There is more I wish I could tell you, but time is up for me here. So know these three things: First, my affection for you was real. I valued our friendship, and I will carry it with me always. Second, you deserve loyalty from the people you love. Third, and maybe most important—if you know a man’s weaknesses, it’s easy to press them and get the result you want.
Be well, and write this story—or a novel, or whatever the hell you want—with my blessing.
The notebooks aren’t arranged in any particular order. The one on top is from several years ago, and when I open it, the pages are dated at the top, filled with Meg’s handwriting. Some entries are lists of things she needed to get done. Call phone company and get internet set up. Others are facts about towns, locations, and people. Marco’s car was repossessed last year, start with him. Flagstaff is too small, it’s not going to work. Some entries appear to be more personal—memories of her mother, rationalizations for decisions she made along the way. Impressions of the people she met, the men she dated and what she was able to take from them: $50,000 from a man in Fresno, who’d stolen that money from his dying uncle; $100,000 from another man in Houston, running a Ponzi scheme. The list wasn’t nearly as long as I’d imagined it would be, because Meg took the time to research first. To make sure the men she targeted deserved it.
I scan the pages, details jumping out at me. Strategies for how to approach a target. How to gain someone’s trust. She even outlines what to do if someone catches on to what she’s doing—Pull them close. Distract them with other things. I look up, thinking about her mystery buyers, who will likely turn out to be no one special at all. Every lead I followed, every theory I had, was curated and handed to me by Meg.
The next notebook in the stack is her first one, dated over ten years ago. I was born to be a grifter, though I didn’t see it until after I’d been one for some time. I find an early entry about Ron Ashton, the heartache and anger so vivid on the page, I marvel at how she could have spent so much time with him over the past few months. How much that must have cost her. I hope the payoff is worth it.
My question from a few weeks ago comes back to me: What does success look like for Meg? The answer is buried in one of these notebooks.
I dig around until I find the most recent one and read about her return to Los Angeles, positioning herself to meet Veronica. The killer deal she and David got on their house was nothing more than an illusion created and executed by Meg, her sole purpose to polish her reputation and be exactly who Ron needed her to be.
Canyon Drive was a legitimate sale, a setup for what would come next—Mandeville Canyon—and a DBA for a company called Orange Coast Escrow. I read a draft of an email to Ron’s business manager: Congratulations on your new home! Orange Coast Escrow is excited to work with you. Included in this email is your secure link to escrow and wiring instructions.
I pull out my phone and type in the web address jotted at the top of the page, pulling up a website for Orange Coast Escrow. It has all the usual links—Tools and Resources, Services, and one titled Wire Fraud Warning. Criminals often try to steal your money by pretending to be us. Please call before you wire any funds! Then it lists a phone number.
In a new window, I Google Orange Coast Escrow. Two links pop up: the one I just looked at and a second one. I toggle back and forth between them, but they’re identical, all the way down to the wire fraud warning. Then I see it—an extra underscore at the very end of the web address I entered from Meg’s notebook. And a different phone number. When I dial it, a woman’s voice says, “You’ve reached Orange Coast Escrow. Please press one to speak to an escrow officer.” When I press it, my call gets disconnected. I try again, with the same outcome.
Next, I look up the listing agent for the Mandeville Canyon property. “Hi,” I say when she answers her phone. “This is Kat, Meg Williams’s assistant at Apex Beverly Hills. We were wondering when the Mandeville property went into escrow.”
The woman on the other end laughs. “God, I wish it was in escrow. Do you guys have a buyer for me?”