Gail Bowen - The Last Good Day

The rain had stopped by the time I reached the gazebo. Even from fifteen metres away I could see that the stone-and-concrete outcropping on which the gazebo had been built was the perfect crypt. The world had suddenly become very small. I walked to the carved woman, reached out, and touched her cheek. It was cool and wet. “How much do you know?” I asked.

“How much do you know?” When I heard Lily Falconer repeat my question, the marrow in my bones froze.

I whirled around. She had made no effort to protect herself against the weather. Her bluejeans and the soft leather bag slung over her shoulder were dark with rain, her white shirt clung to her breasts, and her beautiful hair hung lank against her shoulders. The family likeness between Lily and her mother shocked me. The faces of both women were carved with the lines of those who have known too many sorrows and carried too many secrets.

Startled, I answered without thinking. “How much do I know about what?” I said.

Lily raised her arm and brought the flat of her hand against my jaw with full force. The pain brought tears to my eyes. “Don’t pretend you don’t know,” she said.

I touched my jaw to see if it had been dislocated. It hurt, but it appeared to be where it should be. I started towards my car.

Lily stepped in front of me. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Home,” I said.

She shook her head as if to clear it. “No,” she said. “You’re not.” She reached into the bag slung over her shoulder. “I have a gun.”

The weapon she pulled out was a Glock 22, the German-made semi-automatic pistol used by the Regina police. There was no way Alex would willingly have handed this gun to anyone. I could feel the first stirrings of hysteria.

“Lily, you didn’t -”

She cut me off. “I could never hurt Alex. I knew I’d need a gun, so I took his while he was sleeping.”

She held the gun expertly, aimed down at the sand. There was no doubt in my mind that she was capable of pulling the trigger. Out of nowhere a memory surfaced: Alex and Angus watching a TV cop show, and Alex telling my son that the Regina police had adopted the Glock because it was so fast and safe that it allowed the shooter to concentrate on the target. Now that I was the target, I did not find the memory cheering.

Lily raised the gun. If she pulled the trigger at that angle she’d shoot my kneecap. No more runs with Willie.

“You haven’t answered my question,” she said.

“I know where Clare Mackey is,” I said.

“And you’re going to tell the police.”

I looked at the pistol. The pain in my jaw was excruciating. I’d have to make every word count.

“Maybe not,” I said. “Make me understand.”

“You’re trying to buy time,” she said flatly.

“No,” I said. “I just want to know more.”

“I had to protect the Winners’ Circle,” Lily said.

“No matter what?”

Lily frowned, annoyed at my thick-headedness. “It gave me my life,” she said.

The night I met him, Zack told me that when he joined the Winners’ Circle, he’d been like a drunk discovering Jesus. His words had been sardonic; Lily’s were not. Her lips were slightly parted, and there was a fanatic’s glow in her grey eyes. When it came to the Winners’ Circle, she was clearly a true believer. She was also scarier than hell.

“Tell me about it,” I said. I took a step towards her. “Lily, you’re important to so many people at Lawyers’ Bay. They’re good people and they respect you. I want to know you better.”

Lily met my gaze through eyes that were as forlorn as those of a lost child. “I wish Alex had told me about you earlier.”

“So do I.”

“You know, we might have become friends.”

“Perhaps we still can,” I said. “But, Lily, you’re going to have to put down the gun.”

She looked down at the Glock. “If I throw this away, will you stay with me?”

“Yes,” I said. “I’ll stay.”

Lily raised her perfectly toned arm and pitched the gun along the shore behind me. When I heard it hit the ground, my pulse slowed.

“I kept my part of the bargain,” Lily said. “Now it’s your turn.”

“I’m still here,” I said. “Tell me about the Winners’ Circle. What did it mean to you?”

“Everything,” she said and suddenly her face was washed of care. As she talked, Lily was in the past, discovering her identity, building her life. “The first time I heard the word ‘entitlement’ I thought of the way the partners were the afternoon I met them. It was at this drunken happy hour in the old Falconer Shreve offices. The place looked as if it had been strafed, but the five of them were perfect, so sure of themselves. They knew that they were the best and that they were entitled to the best.”

“And that’s why you wanted to be part of their world.”

“That’s why I deserved to be part of it,” Lily corrected. “I didn’t just marry into the Winners’ Circle. I earned my place. As much as any of them, I made Falconer Shreve a success. I knew if we wanted to get platinum-card clients we needed prestigious offices. I found that heritage building where we are now, and I made all the decisions about the renovations. I’ve hired every administrative assistant and sat in on the interviews for all the juniors we’ve hired. I know when someone is Falconer Shreve material. I’ve made sure the bills are paid and the clients are handled with care – we entertain the ones who matter twice a year, Christmas and Canada Day. That party you were at was my idea. It was my idea for us all to build summer houses out here. When Kevin’s parents were alive, we’d just camp on the beach, but I knew if we were going to be a top law firm, we had to have houses, big expensive houses that said Falconer Shreve was a presence in the community.

“After we built the houses at Lawyers’ Bay, the people in town who had looked down their noses at me my whole life, who had called me names and treated me like dirt, like less than dirt, started treating me with respect. And I treated them with respect. There was nothing to be gained by holding a grudge. I had to make certain everything ran smoothly.”

I met her gaze. “Rose said that from the time she taught you to knit, you never dropped a stitch.”

Lily shook her head sadly. “I couldn’t afford to. I always knew that if I dropped a stitch everything would come undone.”

“And Clare Mackey was going to take away everything you’d worked for.”

Lily looked at me gratefully. “You do understand.”

My jaw was swelling. It was difficult to get out the words. “What happened with Clare?”

“She brought it on herself,” Lily said. “That business with the trust ledgers was old news. Every account had been balanced to the penny. Everyone in the firm took a lot of crap jobs to make sure we got back on top again.”

“So the partners knew.”

“About the trust accounts? No,” she said. “Chris was the only one who knew. I told the others we were in a slump because of the market. I said that, for a while, they’d have to take whatever cases came along, and they did.”

“Without question?”

“They trusted my judgement. If Clare had trusted my judgement things would have been different. I was the one she came to when she discovered the problem with the ledgers. I tried to convince her that since there were no victims, we could all just move along. I said that if she didn’t want to stay at Falconer Shreve, I’d make inquiries about other firms.”

“But she didn’t agree to that.”

“Oh but she did – at first.” Lily’s voice was thick with contempt. “And when she agreed, I arranged an interview with a really good law firm in Vancouver. Everything was taken care of. Then she missed her period, and things fell apart. I’d always gotten along well with Clare. She was like me – realistic, able to keep her focus – but the pregnancy threw her. It was almost as if she saw it as some sort of punishment. She arranged for the abortion. She didn’t tell Chris until it was over. He was devastated. Clare didn’t help matters there. She put the blame for the abortion squarely at his door, said that the poison of dishonesty seeps into everything and that if she was going to start a new life, she had to excise the poison by going to the Law Society. That’s when he came to me.