Widow's Walk Part 28

"And that's too many people dying in the same case."

"I agree," Kiley said. "So?"

"So Smith is on the board of a company named Soldiers Field Development, which had some of its employees following me after I started the case. We talked with them, and this morning we went out to talk with them again. They had packed up and left."

"Suspicious," Kiley said.

"There's a guy who came in as Smith's partner at the bank not too long before Smith was shot. Guy named Marvin Conroy."

Kiley frowned a little. As if the name meant something.

"Marvin Conroy is an acquaintance of your daughter's."

Kiley glanced neutrally at Ann. "Yeah?"

"And Ann was representing DeRosa when he told us that Mary Smith hired him to kill her husband."

"This is all very interesting," Kiley said. "But I was hoping you might sort of get around to why you are here talking to my daughter."

"This is the preeminent criminal law practice in the city. Maybe on the East Coast. What the h.e.l.l are you doing with Jack DeRosa?"

"He was Ann's client," Kiley said. "Ask her."

"That's where we were when you came in," I said.

Kiley smiled and didn't say anything.

"So," I said to Ann, "how'd you come to represent DeRosa?"

"I decline to discuss my clients with you," she said.

"Tell me," Kiley said.

"Bobby," his daughter said, "I am not going to talk about this with these men."

"I want to know, Ann."

Father and daughter stared at each other. I stayed quiet. Hawk leaned placidly against the wall, looking at the view. Then Kiley shifted his gaze to me.

"There any connection between this guy Marvin Conroy and DeRosa?"

"Conroy was in the bank with Smith," I said. "DeRosa was asked to kill Smith."

"That's hardly a connection," Kiley said.

"Yet," I said.

Kiley shifted his glance to Hawk. "I been in the criminal defense business for a long time," Kiley said. "I know what he does."

"And well," I said.

"He watching your back?"

"Yes."

"So this is serious business," Kiley said, probably to himself more than to me. He pointed his chin at Ann Kiley. "You think she's in danger?"

Ann said, "I'm not a she. My name is Ann."

I nodded. "I think Ann's in danger," I said.

Kiley said, "What do you think, Ann?"

"I think it's preposterous," she said.

"No," Kiley said. "I know this guy. He thinks you're in danger, we need to take it seriously."

"For G.o.d's sake, Bobby-"

"And cut the Bobby s.h.i.t, for the moment. It's fine while we're colleagues, but I'm also your father, and I want to know what the f.u.c.k is going on. How come we represented Jack DeRosa?"

Ann Kiley's face got very tight, and colorless. Her jaw clamped, but do what she would, she couldn't stop it. She began to cry. She stood and walked to the window and stood beside Hawk and looked out. Her shoulders shook, though not very much. In the quiet room we could hear the stifled sound of her fight for control. Bobby Kiley didn't move. Hawk looked at me. I looked at Hawk. We decided that quiet was the way to go.

After a time Ann turned from the window. She had stopped crying, but her eyes were red and her face was stiff. She leaned her hips against the window ledge and folded her arms and looked straight at her father.

"I'm having an affair with Marvin Conroy," she said.

Kiley nodded. Ann Kiley took in a long slow breath with a hint of vibrato.

"It's a serious affair," she said.

Kiley nodded again. Ann tightened her folded arms as if she were hugging herself in a cold place.

"He asked me to help him," she said. "He was in trouble."

n.o.body said anything. The phone rang on Ann Kiley's desk. Bobby Kiley picked it up and said, "No calls," and hung up.

"He asked me if I could find him someone to pretend something. He said I was a criminal lawyer, and I should be able to find someone."

"And you found DeRosa," Bobby Kiley said.

"Yes."

"How?"

"I was doing my annual pro bono, for the public defender's office, as required by the firm, and I drew DeRosa, some sort of auto theft, I believe."

"So when Conroy wanted a mug you remembered DeRosa."

Kiley appeared calm. He seemed entirely focused on the questions he was asking and the answers he was getting.

"And Marvin asked me to be DeRosa's lawyer, this time, too, to see that he stayed on message."

"The message being?"

"That Mary Smith had approached him to kill her husband."

"Which was not true," Kiley said.

"No. I don't believe it was."

Kiley sat back in his chair. Hawk and I remained where we were.

Ann Kiley said, "Daddy."

Kiley stood and went to her and opened his arms and she fell against him and began to cry. As he hugged her, he looked at me.

"We can talk later," he said.

"You will need security for her," I said.

"I know," Kiley said. "I can arrange that."

"There's more I need to know," I said.

"She's got nothing else to say," Kiley said.

"I think she does," I said.

"Doesn't matter what you think," Kiley said.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE.

It was Sunday. I was drinking coffee with my right hand and driving with my left. Pearl was asleep in the backseat, and Susan was beside me drinking coffee from a big paper cup which she held in both hands. We were on the road to Newburyport, and we had chosen to take the old Route 1, through the slow rural landscape north of Boston.

"How's your lawsuit?" I said.

"I think the insurance company plans to settle," Susan said.

"Thus leaving you neither vindicated nor convicted."

"But they'll probably cancel afterwards," she said.

"Insurance companies are fun," I said. "Aren't they."

Susan nodded. She dipped into her coffee, her big eyes gazing at the road across the top of the cup.

"And the boy is still dead," she said.

"And it's still not your fault," I said.

She was quiet, her face still half hidden by the coffee. In the backseat Pearl snored occasionally, the way she had begun to do as she got older.

"Fault has little to do with sadness," Susan said. "One of the things that helps kids get through the difficulty of being a gay adolescent is to have someone. I don't mean a shrink. But a friend, a lover, someone. But the thing they need help with prevents them from getting it."

"Because they're too conflicted about being h.o.m.os.e.xual," I said.

"I hate that word," Susan said into her cup.

"h.o.m.os.e.xual?"

"Yes."

"Too clinical?"

"Makes me think of grim men in lab coats," Susan said. "Studying a pathology."

I had nothing to say about that, and decided in this case to try saying nothing. Susan drank her coffee. I drank mine.

"Where's Hawk?" Susan said.

"I thought we'd have Sunday alone together."

"Except for the baby."

"Except for her."

"Is it safe?"

"Even without Hawk," I said, "I am not an amateur."

"True," Susan said. "Have you ever considered that your person might have been suicidal?"

"Nathan Smith?"

"Yes. A closeted gay man. Trying to pretend."

"There was no gun," I said.

"Too bad, he so fit the profile. A life spent in deception, finally too much."

I shrugged.