Read You Think You Know Me Pretty Well aka Mercy Online
Authors: David Kessler
You Think You Know Me Pretty Well aka Mercy (29 page)
Then, as she looked at the number – beginning with +44 20 – she realized that this was from England.
In England they put the day before the month! It’s from August 15!
But that’s tomorrow…
She looked at the time it listed. The fax had been sent at 01:45 AM London time. Now it all made sense. England was eight hours ahead of the west coast. She did a quick mental calculation and worked out that this was 5:45 pm Pacific Daylight Time.
But that didn’t make sense either. She was in the office at that time and she would have heard if a fax had come through. Then she remembered that she
had
heard a fax come through. But she had been too busy to look at it …
the machine must have run out of paper!
A fax had been sent over from England! But where was it?
Before she could gather her wits, the front door swung open and Nat walked in, looking pleased with himself.
“Any news?” he asked.
“I don’t understand,” said Anita Morgan.
“It’s a biological law to do with the inheritance of physical characteristics. Things like eye color and hair color are all controlled by dominant and recessive genes. I don’t remember much of my high school biology, but I do remember that dark is dominant and blond us recessive. That means that blond parents must have two recessive blond genes. And that means that blond parents can’t have a dark-haired child. You must have faced a lot of comments over that.”
He was being deliberately offensive in the way he chose to phrase it. With a client on death row and the clock ticking away, he needed answers –
fast
. Ordinarily, offending a woman was the last thing he would do. But in the present circumstances it was a small price to pay for the answers that he so urgently needed.
“We
didn’
t actually. The people we associate with are too well-bred to make such comments. But you’re right in your insinuation. Little Jimmy was
not
Edgar’s son.”
Although he had already figured it out for himself, Alex’s mind was reeling.
“So the son for whom he yearned … the son whose death he mourned and felt guilty over … wasn’t even his son?”
“That’s right. Rather ironic really.”
“And he never guessed?”
“Oh he
knew
.”
“How did he feel about it?”
“I … I’m not sure. I think he understood … in a way. I did it for
him
.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You see … As you said, Edgar always wanted a son. But he was sterile. We both had ourselves tested at a clinic and I – ”
“Clinic?”
Alex held his breath.
“Yes, a fertility clinic. Why?”
“Where was this clinic?”
“I don’t remember. Los Angeles, I think.”
He exhaled again.
“So it was definitely in the United States?”
“Yes, in California. I
think
it was LA.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt. Please continue.”
“Well anyway. I got my results and it said I was okay. No problems of any kind. I never got to see his results and he brushed me off when I raised the issue. Basically, he was in denial.”
“So what exactly was it that you did for him? Artificial insemination with a donor?”
“Er no, it was rather more direct than that. You see Edgar was too stubborn to admit his … er … little problem. But I wanted children and I knew that he did too. So I had an affair with a mutual friend.”
Juanita was sitting at her desk, trying to remain calm while Nat hovered round.
Had Nat taken the fax? Destroyed it? What did it contain?
She debated whether to ask him about it, but she knew that she couldn’t. If he was up to something, anything she asked would merely alert him to the fact that she was on to him. With Alex out of the office, she didn’t like that idea.
She had never really felt comfortable with Nat. There was something about him that put her in a continuous state of unease. She had tried to mask her own feelings with humor, sometimes even flirting with him. That was just a defense mechanism that she had adopted precisely because she
did
feel so uncomfortable in his presence.
The phone rang.
“Alex Sedaka’s office.”
“Hi, it’s Lee Kelly here.”
Lee was a fifty-five-year-old career burglar and by all accounts a good one. Considering how prolific he was, he got arrested surprisingly little.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Kelly?”
“I’m calling from the Park Police Station on Waller Street. I’ve been busted and I need Alex to rep me at the arraignment.”
“Mr. Sedaka isn’t here at the moment, I’m afraid, and he won’t be available all day.”
“But I
need
him.”
“Mr. Kelly, I don’t mean to be rude but there’s no way Mr. Sedaka can see you today. I don’t know if you’ve been following the news but we have a client on death row and unless we can get a stay of execution he’s going to be fried at one minute past midnight. So I think you can understand that right now you’re very low on our list of priorities.”
“Maybe he can fit me in? I mean, it’s only a few minutes in court.”
“I’ll pass it on to him, Mr. Kelly. But I strongly advise you to use one of those local attorneys at the arraignment court to get you bail and then Alex can take over as attorney of record when he’s not under so much pressure.”
“You want me to put my ass in a sling for one of those courthouse scavengers? No way, José.”
“Well all I can do is pass on your message – ”
“There’s no need to pass it on. I’ve got his cell phone number, so I can – ”
“No, Mr. Kelly, please don’t call him now, he won’t – ”
The line went dead.
“I don’t suppose you’d like to tell me the name of this friend?”
“It’s not important.”
“I don’t mean to pry. It’s just that I have a client…”
He shook his head, realizing the futility of it. Anita already knew about that. Just then his cell phone rang. He looked at the display. The Park Police Station. That meant it was probably a client. He couldn’t handle it right now and in any case they should call the office.
He pressed the red button, sending the call through to voicemail.
Anita Morgan was staring at him.
“May I ask
you
a question, Mr. Sedaka?”
“Sure.”
“What exactly are you trying to find out? I mean, what does all this have to do with the death of Dorothy Olsen?”
“I don’t really know. It’s just that Clayton Burrow may be innocent. And that implies that someone else is guilty.”
“And who do you think that someone might be?”
“Well we’ve discovered evidence that she had a troubled relationship with her father.”
“And you think Edgar might have killed her?”
“It’s a possibility.”
“Well I wouldn’t know about their relationship. We divorced in 1979 and never saw each other after that.”
“Never?”
“There was no need to. We didn’t have any other children and there was a lot of bitterness. I blamed him for Jimmy too, remember.”
“Yes, but was Edgar capable of
deliberate
cruelty?”
“As distinct from what?
Accidental
cruelty?”
“Or callous indifference.”
“To tell you the truth, Mr. Sedaka, I don’t know. He was a deeply troubled man. He could be moody at the best of times – and especially so after Jimmy’s death.”
“Well if he knew that Jimmy wasn’t his son, that must have played on his mind too.”
“Oh absolutely.”
A thought entered Alex’s head.
“There’s just one thing I don’t understand. If Edgar was sterile, how come he had another son with Esther?”
Anita was about to say something when she stopped dead. He noticed her swallowing and suppressing a smile, as if a new thought had entered
her
head.
“I notice that you said a
son
.”
“I meant Jonathan.”
“I know who you mean. But you didn’t express any surprise over Dorothy.”
Alex blushed and squirmed with embarrassment, remembering what Esther had told him about the one-night stand at the frat party. He realized that he had inadvertently breached a confidence. But he had more important things on his mind right now.
“I can’t talk about it.”
“Oh it’s all right!” said Anita with a teasing smile that rolled back the years. “I know that neither of them was his biological children.”
Alex responded with a smile of his own, out of sheer relief.
“I guess I’ll have to ask Esther about it.”
Anita because enthusiastic.
“Well actually I may be able to help.”
“About the fathers of Dorothy and Jonathan?”
“I don’t know about Dorothy, but I can tell you about Jonathan.”
“Yes?”
Anita sat down on the armchair, prompting Alex to sit back down on the sofa.
“About three years after Dorothy was born Esther came to me in despair. She told me how bitter and angry Edgar was, how he alternated between rage and self-pity, sarcasm and depression. She thought he suffered from bi-polar disorder – I think they called it manic-depression in those days. She told me that he wanted a son and seemed to blame both her and Dorothy for the fact that he didn’t have one. She said she’d tried everything to get pregnant again but it just wasn’t happening. But by that stage the family had become completely dysfunctional. She’d even resorted to getting Dorothy to dress up as a boy in the hope that it would placate his anger. But that only made him worse.”
She paused. Alex sat forward.
“Go on.”
“Well at that point I told her that it wasn’t her fault. I mean, I didn’t pry or ask her who Dorothy’s father was, but I told her about Edgar firing blanks. That surprised her, but it also frightened her because she realized that her secret was out with me – part of it at least. I think she may have suspected that Edgar wasn’t Dorothy’s father before, but I confirmed it. She spent the next two or three minutes crying in my arms and then she disengaged and realized that Jimmy couldn’t have been his son either.”
“
And he would have known that too.
He would also have known from the moment Esther told him she was pregnant with Dorothy that she had cheated on him.”
“Exactly. First I have a son that he knows isn’t his and, although he wants a son, it makes him feel inadequate. But at least he loves his son. Then the boy dies in a car accident, with Edgar driving, and he feels guilty. And I don’t spare his feelings, because he’s deprived
me
of
my
son too. We have violent arguments amid all the anger and guilt and recriminations. Then he marries again and before you know it, his wife is pregnant – and once again he knows
he’s
not the father. That must have tormented his masculine pride. But at least he hopes it’ll be a boy. And then it turns out to be a girl – so he’s even
more
resentful.”
“That would certainly mess up a man’s mind.”
“Exactly. And all Esther’s efforts to try and put it right only backfired and made it worse.”
“But what about Jonathan? You said you knew who his father was?”
“More than that – I introduced them.”
“You
what
?”
“Esther thought that the only thing that would placate Edgar’s constant fits of rage wasn’t just to have another son, but to have one who reminded him of Jimmy. But he still wouldn’t admit that he had a problem and so he wouldn’t sign the consent forms for artificial insemination with a donor. So I decided to help her out by fixing her up with the same family friend who … er … sired little Jimmy.”
Juanita remembered that Alex had called her when he arrived at Anita Morgan’s house and asked her not to call him unless it was urgent. The truth of the matter was that she wasn’t really sure how urgent it was.
The missing fax bothered her and she felt she ought to tell him. But that would be rather hard to do with Nat hovering round. She wondered again whether she should simply ask him. But if a fax had come through from the London clinic he should have told her about it. And there was something else that she remembered too.
Suddenly the phone rang. It was Alex.
“I’ve finished with Anita Morgan.”