Ed Dee - The Con Man's Daughter

"Now I want those days back," Eddie said. "I don't deserve it, but I want it all. I want the clean sheets, family dinner after Mass on Sunday, school plays, Monopoly on the floor, soccer games. All the things I thought were boring years ago."

"No more cocktails and showgirls?"

"Just you."

"No more secrets," she said.

"Absolutely no more secrets. I swear."

Eddie looked back down at the soccer field. The screaming got louder. Grace's team made a goal, or thought they had.

"You weren't as bad as you think," Babsie said. "I'll tell you this. If Paulie Caruso did that to me, no way would I have let him keep all that money for himself. No way I'd let that bastard walk away with my share. I would have burned it or given it to charity… anything but let that scumbag have it."

Eddie nodded. His brow furrowed, he kept nodding, deep in thought.

"You took the money," Babsie said. "Don't tell me you took the goddamned money. Oh shit. That's why that fake boodle in your trunk looked so good. It wasn't fake."

"I didn't say I took it."

"Jesus, Eddie. You are so goddamned high-maintenance. Does it ever end with you?"

"Babsie, listen to me. I never said I took the money."

She sat there breathing hard. This was exactly what her father had warned her about when she'd tacked his picture on her bedroom wall in freshman year. Look at those eyes, her father had said. All those eyes will ever see is trouble, because that's all they'll ever look for.

"I love you," he said. "And I understand the responsi-bility that goes with it. I promise you, no more secrets. I meant that."

He was willing to give up the money to save his daughter, Babsie thought, at least that's in his favor. She looked down the hill past the Toyota, at the girl who called her Gramma. Grace loved him. God, she loved him. Kids are never wrong.

"Keep me in the dark on this, Eddie," she said. "The new rule is we both get to keep one secret. This is yours."

Ed Dee retired as a lieutenant after twenty years with the NYPD's Organized Crime Unit. Then he earned an MFA in Writing at Arizona State University. His debut novel, 14 Peck Slip , was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year.