First You Fall: A Kevin Connor Mystery (8 page)

“You look great,” I told her.

“I’ve always loved your honesty, honey.”

“How did you get in?”

“I explained to the super that I was your mother, and that you hadn’t returned my messages for days.”

“He let you in because I didn’t return your cal s?”

“I might have said something about your being insulin dependent and that you were prone to diabetic comas.”

“Mom!”

“Wel ,” she waived her hand at me, “you should have cal ed.”

She turned to Tony. “Now, who’s this fine specimen? Wait a minute—Tony Rinaldi?”

Tony sobered up real quick. “Hi, Mrs. Connor,” he mumbled.

“Tony, honey,” she yel ed, pul ing him towards her in a hug that would have kil ed a lesser man. “Are you two crazy kids final y back together?”

“Not exactly,” I told her.

“Umm, I’m married,” Tony said.

“You’re married?”

“To a woman.”

“To a woman?”

“I’m straight.”

“You’re straight? You’re not straight.”

Tony threw him arms up and turned to me. “What is it with you people?”

“What is he talking about?” my mother asked me.

“Tony is saying that he’s heterosexual and that he’s married to a woman,” I said to my mother. I turned to Tony. “My mother is expressing disbelief because she knows about our history and because we were just making out in the hal way.”

“You were making out in the hal way?” my mother asked.

“Sorry, I thought you heard us,” I said.

“Why were you making out with a married man?” my mother asked me. Then to Tony: “Does your wife know about this?”

“No!” Tony shouted.

“Wel , I’m sure she’l be thril ed to know you’re fooling around,” my mother said. “God knows I was when I found out what my Henry was up to.”

“What was Dad up to?” I asked.

“Why do you think I’m here?” my mother asked.

“Why
are
you here?”

“Haven’t you been at least
listening
to my messages?”

The answer, of course, was no. Now I was paying the price. I grimaced.

“You’re father’s been slipping it to Dottie Kubacki; that’s why I’m here.” She gestured to her bags. “With these.”

“You’re giving me his luggage?”

“I’m moving in.”

Seeing me on the hot seat made Tony happy.

Grinning, he put his hand on my shoulder. “I hate to leave when this is getting good, but I better be going home.”

“To your wife?” my mother asked, pointedly.

“Yes,” Tony growled.

“I’l walk you downstairs,” I said to Tony.

Tony took my mother’s hand. “It’s been a pleasure seeing you again, Mrs. Connor. Kevin was right, you look wonderful. You haven’t aged a day since I last saw you.”

Whatever negative impression my mother had of Tony evaporated like water on a hot stove.

“You’ve always been such a dear,” my mother said, kissing him on the cheek. “Now, you two just run along. I’l wait up here.” As if I were worried she’d leave.

“OK, Mom, I’l be right back. And whatever you do, don’t unpack.”

I rode down the elevator with Tony. “Is it even possible that she could have worse timing?” I asked him.

Tony looked down at his crotch. “Not that I can see,” he answered. “You want me to shoot her? We can say we walked in and mistook her for a burglar.”

“No,” I said. “I’m too mad at my father to let him off the hook that easily. Dottie Kubacki?”

Dottie was a widow who lived two houses down from mine, five away from Tony’s old house. Almost as wide as she was tal , Dottie was not exactly the husband-stealing type.

“Maybe there’s been some kind of mistake,” Tony said. The elevator door opened and I escorted Tony to the door of my building. Even this late, the air stil felt as if it had been baked in a kiln.

“I’m going to walk to my car,” Tony said. “That’l burn off the beers. You go back upstairs and enjoy your mom.”

“I was hoping to enjoy
you.”

We stood awkwardly by the door. Here we were in another doorway. Half in, half out. Going in opposite directions.

I didn’t think it appropriate to give him a kiss goodnight, but I couldn’t imagine parting with a handshake. I decided to go for a compromise and hugged him. He hugged me back.

“Are you gonna be OK?” he asked.

I nodded into his chest.

Tony put his lips to the top of my head. “You know you have me al confused, right?”

I nodded again. I didn’t want to let go, but I did.

“You’l be fine,” Tony said. “I’l cal you tomorrow.”

“Would you real y do it?” I asked

“Cal you?”

“Shoot her.”

Tony grinned again. “So far,” he said, “you have a pretty good record of making me do things I shouldn’t.”

Yeah, I thought, but we hadn’t actual y
done
anything yet.

I watched him walk until he was gone. Then I went upstairs to face the fresh horrors that awaited me.

The Storm Settles In

I OPENED MY
apartment door and found my mother unpacking her bags. “I thought I asked you not to do that.”

“Don’t be sil y,” my mother said, shaking out a garment bag. “Do you know how hard it is to get wrinkles out of silk?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. But Mom, what are you doing here?”

“I told you. I found out a few days ago that your dad was … involved with that bitch Dottie Kubacki.

There was no way I could stay in the house after that.

I would have kicked him out, but where would he have gone? Dottie’s? I’d cut his legs off, first. I tried to cal and tel you that I was coming, but you never answered my messages.”

“What about Kara?” Kara was my married sister who lived in a big house in New Rochel e. A house with at least two guest bedrooms.

“You know she wouldn’t want me there. Besides, those kids would drive me crazy before too long.”

“‘Too long?’ How long do you plan on staying?” My mother started opening closets. Wel , closet.

There was only one. “Where’s your ironing board?”

“I don’t have one. And stop going through my things.” I was glad I hid my porn the other night when Tony was coming over, but it wasn’t
that
wel hidden.

“How can you not have an ironing board?”

“Kara has an ironing board.”

“And five-year-old triplets who should have their vocal cords cut,” my mother answered.

“I only have one bed,” I whined.

“I don’t mind if you sleep on the couch.” There was no use arguing with my mother. She’s like a force of nature when she gets like this: determined, inevitable, implacable. I’ve found that people are either appal ed or amused by her. I was usual y both.

So I helped her unpack. Tomorrow, I would cal my father and have him get her back. It was inconceivable to me that he was actual y having an affair with anyone, let alone with a woman who needed to have her dresses made at Omar the Tentmaker’s. I was more likely to sleep with Dottie Kubacki than my father. I was sure it was al a big misunderstanding.

After an hour spent turning on the couch, I realized I’d never get to sleep. The heavy snoring from my bedroom assured me that my mother wasn’t having the same problem. But then again, there happens to be a very comfortable bed in there.

Maybe I’d get to use it again someday.

I got out of bed and sat at my computer. I decided to see if I could find out a little more about Al en’s sons before I met them at the reading of the wil tomorrow.

First, the younger one. A Google of his name led to a few relevant links. The first was to the financial firm Ingerson Investing. Paul managed two of their largest mutual funds.

His picture was in the annual report. A handsome man, he was posed standing in front of his desk, arms crossed across his chest. His grim, serious-guy expression was meant to convey gravity and strength. But the slimness of his build, his thin lips, the two-hundred-dol ar haircut, and the perfect tailoring of his suit spoke to a certain effeteness. He seemed more likely to study himself in the mirror than to study financial reports.

I fol owed a few links to his funds, and sure enough, they had underperformed the market. I looked at the stocks he had recently bought for the funds, and some of them were real dogs, companies whose malfeasance or misfortunes had made the front pages. Unlike his father, who had a Midas touch with investing, Paul seemed to have the instincts of a born loser.

Another search led me to an article from the
New
York Times.
Paul and his wife were pictured at a cancer fundraiser at the Ritz Carlton. “Investment fund manager Paul Harrington and wife Alana,” the caption read.

Paul looked even spiffier here. Gucci shoes, a suit that fit him like it was custom made, and a white linen shirt buckled to the col ar, no tie. His wife, Alana, was attractive, but severe looking. Almost as tal as he, with sharp, birdlike features that made her smile look predatory. In a strapless white evening gown, her bony shoulders and prominent col arbone gave her the chic appeal of a bulimic. Lara Flynn Boyle would have to diet to get this skinny. Whoever said you can’t be too rich or too thin never saw this picture.

Next, I searched the name of the older brother, Michael. The first link took me to the Center for Creative Empowerment Therapy. There on the homepage was a picture of Michael, with a caption reading “Founder and Leader.”

Although the picture was just a head and shoulder shot, you could see Michael Harrington was a powerful y built and stunningly good-looking man.

Square jawed, heavily muscled, with sharp cheekbones and electric blue eyes. Although there was some resemblance between Paul and him, Michael seemed to have gotten both brothers’

al otment of testosterone.

Like his brother’s official portrait, Michael’s also showed him unsmiling. With his stern expression and piercing eyes, Michael gave you the feeling that if his “creative empowerment therapy” (whatever that was) didn’t work, he could just beat the neuroses out of you.

Hunky as he was, he could have made a fortune with Mrs. Cherry doing just that.

A click on his picture took you to his bio. I was just about to read more about him when an instant message popped up on my screen.

“Angel, what r u doing up?” Freddy typed.

I wrote him an abbreviated synopsis of my evening, making out with Tony, and my mother’s moving in.

“Just when I thought ur life couldn’t get any more dramatic,” Freddy wrote back. “What tragedy wil befal you next? A plague of locusts? Boils? A new Celine Dion album?

“Speaking of crazy divas,” he continued, “would u say hel o to ur mother for me?

I assured him I would.

“Good. Now go to bed. We have to be beautiful for the reading of the wil tomorrow.”

I looked at the time in the Windows taskbar. 2:45

A.M. Ugh.

I signed off and lay on the couch for another hour until sleep came.

Things Go Worse Than Expected

THREE HOURS LATER
I was awakened by the sound of grenades exploding in my kitchen. “What the hel ?” I shouted.

“Honey,” my mother said cheerily. “I was just looking for where you keep the food.”

Welcome, Hurricane Momma. For one blissful moment, I had forgotten about my new roommate.

“I don’t keep any food,” I groaned.

“Toast?”

“Toast is food.”

“Coffee?”

“Nope.”

“How about some tea?”

“I have protein powder, milk, and bananas.”

“Maybe some eggs?”

“Am I going to have to get out of bed?”

“You’re not in bed,” my mother reminded me.

“You’re on the couch. And yes, you have to get up.

Momma’s going to take you out to breakfast at that greasy spoon on the corner. You know, breakfast is a very important meal. The most important of the day, I always say. I don’t know how you can be productive if you don’t start out with a good breakfast

…”

Maybe I should have taken Tony up on that offer to shoot her.

After our breakfast, my mother and I went our separate ways: She to the beauty parlor she runs in Hauppauge, Long Island, I to my apartment to change. I told her that the super would let her in if she got home before I did, but she assured me that he had already given her an extra key. Great.

I put on a pair of tan khakis, a white dress shirt, tan boat shoes, and carried a blue linen blazer, the outfit I wear when a client requests “a nice, clean boy.” I considered wearing a tie, but the blistering heat made me decide otherwise. I don’t know how people who have real jobs survive in this city.

I took a cab to the law office where Al en’s wil was to be read. Standing outside was Freddy, looking spectacular in a black suit with a white silk T-shirt underneath. The outfit was just this side of
Miami
Vice,
but Freddy could pul it off.

“What happened to the sequins?” I asked, getting out of the cab.

“I thought, ‘why detract from my natural beauty?’” Freddy answered. “You look very
Lands End,
darling.”

“Thanks for coming.” I kissed him on the cheek.

“These people scare me.”

“Wel , Auntie Freddy wil protect you,” he said, ushering me inside. “You know there isn’t a white person in the world who scares me.”

We rode the elevator to the forty-fifth floor, where we entered the offices of Al en’s law firm. I could see why rich people would trust them with their finances.