Far From True (10 page)

“What kind of guilt? Do you think he had something to do with Olivia’s death?”

That caught him up short. “Jesus, not directly. I mean, I don’t think so. He was with a friend when it happened. A drinking buddy. He had an alibi. He was supposed to be meeting Olivia but got held up. Unless . . .”

Walden’s voice trailed off.

“Unless what?”

“Unless he got someone to lie for him.” Walden Fisher gazed through the window into his backyard. “And all this stuff he’s going through lately, this show of grief, this not being able to move on, is some kind of act.” He shook his head dismissively. “No, there’s no way. Victor’s not perfect, but he’d never be capable of that.”

Duckworth stood and was walking down the hall toward the front of the house when, as he was passing an open door to a small bathroom, something occurred to him.

“Let me ask you about someone else,” he said. “Did you or Olivia ever know a Bill Gaynor?”

“Bill Gaynor?” Walden Fisher said. “Same name as that woman that was murdered?”

“Rosemary was his wife.”

“Son of a bitch,” he said. “They were married? Bill was our insurance guy.”

RANDALL
Finley and Frank Mancini had arranged to meet for lunch at the Clover, an upscale—at least by Promise Falls standards—restaurant on the town’s outskirts. Finley was more at home at a place like Casey’s, a bar over on Charlton, but when he had an important business meeting, the Clover, with its white linen tablecloths, fine china, and waitstaff who were less inclined to tell you to fuck off, was always his first choice.

Finley had reserved his favorite booth, with high-backed seats and a divider that offered some privacy from the next table over. There was always the possibility he’d say something he didn’t want anyone but his luncheon guest to hear.

He was already seated when Mancini came into the room. He was short and stocky but not fat, a walking fire hydrant. A well-dressed one, too. While the man had spent his life in construction, he didn’t go around wearing a hard hat. He was in a dark blue suit—Armani, Finley guessed—with a crisp white shirt and a red tie.

“Don’t get up,” Mancini said as Finley started struggling to get out of the booth.

Finley stayed seated, shook hands, waited for Mancini to get settled in across from him.

“What can I get you?” Finley asked.

“Scotch.”

Finley waved over the waitress, whose name tag read
KIMMY
.

“Are you new, Kimmy?” the former mayor asked as she handed them menus.

The young woman smiled. “This is my first week.”

Finley smiled and shook his head admiringly. “Just when you think the Clover can’t hire waitresses any prettier, they bring in someone like you. Isn’t she a peach, Frank?”

Mancini smiled.

Kimmy accepted the praise with an awkward smile. “What can I get you gentlemen?”

Finley ordered two scotches. Once the waitress had slipped away, Mancini said, “Shouldn’t a guy who once got caught with an underage hooker cool it when it comes to the young ones?”

“I was paying her a compliment. And that other business was years ago.”

“It cost you your job.”

“A job I’m going to get back. Voters have a great capacity for forgiveness, especially the kind of bumpkins we have in this town. Nobody cares about that kind of stuff these days. Look at Clinton. Fools around with an intern, he’s the most popular former president these days.”

Mancini sighed. “See yourself as Clintonesque, do you?”

Finley chuckled. “Okay, so maybe I’m not quite as popular as good ol’ Bill. But the people in this town can’t remember what they had for breakfast, let alone something I did years ago.”

“Keep insulting them like that. Jesus, Randy, you’ll never get reelected if the voters know you think they’re a bunch of idiots.”

“I never said that. They’re good people.” Finley smiled. “And I have to be who I am. You want me to be somebody I’m not?”

“Randy, I’d like you to be almost anybody else. I’d rather be sitting here with fucking Al Capone. I’d feel safer.”

Finley laughed. Mancini, not so much.

“You love fuckin’ with me,” Finley said. He lowered his voice. “So tell me, what the hell was that at the drive-in?”

“What are you talking about?”

“What am I talking about? You kidding me? The fucking explosion? The screen coming down? Four people dead?”

“It was a tragedy—that’s what it was,” Mancini said.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. We’re all broken up about it. But just between us, was that you?”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Mancini said, loud enough to be heard by nearby diners.

“Jesus, keep your voice down,” Finley said. “So you’re saying you had nothing to do with it?”

“Why the hell would I do that? It had to be the demolition people. They screwed up.”

“Not what I’m hearing,” Finley said. “I’m hearing they hadn’t even started yet.”

“What else are they going to say? They’re in cover-your-ass mode.”

“I don’t know. Thing is, guy like you, you’d have all the expertise to do that.”

“Randy, have you completely lost your mind? We’ve bought the land, and the deal requires that Grayson drop the structures before we acquire it. What’ve I got to gain by blowing things up and killing people? What sense does that make?”

Finley was quiet for a moment. “I have to admit, I can’t figure out an angle. Unless this gives you an out on the deal—then Grayson comes back, slashes his price so he can unload the place.”

“There’s no goddamn angle. I had nothing to do with it. It was the demolition company. You can take that to the bank. Let’s move on. Let’s talk about you and what you’re going to do for me.”

“I have to get elected first.”

“You haven’t even officially declared.”

“Imminent.”

“You need to get moving. You need to win this thing. I got no chance with that Amanda Croydon sitting in the mayor’s chair. I gotta get her out of there. She’s an eco-bitch. You’d think she’d be behind me, but anytime anyone else has ever proposed anything similar, there’s noise concerns—everyone’s worried about soil pollution, contamination of the water table, all kinds of shit that never really happens, at least not as bad as they say it does. I’ve made a
major investment here, Randy, buying that land. You need to get that woman out of there and start running things again.”

“All in good time,” Finley said. “And come on, you never bought property before without knowing if you’d get all the proper approvals? It’s all part of doing business. And what’s the worst-case scenario? If somehow I don’t get in, if Amanda hangs on, you can always just build houses there. You’re not going to get a fight on that.”

“Houses don’t bring in a daily revenue stream,” Mancini said. “You build a house, you sell it, you make your profit, and you move on. But a metal recycling plant, that’s money coming in twenty-four/seven, years into the future. Jobs, too.”

“Jobs, sure. But like you said, there’s money to be made. Once I’m in, I can use my connections. I know people—I can grease palms—I can get this thing approved. I’m not promising there won’t be a few bumps along the way, but it’ll happen.”

The drinks arrived.

“That’s terrific, sweetheart,” Finley said to Kimmy.

“You ready to order lunch?” she asked.

“Steak frites, rare,” Finley said. “Frank?”

“I haven’t even looked at the menu.”

“Just get the steak.”

“I don’t know if I feel like steak.”

“What are you, a homo?” Finley grinned, glanced at Kimmy. “Just joking. I’m totally okay with homos.”

“Fine, the steak,” Mancini said. “Well-done.”

Kimmy slipped away.

“I wonder if she’s seeing anybody,” Finley said.

“You ever think you may have overestimated your attractiveness?” the builder asked.

“Women are drawn to power.”

Mancini laughed. “You used to be the mayor of Promise Falls, not the goddamn secretary of defense.”

“Still, people know me. They know who I am.”

“They know what you are,” Mancini said. “That’s what worries me about whether you can actually get yourself elected again.”

“I feel pretty good about it,” he said. “All I have to do is convince everyone I’m the town’s savior.”

“What, like Jesus?”

“But with Florsheims instead of sandals,” Finley said. He leaned in closer. “This town owes me, Frank. This town owes me another chance. I got fucked over here. These people let me down, and I’m going to give them a chance to make it up to me. I was the victim of a smear campaign, plain and simple.”

“Did the left-wing media force that hooker to blow you?”

Finley did a backhand flip, waving away Mancini’s concern. “People act like they care about that stuff—they love to read about it—but in their hearts they really don’t give a shit. They know I’m one of them. I’m just a regular guy. I get their concerns. I’m not some elitist asshole talking down to them.”

“You’re rich, Randy. You got a thriving water-bottling business. You’re one of the one percent.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t come across that way, and that’s what matters. It’s all about perception.”

Finley told Mancini about how he’d brought someone on to help manage his image, plan a campaign. The guy, Finley said, wasn’t exactly James Carville, but for Promise Falls, he wasn’t bad. Former newspaper guy, worked for the
Standard
before they pulled the plug on it. Which led to a ten-minute discussion of how it was a lot easier to do what you wanted to do when there was no local paper breathing down your neck.

“No headlines about kickbacks,” Mancini said.

Finley frowned. “That’s a very cynical point of view, Frank. What I am is a facilitator. I make things happen. You want to set up a business that will not only profit you, but serve your community. I can help facilitate that. It’s not unreasonable that I should
expect some compensation for my efforts. Be they material or political. It’s the system working the way it was designed to work.”

Kimmy returned with their two orders of steak frites.

Mancini said, “Could I get another scotch, and a glass of water?”

“Tap, or bottled?”

Before he could answer, Finley said, “I wouldn’t go with tap. Never,
ever
tap. Unless you’re brushing your teeth. Sweetheart, you’ve got Finley Springs, right?”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “I think we have San Pellegrino in sparkling, and probably Evian in flat.”

Finley cocked his head. “Are you sure about that?”

“Uh, I think so.”

“Maybe you better go check.” Finley’s voice had turned subtly menacing.

Kimmy withdrew.

“You’re making a scene,” Mancini said. “So what if they don’t carry your water? There’s lots of brands of bottled water.”

“I’m thinking, once I get in, this place definitely is getting a visit from the health inspector. Fire, too.”

“This is what I mean,” Mancini said. “You can’t let yourself get tripped up by the small shit.”

“Look, she’s talking to the manager,” Finley said.

Seconds later, a balding, portly man in a black suit approached the table. “Mr. Finley, how nice to see you today.”

“Carmine. How are you?”

“Excellent. You’ll have to excuse Kimmy. She’s new, and she was unaware that she was looking after one of our most special customers. She’s getting some Finley Springs Water for your friend here as we speak.”

“Oh, Carmine, I don’t care, one way or the other. I’m not about to tell you how to run your restaurant.”

Carmine smiled. “If there’s anything you need, don’t hesitate to see me directly.”

Once he was gone, Finley said, “What do you want to bet someone’s running to 7-Eleven right now?”

“What’s this going to cost me?” Mancini said.

“We’ve already sorted out my compensation on this, Frank.”

“I’m talking incidentals. The greasing of palms.”

Finley shrugged. “Hard to say. Some people come cheaper than others. Some, if you’ve got the goods on them, it doesn’t cost you a dime. Start-up costs are always unpredictable.”

Mancini cut a piece off the end of his steak and put it into his mouth. “Did you ever do anything as a politician, back when you were mayor, that you did strictly for the people, because you thought it was the right thing to do?”

“The welfare of my constituents was and is always my first consideration, Frank, my guiding principle, as it were.”

“I like how you did that without even smiling.”

“It’s a gift,” Finley said.

•   •   •

At the next table, which was separated from Finley and Mancini by a crosshatched wood divider, David Harwood had ordered only a house salad. Steak was beyond his budget.

He knew the spot Randall Finley always asked for at the Clover, and had phoned ahead in a bid for a nearby table. The one they initially showed him to was across the aisle, in full view of where Finley and Mancini would be sitting. So David asked for the table on the other side of the divider.

He didn’t hear everything the two men said, but he heard enough. He wasn’t shocked. He wasn’t even sure he was horrified. You signed on to work with someone like Finley, well, what did you expect?

The question was whether he could stomach it.

Carmine placed the leather folder with the check inside at his elbow.

“Thank you, sir,” he said.

David flipped it open, glanced at the total, felt his heart skip a beat. If this was what a salad cost, what would the steak frites have run him?

He wanted to invite Sam Worthington to dinner, but maybe not at a place as expensive as this.

If she’d even answer his call.

Cal

BEFORE
stumbling upon the secret room, I’d been about ready to give up thinking I could help Lucy Brighton find out who’d been in her father’s house. Up to then, I had no idea why anyone would have broken in, or what they might have been looking for.

Now I had a pretty good idea what someone wanted.

Someone knew about that hidden room, knew what was in it. Namely, those discs, which, I was guessing, were homemade porno. It struck me that someone who’d go to all that trouble to get them was probably on them. And if so, knew Adam and Miriam Chalmers.

Knew them pretty well.

I asked Lucy to find, for starters, an address book and phone bills, while I went back to Adam’s office, dropped into the chair behind the desk, and started looking at e-mails on his desktop computer.

I clicked on the stamp icon, and immediately I was asked to enter a password. I decided to try “Lucy.” When that didn’t let me in, I called out: “Lucy!”

She was in the kitchen. Her father always paid the bills sitting at the kitchen table—he didn’t trust the Internet to pay for things online—and he kept old phone bills in the drawer there.

“Yes?” she said.

“It wants a password. And I tried your name.”

There was a moment’s silence. Then Lucy said, “Try ‘Crystal.’”

I tried it. No luck.

“Nope!” I cried out.

Another short silence. Then, more quietly: “‘Miriam.’”

I typed in the letters. Again, no joy.

“Got any other ideas?” I said.

“I’m thinking.” I was guessing she was at least pleased that Miriam hadn’t been picked over her or her daughter. “Try ‘Devils’ Chosen.’”

“What?”

She repeated it. “That was the name of the motorcycle gang he was with years ago.”

I gave it a try. The first time, with an
s
apostrophe, didn’t work. I tried it again without, and still no luck. The third time, I used an uppercase
D
and
C
.

Bingo.

“I’m in,” I said.

I scanned the mail program. There were dozens of e-mails in the in-box, the sent file, and the trash. It would take hours to go through all of these, but the answer might be here.

The most recent—it had come in early this morning and had not been opened—was from a Gilbert Frobisher. He wrote:

Heard about that crazy drive-in explosion on CNN this morning. Wow. Hope no one you knew was up there. Hell of a way to put Promise Falls on the map. Talked to your old editor at Putnam, who says if you have anything kicking around, any ideas, they’d be willing to talk, but she was not overly optimistic. You haven’t done a book in five years, your name recognition has slipped some, but still, if you had something good, she’d look at it. But she can’t guarantee the kind of advance you had in the past. Not so much money up front, but with the right book you could cash in on the back end. So, start thinking. Talk later.

That e-mail had been a reply to one from Adam, which had read:

Gilbert, my man, I could use some good news. If we don’t get some nibbles soon, I’m going to have to start burning the furniture. I need to live in the manner that not only I have become accustomed to, but Miriam, too. Can’t you start circulating some of the early books around again to the studios, see if there’s any interest? God knows they don’t actually have to be made into movies. A bit of option money would hold me over nicely. And go back to Debra at Putnam. Sound her out. Tell her I have a great pitch, a knockout idea, but I want to see some money on the table before I tell her what it is. I know it’s a bit of a pig in a poke, but she owes me.

The next one, which had been opened, had come in late yesterday afternoon. It was from Felicia Chalmers. I called out: “What did you say your father’s ex-wife’s name was?”

“Felicia.” Excitedly, “I’ve found the phone bills.”

“Look for numbers that come up a lot.”

I clicked on the e-mail from Felicia. It was short.

Nice to talk to you. I’d like to say you’ll work it out, and maybe you will, but you do have kind of a track record, you know. Maybe she just needs some time to think things through. But I wish you all the best. Call me if you want, like you need my permission. Love, Felicia.

What I really wanted to find was an e-mail that said, “Hey, Adam, I’ve got a key. I’ll come by and get the discs.” But things were never that simple. But it was interesting that Adam Chalmers still kept in touch with his ex.

The next e-mail was a fan letter from someone who’d read one
of his books, and wanted to know, if he mailed Chalmers a copy of it, could he autograph it and send it back? Adam had not responded. And there was an e-mail from Lucy herself, which read:

Hi Dad: Is it okay if Crystal comes over Saturday? I’ve got a conference workshop thing I really need to go to, and if she could spend the afternoon with you, that’d be terrific. So long as you and Miriam don’t have anything planned. I’d really appreciate it. I’d drop her off around eleven and pick her up by four.

The message had been replied to. I looked in the sent file, found a quick note from Adam to his daughter saying,
No prob.

I glanced through some of the more recent sent messages. A couple of replies to other fans who’d read and enjoyed one of his books. There was a request from an aspiring author, asking Chalmers to read his book. His reply read:

I can’t think of anything I would rather do than set aside eight or more hours for no compensation whatsoever to read a book about which I know nothing from a complete and total stranger. Do you have friends who have written books, too, that you could send along with yours? Please gather them all up and send them to me, but I want actual paper manuscripts because it has been my experience that the e-mailed ones are much harder to keep lit when you put them in the fireplace to get the logs going.

I continued scanning the e-mails, including those in the trash file. There wasn’t much there. Adam had purged most of the deleted e-mails from the computer. There were only about twenty in there, the oldest from six days ago.

This wasn’t proving to be productive.

Lucy came into the office. “There are three numbers that show up quite a few times on my father’s cell phone bill. Well, four, actually. But the fourth is Miriam’s cell, and that just makes sense.”

“What are the others?”

She read the first one out to me. I opened a browser on the computer and Googled it. If it was a landline, and not unlisted, there was a good chance whoever it belonged to would turn up.

Felicia Chalmers.

“Tell me about Felicia,” I said.

“Is it her number?”

I nodded.

Lucy Brighton stopped to think. “She still lives in Promise Falls, far as I know. I mean, I have nothing to do with her. We weren’t enemies or anything, but once she and Dad broke up, there was no reason to keep in touch. I think she’s got a condo somewhere around here. I think if she’d remarried, Dad would have mentioned it.”

“The two of them clearly have kept in touch. Did your father have financial obligations to her?”

“He gave her a lump sum when they divorced, but not all that much. I wouldn’t be surprised if he slipped her some money now and then. But there were no kids to worry about. And she was the one who’d pushed to get out of the marriage.”

“But she kept the name,” I said.

“Her own last name is Dimpfelmyer. What would you do?”

The Google search had brought up an address on Braymore Drive. I wrote it down in my notebook. Maybe Felicia was still trusted to have a key. And to know the code. Maybe Adam and Miriam’s sex life included his ex. A threesome. I could imagine Felicia might want those DVDs back. If she’d heard about Adam and Miriam getting killed at the drive-in, she wouldn’t want whoever had to empty the house—Lucy, presumably—finding those home movies. So she busted in, grabbed them, and ran out the back when Lucy got here.

It wasn’t a bad theory. And it was a good place to start.

“What’s the next number?” I asked.

She read it off. I did another Google search and came up with nothing. Probably a cell.

“Let’s have a look at the address book,” I said. Lucy handed it to me. I started flipping through the pages, looking for a number that matched the one she’d just given me.

I went through the entire book without getting a hit. I made a note of it, would check it later.

“What’s the last one?” I asked, scribbling it down as Lucy read it off to me. I went to the Google search field again and entered it. Again, no luck. Probably another cell. So I went back to the address book.

This time, I had better luck. And I only had to go to the
D
s.

“You ever heard of someone named Clive Duncomb?” I asked Lucy.

She shook her head.

I turned again to my friend Mr. Google.

“Whoa,” I said, seeing a number of stories come up.

“What?”

“He’s the head of security at Thackeray. And a few days ago he blew some kid’s head off.”

“My God. Why?”

“If it was plagiarism, things have gotten a lot tougher than when I was at school.”

•   •   •

I decided to start with Felicia Chalmers.

She lived in the Waterside Towers condo development, about half a mile downstream from the falls in the center of town. To call it a tower was a stretch. It was a five-story building, which, with the exception of the water tower, was as tall as structures got in Promise Falls.

I parked in a guest spot and entered the outer lobby. No one was on duty, but that didn’t mean I was able to walk in. There was a directory and a panel of buttons by the second door. I found Felicia Chalmers in 502, which meant she was on the top floor.

I hated buzzers. If the woman didn’t want to talk to me, she wouldn’t have to let me in. It was a lot easier to say no to people when you didn’t have to see them face-to-face. And I didn’t want to have to explain, through a speaker, why I was here.

Someone was coming along the sidewalk, heading to the main door of the building. A middle-aged woman with a set of keys in her hand.

I leaned in close to the panel of buttons, appeared to be taking my hand away from one of them, and as the woman came into the building, I said, loudly, “Okay, then, I’ll be up in a second.”

I turned, smiled at the woman with the key. She unlocked the door, glanced my way.

“I’m just waiting to be buzzed in,” I said, making no move to try to sneak in as she pulled open the glass door.

“Oh, just go ahead,” she said, holding the door for me.

“Oh, thanks.”

I scooted in, then politely stepped aside to let her walk ahead of me as we headed for the elevator. The woman got off at three, and I stayed on until the doors opened at five. I got my bearings, figured that 502 was to the left, and walked down the carpeted hallway until I was at Felicia Chalmers’s apartment.

I could hear music inside as I rapped on the door.

Five seconds later, I heard a chain sliding back, and then the door opened. I had to adjust my gaze downward. In high heels, she might have been five-three, but she was barefoot and the top of her head was barely level with my chin. Her blond hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and she was dressed in some turquoise workout clothes. Trickles of sweat ran down her temple.

“Yes?” she asked over the sound of Chicago performing “Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?”

“Ms. Chalmers? Felicia Chalmers?”

“How did you get into the building?”

I got out my ID. “I’m Cal Weaver. I’m a private investigator. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

She put a hand on her hip. “About what?”

“About your former husband, Adam Chalmers.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “God, what’s he done? Wait, let me guess. There’s a woman involved. There’s always a woman involved one way or another.”

Shit.

“Ms. Chalmers, you haven’t heard?”

“Haven’t heard what?”

“May I come in?”

Worry washed over her face. She opened the door wide, let me in, and closed it. She went over to an iPod resting on a Bose stereo unit, muted it, then crossed the room to what I was guessing was the bedroom, and pulled the door shut.

Having completed those errands, she asked, “What’s going on?”

“The accident last night? At the Constellation Drive-in?”

“What accident at what drive-in?”

“Have you watched TV this morning, been online? Facebook, Twitter? Seen the news?”

She shook her head slowly. “I don’t watch the news. It’s all bad. And I’m not on those other things. About the only thing I use is e-mail. Please tell me what’s going on.”

“There was an explosion last night, at the drive-in. The screen came down on a couple of the cars. One of them belonged to Adam Chalmers. He was in the car with his wife, Miriam.”

“What?”

“Mr. Chalmers and his wife were killed. I’m sorry to be the one to break this to you.”

“Adam’s dead?”

“I thought someone would have been in touch. Or that you would have heard somehow.”

“That’s impossible. Oh my God, this is awful. This is unbelievable. I was talking to him yesterday. I mean, not on the phone, but e-mail.” She shook her head. “God, I need a drink. Get me a drink.”

She pointed toward the kitchen.

“What would you like?”

“There’s a bottle of red in the rack there. Glasses on the right. Fill one of them to the fucking brim.”

She dropped herself onto an oversized couch, brought her feet up, and tucked them under her thighs. “Help yourself, too.”

I went into the kitchen, where I noticed three empty beer bottles standing in the sink. Given what she’d sent me in here for, beer didn’t strike me as her beverage of choice, but you never knew. Maybe she liked wine in the morning, and beer at night. But my beer theory was buttressed by the opened bag of spicy Doritos, rolled up and kept fresh with a rubber band. Didn’t seem to match the workout regimen.

I came back with a full glass of red wine. She downed half of it, handed it back, and said, “Top it up.”

I’d brought the bottle, and obliged. I sat down on a chair opposite her.

“You’re not having anything?”