Larger Than Lyfe (34 page)

Mars Buchanan, I loved you and I still love you INFINITELY. You are an AMAZING man. From the moment you first kissed me, my love for you has consumed me like the heat of a flame.

As Erykah Badu says, “Maybe in my next lifetime”…we can pick up where we left off. Please forgive me for what I have done and when, if ever, you think of me, think of Negril. It was the very best time of my life.

Keshari

M
isha had given Keshari all the fucking space that she intended to give her. Enough was e-goddamned-nough! Misha knew that Kesh
ari had been going through a tremendous amount over the past few weeks, particularly following her arrest for conspiracy to commit the recent murder of Richard Tresvant. The very last time that the two of them had actually spoken was the same day that Keshari had been released on bail following her arrest. Misha had driven up to Keshari’s home to offer emotional support to her best friend for as long as she needed. Keshari told Misha that she was going to take a few days to herself, to regroup and get her head together. She sent Misha home that night and promised to get in touch with her soon.

An entire week had passed and Misha still hadn’t heard so much as a peep from Keshari. Media crews, who were still stacked up outside Keshari’s mansion, knew more about her best friend’s current condition than Misha did and the annoying housekeeper had clearly been instructed to intercept all of Keshari’s phone calls. Although the housekeeper could barely speak English, she quickly cranked out that “Mees Meetchell es unavailable,” and then hung up on Misha. Misha tried calling Keshari’s cell phone and only got her voicemail. She was too furious to even leave a message. Misha called
Terrence, Keshari’s assistant, and he couldn’t be of much help either. Keshari was working from home, dealt
with him via e-mail, her fax machine, and messenger service and wasn’t really entertaining any calls from anyone…even Cathy Hughes.

Misha decided to bypass the futile phone calls altogether. She was going straight to Keshari’s house and she was not leaving until she saw Keshari, made sure that she was okay, and gave her a piece of her mind.

Misha got dressed and was preparing to leave when a messenger rang her doorbell. Misha quickly signed for the envelope and ripped it open. It was a letter from Keshari. She read it as quickly as she could while juggling files from her office, her purse, sunglasses, cell phone and keys.

“OH, MY GOD!” Misha screamed, realizing what was being conveyed in Keshari’s letter to her.

She dropped everything she held on the floor and went racing frantically out to her car.

Mars was in his office when his secretary came to his door, escorting a messenger carrying a letter that could only be signed for by Mars Buchanan himself. Mars opened the messenger envelope and instantly recognized the pink parchment stationery. He closed the door to his office and sat down to carefully read Keshari’s first communication to him since their break-up. His secretary had no idea what was going on as he went running for the elevator. A moment later, his Mercedes was speeding at 100 miles per hour up the 405 freeway toward Keshari’s Palos Verdes mansion.

Mars arrived at Keshari’s house to a scene of utter chaos. Police cars lined the street and police officers contended with the television news crews arriving on the scene as they attempted to capture a breaking story and the police attempted to bring order to the chaos. Mars could barely get through the pandemonium as he pulled up outside the mansion’s gates. A reporter recognized him and was instantly in his face.

“Get the FUCK away from me!” Mars yelled, rolling up his window.

Sam Perkins, head of security at Keshari’s residence, opened the gates and Mars’s car pulled quickly inside.

“Mr. Perkins, what’s going on?” Mars asked anxiously, hopping out of the car.

Sam Perkins bowed his head and Mars took off running up the drive.

Misha Tierney was standing on the lawn just off the drive in front of the house. She was being consoled by a police officer. Mars went to her and she collapsed in sobs in his arms. Cold, frozen fear took hold of Mars’s heart.

“What’s happened, Misha?” Mars asked, hugging her and attempting to console her.

“She’s…she’s…she’s…dead,” Misha garbled through her uncontrollable sobs. “She’s GONE!”

Misha had arrived at Keshari’s mansion that morning, directly after receiving Keshari’s letter, and had demanded to be let in. The access codes to the gate sealing off the house’s entrance had all been changed, so Misha was unable to just let herself in. The security officer manning the entrance curtly informed Misha that Ms. Mitchell was not receiving any visitors that day and Misha promptly commenced to curse him out. She had stirred up such a ruckus, verbally castrating the security officer with a stream of
profanities, that he had quickly radioed Sam Perkins for assistance. Sam Perkins came to the scene from the rear of the property and took control of the heated situation. Because Sam Perkins knew that Misha Tierney was Keshari’s best friend, he immediately called the house and told the housekeeper to let Keshari know that Misha was there. Misha explained to him that the situation was an emergency and that Keshari may have done something to harm herself. Sam Perkins tried to explain to her, as calmly as he could, why he couldn’t allow her to go on up to the house as he typically did. Keshari h
ad issued very specific instructions and there were to be NO EXCEPTIONS. When the housekeeper went up to Keshari’s bedroom suite to tell her that the security office was on the line, she found an unconscious Keshari in her robe, on the bathroom floor with a nearly empty bottle of sleeping pills splayed out on the bathroom counter. The housekeeper went into hysterics and came back to the phone, babbling in a mixture of her native Spanish and broken English. Sam Perkins opened the gates for Misha and the two of them rushed up to the house, Sam Perkins radioing “9-1-1” as they went.

Misha found Keshari unconscious on her bathroom floor. Misha checked and Keshari was not breathing. Sam Perkins quickly began to administer CPR while they waited for paramedics. Everything that was happening seemed surreal. Misha felt as if she was floating in the middle of a nightmare. She held Keshari’s hand and sobbed, almost hysterically, as Sam Perkins continued CPR and chest compressions. Misha begged God not to let this happen. She begged Keshari to wake up.

Emergency medical technicians burst into the room and began to work on Keshari. They worked on Keshari for what seemed like hours. A police officer escorted a distraught Misha downstairs and out onto the mansion’s lawn so that she could get some air
and allow the paramedics to continue trying to revive her best friend. When they brought Keshari out of the house on a stretcher with a sheet pulled over her face, Misha screamed inconsolably, running toward the stretcher, and had to be restrained.

When Mars arrived, the ambulance with Keshari inside had just left. When Misha tearfully told him that Keshari was gone, Mars couldn’t bring himself to believe her. His entire body went ice cold and he stood paralyzed, the chaos all around him suddenly seeming far away.

“This is not happening…this is not happening…this is NOT happening,” Mars said over and over again, in confusion and disbelief.

Thomas Hencken’s office received the call regarding Keshari Mitchell’s collapse in her home just after emergency units were dispatched to her residence. Thomas Hencken quickly loaded two cars with DEA agents and rushed to Palos Verdes, arriving just after the ambulance had sped away with Keshari inside, sirens blaring, for South Bay Hospital.

Thomas Hencken’s mind was reeling. The news was not at all what he’d expected. He’d been preparing to pay Keshari another visit to show her some of the evidence that the DEA was continuing to mount against her to take before a grand jury, still convinced that she would break down and provide the testimony that he needed. Although the evidence was still mostly circumstantial, it included an intricate maze of dummy corporations that had funded the start-up of Larger Than Lyfe Entertainment. This peculiar string of business enterprises had eventually led back to Phinnaeus Bernard III, Ri
chard Tresvant’s murdered attorney.
There were also photographs of Keshari Mitchell outside two known cocaine processing houses reputedly owned by The Consortium, one of which had been raided by the Los Angeles Police Department. Now this woman that the task force had been relying upon to give a two-year-old investigation on life support new life was gone and Washington was not going to give the task force another dime, and Thomas Hencken knew that he had a lot of blame to take for most of it.

When Thomas Hencken regrouped from the initial shock, his gut instincts quickly went into overdrive. Something kept telling him that there was something amiss about Keshari Mitchell’s untimely death. Thomas Hencken was not fooled. Over the course of his career, he’d seen it all. Behind celebrity, wealth, power and a prestigious, Wharton MBA, Keshari had very successfully managed to keep hidden for years a double life that involved major crime. That was not to be overlooked. She may not have fit the profile of the kind of criminal that typically surrounded Richard Tresvant.
She may have had some kind of epiphany of conscience that had compelled her to separate from The Consortium. But no one, particularly a woman, held a controlling position in a major, organized drug ring without possessing a Machiavellian level of cunning and strategy accompanied by nerves of steel. That kind of person would not swallow a bottle of pills and call it quits on life because of, what amounted to people like them, a few, relatively minor legal problems. That kind of person kept local and federal law enforcement on their payroll. That kind of person had a wealth of connections and virtually u
nlimited financial resources at hand to fake her own death.

A suicide would free Keshari Mitchell from persecution by The Consortium and anyone else who might put a price on her head. A suicide would free Keshari Mitchell from being subpoenaed to
testify in front of a grand jury about the operations of The Consortium and its client list and suppliers. A suicide would certainly keep Keshari Mitchell from having to face the recent murder-for-hire charges against her. A faked suicide was very plausible and, considering Keshari Mitchell’s current circumstances, easily believed.