Chapter Forty

Forty

"Do you think he's still alive?" my dad asked, sipping his Hendrick's martini. He was talking about Dylan Welch.

"I do," I said. "But I'll admit I don't have a logical reason for feeling that way."

We were sitting at our favorite table at The Street Bar, the two of us in comfy chairs under low lighting. I sipped a very dry Chablis, snacking on potato chips, mixed nuts, and green olives. I'd just given Dad the full update on this increasingly bizarre case.

I'd found it a lot easier than talking to Lee. One, because I didn't have to worry about keeping any information from my father. And two, because The Street Bar was so damn atmospheric. It reminded me, in a way, of Susan Silverman's office—not so much in terms of décor but in its sense of calm.

How strange was it that, just twenty-four hours earlier, I'd been there, in Susan's office, complaining about Richie, his suggestion that I ease up on "dangerous" cases like this one fresh in my mind and stinging? One day ago. It felt like a year…Regardless, this place did make me realize how much more enjoyable therapy would be if booze and snacks were provided.

"Think about it," Dad was saying. "Welch may have supplied the drugs that led to this girl's overdose, when he'd nearly died himself just a couple weeks earlier. If he has a conscience, that might have been enough to send him over the edge. If he's conscience-free, he had plenty of practical reasons: The Mob was after him, and maybe he'd been made aware, maybe not…he was the prime suspect in a murder and in the attempted murder of his best friend." My dad took a sip. "Not much to live for."

"I've thought about all that," I said. "It's true. But my intuition says otherwise."

"What exactly does it say?"

I took a sip of my Chablis and ate a few more potato chips. I was hogging all the snacks, but I couldn't help it. I was starving. I'd barely eaten since the bagels this morning. "I guess I just keep thinking about what Lydia Welch said when she first hired me," I said. "She told me she has a connection with Dylan. She knows he's alive and he needs her help…Jeez, saying it out loud…I know it sounds like a bunch of woo-woo crap."

"Woo-woo?" Dad said.

"Mumbo jumbo," I said.

"Ah. Well, actually, no, it doesn't," he said. "Parents can sense these things. It's not mumbo jumbo. It's a part of nature." He smiled.

I smiled back. "Oh, I almost forgot," I said. "The head of security at Gonzo is a former cop, and he remembers you fondly."

"Who doesn't—I mean, who isn't dead or in jail?"

I shrugged. "I can't think of anybody." I sipped more of my Chablis.

"So what was the fellow's name?" he said.

"Maurice Dupree."

"Hmm…" He stared off into space for a moment, then started to laugh. "I remember Maurice," he said. "I liked him a lot."

I drank more wine. "Well, the feeling's mutual."

"Not the greatest cop, but a sweet, sweet guy."

"Not the greatest cop?"

Dad sighed. He drank his martini. His hand trembled a bit as he raised the glass, but we both pretended not to notice. I popped more olives into my mouth and waited for him to speak.

"That wasn't very fair of me," he said. "He was a perfectly fine cop, but he had a very, very messy personal life. Married with three kids and a very demanding mistress that we all knew about. It's a wonder his wife didn't."

I stopped chewing and stared at him. This genuinely surprised me. Maurice did not seem like a cheater—this man who apologized for saying the f-word. Though, when I thought about it, I wasn't sure what one thing had to do with the other.

"The mistress wanted presents, but his wife did all their bills, right?" Dad was saying. "If he spent a dime, the jig was up. So what Maurice did…He swiped a few items for her out of the evidence locker."

I drank more of my wine and stared at him. "Are you kidding me?"

"Trust me, it sounds a lot worse than it was. It was never anything really material. I remember there was a fake fur. Some costume jewelry. All cold-case stuff," he said. "In fact, nobody could even prove it was Maurice who was doing it, but a bunch of us had our suspicions. Then he takes this one item…Damn. It's so long ago, I can't remember what it was…"

He raised his glass with a shaking hand, then put it down again without drinking, as though this were a battle and the tremor had won. "Anyway, this thing Maurice took was so obvious, no one could ignore it. Sergeant had to let him go." He pushed his drink away, his smile fading. "It was such a good story. And now it's…it's gone." An emotion passed through his eyes—a type of melancholy. I'd seen it before. It happened when he lost memories, but it looked as though he was losing dear friends. And these days, it was happening more and more frequently.

I put my hand over his and gave it a squeeze. "It's okay," I said. "You can call me when you remember."

He nodded. I sipped my wine. He ate a few potato chips. I ate some nuts.

"Anyway," I said. "I feel like Dylan's out there. And if anybody knows where he is, it's Sky."

"So talk to her," he said.

"In the hospital?"

"Visiting hours are up until eight or nine," he said. "Go over there and sit at her bedside and act like you're concerned. Chat her up. You know how it goes. The truth works itself out like a splinter. You just have to wait and be patient. She'll slip."

"But, Dad," I said, "she's really smart."

"You're smarter." He said it as though it was the absolute truth.

My throat tightened up. I drank more wine and watched my father raise his glass to his lips, successfully this time. He drank his martini and smiled at me, and I thought, What would I ever do without him? The question didn't feel as rhetorical as it used to, and I didn't like that. I didn't like this train of thought at all.

"One of the things I like about Richie," Dad said. "He's always known how smart you are."

I sighed. Finished the rest of my glass. "And here I thought we'd go for a whole evening without talking about Richie."

"He's a good kid. You're good together. I can't help it."

I finished the potato chips. "We had an argument yesterday. Kind of," I said. "I don't think he knew it was an argument, because the arguing part happened in my head."

"What was it about?"

"He wants me to semi-retire."

Dad looked at me. "Richie said that?"

"Well…no."

"What did he say, then?"

"He wants me to stop taking dangerous cases."

Dad shrugged. "Sounds like he cares about you."

I looked at him. "I know you retired because of Mom."

He smiled and shook his head. "I retired because it was time."

"But Mom was the one who started making noises about it."

"It's so long ago," he said quietly. "I can barely remember."

"Do you ever resent her for that, Dad?" I said.

He started to say no, but I held up a hand. "Please," I said. "Be honest with me. I know it's your passion because it's my passion, too. You retired for Mom. Because you love her and she wanted you out of harm's way and so she insisted. I love Richie, and so I need to know…If I do what he wants—and what he wants is for me to live, I understand that—will I ever regret getting back together with him?"

I swallowed the rest of my Chablis. I hadn't intended to say any of that. It had been weighing on my mind more than I thought it had, this whole thing with Richie, how it felt like an ultimatum. But was that an excuse to ambush my father like that—to make him dig up emotions he'd no doubt conveniently buried? "You don't have to answer that, Dad," I said. "Honestly, I'm so caught up in this case, I don't know what I'm talking about."

It was his turn to hold a hand up. He took a sip of his martini and set the glass down and gave me a slight smile—a mixture of bemusement and concern. "Mom was the one who started making noises about me retiring. You're right about that," he said. "But she made them for seven years before I did anything about it."

I stared at him. "Seven years?"

"Maybe seven and a half."

"But…I thought—"

"Nope. You two girls know a lot about Mom and me. But you don't know us in our entirety." He finished his martini, that wry smile still on his face.

"She waited for you," I said.

"Yes," he said. "And I bet Richie will wait for you, too. It's what you do when you love someone."

I drank some water. Put the glass down carefully. I was at a loss for words—the way I always was when I realized I'd been wrong about something. And this particular something was huge. My mother, making an actual compromise. Out of love. "What do I do, Dad?" I said finally.

My father waved to the server and asked for the check, handing her his credit card the way he always did, without letting me look at it. "I already told you what to do," he said once she left.

"You did?"

"Yes," he said. "Go to the hospital."