The Last Embrace by Denise Hamilton

took quite a shine to Kitty. He based several of his heroines on her. I think she was flattered.”
    “I would have been flattered,” said Jeanne fervently.
    “What pictures did he write?”
    “He hasn’t actually sold any of them yet.”
    “Ah.”
    “He says true genius is rarely rewarded,” Jeanne continued. “But he’s absolutely devoted to his art. Once he tied me to a chair and gagged me and took notes while I tried to break free.”
    “Good God, Jeanne,” said Red, “you never told me he’s a pervert!”
    “You have a filthy mind, Red. It wasn’t any kink. I gave him permission. He was writing a scene about an abducted girl and wanted to make it as realistic as possible.”
    “You poor sap, and you believed him?”
    “Kitty did too.” Jeanne pouted. “He gave us money for ‘modeling’ when he had any. His family is very stingy with him. It was fun, like method acting. And when he read us the scenes, well, they were magnificent.”
    “What a load of hogwash,” said Red. “Lily, I had no idea what they’d been up to with him. Jeanne, did you tell Detective Pico about this?”
    Jeanne blinked. “I didn’t think it was relevant.”
    “You didn’t think…” Red threw up her hands.
    “Kitty and I both posed for those pictures, and I’m still alive, so it can’t be Freddy,” Jeanne said. “Besides, he’s an aristocrat, he wouldn’t be capable of—”
    “I hate to break it to you, girls,” Lily said, “but I’ve lived in England and Freddy Taunton is no more a British aristocrat than I am.”
    She explained about posh accents and added, “So if he’s lied about that, what else is he concealing?”
    Had Freddy gotten carried away while doing “research” on Kitty, then panicked and dumped the body?
    Lily asked where Freddy lived.
    “The Radcliffe Arms, near Santa Monica and Western. Sixteen fifty-seven Radcliffe. He’s in Apartment E.”
    As Red marched Jeanne downstairs to inform the police about Freddy’s “photo shoots,” Lily decided she wanted to look through his apartment. If he was really leaving on a fishing trip, that wouldn’t prove too difficult. She’d wait a few hours, then set off. But if he was lying…
    Lily picked the last of Kitty’s sundresses off the floor and noticed a strained seam. Just then Red returned, saying they’d left a message for the detectives.
    “Didn’t Kitty have nice clothes?” Red asked. “Here, let me help you with that.”
    She tugged the dress out of Lily’s hands. “Why don’t you take a rest, I’ll finish up.”
    Lily walked to the upholstered chair by the window and sat down. Across the street, the mottled trunk of a western sycamore glowed silver in the moonlight.
    “Red, you’ve told me about Max, and now there’s this Freddy, but did Kitty have any serious boyfriends? Someone she might have kept secret? A gangster, maybe?”
    “Kitty, serious?” Red tittered and put a hand to her mouth, not very convincingly. “Kitty was a gal who liked to keep her options open.”
    “Red,” Lily persisted, “was Kitty seeing anyone regularly?”
    Red inhaled sharply. “Sometimes she acted as if she was suffering through a bad love affair…”
    “Do you know his name?”
    Red pouted. “No. But as I told that Detective Pico, whatever was troubling her seemed to fall away a few weeks ago. Like she’d made up her mind about something. ‘I’ve had a hard time of it lately, Reddy,’ she said one morning, just the two of us in the kitchen, ‘but everything’s going to be okay.’ Then she squeezed my hand. Some of the girls here, they resented her, they thought she put on airs, but not me. I was probably her best friend, though Beverly thinks she was.”
    “She never told you any details?”
    Red reared back, insulted. “I didn’t ask. She was very private. So am I. And now I’ve really got to—” She opened the door and took a quick breath. Fumiko stood in the hallway, her ear to the door, a guilty look on her