Julianna looked at her reflection in the mirror one last time, tousling her long, layered hair. It spilled over her shoulders and down past the top of her black strapless cocktail dress. She wasn't much of a hair stylist - the tousling and making sure it was dry were about as fancy as she got, and other than a few swipes of mascara and some lip ( Read more... )

About twenty minutes after they talked, Julianna showed up at the restaurant Zach Nichols had told her about. It was late evening - around 9:30 - and she was dressed casually, as usual, when she walked through the door.

9:45pm, Chelsea.The brownstone of noted Fortune 500 CEO James Payton was swarming with NYPD officers and personnel. Squad cars blocked off part of the street, blue and red lights whirling, silently punctuating an otherwise serene neighborhood like exclamation points. Uniformed officers lazily guarded the building's entryway. One smacked his ( Read more... )