Twilight (22 page)

Damn, where were the answers? Rick had been so sure, when he steered Dana’s investigation into her own backyard, that he’d been right. Now he was beginning to have doubts. Some kind of turf war was building right here in the barrio, and his old friend Tico appeared to be smack in the thick of it. Had Ken been one of its innocent victims, after all?

24

D
ana was awakened by the shrilling of the phone before dawn. Her heart slammed against her ribs, as she anticipated bad news. It was always bad news at that hour.

“Mom?” Bobby’s voice sounded plaintive.

Back in Ken’s chair again—now there were two rooms upstairs she couldn’t bear to sleep in—she sat straight up. Her grip on the receiver tightened. She forced herself to keep her voice calm. “What is it, baby? Is something wrong? You’re up awfully early.”

“I didn’t want Grandma and Grandpa to hear. They’re still asleep.”

“What didn’t you want them to hear?”

“Me and Kevin and Jonathan want to come home.”

Dana closed her eyes in a futile attempt to block out the image of her son’s pitiful expression. When she couldn’t, she sighed. “Not yet, sweetie. I’m sorry.”

“When?” he asked, suddenly defiant. “It’s not fair that we have to stay here and you get to be at home. We miss our school. We miss our friends.”

“You have friends there. Grandma told me that kids are running in and out all the time.”

“Babies,” Bobby said derisively. “There’s nobody my age.”

“Not even at school?”

“Oh, sure, but they treat me like I’m some kind of weirdo, just because I’m new.”

Dana sensed there was more to this sudden desire to return to Illinois than homesickness. Bobby was also the kind of kid who adapted readily to new situations. Of course, that had been before his very stable world had collapsed.

“What happened at school?” Dana asked, virtually certain that something there was at the root of the problem.

The direct question was greeted with silence, indicating that her guess had been accurate. Bobby had always hidden his feelings. He’d taken his role as the oldest very seriously, especially since Ken’s death. He would never have called, if this worry, whatever it was, weren’t too heavy for his young shoulders.

“Bobby? What happened?” she persisted. “Something must have. Last time we talked, you were okay with staying in Florida for the rest of the school year. Come on, sweetie, tell me. I can’t help if you don’t.”

“One of the kids...” His voice cracked. “Never mind. It’s not important.”

She’d been through this kind of hurt enough times to guess at the source of it. “If it upset you, then it is important. Did somebody say something mean?” she asked, anticipating some typical remark about an unfashionable, dorky shirt, or her son’s thick-lensed glasses. “You can tell me anything, you know that.”

“Not this time. I don’t want to say.”

“It’s okay. Please tell me.”

There was another long hesitation before he finally began in a voice that faltered, “He said...”

She could hear him swallowing back tears, and it killed her that she wasn’t there to gather him into her arms. “Take your time,” she soothed.

“He said...he said my dad was murdered because he was a dope pusher.”

Dana gasped, stunned not only by the unexpectedly terrible cruelty of the remark, but by the content. How would a child all the way in Florida know about the rumors all the way up here? When she’d left them there, she’d thought her kids would be safe from wild speculation and all the fallout from their father’s death. Sure, parents talked, but the discovery of drugs in Ken’s office and at the house hadn’t been publicized.

Or had it? She realized she hadn’t been paying much attention to the papers or to TV news. Whoever had gone to the trouble of planting the drugs might very well have leaked it to the media.

Damn whoever it was to hell, she thought fiercely. She didn’t care for herself, but this was different. Her kids were being hurt by the lies now. And when it came to her kids, this sleaze was walking on very thin ice. She would destroy anyone who attempted to hurt her babies.

“Is it true?” Bobby asked in a tiny, scared voice. He was obviously as shaken by her silence as by the original accusation.

“No, baby, it is not true,” she said adamantly. “Your daddy was a fine man and he hated drugs. Remember, he talked about that all the time so you and your brothers would know just how bad they were.”

“Then why would somebody say that?” he asked plaintively. “He didn’t even know my dad.”

“People like to spread gossip. They don’t care about the facts. And kids your age can be especially cruel without even meaning to be. Whoever said that about your dad probably didn’t know what he was saying. He didn’t realize how badly it would hurt you.”

“He did, too, know,” Bobby insisted. “He laughed, Mom. He told all the other kids, and then he laughed. I want to come home
now!
”

Suddenly Dana wanted nothing more than to gather her children close and hug them. She wanted to be there to protect them from vicious lies, even though she knew rationally that that was impossible. Maybe leaving them in Florida had been a terrible mistake, after all.

Even after all the second-guessing, though, she knew she couldn’t bring them home yet. If they were being taunted hundreds of miles away, then what would happen to them right back here in their own community, where gossip was bound to flourish? Life couldn’t possibly go back to being the way they’d remembered it. Even in Sunday school in their father’s church, there would be subtle, but unmistakable, shifts in attitudes. There was no way on earth to prevent it. How would they feel the first time one of their old friends was forbidden to play with them because of the rumors and innuendos circulating? They would be devastated.

No, this was no safe haven for them now, either. In the long run, they were better off right where they were, at least for the moment.

“I’m sorry, sweetie, but you can’t come home yet,” she said, bracing for more tears. “I’m trying really hard to clear up all these terrible lies about your daddy. All of my energy has to stay focused on that. I need a little more time.”

“But Kevin and Jonathan and me could help. We could tell people the truth.”

“I know you could, and that would be a huge help, but it’s going to take more than just our word. I have to find out who’s behind this, and that takes time. I wouldn’t be able to be home with you.”

“Grandma could come with us. She would if you asked her to. Please,” he pleaded.

“Soon,” she promised. “I’ll be down there before you know it.”

Her vow was greeted with shocked silence.

“You’re coming here?” he asked eventually. “We’re not coming home?”

She heard the panicked note in his voice and tried to reassure him. “That’s something we’ll all have to decide together.”

“No, it’s not,” he shouted. “You’ve already decided. I can tell. We’re never coming home again. I hate you. I hate you. I wish you had died instead of Daddy.”

“Bobby,” she whispered, shattered by the harsh words. As the phone clattered to the floor, she shouted one last time, “Bobby!”

She could hear his footsteps as he ran away from the phone. Her eyes swimming with tears, she listened to her mother’s sleepy attempt to soothe him, to find out why he was so upset.

Sweet heaven, she had made a mess of things. His angry words echoed in her head as she waited, praying that her mother would notice the dangling receiver and grab the phone.

The minutes ticked by. Silence fell on the other end of the line. She could only guess that her mother had taken Bobby back to his room. Was he still sobbing? Had she been able to console him at all?

Eventually she heard the faint padding of bare feet on the tile floor.

“Dana?”

Dana choked back a sob. “Oh, Mom, what have I done to him?”

“It’s not you. It’s just the circumstances. The teacher told me what that awful child said to him yesterday, but Bobby wouldn’t talk about it. I should have called you myself last night, but I thought maybe he was handling it okay. He was so stoic. I didn’t want to upset you by repeating such vicious nonsense.”

“Was there something about Ken’s death in the papers down there? Is that how that child heard about it, from some news report?”

Her mother hesitated. “Now that you mention it, no. There wasn’t a word. I was as stunned as Bobby by what the child said. I was sure he’d just made it up to taunt him. Are you saying there’s some truth to it?”

“Of course not, but drugs have been planted.” She described what the police had found and the theory that she and Detective O’Flannery shared that someone had deliberately set out to destroy Ken’s reputation.

“Well, how on earth would a third-grader down here know about that?” her mother asked indignantly.

“That’s a good question,” Dana said. “Any idea what the kid’s name is?”

“The teacher never said. She was protecting the little darling, I suppose. I’ll do my best to get it out of Bobby, if you think it’s important.”

It was a long shot, but Dana was grasping at straws these days. “Please,” she said. “Just try not to upset him any more than necessary. He’s furious with me as it is.”

“He’ll settle down, as soon as he sees you again. He’s just frightened. His whole world has shifted, and he’s struggling to make sense of it.”

“So am I,” Dana said with a heartfelt sigh. “So am I.”

Dana spent the rest of the morning in emotional turmoil, torn between her children’s needs and her duty to straighten out this mess and clear her husband’s name. Nothing Kate said could placate her, so she finally sent Kate off to do more digging into the backgrounds of their four local suspects—Carolina Vincenzi, Miriam Kelso, Peter Drake and Lawrence Tremayne.

“I want to know if any of them has so much as a parking ticket on their record, okay? Take my laptop and modem. I just reconnected this morning with some of the financial records services I used to use. You can access those and check their credit, too.”

Recalling her conversation earlier with Bobby, she added, “And see if any of them has any ties whatsoever in Florida.”

“What will you be doing?” Kate asked.

“Mrs. Fallon’s coming to lunch. I’m going to call her right now and ask her to bring along Ken’s calendar. I want to check the entries for the last few months before he was killed. Maybe there will be something there, a suspicious pattern of meetings or something.”

Kate nodded as she shrugged into her jacket. “Okay, sweetie. I’ll check in with you later.”

“Do you want to have dinner tonight?”

A guilty expression spread across Kate’s face. “I wish I could, but I’ve already made plans.”

“With the cop?”

“Don’t say it like that, please. He’s a good guy. He really is on our side in this.”

“You could have fooled me,” Dana retorted, then forced a smile. “Sorry. Go and have a great time. You deserve someone special in your life.”

“And you? Where do things stand with the sexy Latino?”

“There’s nothing between us. How many times do I have to tell you that?”

“As many as it takes to make it sound convincing. You’re not even close yet.”

When Dana would have protested, Kate hugged her. “Never mind. Go on denying it if you like. Just don’t shut the door on whatever’s happening out of loyalty to Ken. He wouldn’t have wanted that. Remember something else, too. He respected Rick. He thought he was a very decent guy. He would be happy, I think, if the two of you found something together. He’d give you his blessing, you know he would.”

Dana couldn’t tell Kate that she was holding back out of fear. Not fear of commitment. She already knew that a committed relationship was important. She believed in marriage with all her heart. Not even fear of leaping so quickly into a new relationship, even though she thought that showed evidence of disrespect for Ken’s memory.

No, what she was terrified of was discovering that the man she was falling for might have had a hand in her husband’s murder. No matter how many times she told herself that wasn’t possible, no matter how badly she wanted to trust Rick, she couldn’t overcome all of the doubts. The seed of distrust had been planted, and it seemed to be flourishing, fed time and again by some new piece of information just when she thought things might be okay.

“Just think about it,” Kate pleaded.

“I will. I promise.”

After Kate had gone, Dana made a quick call to the church to ask Mrs. Fallon to bring her copy of Ken’s calendar. No sooner had she hung up than Rick called.

“How’s it going out there this morning?”

“Well enough,” she said tersely.

“Doesn’t sound like it. What’s wrong?”

The genuine caring in his voice had her spilling out what had happened with Bobby earlier. “Am I being selfish to leave him down there so I can finish this investigation?” she asked.

“No. You’re just doing what you think is best. Parents make that kind of call all the time. Sometimes they’re right, sometimes not. You just have to go with your instincts. Even after this incident, his life is more stable there than it would be here at the moment.”

She sighed. “I don’t know why, but it helps to have you say that.”

“You should listen to me all the time. I am very wise.”

“You also have a very large ego.”

“Confidence,” he countered. “I hear most women consider it very sexy.”

“And then there are those who consider it a challenge to destroy it,” she shot back.

“Which are you?”

“Oh, I think I’ll let you worry about that for a while,” she teased.

“So, tell me, what are your plans for the rest of the day?”

“I’m having Mrs. Fallon over for lunch shortly. She’s going to bring Ken’s calendar so I can see what was going on the last few days he was alive.”

“Are you sure that is wise? Won’t it upset you?”

“Yes, but it may also give me some new leads.”

“Okay, then. You will do as you wish, anyway.”

“That’s true. By the way, how did your game with Tico go?”

“Not well,” he said, his voice sobering. “There is something going on with him, but I can’t figure it out.”

“Maybe he’s in love with Maria, and she’s giving him fits.”

“No, this has to do with his brother. Joey is tied up with Carlos in some way, and Tico is obviously frightened for him.”

“You don’t think it has anything to do with Ken’s death, do you?”

“I’m not sure,
querida,
” he said, sounding genuinely distraught. “I wish I were. I will call you later if I learn anything new that might link Tico’s brother to all of this. Joey’s not a bad kid, but I don’t like his new associate one bit. Carlos is not a man to have as an enemy or as a friend. If there’s money to be made, he will use anyone.”