Easy Prey

models—this was before she became as famous as she is . . . was. We were both from Minnesota—that brought us together, and we became friends.”
    “The relationship continued even after you moved back here? I understand you live here now.”
    “Yes, although I go to New York every few weeks, to talk with dealers. I represent both myself and several other potters to the New York galleries. I’d usually stay at Alie’e’s apartment.”
    “Not always?”
    “Not always. We both continued to have other relationships—with men as well as women.” She was looking at Lucas again. “Neither one of us thought of ourselves as primarily lesbian; we were just very good friends and our friendship had a physical component to it. If she had a man over, then I would stay someplace else. Usually up on Central Park South, so I could walk to the galleries on Fifty-seventh Street and over on Madison Avenue.”
    “Did you have a sexual encounter with Miz Maison last night at the party?” Sloan asked.
    Another quick glance at the lawyer. “Yes.”
    “You were alone with her?”
    “No. There were three of us. The other woman is Catherine Kinsley, who I believe is up north at her cabin with her husband. I haven’t been able to reach her.” She flushed for the first time. “This is not heavy duty masculine-style sexuality. This is more like . . . cuddling, kissing, talking with each other.”
    “But there was a physical component.”
    “Yes.”
    “What happened . . . afterwards? How was she when you left?”
    “Sleepy. We were all sleepy, but she’d gotten up very early for her photo shoot, and had to get up the next day, and Silly—Silly Hanson—said she could sleep there, and so we left her. She was okay.”
    “And neither you nor Miz Kinsley saw her again.”
    “No. Well, I don’t know if Catherine saw her, because, like I said, I haven’t been able to reach her this morning. I couldn’t find her number, and I don’t know exactly where the cabin is. Anyway, I don’t think she saw her. We walked out to our cars together, said good-bye, and I went home. Your police people woke me up.”
    “Miz Maison injected heroin around the time of your encounter. Were you present for that?”
    “No.” Quick and definite, Lucas thought. She’d known the question was coming.
    Sloan continued. “You didn’t know that she was using heroin?”
    A slight hesitation, another glance at the attorney, and, “I thought she might be tripping when we met in the bedroom. She was . . . languid. She was the way you get when you’re using. But I wasn’t there when she injected, and I don’t think she had much, because she didn’t fall asleep or anything, not while we were there. It was more like a . . . a . . . party favor.”
    “A party favor,” Lucas said.
    “Yeah. That’s what people call them. Some people call them short pops—you know, if you want the effect but don’t want to get addicted.”
    “You get addicted anyway,” Sloan said.
    Corbeau flipped her head. “You know that’s not true. That’s just a political position.”
    Sloan looked at Lucas, who raised his eyebrows, and Sloan said, “I’m not here to argue with you, but just for the record, Miz Corbeau: Short pops will addict you as fast as anything. Believe me or don’t believe me. But that’s the way it is.”
    She shook her head, and Sloan said, “I don’t want to embarrass you, but I’ve got to ask this question. The medical examiner tells us that Miz Maison has small light scratches around her vulva, and light bruising, as if she’d been involved in a fairly active sexual encounter involving manual stimulation and perhaps oral stimulation. . . . Would that have characterized your encounter?”
    She flushed again, looked at them quickly, one at a time, taking them in. Lucas, still feeling the effect she had on his breathing, squirmed; he felt like a pervert. She didn’t help; she asked, “Do you guys get off on this sort of thing?”
    Sloan, his face a monk’s stolid mask, shook his head. “Sitting in a room like this, full of metal tables and tile floors, this is not very sexual, Miz Corbeau. We need to know, because we need to know if she had another sexual contact after yours, or if yours was most likely the cause of the scratching and bruising. Miz Maison was strangled, which frequently is associated with sexual activity.”
    “Okay,” she said. “Yes, it’s possible that she was scratched. Especially by Catherine. Catherine