Fatal Trust

by Todd M Johnson

  Ian looked at his mother, who’d resumed paging through the photo album. “Mom, I think it’s time to get you to bed.” She continued smiling vacantly.

  Ian helped her to her room and into bed, drawing the covers up around her. As he reached for the light, there was a tug on his shirt.

  “Katie was here today,” Martha said in a far-off voice. “She’s such a nice girl. You were right when you insisted on hiring her, Connor. It was the right thing to do. But I think now she’s worried about you.”

  Ian stared at her face, cradled in the pillow. “Why is she worried?”

  “Because of the trust,” Martha said quietly.

  Ian paused, feeling guilty for prolonging the pretense of being his father. “Why is she worried about the trust?”

  She didn’t say anything more for a long interval. Then she frowned. “It’s not safe.”

  Uncertain what to ask next, Ian hesitated.

  His mother tugged on his arm to pull him closer. “Connor, I need a special favor.”

  Ian sat down on the edge of the bed. “What is it?”

  His mother’s eyes were milky in the soft light. “I want you to say no. Tell him you won’t manage the trust when it needs to be distributed. I know you’ve already written it up and you can’t undo that. But no matter what he says, just tell him you won’t touch it again. Tell him we’re through—really through this time.”

  His mother turned on her side, facing away from Ian. She began to hum a song he didn’t recognize. A few moments later, her breaths grew even and deep. He considered waking her and asking more, but didn’t.

  Ian returned to the living room and sat on the couch. Lifting the open photo album, he set it on his lap and began paging through it aimlessly in a chaos of emotions.

  A favor asked of “Connor.” Including Dad’s surprise handgun to be destroyed on Monday, that made two indulgences his mother had sought surrounding his departed father in the last week.

  He recalled how few favors his mother had asked of anyone in the past, himself included. The one in the fourth grade—that he mow their neighbor’s yard after the man broke his leg. Their neighbor was a glowering giant whose presence terrorized Ian for years but who gentled overnight at the sight of Ian with his mower. Another favor, his senior year, with no girlfriend in sight, when she’d asked him to invite his shy younger sister to the prom. It was the only prom either of them would attend. He never fully admitted to his mother afterward what a great time they’d had.

  And the last one when he finished law school, just weeks after Connor died. They were sitting at Olive Garden over a subdued brunch, celebrating his graduation. Adrianne had slipped away to the restroom. Martha chose that moment to lean close and ask Ian to take over his father’s practice for five years and keep paying Katie the “special way” Dad had—and not tell a soul she’d asked him to do so. She couldn’t explain why; she begged Ian to trust her.

  On the verge of launching his career, the request was a blow. Because he couldn’t refuse her. It didn’t matter that he didn’t know what the “special way” meant at that moment, or what drove the request. He instantly knew he’d do as she asked, bypassing offers by big firms where Zach and Brook were being courted, putting his own plans on hold. Because this was a special favor asked by his mom, who had just lost her husband. And hard as it was, he trusted that she wouldn’t ask such a thing if it wasn’t very important, somehow, for both of them. That was the nature of all her favors after all.

  He could still recall Brook’s odd look when he’d told her, inventing an excuse for his decision that he no longer remembered. Something had broken in their relationship that day. Brook started dating Zach a month later.

  And now here they were, five years on.

  For his part, since he was a teenager Ian could recall asking only one favor of his mom. It was the same summer his dad died, on the back porch of the house, when he asked her to find another man to love and marry. She’d said that more than once, Connor had asked the same favor were he to die, and she’d promised to do her best. Before her memory failed, she could have had her pick.

  Now she was asking “Connor” to refuse to manage the trust distribution. That meant she knew about the trust itself and how it was to be handled—though she’d acted ignorant about it before. It also meant the trust frightened her.

  The implications of this new favor roiled in Ian’s stomach like a drumroll, especially after the day’s interrogation.

  There was a stirring in the hallway. Ian looked up. His mother was standing there, her eyes wide.

  “What is it?” he asked, startled. “I thought you were asleep.”

  “Connor, there’s something more I have to tell you. I know you told me not to. I know you said it could be dangerous. But I did it anyway.”

  “What did you do, Mom?”

  She didn’t even notice it was her son’s reply. “Connor, I . . . I spoke with Mr. Ahmetti. I told him what he wanted to know. I paid him back for his information. He said we’re even now. Please forgive me, but I couldn’t owe that man any longer.”

  28

  FRIDAY, JUNE 8

  11:38 P.M.

  ST. LOUIS PARK

  SUBURBAN MINNEAPOLIS

  Rory Doyle drove the struggling car to the curb a block short of his destination, wanting to walk the remaining distance. The sidewalk was empty at this late hour. He passed a mattress store, a neon-red Closed sign in the window. A small deli. A computer-repair shop.

  Just ahead he saw what he was looking for. Or at least he saw what was there now.

  Rising from the corner lot behind a protective wire fence was the skeleton of a new building under construction. A painted sign declared it would be a combination of residential and commercial when done, with a coffee shop at street level and condos above.

  Rory stepped closer to the fence.

  His cigarette craving was especially strong tonight. Maybe because being here was another in a long line of promises he’d broken to himself. Another sign of the “weakness” Sean accused him of. But he told himself he didn’t care. With the trust payout nearly complete, he’d had to see the spot again.

  Had the lot been vacant all these years before this new construction? Or had they rebuilt the garage that was on the corner the last time Rory was here? He had no way of knowing. He hadn’t been back for thirty-five years.

  Staring at the site in the dark, Rory tasted bile rising deep in his throat. He grabbed the fence and closed his eyes, spitting out the rush of fluid in his mouth. It happened again. And again.

  The nausea eased. He spit once more and took a breath, then looked up at the steel girders. And suddenly he remembered it all so well. . . .

  Like how bitterly cold it was inside the garage that night. “Cold as a meat locker,” his dad had muttered when they’d all stepped out of the Mustang into the abandoned repair shop. One of their crew shut the bay door behind them, making the place more still than a coal mine.

  The Mustang’s headlights that night were crusted with street salt, scattering weak light and a wavy shadow of an oilcan onto a wall. They’d emptied the car in the dim light, including the trunk’s contents. Then the rest of the crew slipped out into the snowstorm, leaving him and his dad alone in the garage.

  An instant later, a sudden plop on the concrete floor made Rory jump.

  He looked up, his heart racing. Chunks of snow were tracing streams off the car’s still-warm hood, sliding around the leather case his dad had propped against the windshield. The plops kept coming, like the cadence of a melting clock. He shrugged at his own jumpiness.

  The place was full of smells that night, he recalled. His own sweat through his jacket. Gasoline fumes mixed with old grease. A sharp bite of iron. The iron he especially remembered.

  “Wipe down the passenger doors,” his dad had ordered, tossing him an oily rag. Rory’s body was shuddering so hard he cursed out loud through his teeth, making his dad call over the hood, “Minnesota winter could fr
eeze the marrow in a charging bear.” Yeah, Rory had thought, that had to be true. Because he could feel his own marrow freezing solid—though some of that, he knew, was the realization of what they’d just done. What he’d just done.

  Rory glanced across the Mustang’s low roof at his dad, working the other side. Always the cool Jimmy Doyle. Moving deliberately, blowing frost clouds as he wiped his side of the car, cold as Rory but showing none of it. “We can’t take any chances with prints tonight,” his dad called out, calm as a cornfield after a snowfall. Like any hurry was pure choice.

  After a time, Jimmy raised his chin to listen, and Rory followed suit. All he could hear was buffeting wind gusts. No sirens. No screaming alarms. His dad let out a familiar grunt of satisfaction before he pounded his feet on the hard floor for warmth.

  Rory was just finishing up his side when his dad came around the front bumper and looked him up and down. “You did okay,” he said to Rory’s numb surprise. “Yep. Everything’s going to be fine.”

  It would’ve felt good, the rare praise. Except it was a lie. His dad even lied when he encouraged. Rory knew he didn’t do so well. The memory of what he’d done burned in the back of his mind like a brand even as Jimmy spoke the words.

  In that moment, Rory thought he’d seen regret in Jimmy Doyle’s eyes—right in the middle of the lie. Rory knew it wasn’t regret for what he’d said. But maybe he regretted that he’d taken his kid through a door that got locked shut behind all of them. Or that he’d broken the vow to Mom that he’d never involve Rory in his business. Over the years, Rory had thought a lot about that brief, uncommon look, because his dad had said more than once that regret was a cancer that made a man weaker and his enemies stronger. Maybe it wasn’t regret at all. Whatever it was, Rory never saw it again.

  Then Jimmy pulled a gray plastic bag filled with bills out of a coat pocket and put it in Rory’s hand. “That’s your part of the cash we got tonight,” Jimmy said. “Take it. But be careful. They feel stiff. They’re probably new and traceable. Spread ’em out. Never bank ’em.”

  Rory took the bag. Jimmy nodded approvingly and pointed at the leather case still propped against the Mustang’s windshield. “It’ll be years,” his dad said, “a lot of years before we can fence the real take for value. That’s okay. It’ll be your inheritance, Rory. So you’re gonna be smart like we talked about. Get a real job. Take no shortcuts. Be patient. Put this behind you. It’ll all be okay.”

  Rory had nodded, but the strange idea that it would all be okay drew his eyes to the place he’d avoided looking until then: the floor behind Jimmy, where they’d laid the burden from the trunk. Even twenty feet away, Rory could smell the iron from that spot, floating like an accusation in the air.

  His dad grabbed his shoulders. “Listen,” Jimmy repeated until Rory’s attention was focused again. “What happened tonight was one time. We had some bad luck, but we’ll put it behind us. Remember that someday that case is gonna be your inheritance. A very big one.”

  The words had sounded as thin to Rory as the oilcan’s shadow. His stare wandered past Jimmy’s shoulder again.

  A slap from a bare hand pounded his face, sending his vision red. Another blow caught his other cheek.

  “Tell me you understand,” his dad demanded, in a voice as calm as if they were walking in the park.

  His face stinging, Rory heard the first far-off call of a siren rising above the wind, followed instantly by banging on the wall. “C’mon!” came a muffled shout. “What’re you doing in there?”

  Jimmy didn’t move. “Say you understand,” his dad repeated.

  Above the welt forming on his cheek, Rory replied, “Sure. I understand.” He’d wondered if his eyes showed the hate as he said it.

  The sirens grew louder.

  Jimmy snatched up the leather case from the hood, Rory’s arm in the other hand, and dragged him around the front of the Mustang. In two strides they reached the spot where the iron smell was strongest. Jimmy took a high step over the uniformed figure curled there on the floor, surrounded by a freezing pool of rust brown.

  Rory slowed, until Jimmy yanked him over the body in a single tumbling step. Two more strides and they were at the side door. Jimmy pulled it open into a face full of snow and wind.

  The others were at the van outside, its engine running. Past flapping wipers, Rory saw one in the driver’s seat and another in a rear seat. The third was by the car door, snow covering his shoulders and a ski hat. A metal gas can was at his feet.

  “Who’s gonna do it?” the snow-covered man said.

  Jimmy turned back to Rory. “Light it up,” he shouted over the wind.

  The regret was still absent from his dad’s eyes, along with the encouragement.

  Maybe ordering him back in there with the guard who’d been breathing half an hour before was to pay for his mistake, Rory had thought at the time. Or to pay for what his eyes said in the garage. Maybe making Rory incinerate the guy with all the rest of the evidence was supposed to be an act of atonement to his dad.

  He wouldn’t do it, Rory told himself. The orders stopped there. That was where he’d draw the line.

  Except he didn’t. He hardly hesitated before stepping to the gas can, picking it up, and doing his father’s bidding. Jimmy Doyle’s bidding.

  The long memory faded. Rory blinked twice. The frame of the condo and retail building returned in the darkness.

  He remembered it all. Better than he remembered last week. He wished he didn’t.

  Rory turned to walk away. He’d never come here again. Never. And he’d get what he deserved from that night. For his kids. Because heaven knew he’d paid for the inheritance. Paid for it every day of his life since that distant night.

  29

  SATURDAY, JUNE 9

  12:18 A.M.

  LARRY’S BAR

  NORTHEAST MINNEAPOLIS

  Ian checked his watch again as two men came into Larry’s. One was filled out, the other slender. Both were far younger than the rest of the patrons hanging around the bar. One of them gave Ian a long stare while the other picked up beers and cues. Soon they were circling the pool table, racking the balls.

  Ian looked away. He’d been waiting at this table for thirty minutes and still no Rory. He didn’t have the energy to stay much longer. What could Rory know—or want?

  The money. Rory was about the money. He’d want assurance he’d get his share and want to know how soon. Of course, two days ago, this had been about the money for Ian too. And it wasn’t like his money problems had gone away. They’d just gotten smothered under things even worse.

  But it didn’t matter. He didn’t come to answer Rory’s questions. He came to ask his own.

  The bartender doubling as a waiter came by again. “Another beer?”

  “No. Diet Coke, please.”

  The bartender looked at him like the order wasn’t worth the walk, but he went away, returning a minute later with a glass half filled with something dark and carbonated.

  He had to know where the trust money came from and Connor’s connection to it. Not only to know how best to extricate himself and his family from Brook’s investigation but also, in light of his mother’s words tonight, to figure out how his parents’ and Ahmetti’s worlds had somehow overlapped. What could Martha Wells possibly have shared with the fence that had any value to him? What could Ahmetti have told her that put her in his debt in the first place? And what did it all have to do with the trust?

  His phone began to vibrate with a text. He pulled it out and stared at an unfamiliar number on the screen.

  Are you coming tonight to talk about the case? the text read. Below the text was the name Willy Dryer.

  Through his haze of fatigue, Ian tried to recall where he’d left things with Willy. He’d told Katie on the phone that maybe he could meet with him soon. But he’d never confirmed for tonight, had he?

  I didn’t think we firmed it up, he texted back.

  I thought we were on came the repl
y. I’m rehearsing for my gig. After tonight, it will be hard to get together for a long time.

  He was so tired. Another night, he texted.

  Please, man. Worried about this one.

  A quick meeting would salvage something from this day. And he was close. I’m in northeast already. Send address again. I’ve only got a few minutes.

  The address popped onto his screen. Only eight or nine blocks away.

  Soon, Ian texted, ending the exchange.

  He was putting away his phone when he heard ringing near the bar. A moment later the bartender sauntered back. “You Ian Wells?”

  Ian nodded. “Yeah.”

  “I just got a call from Rory Doyle. He says he can’t meet you after all. Says he’ll call tomorrow to reschedule.”

  Great. Ian looked at his watch. Nearly twelve-thirty. “Thanks,” he muttered. Ian dropped a ten-dollar bill on the bar and started toward the door.

  As he neared the pool table, the bigger of the two latecomers set down his cue. Ian was coming abreast when the man stepped directly in his path.

  Thick as a freezer, a wiry mustache on his upper lip, the man looked down at Ian with surly eyes. Before Ian could speak, he bumped Ian hard with his chest, sending him stumbling backward.

  Arms came around him from behind.

  Ian’s weariness was lost in a sudden rage. He twisted out of the encircling arms and launched himself at the big one, who took a surprised step back.

  A blow hit the top of Ian’s head. The room flashed bright then dark then light again. He tumbled down.

  On his hands and knees, Ian’s vision cleared slightly. He looked up.

  Kneecaps were six inches from his face.

  Ian launched himself with his legs, driving a shoulder into the nearest knee with all his weight. It inverted with a cracking sound.

  A howl like a wounded bear filled the bar. The big man above him tottered backward, dropping into a chair and gripping his kneecap in both hands.

  Ian looked over his shoulder at the second man still behind him. To his surprise, that one was standing back. He pushed off the floor to his feet unsteadily. “You guys friends of Rory’s?” he demanded angrily.