Jonathan Kellerman - Flesh And Blood

He took another bite of sandwich. “It was almost as if she decided to give me some answer so I’d drop it. And maybe it was Steve’s, but then what was it doing on Shawna’s shelves? In the middle of Shawna’s books.”

“Did you tell anyone about this?”

“The unicops and Riley, just like with the older-man theory. Same reaction: Thanks, we’ll look into it. Maybe they did. Though my guess is if the pictures were of Shawna, Mindy might’ve gotten rid of them. To save Shawna embarrassment.”

“Any idea where Mindy is now?”

“She was older than Shawna, would be a senior by now. Don’t imagine it would be that hard to find her.”

“You never tried.”

“I was out of it – did those few stories, then moved on. But like I said, Shawna stayed with me. Though I never thought I’d be talking about her again. Is our deal still on?”

“Sure,” I said.

“You think any of what I told you might mean something?”

“I’m not dismissing it, Adam.”

Older man, younger woman. Dugger’s ad. Nude pictures. Sexual hang-ups.

I’d thought Dugger a prude, but prudes can have secret lives. Maybe Dugger’s donation to the kids at the church had been a guilt offering.

Adam Green was staring at me.

I said, “So maybe the older man in Shawna’s life was a photographer. Someone who claimed to be working for Duke .”

“Why not? I mean, I can’t see a sleazeball like that actually working for Duke , ’cause whatever else Duke is, it’s bona fide, right? They’d have to be careful – couldn’t assign some psycho to take pictures of young girls, right? But this is Hollywood – there’ve got to be armies of low lifes roaming around with cameras and bogus stories. Everyone says Shawna was smart, but she had gotten big-time strokes for her looks and she was still a country girl. How much of a stretch is it from posing in bathing suits and wearing a plastic crown to taking off the suit? And if Shawna did have a thing for older men, couldn’t she have been vulnerable to some guy coming across mature and sophisticated?”

“Makes sense,” I said.

“You’re not bullshitting me?”

“No. You’ve put together a logical scenario.”

He grinned. “I do that once in a while. Maybe I will write a screenplay.”

WONDERING IF MINDY Jacobus was also a psych major, I called Mary Lou at the department and asked her to look up Shawna’s roommate.

“That girl,” she said. “Lauren. I read about it – I’m so sorry, Dr. Delaware. That poor mother. What does this Mindy have to do with it?”

“Maybe nothing,” I said. “But you know how it is.”

“Sure – hold on.”

Several minutes later. “She’s not one of ours, so I called Letters and Science. She’s an econ major – or was. She didn’t reenroll this year. You don’t think she could also be…”

“No,” I said, feeling my heart jump. “Was any reason given for her dropping out?”

“I didn’t ask. If you can stay on, I’ll call over there again.”

“Sure.”

A longer wait, then: “Nothing ominous, Dr. Delaware. Thank God. She got married, changed her name to Grieg, but the files didn’t get put together. So we saved her some red tape. She’s only enrolled in one business class this quarter, has a job at the Med Center in public relations.”

I thanked her and hung up. Even if I reached Mindy Jacobus Grieg, what would I say to her? Fess up about your missing roommate’s secrets?

No reason for her to respond with anything other than a call to Security.

There was another reason not to confront her. I was off my game. My surveillance of Benjamin Dugger had turned out to be an amateurish fumble. Milo’d been gracious enough not to point that out, and when Dugger had confronted me, he’d steered the conversation in another direction. But no sense adding to my list of gaffes. I’d check in with the pro, see what he thought about talking to Mindy. Later. At the end of his workday, when leads had either borne fruit or dead-ended.

No way to know how Milo would react to what I’d learned about Shawna’s posing for skin shots. He was reluctant to consider her as a factor in Lauren’s death, and all I really had to fuel my suspicion was a college newshound’s hunch. But as I sat there mulling, Adam Green’s intuition refused to fade.

Maybe because it fit my own premonitions. Shawna’s venture into the skin trade firmed the linkage between her and Lauren. So did the fact that both girls had studied psychology, talked about becoming doctors. Grown up deprived in the Daddy department – in Shawna’s case literal fatherlessness, in Lauren’s a cold, hostile relationship with Lyle Teague. I’d treated enough girls in similar situations to understand where that could lead: the search for the Perfect Father.

And who better than a seemingly gentle older man like Dugger – a man with a psychology doctorate, no less – to fill the void?

Shawna’s beauty pageant appearances would have put her in front of an appreciative crowd while still in her teens. Stripping and hooking and runway modeling had done the same for Lauren. I thought of her and Michelle, youth and agility and sexuality playing to a sea of middle-aged leers.

The following day Lauren had talked about the power.

During my attempt to treat Lauren – those few, pitiful hours – she’d been uncooperative, passive-aggressive, seductive. During her final visit sullenness had erupted into outright hostility. Yet Jane claimed she’d admired me, that I’d meant a lot to her and knowing me had fueled her career choice. And Andrew Salander had backed that up.

It was precisely the ambivalence you’d expect from a girl with a father like Lyle Teague. Could I have been smarter… Then I thought of something else: Jane Teague had also found solace with an older man. Perhaps Lauren hadn’t veered as far from maternal influence as she’d thought.

Lauren and older men… Gene Dalby had thought Lauren older. She dressed older. Playing for someone sophisticated?

When Lauren had vented at me, I’d sat there and taken it. Because that was part of my job. And because my shame at being at the party still resonated. But another man – a man who’d contracted to lease Lauren’s body – might not have been so understanding if Lauren’s ambivalence had twisted into verbal abuse.

Gretchen Stengel had put it perfectly: Men paid to have it on their terms. And challenging the rules – or trying to leave the playing field – just wouldn’t do.

Lauren had never been anything but a pawn, but her bravado – I do great with tips – said she’d fooled herself into thinking she was a queen.

The way she’d died – trussed, shot in the back of the head – spelled out cold execution. The killer making it clear that he was in charge.

The hallmarks of a professional job because the killer wanted to make it look professional. Or was he the type of man who kept his hands clean and hired professionals?

Just another business deal… Superficially, it was hard to see Benjamin Dugger – he of the frayed collar, delivering goodies to children – engaging in something like that. But if the man had sexual hang-ups and money, just because he affected a professorial stance didn’t mean he wasn’t capable of the worst kind of cruelty.

Either way, someone had been there to teach Lauren a final, horrible lesson: Self-delusion was the mother’s milk of prostitution, and fantasies of control were no protection against the worst kind of sore loser.

I made the call to the West L.A. station at five P.M. Milo was away from his desk, and a detective named Princippe told me he’d gone out on a call.