Intimate Relations Rebecca Forster (free children's ebooks online TXT) 📖

walked into that room? I looked like a star, not a hair out of place."

"You did," Cori said. "But then again you're a pretty good actress."

"Wow, a compliment," Bev said.

"Yeah. You should have got an academy award for acting like a wife."

Cori saw herself out.

17

"She's got a name."

Finn snapped his fingers against the paper in his hand. It had been two days since he and Cori had a chance to catch up. Cori moved out of Finn's apartment, and Thomas helped her put her house back together. Finn had been in court and also managed a final interview with the Fernandez family who seemed to be missing a son. Finn suspected the young man of a drive-by killing under the colors of The Locos. Strangely, no one knew where he was now. Cori made a detour to Wilshire Division. She filled in Detective Porter who had taken two of her cases when she and Finn were lent out. Finn testified at a parole hearing of a serial rapist who he put away well before his own troubles. Had he been relieved of his duties, he still would have attended this man's parole hearing. Finn intended to see the man die in prison. But right now, The Brewery problem was top of mind and the news was good.

"We've got a name and picture."

He got up from his desk to stand behind Cori's chair. He spread the paperwork in front of her, the victim's picture front and center.

"Pretty."

Cori picked up the photo. The girl's face did justice to the body Cori had seen in the morgue. She was petite. Her hair was long and dark. Her face was delicate and there was a Slavic tilt to her eyes. Her cheekbones were razor sharp and her lips full. Sadly, for all her physical beauty, she wasn't a beautiful girl. There was an underlying cruelty in her that was evident to Cori. She shuffled through other pictures in the file.

"She was hanging with an impressive crowd. This is the Met Gala. " Cori pointed to a copy of an article from the New York Times. "How old is she?"

"Nineteen," Finn answered.  "Her name is Roxana Masha Novika."

"That's a mouthful."

Cori looked up intending to have a full conversation with Finn. What she saw were two other detectives far too interested in their business.

"Let's get some coffee." Cori took her laptop while Finn took the file. Both preferred the break room to the bullpen.

There was a Naugahyde sofa in the room. One arm was silver where a rip had been fixed with electrical tape. There were three mismatched chairs, a round table, and a stool. Today there was nothing to eat, but the coffee was fresh. Finn got two mugs while Cori pulled Roxana's information up on the screen.

"Homeland Security came through. She had a global entry and with an asterisk to keep an eye on her," Finn said. "She holds dual Citizenship. Russian no less. From the looks of her passport she started traveling before she was out of diapers. What have you got?"

"If the mayor wasn't getting flack from the Asylum people, he would get a call from the State Department. Her father's a big name in Russia. An oligarch, if you please. Oil guy," Cori said. "Her name should have been Evita."

"She's dead too," Finn said. He put two mugs of coffee on the table and pulled out a chair.

"She's no Evita anyway. She wasn't riding daddy's coattails." Cori took up her coffee and had a sip. She looked stone faced at her screen. "When I was nineteen I was knocked up, and wondering if I would be struck dead if I wore white at my shotgun wedding. This one's been profiled in W, Vanity Fair, Wired and a zillion more places. She gets her suntan in Italy, skis in the Alps, and the little miss is a top tier influencer."

"A what?"

"Like a movie star without the movie," Cori said. "Her job is to look beautiful, and make other people think that they will be beautiful and rich if they do as she does. She sets the standards, she sells the dream."

"And who pays her to do this?"

"I'll show you." Cori pulled up Instagram and found Roxana's page. Finn raised a brow at the pictures of the girl in her bed, in the bath, standing atop a skyscraper, posing with a bottle of pills. She smoked. She had a drink. Always there was a product or two somewhere about.

"She was taking drugs on social media?" Finn pointed to the latest picture.

"No. Look at the caption. Daily Dose. She's pitching a weight loss drug. Companies pay to have these kids tout their products. Then they get on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook all the social media sites and other people follow them. The more followers you have, the more money you get.  It's huge business. This one could buy and sell us ten times over even without daddy's money."

"For doing nothing?"

"Pretty much. But Roxana was more than a pretty face hawking fashion if we can believe Bev." Cori scrolled down. "She's calling out some big names here. She's insinuating all sorts of things about the executives or their companies. Fraud, cheating. She does it so sweetly. I can see why Bev didn't like her. I can see why Stotler would be afraid of her."

"I would be," Finn said. "Even a lie is taken as God's truth on these sites."

 "Lapinski has been picking up slander and liable cases because of this, but suing can make it worse. Bad press can't be buried anymore." Cori sat back and took a deep breath.  "It's a brave, new, ugly world, my friend."

"But if she was making so much money advertising for companies, why bother with blackmail?"

"Because she could. Because it's an experience. Because she's a mean girl and high school is now the whole world." Cori crossed her arms. "It's hard enough being young, but kids have been brainwashed. They think that everything online is real. They're