The Bling Ring by Nancy Jo Sales Page A

picked up by a network. Whatever the reason for her confessions, she clearly felt traumatized by something.
    â€œYou seem really emotional,” I said. “Are you okay?”
    â€œI’m fine,” she said, sniffling again. “I’d rather talk about it than not talk about it.”
    She would have gone on talking about her pain that day, but Rubenstein cut the interview short, saying Alexis would be available another time. I was disappointed that he wouldn’t allow her to discuss her case, but he assured me she would do so eventually. On my way out of the office, I stopped by a conference room where Alexis was now meeting with Susan Haber and her mother, Andrea. Alexis was begging Haber to let her fly off to Mexico with a friend on his private jet.
    â€œMy friends are telling me, ‘you need to chill out,’ ” Alexis was saying. Her voice had taken on a different tone—it sounded flip.
    Haber reminded her that she was not allowed to travel out of the state, much less out of the country, as she was a suspect in a burglary case.
    â€œNobody will find out,” Alexis whined.
    â€œYou’d be in Mexico and TMZ would catch you on a beach,” Haber said.
    It turned out that Alexis actually wanted to go to Mexico for a Pretty Wild shoot in Cabo San Lucas, which she eventually did. The episode, “What Happens in Cabo, Stays in Cabo” featured Alexis and Tess doing a photo shoot in bikinis to “raise money for Haiti.” “We are successful, strong independent women. I know this is the truth. . .and so it is,” they prayed, outfitted in their bikinis.
    Alexis started telling me more about her career.
    â€œI started modeling about four years ago,” she said, brightening up. She said she booked her jobs herself; she didn’t belong to an agency. “Just print work. I’m not tall enough to do runway unfortunately. I wish . Maybe in, like, six-inch pumps.
    â€œI went to Paris in August and stayed at the Crillon [Hotel]”—this was for the Issa Lingerie shoot for FashionTV—“and it was gorgeous ,” she said. “I flew first-class there and back. . . .I took my sister Tess. We got shopping money every day and a personal driver and Ferraris and Mercedes took us around. It was like two weeks of total luxury . It was incredible .”
    Andrea said, “It wasn’t two weeks, it was—”
    â€œIt was almost,” Alexis insisted. “It was so cool.”
    I observed that she seemed to have a fabulous life for one so young.
    â€œOh, you don’t even know ,” Alexis said, laughing. “I’ve been dating [an Academy Award–winning actor] and Tess is dating Kid Rock.” (In March 2009, Tess posted a picture of herself and Kid Rock posing, along with several other girls, on her MySpace page.)
    Andrea knitted her brow. “You went on one date,” she said. “Unfortunately, she’s over 18 and I can’t say anything,” she told me.
    â€œWe were in this house,” Alexis said, ignoring her mother, “and [the Academy Award–winning actor] takes my Dior red lipstick out of my purse and rubs it all over his lips and turns around and does this 15-minute monologue as a transvestite. It was so funny, so amazing.”
    I said I remembered reading something about how the Academy Award–winning actor had gotten back together with his wife.
    â€œTabloids lie,” Alexis scoffed. “When you read he’s back together with her, he’s not ; he’s just doing it for the kids.”
    Later, my cop source, who had had access to Alexis’ cell phone at some point, told me, “Alexis had sent some texts asking [the Academy Award–winning actor] to hang out with her, kind of clingy. He was very polite about it.”
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    â€œAlexis is going to jail,” my cop source said one day in November 2009. We were sitting in Du-par’s, an