Page 8 of The Perfect Illusion (Jessie Hunt #39)

Jessie reminded herself to stay cool.

The drive south to Marcus Sullivan’s Westport Beach office had taken nearly an hour and she’d gotten increasingly agitated on the way. That was partly due to the traffic. But it was also because this was the community where she had once lived.

At one time, it was where she’d thought she would spend her life—with her then-husband, Kyle, in their McMansion, possibly raising a family. That was all before he turned out to be a sociopathic killer who tried to frame her for murder and then kill her.

It might not have been fair, but by the time she and Brady had parked at Sullivan's building and gotten into the elevator up to his floor, she was ready to go off on the man.

Even if he wasn't a killer, the record showed that he was, at the very least, a predator.

And sometimes predators had to be put down.

“You okay?” Brady asked her, snapping her out of her revenge fantasy.

“Yeah. Why?”

“Your whole body is clenched up and it sounds like you’re grinding your teeth,” he said before adding with a smile, “Don’t worry. I’ll protect you if this guy gets handsy.”

She knew the crack was just an attempt to lighten the mood.

Brady wasn’t in the kind of shape required to protect himself, much less her.

He knew that. Besides, he was well aware of her self-defense training.

She’d even taken a course with the FBI once.

If she had to, she could kick Marcus Sullivan’s ass.

But despite Brady's attempt at humor, she wasn't amused. Sullivan had a comeuppance coming his way. A big part of her hoped he was their guy so she would have an excuse to get physical. As she processed that realization, Jessie realized she needed to rein things in.

“I just want to be ready for how this guy reacts when we come at him,” she lied. “I guess that’s making me a little tense.”

The truth was that she wasn’t tense at all. She was primed in anticipation of what she might get to do. And it scared her. If she could almost taste the pleasure she’d take in beating Sullivan down before knowing his guilt or innocence, what might she do if she had proof of his involvement?

Jessie closed her eyes for a second, hoping that by focusing on centering herself, she could get a grip.

It felt like that grip was loosening every day.

Of late, even small affronts had her clenching her fists or grinding her teeth.

She feared that it wouldn’t take much to make her cross the line into acting on her bloodlust.

It didn't help that she didn't see any path forward to resolving the tension she constantly felt pressing on her from the inside out.

Therapy wasn't helping. The side effects of medication made them a no-go.

Treatment facilities didn't offer enough privacy for someone with her public profile.

What other options did she have? It felt like the walls were closing in on her, and the only way out was to blow a hole in whatever got in her way.

The elevator dinged and her eyes snapped open. She noticed that Brady was staring at her apprehensively.

“You sure you’re good?” he asked.

“I’m sure,” she said with a conviction she didn’t feel as she stepped out into the hallway.

Though this office tower was impressive from the outside, the interior left a lot to be desired. The carpeting along the hallway was worn beyond repair. The wallpaper looked like it hadn’t been replaced since the 1980s. The whole floor smelled musty.

They walked until they reached the door for suite 807, which had a doorplate that read: Sullivan Events . Jessie wasn’t sure if that meant the guy did more than pageants or that he just preferred to keep things vague for an air of mystery.

Brady tried the door handle, but it was locked. Jessie pointed to the old-fashioned buzzer to the right of the door. Brady pushed it, and a static-y voice came through the small speaker box.

“Yes?” asked a scratchy female voice.

“This is Detective Bowen of the Los Angeles Police Department,” Brady said firmly. “We need to speak with Mr. Sullivan.”

After a brief pause, the voice returned.

“Hold on.”

Jessie looked at her partner for the day.

“Do you find it odd that a pageant organizer in a nondescript office in a decrepit building feels the need to lock his door?” she asked.

“What are you saying—that he gets a lot of angry walk-ins and this is his way of avoiding them?”

“The thought had crossed my mind,” Jessie said.

Before Brady could reply, the door opened to reveal a woman in her sixties with short, gray curly hair. Bifocals hung from a chain around her neck, and she wore a threadbare magenta sweater that looked like it was on its last legs.

“IDs,” she said in the same, unimpressed scratchy voice they’d heard over the speaker as she held her glasses up to her face.

They both held them up for her. She squinted at them, then, apparently satisfied, motioned for them to enter. Jessie stepped in first and looked around. There wasn’t much to see. The waiting room was comprised of the woman’s desk, three filing cabinets, two metal folding chairs, and another door.

“Mr. Sullivan is in his office,” the woman said. “I’ll let him know you’re here.”

She walked the six steps to the door and rapped on it.

“What?” Sullivan barked from the other side.

The woman opened the door and poked her head in.

“Police,” she barked back. “They want to chat.”

They heard scrambling, and for half a second, Jessie thought the guy might be trying to make a run for it. Instead, he appeared in the doorway with a scowl on his face.

Marcus Sullivan looked as weathered as his office. She already knew from the information that Jamil and Beth provided that he was 49. But the photos they’d sent of him didn’t reflect just how the years had worn him down.

His face was a strange, unnatural mix of wrinkles and smooth lines.

It was if he’d gotten Botox treatments but didn’t have enough money to finish the whole job yet.

His hair was black, but the roots and ends had hints of gray where the dye job was starting to fade.

He was dressed in jeans and an Oxford shirt that was one button too open for Jessie’s taste.

The sport coat he’d clearly just thrown on was fraying at the lapels.

If his attire was any indication, it didn’t appear that the pageant business was doing all that well.

“What’s this about?” he demanded.

“We’d like to talk to you about a former employee,” Brady said, keeping things as vague as he could until they felt obligated to get more specific.

“Am I in some kind of trouble?” he asked, “because I’ve been the victim of a bunch of witch hunts.”

"No, not at all," Brady told him, lying with a warmth and friendliness that Jessie found impressive. "We just heard that you'd be a real asset in providing some background information on a case we're looking into. It shouldn't take more than five minutes. Mind if we have a seat?"

He stepped into the office without waiting for permission, and Jessie followed suit.

This room was no more impressive than the rest of the place.

The carpet was so worn in places that the flooring was visible underneath.

Sullivan's desk, a rickety wooden behemoth, looked like it might collapse at any moment.

The frame of the decaying couch intended for guests was so compromised that it sank in the middle.

It also had multiple stains on it. Jessie remained standing.

The walls were covered with plaques and framed certificates. But as Jessie peered closer, she realized that nearly all of them merely announced Sullivan’s participation in various events and weren’t actual awards of accomplishment.

The one saving grace of the place was the window, which would have offered a nice view, if not for the equally tall, older building across the way that obscured any chance to see what was beyond it.

“We wanted to ask you about one of your upcoming pageants,” Brady said, plopping down on the couch. He apparently had no reservations about its hygiene.

“I thought you had a question about a former employee,” Sullivan said suspiciously.

“We’ll get to that,” Brady promised.

“Okay, what do you want to know?” Sullivan asked, returning to the chair behind his desk. When he sat down, it groaned loudly.

“How do you select the judges for something like that?” Jessie asked, doing her best to sound genuinely interested.

Sullivan leaned back in his chair. As she'd hoped, the question relaxed him. It was an opportunity to mansplain to her, and he leapt at the chance.

“It’s a complicated process,” he said. “I like to get a mix of judges from different walks of life. Sometime we’ll include a local community leader, like a council person or member of a chamber of commerce.

We might also pursue a celebrity of some kind.

The size of the pageant often determines how big a name we can get.

And then we’ll want some kind of expert, maybe a past pageant winner or a consultant of some kind. ”

“Are you using a pageant winner for the Costa Mesa event?” Jessie wondered.

"As a matter of fact, we are," he said. "We're going with a charming young lady who was Miss Altadena, 2019."

“Oh,” Jessie said, feigning surprise.

“What’s wrong with that?” Sullivan asked, leaning in uncertainty.

“Nothing,” she said with a wave. “I just figured you’d prefer a pageant winner from the area where the event was taking place, to make it more personal for everyone there.”

Sullivan eyed her, clearly weighing how forthright to be in his next answer.

To Jessie’s mind, there was no legitimate reason not to come clean.

If he wasn’t involved in Patricia Hollinger’s death, there was no point in hiding his invitation to her.

And if he was responsible, he had to know why they were here.

Pretending to be clueless would only make him look more guilty.

“I actually did try a local first, or at least a former local,” he said. “My go-to pageant rep for Orange County moved to Florida in January so I reached out to our former Miss Huntington Beach from a while ago, but she declined.”

“Who was that?” Brady asked.

"Her name is Patricia Corning, or at least it was when I knew her," Sullivan said. "It's been almost a decade, so she might have gotten married and changed it."

“You haven’t spoken to her in all that time?” Jessie pressed.

“No. We kind of fell out of touch.”

“Why did she decline?” Jessie asked.

“She didn’t say,” he told her, his tone more guarded now. “Is she the former employee you mentioned?”

Jessie looked over at Brady, who was sitting casually on the couch as if everything was chill. She wanted to catch his eye to see if he was on board with her getting more aggressive with Sullivan. But he was focused on the man and didn’t look her way. She decided to go for it anyway.

"Do you think it might be because of the slew of harassment claims you've faced over the years?"