The Better Liar(54)

“We have an appointment with Albert,” Mary said before I could open my mouth.

“Perfect. I’ll let Mr. Grundman know you’re here. You can take a seat just over there.” She picked up the receiver on the desk phone and pressed a button with the flat of her thumb.

“You remembered his name?” I asked Mary in an undertone as we sat down in the wooden chairs.

She made a face at me. “It’s like you have no confidence in me, Leslie. I swear.” Then she took out the burner phone I’d bought her and stared at it. “I miss Fruit Ninja.”

I shifted position several times, listening to Mrs. Guzmán talk to someone on the phone about the weather. “Put that away.”

“I was on level two hundred twenty-three,” she said, stuffing the phone in her bag.

“Leslie!” Albert walked out from behind one of the room dividers, his arms outspread, one holding a black wooden cane. I got up to hug him. “I see you brought Robin,” he said over my shoulder.

“I did, finally,” I said as he moved to hug her as well. Mary threw her arms around him with the abandon of a toddler, which annoyed me. It wasn’t as if she actually knew him.

“Long time no see,” he said, patting her on the back. “You are beautiful,” he added as they pulled away. “Just lovely. Leslie never said.”

I pulled my lips into a smile. “She’s hard to warn people about.”

    Mary’s eyebrows pinched together for a second. “Wow, thank you, Albert. It’s so nice to see you again.”

“Come on back.” Albert began his slow hustle to his office. He’d told me last time we visited that the doctor wanted him to use a walker, but he didn’t want any clients to see him looking like an old man, so he stuck to the cane at work. It shortened his steps to a few inches at a time so that he didn’t fall over. “Inner ear problems,” he’d said, tapping his head. “Vertigo and bad knees at the same time. A NASA scientist said, ‘We can lick gravity, but the paperwork is overwhelming.’ That’s me, I’m at the doctor every other week these days.”

He held the door open for us despite his cane. Mary went in first, and I heard her little noise of surprise.

Plants covered Albert’s office on every available surface. One bookshelf held, on top of all the casebooks, a series of bonsai trees, like a well-ordered miniature forest. From the ceiling near the window hung three shallow silver basins bursting with snowball plants, like beaded hair. The desk, a mess of paper in the middle, was bordered with tiny pots labeled BASIL, PARSLEY, THYME, and so on.

Albert shuffled in behind us and shut the door. A corner of his mouth lifted. “You like my little garden?”

“It’s amazing,” Mary breathed. “How did you do all this?”

“Well, I get a nice bit of sun through the window, and I keep it open when it’s not too chilly,” Albert said. “Those are real herbs, you know. You want to taste?”

“Oh, no,” she said.

“Oh, come on.” He plucked a leaf from one plant and held it out in thick-knuckled fingers. “It’s mint. Just like toothpaste.”

“It’s hairy,” she said, wrinkling her nose as she took it from him and chewed. I laughed and she shook her head at me.

“I can’t believe he got you to eat his plants in less than ten seconds,” I said.

She spat the leaf into her hand. “Are you not supposed to eat it? It really did taste like mint!”

    “No, no, you can eat it,” Albert insisted. “You can swallow it. It won’t hurt you.”

“He tries to make everyone eat his plants,” I said. “Most people don’t do it.”

She dropped the chewed leaf into the trash can. “I guess I’m politer than you, Leslie.”

“No, Leslie ate it too,” Albert said. “Don’t you remember? I used to bring her mint leaves when I came over. You were probably too young.”

“Probably,” Mary muttered, looking discomfited for the first time since we’d arrived.

“How’s your son, Leslie?” Albert asked. “Doing okay?”

“He’s fine,” I said. “How are your daughters?”

“I think I’ve finally persuaded Ruth to move,” he said. “She’ll have to retake the bar, but her husband’s found a position in Santa Fe that will give them a little boost.”

“That’s great.” I smiled and scooted my chair forward slightly.

“I have to tell you, I’m glad to see you after all this time, Robin,” Albert said, leaning forward to cover her hand with his. “I know this business with the will is a pain in the behind, but Warren just wanted to get both of you girls in a room together again. It killed him when you moved so far away. Where’d you go anyway? Leslie said she was looking for you in Louisiana.”

Mary stroked his hand with her thumb. “I was there for a while, but I moved to Nevada a little while back.”

“Nevada,” he said, shifting away. “Las Vegas?”

“Restaurant work,” she said, affecting a sheepish shrug.

“I worked in restaurants many years myself,” Albert said, smiling at her. “When I was working my way through law school, I washed dishes and helped around the kitchen at a place that’s since been closed. El Cerdito Rojo. The Little Red Pig. The busboys used to watch for pretty girls, and when one came in they’d yell “Corazón!” into the back of house. We’d make sopapillas in the shape of hearts and send them out, complimentary.”