All Things Lost (25 page)

     I was going to have to work on my poker face. I quickly filled him in on everything I had learned. When I had finished he pushed his chair back and began to rub his chin.

     “So, Nadine and Ira waged war on a regular basis, huh?” he mused aloud, “I can't say it surprises me. I knew she wasn't telling us everything.
Sounds like another visit with our favorite hairdresser is in order.”

     “What about Caleb and his friend?”

     “Let's not jump to any conclusions. We don't know that there even is someone else. Sure it seems logical, but things aren't always as they seem, and we're not in the business of making false leaps. Why don't you talk to Caleb again, see if he'll spill anything about a friend.”

     “Me?”

     
“Yes, you.
You've met him; you've already established a relationship with him.”

     “I wouldn't say that. We met once and I got the impression he didn't like me.”

     “It's more than I have. He doesn't know me from a soap stick. Chances are I'd intimidate him. He'll be more likely to open up to someone closer to his age, like you.”

     I snorted. He hadn't met this kid.

     “Don't make rude noises. You sound like a rooting pig. On second thought, why don't you hold off on that visit until we talk to all the neighbors? There's still Mrs. Fields to talk to, she might tell us something we don't know.”

     “That wouldn't be hard,” I commented. “What did you find out from Sgt. Kaplan?”

     
“About what I expected to find out.
Hank's a good cop and he's far from stupid. He'd come to the same conclusions we had and they're checking things out. So far, nothing, but then, who in their right mind would admit they were being blackmailed, it will most likely turn out to be a dead end.”

     “He wouldn't tell you who any of the people on the tapes were?”

     “Are you kidding? I didn't even ask. There would be about the same chance of that as me riding a pig to
Kalamazoo
.”

     “I see,” I didn't but why ask why? “What do we do now?”

     “We keep digging. Sooner or later something will turn up.”

* * *

     When I arrived home I found Steve pacing back and forth in the hallway with his cell phone pressed to his ear. Adam and Mom, pink from her day at the beach, were in the kitchen where Adam was busily making enchiladas from scratch.

     “He's been glued to that phone all afternoon,” Adam grouched when he saw me, “If he stays on there much longer he's going to get a brain tumor.”

     “Who's he talking to?” I asked.

     “Who isn't he talking to?” he answered.

     “He's trying to line up his work crews for the house. He wants then all working at the same time so things will get done faster, but they can't be getting in each other's way.”

     “Do you have any idea how hard it is to coordinate that many different crews?” Steve asked as he came into the kitchen.

     “How many are there?” I asked him.

     “Well, let's see, there's the electrical contractors who have to rewire just about the whole place, the plumbers and the painters, none of which can finish until the construction crew finishes the addition.”

     “What addition?” Mom interjected.

     “The existing kitchen is hopelessly out of date and much too small. We're adding on a new kitchen that will be much larger, modern and up to code. I'm also thinking about building a separate cottage for us to actually live in. There used to be a guest house out back but it burned down in the 30's. We've managed to come up with a couple photographs so we think we can build it so it looks pretty much like the original.”

     “What did they need a guest house for?” I jumped in, “the house is enormous.”

     “It wasn't original to the house. I think one of the later tenants had it built, around the turn of the century from the looks of it. It was a bit Victorian looking. But anyway, besides the crews I've already mentioned I've got some guys coming in next week to start clearing the undergrowth in the wooded areas, some botanical lady to start cataloging the gardens and restoring what is salvageable and marine experts building a dock and gazebo over the river.”

     “Good grief! Is there anything you haven't thought of?” Mom exclaimed.

     “Yeah, how I'm going to get all this done in time for our grand opening this fall.”

     “What's the rush?” Mom asked.

     “I work better with a deadline,” Steve deadpanned.

     The phone rang in his pants pocket. He pulled it out and flipped it open. After talking for a few minutes he snapped it shut with a satisfied smile.

     “There is a God and he still works miracles,” he declared.

     “She,” Mom corrected with a wink.

     “He, She, Them, whoever, the crews start work on Monday. It's a go!”

* * *

     The next day was Saturday so the case was officially on hold until Monday. Mom and I went shopping and I tried to just enjoy the day with her, but I just couldn't keep my mind off the investigation.

     “Hello? Earth to Killian,” Mom shouted and I blinked her into focus.

     “Huh?”

     “I just asked you like three times where you want to go for lunch,” she said in the voice of someone who has had to repeat herself one too many times.

     
“Oh, sorry.
Whatever you want is fine with me.”

     “You're a big help. What planet are you on anyway? Are you mooning around over Asher?”

     
“No, at least not at the moment.
I just can't get this stupid case out of my head.”

     “Tell me about it. I really don't have any idea what you're doing, although maybe that's for the best.”

     “It's nothing dangerous. All we're doing is talking to people.” I gave her a quick overview of what had happened so far, white-washing the part about
Zaranski
to avoid worrying her unnecessarily. “I just feel like we're missing so many pieces,” I finished up.

     “Well, you are,' she said, “I mean, you've just started, right?”

     “Yeah, I guess. I just wish I knew what to do next. It seems like everybody is hiding something.”

     “Everybody has something to hide,” she said quietly. I looked over at her but her eyes were on the road. “Just be careful. You'll always be my baby even if you are all grown up.”

     “That doesn't make sense.
How can I be grown up and a baby at the same time?”

     “That's life, kiddo. None of it makes sense.” We were quiet for a minute and then she said, “I feel like I hardly know you anymore.”

     “Where'd that come from?”

     “I've been watching you these last couple of days. You're not the little boy I left when I moved to
Pennsylvania
. I've missed so much.”

     “I'm still the same person, Mom. Nothing's changed, I just got older.”

     “I'm just being silly, huh?” She wiped a tear from her cheek and gave me a grin. “So what's going on with you and Asher?”

     “I wish I knew,” I sighed.

     “Humor me. Let me feel just a little like a real live mom. Tell me what happened.”

     “I don't really know what happened. Everything was fine, or so I thought. We were going along just like always. We were even planning on moving in together.”

     “You were what?”

     “That's not important now. It was just like all of a sudden things fell apart.”

     “We'll come back to that moving in together part. Fell apart how?”

     “We started fighting, all the time, about everything, about stupid stuff. The next thing I knew we were in
Splitsville
, population me, myself and I.”

     “Things don't just fall apart out of nowhere. What was the root of the problem?”

     “I don't know. I wasn't sure I was ready to move in with him. That seemed to cause a lot of tension.”

     “Well, I'm glad to hear that at least. Not the tension part, but that you weren't ready to move in with him. Was there something more beyond that, do you think?”

     “I honestly don't know.”

     “Have you thought about it, tried to figure it out at all?”

     “Not really.”

     “That's what I figured. It runs in the family, that tendency to avoid what is painful at all costs.”

     “I've just been so busy with other stuff, the case…”

     “Or maybe you're afraid of what you'll find out.”

     I looked away.
“Maybe.”

     “What does Asher think the problem was?”

     “I don't know.”

     “Have you tried talking about it?”

     “Not unless you count last night and that was over before it even began.”

     “Well maybe that's part of the problem, you guys aren't talking.”

     “Asher did tell me once that I never told him anything.”

     “Sweetie, you can't imagine how important communication is in a relationship. You can't have one without it. How can you expect to make things right if you don't even know what you did wrong? Communication is the key. It either makes or breaks a relationship. If you guys can't talk to each other you don't stand a chance.”

     “Is that what happened with you and Dad?”

     “You know what happened with your father and me. I've told you about it before. There was never anything between us to go wrong, it was wrong when it started and it was wrong when it ended. I never loved him. Not like you loved Asher.”

     “I still love Asher.”

     “Then don't give up on this.”

     “I'm trying, but he won't give me a chance.”

     “Then try harder. Just don't give up. Don't give up.”

* * *

     “Don't give up.”

     The short, fat woman at the sink echoed Mom's words from a few days before. She was talking to the woman she had leaning back into the sink under a stream of water. “I think we can fix it,” she told her.

     I was back in Curl
Up And
Dye. I had come to talk to Nadine again, but she was busy with a client and so far no one had even acknowledged my presence.

     “I told you not to try that other place,” Anita barked from behind her client, a wrinkled old prune of a woman who was nodding sagely, I guess in agreement with whatever Anita was announcing. “They might be cheaper, but you mark my words,” she went on, “you get what you pay for.”

     All the ladies nodded and mumbled agreement as if this had been a highly original statement. “Half those girls are just barely out of beauty school,” Nadine added.

     
“You here for a perm?”
Anita asked in a smart-ass tone. It took a second to register that she had finally deigned to speak to me.

     “What? Oh, no. I'm here to talk to Ms. Tingle, if that's ok.”

     
“
Lordy
, Nadine.
You get more visitors these days then the Lincoln Bedroom.”

     “He was here the other day with that detective guy,” Nadine said.

     Anita eyed me suspiciously and I felt like the last doughnut at a weight watchers convention. “I don't remember him.”

     “He was hiding behind the other guy,” the other lady, the fat one at the sink, added helpfully. I frowned. I wanted to yell that I wasn't hiding and while we were on the subject I was standing right here so they could stop discussing me like I wasn't present. Besides, a good detective blends in, right? We're not supposed to get noticed.

     “Have a seat over there, sugar,” Nadine told me, pointing towards a row of uncomfortable looking plastic chairs. “I just gotta finish rolling up Betty Jean

 
here
.”

     I took a seat and looked through the rack of magazines. It seemed my choices were Family Circle, Ladies Home Journal, Modern Maturity or Women's Day. Yeah! I was beginning to doubt the wisdom of my coming here alone. It had seemed like such a good idea back at the office when Novak had suggested I go out for a few more solo interviews. Of course, I hadn't planned on stopping to see Nadine. I had been on my way out to see if I could get to see Mrs. Fields yet when I had turned onto the road that led here on a sudden whim. I was starting to hate sudden whims. They seldom worked out for me, really. Now that I was here I was wracked with insecurity and my inexperience loomed large in front of me. I didn't even know what questions to ask. The woman just plain intimidated me. Novak was so much better with people, and especially Nadine, than I was.

     My spiral into panic was interrupted as Nadine breezed past me in a cloud of cheap perfume and stale cigarette smoke. “Come on,” She said holding the door open. “You've got until this cigarette is gone then I gotta get back to Betty Jean.”

     I obediently followed her out. She lit up the Marlboro in her lips, inhaled deeply and blew the smoke in my direction.