Treasure Built of Sand (Palmyrton Estate Sale Mystery Series Book 6)

by S. W. Hubbard

  But there’s nothing I can do to resolve it other than gamely keep up a line of chit-chat about the sale and hope they’ll each chime in. So we talk about the day’s craziest customers until the food arrives. Then our hunger drives us to focus on the food and forget about conversation.

  Only after the plates are cleared and we’re sipping decaf cappuccino does our attention turn again to the view out the window. Lights have come on to illuminate the eighteen holes of tricks and traps. This late in the year there are only a few players making the rounds. A dad with two tantrum-throwing kids. A couple clearly on their first date. And two young men.

  They talk intently walking from the seventeenth hole to the eighteenth.

  I hitch my chair closer to the window as they prepare to play directly in front of us.

  It’s an uphill obstacle. Hit too gently and your ball will roll right back to the tee; hit too hard, and it will ricochet off a statue of Snow White who smiles angelically at the hole.

  The taller young man sinks to one knee to size up the lay of the hole. Then he takes one careful swing and sinks a hole-in-one.

  “Nice!” Ty approves.

  The other guy steps up to the tee, lifts his arm for the swing, and whacks the ball. It hits Snow White in the head and bounces into the shrubbery.

  They turn to walk off the course.

  The taller guy is Austin Gardner.

  The other is the young man who pursued Gregory Halpern at the party.

  AT NINE PM, I FALL into bed, too exhausted to read the novel I brought along, but too wound up to sleep. Ty, Donna and I talked all the way home about why Austin Gardner would be in Sea Chapel this weekend of all weekends. Did Brielle send him to spy on us since Sophia is away? But none of us saw any sign of him or his friend these last two days.

  And the friend. He must be a year older than Austin since I heard him say he’s a student at Drew. If he’s the same kid. But I’m certain he’s the one who was having the argument with Gregory Halpern, who also happens to be in the area this weekend.

  These people! I need to unwind.

  I lie propped up with the last of the unsold pillows, idly scrolling through Facebook.

  Pictures from my friend Maura’s vacation in Italy....scenes from our niece’s first middle school field hockey game....cat videos....an ad for Ancestry.com.... dog videos.... snarky commentary on politics....an ad for 23 and Me.

  Why am I suddenly getting all these ads for genealogy websites and DNA testing in my Facebook feed?

  Then I remember—Colleen did family tree research to track down all the O’Sheas and Coughlins in County Cork. She submitted DNA from Sean’s parents and herself, but not Sean and me. But she must’ve plugged me into the tree, and now I’m getting solicitations to do my own research. Creepy that Facebook knows this!

  There’s nothing of interest in my newsfeed, yet I addictively keep scrolling. Another ad: Spend Less. Learn More. Let American Genetic Solutions connect you with your family. Take a DNA test for as low as $50. The picture shows two smiling, middle-aged women embracing. The green and blue logo of the company looks familiar, but I’m pretty sure Colleen used 23 & Me. I close my eyes to summon up where I’ve seen that logo before.

  The image swims into focus. The logo is on a white background. In a corner.

  My eyes snap open. This is the logo on the envelope I found under the mattress in Austin’s room. The envelope he drove down here to get in the middle of the night.

  The envelope with names written on the back of it.

  I squinch my eyes shut again trying to remember the names on the list. I’m better at recalling numbers than words. All the names were young, trendy names. Agnes or Gladys or Clyde—names likely to be long-ago ancestors—were conspicuously absent. And they were all first names. If Austin was doing a family tree, wouldn’t there be last names too?

  I concentrate on picturing the list in my mind’s eye. Mason was definitely one of the names. So was Trevor. And Ava—didn’t Regina Mosby say her daughter was named Ava?

  Sean speculated that the list of names were kids Austin was selling drugs to. Was it just a coincidence that he wrote the names on an envelope from a DNA testing company?

  If Austin were doing legitimate research, why hide the information he got from American Genetic Solutions? Why get so agitated asking me if I’d read the contents of the envelope?

  I slap my laptop shut.

  This is not relaxing.

  Chapter 32

  The second day of the Gardner sale flies by.

  Sunday crowds are always less intense. People arrive later, browse longer, haggle with the confidence that I’ll cave to their demands.

  Ty gleefully sells the entire set of furniture from Austin’s room to a customer who’s not Regina Mosby.

  Donna convinces a woman she really does need twelve scallop shell napkin rings.

  And I find a home for a dramatic abstract statue with a nameplate that says it’s Poseidon.

  At four, Ty does a slow pirouette with his hands on his hips. “Man, that was some sale. We sold everything. Every. Single. Thing. That ain’t never happened before.”

  “That’s ‘cause there was no junk,” Donna says. “No family heirlooms. No ugly gifts that the client never had the courage to get rid of. The only things in this house were items that Brielle selected, and that woman has never made a mistake when she bought anything.”

  I laugh thinking of the soap dispenser I selected for our hall bathroom. Every time I go in there, I’m filled with buyer’s remorse. But Donna is right. Brielle’s impeccable taste has resulted in a total sell-out.

  Donna sweeps up the last of the sand that all those shoppers tracked into the house. “Empty houses look so sad,” she sighs. “Even a gorgeous one like this looks forlorn when there’s nothing left but the bare walls and floors.” She walks onto the deck and tosses the dustpan of sand over the railing since Ty has already tied up the trash bag and packed that and the last of the supplies into the AMT van.

  When Donna returns, she takes one last look around. “I guess in a few months this house will look totally different. I’d love to come back and see what the new decorator does with it.”

  I sling my tote bag over my shoulder and usher Donna through the front door. “Not gonna happen, girl. We’ll never be guests here again.”

  TY DRIVES THE VAN TOWARD Palmyrton, while Donna follows in her own car.

  We spend the first fifteen minutes of the trip chatting about comical customers at the sale and items that brought in much more or much less than we expected. Then the traffic gets heavier, and I let Ty concentrate on driving. I reach for my tote bag so I can use my iPad to pass the time with some preliminary profit calculations.

  I can’t find it by touch, so I pull my overstuffed bag onto my lap and start digging. Not in the center compartment, not in the side pocket.

  It’s got to be in here somewhere. I dig some more, and my fingers close around the sticky wrapper of a protein bar. The wrapper unlocks a scene in my mind’s eye. Right before we left, I dug through my bag looking for that snack. I took my iPad out and laid it on the counter so I could get to the bottom of my bag. Then I ate the damn bar, put the garbage I created in my bag, and left my silver-covered iPad on the stainless-steel work surface in Brielle’s kitchen.

  “Shit! I left my iPad at the house. I have to go back and get it.”

  Ty’s face creases in concern as he glances at the dashboard clock. “I promised your man Tim Ruane I’d deliver that table to him by seven tonight, Audge. He said he wouldn’t take it unless I could get it to him by then.”

  “Right. I remember. And that table is bringing us a cool five grand.” I get a brainstorm. “Donna is behind us. I’ll tell her to meet us at the next rest area. You can drive her home in the van while I turn around and go back to Sea Chapel in her car.”

  Ty grimaces. I guess he’s not relishing forty-five minutes alone in the van with Donna. But he does what I ask, and soon we’ve regroup
ed.

  Ty slams the passenger door after Donna gets in. “You sure you gonna be a’ight going back there alone?”

  “I’ll be fine.” I wave as I start Donna’s car.

  “Text me when you get back to P-town, you hear?” Ty shouts after me.

  I toot my horn and head to the shore.

  When I get to the front door of 43 Dune Vista Drive, the security system light next to the front door is blinking green. That means the system has been deactivated.

  I’m positive I set the system to activated before I left.

  Didn’t I?

  Well, I thought I had all my possessions with me when I left, and clearly that wasn’t true.

  I enter the empty house. All the lamps have been sold, but the recessed lights that illuminate the shelves beside the fireplace still work. I turn them on and head for the kitchen.

  There sits my iPad in its new silver-gray case, blending into the stainless-steel prep area. I grab it, but before I can turn to go, I hear noises downstairs.

  I stop breathing and listen, every nerve tuned to the sounds beneath me.

  A faint murmur, sometimes sharper, sometimes lower. Someone is definitely talking down there, but the soundproofing installed in the ceiling of the home theatre area is doing its job to muffle the noises.

  Heart pounding, I creep to the top of the stairs leading to the walk-out lower level.

  Here the voices are clearer. Male and female, but they all sound young.

  “Stop all talking at once. We’ll take turns saying what we need to say to him.”

  That sounds like Austin. Did he invite his friends down here for one last party now that the house is empty, and it doesn’t matter if they make a mess? But why tell partiers not to all talk at once?

  “Mason, you go first.” Austin’s voice again. “Tell Gregory what you need him to understand.”

  Gregory? Gregory Halpern? And isn’t Mason one of the names on the envelope? What’s going on down there? I creep down three steps to the landing. By crouching in the corner, I can see part of the room, and sure enough, Gregory Halpern stands facing a half-circle of teenagers in the empty room. His face projects bewilderment and curiosity, the way it must when he encounters some odd custom in a remote foreign land.

  I prepare to eavesdrop unashamedly.

  Mason stands up. It’s definitely the kid from the party. “Look at us.”

  “Look. At. Us.” He puts his hands on either side of Gregory’s head and forces him to look at the group of teenagers.

  “We are your children. Every single one of us shares your DNA. You made us, and then you abandoned us.”

  What? A piece of information clicks into place in my brain. The envelope from AGS with the list of names. Austin’s internship studying genetics. The kids in this room were all fathered by Gregory? Whoa! He must’ve been awfully busy in his younger days.

  Gregory pulls out of Mason’s grasp, but he still doesn’t seem concerned. “I didn’t abandon you. I never agreed to be anyone’s father. I was doing a service, helping infertile couples create the families they desperately wanted.”

  A sperm donor. Wait...that means Austin was conceived by sperm donation. And Trevor, too?

  “I call bull shit!” Mason’s voice rises. “You weren’t a donor out of the goodness of your heart. You got paid big money, over and over again. Because everyone wanted some of your high class, 1600 SAT, blue-eyed, Ivy League baby batter.”

  Mason shoves Gregory. “Didn’t they?”

  Ah, I see. Gregory was broke for years before he found success with his podcast. Sperm donation must’ve helped make ends meet. I wonder how much he earned?

  “Yes, I was compensated, but...”

  Now Gregory seems distinctly uncomfortable. What’s going on here? Should I sneak back upstairs and call 9-1-1? What would I tell the operator when she asks, ‘what’s your emergency?’

  A kid who lives here has a bunch of other kids here and apparently they’re all related and they’re talking to their biological father.

  And she’d ask if they’re drinking, taking drugs, fighting, displaying weapons.

  No, no, no, and no.

  I stay in my position and keep listening.

  “Look how many of us there are,” Mason continues, his face twisted with fury. “Twenty-three right in Palmer County. Seventy-five in the whole state of New Jersey. One hundred and eighty-four across the US, and the matches are still coming in. Every day we could wake up to a new brother or sister. You have over two hundred children. We all have more than two hundred half-siblings.”

  “Look, I was barely older than you guys are right now.” Gregory attempts a reassuring smile. He’s a man accustomed to talking himself out of tight spots. The man has eluded terrorists! “I was broke. My parents wouldn’t support me unless I agreed to go to law school.”

  “You could’ve gotten a real job.” A tall, slender girl tosses her wavy hair. “Like, where you work for eight hours and get paid.”

  “But it was easier to jack off into a cup and make babies everywhere,” another boy says. “How did Central Repro Systems recruit you back in the day? An ad in the Princeton student newspaper? A flyer on a bulletin board in some dive bar?”

  Gregory turns on Austin. “So, you haven’t told them how this all got started?”

  Austin’s face twitches in suspicion. “What do you mean? When I showed my mother the results of my DNA test...that I was related to tons of kids my age, some of them right in my own school...she admitted I was conceived through a sperm donor. I tracked you down by tracing distant relatives registered on AGS and Ancestry and 23 and Me. I’ve studied genetics. It wasn’t hard.”

  Mason doesn’t look entirely convinced. He squints at Austin. “Sounds like you left something out of the story.”

  For once, Austin’s air of supreme self-confidence slips. “No, no I didn’t.” He turns to Gregory. “What did you mean?”

  Gregory hesitates, but continues. “Your mother is the one who got me into this. She and I dated in college. She got pregnant and had an abortion. Later, when she couldn’t get pregnant with your father, she knew the problem had to be with him. She persuaded me to donate sperm to make the baby she never got to have when we were twenty.”

  Gregory shrugs. “So the first time, I did it as a favor to an old friend. But the clinic paid me anyway and asked if I would donate some more. They had invested in me by testing to make sure I didn’t have any genetic diseases, so they wanted to earn back their investment by having me donate a lot. I didn’t realize my donations would be used so often and so, er, successfully,” Gregory stammers.

  Mason grabs another girl’s arm. “Ava and I were dating. And then I discovered she’s my sister. Any girl I see I ask myself, am I related to her? What am I supposed to do—get a DNA test before I hook up with anyone?”

  Gregory extends his hands in appeasement. “I understand that was upsetting, but it was a fluke. It won’t happen again.”

  “Did you hear what we told you? You have two hundred kids, and the tally is still rising. We keep finding more on this website called Donor Sibling Registry. Your offspring are everywhere. Especially here in New Jersey.” Mason extends his arms to include the group. “We’re freaks. Freaks of nature.”

  “I didn’t know they’d use my sperm with so many different women in the same community,” Gregory protests. “Aren’t there rules about that?”

  “Nope.” Austin says. “There are regulations requiring testing for diseases like HIV and genetic disorders, but there are no rules for how many times a given donor’s sperm can be used.”

  Gregory lifts his hands to heaven. “So then why are you so mad at me?”

  “You could have asked some questions—like ‘where is all this juice going, man?’”

  Gregory sighs. “Alright, I didn’t inquire enough. I see that now. But I was young.”

  The girl who Mason dated steps forward. “We’re young,” she taps her chest with her thumb, “and we know
that every single sperm and egg has the potential to grow into a real, live human being. Are you telling me you were clueless of how babies are made when you were what, twenty-five?”

  “The sperm bank is the organization who acted in bad faith.” Gregory spreads his hands wide. “Why don’t you complain to them about how they overused my donations in the same community?”

  “The doctor who ran the place eighteen years ago is long dead,” Austin says. “The current management is more careful. We checked.”

  Gregory massages his temples. “Look, what’s done is done. Why did you bring me here? What do you want me to do about this mess?”

  “We want you to acknowledge what you did to the world,” a girl who hadn’t spoken previously says.

  “Publicly? I can’t do that! I have a reputation. I have fans.”

  “Exactly,” Austin says. He spreads his hands in a gesture that’s uncannily similar to Gregory’s. “You have a platform. You could do a podcast on sperm donation. Spread the word that other people born through sperm donation should have their DNA tested so they don’t end up screwing their sister. So other couples know they should ask a lot of questions before they do this.”

  Gregory lowers his voice and speaks like a man trying to settle a panicked horse. “I’m sure that seems like a great idea to you. But I have advertisers who won’t want to be associated with a scandal. This involves more than just me and all of you.”

  “Oh, advertisers—you hear that, Mason? Dad doesn’t want to upset his advertisers,” Clark sneers.

  “Don’t call me that!” Gregory’s eyes shoot daggers. Gone is the man who charms his audience. “I have a right to make a living. I finally found a job I adore and now you want to take it away from me. For what? What’s to be gained?”

  Another boy steps forward. “Look, you’re getting off easy. Some of us were hoping you’d be happy to gain a family. We talked about asking you to claim us as your children. But others didn’t want to go public. So you could do the show without admitting that you’ve done sperm donation. Right guys? That’s what we compromised on.”