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Chapter 23

Driving through his neighborhood, Mike was struck by its suburban genericness. This was not Hollywood of the palm trees and starred sidewalks, Venice Beach of the hippie conspiracists and incense burners, Beverly Hills of the Sunday Bentley and nine-dollar cupcake. Lost Hills was built, block after block, of ranch-style family homes, a community of gleaming mailboxes and bright yellow play structures. It was for folks who craved Southern California’s endless summer, who could not afford Malibu real estate but wanted to live a short drive from the Pacific, who didn’t need the paparazzi glare of Los Angeles but enjoyed the bright-light glow from a distance. Neighborhood Watch signs, hammered into every third street corner and front lawn, served as amulets against shadowy men with sinister hats and white slits for eyes. Bad things weren’t supposed to happen here.

He could not see Shep anywhere on the road, impressive given the Mustang’s conspicuousness. He got to the café five minutes early and took an outside table, as planned. Sipping an orange juice, he waited, his nerves frayed. Two women in their fifties dressed like they were in their twenties sashayed in, rat dogs peeping from their handbags. A well-dressed man carried on a domestic dispute through a Bluetooth earpiece. Glancing around the parking lot and surrounding buildings, Mike looked for some sign of Shep, but still nothing.

He turned at the clop of her heels. A middle-aged woman approached, clutching a tatty leather briefcase and wearing a short-sleeved silk blouse and a bark-colored skirt. Librarian’s spectacles with a beaded chain offset a soft, jowly face. Frizzy brown hair spilled to her shoulders. Her big arms had once held muscle. Whatever Mike was expecting, it was not her.

‘Michael?’

‘Mike’s fine.’

She sat. ‘I’ll cut right to it, as I imagine you’re fairly eager after all these years to know what this is about.’

Her curt, businesslike manner was something you’d encounter at a customer-service desk.

‘I think you may have me confused with someone else,’ Mike said.

‘Your father passed a few years ago. John. John Trenley.’

Hearing the first name, he felt a flare of excitement. But Trenley? It meant nothing to him.

‘Your mother’s been gone about a decade now.’

That didn’t square with the blood on his father’s sleeve. But then again, with everything going on, he didn’t know what he knew anymore.

Riverton unsnapped her briefcase and laid it open. ‘Danielle.’

Mike could see only the raised lid and the hinges of the briefcase. His mind raced, but he kept his mouth pressed closed. Danielle. My mother was named Danielle.

‘I was appointed the executor of their estate.’ She smiled self-effacingly. ‘I’m a paralegal. I lived next door to you, was close to your parents. I remember when your mother brought you home from the hospital. I was eleven. I fed you a bottle once.’

Mike’s throat was dry. ‘Your maiden name?’ he asked.

‘Gage.’

The name sailed through three decades to strike a cord, setting his insides on vibration. The Gages next door. Mint green trim on a white house. Where the Doberman had bitten the Sears repairman.

He kept his face impassive, though she was still rustling through her paperwork and not looking at him. He reminded himself that this had to be another play in the scheme they were running on him. Even so, the temptation to respond, inquire, react burned in him like a calm rage.

‘There’s some money, a good amount of money, that’s due you. And, obviously, an explanation of epic proportion. But I need to ascertain that you are who I think you are.’

And there it was.

Her arms wobbling, Riverton withdrew a file from her briefcase, ‘Michael Trenley’ written across the red tab. A few photographs fell free – crisp real-estate shots of a house. ‘Oh, sorry. We had to put the house up, of course. It sold last year, but I can still take you by once we handle the logistics.’

He tried to still his hand but it reached of its own accord and plucked up the top photo. The steps were wider than he recalled and the roof lower, but it tripped a memory.

His childhood house.

The first concrete evidence of his past life. He felt the blood leave his face, but fortunately she was still digging through papers, focused on them. He struggled to show minimal interest, to choke back the horde of questions crowding his throat.

He dropped the photo casually on the café table as Riverton perused the folder. The waiter came by – ‘Hi, take your order?’ – and Mike said, ‘Give us a minute, please.’ He waited until the man had retreated, then said, ‘I’m confused. Why do you think I’m related to these people?’

‘Well, you’ll see it was prit-ty obvious.’ Riverton laid the file open. A newspaper photograph of Mike from the PR shoot with the governor. The same one that the Los Angeles Times had run, but the headline showed that this one had been clipped from the Oregonian. ‘And…’ She slid out from under it a grainy Kodak from the seventies.

Mike’s father as a young man.

Their faces were remarkably similar, right down to the pronounced Cupid’s bow of the upper lip. The family resemblance was strong, if not undeniable.

The reality hit him, twisting his gut: The newspaper picture of him had shone like a flare on the horizon. It was how they – whoever they were – had picked up his trail after all these years. It wasn’t the green houses that weren’t green that had led those men to his door; it was his decision to swallow the truth, to play party to the fraud, to put his arm around the governor’s shoulders and smile for the cameras.

Guilt seethed. Had he listened to Annabel and his own best instincts, this whole threat would have been avoided.

The woman studied him for a moment, then continued. ‘When your father was in the hospital at the end, he confessed to abandoning you when you were four. He explained why he had to. That is your story, right? Abandoned at age four? Because if it’s not…’ She closed up the file and put it away.

Mike just looked at her, his jaw tensed, debating whether it was worth it to spill. That red-tabbed file was sitting there just out of reach, tucked into her well-worn briefcase, temptation incarnate. Could she really be the estate executor? Was she trustworthy?

‘Look.’ She grasped his forearm across the table. ‘I understand the pain you’ve suffered over this. I mean, the loss, waiting for a parent, searching for them your whole life, just wanting to know. I can only imagine. I have the answers for you. Your parents’ estate is waiting for you. I only need to confirm the story of where you came from.’

His breath quickened, her words working on him. Shep was out there watching, but right now it felt as though it were only the two of them, Mike Doe and Dana Riverton alone in the world. He wrestled himself back to calmness. He would not ask questions. He would not appear curious. He would let Shep follow her home and get an address, and they would proceed slowly and with caution.

He looked down, and she withdrew her hand swiftly and put it in her lap. But not before he saw, beneath the makeup foundation she’d pancaked on, the tiny jail tattoo on her thumb webbing. A tombstone with a number 7 on it – the number of years she’d spent inside.

On the edge of his finger was a small flesh-colored streak where her foundation had rubbed off. His heart racing, he cupped his hands so she wouldn’t see.

‘I’m afraid you have the wrong person.’ He rose, dropped a ten on the table, and walked away.