“For God’s sake get on with it,” he said.
He was vibrantly impatient with female silliness.
“I think I can keep most of this secret,” I said.
“Excuse me?”
“The womanizing, the Asian girls,” I said. “The gang bangs. The picture taking, the voyeurism. Of course I don’t have to keep it secret. If you annoy me, I can get even by blabbing to everyone.”
“You have no evidence.”
“I have talked with your wife and she’s prepared to go public, if she needs to.”
“That would be a very dangerous thing for anyone to do,” Patton said.
“No, it won’t be. I have talked with your owner, Albert Antonioni. He will follow my lead.”
“I don’t believe you.”
I shrugged.
“My wife won’t speak a word,” Patton said.
I looked at Betty Patton.
“Yes,” she said. “I will.”
“A wife can’t testify against her husband.”
“Depends,” I said. “But in any case she can talk to the press.”
“She’d be publicly humiliated.”
“I’m humiliated now,” Betty Patton said. “By what I’ve become. By what I’ve allowed you to turn me into.”
“Oh, you didn’t want to make it with every plumber and delivery man that came to the door. You didn’t want me to become governor and maybe someday president, you weren’t pushing me, pushing me, like Lady Macbeth. Big bad old me made you do all that.”
“I started out wanting you to love me,” she said.
“That was a while ago,” he said.
“Yes, it was,” she said. “And then I wanted at least to be able to love you. And then I wanted at least to get even, and then I wanted to get what I thought you owed me, even if we had no marriage.”
“And now what, you want to destroy me?”
“I want to save my daughter.”
“Oh God, motherhood,” Brock said. “Isn’t it a little late for motherly self-sacrifice?”
“If I can save her, maybe I can save myself,” Betty said.
Brock looked at me.
“Women!” he said. “Do you have any thoughts on how to clean up this mess?”
“I do,” I said. “Thank you for asking.”
I gave him my most charming smile. Some men sink to their knees when I give my most ingratiating smile. Patton bore up under it manfully.
“You and Albert can stay in business,” I said. “And Betty will not say anything about you to anyone. Cathal Kragan takes the fall for Kevin Humphries’s murder.”
“Who’s Kevin Humphries?” Patton said.
“Plumber from Framingham,” I said. “Was passing out pictures.”
“And when Kragan, as you so thoughtfully put it, takes the fall,” Patton said. “What ensures his silence.”
“I have Antonioni’s assurance that Kragan will be quiet,” I said.
Patton looked at his wife. She didn’t speak, but her head was up and she looked at him steadily.
“And what is required of me?” he said.
“You set up an irrevocable trust fund for your wife and daughter. With my humble self as trustee. Amount of the fund to come.”
“So you can embezzle from me?”
“Once the fund was in place, I’d actually be embezzling from Millicent,” I said. “The fund will be large enough to cover the cost of psychotherapy for Millicent and for her mother.”
Patton stood and rested his hands flat on the tabletop and glowered down at his wife and me.
“Do you... have... any idea... who you’re... dealing with?”
I nodded.
“I can have you killed, for Christ sake.”
I shook my head.
“Oh?” Patton said. “You don’t think so?”
“Albert Antonioni suggested you call him when we got to this point.”
“Are you kidding?”
I reached behind me, picked up the phone on the kitchen counter, and dialed.
“Mr. Antonioni please,” I said. “Sunny Randall.”
I waited. In a moment Allie came on the line.
“This is Allie.”
“I have Brock Patton here,” I said. “One moment.”
Patton’s face was gray. But he took the phone.
“This is Brock Patton,” he said.
He listened for a moment.
“You know this broad, Allie?”
He listened again. For several moments, nodding his head slightly.
“Right,” he said. “Right.”
He listened again.
“Sure, Allie,” he said. “Absolutely.”
Then he hung up. His face still looked gray, and his eyes seemed very tired.
“Okay,” he said. “That’s the deal. Have your attorney send me the trust agreement.”
He looked at Betty Patton.
“What about you?” he said.
“I’m not coming home,” she said.
“Fine,” he said. “There’s a hundred others just like you.”
“I know,” she said.
He looked at me.
“You’re a smart little bitch,” he said, “aren’t you.”
“I’m not so little,” I said.
He turned and stalked out of my loft and slammed the door, which roused Rosie. She sat up among the pillows looking annoyed. Rosie jumped down from the bed and came briskly the length of the loft and jumped up in my lap and began to lap my neck. Betty Patton folded her arms on the tabletop and put her head down.
“Oh God,” she said.
“You did good,” I said.
“I still have to face Millicent.”
“I know.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Tell her the truth,” I said. “Tell her what you did and why you did it and how you are going to try and change and why. Don’t talk down to her. Don’t give her orders.”
“I’ve forfeited any rights I had to order her around,” Betty said. “Brock is right, it is crazy now to try to be a mother.”
“Don’t aim so high right away,” I said. “Maybe you can learn to be friends in a while. And then maybe you can be an older friend, one who is helpful, one who can offer guidance, one who can love her, one who seems to be sort of like a mother.”
Betty raised her head.
“Do you have a wonderful mother, Sunny?”
“Not especially,” I said.
“Then how do you know all this?”
“Remember,” I said, “I’m a smart little bitch.”
Chapter 58
I had never been able to do the same painting over again, so, since my Chinatown had been destroyed, I was working on a view of the old Charles Street jail. Rosie was lying on the rug near me, and Millicent was reading the paper in bed. We had agreed on no television when I was trying to work. It was a rule for me. I couldn’t stand television and when I’m working I need to be able to focus. But there was a happy and entirely accidental by-product of the rule. She had started to read the paper... Could a book be far behind?
I was busy trying to get the right gray for the jail when Rosie sat up suddenly and looked at the door. I picked up my gun from the table next to me. The doorbell rang. Rosie dashed to the door barking and being fearsome, but her tail was wagging furiously, which meant it was probably Richie. I checked through the peephole. It wasn’t Richie. It was Brian. I opened the door. Brian came in and closed the door behind him and leaned forward and kissed me lightly.
“I figured I better do that,” he said, “or you might shoot.”
I smiled and put the gun on the table. Brian waved at Millicent.
“I might have,” I said. “Would you like coffee?”
“Sure.”
Brian went and looked at my painting while I measured out the coffee and water.
“You decided not to paint Chinatown?” he said.
“I can’t do the same painting again,” I said. “Maybe later.”
“Why is that?”