Page 19 of The Perfect Poise

Hannah tried to hide her skepticism better than earlier as she asked her next question.

“Has she behaved oddly in your group meetings?’

“No, but we’ve only had one so far and there was another guy from class there for it, Van,” Clayton said. “We have another one scheduled for tonight in a study room at Langson but Van texted us that he had a wedding in Connecticut this weekend and his flight was delayed. He won’t be back until after midnight. I was going to postpone the group meeting but before I could, Dana texted that we should go ahead with it anyway, so we don’t fall behind. I was going to make up some excuse, but then I thought that it might be a good chance for you to see things for yourself."

“What do you mean?”

“I thought if you were nearby during the meeting, maybe you could listen in on our conversation,” he suggested. “I could try to get her to come clean and see if she’d admit to this stuff.”

“Then why do you need me there?” Hannah asked. “Why not just record her yourself?”

“Is that allowed?” He said. “I thought it might be illegal.”

“In general it is, since California is a ‘two-party consent’ state when it comes to recording conversations,” Hannah conceded, referring to what she’d learned from Kat during their multiple surveillance outings, “but there are exceptions. If you’re recording to gain evidence related to certain crimes or if you believe your personal safety is at risk, that can sometimes pass muster.”

“That’s good to know,” Claton said, “but all the same, I’d feel more comfortable if you were there. What if I call her out and she threatens me, turns the tables and accuses me of stalking her or something? If I don’t have a witness, it’s just a ‘he said, she said,’ situation. I worry what she might be capable of.”

“You know Clayton, if you’re this concerned maybe you should just go straight to campus police and ask for their help. Then if something escalates, you at least have a record to build on.”

“Listen,” he said, leaning in extra close. “I’ll do that if you say I should. But the whole reason I came to you first was because I was hoping to avoid the embarrassment.”

“What do you mean?”

“Come on,” he said, his tone pleading, “I know it’s not very modern of me to so say this, but it would look pretty lame for me to go the campus cops saying some petite co-ed has me scared. They’d laugh me out of there. I thought you were the option for people who didn’t want to go through official channels. Plus, there’s the other part.”

“What’s that?”

“It could be embarrassing for her too,” he whispered. “If this is legit, I didn’t want to ruin the girl’s life. I just want this to stop before it turns into full-on stalking. I thought you might have a softer touch than the cops. I don’t need you to confront her and demand answers. I was hoping we could sort this out this without anyone official needing to be involved, you know?”

Hannah looked at her phone. It was already 10:21. She needed to leave now so as not to be late to her next class. She sighed.

“I’ll look into it,” she told him as she stood up, “see what I can find out. Then I’ll get back to you.”

“You don’t want to do the library study room thing?” he asked, surprised.

“Like you said, I don’t want to ambush her if it can be avoided,” she said, throwing her backpack over her shoulder. “We can consider that option down the line. I’ll be in touch.”

“Okay,” he standing up and offering a weirdly awkward half-bow maneuver, “thanks for this.”

“I haven’t done anything yet,” she replied, “but you’re welcome.”

She turned and headed off to class. Her first instinct was to think that Clayton Callum was paranoid. But as she had learned the hard way, just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean someone’s not after you.

CHAPTER NINE

Isabella Moreno wasn’t used to being this nervous.

As a world-famous fashion model who started her career at sixteen, she had become accustomed to people gawking at her. But this was different.

After a decade in the industry, she was launching her own fashion line for the first time. As she left Monica, Monica!, the Beverly Grove boutique belonging to her fashion designer friend, Monica Bertoni, she finally allowed herself to breathe.

She looked at the time. It was 11:17. She thought that her fifteen-minute pitch to Monica had gone well. She took the elevator down to the parking level and used the alone time to allow her body to recalibrate.

Monica had invited her to come pitch her line as a practice run for going to the bigger designers, one of whom might agree to partner with her. She’d envisioned something like “Isabella by Dior” or “Isabella + Versace.”

Of course, she didn’t really need their help to make her dream a reality. Her father, Carlo Moreno, was the chairman of Moreno Venture Capital, or MVC, which was valued, at least according to CNBC, at between $3-3.5 billion. His personal wealth was estimated at half that. Isabella had access to about $250 million of it without having to get Daddy’s authorization, not to mention another $18 million she’d earned all on her own through modeling and endorsements.

So she could make this fashion line happen on her own. But the endeavor would be more credible, and generate more buzz, if she could partner with a respected design house.

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