Spitting Image

PROLOGUE

The whole sequence of events was just too jarring to believe. None of it ever made much sense to me. Today was supposed to be our wedding day, the culmination of a dream already way too perfect to be reality. We planned to drive up to Catskill and elope, as my beloved fiancee had promised. The last I remembered, I fell asleep around ten p.m. looking forward to waking to the most blissful moment of my life. He tucked me in, then went into the other room to make the necessary arrangements. We hoped for a simple, no fanfare ceremony, out of the glare of the clamoring tabloids and free from the eager paparazzi. The world admired us, envied us and even went so far as to dub us the planet’s most beautiful couple. He was my All-American Hero, and I was his Belgian goddess. But the moment hotel security discovered me kneeling over his brutally butchered body in the den of our penthouse suite, everything came crashing down in one big horrifying kaleidoscope. In an instant, cruel, bloody images took over, and we became two other entities entirely.

Jerry was the universe’s most famous murder victim, and I stood accused of slashing his throat and stabbing him in the heart anywhere from fifteen to twenty times.

As if on cue, the media tore at the tragedy like vultures just returned from sabbatical. First, the news was all over The Plaza, and from the hotel’s famed lobby it spread like wildfire onto Fifth Avenue before engulfing New York City completely. Winding through the wire services, it made its way around the globe in seconds. The headline in the afternoon edition of the New York Post was screaming about it within hours, the grainy photo of me without makeup, my face aghast, wearing a white, blood spattered bathrobe selling, ironically, alongside one of my most glamorous Vogue covers ever. I found my own protests of innocence muffled in the face of the public’s desperate need to believe the worst. The press loved a fallen celebrity, and now they had two more famous carcasses to feed their frenzy. They certainly knew how to turn a phrase:

MURDER AT THE PLAZA: ACTION-MOVIE LEGEND FOUND SLAIN; BEAUTIFUL FIANCEE ARRESTED. SUPERRICH, SUPERMODEL, SUPERKILLER?

The opening paragraph of the sketchy but incriminating article implied that I was after his $200 million dollar fortune. It chastised me, with my eight figure cosmetics contract, for not knowing when enough riches were enough.

I was once told that this profession made girls grow up quickly and helped them deal with the problems of the adult world, but nothing could have prepared me for the moment at least ten of NYPD’s finest stormed in, frisked me, cuffed me and read me my rights. I was barefoot, wearing only the sheer nightgown Jerry had bought me at the lingerie shop in the lobby the night before. I had to beg them later to let me cover myself with one of the hotel’s complimentary terri-cloth robes.

Daniela Van Aschen, you’re under arrest for the murder of Jerry Nave, the beefiest one informed me as tears ran down my cheek into my mouth. You have the right to remain silent...

You don’t understand, I tried reasoning with them, using eye-batting charms that never failed me before but would at this juncture. I found him dead when I woke up. Someone else broke in and killed him in the middle of the night.

If you give up that right, he droned on, anything you say can and will...

They escorted me out of the $10,000 per night suite just as the coroner was zipping up what was left of Jerry. As the no-nonsense badges led me towards the elevator, I overheard two of the officers whispering to one another. Celebrity scandals like this one must add such joy to the life of the mundane, I thought.

She ain’t so hot without her Maybelline, eh, Bo? Looks like any other blonde bimbo, said the first officer.

His partner snickered, Wonder how long it’ll take for her mug shot to replace those billboards she’s on all over the place. She won’t be smiling much now. To think my wife was actually once jealous of her.

A loud Ssh! came from their superior and both returned to stone faced. After a tense, quiet ride down, they led me out into the plush lobby. A collective gasp went up from the hundreds who had gathered to catch a glimpse of my plight. Their rat-a-tat commentary rang out from side to side. Everything from, We still love you, Daniela. You’re still beautiful! to Why’d you kill him, you greedy, self-serving bitch? Isn’t having everything, looks, money, fame, enough for you? Try working for a living.

One of the drawbacks to being a public figure was the necessary evil of tight security whenever I made personal appearances. I always hated being so distanced from my fans, but on this morning, I was grateful to be surrounded by the muscular guards. Keeping the howling masses at bay, the officers whisked me out of the hotel and into a waiting squad car. They hadn’t allowed me to change clothes, and I shivered in the early morning chill. The balls of my feet caught a few sharp pebbles near the curb and started to throb.

Two hours later, I found myself fidgeting on a hard wooden chair in the dingy questioning room at the NYPD’s 23rd Precinct. I peered through the gazes of the four intense homicide investigators assigned to the case, hoping the whole scene was just a warmup for an episode of NYPD Blue that had yet to air. I needed to find an ally, someone who might believe my side of the story, a cop who read his wife’s Glamour, maybe. But when the questioning began, their hostility burst the bubble around that faint pipedream. I tried to stay calm, but the double whammy of losing Jerry so brutally and them pointing the finger at me proved too nervewracking. I broke down and wept for ten solid minutes.

My first nemesis, a balding middle aged detective who bore a passing resemblance to TV’s Sipowicz (or was it just my wistful imagination?), seemed disgusted with my emotional display. Tsk. You women, correction, girl...by the way, how old are you, Miss Van Aschen?

Twenty five, I whispered sullenly.

You’re all alike, he continued in a harsh tone. You can dish it out, but you can’t take it. You pulverize Jerry Nave, and now you’re crying because your fiancee stood you up at the altar. Is that it?

I didn’t kill anyone, I managed, dabbing my eyes with a tissue. I swear, it’s a mistake. I just found him, I...

Yeah, that’s what they all say, his partner chimed in. This one was way too pale and skinny to have been a favorite TV character. So what’s the deal? You’re rich and famous, and you think you can afford a hot shot lawyer who’ll let you get away with murder? Save your strength, sweetcakes. I don’t care how many magazines you been on. Your looks won’t be enough to get you out of this one.

I closed my eyes to shut out his repulsive smile and turned to a third cop, whose kindly face had yet to turn ugly with nasty words. Aren’t you guys supposed to be asking me questions? Isn’t that why you brought me here?

It occurred to me that long before I knew him, just before he became super famous, Jerry once played a street cop on a show in the Seventies. A fourth cop could’ve been a younger Jerry. All in good time, Miss Van Aschen. Meantime, I suggest you call your lawyer. Wouldn’t want you to get off on some silly legal glitch, would we? Unless you’d prefer to just write up and sign a nice juicy confession and save yourself and the citizens of New York ten million dollars.

I glared up at him, never once considering that unspeakable course of action. I asked for my phone call, and they brought in a cell phone and let me dial Marlena. Before I could even finish my first sentence, my longtime manager was hysterical screaming, What have you done, D? What have you done? When I told her it was all a big mixup, she said she’d rack her brain to find me the best criminal defense lawyer in the country. After all, we had unlimited resources. I felt a little better hearing that.

Within minutes, long before I could think of who I or Marlena might know with connections to a criminal attorney, the Sipowicz clone darted from the room, then came back just as quickly, waving an ominous fax printout in front of his colleagues’ noses. He was grinning maniacally. The others looked excited, wondering about the dark tidings he bore. Something to make their tasks easier, they no doubt hoped.

Gut first, he squatted down on the metal chair next to mine and held the sheet before my puffy eyes. Daniela, if I may refer to such an esteemed sex object by her first name...

I shook my head disgustedly. God, I hated these macho types. That’s why I loved Jerry. He was so kind and sensitive. Two days ago, this cop was probably one of my biggest fans. Now he was acting tough, like he knew what would hurt me. Whatever it is, it’s wrong, I repeated to myself like a mantra. I’ll be proven innocent.

Well, looks like them supermodel days are long gone. Guess whose fingerprints they just found all over the knife handle.

I swallowed hard in disbelief and my eyes felt like they burst into flame. My head started pounding. The drab gray and green room spun around, the officers’ beady eyes and trimmed mustaches weaving themselves into a hideous mosaic that became one with my torment.

My prints on the weapon? How could it be? Could I have blacked out and simply not remembered killing Jerry? But why would I do that? I loved Jerry, I thought, I still love him. But how did my fingerprints get on the knife? If I don’t remember putting them there, then who did?

Within hours, as Sipowicz had predicted, the charmed fairy tale of my life came to an abrupt end. The thousands of Maybelline billboards across the country were being plastered over. The new issue of Vogue was pulled from the newsstands, becoming an instant collector’s item. Video store and Wal-mart employees everywhere found themselves working overtime, pulling my best selling makeup videos from the shelves. Stock in my newly formed multimedia company, Daniela, Inc. plummeted to less than a dollar a share. I imagined my image being torn down from gym lockers around the country. Young girls everywhere no doubt instantly replaced me with a more fitting twentysomething role model.

On the other hand, Warner Bros. found in their vaults an old, bad unreleased movie Jerry had done ten years earlier and gave it a national release within two weeks. EXCELSUS shot to Number One at the box office and remained there for a month. He was still everybody’s hero, and now the martyr was frozen perfectly in time, middle aged but still young, virile and sexy. The good guy done wrong. The legend expunged.

As for me, in no time, the public consensus was clear. A few adolescent boys with overactive hormones may have sent me care packages in jail, but their parents and everyone else saw me as just another spoiled supermodel who killed her fiancee to help increase her own vast fortune. To them, I was the pathetic epitome of sex, greed and overblown ambition in an industry that for too long had fed wildly on those very elements.

Not long after that, I found myself awaiting trial, and when confronted with all the circumstantial evidence, even I found it hard to believe I hadn’t done it. Sometimes I thought everything would be simpler if I had just taken that cop’s advice and confessed. Only I couldn’t. They were wrong about me. I wasn’t a psycho. I wasn’t a murderer.

But somebody out there was.

CHAPTER ONE - DANIELA

A damp eight by ten jail cell that topped out at fifty degrees, I found, made for the ultimate humbling experience. Yet it gave me time to put my life in perspective. Staring up at the pale bulb swinging overhead, squirming all day and night on the most threadbare mattress I ever lay upon, I realized that balance was the key to everything. In many ways, my fall from grace and public favor was inevitable. Achieving so much, so fast always made me feel slightly guilty. Becoming the idol of millions on the basis of good genetics and sheer luck never seemed much like reality anyway. The murder charge and its accompanying miseries were just me waking from the whirlwind of borrowed dreams, the flip side of the fantasy.

Looking back on all the fame, fortune and glamour, they struck me as so damn ironic. Last year, when Meredian Publishing contracted me to do liner notes for a photo retrospective of my career, I shook my head and laughed. I wondered if there were any other business where twenty four was the age for reflecting, reminiscing and possibly retiring. Even the most successful rock stars waited at least till the big three-oh before winning those lifetime achievement awards, didn’t they? My people-those who put me on the treadmill, kept its wheels rolling smoothly and sped it up the minute the latest eighteen year old ingenue hit the cover of the new Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue-told me my fans were clamoring for such an opus. I’d earn another million bucks easy. As with everything else I did, I had no choice but to sign on the dotted line.

But I didn’t know what to write, what pearls of wisdom I could impart. What had I really learned after eight years except how to smile, have my face painted like a totem pole every day and look good in the latest Versace gown? As queen of every frequent flier program known to man, who never spent more than a few days at a time in any one locale, I thought about mentioning my numerous travels. But all those beaches and mountains looked the same after a while. So the South African shoreline was more golden, colder in the morning than the Seychelles. This was an intimate look at the life of a supermodel? The cold truth was, it was never very glamorous. Nearly every decision, from what toothpaste to use to the text of my interviews with Hard Copy, was made for me. And even when everyone told me I was the most beautiful woman in the world, the drivers of the Daniela machine always treated me like a little girl. Worship came easy. Genuine respect was in short supply. And that adoring public was fickle. All I had to do was check out the latest poll in the National Enquirer to see that. It was less than three days since my arrest, yet already 79 percent of their readers believed I was guilty. Only eight percent thought it might be a mistake. The other thirteen percent offered no opinion. That’s what I’d been reduced to, a flow chart in the Enquirer.

If I didn’t laugh at the absurdity of it all, I thought I might cry. The funny part was, I never really aspired to any of this. None of the top models did. No one set out to be a legend just because she was told she had the so-called special look of the moment. Or to be a millionaire with lawyers, accountants and publicists before the age of twenty just because a few top designers called you the essence, the face of your generation. It always seemed weird to me, to be considered one of the most beloved women in the world simply because I grew to six feet, had Mom’s long, wispy blond hair, Dad’s photogenic blue-green eyes and a body that clothes hung nicely from. I didn’t sit around giggling with my Catholic School girlfriends and dream of someday prowling the catwalks of Milan. It felt weird being handed everything you ever dreamed of when you never really dreamed of any of it.

I received a few encouraging letters of support from what few diehard fans remained out there, but it was nothing like the old days, a few months ago. I often got handwritten notes from adolescent girls who would send their photos along, asking me if I thought they had what it took to become like me. I was always tempted to inform them that supermodels were made, not born, that we were creatures sculpted by the powers that be to sell their sartorial fantasies in any given haute couture season. But my handlers advised against it. The illusion was the thing. Shattering it in even one reply to an admirer would be like letting a photographer into my bedroom at five a.m. and shooting me without the proper lighting, with every childish freckle on my face still glowing. I simply wasn’t allowed to.

The fan mail inevitably got around to asking me just how I made it so big. I always scrawled some platitude about working hard and following your dreams, but the truth was, I had no idea why any of it ever happened. The chain of events which made me a super just sort of led me to where I was, just as it now brought me to isolation behind bars with the very real possibility of a lifetime stay. I never attempted to question any of it. Maybe it was none of my business, trying to understand where all the good fortune came from and how and why it so cruelly ran out.

Van Aschen, Daniela. The burly female guard came by my cell and called out my name in a caustic monotone. She had a dour, craggy face, hulking arms, was about my height and double my weight. You have visitors. Say they’re family. Funny Euro-accents. C’mon, get up.

I put the velvet bookmark Jerry once gave me at the chapter break of the new Danielle Steele romance, eased slowly off the bunk and watched the woman’s movements as she pulled my hands out in front of me and cuffed my wrists. My back felt stiff, but I wasn’t about to ask her if I could rub it. She would probably break me in half.

Let’s go, Blondie, Barbie, Goldilocks, she sneered, using the nasty jail nicknames I would soon become used to. "Hey, maybe you should do a layout in Playboy, the women of City Jail. Look awfully cute in your orange Calvin Klein jumpsuit."

I shot her an angry look and, just as I was instructed, averted my eyes from the other prisoners as she led me out of the cell, down a ramp, past the inmate processing center and towards a private conference room in the visiting area. I got a slew of lewd catcalls from behind the bars of the peanut gallery. The girls doing hard time for crimes they really committed were all aflutter at having a real live celebrity in their midst.

Mom, Dad! James! I gushed through the wire mesh when I spotted my parents and brother, who had flown the red-eye in from Brussels to see me. God, it’s good to see your friendly faces. The guard allowed us our privacy, but told us she’d be waiting just outside the steel door. She winked at me when she left.

Hello, Daniela. Dad, all stiff and businesslike with his three piece suit and troubled demeanor, gazed sternly at me. It reminded me of when I muddied the carpet after running through the garden he had just planted when I was seven. He tried to say something else, but just sighed and looked towards the floor instead.

That’s okay, Dad, it’s just important that you’re here. Hi, Mom, hey, Squirt. Was your flight okay?

My God, Daniela, aren’t they feeding you in here? My mother, Sophia, looked older since I’d gone back home for Christmas a few months ago, her sandy hair flecked by more gray than ever before. You look like a stick figure.

Daniela’s the ultimate hangman character. She’s always been a stick, not to mention a stick in the mud. James chuckled to ease the tension. He had just turned twenty and could have been a model himself with his tall, powerful build, dark blond and dark, boyishly handsome features. His eyes met their disapproval and he shrugged. Just trying to ease the tension. It’s not everyone whose sister murders a famous movie star.

Dad wasn’t in the mood for James’ sarcasm. You think this is funny? Everything’s a big joke to you, isn’t it?. Your sister’s in deep trouble here. Nothing to laugh at. When I first made it big, it was Mom who was most supportive. Dad sort of went along for the ride, but he was the cynical one, always wondering when the crash would come. The way he was brooding now seemed to be his way of saying he told us so.

I wanted to hug them all so badly. Dad, please, ease up. I can’t blame him for not knowing what to say. It’s not exactly a five star hotel, Mom, but I couldn’t eat even if they served caviar. My stomach’s in knots, I can’t sleep. I sit there in my...what passes for a bed, keep going over everything in my mind. And I still can’t figure any of it out. I...I don’t know what happened.

It’s okay, honey, Mom comforted me. She looked up at my father for approval. We know you didn’t kill him, no matter what anyone says.

And even if you did, he was a cocky son of a bitch. Probably deserved it, James couldn’t resist, his odd way of lifting my spirits. By the way, you look cute having a bad hair day. He met Dad’s glare and wisely shut up.

Thanks, I managed a smile, brushing the locks from my face. But you’re wrong about Jerry. He was the best, I loved him. I didn’t care about his money, I was actually hoping to get out of the business, get him to slow down his career, move away to some island...

Lovely sentiment. Dad looked bitter. But I think Robinson Crusoe thought of it first. Only without the dead body.

Mom softened the blow. Daniela, please forgive your father and brother. It’s been a long flight. We’ve all been worried sick. Anything you need, we’ll be here for you. Just like the old days. I remember when I first brought you home from the hospital, I said you looked like an angel. You were so delicate, so fragile. I felt like God had given me the job of protecting you. Your father called you the sweetest Belgian waffle.

Dad welled up at the sentiment. I wish none of this supermodel crap had ever happened, Daniela. What good is it all now? Then we’d still be back there...you’d be in the back of the station wagon arguing with your brother over an ice cream cone...Those were the days. He looked up at the flickering florescent light overhead, and I spotted a few tears in his eyes that stubbornly refused to fall. Soon, however, all three were overcome and couldn’t hold back.

I was the only one who didn’t break down, holding on instead to hope inspired by the memory he had conjured up. James, I said softly, I believe I ordered the rocky road sugar cone that afternoon...

The day my father spoke of was a postcard perfect sampling of all the magnificent simple summers of my childhood. It harkened back to everything that made my family so close and unique. Dad was an international lawyer who traveled for weeks on end and Mom taught the deaf part time, but they made up for whatever time they didn’t have for me and James during the week with those fabulous sunny weekends. Most every Sunday in July and August, they packed a picnic lunch, loaded up the station wagon and drove us out to the coast. If Dad was feeling adventurous, he’d take the scenic route along the North Sea out to the wide, sandy beaches of De Panne and dare us to run the hundred yards or so to the border of France. But we spent most of those lazy days with our blanket sprawled on the esplanade at Oostende, sitting on the concrete platform with the other tourists and looking out at the puffy clouds hovering over the sea. The jolly seaside resort town had a whiff of the Belle Epoque along its Albert I Promenade, from the Casino to the Hippodrome, a scent that mixed sweetly with oysters, cockles, mussels and suntan lotion. Often, we would roll down the windows just for a sugary sampling.

I was nine and James was four, and I should have known better than to argue with the little twerp that day. But sitting on the sticky leather back seat of the yellow family station wagon, looking at his mournful face, I couldn’t resist. Mom had just bought us ice cream cones on the pier at the Visserskaai Fisherman’s Wharf, and suddenly regretted it.

James whined the whole way to the beach, vanilla dripping down his hands. Daniela promised she’d let me have a bite of her rocky road. Give it. Mom!

Oh, stop it, you weasel, I baited him. I told you maybe, maybe I’d let you. There’s a big difference.

No. You said for sure.

Did not. I waved the cone in front of him, took a lick and told him how scrumptious it was. Willy Wonka’s got nothing on this, kiddo.

Children! Mom interrupted with her stern honey voice. Stop fighting. Daniela, you should know better. We’re almost at the sand. Listen. Your father’s gonna tell us all about King Leopold again.

James and I both sighed. I stuck out my tongue at him, chocolate full on display. He was about to start up again, but Dad’s droning monologue took precedence. We could just about recite the historical anecdote along with him.

Listening, kids? See, Oostende wasn’t always the fun in the sun place you see before you, he said as he pulled into the vast parking lot. "King Leopold I, however, turned it into one of Europe’s classiest 19th Century resorts, making it fashionable by establishing it...

Mom, James and I finished the well worn speech and laughed. ...as his holiday residence. And now it’s a cross channel ferry port and Belgium’s busiest beach resort.

Dad seemed impressed. He had taught us well. Okay, everyone out. Finish those ice creams and I don’t want to hear about it for the rest of the day. Like King Leopold, we’re here to relax.

As we crunched in through the green tarpaulin lounge chairs to find our reserved spot on the platform, I noticed a huge ferry boat pulling out from port in the distance. Look James, a ferry. God, I wish you were on it. Sail to London, give us all some peace.

Yeah, well, you’re so skinny, they probably would only charge you half. A quarter per chicken leg.

Mom admonished us, but I assured her, He knows I’m just teasing. I pulled James close for a big hug as Dad pulled out his fancy camera. The beaches had a series of charming, very photogenic old-fashioned sunbathing huts, parasols and deck chairs that looked, from the promenade, like a battalion of toy soldiers. It was his favorite backdrop for our summer family portraits.

See, we can get along just fine, I said, hugging a reluctant James. My brother stuck out his own tongue at me in the first shot, then admitted he loved his sister before the next. I hugged him back. Those were two of many snapshots which filled up the albums of my childhood.

Dad put away his camera, looked out at the just barely visible coast of England and mused about James becoming a soccer star there someday. My brother was just a toddler in many ways, but he was also a natural born athlete. What about you, Daniela? Ever give much thought as to what you want your life to be about?

I think I want to grow up just like Mom, be a teacher, special education, so I can work with retards like James. I looked at Mom and Dad for their encouragement. Just kidding. But what I’d really like is to just live on a ranch somewhere down in Wallonia, married, with kids and horses running wild.

Dad seemed a little disappointed. Don’t want to be a lawyer like your dear old dad? Your grades are good...

Too much pressure, and besides, you’re always traveling. Let James do all the traveling with his team someday. I’m a Belgian girl, I’m gonna stay right here.

A crowd gathered at the edge of the esplanade to watch a formation of elegant seagulls in flight over the foamy edges of the water. When they grounded, I turned to Mom and Dad. I like it best when they land. Watching them fly makes me dizzy.

No one ever dared to dream big in Damme, the little Flemish town northeast of Brussels where I grew up. It was a village famed primarily for its attractive location beside a poplar lined canal which froze in winter and in the spring and summer allowed the bi-weekly passage of the Lamme Goedzak, a stern-wheeled paddle steamer which left from the jetty thirty minutes down the way in Noorweegse Kaai. There was an idle windmill alongside its banks, and Dad used to point it out in the background every time we strolled before all the little shops and specialty restaurants on Kerkstraight, which was our main street. Fortunately, whatever historical significance the windmill may have had was beyond his grasp, and so Mom, James and I were spared anecdotes about its place in European culture. But its lack of activity, especially when pitted against the yellowing haze of a winter sky when he took us skating on the river, seemed to reflect the laid back pace of life there. Dreaming of teaching and living on a ranch down South seemed like big talk from a nine year old girl.

In every interview I ever read with a top model, the girl inevitably recalled an adolescence of being shy, insecure and gawky. Unfortunately, being born with pencil legs that grew faster than my nails and hair put together, I was no exception. James’ teasing may not have bothered me when I was nine or ten, but when puberty hit, being the tallest and skinniest in my class became traumatic in a hurry. I hated what I saw when I looked in the mirror. Wearing braces on my teeth for my overbite didn’t help, either. Everything I wanted so desperately to change about myself then was exactly what others liked about me later.

Mom, who stood six foot one and on whom I always blamed own my physical absurdities, perfectly understood what I was going through. She claimed I would fill out and be beautiful someday, but all I ever wanted to be was one of the petite girls whom the boys favored so much. One morning during the second month of seventh grade, though, she wasn’t in such a patient mood. My refusal to get up and get dressed every day was taking its toll. Besides always making her late for work, my stubbornness about going to school on time led to numerous tardies and a slip from an A average to a C. That was intolerable by her standards.

Daniela, I’m not gonna ask you again! I heard her bellow from beneath the sheets of my pink canopied bed, where I barricaded myself every morning. What am I gonna do with you? I can’t change your body overnight. You think it was easy for me? But I coped. You can’t keep doing this.

I peeked out