Flesh And Blood

CHAPTER 37

THE FIRST DAY she was gone, I was miserable, and the next one was shaping up the same way when Milo dropped by at nine a.m. and showed me Jane Abbot’s correspondence with Tony Duke.

“She kept copies,” he said. “In her safe-deposit box. On the bottom, under some stock certificates.”

Two letters. In the first Jane reminded Duke of their time in Hawaii and informed him he had a daughter. A penciled notation on the bottom was dated five days later:

TD called, 3 pm, no prob with $, wants to meet L. I said probs, maybe later.

In the second Jane thanked Duke for his quick response, apologized for restricting him from Lauren, describing her as “a very bright young lady, but unfortunately – through no fault of yours, dear Tony – she is currently emotionally ill and highly troubled.”

TD called 3X, says he knows doctors. Put him off.

Lauren gone, again, no idea where. Next time, bail or not?

A final page in Jane’s handwriting laid out the financial agreement. Fifty thousand dollars a year placed in trust for Lauren, to be supervised by Jane, with the understanding that Jane would do everything in her power to effect a reunion and that, by the time Lauren reached twenty-six, Duke would get to meet her.

Father and daughter had fallen short by six months.

I gave him back the papers. “What’s the status on Mel Abbot?”

“He should be released soon, though no one’s sure where to put him. The closest relative they can find is a cousin in New Jersey, almost as old as Mel. Meanwhile, Irving’s right down the hall from Abbot, in the jail ward – you did good work on his face. The D.A. will file multiple counts of conspiracy and first-degree homicide with special circumstances for mass murder, cruelty, and profit motive. Gretchen’s helping them put the case together in order to plea down her own conspiracy rap – The feds finally came through and verified that Irving had been one of her big-time clients. All we’ve got on her is her pal Ingrid knowing I was looking for Michelle and your seeing Gretchen enter the Duke estate the next day.”

“Gretchen works the system again,” I said.

“What the D.A. wants is Irving on a platter, and Gretchen can fill in the blanks. She can also supply the motive for Michelle – no, there wasn’t any blackmail, no one’s sure Michelle even knew anything dangerous. But Irving thought she did – to be brutally honest, my mentioning Michelle’s name to Gretchen signed her death warrant – and no, I’m not blaming myself, I was doing my job. It’s just the way things happen sometimes.”

He rubbed his face. “And Gretchen’s still claiming she’s never heard of Shawna. I’d like to say I’ve been right about Shawna not being part of this, but at this point I don’t know what’s real and what isn’t. For all I know Irving took pictures of her, boffed her, killed her.”

“Gretchen set up Michelle and Lance and she walks.”

“Maybe she’ll get hers one day… I also found out that Irving’s rag biz went under because of ‘financial irregularities’ – he left behind an army of creditors, and that beach construction project is leveraged to the hilt. Plenty of claws being sharpened – He ain’t gonna find too many character witnesses.”

“What about Anita?”

“So far, she doesn’t appear to be dirty,” he said. “When I saw her she looked worse than Dugger – some kind of intestinal problems; she actually threw up four times during a one-hour interview. She seems genuinely shocked by what her husband and Cheryl were up to – we’re talking emotionally shattered. Even my jaded detective ears ain’t ringing. As I was leaving the mafioso doc was putting her on tranqs… What else – Oh, yeah, Charming Lyle the Model Father finally showed up. Looks like he really was hunting. Rangers picked him up for shooting a doe out of season, caught him skinning it by the side of his truck. Big-time fine, and they sent him back home, bitching all the way. Asshole actually called me up again yesterday, wanting to know if I’d learned anything about Lauren’s will.”

“What’d you tell him?”

“Well,” he said. “I controlled myself, didn’t allow myself free expression of pent-up emotions.”

He ambled to the fridge, stuck his head in, emerged empty-handed, walked over to the window and played with a houseplant.

“What I told him is Lauren died poor. Which is the truth, right?”