It’s a secret I plan to take to my grave, and damned if I’ll let a meddling, rumor-spreading porn star expose my greatest shame.
I lean my head against the wall and go over what we’ve got so far. The PIs—Dave and the two other Vegas PIs we just hired, Julie and Roberto—have found a few good leads:
1. Josh Smith is Michael Lockwood’s third cousin. This gives Smith more incentive than Priscilla’s willing pussy to cover up any Priscilla or Lockwood involvement in the disappearance.
2. The night Priscilla invaded my plane, a man searched both of my homes in Vegas. Marchant’s guy, Dave, captured the whole thing on film, indicating that, for now at least, the bad guys have no idea that we are onto them—or rather no idea that we’ve got Dave on their asses.
3. This one is the big kahuna. The one that gives me hope. Apparently, about a year and a half ago, just before Priscilla’s affair with Governor Carlson began, one of the governor’s mistresses went missing. Maybe. Missy King was a working girl—an exclusive, ‘private’ escort—that the governor met at a brothel on The Strip. He saw her regularly, even took her to social engagements—until he didn’t anymore. There are no missing person reports, and there has never been a police investigation. But her friends—some of them Love Inc. women—tell Dave they think she was kidnapped, and the LVPD did nothing to find her.
Priscilla’s cell phone is bugged as of today, so I’m impatiently anticipating the next time she talks to the governor. Or to Smith. Or Lockwood, for that matter. I’m hoping they’ll fill in some of the pieces, because right now I don’t know what this is.
I’m inclined to speculate that the governor is in all of this somewhere; he’d serve as a link between Lockwood and Priscilla, and if I’m being generous or hopeful, he could tie both Priscilla and Lockwood to another disappearance. But again, that’s hopeful. Right now I’ve got nothing.
The most important thing I can do to remedy that is go to the gala. In my most ambitious plan, I can get my hands on Lockwood’s cell phone. He’ll be there because, like me, he’s brawling at the Joseph Club tomorrow night in the name of charity.
Marchant wouldn’t sign up for the brawl—something about winning making him look like a pimp and losing making him look like a loser—so I paid my five grand and slid into a spot vacated by a Vegas councilman who sprained his ankle.
There was nothing Priscilla could do to keep me out of the party at the Heat Mansion, so she pretended to be pleased. I wonder if she’s coming up here now to try to keep me away.
As if on cue, the door to my penthouse swings open with a whoosh of air. I let her get a few paces inside before I slam the door shut, jumping on her from behind. I sweep her up into my arms and tear her coat open.
She squeals, and I hear something drop. I spin her in a circle and see a big, leather bag sprawled on my floor.
“What did you bring me?”
She winks. “Why don’t you open it and see?”
Chapter 14
Elizabeth
WHEN MARCHANT RADCLIFFE started Love Inc., it was a high-end brothel on the Vegas Strip. According to the Wikipedia page, Marchant never wanted a regular brothel. He wanted a place where the escorts were treated like employees in other well-paying professions—they have excellent health insurance, 401Ks, and the top performers can even buy a stake in the company.
He wanted a different kind of clientele, too. Wealthy. Connected. Men and women who appreciated an upscale ambiance and a whole lot of privacy.
I’m guessing this must be Wiki’s way of saying he wanted to keep the riff-raff out. Eliminate tourists, bachelors, and shut-ins.
After only a year or two, he opened another location in a rural area southwest of Vegas, on a plot of land so large it’s a bonna fide green spot on my GPS. If I recall, it’s something like three hundred acres. For several years, the location on the Strip acted as a gatekeeper. If the escorts liked a client or the client was regular enough, they got invited to the ranch. The Strip location was swanky enough that it competed easily with more established places, so Love Inc. grew as a name brand, but all the while, the ranch was building an identity of its own.
According to Forbes, the ranch location made more than $500 million last year. It has two dozen full-time female escorts and seven full-time male escorts who live on the grounds, setting their own prices and choosing their own clients. Many of them have worked there five years or more. The place has a job-satisfaction rating higher than Google.
Somehow, the Love Inc. Ranch has come to be known as the ‘fluffy bunny’ ranch. I’ve heard it’s not fluffy—all kinds of prostitution goes on there, even some of the more hard stuff—but it’s nicer than any of the comps.