Chapter 5

After they were finished moving in, Bella Lisa took a walk on Tuesday afternoon to check out the new neighborhood. She found a Starbucks around the corner, ordered a coffee and sat down to relax. Even dressed in dirty jeans and a sweaty t-shirt, three or four men of various ages hit on her, trying to find out her name and engage her in meaningless conversation.

Why am I a magnet for every lonely, horny man in Seaside City?

Bella Lisa tried to keep her answers short while checking her cell phone for messages. She finally got a text from her mom in St. Tropez on a photo shoot, congratulating her for graduating high school and apologizing for not being able to attend the ceremony. She had promised to visit her soon at Stanford. She fended off admirer number four by pretending to look at sections of the newspaper that had been left in a communal pile. Her eyes drifted over the pictures as she flipped randomly from page to page in the pile. She saw it completely by accident. The photo was on page 3 in last Sunday’s Arts Section. She first saw her father’s charming smile, then the Artistic Director as he shook the hand of the strange man.

What was his name, Phillip or Phillipe?

She smoothed over the creased picture of her Father on the slightly stained and torn newsprint, proud of him for getting his picture in the paper. She read the caption under the photograph.

“Artistic Director, Geoff Josephson, Board Member, Phillipe Williamson, and actor, Marc Mauricio celebrate at the opening night of “The Last Petal of the Rose” currently playing at Seaside City Playhouse.”

Her father and the Artistic Director took a good photograph, looking directly into the camera lens and smiling. But for some reason Williamson’s eyes were focused elsewhere, to the right of the camera and slightly downward, capturing his strong jaw.

She had to finally admit to herself that he was an exceedingly handsome man, it was plain to see. Though she wanted to look at her father in the picture, her attention kept drifting back to Williamson. There seemed to be a heat and desire emanating from his eyes, or a hunger, as if whatever he was gazing at he wanted to swallow, whole. His lips were parted and she could see his teeth were firmly clenched together. Bella Lisa wondered what he was concentrating upon so intently. Then it struck her.

Could it have been me?

After the camera flashed, Bella Lisa thought she remembered seeing him through the spots in her eyes, looking down at her from the platform. The passion in his eyes was there for all to see, but was the heat and desire directed at her?

Or is it all just in my imagination?

She looked over her shoulder, carefully tearing the page out of the newspaper.

Perhaps Dad would like to see the picture.

Before she folded the inscrutable photograph up into a square, she looked at it once more,

imagining the deep voice of Williamson speaking to her from the picture.

It is you, Bella Lisa Mauricio. You were the one I was looking at. You’re the one I want…

Shaking her head and smiling at her silly thoughts, she slipped the photograph into the back pocket of her jeans. Bella Lisa took a sip of coffee. Remembering the theater reviews usually came out in the Tuesday paper, she bought an LA Times and returned to the condo. Even though her dad never read reviews, Bella Lisa was excited to see them. She hoped they would be positive.

After the market closed on Thursday, Williamson read the thorough report he asked his security team to email him. They conducted a surveillance of the movements of Bella Lisa Mauricio from Sunday through Thursday. Luman was positioned in the condo’s security office, monitoring the lobby and parking area cameras and Cogworthy was stationed on the street outside of the building’s entrance.

8/16/08 7:30PM – Subject arrives with M, parks in assigned space; both take elevator up to condo. They both leave condo in car at 7:55PM.

8/17/08 11:15AM – Subject arrives with M at condo, parks in assigned space, both take elevator up to condo. 12:10 PM moving truck arrives and double-parks in front of condo. M greets two men in lobby and all three men take elevator up to condo. From 12:25PM until 3:15PM the two men move belongings up to condo. The two men leave at 3:30PM. At 4:45PM Subject leaves condo with M. At 5:55PM subject returns with M, park in assigned space. They carry several grocery bags and both take elevator up to condo.

8/18/08 10:35AM – M leaves condo with car. At 2:45PM Subject leaves condo, walks around the corner and enters a Starbucks. At 3:20PM she returns with coffee, takes elevator up to condo. At 7:17PM M returns, parks in assigned space, takes elevator up to condo.

8/19/08 9:03AM – Subject leaves condo, walks around corner to Starbucks. At 9:14AM she returns with coffee, takes elevator up to condo. At 11:19AM M leaves condo with car and returns at 6:16PM, parks in assigned space, takes elevator up to condo.

8/20/08 9:01AM – Subject leaves condo, walks around corner to Starbucks. At 9:16AM she returns with coffee, takes elevator up to condo. At 10:47AM M leaves condo with car and returns at 5:41PM, parks in assigned space, takes elevator up to condo.

Williamson clicked delete and the email disappeared.

If she is a creature of habit, this should work.

He knew he had only one chance on Friday morning, since Mauricio was driving his daughter to Stanford the next day. Williamson shifted around his business meetings and left his most trusted and competent employees in charge of both of his enterprises until 11AM Friday morning. His assistants at the investment firm whispered to each other how odd it was that Mr. Williamson was coming in late Friday, as he was always behind his desk with his three computer screens fired up by the opening bell.

At 8:30AM Friday morning Williamson took the elevator down from his 25th floor Penthouse and walked through the sliding glass doors into the Fitness Center, which was located directly across from the elevator in the lobby. There were only two other people currently working out, a man on a stationary exercise bike and a woman on an elliptical machine. Williamson felt fortunate that the machines they had chosen to work out on were located far to the side and closer to the back of the large room. He got on the treadmill located directly in front of the entrance and started warming up by walking at a steadily increasing pace. Luman called his cell from the hallway on the fifteenth floor at 9:03AM.