up?”
“You know anything about the Madisons?”
“Alexander Madison is the owner and CEO of The Madison
Group. He started thirty years ago as a corporate accountant at another firm, eventually working his way up the ladder to CEO, then
left and started his own. It’s grown from there. Why?”
I played with the straw in my Diet Coke. “You know anything
about his family?”
“He’s married. His wife’s name is Karen. Two children, Alexan
der Junior, called Zander, and Kaylin. Why?”
“How come you know so much about them?”
Royanne took another bite, then scanned the room quickly to
make sure no one was listening. “You remember on the Fourth when
I said I’d just gotten this huge account?”
“Yeah.”
“Madison Accounting Services is trying to buy another firm.
They’d become the largest corporation of their kind in the southeast.
I can’t say anything more about it, but BFB is doing the loan for the
buy. If everything checks out. That’s not for public knowledge.” “Hmm.”
“Now, why are you asking? And please God don’t tell me that
Alexander Madison is some raging pedophile child abuser.” I laughed. “Not that I know of.”
“Seriously, then, why all the questions?”
“I was more curious about his kids than him.”
“Kaylin is still in high school. She’s seventeen and just finished
her junior year at ASFA.” ASFA was the Alabama School of Fine Arts,
a by-application-only public school for talented kids. “Zander is
twenty-two. He’s a sophomore at Auburn, majoring in finance. He’s
doing summer term.”
My eyebrows shot up in surprise at that last statement. “Oh?” “What?”
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit. C’mon. I just told you something in confidence. Now
it’s your turn.”
“I can’t really talk about it.”
Royanne threw her fork down, hard. It rang sharply on the
stoneware plate, startling me and the couple at the table next to us.
They stared. Royanne turned red. Her voice climbed an octave as it
got louder.
“Shit, Claire! What the hell? You know something that could make or break the biggest deal of my career and you sit back and give me the but-I-can’t-tell-you bullshit? No way. I’m not putting up with this. You tell me what you know now or I’m walking out of here and I’m not talking to you ever again.”
`
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I made a stammering attempt to answer Royanne. “I don’t … I can’t …” She snatched her purse from the back of the chair, got out a five and some ones, and threw them on the table. Then she stomped out.
Pablo, noticing the ruckus, hurried over. “Everything is okay?”
“Sure. I just need our checks.” He tallied them for me as I gathered Royanne’s money off the table. I took the checks to the register and paid, getting change to leave a tip for Pablo. He gave me a worried wave as I left.
Royanne was leaning against the passenger door of my car, the butt of her skirt against the dirty white paint. Her arms were crossed and her mouth was set in a tight line. She’d never been this mad at me, not even during all the petty crap of junior high school. I unlocked the doors. “Get in.”
We fastened our seat belts, then she folded her arms again and stared out of the window. I pulled onto Green Springs Highway toward downtown.
“Come on, Roy. This is ridiculous.”
She didn’t answer. A mile or so down the road, I’d had enough. I pulled into a parking lot next to some softball fields and stopped, facing the fence, leaving the car running. A children’s summer league was practicing T-ball. The sweaty kids couldn’t have been older than six. I watched as one baseball-capped kid whacked the ball off the T and ran hell-bent for leather toward first base. The coach on the pitcher’s mound took his time getting to the ball and lobbing it to the boy at first, who caught it. The runner was already safe. I thought about what to say to Royanne, carefully.
“Did you see Michael’s obituary in the paper Saturday?”
She wouldn’t look at me. “No.”
“They printed his whole name. Michael Alexander Hennessy.”
She whipped around to face me. “Alexander?”
“Yep.”
“He was Zander’s kid?”
I pursed my lips and didn’t answer.
“Does Zander have a drug problem? Like Ashley?”
Again, I was silent.
She buried her face in her hands. “Oh God. Are you telling me that my client and the head of one of this city’s most powerful companies had a grandson by a crack whore who murdered him?”
“Hey now —”
“That’s what she was.”
Yes, that’s what Ashley was. She was also damaged. Abused. Starting at a very young age. There but for the Grace of God, as they say. Plus, her effort to straighten herself out was a journey harder than any I hoped I’d ever have to make. I didn’t say any of this out loud.
We stared absently as a pigtailed girl hit the ball all of three feet and ran, arms pumping. Safe again. Royanne ran a hand across her mouth and said, “Well, we’ll just have to deny the loan.”
It was my turn to look quickly at her. “Why?”
“Are you kidding me? Alexander Senior’s reputation is that company. If that’s destroyed, there go the investors. If this gets out —”
“It’s not going to get out. Nobody knows. Alexander Senior doesn’t even know.”
“What do you mean?”
“Senior thinks he paid for an abortion.”
“Oh God.”
“So nobody knows, except me and you and the two people in the room when Michael was conceived.”
“It’ll get out.”
“Maybe not.”
“Sure it will. You already said that reporter — what’s his name, Mahoney — is on this story. Suppose he doesn’t let it go? Suppose he finds out about the Madison’s connection to the dead kid? And their son’s drug problem?”
At the mention of Kirk’s name, my fingers went to my chin, then my lips.
“He’s done with the story, I think. And I don’t know how he’d find out the connection.”
“You did.”
“Yeah, but that’s different. Michael and Zander looked alike. I knew Michael and could put two and two together.”
“And Mahoney can’t? He’s a bird dog. They all are.”
That was true. One whiff of a newspaper-selling, circulationbuilding scandal and I had a feeling Kirk would sell his mother’s soul to Satan to get it.
“Give me some time. Let me talk to Kirk, see what he knows. If he’s done with it, then it’ll all blow over.”
“So he’s ‘Kirk’ now?”
“Kirk the Jerk.”
“I can give you a week. I can stretch out the audit of MAS’s assets until then.”
“Thanks. I’d hate for Alexander Senior’s company to suffer because of a grandchild he didn’t even know about.”
“You don’t know that.”
“What?”
“How do you know that Alexander Senior didn’t know about him?”
She was right. It was an assumption on my part that Zander had told the truth. What if Alexander Senior did know about Ashley and Michael? What would he do to protect his company from the possible scandal? Kill them both? Where would the head of a multimillion dollar company get his hands on enough GHB to kill two people? From his drug-addict son, that’s where. I chewed all this over in my head as the kids in the dugout took the field.
“Do you know him? Senior?” I asked.
“No, I haven’t met him yet. I imagine I will when we do the final deal. Mostly I’m working with his CFO and
a couple of VPs.” She started to laugh. “Whaddya want me to do, ask him about Michael? So, Mr. Madison, your assets look good, you had a strong second quarter, and by the way, did you know your coke-snortin’ son knocked up a crack whore?”
It was my turn to be pissed. “Knock it off.”
“Why?”
“Ashley’s a person. So was Michael.”
She bit her lip. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
I reached over and squeezed her arm, which morphed into a hug. “Me, too.” We broke apart and after thinking a second I asked, “So what about Mrs. Madison Senior? What’d you say her name was?”
“Karen. She runs the Madison Foundation. Does a lot of charity work. The golf tournament is only part of that. She’s also done some stuff with Children’s Hospital, the homeless shelter downtown — what’s it called — The Harbor. And,” Royanne snapped her fingers and looked at me. “Our Mothers Have Wings.”
Our Mothers Have Wings, or OMHW, was an organization I’d been very active in for several years. Founded fifteen years ago by a woman who also lost her mother to breast cancer, OMHW’s mission was to raise awareness about multigenerational disease and the importance of regular screenings, mammograms, and genetic testing. I’d run their grief group for daughters of breast cancer victims until six months ago when I had to give it up as the business of buying my house interfered.
“Huh. I don’t think I’ve met her.” Not unusual. OMHW had at least fifty regular volunteers. “I’ll call Kelsey this afternoon, maybe see if I can wrangle an introduction.”
“Why?”
“To see if they knew about Michael. Ashley was doing so well. I just can’t accept that she’s responsible for Michael’s death.”
“Nothing is going to bring him back.”
“I know. But I owe it to him to find out what happened. And why.”
I put the car in reverse and backed out, then headed downtown. In front of the BFB building, Royanne gave me another hug before exiting the car. “Be careful,” she said.
Back at work, my cubicle was quiet. Russell was out. I could tell I had messages waiting by the small orange light on the phone. No call from Flash. I called a client back, then phoned Kelsey, the volunteer coordinator for OMHW. She was a pretty, petite blonde whose superbubbly, ex-sorority-girl personality made her perfect for recruiting and retaining volunteers.
“Hey Claire! I’m so glad to hear from you! How’s the new house?”
“Coming along. How’re you?”
“I’m great! I hope you’re calling because you’ve got some time to volunteer. You know, we’ve had so many calls about the grief group, I really think we need to start it up again.”
We talked about the logistics of that for a while, and I promised to think about it, then asked, “So, what’s coming up?”
“We’ve got an Angels Aware lunch tomorrow at The Club. You want a ticket?”
“Who’s the speaker?”
“A radiation oncologist. He’s going to talk about new targeted radiation therapies.”
Sounded like a blast. “How much are the tickets?”
“Eighty bucks.”
Yow. That was a pretty hefty chunk out of my paycheck for a lunch. Interpreting my silence correctly, Kelsey said,“I’ll tell you what, if you’ll come early, say about ten thirty, and help Marlie set up and run the registration table, I’ll give it to you for twenty.”
“Sold.” I made my next call, and Detective Brighton picked up after the second ring.
“She pled guilty,” he said, after I identified myself.
“I know, I was there.”
“What do you want? It’s over.”
“Just a quick question. Did Ashley have a drug screen when she was arrested?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because A, we don’t have the facilities to do that at the jail. And B, because the surrender of bodily fluids is something we’d need a warrant for. Not many people will pee in a cup just because you ask them to. It would be too time consuming to get warrants for everyone we arrest. By the time we did, they’d be clean.”
“Oh.”
“Nice try, but it’s over. There’s no use in defending her now.”
“Thanks, Detective.”
“Take it easy.”
So much for that. I might never know whether Ashley was high the night Michael died. I consulted the thick phone book in my desk, then punched in a new number.
Half of me prayed he wouldn’t be there. Maybe I’d go straight to voice mail. But no, my typical luck held true, and he picked up after the first ring.
“Mahoney.”
I froze.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Kirk, it’s Claire Conover”
“Hello.” Frosty, to say the least.
“I was calling to say I’m sorry about what happened the other night.”
“No problem.”
“I didn’t mean to hurt —”
“Like I said, no big deal. Forget it.”
This was followed by a few moments of awkward silence. I struggled for some way to bring up Ashley’s case without being too obvious. “So, now that DHS is out of the spotlight, what are you working on?”
“What makes you think DHS is out of the spotlight? Your agency is never out of the spotlight.”
“Well, I meant now that Ashley’s case is over.”
“I guess you’ll have to buy a paper and find out. Later.” He hung up.
Damn.
I cursed at the phone, which didn’t make me feel any better. Before I forgot, I filled out a form to turn into Mac so I could use comp time for the Angels Aware lunch the next day. As I slid it into his box, he motioned me into his office from behind the glass. I retrieved the form and brought it in with me.
“What’s this?” he asked, reaching for it.
“A comp time request. OMHW is having a luncheon tomorrow and they need a volunteer. I’ll be back by two.” Mac knew I’d volunteered with them in the past.
“You should take the day off tomorrow. You’ve earned it with the week you’ve had. You’ve got plenty of comp time.”
“Thanks. I’ll think about it.” I turned to leave.
“Wait, Claire. I need to tell you something else. Have a seat.” I did, and he said, “Dr. Pope heard from the state commissioner today.”
“And?”
“And the attorney general’s office wants the Hennessy record.” That cold, blood-rushing-to-my-feet sensation again. Just like the day Michael died. “Christ.”
“Now, there’s no need to panic yet. They just want to look at it. To look at our role, and the court’s. They’re worried the reunification might have been rushed.”
The A.G.’s office would look at it, all right. Then decide whether or not to hand it over to the grand jury, who could pursue criminal charges of negligence against the agency. That could mean indictments: of me, Mac, Dr. Pope, the judge on the case. Hell, everybody.
“Jesus,” I said, as if more blasphemy would help.
“Claire, we’ve got an awful lot of ground to cover before anything happens. If anything happens. I debated about even telling you, but I thought you had the right to know.”
“Thanks.”
“I mean it. Just do your job like you normally do. I’ll let you know when it’s time to worry.”
“Okay.”
With thoughts swimming in a sea of anxiety, I went back to my cubicle. I tried to focus on my other cases and put Mac’s revelation about the A.G. out of my head, but it didn’t work. A week ago I thought being fired would be the worst thing ever. Suddenly it seemed like the best-case scenario.
`
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I worked late into the evening Thursday, seriously considering Mac’s suggestion about taking a day off. After much deliberation, I left him a note saying I wouldn’t be in Friday, then went home.
It was close to seven when I unlocked my door, dropped my briefcase to the floor, and immedi
ately ditched my work clothes for denim shorts and a T-shirt. There was a message on my machine from Dad. I returned his call and caught him up on everything. Then I fetched the corkscrew and a half-decent bottle of Pinot Grigio. I parked myself in one of the wrought-iron chairs on my patio and put my feet up on the other.
I stared absently at the whispering oak, hickory, and pines in my backyard. Birds pecked seeds at my feeder, a colorful parade of cardinals, blue jays, and chickadees. The sun went down, turning the cloud-streaked sky pale gray, then pink, then orange. It wasn’t until I finished the fourth glass of wine that the uneasy sensation started to subside. As Mac said, it wasn’t time to freak out yet. I’d done my job to the best of my ability. Michael’s return home hadn’t been rushed. Ashley tested clean for eighteen months straight, a hell of a long time by DHS standards. The record was all in order, with the exception of some minor details. Details that wouldn’t have caused Michael’s death. No way they’d hold me accountable, right?
The problem was the political aspect of the thing. As long as the public focused on this case, the politicians would use it to make themselves look good. The commissioner would, for sure. So would the attorney general. Maybe even Dr. Pope. Look at what we are doing to stop child deaths in our state, they’d proclaim. We are cleaning up DHS. And I’d get thrown under the bus. I hated feeling this way. I hated the constant anxiety. Not to mention the cynical way I was viewing the world.
Maybe I should just chuck it in. Resign, and join the ranks of child welfare workers who were victims of burnout. No more long hours, angry clients, hurt children. The idea was tempting. But what else would I do? I could do many things with the master’s degree I had. I merely had to choose one and find a job. But I’d miss DHS. I’d miss Russell, and Mac, too, on some level. And I still believed I owed Michael answers. I deferred any career decisions, poured myself another glass of wine, and went in to watch some TV.
After flipping channels for a while, I gave it up and went to bed. I woke up Friday with a hangover. It took three cups of coffee and a bagel to make me feel better. I dressed in a light pink suit with white piping and fastened an inch-tall pin to the lapel, a gold angel with wings spread open over the letters OMHW.
My first stop was the jail. I left my purse at security as I had before and took the still-grungy elevator to the second floor. Several other inmates were visiting with loved ones. I parked myself on the last available concrete-footed stool and waited while the guard brought Ashley to me.
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