Page 57 of The Perfect Poise

“Yes,” he confirmed, “at a rate of about four to one.”

“So,” Jessie mused, speaking aloud what she suspected the researcher was hinting at, “are you thinking that the art works might be a front for some other kind of business?"

“The thought had occurred to me,” he admitted. “I just can’t imagine this woman wasting her time on the sale and purchase of bland reprints when she deals in other, original works valued in the millions. It just doesn’t make any sense.”

“So maybe these transactions are covers for the sale of something else,” Jessie said, “something illicit.”

“Drugs perhaps,” Ryan volunteered. “It wouldn’t be the first time that an art dealer subsidized their lifestyle that way.”

“But why take that kind of risk when she didn’t need any help paying for stuff anymore?” Beth asked.

“And just for the record,” Jamil added, “the preliminary toxicology screen from her autopsy came back a few hours ago. It showed traces of alcohol but no drugs, so it doesn’t seem that if drugs were her thing, they were for her personal use.”

Jessie thought back to what she knew about Chloe Baptiste—how she was willing to push the boundaries of propriety when it came to pressuring artists and gallery owners. Even when it clearly wasn’t necessary, considering that she could outbid almost anyone, she seemed to like the thrill of bending people to her will. Chloe Baptiste liked to play with fire.

“What if it’s not drugs?” she pondered aloud. “What if it’s sex?”

“You think she was an escort?” Ryan asked in disbelief.

“No, that doesn’t seem like her style,” Jessie said, “but trafficking in the sale of sex through other people does seem like the kind of thing that might give her a buzz.”

“That would also be incredibly risky for someone in her position,” Ryan countered.

“Actually,” Jamil piped in, “now that I look at it more closely, Chloe seems to have always sold the same prints. When she bought pieces, they varied. But almost all of her sales are prints of the same eight to ten works.”

“That could make sense,” Jessie agreed. “If each work was a code name for an escort, it would make it easy for her talk to potential clients about who they wanted, by naming pieces instead of people.”

“It would also make it easier to do the books,” Jamil added, “and to see which escort was ‘selling’ the most.”

“This is a great theory,” Ryan said, “but do we have any actual hard evidence to confirm that Baptiste is running an escort ring?”

“I don’t know about hard evidence,” Beth volunteered, “but when you guys started discussing the possibility, I pulled up security footage from the office warehouse that Baptiste operated from. I’ve only gone back a few weeks so far, but there is what I’d call a disproportionate number of super-attractive women who entered and left the facility in that time, and they come and go on a pretty regular basis. It could be completely innocent, but it fits with your hypothesis.”

“Okay,” Jessie summed up, “so if we play this theory out, now we have another motive for killing Chloe Baptiste. Maybe she pulled those hardball tactics she’s known for on the wrong client, threatened to reveal that he was paying for sex unless he gave her more money? Or maybe some other person in the same business decided to take out the competition.”

“But how does that explain the other murders?” Beth asked.

“Well, both Isabella Moreno and Lila Warwick are young, attractive women,” Ryan pointed out. “Maybe they were employed by Chloe, and maybe the same client who didn’t want her revealing his secrets decided to take them out too.”

It was a compelling theory, but it didn’t sit quite right with Jessie. These killings felt like they were motivated more by anger than desperation. Plus, both Isabella and Lila were public figures whose livelihoods could be ruined if they were to work as call girls and it came to light. Beyond that, the theory didn’t explain the death of Fiona Greene. She seemed like the kind of person who detested getting her hands dirty. It was hard to imagine her embracing the inherently grimy world of sex work, no matter how “high class.”

“Maybe,” she said, “but I’m not sure all those puzzle pieces fit together.”

“Still,” Ryan pressed, “we should look into who bought those prints. That could be a whole other group of potential suspects.”

“I just found something else,” Beth told them. “Should I set it aside to work on this list of johns with Jamil?”

“What did you find?” Jessie asked.

“I was running Lila Warwick through the system to see if there were any connections among her and the other victims. I found one, but it doesn’t look like it fits with this lead.”

“Tell us anyway,” Jessie told her.

“Well, it looks like two of them—Chloe Baptiste and Lila Warwick—shared the same financial advisor, a woman named Adrienne Shaw,” she said. “The firm that Shaw works for, Wealth Consultants West, or WCW, specializes in helping ultra-high-net-worth individuals and for both of them, she was the primary advisor. The firm also advises the Moreno family, although Shaw isn’t listed as their advisor. And unfortunately, there’s no indication that Shaw ever worked with Fiona Greene. In fact Greene’s financial advisors are with a different firm altogether.”

Jessie had gotten her hopes up briefly, only to have them dashed by the last revelation. But them another thought occurred to her.

“What about before she joined WCW?” she asked. “Did Shaw ever work at Greene’s firm?”

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