Dead Calm

by Annelise Ryan

  “Did he say if he was staying somewhere close by?” I ask.

  “We didn’t discuss that, but . . .” Desi winces and gives me a forced smile.

  “What?” I say, eyeing her warily. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “I told you I invited him here to the party,” she says, with a smile that’s half grimace. “He said he was definitely coming.”

  “Yeah, well he says a lot of things that never happen,” I grumble. “I wouldn’t hold your breath.”

  “We’ll see,” Desi says with a sly smile. “I should go and mingle with my other guests.”

  I’m fairly certain she simply wants to escape my scrutiny, but I let her go. It is her birthday, after all. As she heads for a group of people I don’t know, I make my way over to Izzy, who is standing next to his mother. Sylvie is seated in a chair, drink in hand, looking out over the crowd with a reverent smile as if it was her birthday.

  “How’s it going?” I say to Izzy.

  “So far so good,” he says. “But check in with me again after they cut the cake. I don’t think I can pass that one up.”

  “You can have a small bite,” Sylvie says. “A life without little pleasures isn’t really a life at all, now is it?” She reaches up and pats an imaginary stray hair on her head into place. Her hair is so thin I can see her scalp.

  “How are you doing, Sylvie?” I ask. Even as I pose the question, the nurse in me is doing a quick assessment, checking her overall color, scanning her ankles for edema, studying her chest to see if she’s breathing faster than normal.

  “I’m fine,” she says. “But I would be better if I had my granddaughter here with me.”

  “Where are the kids?” I ask Izzy.

  “Erika has them in her room,” Izzy says.

  I would like to get Izzy off to himself so I can fill him in on what Hurley and I learned earlier this evening, but I know he will be reluctant to leave his mother’s side. Not because he’s a devoted son—although he is—but more because if he leaves her alone, Sylvie will have a conniption. She will clutch at her chest, cut loose with a string of oy veys, and declare in a voice that will be surprisingly loud and robust coming from such a frail-looking old woman that the world must be coming to an end. So I decide to try something different.

  “Sylvie, I want to go and check on Matthew. I haven’t seen him all day. Would you like to come with me and see Juliana?”

  Her face lights up. “Yes,” she says, and then she starts the tedious process of getting out of her chair. Izzy and I both stand by and watch, knowing from past experience that trying to assist her will result in getting our hands slapped and our efforts chastised. Eventually, Sylvie makes it up and takes her walker in hand. Slowly, the two of us navigate through the room and the guests, making our way toward Erika’s bedroom. It’s a slow go, but eventually we get there. And when I open the door to Erika’s room, I am greeted with an unexpected surprise.

  Erika is on the floor with Juliana on a blanket beside her. Matthew is not on the floor, however; he is being held by the man standing in the room.

  “Hello, Mattie,” says my father. “Good to see you again.”

  CHAPTER 32

  “Please put my son down,” I tell him.

  “I’m not allowed to have a little time with my grandson?” my father says.

  Sylvie, who is clueless as to the animosity and history between me and my father, says, “Oh, yes. It is important to spend time with the wee grands, yes?”

  “Why, yes, it is,” my father says. He smiles at Sylvie, who is walkering her way toward a chair near Juliana.

  I stride over to my father and extend my arms out to Matthew, who comes to me without hesitation. Not that he looked uncomfortable in my father’s arms. Quite the contrary.

  “How’s my boy doing?” I say, kissing him on his head. “Did you have a good day today?”

  “Goo day,” Matthew says.

  I look at my father, who is watching us, still smiling. “What are you doing here?” I ask him.

  “I came to celebrate my daughter’s birthday,” he says in a Captain Obvious tone. “And to see my grandchildren. I have a lot of lost time to make up for.”

  Erika looks at me, then away, focusing instead on Juliana.

  “I gave my gift for Desi to Erika,” my father says. “She can give it to her later. I don’t want to cause any disruptions at the party.”

  “No, you just want to cause disruptions in our lives,” I say.

  He doesn’t deny this. Instead, he looks down at his feet.

  Sylvie gives me a tsk, followed by an oomph as she drops into the chair she has finally reached. “One should be more respectful to one’s elders,” she says. Then she smiles up at my father and adds, “Particularly one as handsome as this.”

  Great. Now Sylvie is flirting with my father. Can my life get any weirder? Turns out it can.

  “Mattie, I wonder if I could have a word with you in private,” my father says. “Perhaps we could step out back for a moment?”

  “Whatever you have to say to me, you can say here,” I say. I’m angry, but I’m trying to keep my tone neutral so as not to upset the kids.

  “I don’t think this topic is for general ears,” he says. He narrows his eyes at me, and I sense he’s trying to send me a mental message. I wonder if this is part of his con repertoire, this eye fixation combined with certain word combos. I saw something like it on a TV show once. “It’s regarding royalty,” he adds, his eyebrows arching suggestively.

  I have no idea what he’s talking about, and I know I should just leave, or ask him to, or both. But my damned curiosity is getting the better of me. I set my son down on the floor and kiss him again. “Mommy needs to go do something, but I’ll be back in a minute. Can you stay here and play with Erika?”

  “Look, Matthew,” Erika says, “I’ve got a Thomas the Tank puzzle.” She shows him the wooden puzzle, which has seven large pieces in it. Since my son loves trains and puzzles—a trait he was bound to have given that both his parents are puzzle fanatics—it’s an easy sway.

  I back out of the room as my son drops to the floor, grabs the puzzle, and dumps its pieces out. My father follows me, and once we’re in the hallway, we make our way to the kitchen and the back door. I step outside onto the covered patio, having a momentary flashback to my wedding, which was held here in my sister’s backyard.

  “Your wedding was lovely,” my father says.

  I shoot him a surprised look. “How would you know?”

  He gives me an enigmatic smile, one I suspect he put to good use back in his swindling days. “I was here,” he says.

  “No, you weren’t.”

  “Oh, but I was. You may not have seen me, but I was here. I wasn’t about to miss my daughter’s wedding.”

  I stare at him, wondering if I can believe him. Was this just another one of his cons, his way of trying to win me over?

  “You were wearing a lovely dress in a blue shade that matched your eyes. Your son had a mini-meltdown halfway down the aisle. And just as the ceremony ended, Ethan’s giant cockroach put in an appearance and created quite a panic.”

  “You could have learned all that from talking to Desi, or looking at pictures,” I say.

  “I suppose I could have, but I didn’t. You can ask her. The topic of your wedding never came up.”

  “Whatever,” I say, tired of trying to determine if he’s being honest or not. “What is this royalty you want to talk about?”

  “Mr. Prince,” he says.

  He has my full attention now. “What about him?”

  “He was a hired gun, right? And I’m betting he did his job because his family had been threatened. And when he turned himself in to your husband, they had him killed.”

  I try to figure out how he could have learned this. Jeremy Prince’s name had appeared in the news, and he was identified as the killer of Hal, Tina, and Carolyn Abernathy. But the reason for the killings that appeared in all the media sources wa
s that Prince suffered from a severe case of PTSD brought on by his time in the military, and that he went off the deep end and embarked on a killing spree. The deaths were determined to be random and unrelated.

  The media also reported that Prince’s family was missing and presumed dead as well, even though their bodies hadn’t been found. The “official” explanation of how Prince died was that he attempted to take the gun of the police detective who had arrested him, and a struggle and shootout ensued, one that unfortunately also claimed the life of reporter and photographer Alison Miller.

  This was far from the truth, of course. But in order to protect ourselves and our case, this was the official line that came out of the police department. So how did my father know the truth behind the public story?

  “I’m right, aren’t I?” my father says.

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss this with you,” I tell him.

  “These people are very dangerous,” he says. “Their reach is enormous. You need to be careful.”

  “Yeah, thanks to you. If you hadn’t carried out that con thirty years ago, none of this would have happened, and all these people wouldn’t be dead.”

  He at least has the grace to look ashamed. “You’re never going to let this go, are you?” he says.

  “How can I?”

  He shakes his head woefully, shifting from one foot to the other. Then he reaches into the pocket of his pants and pulls out an envelope. “Here,” he says, handing it to me. “I don’t know if it will help at this point, but it’s the best I have to offer. But I caution you to think carefully, Mattie. This thing is much bigger than you realize. You are biting off way more than you can chew. Please don’t pursue this on your own.”

  What he does next startles me. He steps forward, grabs me by the shoulders, and kisses me on my forehead. “I love you, Mattie,” he says. And then he turns and walks away, heading through my sister’s backyard and into the neighbor’s. I watch him until he disappears.

  A tornado of emotions whirls through me: anger, surprise, frustration, curiosity, and something that feels frighteningly close to worry. Not for myself, but for him. I care for him, I realize. I don’t want to, but I do. And I’m afraid for his safety as well as ours.

  I look at the envelope he gave me. It is sealed closed, a plain white envelope like hundreds of others you could find in any store or home. I’m tempted to leave it unopened, guessing that it’s probably some sort of letter, a plea for forgiveness, or a request to be a part of my life. Either of these things are possible down the road, I realize. But for the moment, I’m too confused, too overwhelmed to deal with it.

  “It’s probably one more con,” I say aloud, though there is no one to hear me. I turn to head back into the house, determined to stash the envelope somewhere and deal with it later. But as I grab the knob on the back door, I hesitate.

  My damned curiosity is nagging at me, and I know from past experience that it won’t stop until I open the envelope.

  I slide my finger under the flap and rip the envelope open. Inside are several sheets of folded paper. They appear old: wrinkled, yellowed, and stained in spots. I unfold them and read the first one, then read it again, unwilling to believe what my eyes are seeing. My heart skips a beat. I look up and gaze around the yard, which suddenly seems immense and threatening. The trees look menacing, the bushes intimidating, the shadows hostile.

  I refold the pages and stuff them back into the envelope. Then I head inside in search of Hurley. Life is about to get a whole lot more interesting.

  CHAPTER 33

  I make a quick excuse to my sister, apologizing for leaving early and telling her that something urgent has come up at work. I gather up Matthew, Emily, and Hurley, telling them we need to go home. Hurley starts to question me, but when he sees the look on my face, he acquiesces. Emily doesn’t seem bothered by the fact that we’re leaving. All she wants to know is whether or not she can call Johnny and do something with him for what’s left of the evening. When I tell her no, that I need her to be home to watch Matthew, she is clearly unhappy. Her displeasure is quickly mitigated, however, when I tell her that I’ll pay quadruple time for tonight’s services.

  She and Hurley drive home in his car; I take Matthew in mine. When we get to the house, I tell Emily to order in something for dinner, and then I leave her and Matthew downstairs while Hurley and I head upstairs to the privacy of our bedroom.

  “What’s going on?” Hurley asks me as soon as we are behind closed doors.

  I take the envelope out of my pants pocket and hand it to him. “My father was at Desi’s party tonight,” I tell him as he peers into the envelope. “We had a little chat in the backyard, and he gave me this right before he disappeared.”

  Hurley looks intrigued as he takes the papers out of the envelope. He unfolds them the same way I did and starts to read. After a moment, he looks at me, his eyes wide, and then he looks back at the papers. “Are these—”

  “The original Miller-Weiss memos? Yes, I believe they are.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned.”

  I let out a mirthless chuckle. “Yes, that is what my father seems to believe, that we are both damned. He warned me that this thing was too big for us and that we need to be careful.”

  “We already know that,” Hurley says a bit irritably.

  “I think he may have a point,” I say. “The little guy bringing down the big one, the whole David and Goliath thing, that plays well in books and movies. But I’m not so sure it works in real life.”

  Hurley gives me a questioning look. “What are you saying?” “I’m saying that I think we need to let it go.” Hurley gapes at me in disbelief. “Not give up,” I clarify. “But rather hand it off.”

  “To whom?” Hurley asks, clearly perturbed. “I already tried to get the FBI involved, but we don’t have enough evidence yet.”

  “Now we have those,” I say, pointing toward the papers that were in the envelope.

  “Thirty-year-old memos from a company that no longer exists? Involving company employees who likely no longer exist either?”

  “But we have some names that we can start with, names that might lead to other names. And we have the evidence that Laura dug up.”

  Hurley shakes his head, his lips pinched. “That’s not evidence,” Hurley says. “It’s speculation.”

  “What about the stuff I found on the computer at the clinic? They tried to cover up the death of that patient David had, but if we investigate it more thoroughly, maybe we can prove that. They had those receipts for liquor purchases, and the bottles they found at the man’s house, but all of that had to have been staged. Maybe there are family members we can talk to who would testify to the fact that the man wasn’t really a drinker. There has to be a trail somewhere. We just need to find it.”

  “First of all, you know that we can’t use any of the clinic information because you obtained it illegally. And even if we do try to use it, it’s going to implicate your ex big-time. Are you going to be okay with that?”

  Given what I learned about David, that he’s already running around and cheating on his new wife—his pregnant new wife, no less—I’m tempted to say yes. And yet there is some vestige of protectiveness holding me back, some lingering bit of concern for the man who I, at one time, thought was the love of my life.

  “We have so many pieces,” I say. “There has to be a way to put it all together.”

  “It would take an army of people to put it all together, and we don’t have that kind of manpower,” Hurley says. “I’m sorry, Mattie. It’s great that your dad finally came through and gave us these memos, but they’re useless. There’s no chain of evidence, and any halfway decent lawyer could get them dismissed. We need something bigger. A smoking gun.”

  I frown, irritated that these people have been getting away with these cover-ups for over thirty years. But I realize Hurley’s right: We need a smoking gun. Or a whistleblower, and the odds of that happening are minuscule given that everyone wit
h any knowledge of what went on is either dead or threatened into silent submission. And as much as I hate to admit it, my father is also right. Anything we do to pursue this case puts us and our family in danger.

  An idea buds in my head, growing off a thought I’d had earlier. I seize on it, watering it, fertilizing it, letting it grow. A few minutes later, it goes into full bloom.

  “Hurley, I have an idea. Tell me what you think.” I run my thought process past him, waiting for him to shoot it down, stomp my flower of an idea into a mash of petals. But he doesn’t. He listens, and when I’m done he sits on the bed, quiet, lost in thought. I give him some time to think it through.

  Finally, he looks over at me, and I see a hint of a smile on his face. “It just might work,” he says.

  I burst into a big smile, excited.

  “Or it might not,” he cautions me. “We can’t be sure how it’s all going to pan out, but it’s the best idea I’ve heard yet.” He bends toward me, sandwiches my face in his hands, and gives me a nice, long kiss on the mouth. “You are bloody brilliant,” he says when he’s done.

  “Thanks,” I say, feeling a warm glow inside that I’m certain isn’t just from my self-congratulatory moment. “I’m also a bit horny at the moment.”

  Hurley’s eyes darken. “Is the bedroom door locked?”

  I hop up off the bed and hurry to the door, throwing the lock. “It is now,” I say in a sultry voice. I saunter my way back to the bed and put one knee on it. Hurley reaches for me, pulling me down toward him.

  And then we share fifteen minutes of utter bliss.

  * * *

  “Wow,” I say as I lay on my back in the bed, staring at the ceiling. “That was certainly nice. Definitely the highlight of my day.”

  Hurley reaches over and laces his fingers with mine. “Mine, too. Want to go again?”

  I look over at him, tempted. But I know if we do, I’ll be too exhausted to do what I need to do next. I roll over, kiss him on the cheek, and say, “Rain check?”

  He lets out an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I’m not sure I have the stamina to follow up on that invitation.” He winks at me, and then we both roll over and get out of bed on our respective sides.