell him. He would find out anyway. "Claudia is, ah, was , my aunt. She was my mother's sister."

The detective swiveled around to look at the pictures of the dead woman. In the lifeless face it was hard to see any resemblance at all to the beauty who sat before him.

"If you are looking for a family likeness, Detective, I'm afraid you won't find it. You see, my birth parents gave me up."

"Well, I'm sorry for your loss," said Toscana solicitously. "Have you told your mother about her sister's death?"

"No. That isn't necessary. My mother and father were killed in an automobile accident last year."

Toscana was a bit flustered and struck by sympathy for her.

"Would you like a cigarette, Miss Sullivan?" he offered clumsily.

Lauren smiled weakly. "As a matter of fact, I would. I try not to smoke. It ages the skin, you know. But I think a cigarette would be nice right now."

Toscana pulled a cigarette halfway out, held the pack across the table toward the actress, and flicked his lighter for her.

She held the cigarette between her beautiful, tapering fingers and inhaled.

The fingers. Toscana stared at her fingers. They were long and delicate and somehow expressive. And familiar.

He had seen other hands that looked like Lauren Sullivan's. He just couldn't quite remember whose.

But it would come to him.

Just feet from where Claudia de Vries's body had been found, Christopher Lund lay beside the crystal clear water in the pool house. He prayed that Claudia's death would be the end to his financial problems.

Christopher took his job as Ondine's manager very seriously. Ondine's income dictated his income. Booking the lucrative modeling assignments was only part of it. Christopher had to make sure Ondine was well rested, showed up on time, looked her best, and had the energy necessary to project whatever the client wanted her to project.

The magazine spreads and runway work at the fashion shows of the top designers paid very well indeed. So well that Christopher's fee, fifteen percent of Ondine's gross earnings, paid for his spacious loft in SoHo, a beach place in Amagansett, a trip or three to St. Maarten each winter to get away from the gray coldness of Manhattan, and a Range Rover and the four hundred dollars a month it cost to garage it in New York City. His recreational cocaine use had grown to an everyday thing, and that ate up his money as well.

He thoroughly enjoyed his lifestyle and all the trappings of success. He was young and ambitious. He wasn't about to be giving up a thing-in fact, he wanted more. He wasn't getting any younger, and it was time to be thinking about acquiring wealth, like some well-chosen art and stocks, not just spending conspicuously.

All of this took money. And Ondine was his cash cow.

He didn't fear her overexposure. The more magazine covers Ondine appeared on, the more billboards she smiled from, the more restaurant openings, movie premieres, or parties she attended with the paparazzi snapping blindingly, the better he liked it. She was a star, and the more the public was aware of her the more powerful she became. Christopher drove her relentlessly.

At twenty-two, Ondine was still young, but the window of opportunity for the big bucks was relatively short. She was at the top of the profession now, but that could change anytime. There were always new, younger women coming along, eager to join the ranks of the supermodel. The public was fickle and, Christopher believed, had a short attention span. The new sensation was always just around the corner. There was no telling how long Ondine's time would last.

As Ondine's business manager, all the money flowed through Christopher. The companies that hired Ondine to tout their products made the checks out to The Lund Agency. Christopher, after taking out his fifteen percent, cut the checks to Ondine.

But Ondine paid little attention to bookkeeping. She trusted her business manager and was not inclined to concern herself with the mundane details of banking. When Ondine had started making real money, Christopher had suggested that he make the deposits into her back account and keep track of her funds, neglecting to mention that he would have the power to withdraw money as well. He suggested that he take over having her tax returns prepared as well. Ondine had been only too happy to agree. Accounting bored her.

Almost imperceptibly, Christopher had increased his take on each modeling assignment. There were all sorts of ways to defraud her, and he rationalized his actions to himself with the knowledge that Ondine was still making an obscene amount of money for merely standing in front of a camera while he was busting his hump managing every aspect of her career.

The deal he had made with Claudia de Vries was especially lucrative. At least it had started out that way. Claudia had wanted to bring Phoenix Spa to another level. Not content with the spa's solid reputation, she wanted it to join the list of America's most exclusive spas. She thought Ondine could help her reach her goal, and Claudia had been willing to pay handsomely to realize her dream.