by Gerry O'Hara
Her only close gal friend in the city was a buyer for an upscale clothing boutique. They’d met a couple of years ago when Christie was modeling evening wear from Kathleen’s store at a breast cancer charity event. She enjoyed Kathleen’s quirky sense of humor and admired her community activism. They occasionally got together for a jog in the park, coffee at Starbucks, or a leisurely lunch on the weekend. She enjoyed their girl talk exchanges: updates on a new guy, new styles, vacations, and life’s ups and downs.
A sharp bark shook her out of her reverie. A Jack Russell terrier pranced in front of a middle-aged woman, the dog’s leash tangling around her legs. Christie smiled as she watched the interaction. The dog owner tried to manage the terrier, but it, too, was hopelessly wound up in the long leash. Finally, the owner dropped the leash, and let the dog run itself out of the tangle. Now she had to trot to catch up with the freed terrier. Her purse bounced against her thigh as she lunged forward, but it seemed a losing effort.
The appearance of a golden retriever stopped the terrier in its tracks, giving the woman a chance to grab the leash. She yanked on it and sternly told the dog to heel. Christie smiled as she watched the terrier ignore its owner and dance on tiptoes to explore the new creature that loomed ahead. The other dog outweighed the Jack Russell by a good forty pounds, but that did not thwart the courageous little dog. The retriever’s owner gave the yapping terrier a wide berth, and finally the Jack Russell and its now-disheveled mistress moved on. Christie stood up and began the walk back to the car.
At her apartment she stir-fried vegetables for a solitary dinner. Before she met Cash, she had been content to eat alone and spend evenings with only her cat for company. Now, without a partner, dinner was unappetizing, and the living room seemed lonely, lifeless. The only sound breaking the silence was a television voice and Tosha’s purring.
She sighed. Love could be unsettling. Love? Where had that thought come from? Love: a strong word, fraught with commitment and anxiety, yet also hope and promise. Falling in love with Cash was a definite possibility. She felt as though she was standing on a precipice, ready to fall at any moment, and she hoped he would be there to catch her.
Walking into her office the following morning, Christie knew that she would pay dearly for yesterday afternoon’s escape. A wad of “while you were gone” messages was lumped against her phone, and a note from Tom Gates indicated that he had a new case for her.
One message caught her interest. It was from Scott Cooper. On the coming weekend, the Big Sur River Gallery was showing his work, followed by an informal reception.
She did not have to look at her calendar to know there was an absence of engagements. Another drive to Big Sur would be scenic, relaxing, and she wanted to lend support to her teacher’s endeavors. Of course, it would be more enjoyable if Cash went along. Should she call him? Indecision niggled at her. She banged her fist on her desk.
Tom Gates poked his head in the doorway. “Everything all right, Christie?”
“Sorry, Tom. Just a bit of desk rage.”
“Oh. Better here than on the road.” He smiled and retreated.
Maybe rage was an exaggeration. Frustration was more like it, she thought. Take a step forward, she told herself. Call and leave a message on his voice mail. Why not?
She dialed Cash’s number and was put through to his voice mail. When she hung up, she put her hand on her chest and felt her heart beating unevenly. Why was she so anxious? It was a simple invitation. What had made her hesitant? Their night out in Big Sur had been romantic, intimate, and held out the possibility of a more serious relationship. At least that was how it had seemed at the time. Now she was unsure. Maybe the answer lay in her acknowledgment that Cash was more than a casual entry into her life. With other men a dinner or theater date now and then implied nothing more than a casual arrangement. She had nothing to lose. Now, too much was on the line.
Later, in her apartment, she changed into baggy sweats and a T-shirt. Plans for the evening were simple: a pepperoni pizza from the freezer and a video. She peeked into the oven: the cheese and sauce were bubbling in readiness. She juggled the pizza onto a plate just as the phone rang. Balancing dinner and a soft drink to carry them to the coffee table, she put them down and reached for the phone.
“Hello?”
“Christie!” Cash’s voice thundered across the line. “I’ve penciled in Big Sur for this weekend.” She was amused by his directness: no prelude, simply a straightforward acceptance.
“I’m glad you can make it.”
“Let’s get together before that. The weekend is too far away.”
Words she had longed to hear; he was eager to see her.
“Tomorrow? Dinner?” he prodded. “I can pick you up at your office or at home.”
“Yes.”
“Yes, which? Home or office?”
There was a hint of laughter in his voice.
“Home.”
“Great, I’ll be there around seven.”
Christie said good-bye and put the phone down. Her pizza was cold, but after hearing Cash’s voice, she hardly tasted what she was eating. Her hopes soared. Cash wanted to see her, and he was too impatient to wait until the weekend. Of course, it might simply mean that he was used to having a full date book; going out with her filled the empty spaces. Where did that thought come from? she asked herself. She had been absent from the dating scene for so long, she was obviously feeling a touch of insecurity. She would push away negative thoughts by concentrating on the romantic moments: Big Sur, Cash’s touch, his kiss, and his tender words.
The following day, Tom Gates brought an elderly woman, accompanied by a man who looked to be in his late twenties, into Christie’s office. The woman looked familiar.
“Christie,” Tom said, “I’d like you to meet Gladys Farley and her son, Drew. I hope you have some time to talk to them.”
“Of course. Won’t you sit down?” Christie nodded toward a pair of straight-backed chairs.
Tom leaned against the doorway. “Mrs. Farley’s daughter, Danielle, has been missing for thirty years.” He extended a hand, palm up, toward the couple. “I’ll let them tell you the rest,” he said, then excused himself and left.
Christie was intrigued by Gates’s lead-in. What could the Farleys possibly want from her? “Won’t you sit down? Tell me why you think I can help you.”
“My daughter, Danielle, was kidnapped by her father in 1982,” Gladys Farley said. She dabbed at her eyes, as though the child had been snatched from her arms just today.
“My husband George and I couldn’t have children, so we adopted. Danielle became our own the minute she was born.” She smiled at the memory. “She was the answer to our prayers, a sweet baby, a sweet child. Life was good.
“Then George lost his job during the aerospace layoffs. He tried hard to get work, but there was nothing available in his field. He couldn’t get a lower-paying job, either, because he was overqualified, and no one would hire him. He became morose and started drinking. Our home environment became chaotic, and I was concerned about our daughter’s well-being. The only solution was a divorce.
“I remarried a couple of years later, and Drew was born the following year. George was bitter, and became antagonistic and mean-spirited. He seemed to resent my being able to conceive a baby in my second marriage.
“The following Memorial Day weekend, he and Danielle were to go to Santa Cruz. He asked me to pack extra clothes because the weather was unpredictable at the beach. When he did not return with Danielle Monday evening at seven thirty, I assumed they were caught in traffic. By nine o’clock I was worried; by ten I was frantic and I called the police. When I hung up the phone, it hit me that George had run off with our daughter.”
“Where do I fit in?” Christie asked.
“Mother received a letter from a woman who claims to be Danielle,” her son said.
“That’s wonderful.” Christie caught an almost imperceptive shake of Drew’s head. He put his hand on h
is mother’s, which were primly folded in her lap, with the hankie crushed between them.
“Drew doesn’t believe the woman is my daughter.”
Christie turned to Drew. “Why?”
“Mother recently gave a large grant to a school in Oakland, and there was major publicity about it. The reporter brought up the kidnapping. I think whoever wrote the letter saw the article and is trying to cash in. Almost every time my mother makes the news, she is contacted by a rash of phony Danielles.”
Now Christie realized why the woman looked familiar. She had seen the write-up and accompanying photos in the Chronicle. Mrs. Farley was an astute businesswoman who had parlayed her late husband’s company into the ranks of the Fortune 500. She was known to share generously with the community at large.
“So you think this may be a scam?”
“Yes,” Drew answered. “The woman’s name is Dani Shepherd. She claims that her father’s widow found a series of newspaper articles about Mother in a desk drawer, and recalled a conversation she’d had with her husband a few days before he died. Supposedly, he told her that Dani’s mother had married into money. She claims she put the pieces together and came up with us.”
“But what if Dani is Danielle? I would give anything to see my daughter again,” Mrs. Farley said.
“I can understand that, Mrs. Farley, but Tom Gates is the man you want to work with, not me. I’m a questioned document examiner, not a detective.”
“None of the detectives over the years have turned up anything. George undoubtedly changed his name, and probably his appearance, to avoid detection. You’re our last chance. We have two letters from Dani, and Danielle’s kindergarten schoolwork. Mr. Gates thought you could compare the writing.”
“Do you have the schoolwork with you?” Christie asked.
Mrs. Farley opened a large purse and drew out a sheaf of papers. The first two papers were crisp and new; the others were folded into quarters and showed the effects of age and continual handling. Christie could visualize Mrs. Farley keeping them safely tucked away in a jewelry box, and reverently taking them out to read over and over.
“Danielle’s disappearance left a hole in my heart.” Mrs. Farley turned toward her son. “If God hadn’t given me Drew, I would have shriveled up and died.”
Drew squeezed his mother’s hand. Christie had wondered if Drew felt threatened by the possibility of a sibling emerging from the past. Now she sensed that he was trying to prevent his mother’s heart from breaking twice.
Christie spread the papers across the desk. This was going to be a trying examination. Three decades divided the handwriting. Thirty years of change. She was looking at the scrawled printing of a child and the smooth script of an adult. There would be no fast answers, if any, and so much was at stake.
“Can you help us?” Mrs. Farley asked.
“I’m sure you can appreciate that this is complicated by time, but I’ll try.”
Drew and Mrs. Farley stood and thanked Christie before leaving the office. At the doorway, Mrs. Farley turned, tears glistening in her eyes.
“This means a great deal to me, to us.” She scraped Drew’s jacket sleeve with her fingertips. “My lost child returning…”
Drew put an arm around his mother and gently nudged her into the hallway.
A few minutes later, Tom Gates stepped into Christie’s office.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“A miracle, if this is her daughter. A heartless scam if it isn’t. And Mrs. Farley deserves better.”
“She certainly does. For years, Mrs. Farley has championed the smaller schools on the outskirts of San Francisco, the ones that don’t usually attract patrons,” Tom said. “She provided funds for books, tutors, and additional teachers, and set up college scholarships. That’s what is so unique about her brand of charity. She has taken up the cause of the underdog.”
“What have you learned about Dani Shepherd?”
“It’s a dead end. Shepherd could be anyone. Nothing links her to Mrs. Farley, or contradicts a relationship, either. She doesn’t have any childhood photos to compare with Mrs. Farley’s meager few. It’s a puzzle, perhaps unsolvable.”
‘“It’s also a challenge. Thanks for sending the Farleys to me, Tom.”
“You better hold that thanks until you complete the job. You may end up cursing me for all the curves this case throws your way.” Tom left Christie to mull over his words.
She read the first letter Dani had written, a summary of the information the stepmother had given her. The second was more personal, a reply to Mrs. Farley’s letter. The content of one paragraph caught Christie’s eye, and she slowed to absorb the words.
“I knew that I was adopted. Each night when my mother tucked me into bed, she would tell me that she and my father had chosen me, and that made me special. When I no longer had a mother to tuck me in, I kept her in my heart. When I was lonely or sad, I would conjure her spirit and imagine her comforting embrace. Now, I must wrap myself around the possibility that my mother is no longer a spirit, dwelling only in my mind, but a real person.”
Christie rubbed her eyes with the side of her hand, feeling the tears that dampened her cheek. Dani’s words sounded sincere. Had her mother’s love been torn from her when she was a child? Or was the letter a hoax, the cruelest imaginable?
CHAPTER TEN
Traffic had been brutal on the way home. There wasn’t much time to spruce up. A fast shower and towel-dried hair was the best she could do. She slipped on crisply tailored slacks and a Hawaiian-print blouse. Time always seemed to get away from her. Cash would arrive any minute and she would not even have a chance to use the blow-dryer.
Precisely at seven, a knock at the door signaled his arrival. Christie looked around the room, making sure nothing was out of place, and nervously finger-picked her damp hair. She opened the door and stepped into Cash’s outstretched arms.
His embrace was firm, drawing her to him so tightly the buttons on his jacket pressed into her chest. She gently pulled away, fearful he would detect the pounding of her heart. She did not want her feelings to be so easily read.
“I have to get a sweater,” she said. “Why don’t you sit down for a moment?”
Cash leaned against the doorjamb as though considering her suggestion. A smile played on his lips. He closed the door behind him, walked across the living room, and sat in a large upholstered chair, which seemed to fit him.
Christie hurried into the bedroom, pulled a lightweight sweater from a dresser drawer, and arranged it around her shoulders. She peered in the mirror one last time to make sure nothing was out of place. Tosha was on the bed observing her. When Christie left the room, the cat jumped down onto the floor and followed.
In the living room, Tosha padded past Christie and stopped just to the side of Cash. She looked up at him, inspecting him, perhaps, and, with determined steps, brushed against Cash’s legs, her tail wrapping around his ankle like a hook. Then she turned around and repeated the procedure. She walked to where Christie stood, looked up and gave a satisfied yowl. “I think you’ve been accepted,” Christie said. “Tosha is selective in who she marks.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Cash said, “but I thought your cat didn’t like me.”
Christie laughed softly, amused by his consternation. “She’s entitled to change her mind.”
“Typical female.”
“Be careful. You wouldn’t want to be branded sexist.”
“Never,” he said. A slight smirk tugged at his mouth. “Let’s be on our way before I say anything more damaging.”
At the restaurant Christie told Cash about the Farleys. “I felt such empathy for her. Imagine having your child snatched away, and after you have learned to live with the knowledge that you will never see her again, a specter of the past appears.”
“It sounds like you have doubts about this Dani person.”
“You have to admit that after thirty years of absence, the chances of a hap
py reunion are sketchy. I don’t want Mrs. Farley to be hurt again. She seems like such a gentle person, very vulnerable.”
“She runs an empire. How vulnerable can she be?”
“I don’t think going up against big business and corporate raiders is the same as dealing with the loss of a child.”
“You’re right. And Tom Gates’s investigation hit a brick wall?”
“That’s what he said. And you know that Tom is one of the best.”
“What about her birth certificate or other credentials?”
“Dani’s birth certificate doesn’t match Mrs. Farley’s daughter’s, but we both know that false documents aren’t difficult to come by.”
“I work with a couple of hotshot detectives, but I wouldn’t want to step on Tom’s toes by siccing them on your subject.”
“I’m afraid they wouldn’t uncover anything Tom hasn’t already. Do you realize what a burden that puts on me?”
“Don’t beat yourself up over this, Christie. The evidence will show the way.”
“Even when it’s thirty years old? I can’t compare a kindergartner’s primitive printing with a mature adult’s writing. I wish there was something else to go on.”
“Perhaps you should talk to this woman. Probe a little. Maybe the Farleys, and Tom, too, have missed something.”
Christie pondered his words. Both Tom and the Farleys might have missed something. “You’re right; first thing tomorrow I’m going to call Dani Shepherd and dig for a clue.”
“Just like Sherlock Holmes,” he teased.
“Thanks for being a good sport about my bringing work to the dinner table. I’m sure you would rather talk about other, more interesting, things.”
He reached across the table and covered her hand with his. “Whether it’s work or personal, everything about you interests me. I want to know you on every level, understand you completely.”
