Family Money(47)

For the next five minutes, I kept going store to store up the corridor but didn’t find her inside any of them. Frustrated, I decided to return to the campaign event. Although I doubted it, I wondered if I’d missed that she’d circled back and returned to her husband. When I got back to the courtyard, the crowd had mostly dispersed. There was no sign of Scott or Greta Malone anywhere. But I did see the woman with silver hair in the black pantsuit. She was walking away in the opposite direction from the stage.

I hurried up to her. “Excuse me, are you with the campaign?”

She turned. “Yes.”

“I’m trying to get in touch with Greta Malone. Do you think you can help me out? I really need to speak with her today.”

“And you are?”

I wondered how to answer that. “A friend of a friend.”

She kind of pitched her head slightly, as if she’d already dismissed me as someone irrelevant. “We appreciate your support, sir. But Ms. Malone is a very busy woman.”

“Look, I’m not some kind of stalker or anything. But I have to talk to her.”

The woman kind of rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you give me your name and number? I’ll be sure to pass the message along.”

I knew that was a lie. She was just getting rid of me. Just the same, I told her my name and phone number, and she at least pretended to type it into her phone. Then we parted ways. Sighing, I stood there wondering what the hell had just happened. I’d been only a few steps behind Greta. I’d only lost sight of her for maybe three seconds. I was certain she saw me. We had connected eyes. Greta knew it was me who had called out her name. So why did she flee? And how could she have just vanished like that?





THIRTY


My plane ride back to Austin was a serious mental and emotional balancing act. On one hand, I was trying to process what all I’d discovered while in DC and what had just taken place with Greta Malone’s disappearing act; on the other hand, I had to somehow focus enough to finish the video presentation for Joe’s service tomorrow. No matter how crazy everything felt right now, I had to be faithful to Taylor, Carol, and both of my girls, and make sure I presented Joe in the best way possible.

The girls were already asleep when I finally got home. Taylor was in our bedroom, packing for our trip out to the lake house after her father’s service tomorrow. The bed was covered in stacks of clothes to be placed into suitcases. I kissed Taylor on the cheek, then dropped into a leather reading chair we had situated in the corner of our bedroom, feeling exhausted.

“How were the girls tonight?” I asked her.

“Mostly happy. They’re very excited to go out to the lake. But I don’t think they really know what to make of the service tomorrow. We’ve never taken them to a funeral. So for their first to be their own grandfather is going to be heavy, I think.”

“They are surprisingly resilient.”

“I know. Maybe I’m more concerned about me.” She placed a stack of clothes into one of two suitcases. “So did you save the day? Is your client staying?”

“Too soon to know.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I’ll be delayed in going out to the lake house for a day or two.”

She looked over, huffed. “Are you serious?”

“I’ll try to wrap it up as quickly as possible, Taylor.”

There was no way I could go out to the lake right now. I had to keep pressing forward in my pursuit of the truth. Although I wasn’t sure yet of my next move, I knew I couldn’t do anything stuck at the lake with my family. I could tell Taylor was more than just annoyed. She was understandably pissed. I had rarely put work above family over the past three years. To do it now when she was at her most vulnerable was probably very confusing. I had prepared what I felt was a viable counterattack in anticipation of this exact response from her. I hoped it would soften the blow.

“This sucks, Alex. You’ve basically been MIA for the past two days. And now you’re going to skip out on us again?”

“I don’t really have a choice, babe.”

“Sure you do. Tell your client to screw off.”

“You don’t really mean that.”

She let out a deep sigh, her shoulders sagging. “I know. It’s just . . .” Another heavy sigh. “I’m just ready for this to all be over already. I don’t even know how I’m going to get through tomorrow.”

“I know what will probably make it easier.”

“What?”

“If you watch the video with me tonight instead of tomorrow.”

“You finished it?”

“Yes. Wasn’t easy. Lots of big emotions. But I think you’ll like it. How about we take a break from packing and go watch it together?”

“Okay.”

A few minutes later, Taylor and I sat together on our oversize sofa in the media room. Taylor snuggled in really close to me, as if she were about to watch a scary move and didn’t want to look directly at the screen. I could feel the apprehension she was carrying in her whole body. After dimming the lights, I pressed “Play,” the music started, and the first photo of her dad appeared on the screen. It was taken two years ago at Easter. He was kneeling behind Olivia and Nicole, his arms wrapped around each of them. Our girls had the biggest smiles on their faces. So did Joe. He looked so happy. It’s how I wanted to remember him. I wondered if there was any pathway forward that would allow that to happen for me. I couldn’t see it at the moment. More photos filled the screen. Within seconds, Taylor was sobbing. And so was I.