Half a dozen bites later the steak was nearly gone. Cat found herself luxuriating over the peppery, winey fat coating the sides, and took forkfuls of salad in between the few final bites in order to sustain the meal. Bess pointed to the plate on the other side of the table.
“Go ahead,” Bess said with evident joy. “I ordered that one for Molly, but she’s obviously still out and about.”
Cat stood up and walked around the table, where she sat down at the opposite seat and repeated the process, devouring Molly’s steak with a pleasure she hadn’t known for months. It was real food, not just a half-cup of rice consumed alone in her apartment with a dash of hot sauce. The blood from the meat drained down her throat, its fat melted on her tongue, and the salad leaves bloomed in her mouth; by the time she’d polished off the second plate, she felt alive for the first time in weeks—and deeply exhausted. Cat looked up and across the table. Bess smiled and popped a final bite of steak into her mouth like it was a piece of popcorn.
“So. Who drugged us?” Cat asked, her mind finally clear.
“Who else has access?” Bess responded.
“Who gains from hurting us,” Cat said thoughtfully, “is maybe a better question. Hutton told me in the summer that solving a crime is about drilling down on the details. What would happen if we kept using all those products without knowing what’s in them?” She opened a window and lit a cigarette.
“We’d ruin the shoot tomorrow,” Bess said slowly. “Somebody else would have to take over.”
“Who?”
They sat there for a moment while Cat smoked, each thinking to themselves, until they both spoke at the same time:
“Lou,” they said together.
“Her ex-husband’s company manages this hotel,” Bess said. “She has access.”
“I’m sure she thought this shoot was supposed to be hers,” Cat realized. “She wants it back.” She exhaled a long, thin stream of white smoke.
“But,” Bess asked, “just to play devil’s advocate here for a moment, is that really worth poisoning your coworkers? Let’s be realistic. She has so much money. She doesn’t have to work.” She shook her head. “I agree that she wants you, both of us, out of the way. I’m sure she wants to take credit for our work. But I just don’t understand why.”
“Maybe it’s not hers, you know? Rich people never have their own money. It’s always tied up in investments and overseas accounts and whatever.” Cat took a long drag of her cigarette and lit a fresh one from its burning embers.
“Lou is a permalancer,” Bess replied thoughtfully. “It’s basically like being an undocumented worker. That’s certainly motivating. But if Lou knows October and November were both flops, why does she still think there’s a staff job waiting at the end of the rainbow? Why is she bothering to come to Paris?”
“Because this is her first job,” Cat realized. “She must not understand. Nobody in her family works. None of them. What is it they say on Lake Como: the grandfather starts the business, the father builds it, and the grandson goes snowboarding? Lou is a seventh-generation snowboarder.”
“That seems awfully naive, though. Even for Lou.”
“November isn’t out yet. Maybe her hopes are still high. What was it they put on the cover instead? Princess Sophie’s Bavarian castle—where Bormann slept?” Cat spit with disdain. “What’s next, Leni Riefenstahl’s gown collection?” Skillfully imitating Lou’s posh Home Counties accent, she continued, intoning, “Here is the Schiaparelli worn during the award ceremony for Triumph of the Will: a crepe-and-satin gown cut on the bias, with genuine ruby beadwork along the collar and repurposed baby teeth sewn onto the bust.”
“I don’t know,” Bess realized. “Nobody’s mentioned anything about November. We never even had a meeting about it. I didn’t even think about it. Honestly…I’ve been preoccupied with Jent.”
“I’ve been working on December and January. I didn’t think about it either. I didn’t want to.” Cat stubbed out her cigarette.
“Let’s find out what Lou’s been up to,” Bess said, grabbing her laptop off the counter and cracking it open.
“I already checked Photogram,” Cat said. “Nothing.”
“No. At work. Her password is ‘password,’” Bess said, laughing. “She told me when I showed her how to use CoopDoc. Let’s see if she has any pitches.”
Cat pulled up a chair to Bess’s side of the table. They didn’t find any pitches, but they did find an email to Margot, Paula, and Courtney Sacks from Legal, marked with the subject line THE FINAL DAYS OF CALLIE COURT.
When they finished reading the attachment, Bess cried.
“Callie went to Hampshire. We hung out a few times freshman year, she lived on my floor,” Bess said. “We drove to a party at Bard once, and he was all she could talk about in the car. I had completely forgotten.”
“This is the cruelest thing I’ve ever seen,” Cat agreed. “Look at Margot’s stone-cold response. She called it ‘perfection.’”
“How could they publish this?” Bess asked. “I mean…Jesus, her poor parents.”
“It’ll move,” Cat said sadly. “People will buy this. They’ll love it.”
Bess looked stricken. She suddenly looked up and met Cat’s eyes. “I just realized something,” she whispered. “What did Callie smell like before she died?”
Cat paused and tried to remember.
“She smelled like juniper,” she finally said. “Just like Christmas.”
Lou, clad once again in her incognito cat sweatshirt and Skechers, waited in the dwindling crowd outside the Mania presentation. She’d been looking for Cat and Bess for the past hour but couldn’t see them. They must have slipped out, she realized. Off to another party.
Her muscles twitched. Time for bed, her body screamed. She started walking swiftly back to her apartment, and recalled how Cat and Bess had looked the night before, lurching around their bathroom, with a deep satisfaction.
Stocking the room had been the easiest part. All she’d had to do was tell the concierge over the phone that she was thinking of investing in Panacea, the heritage brand from the United Kingdom used by the hotel the past hundred years. Would he mind switching out the bottles of what they had in stock with another, slightly cheaper option the Panacea board was presenting her with? She wanted to know if anyone could tell the difference, she’d insisted—and if anyone could, it would be the staff of RAGE. It was to be their little secret. I’m sure you understand.
He happily obliged. Anything for Madame Lucas.
So there was now a very potent mixture of uppers and downers in the bath gels, the shampoo, the conditioner, the moisturizers and perfumes, the linen sprays, the shaving cream, everything. Lou laughed just thinking about how easy it had been. She’d put more energy into choosing this stupid cat sweatshirt. She was so grateful for Bedford Organics. What had started out as a mere investment had gone on to pay dozens of dividends, not the least of which was an enormous profit.