Pick Your Poison

by Leann Sweeney

  I didn’t say anything. If a woman had left her entire wardrobe at his apartment, it meant nothing to me, because I no longer felt the presence of that maddeningly ambivalent voice saying, I want you, Steven; I hate you, Steven.

  Tonight I neither wanted him nor hated him. And maybe, just maybe, I could simply accept him for the flawed, overgrown boy I had lusted for but never truly loved.

  Back home half an hour later, I found Diva sitting on the counter awaiting my arrival, her amber eyes matching the light on the answering machine as it flashed eerily in the darkness of the kitchen.

  Kate had left me a message on the two-way memo telling me Terry had called with information about Feldman.

  My hand hovered over the phone; then I glanced at my watch. Past midnight. “Come on, Diva; let’s go to bed. It’s too late for phone calls.”

  18

  The next day, Terry wouldn’t reveal what he’d learned over the phone, but rather asked me to meet him at his office. As I sat by his desk around nine A.M., I recalled how I had keyed on his computer right after Ben’s death, determined to discover the truth—something that had proved far easier said than done. But Daddy always said that lick by lick, any old cow can polish off a grindstone.

  Terry, wearing a soft green shirt and lightweight sports jacket, had a gleam in his eye. A good sign. After our meeting with Hamilton, he had seemed almost as interested in this case as I was, so maybe he’d caught the detecting bug, too.

  He opened a manila folder and said, “I haven’t located Feldman, so no address. But an old desk sergeant named Grant, who started out as a bailiff at the Galveston County Courthouse years ago, remembers a lawyer named Feldman who made regular appearances in family court for his adoption business.”

  “You’re kidding. This is fantastic, Terry.”

  “Grant says Feldman was a shady baby broker linked to hints of a judicial scandal. A judge named Hayes left the bench after being tied to Feldman and some questionable adoptions.” Terry leaned back and smiled.

  The rush of pleasure I felt at finally getting a solid lead surprised me with its intensity. “We could search back,” I said, “and if Feldman has a record, maybe Jeff Kline will help me locate him.”

  “Hold on. I said there were hints of a scandal. When Hayes left the bench, the investigation ended. Apparently lots of wheeling and dealing went on behind closed doors. She resigned and everything quieted down. Feldman wasn’t seen around the courthouse much after she left.”

  “Did Grant tell you anything else?”

  “He remembers the judge better than he remembers Feldman. Quite a few of the ‘good ol’ boys,’ Grant included, said they knew she played dirty. Their take was that if she wanted to make it in a man’s world, she had to cheat.”

  “How typically Texan of the boys. Is Judge Hayes still around?”

  “I don’t know, but her son is a big-time real estate salesman in Galveston. Here’s his number.” He handed me a piece of paper. “If Mr. Hayes isn’t happy that you’re resurrecting unpleasant rumors about his mother, do me a favor and don’t tell him who sent you.”

  Several hours later I was cruising toward Galveston for the umpteenth time in a week, excited at the prospect of following this lead. David Hayes, the judge’s son, had been more than cooperative. He gave me Eugenia Hayes’s address with his blessing, as well as directions so I could visit her. I didn’t mention her past indiscretions and he didn’t either. I simply told him I was a reporter writing a story about pioneering women in the judicial field. If he knew anything questionable about her past, he made no mention. But then, she probably didn’t share the bedtime story of how she nearly got kicked off the bench. David Hayes might not have a clue about her questionable past.

  The fact she now resided in a nursing home might present a few problems. Not to mention her Alzheimer’s disease. But I wasn’t discouraged. In fact, I hummed the Beatles’ “Here Comes the Sun” as I followed the brick-lined path leading to the front door of Faircrest Haven.

  A kind-looking woman, with tight salt-and-pepper curls and wearing a name tag with Lorna printed in giant letters, greeted me from behind a U-shaped desk several feet beyond the entrance of the two-story building. She abandoned her People magazine to offer a friendly smile.

  “I’m here to visit Judge Hayes,” I said.

  Her face clouded as she flipped through a Rolodex of laminated plastic cards.

  “Judge Hayes?” questioned the woman. “Is he in-patient care or a day resident?”

  “I think he is a she, if that helps any,” I said, peering over the desk and wondering if they’d ever considered indexing the patients on a computer.

  “Oh, my goodness.” Her eyes widened and she shook her head. “You must have the wrong facility. They do those surgeries down at the University Hospital. We only have old people here, not any of those sex-change folks.” She pointed back out the front door over my shoulder. “To get over there, you go back to Seawall Boulevard and turn—”

  “No, you misunderstood,” I said with laugh. “Judge Eugenia Hayes,” I clarified. Or so I thought.

  “You’re telling me our Eugenia used to be a man? Doesn’t that pop the wax out of your ears? You know, she doesn’t make sense half the time, so that explains her problems. It’s hard enough making it in this world, and then you go switching your body parts and—”

  “I’m really in a rush,” I interrupted. “Could you tell me her room number?” I realized I wouldn’t straighten this out in Lorna’s mind, now or in the future.

  “She’s in two-thirty-one. Take the elevator to the second floor and turn left. You know, I always thought Eugenia was a weird name, but now I understand. She used to be Eugene, didn’t she?” She smiled and gave me a conspiratorial wink.

  There was a good reason for Lorna to use laminated cards. Trusting her with technology would have been far too risky.

  When I exited the elevator on the second floor, an overpowering blend of disinfectant and room deodorizer greeted me. I followed the signs and was soon tapping tentatively on the door of two-thirty-one, not sure what I’d find. I’d never visited a nursing home before.

  “Come in,” commanded a woman from within.

  I opened the door and paused, surprised at the size of the voice coming from the tiny person propped up in bed.

  “Shut the door!” boomed the gray-headed lady, her frame nearly lost in the swath of white sheets and pillows surrounding her. “It smells like a goddamn nursing home in that hallway!”

  I quickly complied and moved into the spacious room. I’d expected IVs and oxygen tanks at the very least, but instead, the place resembled a jungle. A huge corn plant stood in one corner, leaning toward the light of the picture window. Potted plants, bursting with blossoms of violet and pink, spread out to line the wall with bright green foliage. Framed by the window, the seething Gulf of Mexico angrily foreshadowed the approaching storm.

  “What do you want?” she demanded. “Because if you’re selling insurance, you can turn around and march right out. Odds are I’ll be dead soon, and no living soul will profit from that event. Not if I can help it.” She opened her arms wide. “Besides, this glorified tomb has taken every penny.” She turned and started fumbling around for something on the bedside table.

  “Can I help you?” I asked, hurrying over to her.

  But she located her glasses before I could reach her side, stretching the wires behind her ears, then scrutinizing me from head to toe. “No. You’re no salesperson. You don’t have their sneaky eyes. God knows I can pick out those idiots at a hundred yards.”

  “Your son told me you lived here,” I said, sliding a dieffenbachia away and pulling a chair up alongside the bed.

  “My son?” Confusion muddied her already hazy brown eyes.

  “He told me you have a problem remembering things sometimes.” Actually, he told me she had trouble most of the time, but did better with the distant past than with recent events. My hope lay there. “Could I ask you a
few questions?”

  “I run a tight courtroom, young lady, so don’t think because you’re fresh out of law school you can get one past me. I’ve seen every trick in the book.” She folded her arms across her chest and stared at me expectantly. “Go ahead. Ask away.”

  “I-I’m not a lawyer, but—”

  “I told you not to argue with me,” she snapped.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said. Even through her disorientation, she exuded an authority not unlike that of the second-grade teacher who had sent me to the principal for chewing gum. “I wanted to ask you about another lawyer, Judge.”

  “You came to the right place, because I’ve known a bunch of them. Professional liars, for the most part.” She laughed, turning her face to the ceiling and guffawing loudly before the outburst mutated into a fit of coughing.

  I helped her sit up straighter, concerned about the faint blueness around her lips and alarmed by the parchment quality of her skin. I feared her bony shoulder might crumble beneath my touch. “Are you all right?”

  “Of course not. Who is? Ask your questions, counselor.” She leaned back into the pillows and closed her eyes.

  “Do you remember a man named Feldman? Samuel Feldman?”

  She bolted upright and hatred raced across her heavily wrinkled cheeks to settle in the tight line of her mouth. “Did that snake send you here? Because if that’s the case, get out!” She started to lift the blanket off her legs.

  I took her hands in mine. “I swear I don’t even know him,” I said quickly. “He hurt someone and I want to see him punished.”

  I’d come up with the right response through pure dumb luck, because she calmed immediately. “You don’t want to find him, nurse.” She squeezed my hands and shook her head emphatically.

  Within the span of a few moments I had gone from lawyer to nurse. Getting information out of her might be more difficult than I thought.

  “Do the world a favor and skip the CPR on Samuel Feldman,” she said. “Nothing wrong with him that reincarnation wouldn’t cure.” She grinned, and I saw teeth too large for her shrunken gums.

  “I have to find him first,” I said. “And unfortunately I’ve misplaced his address.”

  “Check hell. I think he’s stringing barbed wire down there.”

  She seemed quite sure how much she hated Feldman, but maybe if I mentioned the adoptions, she’d focus more on facts than emotion. “I heard you placed many babies with families over the years. Could you tell me about that, Judge Hayes?”

  “Ah, the babies. Sent hundreds to fine homes. Sad part was, the birth mothers were babies, too. Children having children. Tragic. Absolutely tragic. I had to make some hard decisions, but that’s why they elected me.”

  She squared her thin shoulders and I could picture her, robed and dignified, running a courtroom.

  “Um . . . I also need information on a woman named Cloris Grayson. She—”

  “No!” Her face went gray and she clutched both my wrists. “You promised me. You said I wouldn’t lose my good name. You claimed you were a fair man.” She stared off past my right shoulder, obviously focused on the past. And what I saw in her eyes seemed like pure terror.

  I decided to play along, to pretend I was this man she’d spoken of. “I am a fair man, but I need to know about the baby.”

  She cocked her head and appeared lost by my remark. “If you don’t know, who does?”

  “Oh, I know, all right, but I still need help locating Feldman. Finding him will solve my problems.”

  “He went to see Cloris. That’s what he said, anyway. He promised he’d convince her to quit. But don’t trust him. Don’t ever trust him. Look where it got me.” A tear slipped from the corner of one eye. “My career is ruined.”

  She started crying, the room echoing with her long, whimpering sobs while I rubbed the tissue-paper skin on her hand. I’d never intended to upset her this much.

  When she finally regained control, she said, “Tell them the truth, nurse. Tell them I’m not a bad person.”

  “Of course you’re not a bad person,” I said quietly. “Even good people do bad things sometimes.”

  “And child?” she said, slowly closing her eyes. “Water the plants before you leave, would you? We breathe for each other, you know.”

  I stopped at the house on P Street after leaving the nursing home, and, as expected, Steven’s truck was sitting in the driveway, as well as an expensive foreign car.

  I burst in through the back door, anxious to tell him about my conversation with the judge, and found him and another man poring over books and blueprints laid out on the kitchen counter.

  “Hi,” I said, addressing the stranger and extending my hand. “Abby Rose. I take it you’re the renovation expert here to help Steven with my house.”

  We shook, with the man casting a puzzled glance toward Steven.

  “Guess I forgot to mention the owner is my ex-wife here,” said Steven. “Mr. Gibson is the man we hope to contract, Abby. He knows his stuff.”

  “Nice to meet you, Mr. Gibson. The house really belongs to Steven at this point in the renovation. I’ve put this project in his very capable hands.” Maybe that would salve Steven’s ego a little, as I could see he was embarrassed by my blundering in here unannounced.

  Gibson said, “You’ve given me what I need, Mr. Bradley. We’ll have a more thorough consultation in a few weeks.” He gathered one set of blueprints and said, “Nice to meet you, too.” He bowed stiffly in my direction, then hurried out through the back door.

  “I didn’t mean to interrupt,” I said. “But I’ve had a breakthrough on Ben’s case, Steven.”

  “Wonderful. Maybe you should think about applying to the police academy.”

  I ignored the sarcasm and told him about my visit with Hayes and what I considered to be a confirmed connection between Feldman and Cloris. He listened with half an ear, obviously anxious to return to his blueprints and books.

  “How much weight can you put on the ramblings of an old woman with a brain disease?” he asked when I’d finished.

  “I’m certain what she told me was founded in reality. I mean, the name Cloris is so unusual. The next step is to convince Jeff to help me find Feldman.”

  “Jeff, is it? How cozy.” Steven slammed one book shut.

  “He’s a friend, like you are,” I said.

  Steven abruptly gripped my shoulders. “I love you, Abby, and not like a friend. And one day you’ll be back with me, where you belong.”

  I stepped back, away from his grasp. “This is too intense, okay? Can we drop it?”

  “Sure. Sorry.” But that small fire of desire in his eyes remained.

  As for me, I felt nothing but regret.

  19

  The next afternoon Kate was free, so she and I turned our attention to the safe-deposit box. We’d driven in Kate’s 4Runner to Willis’s office first, picked up the needed paperwork to gain access, and were now on our way to the small bank located south of the city near the Space Center. A thick layer of rolling gray clouds covered the sky as the slow-moving storm marched ever closer.

  “Refresh my memory on what those happy weather people are saying,” I said. “Will this become a hurricane?”

  “Probably won’t get that strong before the thing slams into us,” said Kate. “Which exit do we take again?”

  “NASA Road One. About two more miles down the freeway,” I said. “The summer’s been so dry, when the skies do open up, it will be like a cow peeing on a flat rock.”

  “Let’s hope the rain waits until tomorrow,” Kate said. “We have that country-club thing Aunt Caroline arranged, remember?”

  “I remember,” I said.

  “Terry’s coming over about six and we’ll leave from our house.”

  “With all the construction on the interstate, we should plan on forty-five minutes’ travel time,” I said.

  “You bringing Steven?” Kate asked.

  “No way. Slow down, Kate. Here’s the exit coming
up.”

  “Right or left once we get off?”

  “Right, then over the freeway.”

  We found the bank without problems, and after wading through yards of red tape—paperwork no doubt designed to discourage any but the most tenacious person from removing anything of value from inside the four walls of Community Savings—we carried the safe-deposit box to a cubicle.

  But if I thought a miraculous revelation, complete with videotaped documentation, would rise from the depths of that small metal receptacle, I was mistaken. We found an unlabeled computer CD. Nothing else. Still, I held out hope that my theory about Daddy was correct and this CD would reveal something about Ben’s presence at our house.

  When we arrived home, I hurriedly stuck the CD in the computer while Kate ran upstairs to shower. But did I find any evidence connecting Ben and Daddy? Not a chance. The CD contained a spreadsheet and word processing program, and an ancient one, at that. All my slaving over mounds of canceled checks for this!

  I rushed through the program once more, noting that the word processor seemed to lack all the features of the one he’d eventually marketed. Maybe he’d copied the original onto this CD as some sort of keepsake. But why? He’d never seemed the least sentimental about the software he created. Maybe this was a rough draft of sorts, or maybe he’d removed aspects of the program for updating. As far as I knew, he could have been planning to get back into software after all these years.

  One thing balanced my discouragement, though: Aunt Caroline would be more disappointed than I was. We had found no money in that box. Not one penny.

  The Pines Country Club, hidden in the lush forests north of Houston, was perched on a manicured rise near a man-made lake. For business purposes, Daddy considered membership a necessity, so we’d appeared regularly, dressed up like poodles in a dog show. Tonight I made sure not to wear the “plump” dress, opting instead for a one-shoulder forest-green number. I even dug out the panty hose, but passed on the high heels. Nothing would make me submit to that self-punishing throwback to foot binding.