Jeffery’s wife came through the back door with their daughter, and the conversation paused as introductions were made and Matthew heard about the kittens. When the conversation resumed, their daughter watching her favorite movie upstairs in her room, Jeffery’s wife, Cindy, joined them at the kitchen table.
“How are your parents handling the news?” Matthew asked Jeffery.
Jeffery looked over at his wife, the kind of shared look that was a conversation without words. He glanced at Matthew. “I find myself in a bit of a quandary about how to answer that.”
“I’m known for my discretion. If it’s something that’s going to affect Shannon, it’s probably best I hear it before she does.”
“Let me first tell you about last night,” Cindy said, reaching to rest her hand over her husband’s. “He came home and told me, then called his parents. To say there was a significant celebration last night would be to understate their reactions. They came over, and we talked for a couple of hours.
“You don’t have to worry about this news leaking beyond family before you’re ready to have it be public, Matthew. If we can’t duck a question about Shannon, we agreed to simply say, ‘The authorities occasionally receive leads which are promising, and we remain hopeful there will be a good outcome in her case,’ then try to move the conversation to another subject. We can duck and weave around questions for a week or two.
“There was a great deal of joy in this house last night,” Cindy continued. “It was the first time I’ve seen Jeffery’s parents being anything more than politely civil with each other since the divorce. They both showed enormous relief that Shannon has come home alive rather than receiving the dreaded news that she had died and they needed to plan a funeral. So it was a good evening.” She looked over at her husband.
Matthew studied the two of them, asked quietly, “What’s the problem?”
“There’s a problem, primarily with Dad,” Jeffery replied, then hesitated. “Shannon is not his daughter.”
Matthew went still. He didn’t let himself show a reaction to that news but simply took it in.
“That fact came out during the divorce,” Jeffery continued, “though it never became publicly known. Dad’s not sure he’s . . . able to see Shannon just yet, so her approaching me first was an enormous relief to him. Mom . . . she’s shaken. She knows the truth is going to come out, and she’s scared over how Shannon is going to treat her when she knows.
“I’m certain Shannon doesn’t need this shock right now,” Jeffery added. He pushed back from the table, got to his feet, paced as far as the kitchen allowed. “She and Dad were close. Have always been very close.”
He shoved his hands into his pockets, studied Matthew. “I love my sister,” he said abruptly. “Next to my wife and daughter, I love her more than anyone else in the world. So I’m willing to do anything we can figure out to help her. Maybe we can try to keep her return out of the press until she’s had a few more weeks to recover, can be told this news and given a chance to absorb it herself. . . .”
Matthew knew doing so risked Jeffery’s campaign once the press got a sense something was going on and learned Jeffery had stalled the news for weeks. He wasn’t opposed to letting that fallout hit if it was necessary to protect Shannon, but the news was going to be devastating enough that a long delay might only make matters worse for her. “I’m not sure if that’s possible.”
Jeffery stopped pacing to lean against the counter. “There’s no way to hide the truth from her,” he said heavily, “which is what the big brother in me longs to do. I’ve spent the night worrying this problem in circles. Listen for a minute, Matthew, as I run through some thoughts, and maybe it will give you something to work from.”
“Sure,” Matthew said.
“My parents managed to keep it quiet and out of the official divorce record—the cops don’t have it or the press. But my own people discovered the details when I was being vetted in anticipation of a run for governor. My father had arranged for a DNA test to be run on himself so he could check paternity with Shannon. The cops had done Shannon’s DNA panel with hair taken from her hairbrush so they could put the record in the missing-persons registry. My opponent is likely to also find what my father did and may use it at the last minute in the campaign, especially if he’s losing, to take a cheap shot at my family. Someone would eventually dig up the information because of the campaign, even without my sister’s return. But it’s guaranteed to be found out and made public once she reappears alive and people start digging into the entire story of my family.”
“It’s out there to be found. So someone finds it,” Matthew agreed. Something like this didn’t stay hidden.
Jeffery shared a long look with his wife, then turned back to Matthew. “We’ve talked about my stepping out of the campaign, but it wouldn’t stop this information from coming out. The only thing I can think of that buys some time and helps buffer this would be if you take Shannon back to Boston with you, tell her the press here is too engaged given the political race, that she’s better off staying far away from Illinois for a few weeks. Let me fly out there to see her and be the one to tell her. If she’s not in Chicago when she hears the news, it means there can’t be an immediate drive over to Mom to confront the matter, and possibly a family explosion. There’s no question it’s going to be a crisis, but I’d like Shannon to survive it as well as she can.”
“It’s an option,” Matthew said, unsure what he thought about it, though the idea of getting Shannon out of Chicago before this erupted appealed.
“Two things that need to stay at the center,” Jeffery continued. “Mom loves Shannon. And Dad loves Shannon. She’s always been Daddy’s girl. He just doesn’t have the words yet to deal with the fact she’s someone else’s daughter too. That Shannon was thought to have died was his protective wall against the pain of having to figure out how to have a relationship with her when she’s no longer his own flesh-and-blood child.”
Jeffery turned his chair around and sat back down, folding his arms across the back of it. “Dad needs a few days, maybe a week. I think that will be long enough. He’ll find his footing and come around. What I don’t want is for there to be lunch tomorrow with my parents, where Shannon finds her father unexpectedly stiff with her. Or worse, after she knows the truth, Shannon and Dad see each other and they can’t find a way through this. She doesn’t need to be put in the situation of also having to grieve the loss of being Daddy’s girl. He needs some time so he can adjust and be able to embrace her as still being his Shannon. We put the two of them together before that’s possible and they’re both going to get seriously hurt.”
Matthew heard Jeffery out, then made sure he kept his voice level as he asked the question that had to be asked. “Do you know who her birth father is? Did he ever come forward?”
Jeffery shook his head. “Mom wouldn’t say. He may not even know he has a daughter. I would have thought her disappearance could have led him to come forward if he’d known about her.”
“Give me a minute,” Matthew said. “You’ve given me a lot to weigh, and we need a course of action sorted out.” He walked out to the hall where he could pace while he thought through the implications of such news. He ran his hand across the back of his neck. Getting Shannon past this land mine had to be his number one priority. How could that unfold with the highest safety margin—and when? He was recalling everything Shannon had told him about her family, about her mother, her suspicions, and felt sick as he put the pieces together. He didn’t like the answer he came up with, but it was the only one that seemed to best protect Shannon.
He returned to the kitchen and leaned against the doorjamb. “It’s going to have to be you who tells her, Jeffery, and it’s got to be done before she learns about it from anyone else. I’m not able to share information Shannon has told me in confidence, but there are crosscurrents going on related to this news. How this all is going to impact her is . . . worrisome to me.”
“It’s going t
o be hard for her to hear,” Cindy said, her own concern apparent.
“Very hard,” Matthew agreed. “And I’m thinking she must be told sooner rather than later. Tomorrow evening is what I’m thinking. I’ll bring her by around nine, she can look in on her sleeping, beautiful niece, and then, Jeffery, you need to tell her. From there I’ll take her on a long drive and help her deal with it. If you can show me what was said in the divorce proceedings, if there was an admission or copy of this DNA test, or just an allusion to this fact . . . however it unfolded, that would be useful to have.”
Her brother had risen to his feet. “Matthew—”
“I can’t explain, Jeffery. Trust me when I say it’s an incredibly serious set of circumstances or I wouldn’t be jumping time like this. My only priority here is Shannon. I believe I can get her through it, but you’ll have to let me orchestrate how things go. Time isn’t going to help matters. This absolutely can’t be something she learns anywhere else. And if the news is delayed, the broken trust may never be repaired. Worst-case scenario, Shannon disappears. I’ve got to finesse this to avoid that outcome.”
“I feel like I just got my sister back, and I’m going to lose her again,” Jeffery said, a catch in his voice.
“You tell her you love her, you tell her the news, you tell her again you love her, and then you let her go deal with what just hit her. She’s a survivor, Jeffery. What I’m afraid could happen is that she looks at you with blanked emotions, says ‘okay,’ then comments that she likes what you’ve done with the house, that it feels like a nice home, and never mentions the matter to you again. That’s what I’m trying to avoid.”
His wife was pale, but she rose to stand with Jeffery. “Tomorrow night, nine o’clock,” she said. “We’ll welcome Shannon into our home and make sure she knows she has a forever kind of welcoming place here. She’s loved, Matthew. We’ll make sure that gets through before any of this has to be said.”
“Good. That’s what she needs to hear.”
Jeffery’s phone rang.
They all watched as he picked it up and looked at the screen. “It’s Shannon.”
Because Jeffery was way too churned up to keep the rough emotion out of his voice, Matthew stepped in and said, “Remember—calm, normal, emotionally level.”
Jeffery took the direction, drew a deep breath, and firmed up with a nod. He strode toward the living room as he answered the call. “Hey, Shannon. Good morning. Had breakfast yet or are you being lazy and sleeping in?” he asked, his smile projecting in his voice. “Ashley told me over breakfast that just one kitten isn’t going to do because she’s got too much love for just one. The neighbor has four. I think our little lawyer is angling for at least two. Want the other two? I think at least one is a ginger tom like that cat we used to have when we lived over on Court Circle. Do you remember his name?” He paused to listen. “Peanuts, yes! I figured you would know it. I’m getting old, Shannon. I’m about to become a cat owner.” He laughed. “No, you don’t get to help my daughter make her case. She’s already got me wrapped around her little finger.”
Matthew glanced over as Jeffery’s wife stopped beside him, rested her hand on his arm. “He’s a born politician. He can be boiling mad over some news, then slide on a genuine smile to greet someone the next moment. Both emotions are true. I didn’t understand that for the first few years I knew him. I thought most of the kindness and smiles were just him being polite. But he lives in the moment that is in front of him, and unlike most people he can switch from minute to minute.”
“It’s impressive to watch.”
“He loves his sister. He’s devoted his life to getting her back. Shannon will be safe with him. Whatever is necessary, Jeffery will do it. He’s already got a clear hierarchy in his head—his wife, his daughter, his sister, then his parents.”
“What he’s offering Shannon right now—that’s how she gets through this,” Matthew pointed out. “There’s nothing as simple as kittens in her life right now. She needs to borrow that from him while all the painful pieces shake out into the light.”
“He’ll give it,” Cindy replied. “Head on back, Matthew, be there as she gets her day started. I’ll tell Jeffery you’ll be in touch tomorrow morning.”
It was good advice and probably best. “Thanks.” He silently took his leave of Jeffery with a raised hand and headed out to rejoin Shannon.
12
Matthew entered the security code at the apartment door, opened it, out of habit dropped his keys on the side table, and stepped out of his shoes. He knew Shannon was up. He made a point of thumbing through the newspaper as he went to find her. Casual body language could hopefully cover some of the stress. Shannon was seated at the kitchen table, eating a bowl of Cheerios. Peeled and chunked potatoes were boiling on the stove. It looked like she was serious about making potato salad for the cookout tonight.
“How was my brother this morning?”
Matthew spread out the sports section on the table and pulled out a chair. “He said that next to the day his daughter was born, seeing you was the happiest day in his life.”
She smiled. “Nice.” She got up to take her bowl to the sink, stabbed a fork into a potato, turned off the heat. “We need to make a road trip today. We’ll be back before the cookout at five, but we should get on the road soon. I’m sorry, I can’t tell you why in advance.”
Anything that diverted the conversation from her brother was fine with him. “I can take you wherever you’d like to go. But I’d be more comfortable if I could touch base with Paul occasionally, let him know our location.”
“That’s fine.”
She put together the potato salad, slid it into the refrigerator to chill, then went to find her tennis shoes. Matthew swallowed two aspirins and hoped the day did not come with any more hard surprises.
It was a quiet trip heading north away from Chicago. Shannon gave him directions occasionally, but otherwise sat quiet, lost in thought. It bothered him, but he chose not to interrupt the silence. Not quite two hours after their trip began, they entered the small town of Leesburg, Illinois, population twelve thousand. They passed nice subdivisions with new construction, a bank, grocery store, pharmacy, crossed a railroad track, and entered what looked like an older, less prosperous side of town.
“Take a left at the stop sign,” Shannon directed.
The homes were mostly two-story with porches, weathered white paint in need of touching up. Blocks passed. The homes became one-story with a detached garage in the back. “At the next stop sign, take a left, and we’ll be heading out of town.”
They were soon surrounded by more cornfields than houses. He had to ask, “Where are we going?”
“It’s about three more miles on this road.”
He checked the odometer and began to mark off the miles.
Shannon touched his arm. “Up ahead, on the left.”
“The cemetery?”
“Yes.”
He found a place to pull off the road. Shannon got out of the car. He joined her.
“We’re looking for a woman named Eddie Malleton.” Shannon began walking lines of gravestones. It was an old cemetery in the country, mostly full, set between two sizable fields of corn and beans. Matthew noted some of the gravesites went back a hundred years or more, and some monuments were several feet high, ornate with figures and spires and angels with spread wings. It would be an interesting place to visit if it weren’t for the fact Shannon was searching for a marker relevant to her past.
“Here it is,” Shannon called. He walked over to stand beside her. Eddie Malleton’s resting place lay beneath a monument resembling a square tower topped with a brass dome. Shannon leaned against the headstone, and when it rocked back on its base, she nodded to the other side. “Hold this for me, this angle, like I’m doing.”
Matthew grasped the stone, pushed against it, and held the angle steady. She reached under the exposed lip and pulled out a white butcher-paper-wrapped package about four by six inch
es in size. He should have been expecting something like this, but he was still startled. “What is that?”
“One of Flynn’s private hideaways.”
He carefully let the stone drop back in place. Shannon unwrapped the paper, then multiple layers of plastic wrap, to reveal a thick stack of the old-version twenty-dollar bills and a sealed, standard-size white envelope with a bulge at one end. Shannon opened the envelope and pulled out a deposit slip and a key for a safe-deposit box. “The bank in town we passed by,” she said, reading the name.
“I wonder where we’re going next?” Matthew asked dryly.
She handed him the deposit slip with the number 917 written on it.
“We can’t access the box without a warrant,” he said.
“I’ll be on the signature card.”
“You’ve been here before?”
“Not in the bank. Flynn had his own way of getting things finessed. I signed a lot of signature cards that he’d bring to me and deliver back. It wasn’t uncommon for him to set up five deposit boxes in an area when he would slip away to conduct his own business. What name I’m under is the more critical question.”
“We should make a call, Shannon. At least talk to the bank manager before we show up.”
“And have what I need to recover be pulled into evidence by the local cops? I’m not opposed to turning things we recover over to law enforcement, but you need to give me some leeway here or I’m going to walk away and recover these things without you. Some of what I’m looking for is personal enough I would ditch you if I had to.”
“Please don’t do that, Shannon, not over this. We’ll work out any issues that come up.”
“After I open the box and we see what’s inside, you can make the decision on what to do next. I promise, if you insist I stop, I’ll do so and let you make some calls.”