Fonduing Fathers (19 page)

Quinn held his hand out back toward the way we’d come, as though opening a gate to allow me to pass. “I’m sure your kitchen awaits your experienced hand. I won’t hold you any
longer. If I have any further questions, Ollie,” he said, hesitating ever so slightly before using my name for the first time, “may I assume I will find you down here?”

“Actually,” I smiled, “I’m on vacation until Monday.” I could tell I’d confused him. “I’m only in today because the First Lady asked me to take Josh along to the Food Expo, but now…” I glanced at my watch, “I’m out until first thing Monday morning.”

“I see.” His brows came together in an expression I couldn’t read. “Enjoy your time off.”

“HERE WE GO AGAIN,” GAV SAID.

I blew out a breath. “Let’s hope we have better luck this time.”

Dusk was beginning to fall; Gav and I picked our way along an uneven sidewalk to visit Michael Fitch. We’d been obliged to park halfway down a winding block, the only open spot between a dented pickup and a rusted blue sedan.

This neighborhood had seen better days, probably fifty years ago. Mostly small ranches and one-and-a-half-story cottages, the homes here were in need of a good spruce-up, but weren’t decrepit. What the area lacked in pristine homes, however, it made up for in foliage. Trees were huge, swollen with trunks as wide as airplane tires.

Kicking up in advance of an approaching storm, wind gusts whisked through the shadowy leaves forming a rocking
overhead canopy that shushed like shuffled steps, making me glance back behind us repeatedly.

Kids played in front yards, halting their jump ropes and holding onto plastic balls as they watched us make our way to Fitch’s home.

“I guess they don’t get a lot of visitors around here,” I said.

“Why are you nervous?” Gav asked. “It’s not like you.”

I didn’t answer.

“This area’s safe,” he went on. “A little worse for wear, but it’s no mecca for crime.”

“It’s not that.” I could barely see the sky through the heavy tree branches above us, but I looked anyway. “I just know that if Fitch doesn’t help us, we’re back to square one. That has me on edge.”

He didn’t say anything. A car squealed around the corner, windows open, its radio bass turned up so high it made my heart thrum as it roared past. “Such a difference from Linka’s neighborhood, huh?” I said.

Gav’s expression was thoughtful.

“What?” I asked.

“I have a good feeling about Mr. Fitch.”

“You do?”

Gav gave me a wry smile. “Not about the man, but about him helping us. I’m not sure why, but I have a feeling he’ll be more approachable.”

“I hope so,” I said as we stopped in front of Fitch’s house. It was one of the few on the block without a huge tree in the parkway, a blue-frame one-story home with a peaked roof and open attic windows. Colorless curtains whipped outward like twisty arms reaching into the breeze.

The lawn here was overgrown with crabgrass and weeds. No evergreens, no shrubs of any kind broke up the stark foundation’s gray drabness. We took the three concrete steps to the front door. I shot Gav a glance and a shrug that said,
“What do we have to lose?” and pressed a thumb against the cracked plastic doorbell.

No cheery chimes sounded from inside. “You think it’s broken?”

Gav leaned over the wrought-iron handrail and knocked on one of the home’s three front windows, making the sash wobble. “This place needs work.” He glanced up at the cockeyed aluminum awning over our heads. “One good windstorm and that thing’s history.”

Noises from inside let us know the knock had been heard. Footsteps, the creak of rusty hinges, and then for the third time since I’d begun this quest, a woman answered the door with a quizzical look on her face. Dark eyes shifted back and forth and I could see that she was trying to figure out who we could be. I couldn’t help but make comparisons between her and Linka’s wife. Although she, too, was casually dressed, this woman didn’t sport yoga pants and tight tank top. She wore light-colored capris and a baggy gray T-shirt with an iron-on beer logo that had cracked and begun to peel.

“Mrs. Fitch?” I asked.

Three inches of outgrowth told me it had been months since she’d last colored her hair. She must have thought the same thing at that very instant because she ran a self-conscious hand through her shoulder-length tresses. She didn’t wear makeup, but the bones in her slim face made me believe she’d been quite lovely in her younger days. Without opening the screen door between us, she said, “What do you want? I’m not buying anything.”

I glanced up at Gav, who had taken a step back, no doubt to appear less threatening. He had his hands crossed in front of his waist, like a well-behaved schoolboy might. His air was mild, his gaze inquisitive.

“My name is Olivia Paras,” I said. “I think your husband used to work with my dad.”

She shook her head as she took a step back into the house.
“My husband hasn’t worked in a very long time,” she said. “Sorry.”

One of her red, chapped hands grabbed at the door as she made ready to close it.

“At Pluto,” I said quickly. “Pluto, Incorporated.”

She stopped mid-motion, gaze darting back and forth between us again. My words had clearly hit their mark. Warily, she asked, “What did you say your name was?”

I told her. “My dad was Anthony Paras.”

Something sparked behind her eyes. “I remember that name,” she said, bringing her lips in. “Not sure how, though. Sounds familiar. How long ago did you say this was?”

“Long time,” I said. “May we speak with your husband?” I asked, knowing I had to push now or this option would be lost to me forever.

She twisted her mouth, scanned my hands, then cocked her head toward Gav. “And who’s he?”

“Boyfriend,” I said. “May we come in?”

“I don’t know that Mickey’s going to want to talk to you,” she gave a half-hearted shrug, “but no sense leaving you out here while he makes up his mind. Might as well bring you back so he can get a look at you first.” She waved us in, saying, “Let me get this door closed. We got a window air conditioner in the kitchen and I don’t want all the cold air escaping.”

The first thing to hit me when the door shut behind us was the smell. Acrid and unpleasant, I remembered this odor from when I was a kid and we’d visited some friends. I’d been polite enough of a youngster not to ask what the stink was until I could catch my mom alone. She’d whispered that her friend had probably accidentally left one of her pot’s handles over an open flame. “Burnt plastic,” she’d said.

“We just finished dinner,” Mrs. Fitch said as she made her way through the dimly lit living room. “I was cleaning up.” A beige couch sagged along one end of the room while across from it, a brand-new big-screen television held a place
of honor. Two small paintings flanked a plastic orange sun clock on the wall above the sofa. The unframed oils were much too small for the wide space and looked to be amateur attempts at capturing still life: a cluster of grapes draping a misshapen apple. A bottle of wine next to a book.

We stepped along a thin gray rug that covered the squeaky wood floor, past a well-worn easy chair that could have rivaled Archie Bunker’s. Everything in the room was threadbare and worn. Old. I was touched by the many doilies carefully arranged atop tables and across the back of the couch cushions. A valiant attempt to make the place feel lived-in rather than shabby.

The dining room, immediately behind the living room, was dark. Even with the lights off, however, I made out what looked like an antique mahogany table and matching cabinet. Amateur paintings were centered on every open wall here, too.

“Who’s the artist?” I asked.

“Mickey.” She blinked and tried to smile. “He never gives up.” Mrs. Fitch took a right, opening an accordion plastic door to reveal a well-lit kitchen. Small by any standard, it had dull yellow tile walls trimmed in gray. The burnt-handle odor was gaggable in here where it mingled with the smell of cigarette smoke—stale from the ashtray full of used butts on the table, and fresh from the one Michael Fitch lit as we walked in. I blinked to keep my eyes from watering.

His wife whacked the plastic accordion door closed behind us. “Keeps in the cool, you know?” she said. To her husband: “Hey, Mickey, this girl wants to talk to you about her dad. From your Pluto days.”

Mickey Fitch stared up at us with eyes as yellow as the kitchen walls and as saggy as his living room couch. His sickly skin tone and skinny frame made me wonder if he was battling more than nicotine addiction. “Yeah, I know. Thought you’d show up yesterday.” Coughing, he used one foot to shove at the chair across the table from him. It
scraped backward across the dingy linoleum and threatened to topple over before it settled. “Take a seat.” He took a deep drag of his cigarette as we sat at a vintage 1950s table that looked brand-new.

As I lowered myself onto the turquoise vinyl seat trimmed in silver brads, I ran my hands along the table’s chrome edge. “This is great,” I said. “It’s in beautiful condition.”

“It was mine growing up,” his wife said, clearly pleased that I’d complimented her furniture. “My name’s Ingrid, by the way.”

She looked as far from an Ingrid as I’d ever imagined. For me, the name Ingrid conjured up elegance, wealth, soft violin strings, and pastel bucolic settings. But I could tell she’d been a beauty once. Maybe Ingrid fit her after all. She turned to her husband. “You didn’t tell me you were expecting anybody.”

He hadn’t taken his eyes off me from the moment I’d walked in. Gav took the seat to my left, but Fitch didn’t seem to notice.

“Can I get you something to drink?” Ingrid asked, bending down as though she wouldn’t be able to catch our answers if she’d remained upright. “We have tea and water in the fridge.”

“They aren’t staying long enough,” Fitch said. He worked the cigarette to the other side of his mouth. “I don’t have anything you want.”

“No, thank you,” I said to Ingrid as though Fitch hadn’t all but slammed the door on our conversation. Odd, I thought, inviting us to sit if he really had nothing to say.

Ingrid didn’t sit down to join us. She made her way to the sink behind Gav and started washing the dinner dishes, keeping the water low enough to be able to hear our conversation.

“How did you know we were coming to see you?” I asked Fitch even though I was pretty sure I knew the answer.

“Harry Linka called,” he answered, confirming my
suspicion. He leaned forward, both elbows on the table, arms crossed. “What’re you doing, bringing up old stuff from so many years ago? What’s it to you?”

Was he serious?
“Anthony Paras was my dad,” I said in a tone that implied that was explanation enough.

“I remember Tony.” A shadow crossed his features. It could have been smoke, but I thought it was something more. “Your dad, God rest his soul, is at peace, right?” He didn’t wait for me to respond. “Let the dead have their rest. You let this go, okay, little girl?” As if to emphasize that it didn’t matter, he blew a smoke ring toward the ceiling.

I mirrored him, placing my elbows on the turquoise tabletop, crossing my arms and staring him straight in the eye. “I haven’t been called ‘little girl’ in a long time,” I said. “And I’m not so sure my dad is at peace. I don’t think you believe he is, either, do you?”

Fitch glanced away.

Ingrid, who’d stopped washing dishes and was patently listening in on the conversation, asked, “Is that the man who was murdered all those years ago?” then answered her own question with a hand to her throat. “It is. I remember now. Oh, I’m so sorry, honey,” she said to me. “That was your dad, huh?”

“Ingrid.” Fitch’s voice was sharp.

She ignored him. “You must have been just a little thing back then.”

Ingrid wouldn’t have answers for me, but I knew Fitch would. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to be nice to the woman. She was one of the first people to show any sympathy about my dad’s death. To everyone else, it had been so long ago that the story was better forgotten.

“I was,” I said. “I barely remember him.”

“Then why bother me?” Mickey asked.

I ignored the question, instead choosing to push my luck. I wasn’t going to give up until he kicked me out. “Why did you leave Pluto?” I asked.

He slid another glance toward his wife. One corner of her mouth curled downward and she turned back to the dishes. To us, he said, “Disability.”

Unlike Linka, Fitch here wasn’t confined to a wheelchair. Disabilities came in many different forms, however. “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. Pushing again, I asked, “What happened?”

Mickey worked his tongue along his teeth, as though attempting to dislodge an errant morsel from dinner. “Ticker problems,” he said, tapping his chest. “My doc told me I had to quit. If I didn’t I’d be dead in a couple of months.”

Behind Gav, Ingrid made a noise.

Fitch took another long drag of his cigarette, regarding me carefully.

“Was this before or after Harold Linka’s accident?” I asked.

“After,” he said. “Couple weeks later.”

I sat back a little, putting the pieces together. “That’s quite a coincidence,” I said. “Three executives out of work from Pluto in a little over a month’s time. My dad was murdered, Linka had his accident, and then you were released on disability.”