"That's funny, you calling me stupid. I got to her first, didn't I?" Kevin twirled the little phone. It disappeared into his big hand and he looked at that fist as if he admired it. He looked at Josie as if he didn't hold her in the same esteem.
"If the shoe fits," Josie answered dryly and then gave warning. "Push me again and I'll have you arrested for assault. Hand over the phone or I'll have you arrested for robbery. Say one more word to your wife and you won't believe the charges I'll file. If you really are smart, you'll quit while you're ahead."
"And you better think twice before you let me see your bitch face again," he hissed. Josie could feel the warmth of his breath before she retreated a step, but he was still on her. "I don't go down that easy. Tell Suzy she's got one more chance. She can come home and everything will be fine. If she doesn't, she won't get a penny and I'll take you both out. I swear I will."
"The only way Susan will ever even look at you again is over my dead body, Mr. O'Connel."
Josie had had enough. She put out her hand for her phone. Taken aback by her self-assuredness, Kevin O'Connel almost gave it to her. Then he thought again, held his fist high and, with a laugh, dropped it at her feet.
"Oops." The mischievousness melted from his eyes.
Josie looked down, then up again. Kevin O'Connel was waiting for her to get it. The man could wait until hell froze over because Josie Bates wouldn't spend one second at his feet.
"Think about what you said," Kevin O'Connel warned. "That dead body thing—"
"Excuse me?"
Surprised to find that they weren't the only two people in the universe, O'Connel stepped away and Josie looked at the lady who was retrieving the phone. There was a good two grand on the woman's back, another couple hundred on her feet. Not the type you'd figure for a good deed, not exactly the kind of woman who usually prowled the San Pedro courthouse. When she righted herself Josie had the impression that she smiled.
"I think this belongs to you."
She held Josie's phone out on her palm like a peace offering. Josie took it with a barely audible "Thanks" as she kept an eye on Kevin O'Connel. With a cock of a finger he shot Josie an imaginary bullet filled with hatred, arrogance and warning. Then he dismissed her with a grunt, turned on his heel and sauntered away, leaving Josie and the lady to watch.
"He doesn't seem very pleasant," the woman noted.
"He isn't," Josie answered and walked on. She got Susan on the phone again, calming her as she opened the door and absentmindedly held it for the man directly behind her. Josie paused on the sidewalk and made her second call. Eleven rings and Hannah answered. Home from school on a half day, homework done, she was readying her last painting for her exhibit at Hermosa Beach's Gallery C. The girl had come a long way since Josie had taken her in. A casualty of adult folly, Hannah was now legally under Josie's guardianship and she was anxious that Josie would not only be home, but be home in time for the exhibit. Josie assured Hannah that only the end of the world could keep her away, then said goodbye. Dropping the phone in her purse Josie was giving a cursory thought to where she might grab a bite to eat, when she felt a hand on her arm.
"Josie Bates?"
"Yep." She looked first at the obscenely large emerald ring that adorned that hand, then at the rich lady who had followed her from the courthouse.
"I wonder if I could take a few minutes of your time." She offered a smile and followed up with an invitation. "Perhaps lunch? It's already past noon."
Josie inclined her head, peeved at the interruption, perplexed by the invitation and dismayed by the woman issuing it. Josie had sworn off this kind of client long ago: the kind with more money than good sense, the kind usually found in Beverly Hills or Hollywood, the kind who had a different take on justice than the rank and file. This one looked to be bad news. Like a high-priced car she was sleek, high maintenance and tuned to a powerful, itchy idle. If Josie let her, she would press the gas and Josie would have no choice but to go along for the ride. The trick was to get out of the way before the flag dropped.
"I have an office in Hermosa Beach."
Josie reached for a card. When the woman put out her hand again Josie moved to avoid the contact and tried to shake off the sudden chill that crackled up the back of her neck. Something was amiss, but the sense of it was vague and Josie didn't want to waste her time getting a handle on it. Still, the woman persisted.
"I'd like to talk to you today. It's very important. There's a place not too far from here where we could talk privately." Her voice was deep, almost sultry.
"I'm sorry, I don't work that way. Call my office. If you've got something I can help you with I'll let you know; if I can't, I'll refer you."
Josie started to leave but the woman's fingers dug in hard on her arm. It took less than a second for Josie to note the change in the lady's demeanor, to see the flash of anger behind her dark eyes. It took even less time for Josie to break the hold and make herself clear.
"You better find someone else to help you."
"No. I need to talk to you," she whispered, refusing to be dismissed. "It's about Matthew. Matthew McCreary."
The woman smiled sweetly, triumphantly as Josie's outrage turned to surprise. The lady's abracadabra had conjured up a past that left Josie Baylor-Bates mesmerized, almost hypnotized. She came close again. This time both hands reached out and took Josie by the shoulders as if relieved a long search was over.
"I'm Grace McCreary. Matthew's sister."
Josie shook her head hard. She stumbled as she tried to free herself and that made the woman in blue hold tighter still. That was enough to bring Josie around. She pulled back, narrowed her eyes and said:
"You're dead."
CHAPTER 3
Josie threw cold water on her face and looked at herself in the mirror. Then she did it all over again but this time she skipped the mirror. She knew what she looked like: pale under her tan, the blue of her eyes almost black, her cheekbones too prominent because shock had drained her. She was shaken by Grace McCreary's appearance, unsure how she felt about it, and she resented having to figure it out standing in the bathroom of Fistonich's Piano Bar and Restaurant two blocks down from the courthouse.
From the third stall there was a flush. Josie yanked at the paper towels stuck in the dispenser. When the door opened, a waitress came out adjusting a frilly white apron over her full black skirt. She looked like an aged showgirl: great legs and a face that had long ago lost its allure. She rinsed her hands and watched Josie pull harder until she was rewarded with a handful of coarse white paper. The waitress plucked two sheets from the pile in Josie's hands.
"You okay, honey?" She sounded like a carnival barker.
"Yeah. Sure. I'm great." Josie put the towels on top of the dispenser. There was nothing better than finding out that your soul mate didn't have a soul at all.
Josie had lived with Matthew McCreary for three years, knew him a full year before that, had an intimate-as-hell relationship only to find out that he'd forgotten to mention one little thing: his sister was alive and well somewhere in the world. Family, the one thing Josie longed for, Matthew had treated cavalierly. She'd believed his sister died in the same accident that took his parents. How cruel to the memory of his parents, how unfair to Grace McCreary, how malicious to play on Josie's emotional weakness.
Jesus.
She had skinny-dipped with Matthew McCreary in the ocean and made love on the floor of their house. She had told him about her mother's abandonment, her father's death. Josie had respected his pain, recognizing that he lived with tragedy the same way she did. Josie had taken Matthew McCreary's shirts to the laundry because she wanted to, not because he expected it. He had allowed her to believe a lie; to live with a liar.
Christ.
Matthew had told her he was alone in the world. He said he felt complete with her and that made Josie feel whole. He was the first man she had loved. Josie admired Matthew. She believed in him. They par
ted like adults for all the adult reasons, but that didn't keep the parting from hurting or the memory of him from lingering.
Damn him.
Josie had been happy when she heard Matthew was married. She was so proud when he threw his hat in the ring in a bid for the Senate nomination. Josie thought he was close to perfect, just that she wasn't perfect for him. She didn't want to find her identity subservient to his political ambition or his money. Josie believed that was her failure and she had lived with that regret all these years. But what really made her angry was that the mere idea that Matthew McCreary was in her world again made her heart race.
Damn it all, Matthew, and your sister, too.
Crumpling the paper towel, Josie tossed it in the trash, left the ladies' room and paused in the small dark hall by the pay phone. Fistonich's was a restaurant without windows; a throwback to the fifties. At night the piano bar filled with ancient people decked out in cocktail finery any vintage collector would kill for. The women shaded their eyes in blue and tinted their silver hair pink. The men wore toupees that had seen better days and polyester pants in shades the rainbow had never heard of. The place served a decent steak and management watched out for the old folks who got drunk and wept as they sang the old songs and danced cheek to cheek. But that was night and this was noon. The place looked shabby, smelled like smoke and was nearly deserted except for Grace McCreary, who waited patiently at a corner table for Josie to return. When Josie slid onto the black leather banquette, she put her purse by her side and gave Grace McCreary the once-over.
She had seen a picture of Grace as a gawky youngster, so it was no surprise that she didn't recognize the woman upon whom God had played a cosmic joke. He had given Grace everything Matthew had: a high-bridged straight nose; quick, dark eyes protected by lush lashes; high cheekbones and artistically shaped lips. Unfortunately, where the sum of the parts made Matthew look intellectual and intensely handsome, his sister appeared untrustworthy and tough. In short, Grace McCreary looked like Matthew in drag—except Matthew would have been prettier.
To make matters worse, Grace made no attempt to soften her features, choosing instead to accentuate them with a short slash of dark hair that she swept behind ears decorated with moons of mabe pearls. Grace was pulled together with frightening precision and spoke with an East Coast accent so slight Josie might have missed it if she hadn't been hanging on every curious word that came out of Grace McCreary's mouth.
"I ordered you a beer. Matthew said you liked beer." Grace tipped her head back and a plume of smoke seeped from between her rose-colored lips.
"That's illegal in California. You can't smoke in restaurants." Josie gave a nod to the cigarette.
"The waitress smokes. She brought me her ashtray from the back room. You won't turn us in to the police, will you?"
Grace cut her eyes slyly toward Josie, inviting her to share a giggle at this bit of naughtiness. It would have seemed a little girl trick if the glint in her eye wasn't so sharp, if a dare to bend the rules didn't lurk in her tone. When Josie didn't react, the smile faded, the cigarette was extinguished. Ground out. Pushed down until the accordioned filter was half buried in a bed of shredded tobacco. Josie stayed silent. Grace's brow furrowed as she rubbed the bits of the brown stuff from her fingers.
"Then again maybe you would tell on me. Matthew said you were a letter-of-the-law woman. He said you could be counted on to always do the right thing."
"Do you believe everything Matthew says?"
Josie pushed the beer away, insulted by everything about this woman: her odd small talk, her ladies-who-lunch suit, her giant emerald ring and huge pearl earrings, her assumption that Josie would drink beer for lunch while she sipped ice tea. But her contempt went unnoticed.
"If someone is right, why not? He said you put yourself through college on a volleyball scholarship. He said you were smart and trustworthy. I'm not athletic myself and I know how much Matthew admires that. He told me you were as tall as he was, but I didn't expect you to be so beautiful."
"I'm not beautiful," Josie said.
"Handsome, then." Grace amended her comment seamlessly. Her gaze caught Josie's as if she had studied the technique of eye contact but lost the art. "I saw you in the newspaper when you defended that man—the one they said killed the poor boy at the amusement park. The picture didn't do you justice but it was the only one I'd seen. Matthew doesn't have a picture of you."
"I'm sure his wife wouldn't have appreciated him keeping one around."
"He wasn't always married," Grace reminded her and with the mention of Matthew's dead wife the emerald ring turned 'round and 'round. Only the thumb of Grace's left hand moved and she seemed oddly unaware of the motion. It was accompanied by a tic that made her well coiffed head pull up as if someone had bridled her and the bit was painful.
"But he always had a sister," Josie reminded her, eager to shift the spotlight where it belonged. "Listen, Grace, is it just me or don't you find it a little disturbing that Matthew led me to believe you were dead?"
"Matthew told me you always wanted to live at the beach. He told me you were a bleeding heart. . ." Grace talked over Josie as if she hadn't spoken and that was the last straw.
"Okay. I don't know why you're here but this conversation is going nowhere. If Matthew wants to see me he can give me a call." Josie reached for her purse. She was sliding out of the booth when Grace leaned over the table and stopped her as easily as if she'd erected a wall.
"Matthew didn't stop thinking about you when he married Michelle," she said quietly. "He would see you on the television or see a picture in the paper. I could tell what you meant to him. You should know that."
Josie paused, confused by this piece of information. Grace's own hands slipped beneath the table and Josie had no doubt the emerald was still whirly gigging. Wary of this woman's liberties as the past was insinuating itself into the present, Josie pulled her lips together. Grace's mere presence was rewriting Matthew's history and Josie's right along with it and that could threaten everything and everyone Josie loved.
"Matthew and me, that was a long time ago." Josie looked away so that Grace McCreary wouldn't see the flush in her cheeks. "Our history is private. Now, if there's something you want, tell me. If you were just curious, you've seen me. And when you see Matthew, tell him to take care of his own business instead of sending a sister he was ashamed of to do it for him."
Josie was about to leave, to forget she had ever met Grace McCreary, when she saw a fascinating play of expressions ripple across the woman's beautifully made-up face. Grace's shoulders broadened as if she were steeling herself for an assault; she tensed as if trying to absorb a possibly fatal blow and Josie was mesmerized.
"Oh, I see. Well, I suppose I never looked at it that way. I didn't think he was asham—" Grace couldn't bring herself to finish that sentence, so she shook back her hair and started another one. "I've made a terrible mistake. I thought he had told you something—enough that you would understand our relationship."
"Christ."
Josie shifted and pulled her purse close, uncomfortable with the turning of this particular tide. It seemed the truth was that a living sister was less important to Matthew than the memory of Josie and for Grace that was a devastating realization.
"Christ," Josie muttered again, sympathetic to Grace's plight. People erased other people from their lives all the time. Josie's mother had done it, why not Matthew? That connection bought Grace some time.
"No, it's all right." Grace put up a hand to ward off sympathy. The emerald slipped to the wrong side of her finger, flashing like some alien sign of peace. "You mattered to him, I didn't. That's why I know so much about you and you know nothing about me. Please, don't be angry with Matthew. He had his reasons. It isn't important now."
"Then what is important?" Josie asked. "Because it's pretty clear you don't just want to have a drink."
"Matthew is in trouble. You have to help him."
"Maybe you haven't been listening to the news," Josie said. "According to the pundits, if Matthew gets the nomination he's favored in the general election. Why would he need anyone's help?"
Grace's face lit up like that of a lonely child thrilled to find someone who would play with her. She pulled a manila envelope from her purse and pushed it across the table.
"It's not about his campaign," Grace breathed. "It's about the police. They don't think Michelle committed suicide. They think Matthew killed his wife."
CHAPTER 4
Some say that adults can't remember their early childhood; that those who profess to recall a mother's song, a special gift, a poignant moment before they reached the age of reason are only parroting things told to them. Josie knew that was untrue because she remembered being five years old.
They were living in military housing in Texas. The cottage was neat but not perfectly kept. Reminders of her mother were everywhere: a compact by the lamp, a magazine left open, a lipstick-stained coffee cup, a note written in her precise printing with the odd little flourish crossing every f.
That day was hot as only Texas hot could be. The place was still as only a military installation could be when the men have gone off to do important things. Killing things. Josie's father was away but late in the morning a man in uniform stood in their house talking to Emily Baylor-Bates.
Josie wore pink. Her T-shirt was too big, her dungarees too short. She was shoeless and she was quiet, standing on the patch of hallway that connected two small bedrooms to the living room. She was half hidden, not because she meant to hide but because she was shy when people came to the house while her father was gone.
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