The Step Between

by Penny Mickelbury

  “So you think Islington’s wife has been around all this time, keeping an eye on her daughter from a distance?”

  Carole Ann nodded, then shook her head, then shrugged. She didn’t know what she thought. The composite picture of Eve Simmons Islington that was emerging was both complex and complimentary: a young and uneducated though highly intelligent girl moves from a small town to the big city with an equally intelligent, tough, and ambitious husband, where she quickly discovers that a shared background of small-town poverty isn’t sufficient to sustain a marriage. Not even the birth of a child could produce a spark of warmth between them.

  “Islington lied about her leaving him, though. He sent her away. Paid her off and sent her away, probably thinking that a million dollars would buy her permanent absence, though most likely being prepared to pay more later if necessary.”

  “But she didn’t come around asking for more, so he, what, just forgot about her?” The flu bug may have beat up on Jake’s body, but his mean streak was still healthy and active. “He thought she sold her kid for a million bucks?”

  “It happens. She was a poor country girl, remember. People have done and always will do amazing things for money.”

  “People suck,” he said with more energy than his body had, and he virtually collapsed against the sofa back in a spasm of deep, chest-rattling coughing that brought Carole Ann to her feet. He waved her off. “I’m OK,” he managed to wheeze, as he worked to restore his breathing.

  “For Richard Islington, money is everything, so even though Eve had let him know she wasn’t happy with his pursuit of wealth, it didn’t strike him as out of character for her to take his money and quietly vanish.”

  “But you really don’t think she—Eve—was in touch with the girl all along?” Jake’s breath still was labored and several deep inhalations were required before he completed the question.

  Carole Ann shook her head. “I don’t think so. I don’t think that would have been possible without Islington’s knowledge and it looks like that first million to Annabelle came as a shock to both of them—to Annabelle and to Richard. But I do think that, somehow, she was able to keep track of how and what her daughter was doing all those years.”

  Jake chuckled, then stopped himself as it turned into a cough. “I’d like to have seen that bastard’s face when he found out the girl didn’t need him after all.”

  Carole Ann thought she’d like to have seen that, too, though she believed she had witnessed the aftershock; for that’s what she saw in him that day in his house, she realized. His forced self-control was a product of shock and the slow, burning anger it could produce. She recalled Paolo’s assessment of Islington as not a Bill Cosby kind of dad, and knew that his search for Annabelle was not motivated by love, but by revenge. Then, she thought: It’s not Annabelle he wants but Eve. The force of that realization produced a physical reaction so intense that Jake noticed and queried her, and when she explained he, too, immediately accepted the premise as logical.

  “Not a Bill Cosby kind of husband, either,” he grumbled through a hacking cough. “What do you want to do about it?” he asked, wheezing and struggling to catch his breath.

  “I don’t know yet,” she replied with a slight impatience, for even though she believed she was correct about Islington’s basic motivation—find Annabelle and he’d find Eve—that didn’t explain Annabelle’s anger at her father.

  “So.” Jake dropped the word and all its meaning into the silent place created by the end of the Islington discussion and waited for her to answer the unasked question . . .unasked because of his fear of the answer.

  She told him what Patty had told her and what she had learned from reading all the information and documentation she had gathered, and then waited for him to digest and process it all; and while she waited, she watched. He looked weak and tired. She knew the worst of what the flu does had passed—the chills and fever and achy joints and searing headache. What’s left is a body that has to fight its way back to strength and health, a process that Jake had yet to begin.

  “I met MacDonald one time. He was rushing out of the warehouse and into one of the trucks. And I thought at the time that he was avoiding me—that’s what it felt like when he brushed past me, claiming he was late for something, I don’t remember what. I thought that the COO of a company would want to spend at least a couple of minutes with the guy his partner had hired to do such an important job. That’s what I thought at the time. Then I let the thought go so it wouldn’t get in the way of a potentially big payday.”

  He was beating himself up enough, so she didn’t reply; she sat and waited for him to continue.

  “We’re pretty well into the background checks on the top execs at Seaboard, and into the analysis of their finances. One interesting thing: the state AG investigated them four years ago but we can’t find out why. They dropped the investigation and put the whole thing under seal. The next year, Seaboard gave the maximum allowed to every Republican running for statewide office. That was the first, last, and only year they made political contributions.”

  “A sealed investigation by the state attorney general that didn’t result in charges?” She sat up straight. That had the odor of the kind of criminal activity she knew all too well. “I’ll find out what that’s all about, but whatever it is, it won’t win the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval for Seaboard, Jake, and you know that.”

  He snorted. “Right this minute, I don’t care shit about Seaboard, C.A. Wouldn’t matter to me if they were making porno movies and selling moonshine whiskey in the basement and charging admission. I care if we’ve got a bogus client. And I care if it’s my fault that we’ve got a bogus client.”

  She didn’t believe for a second that he didn’t care if Seabord was shaky and shady, but she wisely chose not to comment. “Well, perhaps whatever that’s about, along with our knowledge of MacDonald’s phony identity, will push OnShore into being more honest with us.”

  He sat frowning and thinking for a moment. “You think that’s what we’re supposed to find out for them? What this whole thing is all about?”

  “Could be,” she responded, pondering the possibility. “Could also be OnShore doesn’t know anything about the attorney general’s office looking at Seaboard, and finding out about it could sour the deal for them.” She shrugged, as if trying to rid herself of the burden of the tangle of new information. “MacDonald, or whoever he really is, travels extensively out of the country, according to the information Patty compiled, and the reason given on his visas and declaration forms is always ‘business.’ ” She picked up a page from among those scattered about on her desk and scanned it quickly, looking for something. “Here it is: he lists his occupation on his entrance forms as ‘development consultant.’ ” She tossed that paper aside and scooped up another. “Nothing in this vitae points to his having any kind of experience or expertise that would legitimize his calling himself a development consultant. Who is the John MacDonald who’s alive? How did they find out about the dead John MacDonald? And who is the OnShore COO who’s using the MacDonald name?”

  Jake stood up, shakily, and walked slowly toward the door. “Guess I’d better get busy finding those answers.”

  She stood, too, and followed him to the door. “You don’t have to do it today, Jake. Go back home, go back to bed, and start fresh in the morning, OK?”

  He sighed and nodded. “I don’t have enough lung power to argue with you, C.A.” He opened the door and was in the hallway when he turned back to her. “C.A.? Thanks for not being the kind of person to say you told me so.”

  “You’re welcome, Jake,” she said, and watched his slow progress down the hall to his own office. She stood there, watching, while he entered his office, and watched as, just moments later, he emerged, bundled in scarf and overcoat, closed and locked the door, and headed, hunched over and moving slowly, toward the elevator. Without turning to look at her, he raised his hand and gave a backward wave good-bye, and disappeare
d around the corner.

  Back at her desk, she took up the folder presented to her by Patty a short four hours ago. She separated the OnShore pages from the Islington pages. OnShore was Jake’s case, Jake’s business, Jake’s problem. Eve and Annabelle Islington were her problems, and she was beginning to feel that that was a very apt description for them.

  Bill Williams. She almost didn’t believe the name, and had it not come directly from Patty, she perhaps would have spent time and energy verifying the likelihood of a lawyer named Bill Williams. But that’s what Patty said was the name of the lawyer Eve Islington hired twenty years ago to create and manage her daughter’s trust fund; and she recognized the address, knew the approximate location of Bill Williams’s office in Arlington. And, she thought, if he’d been there for twenty years or more, and if he’d been forward-thinking enough to have bought the building back then, he was sitting on a gold mine now. And anybody competent enough to triple a one-million-dollar investment could be considered forward-thinking. At the very least.

  Bill Williams’s office was exactly where Carole Ann thought it was: one of the first exits off Interstate 95 South in Virginia, after the monuments and the Potomac River and the Pentagon have been left behind. When she moved to D.C., that area was beginning its transformation into an enclave of trendy exclusivity, though enough of old Arlington remained that it was readily and easily identifiable as a convenient and affordable home base for the thousands of mid- and low-level government workers and military women and men who called it home. Now, it was home to lawyers and lobbyists and association executives and journalists—people who could afford to live close to downtown D.C. and work.

  The building was a one-level brick square on a corner lot. The other three corners were anchored by a twenty-four-hour, glass-enclosed gym that provided a constant view of fit and trim young men and women stepping and pumping and sweating; an elegant country French restaurant that looked as if it had been transported that day directly from Avignon; and a trendy, très chic combination coffee shop/juice bar. As she traversed the perfectly manicured brick walkway to Williams’s building, Carole Ann called to memory everything about the man from Patty’s report; and remembering that he was seventy-plus years old, pondered the nature of his relationship with his neighbors.

  There were four names on the building directory, all of them lawyers, Williams’s the last. But his office was the first to the right off the foyer. She opened the door and entered.

  “If that’s Miss Gibson, come on in,” a booming bass voice called out, and she followed it through an empty though well-equipped reception area to a surprisingly large and very inviting office. One wall of the room was taken up by a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf, completely filled. On another wall was a built-in entertainment center, the focal point of which was a gigantic television screen but which also contained a VCR and CD player, and dozens of videocassettes and compact discs. Directly across from the entertainment center was a long burgundy leather sofa, two leather club chairs, and three tables. And, facing her, a desk the size of a football field and, behind it, a man the size of a couple of linebackers.

  Bill Williams heaved himself to his feet and Carole Ann winced at the obvious effort. The man was simply enormous. Not like a football player at all, she thought; more like a sumo wrestler. And he didn’t appear to be seventy-three years old, which, according to his date of birth, he certainly was. He had a head full of sandy hair, bright blue eyes, and, when he shook her hand, a dry, firm grip.

  “I don’t know why you want to see me, Miss Gibson, but I couldn’t contemplate saying no,” he said, indicating that she should take the seat across from the massive desk, and dropping himself down into a leather rocking chair.

  “I appreciate your generosity, Mr. Williams, and I’ll try not to take up too much of your time.”

  He said something that sounded like “pshaw,” and shared the information that he was essentially retired and that it was only fifty years’ worth of habit that brought him to the office every day. “I still do some estate work for a few clients of long standing. But,” and he chuckled, “those any more long standing than me are all dead. So I watch TV and old movies and listen to music and read.”

  Carole Ann studied the room and, taking in his words, realized that it was as much home as office. “It’s a wonderful room, Mr. Williams, and I envy you the luxury of testing yourself by having books and music and movies in your office. I dare not.” And she meant it; she was not merely making conversation, though she was quickly forming an opinion of Bill Williams that ran counter to his courtly presentation.

  He chuckled deeply and acknowledged her compliment with a nod of his head. Then he got down to business. “You’ve got quite a reputation, young woman, and it amuses and amazes an old-timer like myself. Could you possibly understand my fascination with the fact that you and I are both called lawyers? Like the GP of my day and the nuclear surgeon of today are both doctors. The same way, I guess, that watermelons and grapes are both fruits with seeds. Amazing. And amusing if you’re inclined toward the pursuit of humor. Which I am.” Then the old man wheezed another chuckle and settled back in his chair, double chins resting on his chest, hands folded across his enormous belly, and waited for her.

  A perfect portrait of a caricature pretending to be a caricature, Carole Ann thought, and realized what it was about the man she found off-putting: he was patronizing. He was a member of that class in the old school that didn’t welcome women to his world, and most certainly not Black ones. She’d encountered more than a few like him over the years.

  “You’re very good at what you do, Mr. Williams, even though you may not do very much of it these days. But I suspect that one of the things you’re still very good at is lulling people into believing you’re a dithering old has-been. A guy just like you handed me my butt on a platter early in my career as a trial lawyer. It was a good lesson.”

  “And you’re obviously a good student. What can I do for you, Miss Gibson?” The chuckling, country lawyer had evaporated, to be replaced by the shrewd, calculating street lawyer Carole Ann was convinced he was. One who didn’t like or trust women.

  “Richard Islington hired my firm to find his daughter. We want to be certain that locating her won’t put her—or her mother—in danger.”

  The old man didn’t move a muscle. The only hint that he’d reacted to what she said was a subtle change in his breathing. Because he was so large, his normal breathing was audible; under stress, it became louder. “Why are you talking to me about Richard Islington’s daughter?”

  “Because several months ago, you conveyed two point eight million dollars to her in negotiable funds and I thought she might be grateful enough to keep in touch.”

  He heaved himself up from the chair and supported his bulk by leaning on the edge of the desk. His breath was coming rapidly now, as well as noisily. “I don’t know how you know what you know, Miss Gibson, but it strikes me that illegality entered the equation somewhere. We’re definitely different kinds of lawyers. I don’t believe in breaking, bending, or twisting the law to suit my own purposes. And I don’t believe in working for the client with the most money.”

  “You also probably don’t believe in vodoun, the Buddha, or the benefits of exercise and a vegetarian diet,” she snapped at him. “But that doesn’t make me respect you any less, and since you’ve obviously lived a long if not necessarily healthy life, it really doesn’t matter to me. What does matter is whether I can locate Annabelle Islington and her mother before harm comes to them, or at least warn them of the potential for danger. You’d do them a great service by delivering that message.”

  “And why should I—or they—believe you, Miss Gibson?”

  She’d already turned away from him to leave, but she turned back to face him. “No reason at all, Mr. Williams,” she said in an almost airy tone but with a look that contradicted it. She held his steely gaze with her own and became instantly aware that he’d had more practice at this than
she, and therefore was better at it. “Thanks for your time, and you have a good day.” She turned quickly away again. She needed to break eye contact with him.

  “Hold on, now, Miss Gibson,” he said in a wheedling voice, signaling the return of the good ol’ country lawyer. “I’m trying to work with you here, if you’d just give me a minute. I want to believe what you’re saying—”

  She whipped around, not making any effort to conceal her dislike and growing distrust of the man. “I don’t need you to do me any favors. I came here to do you one, and you can accept it or reject it. Your choice.” And before he could reply, she stalked out of the office, omitting to close the door behind her.

  4

  HOURS LATER, SHE WAS STILL working to understand the basis for her almost instant dislike of the old Arlington lawyer. It wasn’t simply that he’d hauled out his country bumpkin routine and tried it on her; practically every lawyer she knew, herself included, employed a fake persona, a facade, for dealing with the public—clients, juries, other lawyers, cops. It was standard and acceptable. Nor was it the underlying hostility to her gender and her race; that, too, was as commonplace as suspenders and bow ties. There was something else, some intangible thing, that raised her hackles and primed her for the attack. She wished Jake were around; he could provide an accurate assessment of her reaction to Williams, could help her identify the source of her hostility. And could tell her whether she owed the man an apology.

  But Jake wasn’t around . . . hadn’t been around for several days. He was somewhere on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, like one of the watermen famous in the region, casting his own nets, hoping to catch something to help unravel the mess that was OnShore and Seaboard.