Sibs

  Rob stared at him, feeling numb, feeling sick. All around him voices were saying how crazy the guy was, first running out in front of a car and then attacking a cop and trying to steal his gun. Rob barely heard them. He was staring at Gates' supine form. From this angle he could see the small round hole under Gates' chin where the bullet had entered. It wasn't even bleeding. He stared at that hole until the first blue and white unit arrived.

  February 25

  11:30 A.M.

  "HOW YOU HOLDING UP, ROB?"

  It was a measure of Lieutenant Mooney's sincere concern that he called him by his first name. Rob was surprised that he knew it. Mooney perched on the edge of his green desk in his gray office; Rob sat in the chair before it.

  "I'm doing all right."

  "You did a full shift yesterday. You could have taken today off."

  "I don't need an extra day off."

  Why was everybody treating him like he was going to fall apart?

  "I remember the first time I shot somebody—"

  "That's just it, lieu. I didn't pull the trigger. It was his finger in there. Not mine. And if he didn't take the bullet, it might just as easily have been me. Or someone on the curb."

  Rob realized he had raised his voice and was getting steamed. He leaned back in the chair and shut up.

  "Hey," Mooney said. "Easy. Just asking."

  "Sorry, lieu. It's just that the whole thing never should have happened."

  That was the part that bothered Rob the most. He was furious with himself for letting someone like Gates get his hands on his revolver. It was the kind of thing that should only happen to a rookie. Not to a guy with his experience. If Rob had been more on the ball he wouldn't have to see blood and bone and brains erupting from the top of Gates' head like a mini Mount St. Helens every time he closed his eyes.

  "But it did happen. He fooled you. You thought he was hurt, you let down your guard, and he pulled a fast one on you. Don't let it get you down"

  "It's not. But it means I'll probably never know the connection between Gates and Bannion and the Wade women. Three of them are dead and the fourth only came to town a couple of weeks ago, so she knows nothing."

  "I'm glad you brought that up. I've been going over these files and here's my scenario: Gates either hypnotized Kelly Wade or got her hooked on schnozz, then pimped her out to do tricks with some wealthy contacts or friends. Bannion got too rough with her and threw her out the window. Gates got pissed at losing such a valuable asset and killed Bannion. Gates tries to elude police surveillance, attacks an officer in front of witnesses, and is fatally shot during the struggle. Three cases closed—bim, bam, boom." He handed the folders to Rob with a satisfied grin. "I like the way you work, Harris."

  "Hey, lieu, that doesn't fit the facts at all. Gates was loaded. He didn't need to rent out his patients."

  "He did it for kicks, then. He was kinky. The motive doesn't matter now that there's not going to be a trial. He did it. And he won't be doing it no more. Case closed. All three cases closed. Understand?" Mooney's face was getting red and his neck was beginning to bulge out over his collar. "We've got other deaths that need investigating. Get to them. Have a nice day, Harris."

  Rob sighed. He knew from years of experience that when Mooney got like this there was no talking to him. He got up and headed for the squad room.

  "You, too, lieu."

  Rob tossed the files on his desk. These cases weren't closed by a long shot. But they weren't solvable, either. And if they were left open he'd have to file semiannual DD5 Supplementary Complaint Reports on each one. And Mooney would have to review each one.

  Why not close them up? Officially, at least. That would get Kara off the hook—she couldn't be a suspect in a closed case.

  But in his head Rob planned to keep them open. And if something new popped up, he could always reopen them officially.

  And that day would come. He didn't know when, but he had a gut feeling this wasn't the last he'd seen of these three cases. In fact, he had an urge to combine the three into a single file: the Wade/Bannion/Gates case.

  Especially after touring the back rooms of Gates' office yesterday.

  He had shown up at the office at nine and told the receptionist as gently as he could that her employer was dead. The woman had shown no emotion other than disappointment at being out of a job. While she was emptying her desk, he had strolled through into the back rooms for a peek.

  The file room had been tempting. He would have loved to get into those locked cabinets, but he had no warrant for a search and no probable cause to obtain one.

  The other room had been the real shocker. A padded cell. With electronic combination locks inside and out, no less. He'd asked the receptionist how often Dr.

  Gates had had occasion to use it and she told him she hadn't even known it was there.

  No. There was too much here that was unexplained. Rob knew he hadn't heard the last of Lazlo Gati/ Lawrence Gates, M.D.

  Manetti stopped by Rob's desk.

  "That background on Kara Wade is ready. The Pennsy folks don't have much on her, but they're sending it down the wire. Should hit the printer any second., Still want it?"

  Rob shrugged. "I'll stick it in the Bannion file. The case is closed. They're all closed."

  Manetti laughed. "Move-'em-Out Mooney strikes again."

  Rob went to the corner room where the printer and FAX machine sat. The printer was an old high-speed dot matrix that printed each line with a scream like Sam Kinison with hemorrhoids. He ripped off the fact sheet and speed-read through it. He grabbed Manetti as he passed.

  "Hey, Augie. Who did this?"

  "Lancaster County Sheriff's office. Why?"

  "It's garbage. They don't have the date of her wedding, and they've got her kid's birthdate screwed up."

  Manetti gave him an elaborate Brooklyn shrug.

  "So call 'em, Rob."

  Rob went back to the sheet, Kara's date of birth, her school records, her college degree and major, her job at the hospital, and even her performance record were all there. So was the kind of car she drove (a five-year old Buick), her credit record (excellent), her voter registration (Independent), and so on. But Jill's birthdate was off by a year. They had her as nine and a half and she was really only eight and a half. And there was no record of a marriage. No mention of Kara's late husband's employment and credit record. No mention of her being a widow. Nothing at all about her late husband. It was an extremely consistent deficiency, almost as if the guy had never—

  "Jesus H. Christ!" he said aloud.

  But if she'd never married, then who was Jill's—?

  Suddenly Rob felt weak all over. Jill… the first time he had met her… in Gates' waiting room… she'd said she was nine and a half…

  Nine and a half! That jibed with the background sheet. Jill had been born six months after Kara left New York!

  Six months!

  That meant—!

  Rob's hand shook as he reached for the phone.

  ▼

  12:30 P.M.

  Kara waited for Rob's knock on the door. He'd called a short while ago asking if they could get together and talk—alone. He had insisted on alone. The doorman had buzzed up to say that he was here.

  Alone. Kara wondered at that. And his voice had sounded funny. Thick, and hesitant. As if he'd had too much to drink. She hoped he wasn't drinking so early in the day. But if he was, she guessed it was understandable. After all, he'd killed somebody yesterday.

  What a shock that seven A.M. call Tuesday morning. Rob on the phone, very subdued, telling her that Dr. Gates was dead. Killed by a bullet from his gun. He'd given her most of the details, and she'd culled more from the eyewitness accounts in the morning paper.

  Her shock hadn't lasted long. It quickly turned to joy, to overwhelming relief. She knew that shouldn't be.

  She shouldn't want to dance and sing because her psychiatrist was dead, but the news triggered something deep within her that wanted to pop cham
pagne and shout for joy. She felt like a lifer in Sing Sing who'd just been let free.

  The feeling had lasted all day. She'd wanted to see Rob last night but he had been up for thirty-six grueling hours by then, with most of the last twelve spent answering questions and filling out reports. He had wanted only to sleep. Sleep was something that Kara found elusive for most of the night. She'd felt too up, too buoyant. The feeling was still with her. It was unsettling to feel so good about a man's death.

  She opened the door as soon as Rob knocked. He'd chosen a good day for a private tete-a-tete. The cook was off and Ellen had taken Jill out to lunch at Rumplemeyer's.

  She went to hug him, figuring he'd need a hug after what he'd been through yesterday, but Rob brushed past her without saying a word. A couple of sheets of paper were rolled up in his hand.

  "It's good to see you, too, Rob," she said, wondering why he was acting this way.

  "We alone?" he said, wandering in a circle around the living room.

  "Yes. I told you—"

  "Good. Read this."

  He handed her the sheets of typed paper. It was all about her.

  "What's this?"

  "It's about someone who was never married. Who's daughter was born a year earlier than she told me."

  Kara felt her mouth dry up. She stared at him.

  "Then you know."

  His stood flatfooted with his shoulders slumped, his face a stricken mask, his brown eyes wide.

  "She's mine?"

  "Ours."

  Kara took a step toward him and stopped. She'd had this planned for years, how she'd explain all the reasons, good ones, that had compelled her to leave him in the job he loved while she raised their child far from the city she could not bear to live in. How she was going to tell him immediately after the child was born. And how "immediately" had dragged on and on as she put off telling him that he was a father indefinitely. Eventually the delay stretched to an unconscionable length and she became too ashamed to tell him.

  And even now, as he stood before her, already aware that Jill was his child, the words threatened to fail her again.

  "You've got to understand, Rob. I—"

  He began to sob. His chest heaved, tears filled his eyes and ran down his cheeks. Kara was shocked speechless. She had never seen Rob cry, had never thought he could. She stepped to his side and touched his arm. She never thought in a million years he would react this way.

  "Rob, I'm so sorry I never told you, but—"

  "She's mine?" he said. "She's really mine?"

  "Yes."

  He smiled then. With tears streaming down his cheeks he smiled and began laughing between the sobs. It was an awful sound, and made him look insane.

  "All the way over I was praying it was true. Ever since that night when you two had dinner at my apartment she's been popping into my mind. I keep thinking if I ever had a kid I'd want her to be like Jill, I'd want her to be Jill! And when I'd think about the two of us getting back together I'd think of maybe even adopting her. But I don't have to adopt her! I'm already her father!"

  Kara too felt like laughing and crying.

  "But what about all that bullshit about your husband being killed on the Penn Turnpike? It was so convincing."

  "Years of practice. And I wanted to see how you'd react." She paused. "Then you don't hate me?"

  "No! I'm madder'n hell, but I don't hate you. You did such a great job with her! I think this is the happiest day of my life!"

  He hugged her and Kara began to cry with him.

  "I'm so glad you found out. I've been looking for a way to tell you but the time was never right. But I knew I had to tell you before we went back to Pennsylvania."

  She felt him stiffen. He pushed her back to arm's length.

  "Pennsylvania? You're not taking her back to Pennsylvania! Not now! Not when I've just learned about her!"

  "Rob, that!s where her home is, that's where she goes to school—"

  "No way! You've kept me out of her life for nine and a half years. No more. That little girl needs a father and I'm going to be it. I don't know how we're going to tell her, and maybe we won't be able to tell her till she's older, but god damn it, even if she doesn't call me 'Daddy,' I'm going to function as her daddy! Am I making myself clear?"

  "But Rob—!"

  The phone cut her off. She went to answer it.

  "Tilsdale residence."

  "Is Miss Kara Wade there?" said a woman's voice.

  "Speaking."

  "One moment please for Mr. Wheatley."

  Mr. Wheatley? Who on earth was—?

  "Hello? Miss Kara Wade? This is Gordon Wheatley, attorney for the estate of Dr. Lawrence Gates. Can you come over to my office immediately?"

  Kara could feel sudden tension coiling within her.

  "What for?"

  "This has to do with Dr. Gates' estate. It's quite important."

  "I want nothing to do with you or his estate."

  "I assure you, it's quite to your advantage to—"

  "I'm too busy!"

  There was a pause, then Mr. Wheatley sighed.

  "Then may I come over? It is extremely important."

  Kara was taken aback by the request. She didn't know lawyers made house calls.

  "How… how long will it take you?"

  "Only a few minutes. I'm just a few blocks away on Park Avenue. And I'll only take a moment of your time."

  "Okay. I guess—so. But don't be long."

  ▼

  It wasn't long. Kara knew that Rob was about to lay a guilt trip on her—one she richly deserved—but she managed to forestall that by telling him about the mystifying call from Dr. Gates' attorney. It seemed only minutes later that Gordon Wheatley showed up with his secretary.

  "This is most irregular," he said as he trooped into the living room. He was a thin, waspish man in his late fifties with wire rimmed glasses and an unruly shock of white hair. "But Dr. Gates' wishes for his estate have been most irregular since the day he made out his first will with us twenty years ago."

  "How so?" Kara said.

  "I'm not at liberty to discuss that, as I'm sure you'll understand. But let me say that I would not have been unhappy if Dr. Gates had taken his legal matters elsewhere long ago."

  Rob stepped forward.

  "What's this all about, Mr. Wheatley?"

  "This." Mr. Wheatley stuck his hand out, palm up, toward his secretary. "Miss Capwell?"

  She placed a small manila envelope on his palm. Mr. Wheatley in turn handed the envelope to Kara. The envelope was heavy and it jingled. She didn't like the idea of receiving anything from Gates, especially after he was dead.

  "What's this?"

  "A list of the assets in his estate and the keys to his home on Twenty-first Street."

  "But why?"

  "You own it now."

  Kara was aghast. She had to sit down.

  "I own it?"

  "Yes. You are his sole heir. He left everything he owned to you. Counting the mines in West Virginia, that increases your net worth by approximately thirty-two million dollars."

  Rob nearly fell into the seat beside her. Kara could barely speak.

  "But I don't want it! I don't want anything of his!"

  "You may refuse it, of course, but I would think about that. There will be a formal probate of the will, but he left specific instructions that immediately after he was pronounced dead, these keys were to be delivered to the heir he had named." He cleared his throat. "We had some difficulty reaching you, otherwise you would have had them sooner."

  "When did he name Kara his heir?" Rob asked.

  "Last week. I will be in touch with you again soon, Miss Wade, under more formal circumstances, I hope.

  However, it was imperative that this particular term of his will be carried out as written. Good day."

  Kara didn't show him or Miss Capwell out. She sat with Rob on Ellen's couch and stared at the envelope in her hand. Finally, Rob spoke.