1 Runaway Man (23 page)

“What’s that?”

“A campaign contribution. Take it, hon. A woman should never have to lie to her husband. It’s the undoing of any marriage. Trust me, I know.”

Meg allowed herself a faint smile as she snatched the bill from Mom and stuffed it in her coat pocket. “I’m starting to like you a little, Mrs. Golden.”

Mom arched an eyebrow at her. “Don’t sound so surprised. I’ve had my fans over the years.” Fans like, say, Bobby the K. But Mom was too much of a lady to mention that. “Now why don’t you just tell us what’s on your mind?”

Meg resumed pacing. “I don’t know what you’ve been led to believe by the media, but I’m not an evil power broker who sits in a tower somewhere pulling strings.”

“That would be your mother-in-law,” I suggested.

“Well, yes, as a matter of fact. Eleanor rules this city. I don’t. I’m a wife and mother. I love my husband and children. I care about the future. And I genuinely believe Bobby will make a great governor. He knows how to get things done. He’s proven that in business time after time. I’m managing his campaign because
I
know how to get things done. I’m responsible for the message that we put out there to the voters and I have to make certain he didn’t jump the reservation when he came here. So, I repeat, what did he tell you?”

“That the story his mother fed us this morning about Kathleen was total bullshit,” I replied.

Meg took a breath in and out. “
This
is what I was afraid of.” She perched at long last on the edge of the sofa. “Did he offer you an alternate version?”

I nodded my head. “That the real reason the Kidds sent Kathleen away to Barrow was that she’d become a stoned-out, wildly promiscuous slut.”

“I have no firsthand knowledge of that,” Meg responded stiffly. “This is the first I’ve ever heard of it.”

“Bobby said that Kathleen’s behavior came as a real shock to him when he came home from Cambridge,” I went on. “The last time he’d seen her she’d been a smiling, happy kid who was enjoying every last drop of her summer on Nantucket. Your husband has real fond memories of that summer, Mrs. Kidd. He said it was when he first fell in love with you. Made a special point of mentioning it, didn’t he, Mom?”

“Yes, he did,” Mom affirmed. “A fond glow came over his face.”

Meg’s own face remained drawn tight. “He’s mentioned that to me many times. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t care much for Bobby that summer. I was a serious girl. Bobby was one of those laughing boys who thought everything was one big joke. Plus he was going away to Harvard and was
so
full of himself—not to mention beer, Jack Daniel’s and whatever else he and his friends were into. He’d drag me to a different bonfire party practically every night and proceed to get falling-down drunk. I thought he still had a lot of growing up to do.”

I said, “He also told us that his father donated two million dollars to Barrow—which hardly makes it sound as if the Kidds held the administrators responsible for what happened to Kathleen.”

Meg’s penetrating stare bored in on me. “Did you believe what he said?”

“Not entirely, no.”

“May I ask why?”

“Because it still doesn’t account for the nagging little matter regarding the baby’s date of birth.”

“What about it?” she demanded.

I glanced at Legs Diamond. “Some of what I know is police business. Are you cool with this?”

“Be my guest,” said Legs, who was just as anxious as I was to hear what Meg Grayson Kidd had to say.

“According to your mother-in-law,” I said to her, “Kathleen gave birth to a baby boy in Nevis late in January of 1990. And I was told by someone who saw the baby’s Nevis birth certificate—which
does
exist—that it listed his date of birth as January 24, 1990.”

Meg continued to stare at me. “So?…”

“So we’ve spoken with two different people who insist that the baby was actually born three months later than that. One of those people had personal contact with the baby soon after it was brought to New York in May of 1990. The other is in possession of a written statement from someone who was there in Nevis when the baby was born. Can you shed any light on this discrepancy, Mrs. Kidd?”

Meg didn’t answer me right away. She pulled inward, her sharp mind working every angle. “No, I can’t,” she said finally. “And I fail to grasp the significance of this. What difference does it make whether Kathleen’s baby was born in January or in April?”

Mom’s eyes glinted at her. “You’re going to play dumb on us?”

Meg bristled. “I’m not
playing
at anything, Mrs. Golden.”

“Do the math, hon. If Kathleen’s baby was born in January, then that means he was conceived while she was at Barrow. But if he was born three months later it means…”

“He was conceived in July,” Meg said, her voice almost a whisper.

I nodded. “During that idyllic summer on Nantucket, when your husband fell madly in love with you.”

Meg sank deeper into the sofa. “Please, go on.…”

“Bobby mentioned that the Kidds and Graysons used to have neighboring beach compounds or cottages or whatever it is you people call them. And that your father and his father spent many an afternoon together that summer on the Kidds’ veranda, playing cribbage and drinking gin and tonics.”

Now Meg shook her head. “That does
not
jibe with my memory. Bobby’s father, the Ambassador, was away for practically that entire summer. I remember that my father missed his company. And Mrs. Kidd was terribly lonely. She kept telling me, ‘Such is the life of a political wife, my dear.’” Actually, Meg did a pretty fair imitation of the old dowager. “Mind you, I was already well aware of this. My father was a US senator. When he wasn’t in Washington he was out on the campaign trail. The only real chance I had to be with him was when we were together on Nantucket. But that particular summer, the summer of ’89, Ambassador Kidd wasn’t there to keep him company. He was in Moscow. The Soviet Union was in economic chaos and the first President Bush asked him to broker talks over there because the international business community trusted him.” She smiled bleakly. “The two political parties used to work together back in those days. Seems kind of quaint now, doesn’t it?”

“Are you sure about this, Mrs. Kidd?” I asked.

“Quite sure. Have your girl out there—the one who’s eavesdropping on our conversation—run an online search of
The New York Times
archives. There was a good deal of coverage.”

“Rita!?…” Mom called out.

“On it, Abby!”

“Why is this of any importance?” Meg wanted to know. “If some teenaged boy got Kathleen pregnant that summer, what difference does it make whether Bobby’s father was or wasn’t around?”

“It matters,” I replied, “because we have information that suggests it wasn’t a teenaged boy. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Mrs. Kidd, but our source believes Kathleen was sexually abused by a member of her own family.”

Meg’s eyes widened. “Are you suggesting that Kathleen was molested by her father? That’s absurd! The Ambassador adored her. Whoever told you that is a malicious liar who’s trying to slime the family and destroy Bobby’s candidacy. That never happened. Never.”

Rita tapped on Mom’s half-open door and said, “Ambassador Kidd was in Moscow for all of July, 1989, and most of August. He returned to DC on the twenty-first of August to brief the president.”

“There, you see?” Meg said. “You’ve been lied to.”

“Well, now I’m completely puzzled,” I confessed. “Because your husband definitely told us that his father and your father played cribbage together every afternoon that summer. Didn’t he, Mom?”

Mom nodded her head. “Yes, he did.”

Meg glared at me angrily. “Please tell me you’re not suggesting that
my
father molested Kathleen.”

“Senator Grayson
was
a member of Kathleen’s family, wasn’t he? His brother’s wife and your mother-in-law are cousins, correct?”

“Correct,” she acknowledged, biting off the word. “But my father couldn’t have done anything like that to Kathleen.”

Mom smiled at her gently. “I understand how hard this must be for you to—”

“No, you
don’t
understand. By that summer my father had already been operated on twice for prostate cancer and was, according to my mother, no longer able to perform sexually. It was … a difficult time for both of them. My mother needed someone to confide in and she confided in me. We were best friends. Still are. I can produce my father’s medical records if you don’t believe me. It was a fast-moving cancer that killed him less than three years later, as you may recall.”

“Exactly how much of this is your husband aware of?” Legs Diamond asked her.

Meg peered at him curiously. “What are you asking me?”

“If Bobby knows that your father was impotent in the summer of ’89.”

“It was a private, personal health matter. Bobby was never privy to it. Why would he be?”

“Maybe your father told him about it,” Mom suggested.

“Not a chance. My father didn’t discuss those things with even his closest friends. And, trust me, he and Bobby were not friends.”

Mom tried again: “Surely
you’ve
told Bobby about it. You two have been married for quite a few years. No secrets, right?”

“Wrong, Mrs. Golden. My father valued his privacy and I’ve always respected that. I’m quite certain I’ve never told Bobby about this.”

And yet she’d just told the three of us. Why had she? Because she was scared to death? Or because she was playing us?

“If that’s the case,” I said slowly, “then your husband made a big mistake this afternoon. Putting that out there, I mean.”

“He actually hinted to you that my father raped Kathleen?”

“Not in so many words, no.”

“Well, what
did
he say?”

“That your family might be behind Kathleen’s death, Bruce Weiner’s death, all of it—up to and including the murder of Charles Willingham.”

Meg frowned at me. “What does Charles Willingham have to do with this?”

“He and Bruce Weiner were close friends. You didn’t know that?”

“Of course not. Why would I?
None
of this makes the slightest bit of…” Meg got up and went over to the window. Stood there in her long camel’s hair coat, staring out at the street with her back toward us. She was struggling to regain her composure. Then she turned back around to face us, her chest rising and falling. “Exactly what did Bobby say?” she asked me in a controlled voice.

“That you’re the most ruthless person he’s ever met—with the possible exception of your father. That there’s nothing you won’t do to win an election, up to and including murder. Preventive damage control, I think he called it.”

“He said no such thing,” she gasped. “You’re lying.”

“Why would we lie to you?” Mom asked her.

“To throw me off balance.”

“And what would be the point of that?”

“I-I don’t understand.…”

“You understand everything, hon. You’re no fool.”

Meg shook her head. “What are you telling me?”

“Your husband showing up here like he did was strictly a panic move,” I said. “I guarantee you his mother didn’t sign off on it. No, he spitballed it all on his own. Trashing his late sister, tossing your father into the mix—it reeks of panic. The man’s lost control of this situation.”

“I still don’t see what you’re…” Meg’s eyes widened in horror. “No, you can’t be thinking
that
. His own sister? He couldn’t have. It’s not possible.”

“A simple DNA test would prove it one way or the other,” Legs offered. “We have Bruce Weiner’s blood sample.”

“Fine. We’ll have Bobby take one.”

“Trust me, Mrs. Kidd, he’ll never consent to it,” he said. “Not in a million years.”

Meg fell silent for a long moment. “If that is what happened then it was my fault.”

Mom tilted her head at her curiously. “How was it your fault?”

“He drank too much and h-he wanted sex
all
of the time,” Meg recalled in a flat, toneless voice. “Kept trying to go all the way with me on the beach, night after night. He was incredibly insistent. But I wasn’t ready yet. I was a sixteen-year-old virgin. I wasn’t sure if he genuinely cared about me or just wanted to get in my pants. Which means I sent him home, night after night, feeling sexually frustrated. If he did that to poor Kathleen, it’s because I held out. It’s my fault.”

“No, it’s not!” Mom barked at her. “And don’t you say that again or I’m going to slap your face. Don’t even
think
it.”

Meg looked at her, startled, then lowered her gaze. “Eleanor sat me down last year when Bobby decided to run for governor. It was just the two of us, and she was very emotional, which is not like her, believe me. She told me to be sure we made enough time for our children so we wouldn’t be sorry later in life. When I asked Eleanor what she meant she said, ‘They both got away from me.’ She had tears in her eyes,” Meg recalled, her own eyes growing shiny. “And then … she started telling me about the summer of ’89, when the Ambassador was away in Moscow. Kathleen stopped speaking to her that summer. Got terribly quiet and withdrawn. And Bobby became impossible to control. He’d come in at all hours, high as a kite. She actually found a naked girl in bed with him one morning—the daughter of a prominent conservative columnist. Bobby told her he’d been so drunk that he didn’t remember bringing the girl home. He experienced blackouts, apparently. Eleanor told him he had to stop drinking so much or he’d do something he’d truly regret. He just laughed at her and said, ‘Being a Kidd means never having to regret a thing.’” Meg stood there by the window in shaken silence. “Bobby got so drunk one night that he raped his own sister, didn’t he?
He
got her pregnant. And Eleanor knew. She’s always known. So has Peter Seymour. They’ve all known. The only person who didn’t know was me. I’ve been married to that man for all of these years. I’ve shared his bed. I’ve given him two children and I’ve never, ever…” Meg’s chest heaved suddenly and she clamped a hand over her mouth.

Mom pointed to her bathroom. Meg ran in there, slamming the door behind her.