Vixen Read Free Page B

“No record prior to the grand theft charge, just a couple of minor moving violations and a bunch of parking tickets, most of them in the L.A. area. Worked at two yacht harbors down there, Marina del Rey and Newport Beach. Good employment records in both places, left both jobs voluntarily for unspecified reasons. Worked on Andrew Vorhees’ yacht for six months before his arrest—no problems there, either. Parents both dead, no family except for the sister. No traceable contacts with anybody else down south or up here.”
    â€œPretty much confirms what Cory Beckett told me about him.”
    â€œYeah. But I’ll bet she didn’t tell you anything about her background.” Tamara waggled an eyebrow. “Juicy stuff.”
    â€œWhat, you checking up on our clients now?”
    â€œAfter that fiasco with Verity Daniels, you bet I am.”
    The Daniels tangle was a sore subject with me, too. It had landed Jake Runyon in jail on a bogus attempted rape charge, almost gotten the agency sued for malfeasance, and its finish was the source of my promise to Kerry to keep myself out of harm’s way.
    â€œBesides,” Tamara went on, “her background and her brother’s are pretty closely linked. Kenny may be a nerd, but she’s anything but. Some real interesting facts here.”
    â€œSuch as?”
    â€œFor one, she’s not a model. Not now, not ever.”
    â€œNo? Then what does she do for a living?”
    â€œMarries rich dudes. Two of ’em so far.”
    Well, that wasn’t much of a surprise. “Married now? She wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.”
    â€œNope. First husband divorced her after eight months. She got enough of a settlement to set her up real sweet for a while. Number two, rich dude named Lassiter, lasted a little over a year. No divorce there, though.”
    â€œNo?”
    â€œGuy offed himself.”
    â€œFor what reason?”
    â€œFinancial setbacks, according to the note he left,” Tamara said. “But there’s more to it than that. Two grown sons from a previous marriage claimed Cory was responsible for Lassiter’s suicide.”
    â€œOn what grounds?”
    â€œSeveral. Two substantiated affairs during the year of marriage. Quote, bizarre sexual practices detrimental to his mental health, unquote.”
    â€œBizarre in what way?”
    â€œNot a matter of public record. Could be anything from orgies to goats to whips and chains.”
    â€œGoats?”
    Tamara chuckled. One of her less-than-endearing traits is an off-the-wall sense of humor that she sometimes uses to shock my old-fashioned sensibilities. “Sons also claimed she mishandled finances, and coerced their father into making a new will that cut them out of the estate and left everything to her. They sued and had enough legal chops to get a favorable ruling. They got the big slice, she got a little one. Case brought her some negative publicity—probably one of the reasons she moved up here.”
    â€œSo she’s a promiscuous gold digger. What does that have to do with her missing brother?”
    â€œNothing, maybe. Except that both her exes owned yachts berthed at local marinas, the first one in Marina del Rey, the second in Newport Beach—the same places Kenny worked.”
    I chewed on that for a bit. “So maybe it was the husbands who got him his jobs there.”
    â€œUh-uh. He was working at both marinas before she hooked up with either guy.”
    â€œWell? Maybe she likes boats, too, hangs around where her brother works, and that’s how she met the future husbands.”
    â€œOr Kenny set up the meetings for her.”
    â€œWhat’re you suggesting? The two of them working a scam to find her eligible marriage partners?”
    â€œCould be. He trolls around, finds a likely prospect, baits the hook, and she does the rest.”
    â€œImmoral, if so, but not illegal.”
    â€œNo, but if that’s