Omens (23 page)

“So the fight was about Jan and Pete?”

“Yes. Tim had started seeing a new girl. Christian had still been hoping Jan and Tim would reunite. He found out that Jan had called Tim to say she was happy for him. Christian exploded. He told Jan it was rude and cruel to congratulate Tim on finding a replacement for her. They fought. Christian stormed out. He came back that night after Jan was in bed. They didn’t speak the next day and then…”

And then Jan and Pete were dead.

“So it was nothing,” Anna said. “A family fight. Hardly anything that would make Christian…” She shook her head. “I can’t even say the words.”

After a few more questions, Gabriel wrapped it up. He asked if Anna had any contact with Tim Marlotte. Turned out they still exchanged Christmas cards. She had his number and was happy to ask him to speak to us.

As we left, Gabriel was closing the door and I noticed the welcome sign. Earlier I’d seen only red flowers on it. Now I saw what they were and tried not to stiffen.

“Poppies,” I murmured. “An odd choice for decoration.”

“Why?”

“Do you know what they signify?”

“Opium?”

I shook my head and started down the steps. “Death. Appropriate, I suppose, given all she’s been through.” I tried not to think of her father, of what she’d go through then. “God, I don’t think I said one word in there.”

“You did very well.” He reached into his pocket. “Have a cookie.”

I took it. “I didn’t even see you swipe that,” I said as I circled the front of the car.

“Just like you didn’t see me take Grace’s scone the other day. You need to pay more attention, Olivia. You’re very good at listening. But paying attention is about more than listening.”

“Yes, sir.”

We got into the car.

As he backed out, he checked his watch. “Not yet one o’clock. We can talk on the way back to Cainsville or we can go to lunch.”

“Lunch, please. Keep it under fifty bucks and you can even put it on my tab.”

Gabriel took me to a deli near our highway exit. We ordered at the counter, then took numbers to a table to await our food.

“So now I know why you wanted me to look frumpy,” I said as we sat. “You could have just told me.”

“Could I? Let’s see. I’d say, ‘You need to dress down for the interview today because Anna Gunderson finds me irresistible,’ and you’d say…”

I sputtered a laugh.

He turned a look on me.

“Sorry,” I said. “It was … the way you worded it.”

“I’m sure it was.”

I pulled the paper from my straw. “I was impressed by how you handled it. You knew what she wanted to see, and you pulled it off so well even I was almost convinced.”

“Almost? What gave me away?”

I hesitated.

“Something gave me away. I’d like to know what it is so I can correct the oversight. What was it?”

“Physical contact.”

A lift of his brows.

The server arrived with our sandwiches. I waited until she was gone and said, “When you brushed her hand or touched her arm, it was awkward. That was the only time I could tell it was an act. My advice? Work with it. Start to reach out and then stop yourself. It’ll look like you
want
to touch her even more than if you actually did.”

He considered. “That might work. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

I took a bite of my sandwich. Then I opened my notebook.

“Okay, we have Anna’s story. So what’s your take on it?”

T
he journalist spooned through his soup, looking for more meatballs, annoyed by the shortage but really, if he admitted it, annoyed with himself for blowing a story. It’d been an easy assignment. Everyone knew the councillor was a huge fan of the Cubs—or, at least, a huge fan of the player her husband had hired for his car dealership ads. The problem? No one could prove it.

Then the
Post
got an anonymous tip. The Cub boy toy had checked into a motel and the tipster saw the councillor slip into his room. The journalist got there and staked out the place. Two hours later, he’d heard the roar of the ballplayer’s Porsche peeling from the parking lot, which meant the fifty-year-old councillor must have climbed out the motel window. Hey, she was banging a twenty-six-year-old, so she wasn’t exactly an arthritic old lady. But his editor wasn’t going to buy that. He was in deep shit.

And that’s when he saw Gabriel Walsh.

He knew Walsh on sight. Everyone at the
Post
did. Their readers loved him. Or loved to hate him. Same thing, really. At thirty, the man was already a legend. Graduated first in his class. Grew up on the streets. Had a juvie record for picking pockets. Paid for law school with an illegal betting ring where he’d played the triple role of bookie, loan shark, and collection agency. Or that was the legend. The truth, as anyone who’d done his research knew, was a little different. Walsh had graduated in the top quarter of his class but hardly first. The betting? Street life? Juvie record? All unproven. Even his age varied from story to story.

Yet the fact that the rumors were unproven and not
disproven
meant they were still in play. Oh sure, they could just be mean-spirited gossip invented by envious colleagues. Maybe despite his reputation, Gabriel Walsh was a very nice guy.

The journalist laughed, nearly choking on his Coke. While some girls at the office were certain Walsh only played the role of a cold son of a bitch, it was generally accepted he was
not
a nice guy. Or even a reasonably decent guy. There were too many stories.

If the journalist could prove one of those uglier rumors was fact, he’d have a real article. Others in his esteemed profession had tried. A couple from lesser publications had written stories rife with innuendo and anonymous sources. One resulted in a lawsuit that forced the closure of the weekly rag and the reporter’s decision, at thirty-two, to take early retirement in Mexico. In the other case, the magazine survived the lawsuit, but the reporter had ended up where he’d hoped to put Walsh—in jail. Apparently it wasn’t a good idea to go after a guy like Walsh when you have a coke problem so serious you’re dealing on the side to pay for it. Of course, there were those who said the dealing started
after
the article came out, at the prompting of the journalist’s supplier, who had some tenuous connection to the Satan’s Saints. But that was just rumor.

All things considered, though, it was probably best if he forgot about digging up a story on Walsh and settled for enjoying the very nice legs on his female companion. When he’d noticed her notebook and pen, he thought maybe she was a reporter, some cute young thing who’d managed to snag an interview. But no, others had tried that gambit. Walsh allowed his clients to do interviews but never gave them himself.

Was she his date, then? She was attractive enough, with the kind of face you noticed and thought was beautiful, then on closer inspection realized wasn’t really—nose and jaw a little too strong—but you kept looking anyway. Her glasses were flattering, but why the hell would she wear them when she had such a striking face? And her hair … That was the worst. A horrible red dye job that was already fading. Underneath, her hair looked blond. That was as much a crime as the glasses. Why would you dye your hair when—

The young woman turned, her gaze following a woman’s bag adorned with poppies. She frowned slightly and when she did, at that angle…

Holy shit.

It couldn’t be. He never got that lucky.

He yanked out his phone and ran a quick Internet image search. The tiny screen filled with results. He clicked on one and looked at the photo, then at the young woman, now listening to something Walsh was saying.

Olivia Taylor-Jones.

Eden Larsen.

The society-brat-turned-serial-killers’-daughter was having lunch with the man who’d once represented her mother.

Now he had a story.

A
s we walked to the car, Gabriel gave me research assignments.

“Summarize your findings and e-mail them to me. I’m in court most of tomorrow, but if you have it to me tonight, I can give it a read and suggest new research directions.”

“I can’t do it tonight. I work until eleven and the library closes at six.”

“Library? Why…?” He sighed. Deeply.

“Yes, I need a computer. I’m saving up for one.”

He waved for me to cut through a parking lot. “I imagine that’s a new experience for you.”

“It is. I’m catching up on everything I missed not being raised by the Larsens. Counting my pennies. Saving up for a new bike, a Ouija board, a hunting knife to teach a lesson to all the mean girls…” I put my notebook away. “Speaking of which, how’s the gun situation coming along?”

“I’m reconsidering the wisdom of that right now.” He waved me to the left. “It’s coming. As for the computer…”

“I need better Internet access, I know. Larry has a computer at the diner. He’d probably let me use it—”

“Mr. Walsh!” a man’s voice called behind us.

As Gabriel turned, he pulled me behind him, the move so smooth I didn’t even realize what he was doing until I was confronted by the wall of his back.

“Yes?” Gabriel said.

The patter of jogging footsteps. “Colin Hale.
Chicago Post
. I—”

“Turn around, Mr. Hale, and go back the way you came.”

“I just want—”

“I don’t speak to reporters, Mr. Hale. Turn around now.”

“It’s actually your client I’d like to talk to.” A nervous laugh. “Or maybe
client
is the wrong word. I imagine Miss Larsen is looking for information on her mother. Right? Family history, so to speak.”

Hale tried to sidestep, but Gabriel blocked him. I stayed where I was. As much as I might like to stand up for myself, I didn’t need another “serial-killer junior” photo in the paper. And Gabriel did make a very good wall.

“I’m going to ask you one more time, Mr. Hale. Turn around now.”

Hale tried to dodge around him again and Gabriel’s arm swung. I heard the crack of fist hitting bone. I saw Hale fly off his feet, blood spraying from his mouth.

Hale hit the pavement, and Gabriel strode over. He reached down and patted the man’s jacket pockets. When Hale’s hands flew up to ward him off, Gabriel just swatted them away, his face expressionless. He found what he was looking for—the reporter’s cell phone—and took it, then walked back and nudged me to resume our journey to the car.

Gabriel stayed behind me. When I glanced back, he was doing something on the phone, nonchalantly, as if unconcerned about turning his back on a man he’d just decked. At the scrabble of gravel, he tensed. He didn’t look back or even stop walking, but he was clearly listening.

He glanced up from the phone and gave me a “keep going” wave. A moment later, he murmured, “Good.”

I looked back to see him pitch the phone in Hale’s direction.

“No photos?” I said.

“Just a poor one of us in the diner. I erased it and checked his e-mail in case he’d sent it. He hadn’t.”

We continued to the car. I waited until we were on the road, then said, “You aren’t worried you’ll get in trouble for hitting him?”

“No, I do it all the time.”

He was joking. I think.

Gabriel turned onto the road leading to the highway. “He can’t write about it without witnesses, which he doesn’t have. He could report the assault, but he wouldn’t get far. A reporter tried that back when I started my practice. He approached me for an interview. When he wouldn’t leave, I responded in what could be called a threatening manner. He reported that I assaulted him. I had not. That was proven beyond any doubt. Shortly after that a photographer tried something similar with the same results. Clearly I was being stereotyped by my size and my choice of clientele and being persecuted by the media for my refusal to grant them unrestricted access to my clients.”

“So now, if you do hit a reporter and he wants you charged with assault, the cops ignore it. Lucky break for you, then, getting two false accusations right off the bat.”

“There’s no such thing as luck, Olivia.”

I laughed. When I did, he glanced over and studied my expression before turning back to the road.

I suppose if he was saying that he’d engineered the false accusations, I should be appalled. I thought of what happened in the parking lot. The way he’d hit Hale. The casualness of it. Punching the man hard enough to knock him off his feet. Maybe even hard enough to loosen teeth.

I remembered Gabriel’s expression. No anger. Not even annoyance. He’d warned Hale. When the man tried to get past, he hit him. A reasonable response to a threat.

I glanced over at him.

“Yes?” he said, gaze still on the road.

“You have blood on your cuff.”

He stretched his arm out over the steering wheel, suit jacket sleeve shooting back, his right cuff speckled with Hale’s blood. A murmured curse of annoyance, and he adjusted the cuff so it wouldn’t show.

“I think what happened proves my earlier point, Olivia. You are recognizable in that ‘disguise.’ While Hale didn’t get a photograph, he may still write a piece saying he saw you with me. He may include a description of your attempts to disguise yourself. You need to give this some serious thought.”

“How? He’ll print that or he won’t. I…” I paused. “Shit. I need to warn my mother.” I took out my cell. The battery was dead. I swore again.

“Can I use yours?” I said. “I’ll block the number. It’s a local call. I’m just passing a message through the family lawyer.”

“For your mother?” Gabriel glanced over. “She’s not speaking to you?”

“She’s in Europe avoiding the media mess. Which doesn’t mean she won’t hear of this if it’s printed, unfortunately.”

“Europe?” His brows lifted. He said nothing, but his expression spoke for him. Part of me wanted to make excuses for her. And part of me saw his reaction and felt relief, vindication even. If someone as objective as Gabriel Walsh found my mother’s behavior odd, I wasn’t wrong to be annoyed with her.

“If you’re speaking to
her
lawyer, perhaps
yours
should speak to him,” he said. “I can convey your message.”