Seeing me on the hot seat made Tony happy.
Grinning, he put his hand on my shoulder. “I hate to leave when this is getting good, but I better be going home.”
“To your wife?” my mother asked, pointedly.
“Yes,” Tony growled.
“I’l walk you downstairs,” I said to Tony.
Tony took my mother’s hand. “It’s been a pleasure seeing you again, Mrs. Connor. Kevin was right, you look wonderful. You haven’t aged a day since I last saw you.”
Whatever negative impression my mother had of Tony evaporated like water on a hot stove.
“You’ve always been such a dear,” my mother said, kissing him on the cheek. “Now, you two just run along. I’l wait up here.” As if I were worried she’d leave.
“OK, Mom, I’l be right back. And whatever you do, don’t unpack.”
I rode down the elevator with Tony. “Is it even possible that she could have worse timing?” I asked him.
Tony looked down at his crotch. “Not that I can see,” he answered. “You want me to shoot her? We can say we walked in and mistook her for a burglar.”
“No,” I said. “I’m too mad at my father to let him off the hook that easily. Dottie Kubacki?”
Dottie was a widow who lived two houses down from mine, five away from Tony’s old house. Almost as wide as she was tal, Dottie was not exactly the husband-stealing type.
“Maybe there’s been some kind of mistake,” Tony said. The elevator door opened and I escorted Tony to the door of my building. Even this late, the air stil felt as if it had been baked in a kiln.
“I’m going to walk to my car,” Tony said. “That’l burn off the beers. You go back upstairs and enjoy your mom.”
“I was hoping to enjoy you.”
We stood awkwardly by the door. Here we were in another doorway. Half in, half out. Going in opposite directions.
I didn’t think it appropriate to give him a kiss goodnight, but I couldn’t imagine parting with a handshake. I decided to go for a compromise and hugged him. He hugged me back.
“Are you gonna be OK?” he asked.
I nodded into his chest.
Tony put his lips to the top of my head. “You know you have me al confused, right?”
I nodded again. I didn’t want to let go, but I did.
“You’l be fine,” Tony said. “I’l cal you tomorrow.”
“Would you real y do it?” I asked
“Cal you?”
“Shoot her.”
Tony grinned again. “So far,” he said, “you have a pretty good record of making me do things I shouldn’t.”
Yeah, I thought, but we hadn’t actual y done anything yet.
I watched him walk until he was gone. Then I went upstairs to face the fresh horrors that awaited me.
CHAPTER 5
I opened my apartment door and found my mother unpacking her bags. “I thought I asked you not to do that.”
“Don’t be sil y,” my mother said, shaking out a garment bag. “Do you know how hard it is to get wrinkles out of silk?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. But Mom, what are you doing here?”
“I told you. I found out a few days ago that your dad was… involved with that bitch Dottie Kubacki.
There was no way I could stay in the house after that.
I would have kicked him out, but where would he have gone? Dottie’s? I’d cut his legs off, first. I tried to cal and tel you that I was coming, but you never answered my messages.”
“What about Kara?” Kara was my married sister who lived in a big house in New Rochel e. A house with at least two guest bedrooms.
“You know she wouldn’t want me there. Besides, those kids would drive me crazy before too long.”
“‘Too long?’ How long do you plan on staying?”
My mother started opening closets. Wel, closet.
There was only one. “Where’s your ironing board?”
“I don’t have one. And stop going through my things.” I was glad I hid my porn the other night when Tony was coming over, but it wasn’t that wel hidden.
“How can you not have an ironing board?”
“Kara has an ironing board.”
“And five-year-old triplets who should have their vocal cords cut,” my mother answered.
“I only have one bed,” I whined.
“I don’t mind if you sleep on the couch.”
There was no use arguing with my mother. She’s like a force of nature when she gets like this: determined, inevitable, implacable. I’ve found that people are either appal ed or amused by her. I was usual y both.
So I helped her unpack. Tomorrow, I would cal my father and have him get her back. It was inconceivable to me that he was actual y having an affair with anyone, let alone with a woman who needed to have her dresses made at Omar the Tentmaker’s. I was more likely to sleep with Dottie Kubacki than my father. I was sure it was al a big misunderstanding.
After an hour spent turning on the couch, I realized I’d never get to sleep. The heavy snoring from my bedroom assured me that my mother wasn’t having the same problem. But then again, there happens to be a very comfortable bed in there.
Maybe I’d get to use it again someday.
I got out of bed and sat at my computer. I decided to see if I could find out a little more about Al en’s sons before I met them at the reading of the wil tomorrow.
First, the younger one. A Google of his name led to a few relevant links. The first was to the financial firm Ingerson Investing. Paul managed two of their largest mutual funds.
His picture was in the annual report. A handsome man, he was posed standing in front of his desk, arms crossed across his chest. His grim, serious-guy expression was meant to convey gravity and strength. But the slimness of his build, his thin lips, the two-hundred-dol ar haircut, and the perfect tailoring of his suit spoke to a certain effeteness. He seemed more likely to study himself in the mirror than to study financial reports.
I fol owed a few links to his funds, and sure enough, they had underperformed the market. I looked at the stocks he had recently bought for the funds, and some of them were real dogs, companies whose malfeasance or misfortunes had made the front pages. Unlike his father, who had a Midas touch with investing, Paul seemed to have the instincts of a born loser.
Another search led me to an article from the New York Times. Paul and his wife were pictured at a cancer fundraiser at the Ritz Carlton. “Investment fund manager Paul Harrington and wife Alana,” the caption read.
Paul looked even spiffier here. Gucci shoes, a suit that fit him like it was custom made, and a white linen shirt buckled to the col ar, no tie. His wife, Alana, was attractive, but severe looking. Almost as tal as he, with sharp, birdlike features that made her smile look predatory. In a strapless white evening gown, her bony shoulders and prominent col arbone gave her the chic appeal of a bulimic. Lara Flynn Boyle would have to diet to get this skinny. Whoever said you can’t be too rich or too thin never saw this picture.
Next, I searched the name of the older brother, Michael. The first link took me to the Center for Creative Empowerment Therapy. There on the homepage was a picture of Michael, with a caption reading “Founder and
