City Dark(67)

“No, you definitely are not.”

“Well, I’m a lawyer, you should know. Not one who works with the police, though.”

Wilomena kept her head pointed toward the waves but gave Aideen strong side-eye for a few seconds. “Yeah, I see the briefcase. I figure you’re not selling watches out of it. You say you ain’t a DA, though? You sound like one.”

“No, I’m not.” She paused. “I was for a long time, though.”

“Yeah, I can hear it, yo. Cops in your family too?”

Aideen grinned a little. Whoever Wilomena was, she was not slow on the uptake. “I was married to one, yes.” She paused again. “Wilomena, the woman I’m here about, I think you knew her. Her name was—”

“Lois,” Wilomena said heavily, as if uttering the name was exhausting. “Funny how everyone and their aunt Jo all the sudden takes a serious interest in this woman. She had to turn up on a beach with a seagull’s beak buried in her cooch first, though.” Aideen had never heard that fact, and for a split second her face froze in horror. Wilomena looked back at her apologetically. “I saw that shit. It was nasty.”

“I’m really sorry.”

“So did they find him?”

“You mean the killer? They arrested someone, yes.”

“He did it.” Wilomena said it with casual certainty.

“Well, he’s who I represent, Wilomena. I’ll understand if you don’t want to speak with me knowing that. I will say that you’re right about Lois. I’ve found out a few things about her. No one really paid her any mind until she was dead. That’s awful.”

“You’re trying to get him off, then? Or plead him out?”

“Right now, I’m just trying to figure it all out. I believe that something’s wrong, and that Joe’s a good man. That’s why I’m representing him, and it’s why I’m here.”

Wilomena’s eyes had been dulcet and sleepy but now lit up sharp again. “He’s a good man? Strangled his mother like that? That’s the word on the street.”

“I don’t think they arrested the right person.”

“Oh, I got a headache comin’ on.”

Aideen sighed. “Yeah, I know that feeling. Did the cops ever show you Joe’s photo?”

“Didn’t see no photos from the cops.”

“Do you mind looking at one?” Again, Wilomena just shrugged. From the briefcase Aideen drew a manila envelope and then from it a photo of Joe, taken from his law firm’s website. He and his old partner, Jack Abrams, stood side by side in sharp suits against a dark background. “He’s the one on the left.” Wilomena studied the photo for a few seconds. She seemed about to speak but then stopped herself, her eyes still on it.

“He’s a lawyer too?”

“He is, yes.”

“Lois mentioned him,” Wilomena said matter-of-factly. Aideen felt her heart pick up a beat. “She said she knew where he lived, even.”

Aideen was taken aback. “Were you able to tell the police this?”

“Police didn’t ask. Anyway, I didn’t remember it until I saw that picture. Wilomena’s tired, yo.”

“Sure. So Lois knew that Joe was her son, and that he lived nearby?”

“Something like that, I didn’t grab it all. Sad-ass story’s what it sounded like. Old lady wandering around out here, living in shelters and looking for her lawyer son? What’s that about?”

“They were estranged for many years,” Aideen said.

“Sad-ass story.”

“It is. It’s very interesting to me that Lois was looking for Joe.”

“Yeah, maybe Joe didn’t want to be found.”

“Maybe. Can I show you one other photo? This one is of Lois, but it’s from a couple of years ago.” She held up the printout of the Sacramento Bee article, the one with a photo of a group of women posing with Pastor Nelson in a community garden. Wilomena hesitated, then looked over.

“Yeah, that’s her. The old lady on the right side.”

“Did she look much different when you met her this summer?”

“Not really. A few pounds lighter, maybe.”

“That photo was taken in California, before she came back here.”

“California. She should have stayed there.”

“That’s the thing. Based on what you’re telling me, I’m wondering if she came back here to maybe look for family, like Joe. They were apart for many, many years, but . . . I get the sense she might have wanted to reconnect with him.”

Wilomena released a heaving breath, like she was tolerating a particularly annoying child. “If you or anyone else had ever talked to her before she got strangled out here, you wouldn’t have to get the sense, yo.”

“It’s what she told you, then? I’m sorry to sound thickheaded, Wilomena, but these details could be everything.”

“Wasn’t much. She hadn’t seen him in a long time, just like you said. I think she took up here because she found out he lived in one of these neighborhoods, off the beach.”

“He does,” Aideen said. “But from what I understand from reading the police reports, Lois was trying to get to Staten Island. That’s where she’s from, orig—”