38

I drove my scooter down Michigan Avenue. Too slowly, apparently. Cabbies honked and zoomed around me, cars cut in front of me and then sped away. I turned left on Chicago Avenue and drove down to State Street. I stopped at a light and readjusted the helmet, making it even tighter.

You will no longer be handling Pickett’s legal work.

The car behind me bleated its horn. I wasn’t even sure where I was going, but I turned right, since I was already in that lane. A few blocks later I realized I was close to my mom’s place, an elegant graystone near State and Goethe.

My mother had moved into the house after she married Spence fifteen years ago. As a prominent real-estate developer, Spence had bought the place when it was falling down. He’d given it some much-needed TLC and restored the structure of the house, along with its walls and floors and stairs, but apparently it had still lacked character and decor, which my mother saw as the ultimate challenge. After they met, she and Spence traveled the world collecting furniture, art, vases and tapestries. The place was now stunning-soothing colors of ivory and gold permeated the place, and it was often where I went when I was feeling down.

I knocked on the front door. My brother answered it. Charlie hangs out at my mom’s place a lot. “Iz!” He pulled me into the house and wrapped me in a hug. “I was just telling Mom about the other night. Sorry I was good for nothing.”

I laughed. “You were fine. It was nice to have someone there.”

We went into the front room-a big, beautiful living room with ivory couches and muted Oriental rugs over wood floors that were wide-planked, honey-colored and glossy. The only thing my mother didn’t like about the room was that it faced east and got dark in the afternoons. My mother was prone to depression, and when the sun swung over the building and the living room fell into shadow, she had to head for the back of the house.

But now it was sunny and cozy. My mother walked into the room. She was wearing a fitted, white button-down shirt, pressed jeans and bare feet. Thin silver bracelets jingled faintly from her wrists as she looked at me with crossed arms.

“Why didn’t you call me the other night?” she asked. “You didn’t even mention the break-in at the funeral.”

“I didn’t want to worry you. And I had Charlie there.”

My mother pursed her lips. She didn’t want to disparage her son in front of him, but we both knew what Charlie was like.

“It was fine, Mom.”

She walked over to me and pulled me onto a silk couch, and then she drew me into her arms. I clung to her, felt myself melting.

“Any word from Sam?” my mother asked.

I thought of the postcard. I thought of what Sam had written there. Trust me. And please don’t tell anyone you got this.

I would do what he asked. For now. But the trust I had in Sam was starting to wane. I didn’t want that to happen, but I didn’t want to be a fool either.

“No word,” I said.

“What do you want to do about the wedding?”

“Do you think I should call it off?”

“Not yet. You’ve got time for that if you need it.”

Something inside me said, Do it now. You have the perfect excuse. Then I felt guilty for the thought.

“I know you’ve been so excited about the wedding, Mom.”

She tutted. “Oh, I was, but that doesn’t matter now.” She stroked my forearm, something she’d done since we were kids when she wanted to calm us. “How are you?”

“I just found out that I’m losing the Pickett Enterprises work.”

My mother straightened. “What?”

“I saw Shane. He’s running the company now and wants someone more experienced. He’s going to gradually pull the work from me and give it to Tanner.”

My mother shook her head. “Forester wouldn’t have wanted that.”

“It doesn’t matter what Forester wants anymore. Shane is CEO. He wants to work with Tanner, his friend, and he wants to make sure he’s got an experienced panel of consultants on his team. I can’t blame him, really. He’s not very experienced himself.”

“But Forester trusted you, and you did exceptional work for them, that’s what he always said.”

I shrugged. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Of course it matters.” My mother’s face looked drawn. She hated to see her kids in pain.

“It should matter,” Charlie said. He took a sip from a can of cranberry juice, his during-the-day substitute for red wine, and stared thoughtfully at the can. “Forester was one of the richest men in this town, but he was also the nicest. He cared about people. And he built that company from the ground up. It shouldn’t be dismantled so quickly.”

“It’s not being dismantled,” I said, wondering why I was arguing for Shane. “It’s just that someone has to run it now that he’s gone, and that someone is Shane.”

“I wonder about that man,” my mom said in a musing tone.

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve always thought there was something a little different about him, something that wasn’t quite authentic. I’ve never been able to put my finger on it.”

Just then my cell phone rang. I took it out of my bag. The display showed a local number I didn’t recognize.

“Hello?”

“Isabel McNeil?”

“Yes.”

“This is Ernesto Rosario. I’m a producer for Fox News. We’d like to interview you about the disappearance of your fiancé and the death of Forester Pickett.”

“I’m sorry, but I won’t be commenting.”

“If we could just ask you a few questions. We’d be happy to meet you wherever-”

“No comment.” I’d gotten good at saying that during the times Pickett Enterprises had landed in the press, like after the radio stunt when listeners jumped into the Chicago River, but I’d never had to say it on behalf of myself.

I hung up the phone. It rang again. A different local number this time. “Ms. McNeil? This is Tiffany Millstone with ABC.”

“No comment.” I hung up. “Fox and ABC,” I said to my mom and Charlie.

Charlie took a final sip of cranberry juice and then crushed the can with his hand. “That’s not good.”

He was right. For the next half hour, my phone kept ringing with calls from reporters and producers all over the city. Finally, I changed the outgoing message to say that I would not be giving interviews or making any comments about Forester Pickett or Sam Hollings.

“I wonder if they’re going to be outside your house,” my mom said, looking worried.

“My address is unlisted, remember?” When I’d bought my condo, I had just finished a few dates with a guy who showed up at my apartment way too often and without notice. I unlisted the address to deter him.

I turned off the ringer because the calls wouldn’t stop, but then I saw Mayburn’s number flash across the phone.

“Hello?” I stood and took the phone into my mom’s kitchen. It had high ceilings, beautiful woodwork and a cozy breakfast nook that overlooked the small, landscaped backyard. I sat at the nook and turned my back to the room.

“Hey,” Mayburn said. “I have a buddy who’s with the government, and I asked him to run a search on the passenger lists for all the major airline carriers this week.”

“And?”

“No air travel by anyone named Sam Hollings.”

“Which means he drove wherever he went.” To Indianapolis, probably.

I struggled with whether to tell Mayburn about the postcard. Sam had asked me not to. But what did I care anymore what Sam wanted? I had been battling in my head with this since the moment I’d gotten that damn postcard. I wanted to trust Sam. Desperately. If I didn’t, and this thing somehow got resolved, wouldn’t I have then betrayed him? I decided to track down Alyssa before telling anyone about the postcard.

“Or he flew under a different name, or he might have chartered a private plane,” Mayburn said. “I’ll keep looking into it. How was your talk with Forester’s son?”