Sleeping Beauty (16 page)

“You're Catholic, so abortion is probably not on the agenda. I think she'll carry the baby to term and put it up for adoption. If that's the case, Norman wants to raise the baby. He wants to adopt. That's why I'm here, to work things out.”

Van Meter's features tightened as Philips spoke. He was livid by the time the lawyer finished.

“Your client is lucky that I'm not suing him for slander, which I will if you breathe one word of this scandalous accusation outside this room.”

“Your daughter isn't pregnant?”

“The private life of Mr. Van Meter's daughter is none of your business,” Brucher said.

“I beg to differ with you, Anton,” Philips answered calmly. “If she's carrying my client's child it is definitely my business. It will become the business of the courts if you and Mr. Van Meter persist in insulting my intelligence and threatening my client.”

Philips turned to Henry Van Meter. “If we sue for custody, your daughter will be fodder for every gossipmonger in the state. Is that what you want?”

“How much?” Brucher asked.

Philips shook his head in disgust. “Now that is insulting. But I'll let it pass. Norman isn't after Mr. Van Meter's money. He is a very moral young man who wants to do what is right.”

“Your client has been misinformed,” Henry said. “My daughter is studying abroad. I'm not convinced that she even knows this person. She never mentioned him to me.”

Philips took several photographs of Norm's battered face and laid them on the conference table.

“If Casey doesn't know Norman, and she isn't pregnant, what was your son's motive in beating my client to a pulp?”

“Miles did not do this,” Henry said after casting a brief glance at the pictures.

“He'll have a chance to prove that at his trial,” Philips said.

“Now you're threatening my son?” Van Meter asked, outraged.

“I'm not threatening anyone. I'm just making certain that you understand that many people will be hurt and embarrassed if you continue to deny the truth. I would think that you'd be happy to have this problem off your hands. You might even have a personal interest in the child's welfare, Mr. Van Meter. The baby will be your grandchild.”

Philips paused for a moment to let what he'd said sink in.

“Would you step outside for a moment so I can confer with my client?” Brucher asked.

“Sure.”

Ken Philips smoked a cigarette in the hall while Brucher and Van Meter conferred. They called him back twenty minutes later.

“We don't concede that there is any merit to your claim, Ken,” Brucher said, “but, hypothetically, if Casey is pregnant and agreed to let Mr. Spencer adopt her baby, would Mr. Spencer be willing to refrain from any future contact with the Van Meters and to agree to keep the identity of the child's mother secret?”

“Let me talk to my client.”

Y
our father agreed to Henry Van Meter's terms,” Jerry Philips explained to Ashley. “His parents helped him raise you. Norman worked during the day and went to Portland State at night to get a degree. That's where he met Terri. They fell in love and Norman told her about you. Getting a ready-made family wasn't something Terri had bargained for, but she loved Norman and she fell in love with you.”

“How do you know all this stuff about my parents' private life?” Ashley asked.

“My father had notes of interviews with your father in his files, and Henry told me a lot. My dad's point about you being his grandchild hit home. Henry was a bastard, but he was a bastard who wanted his line to continue. He assumed that Miles or Casey would have other children somewhere down the line, but you were his first grandchild, and he had an investigator from Brucher's law firm keep track of you and Norman.”

“He spied on us?”

Jerry shrugged. “I don't know if he thought of it that way. At some point he realized that neither of his children was going to give him another grandchild anytime soon, maybe ever. Then he became ill. Once he decided that you were the last of his line, he watched you more closely.”

Ashley sat back. Her life had been an illusion orchestrated by her
father, Henry Van Meter, and men she'd never met. How could her father and Terri have lied to her all these years?

“Does Miles know about this?”

“Only Henry, Anton Brucher, my father, Norman, his parents, and Terri knew until Henry told me.”

“So Dean Van Meter never knew I was her daughter?”

“As far as I know, Casey never learned who adopted her child.”

“Then how did I get the scholarship to the Academy? After what you've told me, I don't believe it was chance.”

“Henry arranged for the scholarship after your father was murdered. He also talked to someone at Brucher, Platt about putting you in his will shortly before your father was murdered, but he had his stroke and Casey was hurt and he never got around to it. He asked me about drafting a new will for him when he hired me to find you. Then he died.”

“Why would he care about me all of a sudden? He'd never done anything for me before.”

“He changed after the stroke almost killed him. He became very religious and he developed a social conscience. When he was younger, Henry had no sympathy for or interest in the poor. He believed in a class system run by men like his father who had started with nothing and became rich. The Academy started as an elite boys' school and he didn't let in girls until Casey was old enough to attend. In recent years, he started giving scholarships to deserving minority students and children of the poor.”

“That was big of him,” Ashley said bitterly. “And now he's trying to manipulate me from the grave to get me to rescue a selfish bitch who thought nothing of giving me away so I wouldn't interfere with her fucking and partying.”

“Like it or not, Casey Van Meter is your mother. If she comes out of her coma who knows what might happen between you.”

“Why should I care if anything happens? She never gave a damn about me.”

“Ashley, I know this has hit you hard. It's overwhelming. Don't make any decisions now. Give yourself some time to think it through. The hearing is next week. We've got some time.”

“If I go back, Joshua Maxfield will know where I am. Why should I risk that? What's the chance that she'll come out of her coma, anyway?”

“Henry invested a lot in a biotech company that's working on a drug that offers some hope. It's being administered to Casey as part of a trial.”

Ashley's face was tight with anger.

“She gave me away, Jerry. I was nothing to her. Did she ever even try to find out what happened to me? Has she ever shown any interest in me at all?”

“I don't know,” Jerry answered softly. “Look, you're right. Casey was selfish….”

“
Is
selfish. Being unconscious doesn't change her. She's a self-centered bitch. I'm not going to risk my life to save her. I don't care if she dies.”

Jerry could think of no argument to persuade her, so he said nothing.

“And my father, Terri…. They lied to me my whole life. How could they do that?”

“They did it because they loved you. Don't let your anger poison you. Your father was courageous. Think about it. He could have forgotten about you. It would have been easy. I bet you ninety-nine out of a hundred guys in his situation would have breathed a big sigh of relief when they found out that Henry Van Meter was tidying up their mistake and it wasn't going to cost them a penny.

“He was poor, Ashley. To finish school he had to work all day and go nights. He gave up his scholarship, his normal life. He did it all for you. And Terri came through for you, too. How many young women would have run as soon as Norman told them that he had a kid? But she didn't. She took you in, she made you her daughter.”

As Jerry talked about her family, Ashley's anger faded. When he finished, she looked exhausted.

“It's been so hard, Jerry, hiding all the time, living from moment to moment. Now this.”

“I know. I can't imagine what you've been going through.”

The waiter walked out with their dinner, and they stopped talking. As soon as the waiter left, Jerry dove into his food. He was famished and he wanted to give Ashley time to think. Ashley picked at her dinner, as she tried to grasp what Jerry had just told her.

“This was good,” Jerry said when he was finished.

Ashley snapped out of her trance and looked at Jerry's plate. There wasn't a strand of pasta left.

“I guess you were hungry,” she said.

Jerry smiled sheepishly. “I told you I was starving.” He wiped his mouth with his napkin and drank some more wine. “I need a place to stay. Is there a hotel you can recommend?”

“I have an apartment just north of Siena. It's not far away. You could stay with me. There's a guest room.”

“I don't want to impose.”

“I'd really like it if you stayed. I don't want to be alone tonight.”

“That settles it then.”

“You're very kind, do you know that?”

Jerry blushed. “I'm just doing this so I can up my billable hours. I've got to pay the rent, you know.”

Now it was Ashley's turn to reach across the table and lay her hand on top of Jerry's.

“Thank you,” she said.

 

It was dark by the time they arrived at Ashley's apartment. It was above a butcher shop, and the butcher was her landlord. She gave Jerry a tour. There was a small front room, a smaller kitchen, a bathroom with a narrow shower, a bedroom, and another room with a pullout sofa and a small dresser.

The apartment was sparsely furnished. There were no pictures or posters on the walls, or knickknacks on the shelves. It had the feel of temporary occupancy, a place that could be vacated on the spur of the moment.

Ashley kept a few pictures on her nightstand. Jerry thought he might have seen them in Ashley's dorm room at the Academy. In one photograph, Terri and Norman Spencer smiled at the camera from the front lawn of the house in which Norman was murdered. In another, Terri and Norman flanked Ashley, their arms over her shoulders, large smiles plastered on the face of each member of the family. The last photograph had been taken after the district soccer finals. It showed the Eisenhower
team with Ashley front and center holding the championship trophy. The pictures made Jerry sad. He tried to imagine what life must have been like for Ashley since she fled to Europe. Lonely was the first word that came to mind. Ashley had not known Italian, she had no friends, and she could not confide in anyone or get too comfortable in one place. Yet she had survived. She was tough.

Ashley found a pillowcase and some sheets and led Jerry into the room with the pullout sofa.

“You're in here,” she told him. “I'm going to wash up while you settle in.”

Jerry put his clothes in the dresser and set up his bed. When he was done, he joined Ashley at the kitchen table. She had changed into a T-shirt and shorts and was sipping some wine.

“Want some? It's a good local chianti.”

“No thanks. I'm exhausted. One drink would put me out.”

“I'm strong. I'd get you into bed.”

Jerry laughed. “How long have you been living here?” he asked.

“Five months. It's the longest I've stayed in one place.”

“Made any friends?”

“A few. There's a women's football club. I've been playing for them. They don't know my real name or anything about me. They think I'm taking a year off from college.”

“That's good, that you have friends.”

“It's made me feel like I belong, but it's hard living a lie. I have to be careful to keep my fictitious life straight. I've made my story simple but I always have to be on guard.”

“Where do you play?”

“There's a men's pro team in town. We use their stadium. There's a league. We play games on the weekends. Our crowds are small, but they're enthusiastic. It's fun.”

“Do you still have your old stuff?”

“I'm rusty but I'm holding my own.”

During the next hour, Ashley filled him in on what she'd done since fleeing the States. At some point, Jerry started to yawn. A few times, his eyes closed.

“It's time for you to go to sleep,” Ashley said.

“Good thinking. I'm so exhausted I'm afraid I'll pass out.”

Jerry stood up.

“It's good seeing a familiar face again,” Ashley said.

“It's good seeing you again, too.”

They were standing close together. They both felt awkward. Jerry wanted to kiss her goodnight but was afraid she would misinterpret his action. Suddenly he remembered something that gave him an excuse to break the tension.

“I brought you something.”

“What?”

“Wait here.”

He went into the guest room and rummaged around in his suitcase. When he returned he was holding a folded sheet of paper.

“You know how I told you I found the file my father kept on your father's case?”

Ashley nodded.

“I found this in it. My dad wrote it to your dad after he graduated from college. I thought you might want it.”

Ashley took the letter.

“Well, that's it for me,” Jerry said. “See you tomorrow.”

Jerry left the kitchen, and Ashley put the wineglasses in the sink with some plates that were left from lunch. As she washed the dishes she thought about Jerry. The first time they'd met he was in his mid-twenties and she was a teenager. They seemed ages apart. Now he didn't seem that much older.

She could hear Jerry moving around in his room, settling into bed. It was odd having someone else in her apartment, especially a man. She had not let herself get involved with anyone since running from Portland. Not that she would ever get involved with Jerry. He was her lawyer. Their emails had mostly been about business, although he always asked how she was doing and offered her encouragement. She didn't know much about him, anyway. He didn't wear a wedding ring but that didn't mean he didn't have a girlfriend. And he was educated. She didn't even have a high school diploma.

Ashley shook off her thoughts and went to her room. She wanted to read the letter but waited until she was in bed. There were two holes in the top of the paper. They'd been made so it could fit on the metal prongs in a file. The copy had been made with carbon paper and the letter had been typed on a typewriter, not a word processor. Some of the words were smeared.

Ashley's throat constricted as she read the letter and she fought to keep from crying. There was a picture in one of her folks' albums of Norman Spencer carrying her onto the stage at Portland State when he accepted his diploma. She had seen it a few times but never appreciated the sacrifice that her father and Terri had to make to bring about that moment. Then her father had made the ultimate sacrifice when he rescued her from Joshua Maxfield.

Ashley closed her eyes. She thought about the last moments she'd shared with her father, something she had tried to block out since the night he died. He had been in pain; he had been on the verge of death, yet he had smiled, because he knew that she would be safe. If she
stayed here she would be safe, but her father had not sacrificed his life so she could grow old hiding in a small, dark apartment.

Ashley got out of bed and walked into the hall. The door to the guest room was closed. She knocked on it.

“Yeah?” Jerry said. He sounded half asleep.

“Can I come in for a second?”

“Sure.”

Ashley opened the door. Jerry was under the covers. She stood in the doorway.

“This isn't a life, Jerry. I have to lie all the time, I'm always looking over my shoulder. I can't have any real friends. Sometimes I wonder if Joshua Maxfield is interested in me anymore. What if he doesn't care and I'm holed up here, scared to death of someone who doesn't even think about me anymore?

“And there's Casey. That's very…confusing. I've gotten used to having no one, but now I find out I have a mother.” She looked down. “I want to go home.”