by Kelly Irvin
Aaron understood that desire. He eyed the darkroom where he’d hidden the box of receipts and the letters. King would know he was in the house. The 4Runner with its Channel 29 badge hanging from the rearview mirror would be a dead giveaway. So what? He had a right to be here. He and Nina were friends and colleagues. Let King chew on that.
Aaron eyed the closed door. He could take a run at those receipts. No. It didn’t seem right to go through its contents without Nina. Besides, nothing said King wouldn’t come up here looking for him.
He could print some photos. No. His job was video. Act normal. He’d just taken a box of papers germane to a murder investigation from a dead judge’s study. Act normal?
He blew out air, once, twice, then tugged his phone from his pocket. Maybe Melanie had learned something. At the very least she knew what the other stations were reporting.
The phone rang five times. He was about to give up when her irate voice squawked in his ear. “What are you doing calling me at the crack of dawn?”
“It’s not anywhere close to dawn. It’s almost seven o’clock. What did you find out?”
“I overslept. I never oversleep. Quite a bit.”
“Like what? Spill it!”
“All in good time.” The sound of a lighter popping followed by sucking told him Melanie had lit the first of what would be a pack of cigarettes before the end of the day. “We need to meet.”
“Why?”
“Because I did some digging and there’s some stuff you need to know. It’s not good and your girlfriend might not be all that happy about it. You might not want to be the one to tell her.”
The line between what he knew from helping Nina in her hour of need and what he knew because of his job would be a plank he would have to walk each day. “She’s not my girlfriend. What kind of stuff?”
“I don’t want to talk about this on the phone. Besides, I told Serena Cochrane we’d meet her for a late breakfast. I need to take my morning run and shower first. You remember her. Fischer’s court coordinator.”
He did. A sweet lady with a large bowl of candy on her desk. “She says he’s on the take?”
“Not in so many words. She loved her judge.” The sucking of nicotine filled the line. “But she scheduled his cases and guarded the door to his inner sanctum like a she-lion. She’d been with him for his entire judgeship. He trusted her. She’d been up pacing the floor last night trying to decide what to do. She knows something.”
“About what?”
“She says the judge gave her something to keep for him.”
“And she’ll give it to you.”
The nicotine hissed out. “She’s thinking about it. She says I did a decent job on the cases I covered in her court.”
“When did you ever have the occasion to be nice to a coordinator in a civil court?”
“Remember that helicopter crash case that ended up settling?”
“I do, actually.”
“I covered it. Serena is a very sweet lady, and she’s all broken up about the judge’s death, but that’s not to say she wouldn’t love her fifteen minutes of fame. She says the judge told her if anything happened to him, she was to give it to Mrs. Fischer. She doesn’t want to give it to the lady because she heard about the divorce. Mrs. Fischer is not in her good graces, she says.”
“What was it?”
“She didn’t want to say on the phone.”
“But she told you about this something. A reporter.”
“I told her I was helping Nina clear her name. Serena loves Nina because the judge loved Nina. She wants to help her. She’s known her since she was a little girl. Her and Jan and Trevor too. I told her I’d buy her breakfast and hear her story. Can you meet her at Jim’s on Broadway about eight thirty?”
“I think I can swing that, depending on when the detective downstairs leaves.”
“Downstairs? Where are you?” Her chortle nearly blew out his ears. “You’re with Nina, aren’t you? Are you in her apartment? You can’t be working on the exhibit, not when her father just died—”
When Melanie found out he hadn’t told her about someone breaking into the Fischer house and assaulting Nina he would be off this story. So be it. He’d given Nina his word. “Shut up, will you? I came over to help her look for some paperwork. I’m helping out a friend who is in trouble, remember?”
“You want to help her, get over to Jim’s by eight thirty. I may be running late.”
He hung up and checked the time on his phone. An hour. Nina would want to go with him. Which was fine. Serena Cochrane might be even more forthcoming with the beloved judge’s daughter right there.
“He’s gone.” Nina trudged into the room. She looked done in. She needed to sleep. But she wouldn’t. “He’s coming back with a search warrant.”
“I have to go to Jim’s restaurant in a little bit.” He recounted his conversation with Melanie. “Maybe Serena can tell us something that helps make sense of all of this.”
“Serena is a wonderful lady. Dad loved her. She wouldn’t say a bad word about him. He couldn’t be bought.”
He’d give anything to wipe away the pain on her face. “I’m sorry. But we need to find out. He had a gambling problem he hid. Maybe someone blackmailed him.”
“I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“What do you mean?”
“Trusting him. As a kid I learned not to trust anyone. Yet I let him in.”
“He was a good father.”
“I’m beginning to wonder if good fathers are extinct.”
“God is a good Father. We can’t always understand what His plan is, but we have to trust He has one.”
“Can’t always understand? Try never. Dad was a hypocrite and a liar.”
The bitterness in her voice reverberated in the room. Restoring her faith in God the Father was on Aaron’s daily prayer list. The judge certainly hadn’t made it easier. “Let’s just see what Melanie found out before we pass judgment. Let’s see what Serena has to say, okay?”
“Knowing Serena, she’ll have plenty to say.”
“She’s a talker?”
“A big talker, but she’s a hard worker too. She’s been Dad’s court coordinator for more than fifteen years. She’s loyal, a quality Dad valued above all else.”
“He trusted her to keep something very important. I’m curious to see what it is.”
“Me too.” Nina plopped onto the couch next to Daffy, who didn’t budge. “King’s coming back with a search warrant. Trevor is about to self-combust. Mom thinks we need to clean up. She doesn’t want the police to think she’s a bad housekeeper. Jan wants to take out King with a sniper rifle.”
“She probably shouldn’t express that sentiment too loudly.” Grace hadn’t done her own housekeeping in years. “You have nothing to hide.”
“Except a box full of receipts I don’t want him to see.”
And the letters from her mother. Aaron glanced at his watch. “There’s still time. If you want to look at the letters before he comes back, and before I have to meet Melanie.”
She closed her eyes and opened them. Her hands clutched at her knees, then loosened. “I’ll look at the letters while you dig through the receipts and let me know if you see anything that . . . helps.”
Aaron brought out the boxes. He handed her the letters and settled next to her on the couch, leaving a discreet space between them. Their fingers touched when he handed her the letters. She felt warm, almost feverish. “You sure you want me here? You don’t want Jan?”
“Stay.” She unbundled the letters and smoothed her fingers over the top envelope. She glanced over at him. “According to the postmark, this is the first one. Can I tell you something?”
“Anything.”
“I’ve always dreamed of having some communication from her, and now that it’s here, I’d rather have the stuff I made up. That Jan and I made up. Somehow, I know I’ll be disappointed. It’s all she ever did. Disappoint. Jan more than me. I was older an
d . . . more realistic.”
Nine years old. Not that old. “Reality can really bite.”
“Yeah, it can.”
Her face was so full of pain, he had to duck his head and focus on the receipts. Neat envelopes each bearing a date in black magic marker. They went back five years. Five years of extended hunting and fishing trips with his buddies so he could take a hike to Las Vegas. He apparently believed the adage that what happened in Las Vegas stayed in Vegas.
At first it was mostly hotel rooms and car rentals. A small, incongruently neon-green notebook held rows and rows of Judge Fischer’s elegant penmanship. A true patron of cursive to reflect his growing addiction to gambling. He started small with craps and slot machines. Graduated to blackjack and poker. The amounts grew accordingly. Lost and won. Often more winning then losing at first. Then he added betting on football games and boxing matches to the smorgasbord.
Each envelope contained its own notebook in different colors. Somehow that appealed to the judge. Neon green, electric blue, stunning turquoise. The numbers inside weren’t as bright. He lost more than he won. In the second year, he started a new, separate notebook recording sums of money that apparently had nothing to do with gambling.
They were fat, round numbers next to dates. Nothing else. Dates across a span of two years. No hint of what they represented.
The last year held a receipt for the purchase of a condo: $750,000. Another receipt showed he had purchased a new Jaguar. No Prius for Vegas Fischer.
How did he lose so much at gambling and still afford to buy a luxury condo and a fancy vehicle? Receipts for fancy restaurants, roses, clothes, jewelry from high-end shops on the strip. Aaron went back to the dates and sums of money. Where had a district court judge gotten that kind of money?
Melanie’s voice lingered in his head. “He’s on the take.”
Melanie. “We need to go.”
Her expression pensive, Nina held a creased piece of Chief tablet paper in her hand.
“Nina?”
Heaving a sigh, she folded the letter and returned it to the envelope. Her blue eyes were wet, but no tears fell. “She wanted us back.” Her voice quivered. Still, she smiled as she tapped the envelope. “In this letter she’s talking about a Christmas when we went to a shelter, and there was a Santa Claus and we both got Strawberry Shortcake dolls. They were used, but we didn’t care. We were so excited. We got stockings with candy and apples and oranges and nuts in them. She said it was a great day.” Nina ran her fingers over the envelope. “She got a bottle of cheap perfume and some toiletries. It was a great day.”
“Where were you?”
“Either Tampa or Pensacola. I think it was Pensacola. We walked down on the beach waiting for the party to start. We took a city bus to the shelter. We were all sandy when we got there. They gave us both new sneakers.”
“A nice Christmas.”
“The only good one I remember. That’s why she remembers it. She probably doesn’t recall what happened after that.”
“But you do?”
“She had a Salvation Army voucher for a hotel room. As soon as we got there, she took off. She left us watching A Christmas Story on the TV. Told us to play with our dolls and eat candy. Jan ate too much and barfed on the bedspread. I had to clean it up.”
“Where did she go?”
“A bar, I guess. She came back in the middle of the night, all giggly and stinking like beer. She had a guy with her. She woke me up all irritated because the room stank like vomit. The guy left. He said he wasn’t up for a lady with two kids. She shook me and screamed at me and woke up Jannie, who cried.”
“You didn’t cry.”
“That’s what she wanted. Even when she left bruises on my arm from squeezing so hard, I wouldn’t give her that one thing she wanted.”
“I’m sorry.”
Nina held up a Polaroid photo that had been wrapped inside the tablet paper. Aaron took it. Two little girls in faded blue matching jumpers and an emaciated woman with hair the color of red that came out of a box smiled up at her. The girls clutched dolls to their skinny chests. Nina had been a towhead. Jan’s dark hair was caught up in a ragged ponytail. Both her front teeth were missing.
“How could she not love two girls with smiles like that?”
“My dad said she gave us up without a fight.” Her face filled with pained bewilderment, Nina shook her head. “Social services and the cops swept the tent city. They wanted to dismantle it. Which is absurd. The homeless have to go somewhere. We got picked up as unaccompanied minors. We went into the foster system while they tracked her down. I guess she still had some tiny bit of decency left. She called Dad and asked him to take us so we wouldn’t get lost in the system forever.”
“She loved you enough to know she couldn’t take care of you and her brother could.”
Her gaze wandered over his shoulder to some distant spot. “She abandoned us and gave up on being our mother.”
The hurt in her voice filled Aaron with the intense desire to do something, anything, to take it away. He wanted to smack someone around, and he wasn’t the barroom-brawl type. Judge Fischer hadn’t known much about the tender hearts of little girls. Or grown-up ones. “Are you going to read the rest of them?”
“Not right now. I need time.” She smoothed the stack of envelopes with gentle fingers. “I want to make a collage of these. Preserve them. They’re all I have—all Jan and I have—of her.”
“After you and Jan read them.”
She bundled the stack with its thick rubber band and laid it gently on the coffee table. “I shouldn’t have involved you in this.”
“We needed to see the receipts. I think they’re important to what happened to him. I’m just not sure how.” If she wanted to change the subject, Aaron would oblige. He summarized what he’d seen in the notebooks, noting the unexplained sums of money and the Las Vegas bank account registry. “Your father had another source of income. That’s how he financed his other life, his gambling and the high life he lived in Vegas. The big question, among many, is where did the money come from?”
“If King gets Dad’s financial records, he’ll eventually ask the same question.”
“And he’ll start looking around for other evidence.” Aaron joined her in staring at the box. “We could mail it to him. Or I could tell him I found it.”
“He already thinks you had something to do with all this because of me.”
That was bound to happen. Her explanation of King’s interest in him made Aaron do some snorting of his own. Conspiracy to commit murder. For what earthly reason? He’d covered enough murder trials to know there didn’t have to be an earthly reason. Or any reason at all that made sense.
Murder was generally senseless.
He stood. “I’ll be back as quick as I can. Hold down the fort.”
She looked up at him with those liquid blue eyes, pain etching lines around her swollen mouth. She’d seen so much. Been hurt so much. It had to stop. A person shouldn’t have to bear quite this much. He leaned down and kissed her uninjured cheek. A soft, quick kiss. No staking of territory. A question. Or an invitation.
Her skin was soft and warm. She smelled like spearmint and eucalyptus. He closed his eyes and breathed her in. Now was not the time for this. She was too vulnerable. He wouldn’t take advantage of her emotional state.
He straightened. “Sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?”
Her hand came up and touched his face, drawing him back. Her eyes were big and her mouth slightly parted, an invitation that couldn’t be ignored. He sat and leaned into her. The kiss began softly, so softly. An exploration, all the sweeter because it had been so long in coming.
Her lips tasted sweet. He let his lips linger there. He kissed her forehead and the bruise on her cheek. He trailed his fingers across her silky hair, then traced her jawline. Her lips sought his. They felt exactly as he had imagined. Only better. He eased back. “My timing stinks.”
“I disagree.
” Her hands fluttered. She touched her lips with two fingers and let them drop. “It’s confusing, I’ll admit, but sooner or later, we have to figure it out. We’ve both known that for a while.”
“I don’t mean to take advantage.” He stood, backed up, so he wouldn’t be tempted to kiss her all over again. “You’re going through so much right now.”
“I stopped letting people take advantage of me a long time ago.” Frowning, she pushed her hair behind one ear, making herself seem even younger. “You’re my best friend. I don’t want to do anything to change that, or I would’ve kissed you a long time ago.”
He let her words sink in. He had to be grinning like an idiot. His face hurt. She had the same concerns that he did, but he wanted to build that friendship into something that would last a lifetime. And he wanted a partner in Christ. Scripture was clear about the whole unevenly yoked thing. “You’ll always be my best friend.”
And more.
“You say that now, but my experience with . . . stuff like this is that someone always ends up hurt.”
“I would never do anything to hurt you.” That, she could bank on. “I’m sorry. This is something that should wait.”
“Stop saying you’re sorry.”
“We’ll talk later.”
Certain if he didn’t go now he would swoop down for another kiss, this one longer and deeper, Aaron strode to the top of the stairs without looking back.
“Aaron, stop. I told you, I’m going with you.”
“That’s not a good idea.” He put his hand on the ornate banister and swiveled halfway. “It’ll make King even more suspicious.”
“We’ll be back before he gets his warrant.” She popped up from the couch and grabbed her beautiful Leica M6 from the table. It was her most prized and valuable possession. One that had cost her an entire summer’s wages before her sophomore year at UT. She used it when she wanted to shoot black-and-white film. “Besides, I’m not under house arrest. It’s a free country.”