Guilty (13 page)

I want to hit something. Rip something. Destroy something.

I push myself up off the couch and go up to my dad's room. Like Tracie, he has his own closet, which Tracie used to call his dressing room. It's got all his suits in there, hung up neatly. It's got his shoes on rows of low shelves. It's got shelves of sweaters and jeans, shirts and T-shirts. It's got little drawers of socks and underwear.

And, behind a mirror, it's got the safe.

I hinge the mirror back and look at the round door of the safe with its combination lock. My father thinks I don't know the combination, but I do. I found out by accident one day after my mother died, when I was snooping around. The men had come to install the safe, and I heard my dad joking with one of them that he had a combination that would not only keep the jewelry safe from robbers but also from “my second wife.” He'd laughed, and the workmen had laughed with him. I figured out the combination pretty fast. I started with my birthday. Then I tried my mom's. The safe popped open. But I never told him.

I reach out for the cold steel of the combination dial now. I twist it around one way, then back the other, then around again. It opens. I turn on the light over the safe and reach inside for the boxes of velvet-lined jewelry. I pull them out and open them, ready to inventory what's there, ready to make sure Tracie didn't lose anything else that she had no right wearing in the first place. I know every piece by heart. When I was little and my mother was getting ready to go out, I used to watch her try things on and choose what went best with whatever she was planning to wear or wherever she was planning to go.

I open the first box and lift out the pieces one by one—the gold, the silver, the diamonds, the rubies, the emeralds and, my favorite, the sapphires that sparkled like my mom's eyes. Everything is there.

Everything is in the next box too. And the next.

And—I don't understand it—in the last box.

Everything.

Including the earrings that my father was looking for in Tracie's closet. They're right there in their little velvet compartment, where they lived when they weren't on Tracie's ears.

I start to reach into my pocket for my cell phone to tell my dad the good news.

Then I see that there is something else in the safe—something that wasn't there the last time I looked. An envelope. I reach in and pull it out. That's when I find out it's actually two envelopes, both addressed from my dad, both from the same place. I open the first one and read it. I put it back and open the second one. I read that too.

Then I put everything back exactly where I found it, and I close the safe.

I stand there for a long time before I swing the mirror back into place, hiding the safe again. I look at my reflection, at the shell-shocked expression on my face. I don't know how long it is before I leave my father's room and go back downstairs. I do know that it's a long time before I take out my phone and dial my dad's number at the club.

“Hello?” His voice is impatient. I hear music pulsing in the background.

“Dad, it's me—”

“What?” He sounds surprised. “Finn? Hang on a sec.” What I hear next is muffled, which is how I know that there is someone else in his office with him.

“…dark hair,” the other voice is saying. I'm pretty sure it's one of the bouncers. “Cute. She was at the funeral. Maybe you saw her.” I miss the next bit. “…to Dodo. Said she was asking about Mrs. Newsome. I thought you'd want to know…”

My dad's voice cuts in, crisp and clear.

“Finn, I'll call you back, okay?”

Before I can say anything, all I hear is dead air.

Minutes tick by, and I think he's forgotten me. He gets preoccupied by work. My mother used to complain about it. Then my phone rings.

“What's up, son?”

“It's nothing,” I say. But that's not true. “They should have told you, Dad.”

“Who? What's going on?” There it is, that hint of impatience, although I know he's trying for my sake to keep it under control.

“The parole board. If they'd let you know—”

I hear something else. A noise. But I can't identify it.

“Finn, I know you're having a hard time with all this. But do you think it can keep until I get home? I'll try to get away early. We'll have breakfast together. What do you say?”

“Dad, I just—”

“I gotta go, son. I'll see you when I get home. I promise.”

I hear dead air.

Twenty-Two

LILA

I
fly from the house as soon as I hang up the phone. I tell myself, if I don't hurry, I'll be late. First I am walking fast. Then I am jogging. Then I break into a run. People turn to look at me as I speed past them. A hundred questions and regrets are spinning around in my head. Maybe if I run fast enough, I will leave them behind.

But, of course, I don't.

The whole time I'm running, I think about Finn Newsome. It was a mistake to give him my phone number, just like it was a mistake to make this latest call.

Or was it?

I knew what I was doing when I recited my phone number, just like I knew what I was doing when I went to that funeral. I wanted to talk to him. I wanted him to tell me exactly what he saw. But then what happened? I made a mess of it when he turned up at my door. All I succeeded in doing was upsetting him. I didn't get a chance to ask him what I'd wanted to.

Okay, that's not the truth—not the whole of it anyway.

The truth is that I chickened out. I was afraid what he would think if I started asking about that night and about what had happened to his mother all those years ago.

The truth is that I was afraid how he would react when he found out who
I
am, that I'm the daughter of the man who killed both his mother and his stepmother. I was afraid this complete stranger would hate me.

I arrive at the coffee shop out of breath and fifteen minutes early and sit down. As my breath returns to normal, I tell myself I should just stop and go home. But I don't. I'm getting good at telling myself to do one thing and then ignoring myself and doing the opposite. More truth: I spent most of my childhood with kids and grown-ups whispering behind my back:
Poor Lila, her dad
is in prison. He killed a woman.
What will they say now? I don't want to know.

I take a seat at a small table near the front of the restaurant where there's no chance that he will miss me, although, really, why would he? He agreed to meet me. He seemed glad that I called. He was the one who suggested the place. He also told me not to worry, he remembers what I look like.

I'm telling myself to take long slow breaths that will trick my body into thinking everything is okay, but even so, I'm practically jumping out of my skin from nervousness. I'm meeting an honest-to-god ex-con. I realize I don't even know what he was charged with or how long he was in there. He could be an ax murderer. Or some kind of psycho pervert. Or—another possibility—maybe he's lying about knowing my father. The possibilities rattle around in my head, and I tell myself that if I was smart, I'd get out of there. Right now. Instead, when the waitress comes around, I order a coffee, which is pretty much the last thing I need. I'm stirring it around and around when he comes through the door. Peter Struthers.

He spots me right away, smiles and comes over to my table. He sits. The waitress comes back again, and he orders a coffee.

“How are you doing, Lila?” he says. His smile looks genuine and warm. But so what? I watch tv just like anyone else. I know that psychos can come across as normal. Even better than normal—they can come across as sincere.

“I'm okay,” I say. I take a sip of coffee to cover my nervousness, but it doesn't work. My hand shakes, and coffee slops onto the table.

Peter Struthers mops it up with a paper napkin.

“You want something to eat?” he asks.

I shake my head.

He studies me.

“Have you eaten anything today? Because I know how hard it can be after losing a loved one…”

I haven't eaten. I've barely slept. I guess that's why I snap. That, and the fact that I hate it when people tell me they know how I feel when
I
know for a fact that they don't.

“How exactly do you know my dad?” I say. I sound like a real bitch, but at that moment I don't care.

His eyes jump wide for a moment. He's taken aback. But all he says is, “I was a volunteer in a prison program.”

I have to hand it to him; he's said the last thing I expected to hear.

“Volunteer?” For god's sake, I tell myself. Just spit it out, the question you've been dying to ask: what were you in for?

“My regular job is teaching—adult education,” he says. “At the time I met your dad, I was dating a social worker.” There's that gentle smile again. “She's my wife now. She was the one who got me into the volunteer program.”

I'm staring at him like he's just climbed out of a spaceship and is waggling his little green antennae at me.

“You're a
teacher
?” I say.

“Yes.” He's puzzled by my puzzlement. Then he smiles. “Oh,” he says. “You thought I was—”

“I'm sorry.” I cut him off. I don't want to hear him say what I was thinking. I don't think I could stand to sound so stupid.

“It's okay. I should have done a better introduction. But it wasn't exactly the best time, you know?”

I sure do.

“Anyway, it was through volunteering that I met your dad. By the time he finally decided to join my group, he was pretty determined to make a big change in his life.”

“What kind of change?” I ask.

He frowns and leans back in his chair. The way he's looking at me makes me feel like the dumbest person on the planet.

“He decided he wanted to learn to read and write.”

I stare in astonishment at Peter Struthers. I shake my head. We can't be talking about the same person.

“My father was Louis Ouimette,” I say.

He nods. His eyes lock onto mine, and I see that they're the same gray as a stormy sky.

“He had you fooled, huh?” he says.

“Fooled? I don't understand. My father was French-Canadian. He—”

“He used that as his cover. Or he'd say he'd broken his glasses and hadn't gotten around to getting them replaced.”

Again with the glasses! He reminds me of Dodo—and neither of them knows what they're talking about.

“My father was born in Quebec,” I say angrily. “In the north. He lived there until—”

He raises a hand in surrender.

“I'm doing a lousy job at communicating,” he says. “I don't mean that I didn't think your father was really French-Canadian. I just meant that he used that to cover the fact that he was functionally illiterate—in any language.”

Illiterate?

“Not
my
father,” I say. “My father put a high value on education. He was always telling me it was the most important thing.” But I'm thinking about the box I found, which is the reason I called Peter Struthers in the first place. And even as I'm practically yelling the words at him, I realize that he isn't the person I'm angry with. He just happens to be the only person around I can yell at.

He stays perfectly calm.

“Your dad put a high value on education because his own lack of it had a big impact on his life, Lila. It took him a long time to realize it, but he did. I taught your father for the past few years. When he was first recommended for the class, he refused. He wouldn't even admit that he needed to learn. Then something changed. He told me it was you. He said he realized that he was going to get out one day and he wanted to make a life with you. I think that's what made him change his mind. He didn't want you to think he was stupid.”

“Why would I think that? My father wasn't stupid. He had problems. But he knew a lot of stuff. He could fix anything. And he could make things. Anything.”

Peter Struthers nods. “It's been my experience that people who are functionally illiterate are very clever about hiding it. And they compensate by developing other skills. People like your dad, who function pretty well without being able to read and write, can develop good memories. And, in your dad's case, he had good spatial abilities. Once he made up his mind and got over the impatience that adults often experience when learning what they think of as kid stuff, he did really well. Grammar drove him crazy, but he applied himself. He did it for you, Lila.”

My mind is racing. I want to tell him he's wrong about my father.

“You're saying my father really was illiterate?”

“Functionally illiterate. And the key word is
was
. To all intents and purposes, he couldn't read and write when he went into prison. But he could when he got out. That's what I wanted to tell you. He used to write to me from time to time. I know he never told you. He was too ashamed. But I think it was a great thing that he did. And he did it for you more than for himself. I know he's had a rough life. I also know that you loved him. I thought you would be happy to know what he did for you. Happy and proud.”

Tears dribble down my cheeks as I think about what he's just told me. I remember my mother reading to me when I was small, before she died. But never my father. He used to watch tv with me. And sports. And sometimes movies. But he never read to me. And now that I think about it, I can't remember ever seeing him with a book. Or a newspaper. And he was always too busy—so he said—to go to my school to meet my teachers.

And then he was in prison.

“But I used to write to him.”

“He got the prison chaplain to read your letters to him. It was the chaplain who asked me to talk to him about enrolling in my class. He turned me down at first.”

“He never wrote to me.”

“He couldn't bring himself to tell someone else to write what was in his heart, not even the chaplain. And, anyway, he knew you would never stop writing—or visiting.”