Death On the Dlist (2010) by Nancy Grace Read Free Book Online

full-on face-lift, but still a star. And so was the new Mrs. Saxton, Lisa. She was an actress and had to be twenty years younger than him even if she was lying about her age by, say, seven or eight years.
    They’d met on a movie set. As soon as the affair took off, he dumped his wife, leaving her and his four kids, to move in with the actress.
    He glanced at the photos again. Even though they were set up to look like candids, on vacations and such, they all looked like glamour shots from the mall. They had to be professionally touched up . . . or were people actually this beautiful?
    He thought for a second about all the stars he’d caught without makeup and sold the shots to the tabs. The ones on the grand piano were touched up, no doubt about it.
    Hadden felt a tingle in his gut. He was on the verge of a huge paycheck, but this was dangerous. Skulking around an old Hollywood star’s place was a suicide mission.
    And they were pretty freaky about that out here because of squatters, people from the city who came out here off-season and took up in empty mansions until they were busted. Sometimes they made it a whole season, living the high life, eating the food out of inlaid Sub-Zero fridges, watching TV in fancy home theaters, sleeping on the thousand-count Egyptian-cotton bedsheets, until somebody recognized they were out of place.
    Usually they just ended up paying a fine. Owners didn’t want to be bothered with prosecuting. Just wanted their maids to change the sheets.
    Hadden better hurry. And Quinton better be out back and he damn well better have a dead body with him. Turning the corner, Hadden spotted him standing at the door of the pool house, guarding his find.
    “Hey, man. Show me the cash.”
    “Not one for small talk, huh? Okay. Here, here’s half. Show me the body and I’ll give you the rest.”
    Hadden took a fat roll of cash out of his right pocket and peeled off three grand. With no fanfare, he thrust it into Quinton’s right hand.
    “Where’s the other two?”
    “Right here in my pocket and it’ll be in yours the minute I see the body.”
    Quinton stalled for a moment, thinking over his options, but other than tackle Hadden right then and there, take the money and run, his only real choice was to hope Hadden would come through.
    “Okay. Follow me.”
    He led Hadden through a set of carefully manicured wisteria bushes, trained to wrap themselves around a lattice arch.
    And sure enough, there she was.
    “What a set of legs. It’s a shame.” It was all Quinton could think to say as Hadden stared through the glass door to the pool house.
    For a moment Hadden said nothing, and suddenly, Quinton was afraid he wouldn’t get the remaining two grand. “Hey, man. You said five grand if it was in a celeb’s house. And it is. You don’t get a whole lot bigger than Eric Saxton. Plus, there’s the wife. She’s a star, too.”
    “Shut up, Quinton. You’ll get the money. I’m just trying to place that tattoo she’s got on her ankle. I know I’ve seen it somewhere before.”
    Quinton squinted again through the glass. He was right. Guess a photographer’s eye caught it. There was a series of small, delicate, Chinese-looking characters down the inside of the girl’s left ankle.
    “What the hell? Who cares about a tattoo? She’s got her head blown off in Eric Saxton’s pool house!” Quinton didn’t feel like getting philosophical about the woman’s tattoo. He wanted to get his money, then get the hell out of here.
    “Yeah. Here’s the money.” Hadden got out his money ball again and counted out two thousand.
    Handing it to Quinton, he started to quickly assemble his Nikon, attaching a long lens to one end. “Now, it’ll only take me a minute to get some up-close shots . . . Call 911. Pronto.”
    “What’s my excuse for being back up here?”
    “Tell ’em you’re checking the recycle bins.”
    “But I already told the crew that!”
    “Whatever! Tell ’em you missed one! Just