Death On the Dlist (2010) by Nancy Grace Page B

Ha, ha! It was Tofurkey! A tofu substitute!”
    Gritting her teeth, she punched in the letters and hit “send.” This was ridiculous. Could she block his never-ending text messages? But if she didn’t keep writing this kid back, the press could make hay over her breaking the heart of an Eagle Scout in Slidell, Louisiana, or wherever . . .
    No sense risking that. Sweat was rolling down her back. Why did this actress get a lead role on a Lifetime movie? She was horrible.
    She, Fallon Malone, would have been so much better. Were these people that blind? Couldn’t they see what a box office draw she still was? She’d even be willing to wash another car without a stitch on underneath . . . or a van . . . even an eighteen-wheeler . . . anything . . .
    Turning the volume up on Lifetime, she waited for the next BlackBerry jingle.

Chapter 15
    THIS WOULD DRIVE HIS MOTHER CRAZY. THE FACT THAT HE, FRANCIS Merle McGinnis, was texting back and forth with Fallon Malone. And Malone wasn’t the only one. He texted, e-mailed, hand-wrote letters to them all. And they wrote back. Why?
    Because they were into him.
    He made it a ritual to devote time to each one of the women every day; he recorded every TV appearance he could find, even going so far as having a satellite dish installed to get hundreds more channels than local cable offered. Now Francis had access to thousands of channels on which to find them. Even the repeats. Of course, live TV was the best because then he could get fresh signals, messages especially to him from the ladies via the airwaves.
    It was their secret. The casual viewer would never catch on. A tilt of the head, a wink of the eye, pushing hair back from the face or behind the ear, touching a necklace or earring—each move had significance. He loved communicating with them like this, and told them so in all the letters he sent. It was in the letters that he prearranged what each signal would mean. There were different love signals from each lady.
    They were into it.
    He had loved watching Celebrity Closets over and over. Prentiss was always gorgeous, but over the last few months, he had gotten really concerned she was dressing a little slutty. She was totally coming across as a tramp. Not that he’d ever tell his mother he agreed with her even in the slightest.
    He’d written to Prentiss several times about her image problem, nice, long letters. He had tried to stop her from looking so cheap, flaunting herself. She was ruining her image, plus other men could mistake the look for a come-on.
    After all, Prentiss was already taken. They’d had an intimate relationship for years, since long before Celebrity Closets hit the airwaves. He stuck with her through thick and thin. And what did she do? Wear low-cut blouses, tube tops, mini-skirts, you name it. Plus, she flirted outrageously with the male celebrities and Francis was convinced she did a better job on their closets than she did for female celebrities. It was subtle, maybe the shelf liner was more upscale, more shoe space . . . Francis noticed details like these. Subtle . . . but important details.
    She even flirted with some of the workmen on the show, construction guys responsible for tearing down walls and building shelves. But that was all for ratings, it didn’t mean anything at all . . . and Francis had been very understanding and patient . . . up to a point. Then, he had to endure the trumped-up claim she’d had an affair with one of the young and talented celebrities whose closet she “designed,” but Francis stayed strong and sure enough, it all blew over.
    It obviously wasn’t true. She’d never cheated, he was sure. At least, pretty sure.
    But Prentiss wouldn’t respond to his letters. She just wouldn’t listen. She’d put her career before his wishes. She didn’t understand his motivation. She refused to see it wasn’t that he was jealous, he was trying to help her. But she kept right on with the slutty look no matter how much he warned