There was a separate stack of black-and-white prints at the bottom of the box. Jeffrey picked these up. The rubber band holding them together was so old it broke off in his hand. The first photo was of a young woman sitting in a rocking chair holding a baby. Her hair was cut into the shape of a football helmet and sprayed to within an inch of its life, the same way Jeffrey’s mother had worn hers when he was in high school.
In other pictures the woman was playing with the child, her hair growing longer in each shot as the boy aged. There were ten pictures in all, stopping around the time the kid was three. Jeffrey stared at the last shot, which showed the woman sitting alone in the rocking chair. She was staring right at the camera, and there was something familiar about the shape of her face and her long eyelashes. Jeffrey turned the last photo over, reading the date, trying to put the pieces together. He stared back at the woman, wondering again why she looked so damn familiar.
He flipped open his phone and dialed Kevin Blake’s office. Candy answered after three rings.
“Hey there, hon,” she said, sounding pleased to hear his voice. “I was just about to call you.”
“Did you track down Monica Patrick?”
“Yep,” she said, not sounding happy about it. “She’s been dead three years now.”
Jeffrey had feared as much. “Thanks for trying.”
“Sure,” she said. “Don’t know what good she would’ve been. I guess you were looking for some kind of scandal?”
“Something like that,” Jeffrey allowed, staring at the photograph as if he could force it to make sense.
“I went through all of that when I screened him,” she said. “Brian’s not exactly Albert Einstein, but he’s one of those workhorse types. Does the jobs nobody else wants to do. Stays until midnight making sure everything’s done. We call it anal retentive now, but back then it just meant you had a work ethic.”
Jeffrey tucked the photographs into his pocket and put the shoe box back where it belonged. “I got the impression from his wife that he’s still like that.”
“Well, she should know,” Candy said. “Though it’s a bit late in the game to start complaining about it.”
Jeffrey closed the closet door, looking around the room. “What do you mean?”
“That’s how they got together,” she told him. “Jill was his secretary back at Jericho.”
“You’re joking?”
“Why would I joke about that?” she asked. “There’s nothing wrong with being a secretary.”
“No, not that,” Jeffrey said. “It’s just that neither of them ever mentioned it.”
“Why would they?” Candy asked, and she had a point. “Didn’t you ever wonder why they have different names?”
“Not really,” he told her, hearing a car door slam in the driveway. He walked into the living room to look out the front window. Brian Keller was leaning into the backseat of a tan Impala. He pulled out a couple of large white boxes, leaning them on his thigh while he shut the car door.
“Chief?”
“I’m here,” Jeffrey told her, trying to pick back up on the conversation. “What were you saying?”
“I’m saying he probably divorced her by now.”
“Divorced who?” Jeffrey asked, watching Keller try to manage the boxes as he walked toward the garage.
“The girl he was married to when he started seeing Jill Rosen,” she told him, then added, “Not that she’s a girl now. Hell, she’s probably in her fifties. I wonder what happened to the son?”
“The son?” Jeffrey repeated, hearing Keller’s footsteps on the stairs. “What son?”
“His son from his first marriage,” she said. “Are you paying attention to me at all?”
“He has a son by his first marriage?” Jeffrey said, taking out the photograph.
“That’s what I’ve been telling you. He just up and left them. Never even mentioned them to Bert. You remember Bert Winger—he was dean before Kevin came along. Not that Bert woulda given two shakes about Brian’s family situation. He had two kids of his own from a previous marriage, and let me tell you, those children were the sweetest little things I ever—”
“I need to go,” Jeffrey said, closing the phone. He finally knew why the kid in the photo looked so familiar.
The old saying was true. A picture really was worth a thousand words—or in this case, a free ride to the police station in the back of a squad car.
Keller walked in the door and startled at the sight of Jeffrey, nearly dropping the boxes. “What are you doing here?”
“Just looking around.”
“I can see that.”
“Where’s your wife?” Jeffrey asked.
Keller’s face paled. He leaned over, dropping the boxes onto the floor with a heavy thud. “She’s at her mother’s.”
“Not that one,” Jeffrey said, holding up the photograph. “Your other one.”
“My other—”
“Your first wife,” Jeffrey clarified, showing him another picture. “The mother of your oldest son.”
16
Lena shuffled into the kitchen, every joint in her body grating like rusted metal. Nan was sitting at the table reading the newspaper while she ate a bowl of cereal.
“Sleep okay?” Nan asked.
Lena nodded, looking around for the coffeemaker. The kettle on the stove was steaming. A cup was on the counter with a tea bag beside it.
“Do you have coffee?” Lena asked, her voice barely a whisper.
“I’ve got instant,” Nan said, “but it’s decaffeinated. I could run up to the store before I go to work.”
“That’s okay,” Lena said, wondering how long it would be before she started to get a caffeine-withdrawal headache.
“You sound better this morning,” Nan said, trying to smile. “Your voice. It’s more like a whisper instead of a croak.”
Lena slumped into a chair, exhaustion pulling at her bones. Nan had taken the couch, leaving the bed to Lena, but Lena had not been able to get comfortable. Nan’s bed was underneath a bank of windows that looked out into the backyard. All of them were at ground level, and none of them had blinds or even curtains. Lena had not been able to close her eyes, afraid that someone would crawl in through the windows and grab her. She had gotten up several times, checking the locks, trying to see if anyone was outside. The backyard was too dark for her to see more than a few feet, and Lena had finally ended up with her back to the door and the gun in her lap.
Lena cleared her throat. “I need to borrow some money.”
“Of course,” Nan told her. “I’ve been trying to give you—”
“Borrow it,” Lena insisted. “I’ll pay you back.”
“Okay,” Nan agreed, standing up to wash her bowl at the sink. “Are you going to take a little time off? You’re welcome to stay here.”
“I need to hire a lawyer for Ethan.”
Nan dropped her bowl in the sink. “Do you think that’s wise?”
“I can’t leave him in jail,” Lena said, knowing that the black gangs would kill Ethan as soon as they saw his tattoos.
Nan sat back down at the table. “I don’t know if I can give you the money for that.”
“I’ll get it from somewhere,” Lena said, though she did not know where.
Nan stared at her, lips slightly parted. She finally nodded. “All right. We’ll go to the bank when I get home from work.”
“Thank you.”
Nan had more to say. “I didn’t call Hank.”
“I don’t want you to,” Lena insisted. “I don’t want him to see me like this.”
“He’s seen you like this before.”
Lena gave her a warning look, letting Nan know that was not open for discussion.
“All right,” Nan repeated, and Lena wondered if she was saying it more to herself. “So I’ve got to get to work. There’s an extra key by the front door if you go out.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“That’s probably best,�
�� Nan said, glancing at Lena’s neck. Lena had not looked in the mirror this morning, but she could imagine how bad she looked. The cut on her cheek felt warm, like it might be infected.
Nan said, “I’ll be back at lunchtime, around one. We’re going to start inventory next week, and I need to get some things done.”
“That’s okay.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to come to school with me? You could stay in the office. No one would see you.”
Lena shook her head. She did not ever want to return to campus again.
Nan scooped up her book bag and a set of keys. “Oh, I almost forgot.”
Lena waited.
“Richard Carter might drop by.”
Lena muttered a curse that Nan had obviously never heard from a woman.
Nan said, “Oh, my.”
“Does he know I’m here?”
“No, I didn’t know you were going to be here. I gave him the key last night at dinner.”
“You gave him the key to your house?” Lena asked, incredulous.
“He worked with Sibyl for years,” Nan defended. “She trusted him with everything.”
“What does he want?”
“To go through some of her notes.”
“He can read Braille?”
Nan fidgeted with her keys. “There’s a translator at the library he can run it through. It’s going to take him forever.”
“What’s he looking for?”
“God knows.” Nan rolled her eyes. “You know how secretive he can be.”
Lena agreed, but she thought this was odd behavior even for Richard. She would find out what the hell he was up to before he even got near Sibyl’s notes.
“I’d better scoot,” Nan said. She pointed to the cast on Lena’s wrist. “You’re supposed to keep that elevated.”
Lena raised her arm.
“You’ve got my number at school.” Nan indicated the keypad. “Just press the ‘stay’ button if you like.”
“Right,” Lena said, though she had no intention of setting the alarm. A spoon clanging against a frying pan would be more effective.
“It gives you twenty seconds to close the door,” Nan said. Then, when Lena didn’t respond, she pressed the “stay” key herself. “The code’s your birthday.”
The pad started beeping, counting down the seconds Nan had to leave through the front door.
Lena said, “Great.”
“Call me if you need me,” Nan told her. “Bye!”
Lena closed the front door and locked the bottom latch. With one hand she dragged a chair over and propped it under the knob so Richard couldn’t surprise her. She pulled aside the curtain and looked out the little round window in the door, watching Nan back out of the driveway. Lena felt stupid for breaking down in front of Nan last night, but part of her was glad that the woman had been there. She was finally understanding after all these years what Sibyl had seen in the mousy librarian. Nan Thomas wasn’t that bad after all.
Lena grabbed the cordless phone off the coffee table on her way to the kitchen. She found the Yellow Pages in the drawer by the sink and sat at the table. The ads for lawyers took up five pages, each one of them colorful and tacky. Their headlines beseeched those suffering from car accidents or sucking off disability to call RIGHT NOW for help.
Buddy Conford’s ad was the biggest one. A picture of the slick bastard had a cartoon balloon coming out of his mouth with the words “Call me before you talk to the police!” written in fat red letters.
He answered on the first ring. “Buddy Conford.”
Lena chewed at her lip, reopening the cut. Buddy was a one-legged bastard who thought all cops were crooked, and on more than one occasion he’d accused Lena of using illegal methods. He had busted a few of her cases wide open on stupid technicalities.
“Hello?” Buddy said. “All righty, counting to three. One . . . two . . .”
Lena forced herself to say, “Buddy.”
“Yep, you got ‘im.” When she did not say anything, he prompted, “Speak.”
“It’s Lena.”
“Come again?” he said. “Darlin’, I can barely hear you.”
She cleared her throat, trying to raise her voice. “It’s Lena Adams.”
The lawyer let out a low whistle. “Well, I’ll be,” he said. “I heard you were in the pokey. Thought it was a rumor.”
Lena kept enough pressure on her lip to cause pain.
“How’s it feel to be on the other side of the law now, partner?”
“Fuck you.”
“We’ll discuss my fee later,” Buddy said, chuckling. He was enjoying this even more than she had imagined he would. “What are you charged with?”
“Nothing,” she told him, thinking that that could change at any minute, depending on what kind of day Jeffrey had. “This is for somebody else.”
“Who’s that?”
“Ethan Green.” She corrected herself. “White, I mean. Ethan White.”
“Where’s he at?”
“I’m not sure.” Lena closed the phone book, sick of looking at the cheap ads. “He’s charged with some sort of parole violation. The original charge was bad checks.”
“How long’ve they had him locked up?”
“I’m not sure,” Lena said.
“Unless they have something solid to charge him with, they mighta already cut him loose.”
“Jeffrey won’t cut him loose,” Lena told him, certain of that one thing. He only knew Ethan White from his rap sheet. He had never seen the good side of Ethan, the side that wanted to change.
“There’s something you’re not telling me here,” Buddy said. “How’d he end up on the chief’s radar?”
Lena ran her fingers along the pages of the book. She wondered how much she could tell Buddy Conford. She wondered if she should tell him anything at all.
Buddy was good enough to know what was coming. “If you lie to me, it only makes it harder to do my job.”
“He didn’t kill Chuck Gaines,” she said. “He wasn’t involved in any of that. He’s innocent.”
Buddy gave a heavy sigh. “Honey, let me tell you something. All my clients are innocent. Even the one that ended up on death row.” He made a disgusted sound. “Especially the one that ended up on death row.”
“This one’s really innocent, Buddy.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Maybe we should do this in person. You wanna swing by my office?”
Lena closed her eyes, trying to visualize herself out of the house. She couldn’t do it.
Buddy asked, “Something I said?”
“No,” Lena told him. “Can you come here instead?”
“Where’s here?”
“I’m at Nan Thomas’s house.” She gave him the address, and he repeated the numbers back to her.
“It’ll be a couple of hours,” he said. “You gonna be around?”
“Yeah.”
Buddy said, “I’ll see you in a couple.”
She hung up the phone, then dialed the number at the police station. She knew that Jeffrey would do everything he could to hold Ethan in lockup, but she also knew that Ethan was well aware of how the law worked.
“Grant Police,” Frank said.
Lena had to force herself not to hang up the phone. She cleared her throat, trying to make her voice sound normal.
She said, “Frank? It’s Lena.”
He was silent.
“I’m looking for Ethan.”
“Yeah?” he grumbled. “Well, he ain’t here.”
“Do you know where—”
He slammed the phone down so hard the sound echoed in Lena’s ear.
“Shit,” she said, then started coughing so violently she thought her lungs were going to pop out of her mouth. Lena went to the sink and drank a glass of water. Several minutes passed before the coughing fit passed. She started opening drawers, looking for some cough drops to soothe her throat, but found nothing. She found a bottle of Advil in the cabinet over the stove and shook
three capsules into her mouth. Several more came out, and she tried to catch them before they fell on the floor, smacking her hurt wrist against the refrigerator in the process. The pain made her see stars, but she breathed through it.
Back at the table, Lena tried to think where Ethan would go if he was let out of jail. She did not know his number at the dorm and knew better than to call the campus office to try to get it. Considering that Lena had been in jail last night, she doubted that anyone would want to help her.
Two nights ago she had plugged in her answering machine in case Jill Rosen called back. Lena picked up the phone and dialed her home phone number, hoping she had hooked up the machine right. The phone rang three times before her own voice greeted her, sounding foreign and loud. She punched in the code to play back her messages. The first one was from her uncle Hank, saying he was just checking in and was glad she had finally decided to get an answering machine. The next was from Nan, sounding very worried and asking Lena to call her as soon as she could. The last message was from Ethan.
“Lena,” he said. “Don’t go anywhere. I’m looking for you.”
She pressed the three button, rewinding the message to play it again. There was no time or day stamp on the machine because she had been too cheap to spend the extra ten bucks, and the three rewound all the messages, not just the last one, so she had to listen to Hank and Nan again.
“Don’t go anywhere. I’m looking for you.”
She hit the three again, suffering through the first two messages before she heard Ethan’s voice. Lena pressed the phone closer to her ear, trying to decipher his tone. He sounded angry, but that was nothing new.
She was listening to the message a fourth time when a knock came at the door.
“Richard,” she mumbled under her breath. She looked down at her clothes, realizing she was still wearing the blue pajamas. “Fuck.”
The portable phone beeped twice in quick succession, the LED screen flashing that the battery was low. Lena pressed the five key, hoping that would save Ethan’s message.
A Faint Cold Fear Page 36
