Page 23 of The Lady Has a Past

Irene looked up from her notebook. “Violet. I don’t wear it, myself. It’s a little too heavy for my taste.”

“I don’t care for it, either,” Lyra said. “Irene is right. It’s on the heavy side.”

“I agree,” Elena said. “It feels East Coast somehow. Not California.”

Luther had been ignoring the byplay but he abruptly stopped pacing and turned around to look at the women.

“Why did Guppy leave New York?” he asked.

There was a short silence. Irene, Elena, and Lyra looked at each other. Irene shrugged.

“I’m sure the rent on Madison Avenue was sky-high,” she said. “It was probably costing her a fortune to keep the spa open.”

“I’ll bet she wanted to go after the celebrity market,” Lyra offered. “The Guppy image was starting to become a bit stodgy. Women of a certain age wear Violet. Younger women are turning to newer cosmetic lines. Guppy probably concluded that moving the spa to California and appealing to the Hollywood crowd would update the image of her brand. She’s always been very shrewd when it comes to marketing.”

Simon looked at Lyra. “You know a lot about marketing.”

“I was raised in the business world,” Lyra said.

And you took notes,Simon thought,because you planned to take over your father’s business empire.

He wondered how much it had hurt when Lyra realized she was not going to inherit control of Brazier Shipping because she wasn’t the son that her father had evidently wanted.I know the feeling.

Ruthlessly he shoved the past back into the shadows and focused on the present.

“Let’s think about this,” he said to Luther. “Miss Kirk told Lyra she was meeting an acquaintance, remember? The acquaintance probably chose the location. Given what we now know about the Labyrinth Springs Hotel and Spa, it’s safe to assume that Miss Kirk is not in the midst of a sudden health crisis.”

Luther’s jaw tightened. “None of this feels right.”

“I agree,” Lyra said. “And those clippings in the shoebox indicate that whoever called her is someone from her past.”

Irene tapped her pencil against the notebook. “It’s too late to telephone those East Coast newspapers. The offices will all be closed. But I’ll start contacting the morgues first thing in the morning.”

“The next step is to pay a visit to the Labyrinth Springs Hotel and Spa,” Simon said.

“Yes,” Luther said. “At the moment it’s our only lead. I’m coming with you.”

Oliver spoke up quietly. “Bad idea.”

“He’s right,” Lyra said. “You should not go to Labyrinth Springs, Mr. Pell. Not yet.”

Luther scowled. “Why the hell not?”

Lyra folded her arms and regarded him with a cool, commanding air. It was the look of a woman who was accustomed to giving orders and having them carried out.

“This is Raina Kirk we are dealing with here,” she said. “We don’t know for certain that she went to Labyrinth Springs, and if she did go, we don’t know why. There are, however, some things we do know.First, she wanted to keep her actions a secret from all of us. Second, if she doesn’t want us to know what she is doing, she will not welcome Mr. Cage and you barging into her personal business like a couple of maddened bulls entering a bullring.”

Simon blinked. “Maddened bulls?”

“Figure of speech,” Lyra said.

“My gut tells me Raina is in serious trouble,” Luther said.

“My intuition tells me the same thing.” Lyra inclined her head. “But if that’s true, there is even more reason to approach this situation with caution.”

Luther shot her a fierce look. “Got a better idea?”

As far as Simon could tell, Lyra was not intimidated.

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