The Common Lawyer (32 page)

Russell took a few moments to calm himself.

"So tell me about the eighth woman."

Andy handed the dossier to his client. Russell thumbed through it while Andy gave him a full report on Sally and Jimmy Armstrong in San Diego. Russell was shaking his head.

"Paralyzed at sixteen … his whole life in a wheelchair."

"Seven out of eight kids, Russell."

"He's not mine, Andy. And neither is his sister. I knew Sally twelve years ago."

"Another married woman? While you were married?"

"She was divorced. She must have remarried."

Andy recalled that Sally Armstrong's divorce and second marriage were mentioned in the dossier.

"All these sick kids."

"You're over-thinking this, Andy. Life is random. Cruelly random."

"At least Jimmy's getting great care."

"I'll still wire a million to your trust account. You can fly back out to San Diego and give it to her … after you find Frankie Doyle."

"The DNA matched?"

Russell Reeves nodded. "The girl's mine, Andy."

"Natalie Riggs is pregnant?"

Tres' face was grim. "Two months, the doctor said."

Andy and Tres were sitting at their usual table at Güero's. Dave was at his nude yoga class, and Curtis was teaching an evening seminar.

"How's she handling it?"

"She's happy." Tres shrugged. "Hormones must've kicked in. She and her mother, they're at Neiman Marcus right now picking out maternity clothes."

"Hey, she'll probably start wearing underwear now."

"Yeah … big underwear."

"There's just no pleasing you, Tres."

"She took her cameraman with her."

"To buy underwear?"

"For the news. Says she's going to do a series on pregnancy and motherhood from start to finish, in real time." He drank from his beer. "Course, that means we've got to get married now. You'll be my best man?"

"Do I get free beer?"

They drank Coronas and contemplated life for a few minutes, as if offering a moment of silence for Tres' bachelorhood.

"Man, she had a great body," Tres said softly, as if speaking of a deceased dear friend.

"She'll get it back, Tres. Natalie's not the type to keep the baby fat."

"That's what she says. But you should've seen her getting down on the double-chocolate cookie-dough ice cream last night."

Another moment of silence, this time for Natalie's great body. Tres broke the silence again.

"How's Floyd T.?"

"Good. Double bypass surgery. They said he needed to sleep, so I left, came straight here. Doctor said he'll be in the hospital for a week."

"Reeves took him over there in his limo? Paid for his care?"

"And gave him mouth-to-mouth."

"Can't say I would've done the same. He really is a good guy, like they say."

"Yeah, I guess so."

Tres turned to him.

"You
guess?
Talk to me, buddy."

Andy hesitated then said, "Tres, you can't breathe a word of this to anyone, not even Natalie."

"With what you could tell her about me?"

"I can't imagine what Russell Reeves would do to me if this got out. And Natalie's a reporter."

"I can't imagine what Natalie would do to me if she found out I hired a PI to follow her. We're in a Mexican standoff, buddy."

Andy drank beer for courage.

"I'm tracking down Russell Reeves' old girlfriends. Seventeen."

"
Seventeen?
No way."

"Way. All over the country."

"That's why you've been traveling so much?"

Andy nodded. "We found the first six women easy enough."

"We who?"

"Downtown PI, ex-FBI. Russell gave me his name, only the PI doesn't know Russell's the client. Anyway, we found them, and Russell gave each woman a million bucks. Anonymously."

"Why?"

"He doesn't want anyone to know—"

"No. Why'd he give them money?"

"To make amends, he said. Because he treated them badly and they're down on their luck."

Tres nodded. "He's suffering that rich-guilt complex. Feels guilty for being filthy rich, so he relieves his guilt by giving his money away. It's a common affliction among the rich … not for me, but for some rich people." Tres shrugged. "Course, for him, a million is like us giving a bum a buck. Well, for you anyway."

"Thanks."

"So he's giving away a bunch of money. What's the problem?"

"We had a hard time finding the seventh woman—her name's Frankie Doyle. So I went to her last-known address in Boston, talked to her ex-husband. Name's Mickey. He hit her, so she divorced him three years ago and took off with their five-year-old daughter. They moved to Montana then to New Mexico and West Texas and now to Buda."

"As in Buda just down the road?"

"Yeah. And they changed their names every time."

"She must really be afraid of Mickey."

"Maybe. But we found her. Or Lorenzo did."

"Why not the FBI guy?"

"He goes by the book."

"You meet her?"

Andy nodded. "Says she never dated anyone but Mickey."

"She's lying."

"Why would she lie about that?"

"Everyone lies."

"Maybe."

"Okay, so she's on the run from Mickey. And Reeves wants to give her a million bucks. I still don't see the problem."

"Russell says the girl is his."

"
Whoa
. Hold on. How?"

"He says they had an affair while he was up in Boston, teaching at MIT. Nine years ago."

"While he was married?"

"And while she was."

"Now that's a problem, Russell Reeves with a love child. How does he know the girl is his?"

"DNA."

"How'd he get her DNA?"

"He didn't."

"You did?"

Andy nodded.

"How?"

"Band-Aid in the trash."

Tres seemed impressed.

"Does she know Reeves is the father of her child?"

Andy shrugged. "When I went back out to get the DNA, she and the girl, they had already bolted."

"Why?"

"They're scared."

"Of what? Or whom?"

"I don't know."

"So Reeves had you tracking down his old girlfriends to find this girl?"

"Yeah … or to find out if he had another child. But here's the weird part."

Tres laughed. "Like none of that was weird?"

"Seven of the eight women have sick kids, like Russell."

"How sick?"

"Cancer, paralysis, cerebral palsy … The only kid who's not sick is—"

"Reeves' love child."

Andy nodded. "But Russell's worried she might get sick. Says he might have given the girl the same cancer gene he gave his son."

"Who's dying."

"Exactly. Said if she has the gene, he wants his scientists to give her gene therapy. To save her life."

"So she's running from Mickey … or someone … but doesn't know her daughter might have cancer … or might get cancer."

Andy nodded again.

"And Russell wants you to find her again."

"Yep."

"Complicated."

They sat quietly and finished their beers.

"Tres, can I ask you a rich person question?"

"Municipal bonds."

"Is Russell Reeves a complicated person because he's rich? Or is he rich because he's complicated?"

"He's rich because he's a genius. He lives a complicated life because when you're rich, the simple stuff of life is easy. You don't have to worry about paying the bills or buying medicine or affording college tuition. So life can get boring unless you create complications to make it interesting."

"Like having affairs while you're married to a Miss UT?"

Tres nodded. "Like most rich people, he figures the rules don't apply to him. He can do whatever he wants. Of course, the past always comes back and bites you in the butt … like finding out you have a love child. Then life gets complicated."

"Are you like that?"

"I probably will be by the time I'm forty."

They watched a pedicab try to cross Congress and almost get nailed by a speeding SUV.

"That would've hurt," Tres said. He turned to Andy. "Be careful, buddy."

Andy laughed at his friend's serious expression.

"Tres, this deal is definitely a ten on the Weird-Shit-O-Meter-of-Life all right, but I don't think I'm in danger or anything." He pointed at the pedicab. "Riding in one of those down Congress, now that's dangerous."

"You read yesterday's paper?"

Andy shook his head. "I was in San Diego."

Tres reached to his back pocket and pulled out a folded-up page from a newspaper. He unfolded and smoothed the page on the table. It was a newspaper article about an Austin lawyer who had been shot and killed in Ithaca, New York, the apparent victim of a random robbery. He was only forty.

"What's he got to do with me?"

"Read the rest of the story."

Andy read aloud: " 'Laurence G. Smith had been a partner at Rankin Edwards & Phillips, a prominent Austin law firm whose clients include … Russell Reeves.' "

NINETEEN

First thing the next morning, Andy Prescott rode his bike down South Congress, parked outside his favorite PI's office, and walked inside. Lorenzo Escobar looked up from his laptop.

"Don't tell me you lost her?"

" 'Fraid so."

Lorenzo seemed amused.

"Oh, I checked out that Maureen O'Malley Reeves."

Andy had asked Lorenzo to run a search on Russell Reeves' mother. He wasn't sure why.

"She's legit. Lives out in California in a high-end retirement place on the ocean. Got a son lives here. Russell Reeves, the billionaire."

Russell had told the truth.

"What color is her hair?"

"Blue."

Lorenzo motioned Andy over to his laptop.

"My West Coast associate, he took this photo, emailed it over." On the screen was a color photo of four old women. "One on the right, that's her."

"She does have blue hair. They all have blue hair."

Lorenzo shrugged. "Old ladies do that. Anglos, anyway."

"I need you to find Frankie Doyle again."

"She don't want to be found."

"I've got to find her."

"Same fee?"

Andy nodded. Lorenzo faced the laptop. Andy sat and read the local paper. Ten minutes later, he heard Lorenzo's voice.

"Gotcha."

Lorenzo wrote a note and handed it to Andy.

"That's her new address."

Andy turned to leave, but Lorenzo said, "You forgetting something?"

"I'll get the money, bring it back later."

Lorenzo grabbed his keys. "I'll drive you."

Lorenzo Escobar drove a black 2005 Cadillac Escalade with blacked-out windows and black leather seats. Selena, the Latina singing sensation who had been murdered when she was just twenty-three by the president of her fan club, sang softly on the CD player. Lorenzo had driven Andy first to the bank for his $9,999, and then to San Marcos thirty miles south of Austin.

San Marcos is home to Texas State University and thirty thousand college students. If you're young and want to get lost in a crowd, it would be a good place. Two days before, Frankie Doyle had rented an apartment in San Marcos under her real name. She had signed a rental application; the application authorized the landlord to run a credit check.

"Must not have read the fine print in her tenant app," Lorenzo said. "Smart girl, she'd know we could track her that way."

Lorenzo had pulled her credit report and found the landlord's inquiry, which included the address of the apartment complex on Aquarena Springs Road, the main drag through town. It was the first activity on Frankie Doyle's credit file in three years. She was desperate.

They knew the apartment complex where she lived, but not the specific apartment. So Lorenzo stopped at the manager's office and went inside. When he returned, he said, "Apartment 621. Upstairs."

"How'd you get the manager to—"

Lorenzo gave him a look.

"Never mind."

They drove through the parking lot until they found Apartment 621. Frankie's old Toyota was nowhere in sight. So they parked and waited. Frankie Doyle had lied; the DNA matched. Russell Reeves was the girl's father. And like any good father, he wanted to find his daughter, test her for the cancer gene, and save her life. What's wrong with that? Nothing. Nothing at all.