The Murderer's Daughter (3 page)

G
race's therapy room had once been the master bedroom of the country-English cottage that served as her professional headquarters. A cute little twenties thing, the house occupied a quiet corner on an obscure side street in West Hollywood, like many of its neighbors hidden behind tall hedges.

The location was walkable from the flats of Beverly Hills but set well away from B.H. glitz and the frenetic activity of WeHo's Boystown. The corner location was no accident: Grace had insisted on it, so patients could enter on one street and exit on another.

On the surface, the people who came to her for help had much in common but they would never meet one another. A different therapist might question that, reasoning that post-traumatic patients could benefit from sharing common experiences.

Maybe so, but in Grace's mind that was outweighed by the need for depth probing, the magic of one-on-one. Sometimes she thought of herself as a one-woman emotional vaccine.

She'd done the place up with soft seating, flattering lighting, inoffensive hues, the only feature hinting at herself, an array of framed diplomas, licenses, and honors, displayed behind her desk.

The house had come with wainscoting, Greek-key moldings, decorative alcoves, a tile fireplace, and diamond-pane windows. The day Grace took ownership, she began painting and scrubbing, ended up polishing the oak floors on hands and knees. After teaching herself the rudiments of commercial sewing—plenty of trial, even more error—she created ecru silk drapes from remnants scored in a thrift shop, hung the finished product from antique brass rods she nabbed online.

Proud of me, Malcolm?

The result: a work environment that felt
right.

Now, with her workday over, she poured herself a glass of water and glided into the living room/waiting room. Parting two of the curtain panels, she gazed out on blackness.

Starless: her favorite flavor of night.

Double-bolting the front door and switching off the lights, she returned to the therapy room and unlocked the closet, a walk-in intended for a wardrobe that now held far less. Retrieving a small leather box, she plucked out a pair of nonprescription color contact lenses from a collection she'd assembled.

Tonight: light blue, allowing some of her natural brown to peek through and create an intriguing sea green.

Stepping out of oxblood flats, she unbuttoned her work blouse—one of the dozen white silk button-downs she'd had custom-tailored by a Hong Kong tailor who visited L.A. twice a year for trunk shows—and shed man-tailored black slacks, also purchased from Mr. Lam in a lot of twelve. Off came her bra and panties and on went tonight's dress.

She'd selected it yesterday, a long-sleeved, gray, cowl-necked cashmere sheath she'd christened One Piece Wonder. Silk lining eliminated the need for underwear. The gray was a medium shade that adored her chestnut hair, the hem ended an inch below her knees, promising an interesting journey, and the sleeves flattered her arms.

No buttons, no zippers, no froufrou of any sort. Over the head, in with the arms, slithering down her body, liquid as a coat of lotion.

Tonight's shoes were maroon suede pumps handmade by a Barcelona cobbler who specialized in flamenco shoes. Add to that the chocolate-brown single-clasp briefcase and matching drawstring bag already hosting money, keys, lipstick, and a gray-matte .22 Beretta, and she was ready.

Playtime.

It had been
a while—months—since Grace had surrendered to The Leap. Abstention had nothing to do with self-doubt or restraint, it was simply a matter of professional responsibility: Busy time in her practice, her priority was the mental health of her flock.

Which wasn't to say she hadn't taken a few small jumps.

Driving home late at night on Pacific Coast Highway, making sure the road was clear then bearing down delicately on the Aston Martin's accelerator.

Pushing the car to seventy, eighty, ninety, a hundred and twenty.

Holding that speed while clamping her eyes shut, hurtling forward, blind.

The joy of weightlessness.

A couple of Sundays ago, she'd woken at sunrise and hiked up a canyon on the land side of PCH, finding herself the sole explorer of a series of well-marked trails that snaked up into the Santa Monica Mountains. After two miles of following the rules, she'd stripped herself naked, balled her clothes and tucked them into her backpack, and veered off the trail, stepping randomly into brush.

It didn't take long for the foliage to turn dense, obscuring landmarks.

Soon, Grace was giddy with disorientation.

Losing herself.

Nearing a grunt. Spying a flash of beige.

Letting in the fear. Reprocessing it as arousal.

Reaching deep into her core and reminding herself of all that she'd been through, everything she'd accomplished.

The key was to survive. She walked on.

It took a while, but eventually she found her way back to the Aston, scratched and bruised and dirty, a mountain lion's warning reverberating in her head.

Abrasions were easily touched up with cosmetics. The beast's bravado remained a barb in her brain and that night she went to sleep imagining its rage and its bloodlust and slept wonderfully.

Oh, you gorgeous killer.

Maybe one day she'd return and look for the cat. Toting a slab of raw steak in her backpack.

Naked Woman with Meat.
Great title for a painting.

G
race's exit took her through the kitchen, out the rear patient door, and onto the impatiens-ringed, jacaranda-shaded lawn that served as the cottage's backyard.

A narrow door cut into the facing wall of the garage. Though tiny, the house had been built for L.A. and even in the twenties that meant
Worship the Automobile
and space for two vehicles.

Waiting for her, side by side, were her twin chariots, both black, both spotless, both, in Grace's mind, female.

The Toyota Matrix S station wagon was logic and function, as obtrusive as a tree in a forest.

The Aston Martin DB7 screamed irrationality.

Tonight, the choice was obvious.

Sliding into the low-slung beauty, she home-linked the garage door open, inserted the ignition key, pushed the red starter button, and brought four hundred fifteen snorting broncos roaring to life. Switching on her iPod, she called up Bach's Sixth Brandenburg Concerto and backed the Aston out just past the garage door. Looking up and down the street, she idled, giving the car time for its rarefied organ system to reach optimal body temperature.

Automotive foreplay; rush a girl and she could grow balky and cranky.

When the Aston's noises signaled readiness, Grace looked around again and pressed a maroon toe down on the gas.

The car shot forward like the land-rocket it was. Grace raced a block or two before slowing to a cruise as she manipulated a maze of narrow streets and exited east onto Sunset.

Heading in the opposite direction of her destination because she needed time to wind down, she turned up the volume on Bach and drove until her body grew cool and loose and itchy in that wonderful pre-Leap way. Hanging a left turn, she roared up several blocks of inky residential hillside, drove past a
Dead End
sign, and zipped around the curve of a cul-de-sac. Reversing direction in a quick swoop, she returned to Sunset, slid into light traffic, and floated west over the Beverly Hills border.

As if she'd entered a new country, the scenery shifted from clubs and cafés and show-business office buildings to gated mansions graced with chlorophyll. Another half a mile of relative quiet passed before she headed south on broad, flat avenues, continued past both big and little Santa Monica boulevards, and entered the B.H. business district.

At this hour, not much business going on; all but a few shops were dark. Rich folk had pools, tennis courts, home theaters, home spas, home everything. Why venture out to mingle with the yokels?

Precious few yokels, as well, just a scatter of tourists and window-shoppers. Easing the Aston toward Wilshire, Grace caught an eyeful of her goal but stopped half a block shy.

The Beverly Opus
was a ziggurat of pink limestone and smoked glass, introduced by a valet parking area paved in slate and centered by a palm-fringed fountain. High-end chrome was routinely displayed as proof of the hotel's elite clientele but valets in top hats and tails were more than happy to park any decent vehicle out front for a twenty-dollar tip.

It wasn't thrift that led Grace to enter a public lot charging a flat fee of three bucks after eight p.m., providing you had a credit card to feed the robotic entry machine.

Preparation was all.

Driving straight up to the top level, she searched for the darkest, most remote corner she could find, one blocked from easy view by a pillar.

She nailed it easily, tucked in the southeast corner, a grease-spotted slot flanked by
two
pillars.

The kind of space self-defense manuals warned women to avoid.

Perfect.

The Beverly Opus
was three years old and rumors of its closure had circulated since its opening. Maybe that would finally come true—there were, she noticed, fewer glitz-mobiles than the last time she'd been here, half a year ago.

No paparazzi glomming from the sidewalk, another bad sign.

There was never a shortage of camera-demons at the nail salon on Camden Drive where Grace got her weekly mani-pedi, but the Opus had been abandoned.

Tsk.

She continued past the valets and the doormen. Six months ago she'd arrived with a different hairstyle, different dress, different makeup, different stride. But even if she hadn't varied her appearance for tonight, no one would notice another slim youngish woman toting a briefcase.

Business traveler, synonym for invisible.

Sure enough, the three clerks at the reception desk didn't look up as she passed.

She strode across the marble lobby, past an oversized
pietra dura
center table graced with a flower arrangement that could've supplied a month of funerals. Continuing up a long hall lined with still-open but customer-less gift shops peddling cashmere and silk and velour leisure wear, she found her way to the lounge, a cavernous place made larger by a thirty-foot coffered ceiling, and set up with nebulous seating areas, potted orchids, and a burnt-orange grand piano currently unoccupied.

The room was two-thirds empty, every drinker scoring plenty of personal space. Taped smooth jazz competed with the clink of glasses and the draggy murmur of obligatory chitchat.

Selecting a two-person loveseat that faced the piano but was well distant from it and from the bar beyond, Grace settled, placed the snakeskin briefcase next to her, the bag on the sofa. Crossing her legs, she dangled a shoe, appeared to grow contemplative. Then, as if coming to a conclusion, she unclasped the case and drew out a packet of investment mailers from a cold-call fool angling for her business—boring crap she stockpiled for nights like this one. Pulling out a jargon-ridden pamphlet on emerging markets, she pretended to be fascinated by charts and graphs and dishonest attempts to prognosticate.

It didn't take long for a Spanish-accented voice to say, “Can I help you, ma'am?”

Looking up, Grace smiled at a small, thick waiter in his fifties.
Miguel
engraved on a little brass badge.

“Negroni on the rocks, please. Hendrick's Gin, if you have it.”

“Sure we have, ma'am.”

“Great. Thanks.”

“Something to eat, ma'am?”

“Hmm…do you still have cheese toast?”

“We do, sure.”

“Cheese toast with the Negroni, then.” Favoring Miguel with another smile, she returned to her financial miseducation. A few minutes later, the drink and the snack were placed near her right hand and she nodded and thanked Miguel without laying it on too thick.

Sip, nibble, sip some more.

The bitterness of Campari was perfect, cutting through all the financial pie-in-the-sky, and the cucumber nuance of the Scottish gin was an additional pleasure. Last year, Grace had gifted herself with a week in Florence, staying in a far-too-large suite at the Four Seasons. The bar had served up something called a Valentino, riffing on the classic Negroni with more cucumber and other stuff Grace couldn't identify. She'd promised herself to learn the recipe, hadn't so far.

Such a busy girl.

Continuing to fake-read the financial b.s., she thought about Florence, mind flashing like a fast-shutter camera.

The Leap she'd taken there.

Just after midnight, the hotel's perfect Tuscan gardens.

A lovely man in his late forties named Anthony, British, a banker, reserved and polite, not at all handsome. Beautifully surprised when she responded to him in the bar with a cool upturn of lip and flash of black-brown eyes.

Then the rest of it, the poor fool crying out that he loved her as he came.

Figuring he'd try to find her the following morning, she'd checked out early, drove to the Tuscan outlets, and scored some budget Prada. Then on to Rome, where she ate salt cod and fettuccine with dried beef in the old Jewish ghetto and girded herself for the eleven-hour flight back to home sweet home.

The Haunted needed her. Anthony would cope.

Drinking and nibbling
and reading in the Opus lounge for precisely five minutes, Grace looked up, pretended to stifle a yawn, kept her head and eyes as immobile as possible, and scoped out the room.

Near the piano were four useless multiples: three triads of business-types and a quartet of nerdy-looking weeds who were probably computer wizards and a whole lot richer than their inept fashion suggested.

To her right sat two solo females: a sixtyish but still foxy blonde, maybe even an experienced hooker with way-off-the-charts boobs, a pre-melanoma tan, and a platinum dye-job that seemed to provide its own illumination. All that came packaged in a minimal sleeveless black thing that showed off slim but age-hardened legs and overbaked, sun-puckered cleavage.

The woman's demeanor shouted
Someone fuck me, already!
and Grace figured she'd eventually get her way.

The second woman was plain, dressed in a brown suit that wasn't her friend. Like Grace she was reading what appeared to be business papers. Unlike Grace, she was probably serious about it.

Last but not least, to Grace's left, two possible targets.

Solo males.

The first was an extremely tall black guy with stilt-legs who might be a retired athlete, drinking Diet Coke. His eyes met Grace's with momentary interest, then shifted abruptly to the right as he got up to greet the gorgeous wife and ten-year-old daughter who'd suddenly materialized. Final swig of soda and Happy Family was off.

The second solo Y-chromo was at least eighty. Grace had no bias against well-mellowed types—years ago, at a convention in New York, she'd captured a French surgeon twice her age, found him gentle, considerate, much smarter than any young man she'd met. But patience and tenderness and little blue pills weren't what she craved tonight.

Assuming a target showed up.

Over the next
twenty-two minutes, none did, and as Grace nursed her drink and moved on to a second brochure, she began to wonder if she'd have to shift locales. Maybe back to WeHo, one of the obnoxiously hip hotels that lined Sunset. If that didn't work, she might have to settle for a painfully retro cocktail lounge catering to trust-fund slackers.

Or be content with nothing.

A bit more time passed and she was resigning herself to nothing when she looked up and there he was.