Simply Lies

Chapter 29

On the drive home, Gibson mulled over things.

If Clarisse was Francine, she could have found and killed her father at Stormfield. Whether her brother, Doug, was around and part of it, Gibson didn’t know.

But then why involve me? If she did kill him, then she basically engaged me to find her.

Since that made no sense, Gibson had to conclude she had it all wrong, or was missing something vital that would make her initial speculation right.

Later, she turned into her driveway and sat there for a bit.

If the “and parents” comment made by Clarisse meant she had a parent in assisted living, then Geraldine Langhorne might be alive. Had Francine found her mother, and made her tell where her father was? Then she went and killed him? But that still didn’t explain Gibson’s involvement in all this. And had something just happened to Geraldine, if that’s who it was? Based on the partial conversation Gibson had overheard, it was possible.

And if Clarisse is Francine, how did she even know that I exist?

Based on what Beckett had told her about the school play, Francine had been a thespian, too. She and Gibson were close in age. Had Francine gone to Temple while Gibson had been there? Had she used the name Francine Parker? Or had she used another name? And where was Doug? Had he followed his sister across the country? From what Beckett had told him about Doug Langhorne, he didn’t sound much like the college type, but one never knew.

But that’s something I can check.

Gibson went inside to her office. She could hear the kids playing with Silva in the backyard. She picked up her iPad that she had used to take pictures of the items at Stormfield.

Gibson sat down and scrolled through picture after picture of the mansion’s interior. The thing was, there wasn’t millions of dollars’ worth of assets there. She had gotten particulars on the Formula cabin cruiser. Brand-new, it would go for well over a million. But this model was four years old, so it would be worth far less. And if the millions were the ones Langhorne had already spent on purchasing Stormfield and the boat, he couldn’t imagine how Clarisse intended to get her hands on those proceeds. She would have to prove that she was Harry Langhorne’s daughter. And if she had killed her father, that would not exactly be smart. Plus, even if the place was sold and millions resulted from that sale, it could be argued by the government that the monies Langhorne had used to buy the place were stolen from a criminal organization. In that case she might not realize a penny. And while Harry Langhorne might well have been a Class A asshole, as Marshal Beckett had said, that didn’t give anyone the right to murder him.

Yet how many times have you dreamed about killing your ex?

Her small attic had an access door in the middle of the upstairs hall. She pulled on the cord and a set of stairs dropped down. She clambered up and turned on the light. There was no room to stand, so she stepped across the loose plywood boards set over the ceiling joists until she reached the pile of cardboard boxes.

She opened one and pulled out her yearbooks from Temple. She went over all four of them. There was no Francine or Doug Parker, not that she had expected to find those names. Next she went through all the photos of the students. The problem was, the only pictures she had of Francine and Doug Langhorne were from when they were children.

As they were leaving the cafe, she had asked Beckett if he had any photos of them as teenagers, but he had told her no. As a routine, he said, they did not take pictures of their protectees, in case they fell into the wrong hands. That meant Gibson really had no idea what Francine or Doug looked like now.

She stopped at one page in her junior yearbook, which showed Mickey Rogers onstage in the role of Eliza Doolittle from My Fair Lady. She smiled and ran her fingers over the images. The cockney accent had been really hard for the Jersey girl to master, but she had worked her butt off to nail it. The camera angle showed the audience, and also some of the crew in the wings.

She heard her kids screaming and playing in the backyard. She took the yearbook with her, left the attic, and walked over to a window where she could see Tommy and Darby running in circles, using their arms as plane wings, while Silva clapped and danced around them.

She glanced down at her far younger self on the page as she beamed out at the audience.

I thought I was going to be the next great thing on Broadway, even though my pipes weren’t the best and my acting chops, though decent, were not exactly Tony Award level. Now I’m approaching forty, divorced with two little kids, and I’m embroiled in something I can’t even begin to understand.

But whoever said life was predictable?

She put the yearbook down and hurried outside to be with her kids.