by Lisa Gardner
—
WHEN I GET downstairs, I discover Mr. Delaney at the kitchen island. He has already shed his wool coat, revealing a deep-blue sweater that is stunning with his silver beard and hair. My mom doesn’t seem to notice, throwing what appear to be fistfuls of kale into the Cuisinart.
Mr. Delaney eyes me ruefully. “Breakfast of champions,” he says.
“Please tell me you have Pop-Tarts somewhere on your person.”
My mom pauses right before hitting the grind button to stare at us in horror.
“Never mind,” I tell her. “Green is beautiful.”
She smiles, returns to pulverizing.
I take the seat next to Mr. Delaney. “What brings you here this morning?”
“Just wanted to see how you were doing.” But he’s looking at my mom as he says this. I take in his sweater again, a color that he must know is flattering. Mr. Delaney has a bit of a reputation with the ladies, enough of one that he always jokes he’s too busy to settle down. But is that true? He’s never had one significant relationship that I know of. And yet he returns here, again and again, to the widow of his best friend.
And my mother? To the best of my knowledge, she’s never dated since my father died. Sixteen years later, surely she’s entitled to move on. Maybe the beautifully decorated house isn’t for my benefit after all.
Do I mind? My mother, Mr. Delaney?
I can’t wrap my mind around it. I’m adult enough to know my mom is self-absorbed, vain, and probably a functional alcoholic. I still can’t view her as a woman who might be lonely, a woman with needs.
I’m never getting through liquefied vegetables now. I get up and make some toast. My mother frowns at me, then throws an entire cucumber into the Cuisinart. Does she think I’m giving birth to a rabbit?
I make three pieces of toast, butter them, slice them in half, then bring them to the table. My mother has finished with the Cuisinart and has moved on to furiously slicing fruit. She has yet to pause since I entered the kitchen, or even say good morning. There’s something manic about her efforts. She’s not just preparing breakfast. She’s on a mission. I feel my uneasiness grow and look at Mr. Delaney again. I suddenly have a feeling I’m not going to like why he’s really here.
Sure enough, once the fruit’s been savaged and tossed on a serving platter, liquefied vegetables poured out for all, my mother arrives at the table, pulls out her own chair, folds her hands, stares at me.
“You have a trust,” she says.
I stare at her blankly.
“Your father was a very successful man.”
I nod, vaguely understanding this. “You once said he contributed to some major projects.”
“He still receives royalties,” my mother states. “Significant royalties.”
I guess that explains the house, the clothes, my mother’s lifestyle, which has never changed.
I’m still confused. “So you’re setting up a trust for me?”
“We set it up when you were eight.”
“Excuse me? I’ve had a trust? Since I was eight?”
I stare at Mr. Delaney because, of course, this has something to do with him. “I assisted your parents in finding the best attorney for establishing the trust,” he says now. “As a criminal defense lawyer, it’s not my area of expertise. At your parents’ request, however, I agreed to be executor of the funds.”
“So . . . you’re the one who never told me I had a trust?”
“Actually, I assumed they had informed you.” The look he gives me is faintly apologizing. I’m not buying it.
“They didn’t.”
“Well,” my mother interjects, “like most trusts set up for second-generation wealth—”
I’m second-generation wealth?
“—you don’t come into the money all at once. Eligibility occurs in stages, as you turn certain ages. And given that we already had college resources set aside for you, and that we didn’t want you inheriting too much money when you were still young and stupid, the first-stage gate . . . Well, you’d just met that Conrad. It hardly seemed the time to turn you into an heiress. How would you know what his true intentions were? Then, of course, you had to go and marry him.”
I open my mouth. I close my mouth. I don’t know what to say. My mom gives me a little shrug—as if to say, So that’s that—and picks up a piece of cantaloupe.
I can’t decide if I want to scream or throw things. So I settle for sitting perfectly still. I have money. Apparently, a great deal of it. And no one bothered to tell me. Forget Conrad. She just didn’t want me to know. My mother, that selfish bitch, wanted to remain in control.
I turn to Mr. Delaney. “You figured it out. Yesterday, when I asked to go to the bank, you realized I had no idea.”
He nods.
“You’re the one who confronted her.” I point at my mom. “You’re the one who ordered her to tell me. Otherwise, I’d probably still be in the dark. Because if I have money, then I have independence. And heaven forbid”—my voice grows low and forbidding—“that I be able to take care of myself and my child.”
My mother looks right at me. Takes a bite of toast.
“How much vodka do you have in that orange juice, Mom?”
“I did what I thought best. No need to be nasty about it.”
I give up on her completely. She’s never going to apologize or reconsider her actions. She doesn’t have it in her. I target Mr. Delaney instead. “How much?”
“Roughly eight million dollars.”
“Eight million dollars?”
“You can’t take it out all at once,” he warns. “There are some provisions in place. I can go over it with you later today.”
“How successful was my father?”
“Your father was brilliant,” Mr. Delaney says simply, as if that explains everything.
“But being a math genius doesn’t necessarily translate to financial gain. Lots of geniuses die poor.”
“Let me put it another way. Your father’s genius translated nicely to the expansion of computing power and a couple of Department of Defense encryption programs.”
I feel like a gaping fish again. I had no idea. My dad was just my dad. The father I loved, standing at a whiteboard, dry-erase marker in hand, muttering under his breath.
There was applied mathematics, and there was theoretical mathematics. My father had been the theoretical kind, which my mother used to say proved he was a true genius. As if the applied kind were secretly selling out their intelligence for capital gain. But no, my father had ended up profiting. A lot.
I wondered what the applied mathematicians had thought of that. I wonder what his TAs and research assistants who probably helped develop some of the theories that then ended up being worth so much money thought of that. Let alone work that went to the Department of Defense.
I have so many things to consider. My mind feels overfull, near bursting. I’m sitting in my childhood home and yet it’s like I’ve never been here. Never truly looked at my family, never seen any of us at all.
“I have some calls to make.”
“You haven’t eaten breakfast.” My mother sulks.
I pick up the glass of green juice, which has separated into silvery green at the top, swampy green at the bottom. I chug it down. Then, just because I am feeling childish and petty and pissed off, I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.
My mother glares at me.
I turn to Mr. Delaney. “I need to speak to some of my father’s former colleagues. I want to meet with them, today, in person. Can you help me?”
“Of course.”
“You should know, the police came by yesterday. I spoke with them—”
“Told you!” my mother bursts out, eyes on fire now as she turns for Mr. Delaney. “I told you she met them without your permission!”
; “As your lawyer,” Mr. Delaney begins, his voice clearly placating as he attempts to split his attention between the two of us, “I advise against talking to the police. Or, if you feel compelled, let me set it up and be in the room. My job is to protect you, Evie. I can’t do it if you won’t let me.”
“They talked to me, too. Sergeant Warren learned some things about Conrad.”
“Such as?”
“He definitely had secrets and aliases. But maybe they weren’t all bad.” I stare at my mother. “Maybe, some lies are for good.”
She sips her orange juice, which I’m now convinced is half vodka.
“I’m sure they’ll get back to me today with more information,” I continue. “Till then, I want to learn more about my father. Exactly who he trusted, what he was working on, sixteen years ago.”
Mr. Delaney doesn’t seem surprised. Following in my footsteps, he picks up his own glass of liquefied veggies and quaffs it down. “When do you want to start?”
“Right now.”
I leave the room to finish getting ready. As I exit, I can see Mr. Delaney cross to where my mother is sitting, a hard set to her face.
“She does love you,” I hear him murmur in my mother’s ear, his hand familiar upon her shoulder. “Unfortunately, neither one of you is any good at saying it.”
For a moment, I think she’s going to shut him down. Then, briefly, she reaches up, enfolds her hand around his own. They stand there, a second, two, three.
When my mother looks up again, sees me watching them, her hand falls away. She glares at me, her gaze as hard as ever, till I give up and walk away.
CHAPTER 29
D.D.
D.D. AWOKE TO THE THUNDER of footsteps. She just had time to brace herself before the bedroom door burst open and Jack came plowing into the room, Kiko hot on his heels. Boy and dog hit the bed in a single flying leap.
“Two weeks till Christmas!” Jack roared. “Daddy says we can get a tree this weekend!”
Next to D.D., Alex groaned. Jack found the space between them and started his favorite morning ritual of bouncing. Kiko, on her spindly black-and-white legs, did her best to dance around her favorite boy, while tripping over Alex’s and D.D.’s prone forms.
D.D. managed to turn her head toward her husband. “We’re getting a tree this weekend?”
“Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“We are going to find a real grown tree and cut it down!” Jack fairly screamed. “With a chain saw and everything. Then we’re going to drink hot cocoa with whipped cream and marshmallows!”
“When he discovers coffee,” D.D. said, “we’re in real trouble.”
She managed to unpin her arms from the covers and hold them out to her very exuberant child. In response, Jack collapsed to his knees, then pitched forward into her arms. He was still vibrating. He smelled of grubby hands, syrupy pancakes, and little-boy sweat. God, she loved him.
“Will a Christmas tree survive in our house?” she asked him.
“Of course! Kiko and I will take very good care of it.”
“You can’t leap on the Christmas tree.”
“No!”
“You can’t jump around the Christmas tree.”
“Never.”
“No throwing ornaments. And absolutely, positively, no peeing on branches.”
Jack stared at her indignantly.
“That last instruction was for Kiko,” D.D. informed Jack. Since Jack was on top of her, Kiko had moved on to Alex and was attempting to lick his face, whether Alex wanted his face licked or not.
“What time is it?” Alex mumbled around dog tongue.
“Round bottom six,” Jack supplied.
“Oh dear.” D.D. moaned. “I gotta get to work.”
“No work!” Jack ordered. “Let’s go get the tree.”
“How about work and school today, tree tomorrow?”
Alex, one hand blocking his cheek from Kiko, arched a brow at her. First rule of thumb for a kid Jack’s age was not to make promises you can’t keep. Given the demands of D.D.’s job, that was easier said than done.
“I can figure it out,” she assured him. “For that matter, I have a new fed playmate. Maybe I can make her work tomorrow.”
“You have a playmate?” Jack asked. He’d calmed down slightly, curling up in her arms, head pressed against her shoulder. Kiko gave up on Alex, licked Jack’s face instead. The dog was very gentle about it, as if she was grooming her puppy. Kiko loved Jack, too.
“A fed playmate?” Alex asked.
“SSA Kimberly Quincy. She has an interest in my victim, who we’re pretty sure has been living under a false identity.”
“What about the wife?” Alex asked.
“I still don’t know. But I’m thinking that whatever happened Tuesday night was more than a domestic situation. Which is why”—she flipped abruptly, catching Jack beside her and tickling his sides while he giggled hysterically—“I gotta get to work.”
“Gonna catch bad guys?” Jack asked. It was his favorite question.
“Oh yeah. And lock up a few from Santa’s naughty list as well. We all gotta do what we can to help the big guy this time of year. Speaking of which, where’s the elf?”
The Elf on the Shelf, which Alex had sagely brought home a few weeks ago and started moving around the house, was supposedly the eyes and ears of Santa. Reported all naughty, noticed all nice. Personally, D.D. thought a spying house elf was a little creepy. But Jack was all about keeping the elf happy, given that his future supply of Christmas LEGO bricks depended on it. Oh, the power of the holidays.
Not to mention, D.D. herself had taken up Googling photos of Felonious Elf on the Shelf, posed in various criminal acts, and/or at various crime scenes. Some of them made her laugh hysterically, which was probably inappropriate. Then again, she knew for a fact that Alex had already looked up how to make elf blood spatter. What either one of them was doing raising a child was the real question. And yet, here they were.
At the mention of Elf on the Shelf, Jack untangled himself from D.D.’s embrace and went tearing out of the room, Kiko in immediate pursuit.
“Does he ever walk?” D.D. asked.
“Not that I’ve seen.”
“I could use that kind of energy on my case team.”
“What do you think?” Alex said, referring to her case now that Jack was out of the room.
“I have no idea. You know how at the academy you’re always talking about the importance of victimology?”
He nodded.
“This is one of those cases. Turns out Conrad Carter wasn’t Conrad Carter at all. He’s been living for years under an assumed name. Even met Jacob Ness in a bar in the South under an alias.”
“The Jacob Ness?”
“Which is why I got a visit from the SSA Quincy. Then, just to make it really interesting, Conrad’s father was a detective in Florida who died under mysterious circumstances.”
Alex’s eyes had widened. “That’s one of the crazier victim backgrounds I’ve ever encountered.”
“Hah. Wait till you meet my case team.”
“You love this case, don’t you?” He knew as well as anyone, the larger the riddle, the bigger D.D.’s fascination.
Now, she broke into a wide smile. “Honest to God, it’s like Christmas has come early.”
* * *
—
D.D. ARRIVED TEN minutes late to work. Supervisor’s privilege, she decided. But in consideration of the fact that several of her detectives had no doubt pulled all-nighters, she arrived bearing gifts: a tray of four fancy coffee drinks with whipped cream and chocolate drizzles and peppermint pieces. Not just caffeine, but caffeine and intense amounts of sugar married together in a concoction designed to cause an immediate jolt to the central nervous system.
She set down her sho
ulder bag. Ditched her coat. Switched from her thick winter boots to her much sleeker black leather boots, which she’d decided to keep at the office and away from Kiko’s evil clutches. Then, picking up the tray of chocolate minty goodness, she went in search of her detectives.
She found Phil first and presented beverages. He selected the cup closest to him and, without a word, took a hit, smearing whipped cream across his upper lip.
“When I’m done with Betsy, I’m gonna marry you,” he said.
“Oh, you adore her, you big softy.”
“I adore coffee. Whipped cream. Chocolate. What is this, a liquefied brownie?”
“Entirely possible. What do I need to know?”
“Video surveillance sucks.”
“Fair enough. Walk me through it.”
Phil caught her up on the techs’ attempts to find footage of the arsonist Rocket Langley’s designated drop site. As it was located in a major urban environment, the issue wasn’t whether there were cameras, but how many cameras, where were they positioned, and were any of the captured images any good?
“Patrol collected the tapes,” Phil explained. “Tech support started skimming for content. We have a photo of Rocket, so our first goal was to see if we could capture a shot of him in the general area. Which we did.”
“Sounds promising.”
“Yes and no. Drop site is a loose brick on the side of a building. Pull brick out, leave behind money, instructions, replace brick. There’s only one camera angle that’s any good for that side of the building, however. We caught Rocket walking up the street. Full on, there’s his face square in the lens, so that was excellent. But then that camera loses him. Security footage from a local business picks him up again, standing at the wall, but from that angle we can only see the back of his head. Rocket stood there so long we honestly thought the dude was urinating. I finally drove out there at four A.M., which is how I discovered the loose brick.”
“Anything there now?”
“No.”
“Okay. So you’ve located the drop site and at least spotted Rocket in action. What time and day?”
“Wednesday morning, seven A.M.”