She was also puzzled. Susan Miles looked very much like her, yet very different. Apparently the receptionist had missed the resemblance. Now, studying Susan, Lauren could understand why.
Susan’s hair was far lighter than Lauren’s, for one thing. It had obviously been colored, though there was nothing obviously doctored about the blond, sun-streaked tangle. It blended perfectly with Susan’s skin tone and makeup and looked completely natural.
Makeup. Yes, another difference. While Lauren wore it lightly and for simple enhancement, Susan’s makeup sculpted her face, shading and contouring with a skill that was remarkable. Plastic surgery? Lauren doubted it. Yet there was something about the nose … a small bump …
The woman who’d been with Susan left. Susan bent over the desk to examine the appointment book, then followed the receptionist’s finger to Lauren and Matt. She smiled as she straightened and approached them, but her smile wavered as she neared. Lauren thought she saw a faint drain of color from Susan’s face. The smile remained but was more forced.
Lauren stood up, finding solace in the warmth of Matt’s body by her side. If Susan was playing a part, she herself was doing no less. She held out her hand, willing it not to shake. “Michele?”
Susan met her clasp. “Yes. You’re Lauren. And …” Her gaze slid to Matt.
“Matt Kruger,” he said with a smile.
Susan nodded, but she was already looking back at Lauren. She folded her hands at her waist, hesitated a minute too long, then cleared her throat. “Well. You’re here for a consultation. Why don’t you come back to my office?”
They followed her down the hall to the last door on the right. The office they entered was simply decorated and furnished, exuding the same quiet dignity as the front room had. Large semiabstract watercolors—one of a woman’s face—hung on the walls. Had it been another time, Lauren would have paused to admire the pictures themselves, if not their matting and framing, but she was too busy trying to organize her words and thoughts to handle anything else.
They were all three seated—Susan behind her desk, Matt and Lauren in comfortable chairs before it—when Susan spoke. “What can I do for you?” she asked. Her tone was thoroughly cordial, even warm. The wariness in her eyes was subtle enough to go unnoticed by any but the most watchful of observers. Lauren and Matt were that.
Lauren went straight for the heart. “You’ve noticed the resemblance, haven’t you?”
Susan frowned. “Resemblance?” Her expression was one of confusion, but it was studied. A second, almost imperceptible drain of color from her face betrayed her.
“I have a problem,” Lauren explained softly, her eyes never once leaving Susan’s. “I was hoping you could help me. Several months back I had plastic surgery, reconstructive work, actually, to correct a long-standing medical problem. The work was extensive, and when it was done, I looked like a new person. But after I returned to the States—the clinic where I had the surgery was in the Bahamas—I ran into trouble. Things started happening. Odd things. Dangerous things.” She gave several examples, then paused, looking for a reaction in Susan. But the latter, aside from her underlying pallor, remained composed, so Lauren went on.
“Matt and I put two and two together when I began to get letters addressed to Susan Miles. We realized that I was being mistaken for someone else, but we couldn’t find a Susan Miles in the area and we didn’t know what to do next. Then, just about a week ago, I was abducted, forced off the street into a car by two men who firmly believed I was Susan Miles.”
Susan blinked. That was all.
“They drove me around for hours, finally brought me to an abandoned warehouse and told me their plan. They meant to set me on fire and watch me burn. They had every intention of seeing me dead, as their boss wanted me to be.” Lauren paused again, this time out of necessity. Her voice began to shake, whether from remembered terror or the utterly bland look on Susan Miles’s face, she didn’t know.
Matt came to her aid. “Lauren managed to escape. But we don’t know if they’re still out looking for her or if they actually let her go because she managed to convince them she wasn’t Susan. The police have nothing to go on, at least nothing that’s leading them anywhere, and Lauren can’t live under guard indefinitely. We realized then that our only hope was in finding Susan.”
For the first time, Susan stirred. She propped her elbow on the arm of her chair and rested her chin on her knuckles. Her fingernails were beautifully shaped and painted a sheer pink noncolor. “I’m not sure I understand. I’m a beauty consultant, not a detective. Why have you come to me?”
Lauren resumed speaking, more calmly, now, and briefly sketched the course of their search. She concluded with a soft “Ann Broszczynski sent us here.”
Susan’s eyes were blank and she was shaking her head, but her knuckles had curved into a fist. “None of those names mean anything to me. Ann—whoever she is—must have been wrong. I have no idea why she sent you here.”
“I think you do,” Matt challenged. “You saw the resemblance to your old self the minute you looked at Lauren, and we saw the resemblance the minute we looked at you.”
A hoarse laugh tripped from Susan’s throat. “This is ludicrous! I don’t know why I’m even sitting here listening to you.” But she didn’t move. “Do you really expect me to swallow the story you’ve told? I’m sorry. Even if I believed it, which I don’t, I don’t know why someone would have sent you tome.And as far as the resemblance is concerned, you’re mistaken—”
“No.” Matt spoke softly, trying his best to understand her fear as he tamped down his own impatience. “We’re not here to hurt you. You have a problem, and because of that, Lauren has a problem. I, for one, don’t think it’s fair that she’s been saddled with it. She did nothing but try to correct a medical deficiency, and now she’s being punished. We know that Theodore Prinz is at the root of the problem. We also know that unless you agree to go to the police and testify along with Lauren, he’ll snake his way free.” Susan’s telephone chirped melodically. Matt ignored it. “It’s only a matter of time before he finds you—Ann realized that—and he may well kill Lauren along the way.”
When the phone on the desk chimed a second time, Susan picked it up. Her every movement was carefully controlled. “Yes? … She’s back? … No, no, don’t let her go. I’ll be there in a second.” Replacing the receiver, she rose from her seat and headed for the door. Matt was instantly on his feet, but she held him off with a hand. “There’s a problem at the front desk. I have to see to it, but I’ll be back. Please don’t go anywhere. I’d like to hear more about this Theodore Prinz.”
With that, she left the office. The door had no sooner closed behind her than the phone rang again, that same soft tinkle. Matt stared at it and frowned. When he made a move toward it, Lauren was one step ahead. Their lines of sight merged on the keyboard. A red dot flashed beside the bottommost number, one that was separate from the others, one totally apart from that marked “X” that would connect the interoffice line.
“Damn it,” Matt barked, heading for the door, “she’s gone! That wasn’t the receptionist. It was someone on her personal line, someone who’s calling back now to find out what in the hell she was talking about.” He was in the hall, looking first one way, then the other, with Lauren by his side. “I’ll take the back, sweetheart. It probably leads to an alley. No, you take the back. I’ll circle around and head her off.” He burst into a run toward the front of the shop.
Brushing past the white curtain at the end of the hall, Lauren raced through the back room, threw open the door and dashed up the steps. Yes, there was an alley, a long, long alley strewn with trash cans and miscellaneous other debris. Susan Miles was about halfway down its length and running.
“Michele!” Lauren screamed as she, too, broke into a run. “Wait!”
Susan wasn’t waiting. She was running as if the devil himself were at her heels, and would have long since made it to the end of the alley had it not been for the dodging the obstacle course demanded.
“Michele! Wait! It’s dangerous!”
