Page 10 of The Bridesmaid
Maybe he does care. He just doesn’t show it. Or can’t, maybe.I’m still trying to figure him out.
We pass a gold-legged glass table set with magazines. Swedish supermodel-turned-photographer Petra Morka lounges on a leopard-print chaise longue, with high-heeled ankle boots, baggy-cropped jeans, and a loose fishnet vest. Her jaw-length white-blonde hair is undercut on one side, and her sea-green eyes hold the camera’s gaze. She dangles a camera casually from her long fingers.
‘She’s one of our bridesmaids,’ says Mark, distractedly as we pass.
‘Wait. You’re going ahead with the wedding?’
His step slows fractionally, and he frowns. ‘We decided we should. There’s a dress-fitting booked here for later today, and it’s all going ahead. You’ll understand when you see what happened.’He unexpectedly swerves off down an arterial corridor. ‘The manager is a friend of mine,’ says Mark. ‘He’s agreed to take you into the ballroom through the kitchen entrance.’
Chapter Eight
HOLLY
The Plaza manager is a tall man wearing an understated suit I suspect is extremely expensive. He is bald, with short expressive brows, a sheen to his black skin that speaks of expensive moisturizers, and a twinkling expression to his deep brown eyes that make me like him instantly.
He proffers a large hand and encloses mine in it. ‘Miss Stone. I am Mr Cohen, manager of the hotel. ‘It’s good to meet you in person. I’ve read about you of course. Goth-girl Holly Stone. You find things out from crime scene data material that even the best police forensics miss.’
I find myself blushing. I guess a manager of such a prestigious venue has to be charming by nature.
Mr Cohen checks his watch. Glances at Mark. ‘We don’t have very long before professional clean-up begins. If you’ll forgive the imperative, we should go right away.’
He leads us into the ballroom through the kitchen entrance.
It’s like stepping inside a giant Grecian temple. Classical stone pillars line the sides, rising to arches of deep intricate carvings that curve gracefully overhead. The chandelier is a giant undulatingriver of glass that seems to pour down from the center of the lavish gold ceiling.
I take in the two broad banks of grand tables laid for dinner. They are, in a word, unreal. Thousands of white and black roses have been fashioned into giant globes, hung strategically around the room. The combined effect is otherworldly; a dark fairytale made real. Blooming foliage is artfully snaking over the deep-colored soft-furnishings, as though reclaiming them. I’m momentarily swept up in the theater of it.
It must have been spectacular on the day. But now the edges of the petals have begun to fade to brown, there’s something haunting about it. My stomach turns, recalling the image of the remains. They must have been found somewhere to the back. Where the shining dance floor reflects the light. My nostrils are hit by a familiar smell. The clean-up fluids used by professionals in death.
The manager’s face mirrors my uneasiness. ‘I’ll wait just outside the room. I … would rather not go any further inside.’ He checks his watch. ‘You have fifty minutes.’
Mark and I walk alone, further into the room. At the back is a stage, and I can just make out three shapes hanging. Two dresses. One with someone inside. I feel my throat constrict by degrees.
The body, shot in close-up in the pictures I saw, can now be seen in all its awful majesty. It’s like a bizarre avant garde set-up. An art installation on the wrong side of good taste. But even I’m aware Adrianna Kensington doesn’t know any artists that nasty. It’s the strangest murder scene I have ever been to.
The victim has been strung up high above the stage of the Plaza, inside a bloodied wedding gown. Her hair is hacked and shorn away. As the features of the face come into focus, I freeze, trying to process what I’m seeing.
The head is hanging down, but … Shock waves ripple through me.
‘Is this … Is this some kind of sick prank?’ I demand. But as I turn to take in Mark’s face, I know it isn’t.
The dead woman is my former boss and mentor. The most brilliant and complicated woman in my life.
Attorney Simone Walters.
Chapter Nine
HOLLY
Simone’s body hangs limply inside a long silken wedding dress. Her feet point downwards, inches from the ground; a ghostly ballerina, floating. Her head has dropped to her chest, disguising some of the worse close-up injuries the pictures show.
Of all the hundreds of crime scenes I’ve attended, I’ve never had an emotional reaction like this. My chest feels like it’s closing in on itself. I put a hand out to steady myself, and finding thin air, stagger slightly.
Simone.
Suddenly the circumstances of our broken contact seem … if not unimportant, then at the very least, surmountable.
If I’d have known I would never see her again …
