The Perfect Scandal Read online

  As if to reinforce her self-doubt, Captain Decker, a weathered, slouchy man in his sixties with intermittent clumps of gray hair and glasses, began barking orders at the remaining guests assembled near the gazebo where the ceremony was to have taken place.

  “Detectives Valentine and Bray,” he instructed the two female detectives closest to him, “I need one of you to catch up to Hernandez. He went straight to the bridal suite, but I’m worried he that he might be in shock. I don’t want to miss an important clue because he’s thinking like a man whose fiancée is missing rather than a detective. Whoever stays here, take this imposter into custody. Read her rights but don’t start questioning her yet. I want to be there for that.”

  Honey watched as the two detectives snapped into action. The one in the evening gown who had helped tackle the imposter bride—a gorgeous, curvy brunette in her late twenties who looked more like a swimsuit model than a detective—hurried up to the bridal suite. The other detective, in her late thirties with dirty blonde hair and an unflappable air of professionalism, walked over to the handcuffed woman, still in the fetal position on the ground, knelt and began whispering quietly in her ear. Honey couldn’t hear what she said because Decker’s voice drowned her out.

  “Winslow and Ryerson,” he said, pointing at a slightly built, young, African American man and the towering brunette next to him in the cocktail dress who’d helped tackle the imposter bride before she could throw herself off the cliff, “time to earn your field stripes as police researchers. Work with hotel security. I want you to go through every snippet of footage from the last half hour. Look for anything that indicates how this woman got into the resort and where the hell Jessie Hunt went.”

  “I can help with that,” said Hugo Cosgrove, Peninsula’s head of security, waving at them from the top of the path. “I’ll take you to our security office control center. Also, we’ve already shut down all the roads out of the resort and are having security search each vehicle. It might already be too late at this point, but we figured it can’t hurt.”

  “Thank you,” Decker said, before turning his attention to the remaining people standing nearby. “As for the rest of you, I’m looking around and I see people who came here as guests, hoping to help Ryan and Jessie celebrate their special day. Not only do we have almost every member of Homicide Special Section, the elite investigative unit they worked in together, here right now, but I also see representatives of Los Angeles divisions of the FBI, the U.S. Marshals Service, the County Sheriff’s Department, not to mentioned retired LAPD detectives and criminal profilers. One of our own is missing. I plan to set up a command center and utilize every resource at our disposal to find Jessie Hunt. And while it’s not official. I think we can all guess who’s responsible for this: Andy Robinson. I’m guessing that if we find her, we find Jessie. Let’s move up to the security office and reconvene there. I could use all your help.”

  A slew of people followed Decker back up the hill. A middle-aged, chunky man that Honey guessed was one of the retired detectives, stayed back to help the dirty-blonde-haired detective corral the imposter bride. Honey noticed only one other person—besides herself—who didn’t seem to have an assigned job. An attractive black woman, maybe thirty, sat in one of the ceremony folding chairs, with her head in her hands. She was sobbing softly.

  Honey had heard that Jessie had a half-sister who was here tonight and wondered if this might be her. Perhaps in the rush to rescue her, no one had thought to console her sibling. Honey couldn’t solve crimes, but maybe she could at least help with this. She walked over and sat down next to the woman.

  “How are you doing?” she asked softly.

  The woman looked up. Even the tears streaking down her face couldn’t hide her beauty.

  “I’ve been better,” she muttered.

  “Are you Jessie’s sister, Hannah?” Honey asked.

  That almost seemed to make the woman laugh.

  “No,” she said. “Hannah was the tall, blonde teenager who barreled up the hill a minute ago, ready to kill whoever did this to her big sister. I’m Lacy, a friend of Jessie’s from college. We were super close until a few years ago. Then we had a falling out over something stupid. I moved to Europe, and we just never really patched things up. I hoped tonight might change that. And now I’m worried that I might never get the chance.”

  Honey put her hand on Lacy’s shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze. She might not be a detective, a police researcher, or an FBI agent, but this she could help with.

  “Don’t worry, Lacy,” she said quietly, “you heard the captain. The resources of the entire law enforcement community of Southern California are being brought bear to find Jessie. You’ll see her again. You’ll patch things up. You’ll have a drink, years from now, talking about how crazy this night was.”

  Lacy nodded. She seemed to believe it. And Honey wanted to as well. After all, Jessie Hunt was more than just a criminal profiler. To many in this city, she was a symbol of justice and fortitude, someone who had suffered terrible personal tragedies yet still fought to keep its residents safe. If they lost her, it would be devastating to more than just the people here tonight. Besides, what she said was true. LAPD, Sheriff’s Department, FBI, U.S. Marshals—there was an army of investigators on site, all of whom were personally invested in Jessie’s safe return.

  And yet, something gnawed at Honey. Even though her experience in the adult film industry had been mostly positive, largely because she insisted on total control of everything she did and with whom, she saw a lot of ugliness. Many women fell through cracks, a lot disappeared, even really famous ones with teams of people whose prosperity depended on them being found. It was scary out there, even for a criminal profiler who had an army of supporters looking for her.

  But Honey didn’t say any of that to Lacy. She just sat with her, not speaking, a silent source of support if she was needed.

  CHAPTER TWO

  4:57 a.m., Sunday morning

  Jessie could feel her muscles start to cramp up.

  She tried to ignore it, not wanting to give any indication of weakness. But she was almost to the point where she wouldn’t be able to mask the sound of the occasional whimper escaping her lips.

  By now she knew they were heading east into the desert. In Los Angeles, the last few nights had been in the high fifties but it was easily ten to fifteen degrees colder than that here. She guessed that they were either in California’s Mojave desert or maybe as far east as Nevada or Arizona.

  “I haven’t forgotten about that blanket,” Andy said from the front seat, seeming to read her mind. “There’s a rest stop at the next exit. Assuming there’s no one else there, we’ll pull over.”

  “How generous of you,” Jessie replied snarkily, refusing to allow herself to sound sincerely grateful to her abductor.

  “I know you’re frustrated,” Andy told her with a smile on her face. “You probably didn’t have ‘get kidnapped on my wedding day’ on your Bingo card when you woke up this morning. But believe me, I saved you from a bunch of hassles. Now you don’t have to worry about the inevitable divorce in a couple of years, the little sister living off you even though she’s supposed to be off at college or—what is it these days—culinary school? The annoying friend who keeps using your inside access with the LAPD to keep her struggling detective agency afloat. You’re in the clear on all of all that. And no one will blame you. I take the hit and you get the freedom. It’s a win-win scenario for you. I know you don’t see it that way yet, but you’ll get there.”

  Jessie didn’t reply. Was she really expected to respond to the warped logic that Andy using to make her argument? There was no point in that. Almost more concerning than her unhinged reasoning was the specificity of her knowledge.

  How had she learned that Hannah was applying to culinary schools? How did she know that Jessie occasionally passed on LAPD tips to Kat to help with her private eye cases? Until a week ago, Andy Robinson had been incarcerated. Had she known all this w
hile being held in the Western Regional Women’s Psychiatric Detention Center? Or did she learn all of it in the week since her release?

  And what else did she know? Clearly, she’d discovered enough to infiltrate Jessie’s wedding, despite supposedly being watched round the clock. And even with a dozen law enforcement members as wedding guests, she managed to sneak into the bridal suite with an accomplice, incapacitate the bride, and sneak her out of the resort without being noticed.

  That wasn’t a plan constructed on the fly. While Andy clearly viewed it as some kind of Thelma & Louise sequel, it had been meticulously planned by someone who, while disturbed, was also, brilliant. If Jessie was going to uncover the woman’s plan and find a way out of this situation, she needed to know what she was dealing with. And that meant engaging with Andy, even if the idea made her slightly ill.

  “You seem awfully sure of yourself,” she finally allowed. She knew that any overt pleasantry would be met with suspicion, so she went with a reluctant, skeptical, compliment.

  “Maybe you’ve forgotten who you’re dealing with,” Andy replied tartly. “I’m not one of your clumsy serial killers whose every choice is beholden to their violent impulses. It’s so easy to profile them, isn’t it, Jessie? They’re all at the mercy of their desires. Understand their desires and you can predict their actions. But I don’t work that way.”

  “I didn’t suggest that you did,” Jessie told her, sensing the car veer right and slow down, indicating that they’d pulled off the freeway. “But you’d acknowledge that drugging me and sneaking me out of my own wedding isn’t exactly embracing the sisterhood. What happened to supporting each other’s choices, even if we don’t agree with them?”

  “I’m not a sophomore at liberal arts college, Jessie. My job isn’t to enable your bad decisions. I’m rescuing you.”

  “What if I don’t want to be rescued?” Jessie shot back as the car rolled to a stop. “Do you really expect me to thank you for putting me in a situation that required tying me up? You do see that this isn’t a great way to build trust, right?”

  “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Andy replied as she put the car in park. “You’ll get there eventually. Now do you want that blanket or not?”

  “Would you at least untie me, as a gesture of good faith?”

  Andy turned around in her seat and offered a sympathetic smile.

  “But Jessie,” she said sweetly, “you just told me that you didn’t want to be rescued by me. Considering that, it would be awful foolish of me to untie you, don’t you think?”

  “How do you expect to ever win me over if you do everything by force?” Jessie challenged.

  Andy smiled. Jessie wanted punch her in the face.

  “It won’t always be this way,” she assured her. “When I’m more confident that you won’t try to make a run for it the second that I give you a little autonomy, then we’ll loosen those bonds a little bit. Ironic, right? We have to strengthen our bonds in order to loosen yours. Anyway, enough chitchat for now. Let me get you that blanket and then we’ll get back on the road. After all, we’ve still got a ways to go, and that head start we got won’t last forever.”

  She got out of the front seat and headed to the back of the car. Jessie looked at the cuffs holding her in place, one on her wrist and one on her ankle, both attached to the metal frames of the backseat. She waited until she saw the trunk pop before she started tugging on the cuffs with her arms and legs, hoping for some give in the frames or the cuffs. But there was none.

  Worse, the effort caused a rippling, stinging pain in her wrist and ankle. She didn’t know if it was being in one position for so long, the lack of circulation, or the cold, but the effort to yank free made her extremities feel like they’d been attacked by dozens of bees. The trunk slammed shut and Andy reappeared. Jessie gulped hard, hoping to mask the pain she felt.

  “Thirsty?” Andy, asked, misinterpreting the swallowing motion, and pulling out a bottled water.

  “How do I know it’s not drugged?” Jessie asked through gritted teeth.

  “You don’t,” Andy replied casually, “but it’s not. I can’t promise I won’t knock you out again but there’s not really any need for it right now, in the middle of the night, with you tied up like this.”

  She gave Jessie several glugs, then tucked the blanket in around her. It was thick and, despite being a little scratchy, started to warm her up right away. Andy got back in the front seat and turned the car back on.

  “You know, I was thinking about your people back at the resort,” she mused amiably. “They’re probably moving heaven and Earth to find you by now, not that it’ll do them much good. To be honest, that’s part of the fun of this for me—knowing that all those big important, folks are going to bring their power to bear in the search for you, and in the end, it won’t matter. You know why?”

  “No,” Jessie said, deciding to play along for now. “Why?”

  “Because we’re going somewhere very special,” Andy said, sounding borderline giddy, “someplace they’ll never find us, no matter how hard they look, or for how long. And when we get there, I think you’ll be surprised to find that you’re going to love it. I promise.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  7:46 p.m., Saturday night

  At first Ryan Hernandez couldn’t think.

  He’d been in something like shock when the woman in front of him at the wedding pulled back her veil, started laughing maniacally, took off in in the direction of the oceanside cliff, and was tackled by Susannah Valentine and Beth Ryerson just before she could jump.

  He was still in a semi-stunned stupor, not fully processing that Jessie wasn’t there when people began interrogating the imposter. It was only when Kat Gentry started pummeling the woman that his brain clicked back on. There were more than enough people to deal with the crazy fake bride. He needed to know where Jessie was.

  That’s why he had gone up to the bridal suite. That’s why he had forced himself to take several slow, deep breaths once he was sure she wasn’t there. The suite was now a crime scene, and he couldn’t let his panic and emotion corrupt it and possibly prevent the discovery of some crucial piece of evidence.

  He had stepped back outside just as Kat Gentry and Hannah Dorsey came running up.

  “She’s not in there,” he said quickly. “Don’t go in. CSU is going to have to process the scene and they don’t need us muddying it up.”

  Kat and Hannah, both out of breath, nodded.

  “Did the woman say anything?” he asked. “The one in the wedding dress?”

  Kat, a former Army Ranger, and Jessie’s best friend, shook her head.

  “My fists got her to stop laughing but she shut up completely after that,” she said. “Captain Decker sent me packing.”

  “You’re lucky that’s all he did,” Ryan said.

  “Believe me,” she replied, “if it was just me and her, that interrogation would still be going on and she’d be talking.”

  Ryan wasn’t inclined to doubt her. Katherine “Kat” Gentry wasn’t to be trifled with. Even if one didn’t know about her military background, her powerfully built, muscular frame, along with the multiple facial burn marks and a long scar that ran vertically down her left cheek from just below her eye should have been enough to tell people not to screw with her. But it was moot now.

  “That’s spilled milk,” Ryan told her. “We have to assume we won’t get anything out of her. How are we going to find Jessie?”

  “By finding Andy Robinson,” Hannah said, speaking up for the first time.

  “What do you mean?” Ryan asked.

  “We didn’t have time to get into it earlier, with everybody rushing around before the ceremony,” Hannah explained, “but I recognize the woman in that dress. She’s the same woman who tried to mow Kat down earlier today when we were running wedding errands for you guys. That’s not a coincidence. I bet that if we put her face and prints into the system, we’ll find that this imposter bride was one
of Andy’s acolytes and that she helped her with this whole plan.”

  Ryan immediately knew what she was referencing. While in the Female Forensic In-Patient Psychiatric Unit of the Twin Towers Correctional Facility, where Andy Robinson had been held prior to her transfer, she had cultivated a group of minions, a cult-like collection of followers. Some of those women, after being released, committed heinous murders on her behalf. Others, like this fake bride, were apparently part of sleeper cells, leading seemingly normal lives but ready to be activated on Andy’s command.

  “I’ll have Jamil Winslow plug her into the system,” Kat said. “Once we get a name, we can find out exactly how she’s connected to Andy. Maybe that will give us a way to go at her.”

  She dashed off, leaving Ryan alone with Hannah. He looked over at the half-sister of the woman he was to have married less than five minutes ago. They were similar in so many ways. Both were tall, though at five-foot-ten, Jessie had an inch on her little sister. They shared the same penetrating green eyes. Both had lean, athletic frames, although Hannah’s veered more toward pure skinniness. Jessie’s hair was brown, and Hannah’s was blonde, but they each wore it just below the shoulders. Both were stubborn and driven and unrelenting in pursuit of their goals.

  But Jessie was an adult. The person in front of Ryan was still a few weeks shy of her 18th birthday and right now, she looked it. He realized that she’d been putting on a brave face, doing all she could to stay strong in order to help with the search. But now, alone with him, the veneer seemed to be cracking and she looked like a lost little girl.

  “Hey,” he said softly, “it’s going to be okay. “We’re going to find her.”

  Hannah looked up at him. Her eyes were damp, but her gaze was steely.

  “You don’t have to sugarcoat it for me, Ryan,” she said. “We both know what Andy Robinson is capable of. There’s a real chance I may never see my sister again. When we re-join everyone, I’ll put that thought out of my head and focus all my energy on getting her back. But right now, in this moment, let’s be honest with each other and allow for the possibility that she might be gone for good.”