Beauty & The Beast (Book 1)

30. The next moment

Cat called Tess after leaving the studio and told her to meet her outside the gallery, telling her she had a lead on Daphne and about the paintings, saying some clean up crew found it and reported it.

"Hey, who's Daphne Kennedy?" Tess asks when Cat pulls up at the address and gets out of her car.

"Nicholas's girlfriend, those paintings in the studio are all of her."

"Was she at the gallery tonight?"

"Yeah, she said she barely knew the guy but when I mentioned the apartment that he leased, she took off. I don't think she realized he wanted to move in with her."

"If she was his girlfriend wouldn't she know?"

"Unless someone made her doubt that he loved her. And the person who wouldn't want her to move in with her boyfriend is her pimp."

Tess nods at the house. "No, try Madam. Lauren, the curator, she conveniently left the gallery right after she saw me." Tess had followed up on Lauren's strange behaviour and managed to find this out.

"Makes sense." Cat takes out a glove. "Found this at the studio. People are supposed to use those when they move art."

"People as in a curator with a gallery show."

"Could explain our white fibres."

"I had a unit out on Lauren's apartment. Our curator got home ten minutes ago."

A couple of blocks away, they pull up to the apartment building.

"Anyone enter the building in the last ten minutes?" Cat asks the officer at the entrance.

"A woman, early twenties."

"Green dress?"

"Yeah."

Cat and Tess make their way in, walking down the quiet hallway, only to hear muffled voices coming from behind one of the doors.

"That's Lauren's apartment," Tess says, listening to one of the more distinct voices. They arm themselves and Cat rushes up to the door.

"NYPD! Open up!" She yells, knocking three times. They open the door themselves and enter in time to hear Daphne.

"He's dead, and I can never get him back."

"This has been a terrible shock, but I swear I had nothing to do with this Daphne," Lauren placates. She is standing with folded hands in front of Daphne, who is pointing a handgun at her, begging her not to shoot.

"Drop your weapon. Daphne don't do this," Cat says, Lauren looking towards the two of them gratefully.

"You couldn't stand the thought that I might actually be happy," Daphne chokes.

"Nicholas wouldn't want this for you," Cat tells the crying girl.

"She told me I was just a call girl," Daphne says shakily. "That I meant nothing to him. That I wasn't worthy of love."

"He was gonna leave you anyways, they always do," Lauren says.

"Lauren didn't wanna miss one of her best money makers, isn't that right?" Tess keeps her gun on Daphne and her eyes on Lauren.

"He swore to me he wasn't sleeping with any of the other girls but I didn't believe him because of your lies."

"Nicholas knew he had to get Daphne away from you, that's what that phone call was about. Not the price of the paintings but the price of Daphne's freedom," Cat turns to Lauren.

"What?" Daphne asks, gulping.

"That's not true," Lauren assures her.

"But he didn't have the money to buy her out. So what did he do Lauren? Threaten to expose the entire operation? Turn over that client list?"