John Hart - Iron House

His name was Wendell James Winthrop, an estate attorney who very quietly put the senator’s will into probate. A junior detective took the time to check it out, and discovered that Abigail was not even in it, not for a dollar or a dime. She could spend a year in the house, and then leave with clothing, jewelry and personal effects. Even Julian was excluded. A billion dollars, and they got none of it.

Yet, it did this wonderful thing.

When the police learned there was no financial motive for murder, their case against Abigail evaporated. They had combed through the file a hundred times by then, and knew more about the dead senator than they would ever need to know.

He’d been blackmailed for years; he was dead.

Most or all of his blackmailers were dead.

The murder weapon was found with all the dead blackmailers.

In the highest circles of law enforcement, there was talk of another hitter, a cleaner who came in and took out everybody involved. Some of the organized crime people at the FBI whispered about Otto Kaitlin and the enforcer whose identity he’d worked so hard to keep secret, but even the whispers were quieter than most. No one had ever established the existence of such an enforcer. They had no name, no photographs, no description. To some, he was a myth fabricated by a very clever gangster, a bogeyman to scare grown men. In the end it was decided, very quietly, that the full truth might never come out.

While this was happening, Michael watched the news in his hotel room. He took long walks in Chapel Hill, ate dinner out and thought constantly of Elena. He wondered where she was, and if she would call or not. He fretted over her injuries, worried about the baby. He waited to hear from Julian, but that didn’t happen, either. Two days after the farm story broke, Jessup finally called. “She’s sleeping for the first time,” he said.

“Is she okay?”

“Like a weight’s been lifted. Like she finally believes she didn’t do it.”

Michael was silent, then said, “That’s the second time you’ve made a reference like that.”

“I know. It was intentional.”

“Perhaps it’s time you explained some things,” Michael said.

“Perhaps it is.”

They met in Raleigh because it was big and anonymous, and because old habits died hard. Michael watched him roll in and waited a full thirty minutes to make sure he was alone.

He was.

The restaurant sold ribs and beer and was empty at three o’clock in the afternoon. They took a table in a small back room; ordered a pitcher of beer and asked to be left alone. When the beer came, Michael poured two glasses and waited for Jessup to meet his eyes. When the wait got long, he decided to start easy. “Any word from Julian?”

Jessup dipped his head, relieved. “He came home yesterday. The medicine finally leveled him out. He’s thinking straight.” Jessup sipped, got foam on his lip and wiped it off. “Apparently, he’s taken up with Victorine Gautreaux. She was watching after him.”

“Where?”

“Holed up in the woods and scared to death.”

“How is he?”

“Confused. Fragile. The usual. I’m still not sure he understands exactly what’s happened. He wants to see you, though. He thought maybe he’d dreamed it, seeing you. He’s like a kid with anticipation.”

Michael spun the glass, watching Jessup. The man was clearly afraid of the conversation that was coming, and Michael had theories on that. Julian, he decided, might be a soft approach to the place they needed to go. “He saw Abigail kill Ronnie Saints, didn’t he?”

Jessup drained his beer, poured another. “Oh, man…”

“In the boathouse. That’s why he broke down,” Michael said. “That’s why he ran away. He saw her kill Ronnie Saints and couldn’t process it.”

“She had the best intentions.” Jessup’s head moved, eyes on the cold glass. “She just wanted them to apologize to Julian. She tracked them down, paid them-”

“And then killed them.”

His eyes snapped up, then. “It wasn’t like that. Abigail doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. She’s tough and honest and fair, but she’s sweet as the day is long. She would never hurt anybody. Even the thought that she might hurt somebody-”

“It’s just that she’s schizophrenic.”

Jessup licked his lips, eyes nailed to the table.

Michael leaned in on his elbows. “She told me how it works, you see. On our drive to the mountains, she told me how it runs in families.”

“This is a mistake. I shouldn’t be here.”

But he didn’t move, and Michael knew why. Secrets are hard; they weigh a man down. “See, Andrew Flint said something interesting when I was at Iron House. He was quite taken with Abigail on the day she came to adopt us. She was beautiful, rich. But that’s not what stuck with him. She told him a story about why she cared about us, about Julian and me. She told Mr. Flint that she’d grown up in an orphanage herself, that she’d had a sister, that she had certain sympathies for older siblings left to linger in a place like Iron House. She told it with some conviction, apparently. That’s what Flint said. She told it with feeling. Did you know she told him that?”

“I knew.”

“And yet I met her mother in a dump house at the base of Slaughter Mountain. Arabella Jax. A charming lady. You met her, too.”

“Oh, man.”

He shook his head; Michael ignored his worry and sudden distress. “She says Abigail ran away from home when she was fourteen years old, which leaves me with the question, why did she lie to Andrew Flint? Most importantly, why did she care about us at all?”

Jessup leaned back in his chair. Pushed the glass away. “Why don’t you tell me, smart guy?”

Michael swallowed in a throat that was suddenly dry. He thought of the love Abigail so clearly felt for Julian, and how she’d been willing to go to the farm and face down Jimmy on the chance of saving Michael’s life. Ten million dollars. Thirty. She didn’t care about the money or her own safety. And yet she’d been so very afraid. Then things went south in the barn, and her fear vanished. He saw the way she’d come off the floor to take Jimmy’s hand at the wrist. She’d been a different woman, then, cold and smooth and violent. Michael had rarely seen such perfect timing and physical control; but she didn’t even remember this thing she’d done.

Schizophrenia runs in families, she’d said.

Siblings.

Parents.

Michael’s fingers felt uncertain on the glass, but he made his face a stone. “Is Abigail my mother?”

“You ask because she and Julian share the same affliction?”

“Because she cares more than she should. Because she had no reason to come for us in the first place.”

Jessup poured another beer, and took his time doing it. He drank deeply, looked up and left, as if for God to give him a sign. “You asked once about Salina Slaughter.” His eyes came back, red and heavy. “Let me tell you first about Arabella Jax. You saw the way she is?”

“I did.”

“She was worse when Abigail was young, vile and selfish and rotten to the core. I swear…” Emotion rose in his eyes. “I’ve never worked so hard to keep from killing a woman.”

“You went there to ask about Salina Slaughter?”

“Years ago. She didn’t want to talk about it. Not about Abigail. Not about Salina.” He nodded, lips tight. “We got there in the end.”

“You hurt her.”

“I’m not proud of it.”

“She’s still scared of you. She tried to blow my head off the second I mentioned Salina Slaughter. She thought you’d sent me.”

“She’s a ferocious bitch of a liar. I did what I did to get the truth.”