2 Sisters Detective Agency(10)

The morning had begun with the broken promise of a walk to burn off the second dinner, feeling too stiff from sleeping in my car to push myself physically. Vegas had whizzed by my car windows, a searing, glaring kingdom surrounded by sand. I sunk into a chair two down from the beauty in Abelman’s waiting room. I felt only a mild sense of annoyance as she took a Diet Right magazine from the coffee table before us and slapped it suggestively on the chair between us.

I’d set my expectations of my father’s debt at a hundred grand. If I sold my condo in Watkins, that might give me enough to stave off debt collectors for a while. Then I’d probably have to make some unwelcome business decisions. Being a public defender paid my bills, but it wouldn’t pay my father’s. I’d never been in it for the money. I liked helping young people who were stuck in a criminal jam. I felt like those early offenses—usually fueled by plain stupidity, emotional overreaction, or the spirit of adventure—could make or break a kid and determine whether they became a lifelong criminal. When I helped a kid who was on a dark path, when I spared them jail time and got them a second chance, I felt like I was actually doing that corny thing all lawyers profess to want to do at some point in their career: making a difference in people’s lives.

But shouldering my father’s mistakes might mean giving that up for steadier, higher-paying legal work. I sat staring at my feet as the minutes ticked by, trying to remind myself that it wasn’t good practice to hate someone who was dead.

Abelman, a small man in a suit with terrible hair plugs, emerged as the young woman was taking her sixth or seventh selfie and I was sucking on an over-chewed fingernail.

“Ladies,” he said gravely, gesturing to his inner office.

“Huh?” the girl said. She looked at me.

I shrugged. Abelman had already disappeared back into his office.

“This is my appointment,” she said, giving me another completely uninhibited dressing down with her big Bambi eyes. “You can wait. I was here first.”

“Ladies!” Abelman called. “I haven’t got all day!”

The beauty huffed as she entered Abelman’s office ahead of me. The hot, heavy trepidation that had followed me all the way from Colorado was thumping in my temples now, alarm bells ringing, and they were focused on the self-obsessed young woman. She was almost glowing in my vision, a beacon of danger. I lowered myself cautiously into a chair in front of Abelman’s cluttered desk, next to the one where the pissed-off beauty slumped.

“I’ve been trying to figure out a way to do this properly for the past three days,” Abelman said. He raised his hands, held them wide, helpless. “I can’t do it. There’s no gentle way to go about it. So I’ve decided, now that you’re both here, I’m just going to say it straight up.”

I gripped the arms of my chair. When I looked over, I saw the young woman was gripping hers too.

“You two are sisters,” Abelman announced.





Chapter 11



I released my grip on the arms of my chair. A strange, unfamiliar sensation rushed through me, and it wasn’t the boiling horror I’d expected to feel at this moment as I sat there before the lawyer. It was a strange, giddy relief. I found myself looking over at the young woman with an astonishment so heavy I was able to completely ignore the twisted expression she had on her face as she looked back at me.

“Whoa” was all I could say.

“Wait.” The girl swallowed hard, pointed at my face. “You’re my dad’s…My dad…”

“This is Rhonda Bird,” Abelman told her, gesturing to me. “Early’s daughter with his first wife, Liz Savva.”

Abelman gestured to the girl. “This is Baby—uh…”

“Baby?” I scoffed.

The girl glared at me.

“Barbara Ann Bird.” Abelman rolled his eyes. “Everyone calls her Baby. I’ve dealt with the family since she was born, fifteen years ago.”

“You must mean twenty, twenty-five years,” I said.

“No,” Abelman said knowingly, with the gravity of someone who was very tired. “I don’t.”

“She’s…” I felt my mouth was gaping open, but I didn’t seem able to close it. I turned to the girl. “You’re fifteen?”

“Not only is she fifteen, Ms. Bird,” Abelman said, “but she’s also now your legal charge.”

“What?” Baby and I said together.

Abelman picked up a manila file sitting at his elbow, flipped it open, and extracted a single sheet of paper from the top of the pile, holding it up as he read. “‘I instruct my lawyer, Mr. Ira Abelman, to inform my daughter Rhonda Mavis Bird of the existence of my second child, Barbara Ann Bird, on the occasion of my death. Should Barbara be under the age of eighteen, it is my wish that Rhonda assume full custody and legal responsibility for Barbara from that point onward.’” He put the paper down. “Early told me it would be best to inform you of this decision in person, Ms. Bird, which is why I was so reluctant to share this information over the phone. He was concerned that if I explained the entire situation to you from afar, there was a chance you would not come to Los Angeles to assume care of Baby.”

“This is not happening,” Baby said. She was sitting bolt upright in her chair now, as white as lightning, like someone on a plane listening as the captain patches through the Brace for Impact call. “This is not happening.”