John Lescroart - The Motive

"It was yesterday. Maybe we should all just move in since we're spending so much time here anyway. We'd save a bundle on rent. And Vin, you could get in time with that critical small-child experience you're going to need when you have your own kids."

"I'm not having kids."

"Sure you are."

"No, I'm not. I'm going to be a rich bachelor." "There's a noble calling," Hardy said. "How are you going to do the rich part?" "I'm thinking the lottery."

"He got that from you," Hardy shot at Glitsky. "The adults in this house don't play the lottery. And you know why? Because we're good at numbers, and the lottery is the tax for the math-challenged. I believe I've even mentioned this to you before."

"Don't listen to your father, Vin. Somebody wins the lottery every few weeks, and you've got as good a chance as anybody else."

Withering Glitsky with a glance, he said, "Pathetic," and looked at his son. "You got a backup? Plan, I mean, to get rich."

"I guess if things got tight I could always be a movie star for a while."

"There you go," Glitsky said proudly. "Plan B, ready to go."

"Although traditionally," Hardy said, "doesn't the movie star come from within the ranks of the supremely attractive?"

Vin looked at Glitsky, sniffed theatrically. "He cuts me deep." "I heard it."

"It happens all the time. My self-esteem's in the toilet."

Hardy stopped in the middle of a bite of red pepper. "You'll live, I promise. I didn't even know the word 'self-esteem' when I was a kid."

"Isn't it two words?" Glitsky asked.

"It's hyphenated," Vinnie said. "And Dad didn't hear of it as a kid 'cause it wasn't invented until after the Renaissance."

Hardy deadpanned his son for a minute, said, "Too bad Abe's Indian name is already taken." He turned his attention to Glitsky. "But callously leaving for a moment the discussion of my son's future plans for wealth and world domination, what really brings you here?"

Glitsky laid his knife down. "This morning I talked to Nils Granat about the towing business. As I was in the neighborhood anyway, I thought I'd stop by since you seemed interested last night. He says nobody he knows would ever consider using strong-arm tactics to accomplish their business goals. Those may have been his exact words."

"Well, what did you expect? He's not going to tell you they've got a team of hit men out whacking people who get in their way. I still think it's a pretty good theory."

"Well, I'm going to have a few conversations with Tow/Hold management, see if any of them get nervous. Meanwhile, though, I also talked to Hanover's secretary, who seems to think it's probably somebody in the family who stood to lose the inheritance."

"You already had that one. What was her name again, the daughter-in-law?"

"Catherine Hanover, but I don't think so. I can't believe she would have spelled her motive out so clearly if she'd had any part in it. Still, the family connection's on the table. But you know the most interesting thing?"

"The uncertainty principle?"

"What?"

"The most interesting thing. The uncertainty principle. Actually, quantum mechanics in general, in fact. All of it damned interesting, although I'm not sure I get most of it."

Glitsky picked up his knife again, went back to the cutting board, shaking his head. "Why do I talk to your father, Vinnie?"

"It feels so good when you stop?"

"That must be it."

"Okay, okay," Hardy said. "I'm sorry if I hurt all the dainty feelings in this kitchen. I give up, Abe. What's the most interesting thing?"

He put his knife down again. "Missy D'Amiens didn't spend a million dollars fixing up her house."

Hardy leaned back against the counter, crossed his arms. "Few of us do, Abe. Why is that interesting?"

"Because everybody I talked to up 'til now said she had. Hanover's secretary, the daughter-in-law, Cuneo. That was the number."

"And this means?"

"If it's true, it means half a million dollars cash has gone missing."

"With who? Where'd it go?" "That's the question."

The Beck was in the honor society at her high school, and one of the requirements of that organization was doing some nonschool community service, in this case cleaning up selected city parks and other public amenities in a "graffiti abatement" program, which had begun in a bit of controversy.

Hardy and Frannie both thought it was a nice "only in San Francisco" touch that the program-created to clean up the worst of the obscene tagging that desecrated nearly every square inch of wall space in certain neighborhoods-had been hotly debated and nearly disallowed by the school district on the grounds that the cleanup represented an authoritarian stifling of artistic expression among the city's troubled youth. A number of adult San Francisco residents and parents, and nearly half of the school board, held to the belief that spraying "FUCK" and other such creative epithets in DayGlo on billboards and benches at bus stops and anywhere else the spirit moved one was apparently therapeutic and good for a child's self-esteem. That word again.

With a growing sense of outrage, Frannie had eventually joined the debate and for the past few weekends, in support of the kids' efforts, she had been going out with her daughter and her friends, all of them armed with buckets and detergent, to help with the cleanup. And now they were home.

The guys were still making the gumbo-Hardy, with a just-opened bottle of Anchor Steam next to him, peeling shrimp over the sink, Glitsky cutting up the andou-ille, Vincent seeding and chopping the jalapenos.

"What's cooking?" Rebecca yelled from the front door. "It smells great!" Footsteps broke into a run in the hallway, and in a second, she burst into the kitchen. Hugs all around. "Uncle Abe! Two days in a row! Hey, Dad! What are you guys making?" She was at the stove, wooden spoon in hand. "What is this stuff?"

Vin flew across the room. "No, no, no, no, no! No tastes, no bites. That's dinner."

Frannie showed up a few steps behind her daughter. Her windblown red hair, which she'd been growing long for some months now, fell below her shoulders, and her color was high after all day in the sun. She was wearing khaki shorts and a pink tank top, and her green eyes were sparkling.

Hardy found himself struck by a sudden contentment so acute that it felt for a moment like a hot blade through his heart.

The sun was low enough in the late afternoon that it made it through the picture window in the front of the house, spraying the hardwood in the dining room with an amber glow that reflected all the way up and into the kitchen. Behind him, over the sink, the window was open and a still unseasonably warm breeze tickled the back of his neck. The smell of the gumbo was intoxicating, both of the women in his family were smiling and almost too lovely to believe, and his son and best friend were working with him to make something everybody would love to eat. Everything dear to him was close, safe and protected in this room, on a perfect day.

He closed his eyes for an instant against the rush of emotion.

"Are you okay, babe?"

Frannie was in front of him, her hand on his arm, a worried look on her face.

Blinking a couple of times, Hardy leaned down and planted a quick kiss on her forehead. The moment passed unnoticed by everyone else-still bickering over the gumbo-but Frannie gave him a last concerned glance before he said, "Too good, really. That's all. Too good." He pulled her to him for a second, and squeezed, as the words of Abe's toast came back to him. May nothing ever change.

On the counter by Vincent's cutting board, the telephone rang.

"Let it go," Hardy said. "I don't want to talk to anybody."

But Vincent had already grabbed it on the first ring, said hello and was listening. "Just a second," he said. "Can I tell him who's calling?" He passed the phone over to his father. "Catherine Hanover."