Dear Daughter (38 page)

I’m assuming you’ve met my brother by now, and I’m assuming you know what he thinks of me. The bastard. I gave him everything I had, but he wouldn’t lift a finger when I needed something from him. Sound like anyone else you know?

I heard he has a daughter now. I want you to find her. And I want you to make her exactly like you. It’s only fair.

(That reminds me: Has your father introduced himself yet? If not, you should find him. I think you’ll be entertained. And now that you have all my money, you no longer pose a threat to him. Another thing you can thank me for.)

Despite it all, I’ve always tried to do right by you. For once do the same for me. Unless, of course, you were the one who killed me, in which case I suppose all bets are off.

Although really, Schätzli, why split hairs? It doesn’t matter how I died. You killed me the moment you were conceived.

All my love,

Tessa

I returned everything to the box except the letter. I locked the lid and removed the key. Then I reached into my bag and pulled out the matchbook. There was one match left. I lit the letter on fire and watched it burn.

•   •   •

I was staggering out the door when the manager called out to me.

“Oh, Ms. Kanty, hold on! I have your brother on the phone—he asked us to call him, you know, if you ever came in, and I was just so excited that I wanted to do it while you were still here!”

My hands were as numb as they’d been the night before. I took the receiver.

“Who is this?” Eli asked.

I didn’t answer.

“Is anyone there?”

I still didn’t answer. I had to pull the receiver from my ear at the force of his exhalation.

“Speak, dammit.”

“Meet me at the old house,” I said finally. “In an hour.”

From the Diary of Tessa Kanty

March 23, 1985

If only I’d been born first, none of this would have happened.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Rue was still asleep in the seat next to me when I pulled up to the inn. I shook her shoulder.

“Rise and shine, kid.”

Her eyelids fluttered open—and immediately slammed shut. “No. Sun bad.”

I pressed my room key into her still-unresponsive hand. “Go inside and sleep it off. Don’t even think about trying to face your parents until you’ve rested.

“Oh man,” she groaned. “Why’d you bring me back here? My dad’s going to kill me.”

“If it makes you feel any better,” I said, “I’m guessing he has bigger things to worry about today.”

She bolted upright, blinking rapidly against the light. “What happened?”

“Nothing that concerns you,” I said.

“But it concerns my dad?”

“Well—”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“He and I, we’re just going to have a little talk, that’s all.”

“Is it about Tessa?”

I hesitated, and whatever I was doing with my face clearly gave her the answer I was trying to withhold.

“I’m coming with you,” she said.

I shook my head. “Absolutely not.”

She smacked her hands against the dash. “If it involves my family, then I deserve to hear it as much as anyone.”

“Rue, there are things you don’t understand—”

“That’s not your choice to make.”

Now I was the one who was blinking against the light. “You just had to put it that way, didn’t you?” I checked the clock on the dashboard. I didn’t have much time. “Fine,” I said. “You can come with me. Just stay out of sight, okay?” I paused, considering Eli’s size, his bulk, his discipline. “Unless I scream. Then run for help, okay?”

“Why would you scream?”

“I guess we’re going to find out.”

•   •   •

I hid Rue in the kitchen of the old Kanty house and planted myself on the beer-stained couch. Less than ten minutes later, the front door creaked open behind me.

“Over here,” I said.

Eli came into the living room, stopping dead center in a dingy shaft of light. “You” was the only thing he seemed able to say.

I sighed. “Can’t anyone ever be happy to see me?”

“I’m—confused.”

“You don’t recognize me, do you?”

“Of course I recognize you.”

“That’s not what I mean.” I pushed back my hair, took off my glasses, and gave him my best paparazzi smile. “Look again.”

He took a step toward me, his face screwed up in concentration.

“You’re not even
trying
,” I said, horrified by the whine that had worked its way into my voice. But why couldn’t he see me?

He shook his head again. “I don’t know—”

I slapped my hands against my thighs. “For fuck’s sake, I’m Tessa’s daughter. I’m your
niece.
”

Eli crossed the room in three efficient strides. I scrambled back on the couch, but he got to me before I could dodge his grasp and jerked me up onto my feet. “What the hell are you talking about?”

I struggled against him. “Look, I’m no happier about it than you are.”

“How old are you?”

“That’s kind of an indiscreet question—”

He shook me. “How old are you?”

“Twenty-seven.”

He dropped me. “Jesus Christ. She actually did it.”

The backs of my knees hit the sofa, and I collapsed onto it, my hands pressing into the cushions on either side of me. Even though the sofa seemed sturdy enough beneath me, I still felt ready to tip over.

“She actually did
what
?” I whispered.

He sat down on the stained and scarred coffee table, lost in some fog I couldn’t see my way through. We sat in silence for what felt like eons before he spoke again.

“It was my fault,” he said. “I can see that now. Dad always told us there was gold out there. When Tessa and I were kids he’d give us a colander and a chisel and send us out into the woods. ‘Treasure hunting,’ he called it. It never occurred to me that it was just a game.

“And when he died, well—I suppose a part of me was glad that I’d finally get my chance to go out and find that gold for real. I used the money they left us to hire surveyors. When that money ran out and they still hadn’t found anything, we sold everything we could. We got jobs. And when that didn’t work out, I went to the bank for a loan.”

“The Jenkins Savings and Loan,” I said.

He nodded. “They gave us the loan and took the house as collateral. But I wasn’t making much money, and Tessa couldn’t hold down a job, so we fell behind on our payments pretty fast. The bank was going to take the house. I went to them, I asked them to give us more time, but they wouldn’t. So—”

“What?”

He looked up at me. “I came up with another plan. I just never thought she’d take it so far.”

I clenched my hands in my lap to keep them from shaking. “Explain it to me. Use small words.”

“You have to understand, she was just so beautiful—and I’d seen the way Mitch looked at her.”

I glanced at the half-rotted kitchen door, wondering how much Rue could hear, wondering if I should stop Eli before he went any further.

But I’m a selfish bitch, so I didn’t.

“It seemed like it would be easy enough,” Eli was saying. “All she had to do was get—was come up with a good reason for him to marry her. Then we’d never have to worry about money again.”

I’d been right. It
was
possible to fall even when sitting on solid ground.

“Did she volunteer for this?” I managed to ask.

He put his face in his hands. “I told her she wouldn’t be welcome in our home if she didn’t.”

Now, I’ve said plenty of staggeringly dopey things in my time, but each and every one of them was on purpose. Or at least they were until this:

“That is
so
uncool.”

His head came up. “You couldn’t possibly understand what it was like for us. We didn’t have
any
money—we’d already lost the house in Ardelle. Sometimes Tessa had to steal from work just to feed us. We had to burn our furniture for firewood, for God’s sake. We were desperate.”

I looked up at the ceiling, wondering if maybe I could just stare at it for the rest of my life. Sure, it was water-stained and on the verge of collapse, but it was so much better than the alternative.

“What about the land?” I asked. “The land you owned. You could’ve sold that.”

“No,” he snapped. “That’s Kanty land.”

“There had to have been other options.”

“Look, it’s not like it was anything she hadn’t done before.”

I crossed my arms. “So she fucks a person once, she’ll fuck anyone anytime, is that it?”

He swallowed. “I wasn’t thinking, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I’m sorry about everything, really—will you . . . will you tell her I said that?”

I stared at him in abject horror. He didn’t really think my mother was still alive, did he?

“Will you tell her?” he asked again.

I watched him very carefully. “She died ten years ago,” I said.

It was then that I had the dubious pleasure of seeing a man’s composure collapse in excruciating detail right before my eyes. His face went slack first, then his shoulders, then his knees, a puppet whose strings had been cut.

I looked back up at the ceiling and pressed a hand to my mouth.

He hadn’t known.

“What happened?” he asked.

“Oh, you know, the usual. Shot in the chest with a twelve-gauge Winchester.”

“
Jesus
.”

“No, I don’t think it was him.”

His laugh was bitter. “That sounds like something Tessa would have said.”

I sat up. “No, you don’t get to say that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“
Words
.”

He drew in a breath. “Look, I don’t know what Tessa left you with—if anything—but I have plenty of money now if you need it.”

“Because you just executed another variation of your plan. Mitch, Cora, same diff, right?”

“My marriage is nothing like that,” he said tightly.

“Yeah? Then why don’t you have a job?”

He pushed himself to his feet and straightened his jacket, tugging at its hem until the shoulders smoothed out. “The offer stands. Think about it. I’m sure Tessa would have wanted you to be taken care of.”

I settled back onto the sofa and threw my arm over my face. “You don’t know anything.”

“Something else Tessa would’ve said.”

•   •   •

As soon as Eli left, the door to the kitchen creaked open.

“I’m sorry you had to hear that,” I said.

Rue slumped on the other end of the sofa and stared at the wall. “It’s okay,” she said. “Probably better to hear it now.”

I made a noise of agreement.

“On the plus side,” she said, “I’m pretty sure I never want to see Mitch again.”

“Don’t be so hasty. If he leaves his wife for you, you could be my stepmom.”

Rue chewed on a thumbnail. “Were you telling the truth? Tessa’s dead?”

“Yup.”

She laughed, then clapped her hand over her mouth.

“What?”

“‘She likes to give back to the earth.’ You’re fucking sick.”

“I like to think so.”

I propped my boots on the table. She followed suit. Our feet, I noticed, were the same size.

Rue looked at me expectantly. “So what now, cuz?”

I hesitated. Should I really let her be a part of this? She could take it. She could stand to find out if Leo or Mitch had done it. It might even do her good.

But what if I
had
done it? How would she look at me then? And why did I care so much?

If I
was
guilty, though, I might never see her again.

I tapped her toe with mine. “What would you say to solving a mystery?”

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

I had to bang on Leo’s door for a good ten minutes before the son of a bitch finally opened it.

“I didn’t think you were coming back,” he said.

“I sure wasn’t planning on it,” I said.

Rue poked her head out from behind me and waved impishly. “Hi, Leo.”

“What’s she doing here?” Leo asked.

“She’s my bodyguard, so no sudden moves.” I held up the phone I’d taken from his nightstand. “Recognize this?”

He leaned against the doorframe and crossed his arms. “I think it’s called a cellphone.”

“Let’s try again.” I switched on the phone and navigated to a picture of my mother at the Vienna Opera Ball. “Recognize
this
?”

He held up his hands. “Hold on now—”

At the Russian Ball in Biarritz.

“Or this?”

“Jane—”

At the Geneva Charity Ball.

“What about this? I mean, I’m not saying I was dumb enough to trust you or anything, but—dude, this is seriously fucked up.”

“
Jane
.” He grabbed my wrists. “Listen to me. That’s not my phone—it’s Walt’s.”

I was so busy hearing the first name I barely registered the second.

“What did you just call me?”

“What did you just call her?” echoed Rue.

Leo didn’t say anything. That was something I realized I liked about him. He was willing to wait for me to figure things out.

“But . . . if this isn’t yours, then how did you know?” I asked.

“As soon as that truck was flagged as stolen, pretty much. That along with the news coverage . . .”

I lifted my chin. “Did it live up to the hype?”

“What?”

“Fucking Janie Jenkins.”

A choking noise from behind me.

“You can’t possibly think I’m going to answer that,” Leo said.

Rue shoved us apart. “Would anyone like to explain what’s going on here? Did you just say you’re—”

“Wait,” I said, finally rewinding the conversation and playing it back in my head. “This is
Walt’s
phone?”

Leo hesitated. “Look, we both need coffee. You too, squirt. Why don’t you guys come on in.”