All Eyes on Her Read Online Free Page B

Claudia out of her share of his empire.
    Over the next few weeks, we worked out a private settlement that took good care of Claudia while sparing Bruno the ugliness of having to report anything new to the IRS. Yes, we were in the business of secrets, and the final one that I had to keep in the Bronstein case was the one belonging to Jonathan. It was his opinion that his big-man reputation simply couldn’t withstand the hit of his having convinced someone to do the right thing. And in a way I saw his logic. So I had taken the fall for Jonathan’s conscience, claiming to be the one who had forced Bruno to make an equitable arrangement. And I made a lifelong friend in Claudia Bronstein (the proud new owner of their house in Palm Springs, along with the third largest strip club in Hollywood) in the process.
    “I still can’t believe that guy calls himself an entrepreneur,” Jonathan mused from the couch a half hour later.
    “Meaning?” I looked up from my books on case law.
    “Meaning—” he lowered his voice and glanced at the door to make sure that his pesky sense of morality would remain between the two of us “—in my opinion, a real entrepreneur is someone who makes something from nothing. Like my dad, who used all his savings to build an import business from scratch. He’s the perfect blend of an inventor and a salesman. But with Bruno, it doesn’t apply. He didn’t have to invent or sell anything. People are hardwired to want sex with ridiculously beautiful women, and to be fascinated with depravity, especially in this town. How much of an accomplishment is it when all you’re doing is essentially turning the lights on at the crack store to make it a little easier for the junkies, who were already looking to find it? Sure, he diversified into related businesses, but he never had to sell anything to anyone that they didn’t already want and kind of need.”
    In order to keep some semblance of idealism alive within herself, a girl in L.A. has to search for signs of integrity in most men with the resolve of a drug-sniffing dog. Jonathan was one of the good ones, I had long since decided. And my resolution made it so much easier both to work with him and to recognize as a fact how influential in the upper echelons of the local legal community I had no doubt he would one day become.
    “Okay. But he’s pretty damn proud of himself. As proud as I’m sure wife number three will be…just as soon as she turns eighteen and decides to apply for a job at his club, that is.”
    “That guy doesn’t have much to be proud of.” He half laughed, turning his attention back to his work. “Take it from a junkie.”

three
    O KAY, SO IT’S NOT A DIRTY LITTLE SECRET IN THE “N O OFFICER, I have no idea how that horse managed to dress itself up in full bondage gear and climb into a vat of Jell-O” sense of the phrase. But still, my obsession for the horoscope section of the otherwise godawful celebrity rag, Pucker, always made me feel a little dirty.
    So in the end it turns out that my father was right. Family is the truest testament to the concept of karma, since they always get so much farther under your skin than anybody else without even trying. And that much irritation can only have been built up over multiple lifetimes. Case in point…Even though I hadn’t spoken to her in a week or more, I was thoroughly resenting my mother’s potential satisfaction at the mere thought of my resorting to the horoscopes for advice before I had even checked my weekly copy of Pucker, which Cassie left for me in a very nondescript-looking envelope on her desk every Friday afternoon. She referred to the magazine as my dirty little secret because she knew that despite my vocally vehement protests to the contrary, no one at the firm would ever believe I wasn’t reading it for the celebrity gossip.
    But when you live your life surrounded by celebrities, you quickly find that you have about as much interest in their love lives as you