by Harlan Coben
Grace did not reply.
The Bedminster condos were generic, which, when you're talking about condos, is something of a repetition in terms. They had the prefab light-brown aluminum siding, three levels, garages underneath, every building identical to the one to its right and to its left and behind it and in front of it. The complex was huge and sprawling, a khaki-coated ocean stretching as far as the eye could see.
For Grace, the route here had been familiar. Jack drove by this on his way to work. They had, for a very brief moment, debated moving into this condo development. Neither Jack nor Grace was particularly good with their hands or enjoyed fix-the-old-home shows on cable. Condos held that appeal--you pay a monthly fee, you don't worry about the roof or an addition or the landscaping or any of that. There were tennis courts and a swimming pool and, yes, a playground for children. But in the end there was just so much conformity one could take. Suburbia is already a subworld of sameness. Why add insult to injury by making your physical abode conform too?
Max spotted the complicated, brightly hued playground before the car had come to a complete stop. He was raring to sprint for the swing set. Emma looked more bored with the prospect. She held onto her Game Boy. Normally Grace would have protested--Game Boy in the car only, especially when the alternative was fresh air--but again now did not seem the time.
Grace cupped her hand over her eyes as they started moving away. "I can't leave them alone."
"Mrs. Alworth lives right here," Duncan said. "We can stay in the doorway and watch them."
They approached the door on the first level. The playground was quiet. The air was still. Grace inhaled deeply and smelled the freshly cut grass. They stood side-by-side, she and Duncan. He rang the bell. Grace waited by the door, feeling oddly like a Jehovah's Witness.
A cackling voice not unlike the witch in an old Disney film said, "Who is it?"
"Mrs. Alworth?"
Again the cackle: "Who is it?"
"Mrs. Alworth, it's Scott Duncan."
"Who?"
"Scott Duncan. We spoke a few weeks ago. About your son, Shane."
"Go away. I have nothing to say to you."
Grace picked up an accent now. Boston area.
"We could really use your help."
"I don't know nothing. Go away."
"Please, Mrs. Alworth, I need to talk to you about your son."
"I told you. Shane lives in Mexico. He's a good boy. He helps poor people."
"We need to ask about some of his old friends." Scott Duncan looked at Grace, nodded for her to say something.
"Mrs. Alworth," Grace said.
The cackle was more wary now. "Who's that?"
"My name is Grace Lawson. I think my husband knew your son."
There was silence now. Grace turned away from the door and watched Max and Emma. Max was on a corkscrew slide. Emma sat cross-legged and played the Game Boy.
Through the door, the cackling voice asked, "Who's your husband?"
"Jack Lawson."
Nothing.
"Mrs. Alworth?"
"I don't know him."
Scott Duncan said, "We have a picture. We'd like to show it to you."
The door opened. Mrs. Alworth wore a housedress that couldn't have been manufactured after the Bay of Pigs. She was in her mid-seventies, heavyset, the kind of big aunt who hugs you and you disappear in the folds. As a kid you hate the hug. As an adult you long for it. She had varicose veins that resembled sausage casing. Her reading glasses dangled against her enormous chest from a chain. She smelled faintly of cigarette smoke.
"I don't have all day," she said. "Show me this picture."
Scott Duncan handed her the photograph.
For a long time the old woman said nothing.
"Mrs. Alworth?"
"Why did someone cross her out?" she asked.
"That was my sister," Duncan said.
She flicked a glance his way. "I thought you said you were an investigator."
"I am. My sister was murdered. Her name was Geri Duncan."
Mrs. Alworth's face went white. Her lip started to tremble. "She's dead?"
"She was murdered. Fifteen years ago. Do you remember her?"
She seemed to have lost her bearings. She turned to Grace and snapped, "What do you keep looking at?"
Grace was facing Max and Emma. "My children." She gestured toward the playground. Mrs. Alworth followed suit. She stiffened. She seemed lost now, confused.
"Did you know my sister?" Duncan asked.
"What does this have to do with me?"
His voice was stern now. "Yes or no, did you know my sister?"
"I can't remember. It was a long time ago."
"Your son dated her."
"He dated a lot of girls. Shane was a handsome boy. So was his brother, Paul. He's a psychologist in Missouri. Why don't you leave me alone and talk to him?"
"Try to think." Scott's voice rose a notch. "My sister was murdered." He pointed to the picture of Shane Alworth. "That's your son, isn't it, Mrs. Alworth?"
She stared down at the strange photograph for a long time before nodding.
"Where is he?"
"I told you before. Shane lives in Mexico. He helps poor people."
"When was the last time you spoke with him?"
"Last week."
"He called you?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"What do you mean where?"
"Did Shane call you here?"
"Of course. Where else would he call?"
Scott Duncan took a step closer. "I checked your phone records, Mrs. Alworth. You haven't gotten or made an international call in the past year."
"Shane uses one of those phone cards," she said too quickly. "Maybe the phone companies don't pick those up, how I should know?"
Duncan took another step closer. "Listen to me, Mrs. Alworth. And please listen closely. My sister is dead. There is no sign of your son anywhere. This man here"--he pointed to the picture of Jack--"her husband, Jack Lawson, he's also missing. And this woman over here"--he pointed to the redheaded girl with the spaced-out eyes--"her name is Sheila Lambert. There's been no sign of her for at least ten years."
"This has got nothing to do with me," Mrs. Alworth insisted.
"Five people in the photograph. We've been able to identify four of them. They're all gone. One we know is dead. For all we know, they all are."
"I told you. Shane is--"
"You're lying, Mrs. Alworth. Your son graduated Vermont University. So did Jack Lawson and Sheila Lambert. They must have been friends. He dated my sister; we both know that. So what happened to them? Where is your son?"
Grace put a hand on Scott's arm. Mrs. Alworth was staring out now toward the playground, at the children. Her bottom lip was quivering. Her skin was ashen. Tears ran down both cheeks. She looked as if she'd fallen into a trance. Grace tried to step in her line of vision.
"Mrs. Alworth," she said gently.
"I'm an old woman."
Grace waited.
"I don't have nothing to say to you people."
Grace said, "I'm trying to find my husband." Mrs. Alworth was still staring at the playground. "I'm trying to find their father."
"Shane is a good boy. He helps people."
"What happened to him?" Grace asked.
"Leave me alone."
Grace tried to meet the older woman's gaze, but the focus was gone from her eyes. "His sister"--Grace gestured toward Duncan--"my husband, your son. Whatever happened affected us all. We want to help."
But the old woman shook her head and turned away. "My son doesn't need your help. Now go away. Please." She stepped back into her house and closed the door.
Chapter 33
When they were back in the car, Grace said, "When you told Mrs. Alworth you checked her phone records for international calls . . ."
Duncan nodded. "It was a bluff."
The children were plugged back into their Game Boys. Scott Duncan called the c
oroner. She was waiting for them.
Grace said, "We're getting closer to the answer, aren't we?"
"I think so."
"Mrs. Alworth might be telling the truth. I mean, as far as she knows."
"How do you figure?" he asked.
"Something happened years ago. Jack ran away overseas. Maybe Shane Alworth and Sheila Lambert did too. Your sister, for whatever reason, hung around and ended up dead."
He did not reply. His eyes were suddenly moist. There was a tremor in the corner of his mouth.
"Scott?"
"She called me. Geri. Two days before the fire."
Grace waited.
"I was running out the door. You have to understand. Geri was a bit of a kook. She was always so melodramatic. She said she had to tell me something important, but I figured it could wait. I figured it was about whatever new thing she was into--aromatherapy, her new rock band, her etchings, whatever. I said I'd call her back."
He stopped, shrugged. "But I forgot."
Grace wanted to say something, but nothing came to her. Words of comfort would probably do more harm than good right now. She took hold of the wheel and glanced in the rearview mirror. Emma and Max both had their heads lowered, their thumbs working the buttons on the tiny console. She felt that overwhelmed thing coming on, that pure blast in the middle of normalcy, the bliss from the everyday.
"Do you mind if we stop at the coroner's now?" Duncan asked.
Grace hesitated.
"It's about a mile away. Just turn right at the next light."
In for a penny, Grace thought. She drove. He gave directions. A minute later he pointed up ahead. "It's that office building on the corner."
The medical office seemed dominated by dentists and orthodontists. When they opened the door, there was that antiseptic smell Grace always associated with a voice telling her to rinse and spit. An ophthalmology group called Laser Today was listed for the second floor. Scott Duncan pointed to the name "Sally Li, MD." The directory said she was on the lower level.
There was no receptionist. The door chimed when they entered. The office was properly sparse. The furniture consisted of two distressed couches and one flickering lamp that wouldn't muster a price tag at a garage sale. The lone magazine was a catalogue of medical examiner tools.
An Asian woman, mid-forties and exhausted, stuck her head through the door of the inner office. "Hey, Scott."
"Hey, Sally."
"Who's this?"
"Grace Lawson," he said. "She's helping me."
"Charmed," Sally said. "Be with you in a sec."
Grace told the kids that they could keep playing their Game Boys. The danger of video games was that they shut the world out. The beauty of video games was that they shut the world out.
Sally Li opened the door. "Come on in."
She wore clean surgical scrubs with high heels. A pack of Marlboros was jammed into the breast pocket. The office, if you could call it that, had that Early American Hurricane look going for it. There were papers everywhere. They seemed to be cascading off her desk and bookshelves, almost like a waterfall. Pathology textbooks were open. Her desk was old and metal, something bought at an old elementary school garage sale. There were no pictures on it, nothing personal, though a really big ashtray sat front and center. Magazines, lots of them, were stacked high all over the place. Some of the stacks had already collapsed. Sally Li had not bothered to clean them up. She dropped herself in the chair behind her desk.
"Just knock that stuff to the floor. Sit."
Grace removed the papers from the chair and sat. Scott Duncan did the same. Sally Li folded her hands and put them on her lap.
"You know, Scott, that I'm not much with bedside manner."
"I know."
"The good thing is, my patients never complain."
She laughed. No one else did.
"Okay, so now you see why I don't get dates." Sally Li picked up a pair of reading glasses and started shuffling through files. "You know how the really messy person is always so well organized? They always say something like, 'It might look like untidy but I know where everything is.' That's crap. I don't know where . . . Wait, here it is."
Sally Li pulled out a manila file.
"Is that my sister's autopsy?" Duncan asked.
"Yep."
She slid it toward him. He opened it. Grace leaned in next to him. On the top were the words DUNCAN, GERI. There were photographs too. Grace spotted one, a brown skeleton lying on a table. She turned away, as if she'd been caught invading someone's privacy.
Sally Li had her feet on the desk, her hands behind her head. "Look, Scott, you want me to go through the rigmarole of how amazing the science of pathology has become, or do you want me to bottom-line it?"
"Skip the rigmarole."
"At the time of her death, your sister was pregnant."
Duncan's body convulsed as if she'd hit him with a cattle prod. Grace did not move.
"I can't tell you how long. No more than four, five months."
"I don't understand," Scott said. "They must have done an autopsy the first time around."
Sally Li nodded. "I'm sure."
"Why didn't they see it then?"
"My guess? They did."
"But I never knew . . ."
"Why would you? You were, what, in law school? They may have told your mom or dad. But you were just a sibling. And her pregnancy has nothing to do with the cause of death. She died in a dorm fire. The fact that she was pregnant, if they knew, would be deemed irrelevant."
Scott Duncan just sat there. He looked at Grace and then back at Sally Li. "You can get DNA from the fetus?"
"Probably, yeah. Why?"
"How long will it take you to run a paternity test?"
Grace was not surprised by the question.
"Six weeks."
"Any way to rush it?"
"I might be able to get some kind of rejection earlier. In other words, rule people out. But I can't say for sure."
Scott turned to Grace. She knew what he was thinking. She said, "Geri was dating Shane Alworth."
"You saw the picture."
She had. The way Geri looked up at Jack. She had not known the camera was on her. They were all still getting ready to pose. But what was captured, the look on Geri Duncan's face, well, it was the way you look at someone who is much more than a friend.
"Let's run the test then," Grace said.
Chapter 34
Charlaine was holding Mike's hand when his eyes finally fluttered open.
She screamed for a doctor, who declared, in a moment of true obviousness, that this was a "good sign." Mike was in tremendous pain. The doctor put a morphine pump on him. Mike did not want to go back to sleep. He grimaced and tried to ride it out. Charlaine stayed bedside and held his hand. When the pain got bad, he squeezed hard.
"Go home," Mike said. "The kids need you."
She shushed him. "Try to rest."
"Nothing you can do for me here. Go home."
"Shh."
Mike began to drift off. She looked down at him. She remembered the days at Vanderbilt. The range of emotions overwhelmed her. There was love and affection, sure, but what troubled Charlaine right now--even as she held his hand, even as she felt a strong bond with this man who shared her life, even as she prayed and made deals with a God she'd ignored for far too long--was that she knew that these feelings would not last. That was the terrible part. In the middle of this intensity Charlaine knew that her feelings would ebb away, that the emotions were fleeting, and she hated herself for knowing that.
Three years ago Charlaine attended a huge self-help rally at Continental Arena in East Rutherford. The speaker had been dynamic. Charlaine loved it. She bought all the tapes. She started doing exactly what he said--making goals, sticking to them, figuring out what she wanted from life, trying to put things in perspective, organizing and restructuring her priorities so that she could achieve--but even as she went through the motions, even as her lif
e began to change for the better, she knew that it would not last. That this would all be a temporary change. A new regimen, an exercise program, a diet--that was how this felt too.
