So Pretty It Hurts

walking in front of a stone wall on a cobbled street, looking slim, handsome, and grim. Farther back there was a cluster of people, their jaws slack. I glanced down at the caption and caught my breath.

“Journalist Richard Parkin leaving the funeral of his half sister, runway model Fiona Campbell.”

Chapter 17

I reread the caption twice, totally shocked. There was no story accompanying the picture, so I Googled Fiona Campbell. I found only one tiny reference to her, in an article published the year before her death. It was about the party and drug scene in London. I wondered if drugs were behind her tragically early death.

I knew what I’d found had to be significant. Doing the math, I realized that Fiona was probably working as a model at the same time Devon’s career was exploding. And someone—yes, it was Jane—had told me that Devon kept a place in London, that she felt at home there. Maybe that’s where she had worked early in her career. And if that was the case, there was a good chance she would have known Fiona.

I smiled to myself as a memory fought its way into my conscious brain. Richard and I, sitting in the great room the morning after Devon’s death. I’d asked for his impressions of Devon that weekend. And he’d made the comment about how models liked to smoke. I’d been surprised, wondering how he would know that. Almost immediately afterward, he’d left the room.

So had the two girls actually known each other? And was that why Richard had maneuvered to be in Devon’s presence on the weekend? Perhaps he’d never had any particular interest in tracking Devon down, but when he’d heard that she was going to be at Scott’s, he decided that it would be a chance to talk to her about his sister, to learn what he could. But I’d never seen Richard interacting with Devon for even a second. He’d just watched her, sometimes out of the corner of his eye.

Quickly another thought charged across my brain. Richard may have had an ulterior motive when he secured the invitation for the weekend. What if Devon and Fiona had been into drugs together, and that’s how Fiona had died? What if Devon had actually encouraged Fiona’s drug use? Richard might have held her responsible and then jumped at the chance to confront her.

And that could be the reason Devon had looked so frightened that day in the woods—Richard may have just ambushed her. After our walk, while I’d idly checked out the buildings on the property, he had headed toward the large barn, but he could have bumped into Devon on the way and initiated a showdown with her. It was, after all, only ten minutes or so after the hike that I had found Devon sobbing. And maybe a verbal bitch-slapping wasn’t all Richard had arranged for the weekend.

I was going to have another little chat with the cagey Richard Parkin. But first I needed to learn more about his sister. For the second time in a couple of days, Cat Jones’s name popped into my mind. Before she’d taken over Gloss magazine, she’d been the editor in chief of a hip downtown magazine called Get, where I’d worked as well, and there was a chance she knew Richard, or at least was friendly with people who did.

I phoned her office, and of course her assistant picked up. Cat hadn’t answered her own phone since the 1990s. I wasn’t surprised when I was handed the “Unfortunately, Cat is in a meeting right now—may I have her call you back?” line, but I was surprised when the assistant suddenly asked me to hold, as if someone had gestured to her. When she released the hold button, she offered an update. “Cat says she will call you back in twenty minutes. What number can she reach you at?”

So I had piqued Ms. Jones’s curiosity. She probably thought I was calling with hot industry gossip, which Cat absolutely thrived on. When it came to herself, she of course favored only flattering chatter and tidbits, especially press items accompanied by fetching photos of her with captions like “Purrrfect Comeback” or “Puss in Boots,” but as for anyone else in the media world, she preferred the mean and salacious, even if it was all mere speculation.

While I waited for Cat to return the call, I phoned a rental agency for a car to drive out to Pine Grove the next day. There was no way I could drive my Jeep. Last weekend all the houseguests at Scott’s would have had the opportunity to see it, and I couldn’t take the chance of being spotted in Pennsylvania.

“Well, well,” Cat said when she called back exactly twenty minutes later. “Are you still on your book tour?”

“No,” I said, snorting. “My publisher doesn’t believe in them. But they set me up on a wonderful blog tour. I’ve stayed at some of the best Web sites.”

“I enjoyed your book party, by the way,” Cat said, disingenuously. “Lots of interesting people there.” She had stayed all of fifteen minutes, two of which were spent air kissing and the rest eyeing the Buzz reporters I’d invited, as if she had come face-to-face with the last leper colony on earth.

“I was glad you could make it,” I said.

“Though I would have liked more of a chance to talk to you. I honestly didn’t think I’d be seeing so little of you when you went to Buzz.”

That was funny. She was making it sound as if I’d bolted. And yet she was the one who’d given me the boot, when she’d decided to jettison the human interest and crime stories in Gloss to make room for pieces like “78 Ways to Apply Body Butter” and “Green Tea: It Does Anything You Could Possibly Think Of.” I’d been pissed at first, but in the end I couldn’t blame her—if she didn’t boost circulation fast, her job and her ever-present herd of town cars would be at risk. I’d figured in time we’d manage to restart our weird kind of friendship, but so far it hadn’t happened.

“I’m sure you’re crazed right now, but maybe we could do a dinner after the holidays,” I said.

“I take it that’s not why you’re calling today, though.”

“No, you’re right,” I said, smiling at her little zinger. Cat was the master of those. “I need a favor—or rather a piece of information. I’m in a bit of a jam, the details of which I won’t bore you with, but I desperately have to get my hands on some facts about Richard Parkin. Do you know—”

“What kind of jam?”

“I promise to tell you when I see you next time, but it would take too long now—and I need to move quickly.”

There was a pause, and I could sense her plum-colored lips forming into a pout and a finger brushing a strand of long blond hair away from her face.

“Well, I never fucked him,” she said after a few seconds. “But I’ve certainly met him. I’ve even sat at the same dinner table with him on several occasions.”

“He had a half sister who died about fourteen years ago. She was a model in the UK. Have you ever heard anything about that?”

“God, no. And that surprises me. It’s not like him to forgo an opportunity to milk some human tragedy.”

I sighed, feeling nearly defeated.

“Can you think of any way for me to dig up this info?” I asked, nearly pleading. “It would help if I could talk to someone who knew him during his Fleet Street days.”

“Well, though I never fucked him, I know someone who did. Claire Trent. She’s a friend of mine in London. She used to write, but she married a rich banker and now sits around all day eating the proverbial bonbons. Would you like her number?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “Do you want to get in touch with her first and let her know I’ll be phoning?”

“Not necessary. I’ll put my assistant back on, and she’ll give you the number. Just tell Claire I suggested you call. She’s looking for diversions these days.”

“Thanks, Cat. I’ll talk to you after Christmas.”