Dark Road Home

by Anna Carlisle

  “Mom,” Gin rebuked, dizzy.

  “Sorry, but I thought it was important you know. He was drunker than I thought and it was over so fast. I never even got my dress off. Later he didn’t even seem to remember.” She shrugged. “Maybe he didn’t remember. The only thing he ever said about it later was that there was no way he should have been driving that night. Which was true . . . but I was in shock, I guess, and I didn’t stop him. Soon after that he started seeing a woman from Clairton. And he found a regular sitter, so we saw less of each other.”

  “Okay. So . . . no one ever said anything, and we grew up . . . and all those years you never told anyone.”

  “Not a soul.”

  “Then how did Lawrence suspect?”

  “After they found the body, he came to talk to me, he had all his notes from years ago. He kept coming back to the fact that I hadn’t wanted Lily to date Tom. I think he was trying to build a case against Tom, especially since Jake was back under suspicion. He thought my objection to Tom had to do with his character, and he kept asking me questions, coming at it from all different directions.”

  “But you never really suspected Tom, did you?”

  “I don’t know, honey. Sometimes . . . when I think about how he’s always gotten his way, about how he’s never done an honest day’s work in his life—I’m sorry, but it’s true, everyone says so. Men like that are unpredictable.”

  “Okay. So Lawrence suspected Tom, maybe, or guessed at the truth perhaps—”

  “Well, I suppose he must have, otherwise why go hunting for my medical records? That stack he had—he must have paid someone off for the whole set.”

  “I don’t know, Mom. Paying someone would be illegal . . .”

  “So maybe he subpoenaed them or, I don’t know, flashed his badge and that was enough to convince them. The important thing is that once he knew, he went to Richard, and Richard—” She put her hands together, like she was praying. “You know your father. Honor is very important to him. He could never have forgiven me, and he would have done anything to keep it from getting out.”

  “Mom! You can’t mean that you think Dad killed Lawrence?”

  “Yes. That is exactly what I’m saying.” Her mother’s fists clenched and her mouth thinned to a hard line: Madeleine at her most formidable.

  “But—”

  “Listen to me, Virginia. I have been on this earth for a lot longer than you have. I have been married for nearly thirty-eight years. In that time, I’ve learned that there is very little any of us wouldn’t do when we’re put to the test.”

  “But how could you live with him? How could you be in the same house with him if you thought he—he—” She couldn’t bring herself to say the words, to put “Dad” and “murder” in the same sentence.

  “Considering the truth I kept from him,” Madeleine sighed, “I wasn’t really in a position to judge, was I?”

  “I can’t—that’s not—” Gin pushed her chair back from the table. She’d gotten all she was going to get from her mother, and she doubted she could change Madeleine’s mind now anyway. “Look, promise me one thing.”

  Madeleine lifted her eyes to gaze miserably at Gin.

  “Don’t say anything about any of this, not to anyone. Not Dad, not the cops, not Jake. Okay?”

  “All right. For now.”

  “I’ll call you later. I need to do some things.”

  “Take care of yourself today, sweetheart,” Madeleine said, walking heavily to the stairs. “I think I’ll just go freshen up before I leave.”

  33

  Gin parked in the back of an abandoned service station several blocks from the hospital. Yesterday’s discussion with Red had heightened her caution: given the revelations of the last twenty-four hours, the fewer people who were tracking her whereabouts, the better.

  Walking along the broken sidewalks and littered streets of the least affluent part of town, she couldn’t help but consider the metaphor. Trumbull, in the days since her childhood, had fallen precipitously from grace. Not even her mother, perhaps the town’s biggest booster, could possibly fail to see the ignominious despair that had been swept in along with poverty and drugs.

  And what of herself? The intervening years had changed Gin, too, but her poverty was one of joy, of exuberance, of faith. At eighteen, her life hadn’t been perfect—but she’d had a fundamental confidence that life would lead her on a path that would have its share of delights: she’d go to college, marry Jake, have darling children, and live in a pretty house somewhere far away.

  Instead, she lived on a hamster wheel of work and sleep. Her investment in her job had become rote as well. The pleasures she knew she was supposed to enjoy—food, sex, art, leisure—were pale and insubstantial. Only when she ran, when she pushed her body to its limits, did she feel anything at all.

  Until she’d come back here. Which was absurd, wasn’t it? If she couldn’t find satisfaction in one of the most beautiful, culturally rich cities in the world, how could she possibly find it here, in a dying steel town? If she didn’t look forward to seeing even the colleagues she admired and liked the most, how could it be that she found comfort in her parents’ company?

  If she couldn’t be satisfied with a man like Clay—intelligent, accomplished, handsome, wealthy—how could it be that thoughts of a rough-edged construction worker made her blood run hot?

  Arriving at the back entrance to the surgery center, Gin took a moment to compose herself. She dabbed the perspiration from her forehead with a tissue—heavy clouds portended rain in the not too distant future, but for now, the humidity and heat rolled off the streets. She applied lipstick in her hand mirror and wished she’d spent more time covering the dark circles under her eyes.

  Then she went into the building. She walked directly to Spencer’s office, finding him with his sleeves rolled up, staring at a complex-looking spreadsheet on his large monitor.

  “Spencer?”

  He didn’t jump so much as abruptly shut down, closing his eyes briefly before turning in his chair and greeting her with a warm smile.

  “Virginia! I’m so glad you dropped by. And your timing’s perfect—I was just struggling with these numbers, and I could use a break. Don’t suppose you’d let me buy you a cup of coffee, would you? The cafeteria’s finally started carrying Peet’s.”

  “Actually I was hoping that I could speak to you privately. Would that be all right?”

  Something flickered in his eyes—a darkness, hesitation, fear, or maybe just annoyance—but he gestured for her to come in. “Of course.”

  She closed the door behind her and sat in the upholstered chair, noticing that it was new and quite nice. The surgery center must be doing well, to be able to afford remodeling and the expense of carrying nonproductive staff like Tom.

  “I’m afraid I have something difficult to discuss,” Gin said, glad she’d practiced what she wanted to say in advance. She couldn’t afford to be tentative now, not with everything that was riding on this conversation. She couldn’t give the impression of weakness.

  “Oh?” The smile slipped a little, and Spencer picked up a mechanical pencil and tapped it against his open palm.

  “I know the truth, you see. About you and Lawrence.”

  The tapping abruptly stopped. Spencer stared at her, his bland smile reshaping itself into a frown. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, then set the pencil back down on his desk, lining it up precisely with the edge of the blotter.

  “Virginia, I don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

  “I think you do.”

  For a moment neither of them spoke. “Well, whatever’s on your mind, I’m happy to hear you out. But this isn’t the time or place.”

  “All right.” Gin kept her tone neutral, but she wasn’t going to be put off. “You’ve already said you have time for a cup of coffee. Where would you like to go?”

  “Perhaps we could find some time tomorrow—”

  “Now, I’m
afraid.”

  “I see.” A tic in the corner of Spencer’s mouth twitched; his eyes grew even more opaque.

  A man who kills one of his oldest friends is desperate, indeed; would he hesitate to harm his children’s friend? Gin never would have believed it, until this moment. The man she had grown up knowing—soft-spoken, deliberate, kind but also a workaholic, perpetually exhausted, inflexible—that man seemed to have vanished, replaced by this one with the carefully disguised exterior, the elastic features.

  But that was the mark of the best liars, wasn’t it? You never knew what they were capable of.

  “Well, Virginia,” Spencer said, recovering himself, his bland smile back in place. “Shall we go for a walk?”

  Gin considered the options. The surgery center opened onto a view of the river far below, across the landscaped drive. But the neighborhood behind it had steadily eroded until it was littered with boarded-up businesses and falling-down houses and burnt-out empty lots. Not the ideal place for a conversation—unless one wanted to make sure no one would ever admit to seeing them talking.

  “A drive, I think. We can take my car.” Gin had already considered the options, doubting Spencer would speak freely in his office. She needed to control the conversation, however. And while she couldn’t imagine Spencer trying to hurt her, she no longer believed that she really knew him.

  Spencer didn’t look happy about it, but he held the door for her and followed her back through the hospital. Gin made sure to greet everyone, to make sure they were seen together. Paranoid, perhaps, but she was out of her element now.

  “Nice ride,” was Spencer’s only comment when they reached her Touareg. “I suppose the compensation is pretty good in Cook County.”

  “It pays my bills.”

  The destination Gin had chosen was only a quarter mile away. She parked right in front, gambling that she wouldn’t be ticketed for the yellow curb—and willing to risk it: a parking fine would be more than fair trade for her safety.

  The sign above the decrepit building read “M TTYS.” At one time, it had read “SMITTY’S”—and the neon had worked, too. Gin squared her shoulders and entered the dank, dim space, grimacing at the sticky floor and the scent of stale popcorn and spilled beer.

  The only other people in the place, at a little after eleven in the morning, were an elderly man playing solitaire, a sixty-something woman in a booth mumbling to herself and wildly swinging her foot, and the bartender, a tired-looking man with a crew cut and a Steelers T-shirt stretched tight over his paunch. He slapped two cardboard coasters on the bar and spoke in a monotone: “Git you something?”

  “Club soda for me.” She turned to Spencer. “My treat.”

  “Coffee?” he asked.

  The bartender didn’t even bother to respond, but just glared at him balefully.

  “All right. A Coke.”

  “Ten dollar minimum on credit cards,” the bartender said, not moving. Gin took a twenty from her purse, laid it on the bar, and picked up a shot glass filled with toothpicks and set it down on top like a paperweight.

  The bartender moved off to get their drinks.

  “This isn’t exactly what I would have pictured for your kind of place,” Spencer said.

  “It’s not. But when I had a drink with Tom the other day, I remembered that I can’t stand the country club.”

  “Ah, right, you were having that deep conversation with Tom.” Something like contempt flashed on his face.

  “If you can call it that. He wasn’t at his best.”

  Spencer sighed. “Tom is battling addiction, which as you know is a difficult disease.”

  Gin shrugged. She couldn’t argue that point, and she’d seen firsthand how parents could defend indefensible behavior from their children. It wasn’t what she was here to discuss.

  She dug in her purse for the copy of the RFLP that she had made in her mother’s office an hour ago, and laid it flat on the bar. “I don’t know if you’re familiar with old methods of DNA testing,” she said.

  For a moment, Spencer merely stared at the paper. Though Gin did her best to read his expression, there was little change beyond a thinning of his mouth, a hardening of his jaw.

  “Now listen, Gin. This is coming completely out of left field. You’ll understand that I’m . . . I’m feeling a bit blindsided.”

  “You are Lily’s biological father.”

  “So it appears.” Spencer pushed the paper back across the bar to Gin, who folded it and returned it to her purse. “I am obviously going to need some time to adjust to this . . . this new . . .”

  He swallowed, and for a moment Gin almost felt sorry for him. It was hard to believe that his reaction was an act—except for the subtle change in his demeanor back in his office. The brief parting of the curtain that revealed the darkness inside him. The bartender slid their drinks in front of them and Spencer picked his up and drank deeply.

  “You wrote my mother a note last week,” Gin said. “I found it in the laundry. Telling her not to blame herself.”

  “Despite what you may believe, I’m not a monster, Virginia. I have . . . thought of your mother often, through the years. We were close, once.”

  “You killed Lawrence.”

  “Whatever would make you jump to that conclusion?”

  “You probably won’t remember this,” Gin said. “But when Christine and I were in second grade, you came to talk to our brownie troop before cookie sales. You were there to tell us how to be good businesswomen. The thing I remember most of all? You held up a cookie and said, ‘There are a lot of chocolate-covered cookies in this world, but only one Thin Mint.’”

  “I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

  “Your point was that our ideal customer would never be satisfied with an imitation. She would have taken note of every element of the cookie—crunchy wafer, good-quality chocolate, and yes, sold by adorable gap-toothed little girls in brown uniforms, and that would make the sale. Well, when I think about who might have wanted Lawrence dead, I guess I could think of a few other candidates. People he arrested in the past, maybe. My parents, since you could argue he botched the search all those years ago. Me, for the same reason. Even Jake, for allowing him to be the prime suspect.”

  “How does this relate to cookies?” Spencer’s hand clenched his glass tightly.

  “No crunchy middle, no chocolaty outside, no cute little girl. None of those other possible suspects have anything to recommend them.” She picked a toothpick out of the shot glass and snapped it in half. “You, on the other hand . . . what do you suppose the town would think if they knew that you were the father of the murdered girl? The secret lover of our future mayor—at a time when the center’s expansion plans are about to go before the city council? All kinds of well-laid plans would fall apart, I’m guessing. And that doesn’t even take into account the twins. What would Tom think? I mean, some people might consider him fragile. And Christine . . . she worships you. Always has. Losing her respect would be awfully hard to bear.”

  Spencer shook his head at her. “You’ve put together a complicated narrative here, but I have to admit, it makes a certain kind of contorted sense. Except for two things. Until this afternoon, I had no idea that Lily . . . excuse me.” He grabbed a napkin from the bar and dabbed at his eye. When he spoke again, his voice was thick and rough. “I had no idea that I was her biological parent. And second, Lawrence and I were friends. Had been for years.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  Spencer downed the rest of his drink, then looked around the bar, as if he were noticing the surroundings for the first time. “So you came here to accuse me. Listen, Virginia, I know you’ve probably worked with a lot of cops at your job. Maybe that’s given you a sense of . . . obligation, to get involved in things that aren’t really your responsibility.”

  “My sister’s murder is what made me get involved,” Gin snapped. Spencer was trying to feel her out, find the approach that would work best with her, but she w
asn’t going to let him get the upper hand.

  “So are you recording me right now? Hoping you’ll get me to confess to this crazy version of events?”

  “Nope,” Gin said, though the idea had crossed her mind. The digital recorder she used at work was compact enough to fit into her purse—but her phone would have worked reasonably well in a pinch. In the end, she’d accepted what she already knew: Spencer would be too smart for that. “Let’s just say I’m here to satisfy my own curiosity.”

  “I wish I could help you. But all I have to offer is the truth.”

  “You’ve kept yourself in admirable shape, Spencer, but even so you must have had your doubts about going up against Lawrence. I imagine you’ve never fired a gun, and even if he did have a couple decades on you, knowing he used to be a marine . . . well, I would have been intimidated. But oh, right, you and my dad have always been as thick as thieves. I remember being on vacation and Dad giving you his passwords over the phone so you could fix something in the office since we were thousands of miles away on a beach in Mexico. And knowing Dad, he never got around to changing them.”

  Spencer said nothing.

  “Which would also explain how you were able to fake his signature. All those expense receipts that must have come across your desk, from every trip Dad ever took on hospital business. You can probably write it just as well as he can by now. I mean, I doubt that will hold up in court—no one’s that good—but it did the trick.” Gin considered mentioning Red and the video of the overflow lot, but decided to keep it for later. There was no doubt in her mind that Spencer had killed Lawrence, but the whole reason she was here was to learn what had happened to Lily.

  “Once you had the prescription, it would have been easy enough to fill. After that, I’m a little hazy on how things went. You went to his house, maybe you chatted, a couple of old friends having a drink. Or maybe you acted all concerned about the investigation, was there anything you could do, how could you help—Lawrence would have been perfectly relaxed in his own house. He might not even have registered what you were doing when you leaned over and slid that syringe in. I’m guessing you went for the neck, knowing that the bullet wound would probably obliterate the needle mark. He might have lost consciousness without ever knowing what you planned to do.”