Not Guilty (39 page)

An exhumation. Maureen had been planning to dig up these old bones. To make an identification.

“Excuse me,” said a deep voice.

Her face red with guilt, Keely looked up. Standing in front of the
desk, nervously toying with a mangy purple velvet ring box, was a young man with mocha-colored skin, a head full of dreadlocks, and sea green eyes. He was wearing an expensive-looking leather coat. Keely stared at him. Obviously the young man did not recognize Keely, but she immediately remembered him from Lucas’s office.

“I’m here to see Miss Chase,” he said in a British accent.

Keely hesitated, carefully replacing the papers in the manila envelope. “I guess you haven’t heard,” she said.

The young man frowned. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Heard what?”

Keely refastened the hasp. “I’m afraid Ms. Chase has . . . I’m afraid she’s dead.”

The young man’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Dead? That’s not possible. I just spoke to her yesterday afternoon. She was perfectly fine.”

“I’m afraid it’s true,” said Keely gently. “She . . . took her own life.”

“Oh, no. Bloody hell,” he said. He shifted the small velvet box nervously from one hand to the other. Keely noticed that he wore a number of rings on his long fingers and that his nails were flawlessly shaped and buffed. “I don’t understand. She was a young woman.”

“I think she was . . . grieving,” said Keely. She set the envelope back down on the desk.

“She told me to come today,” he said, shaking his head.

“I know. It was a shock for everyone.”

“I mean . . . it’s terrible, of course,” he said.

“Yes,” said Keely. “Tragic, really. Well,” she said, standing up. “If you’ll excuse me, I’d better be going.”

“Don’t you work here?” he asked.

Keely sighed. “Oh no. I was just looking for something . . . something of mine. I thought Ms. Chase might have . . .”

“Unfinished business,” he said grimly.

“Something like that,” Keely admitted. The young man nodded.
“Right. Hmmm. I don’t know what I’m going to do with this now.” He opened the velvet box and frowned at its contents. “Do you suppose her successor will carry out her intentions?”

“I don’t know,” said Keely. “I imagine so. Why? What have you got there?”

He turned it toward her, and Keely leaned forward to look into the box, expecting to see some piece of jewelry. Instead, lying on the stained, cream-colored satin inside the box was something that looked like a small, discolored white pebble.

“What is it?” Keely asked.

The young man turned the box back around and stared wistfully at its contents. “It’s a tooth,” he said.

A
tooth?”

“A milk tooth, actually.”

“A baby tooth,” said Keely.

“Yes. Right. Same thing,” said the young man absently.

Keely stared at him. “What did she want with that?”

“Hmmm?” said the young man, looking up. “Oh. She wanted it for the DNA. She was going to have some bones dug up. She wanted to try to match it; I don’t really understand how they do this.”

“Nor do I,” Keely said faintly.
The exhumation,
Keely thought. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears. “Whose tooth . . . I mean, who did the tooth . . .?”

The young man snapped the velvet box shut. “Oh, it was me mum’s.”

“Your mother’s,” said Keely.

“I’ve been trying to find her,” he said.

Keely stared at the velvet box, her mind racing. Was it possible that the person Richard and Mark had killed was this boy’s mother? She felt her stomach churning. Part of her just wanted to walk away and probe this no further. But she couldn’t. This young man was searching for his mother, and she might have a part of the answer. Ever since she had read Richard’s note, she’d known that apart from her own concerns, there was a victim to consider. And a victim’s family. “Has your mother been . . . missing for a long time?” Keely asked.

“Missing? No,” he said. “Not exactly missing. It’s just . . . Oh, it’s a long story,” he said dismissively.

Keely hesitated. “I don’t mean to pry,” she said. “I’m just . . . I was just curious.”

The young man sighed but immediately began to explain, as if he enjoyed a chance to tell his story. “She left me, and me dad, you see, when I was just a baby, and she came to the States. Walked out on us, really. I never heard from her. But I figured since I was coming here anyway, I’d look her up. But no one could tell me where she was. That’s when I decided to try Missing Persons and I met Miss Chase. Rather rude, she was at first. Then yesterday, she called me up, all excited. Said she thought she might be able to help me after all.”

“Yesterday? Really?” Keely breathed.

“She had some new information. She wanted to have some old remains dug up. She said I should come in and they’d take a DNA sample and they might be able to tell something from that. Certain matches are genetic between parents and children, you know. But I said, ‘Hold on! I can do you one better than that.’ And I told her about the tooth.

“I got it from me gran. Seems she had some regrets about tossing me mum out all those years ago. When she heard I was coming to the States, she gave me the tooth in this box. She said I should show this to Veronica when I found her. To prove who I was. Miss Chase thought that was brilliant. Told to me to bring it in today.”

“Veronica?” Keely asked. Her legs suddenly felt rubbery.

“Veronica Weaver. Did you know her?”

“No,” Keely whispered. “No, I didn’t.”

“She married some bloke here in town. Apparently she left him years ago and went to Las Vegas with some toff. But there’s no address for her out there. I began to wonder, you know.”

“Sure,” said Keely. “Maybe you can still find out. Ms. Chase’s successor,” she said faintly.

“Maybe so. I can’t hang around here forever. I would like to know, though. Close the chapter out, so to speak.”

“You should pursue it. She was your mother,” Keely said.

“Well, it’s not like she gave a damn,” he said. “I never heard from her. I don’t remember her. Just . . . curiosity, you know.”

“Closure,” said Keely. “Yes, I do know.”

“Well, maybe I’ll stop back later.”

“Yes, you should,” she said.

“Nice talking with you,” he said, extending his hand politely. “My name’s Julian, by the way. Julian Graham.

Keely shook his hand. “Keely,” she said. And then she stopped herself-before she spoke her last name. “Nice to meet you.”

A
LL THE WAY OVER
to Ingrid’s house, Keely’s mind was racing. Veronica Weaver. There was no proof that the remains Maureen had planned to exhume were Veronica Weaver’s, and yet Keely felt a sickening certainty that they were. She felt light-headed, almost faint at the thought that perhaps it was Veronica Weaver that Richard and Mark had killed.

Oh God,
she thought.
Wait until Lucas finds out.
She could hardly bear the thought of it. If he learned that Mark had been involved in the death of his daughter-in-law . . .
But no,
she thought.
It couldn’t be.
She remembered Betsy saying that Veronica had called them from Las Vegas. They’d spoken to her. So it couldn’t have been Veronica.

Right,
Keely thought as she turned down Swallow Street. That meant it was someone else, not Veronica. Besides, Mark would never have done that to Lucas, the man who had adopted him. He worshipped Lucas. It was impossible. And yet, even as she thought it, she felt her stomach churn. Mark had lied to her so successfully. Couldn’t he have lied to Lucas, too?

Keely pulled into Ingrid’s driveway, determined to hide her fears from Ingrid. She walked up to the front door. It opened before she could even reach for the doorknob or tap on the knocker. Dylan stood there, holding the door open for her.

“Hi, sweetie,” she said.

“Hey, Mom.”

“How are you doing? How was the first day back?”

Dylan shrugged. “Not too bad,” he said.

Keely felt a surge of relief.
Thank you, God,
she thought.
Not too bad
was tantamount to enthusiasm at Dylan’s age. “Well, good,” she said. “I want to hear all about it.”

Abby, squealing as her mother came in the door, began to toddle
towards her. Keely scooped her up and held her close. Ingrid emerged from the kitchen, wiping her hands on an apron.

“Ingrid, thank you so much,” said Keely. “I hope they didn’t tire you out.”

“Are you kidding?” Ingrid scoffed. “They were perfect. What have you been up to this afternoon? Everything all right?”

Part of Keely wished she could confide in the older woman. She felt such a need for someone to talk to. An image of Dan Warner sprang to her mind again, but she firmly pushed it down. “Nothing much,” she lied. She couldn’t burden Ingrid with these sordid details about Mark. And especially not about Richard. The older woman wasn’t well enough. “I had some business about the estate,” she said. The all-purpose excuse.

Ingrid nodded. “No end to the paperwork,” she said.

“Dylan, honey, get your book bag. We need to get going,” said Keely as she bent down and collected Abby’s things.

“I wish you could stay for supper,” said Ingrid.

“When you’re better,” said Keely firmly. “We’ve imposed enough on you for one day.”

Ingrid put her arms out to Dylan, who gave her a fierce hug. Keely was struck, as she always was, at the depth of feeling between them. Ingrid pulled back from Dylan’s embrace and looked him sternly in the eye. “You keep your head up and don’t you let anybody bother you. They may not appreciate you over at that school, but I do.”

“I’ll be okay, Grandma,” he said, smiling and kissing the top of her head.

Ingrid waved as they went down the walk and got into the SUV. Once they were buckled into their seat belts and the SUV had pulled out of the driveway, Keely glanced at Dylan. “Why did Grandma say that?” she asked. “Was somebody bothering you at school?”

Dylan shook his head. “Not really. She was waiting outside for me in the car and she saw some kid poke me as we were coming down the steps.”

“What do you mean, poke you?” Keely asked. “You mean like a punch?”

“No, I mean like a friendly poke,” Dylan said impatiently. “Mom, it was nothing. Believe me. I know the difference.”

Keely sighed. “I guess you do, honey.”

“Trust me, I do,” he said.

Keely nodded. “Have you got a lot of homework?” she asked. There was something so soothing to her about the routine questions, the concerns of everyday life.

Dylan rolled his eyes. “Really boring crap. I have to do a paper on the separation of powers in the federal government. Everybody’s supposed to do one branch. I’ve got to do research on the Supreme Court.”

“That should be interesting,” protested Keely.

Dylan made snoring noises.

Keely sighed with relief. Teenage melodrama. It was so . . . normal.
“Well, I’m sure you’ll find everything you need to know about it on the Internet.”

“I guess,” he said disinterestedly. She glanced over at him. He was staring out the window, but the expression on his face was not stormy.
I can manage anything as long as my kids are all right,
she thought.

When they reached the house and went inside, Keely heard the phone ringing. Dylan rushed to answer it, but there was no one on the line by the time he reached it. He hung the phone up and checked the number of the last incoming call. “Who was it?” Keely asked as she removed Abby’s jacket. Then she got the baby a cup of juice from the refrigerator.

“Dunno,” he said dejectedly. “Don’t recognize the number.”

Keely glanced over his shoulder at the number he had written down, but she didn’t recognize it either. She looked at Dylan curiously.
“Were you expecting to hear from someone?” she asked.

“No,” he said, too quickly. “I’m going upstairs.”

Keely nodded. She had a feeling he might have been hoping Nicole would call, but she didn’t want to mention that the Warners seemed to be away. She knew if she did, he would deny any interest in talking to Nicole and would resent her interference.
Okay,
she thought.
I’ll keep it to myself.

After Dylan tramped up the stairs to his room, Keely sat down at
the kitchen table and thought about Mark. Before last night, her every thought of Mark had been one of sorrow and a longing for the life they were making together, a life that had been abruptly destroyed.
What a difference a day makes,
she thought. Now, when she thought of him, there was a small part of her that felt . . . satisfied that he was dead. Although she could never admit it out loud, a small corner of her heart felt that maybe he had gotten what he deserved.

The doorbell rang, startling her out of her vengeful reverie, and she looked out the kitchen window to see who was at her door. She recognized Phil Stratton’s car.
Is there no end to this?
she thought wearily. And then, suddenly, she remembered that she had asked him to come, to talk to Dylan. She went to the door and opened it. Phil stood on the doorstep looking pained. “Mrs. Weaver, could I come in?” he asked.

Keely made a welcoming gesture with one hand, and Phil walked into the living room in front of her. He sat down. Keely picked up Abby and sat down opposite him, holding the baby on her lap. Abby snuggled contentedly against her mother, chewing on a rubber doughnut.

“Are you here to talk to Dylan?” said Keely.

Phil frowned and hesitated, as if he didn’t know where to begin. Finally, he said, “No. It’s about Maureen Chase.”