Fire Sale

Another point that we could only speculate on was Marcena’s scarf, the one Mitch had found that had led him to her. The forensics team guessed it was coming loose from her neck when Grobian tossed her into the trailer; perhaps it got caught in the doors and then was snagged on the fence when the truck left the road to go cross-country to the landfill.

These were just little points, the ones that I worried over. I had a private belief, or wish, that Marcena regained consciousness and left a deliberate trail: the scarf had been torn, with a big piece on the fence, and a smaller piece that Mitch found first. I liked to think she’d taken some kind of active steps to try to save herself, that she hadn’t lain passively in the truck, waiting for death. The idea of anyone’s helplessness terrifies me, my own most of all.

“It’s possible, Victoria,” Lotty said, when I talked it over with her. “The human body is an amazing instrument, the mind more so. I would never discount any possibility of remarkable strength and contriving.”

That same Tuesday, I started picking up the reins of my business again. Among dozens of messages of good wishes from friends and reporters, and a van full of flowers from my most important client (“Delighted to know you’re not dead yet, Darraugh,” the card read), my answering service reported at least twenty calls from Buffalo Bill, demanding a meeting: he wanted to know “what fabrications I was filling his grandson’s head with, and straighten out once and for all what I could and could not say about the family.”

“Boy won’t come home,” the Buffalo said to me when I called him back Tuesday afternoon. “Says you’ve told him all kinds of lies about me, about the business.”

“Careful with the words you toss around, Mr. Bysen. You accuse me of lying, and I could add a slander suit to your family’s legal troubles. And I don’t have any power over Billy-he’s deciding for himself what he will and won’t do. When I talk to him, I’ll see if I can get him to agree to meet with you-and that’s all I’ll do.”

Later that same afternoon, Morrell came by with Billy-and Mr. Contreras and the dogs. Josie had gone back to school-under protest, according to her mother. I myself had canceled basketball practice yesterday, telling the team I’d have to let them know when I was strong enough to return. They’d responded with a get-well card big enough to cover the wall in Lotty’s spare room, filled with encouraging messages in English and Spanish.

Amy Blount had already filled me in on Billy and Josie, because she hadn’t been able to persuade them to leave Mary A

As Amy described it, the reunion between Rose and her daughter was a predictable combination of joy and fury (“You were here, not two miles from me, clean, well fed, safe, and me, I have not slept at night for worry!”).

Billy, shell-shocked by his father’s behavior, stayed on at Mary A

The main reason Billy wouldn’t leave Mary A

On Tuesday, in Lotty’s apartment, he tried to explain some of that to me, and some of his reluctance to see his family again. “I love them all, maybe not Dad, at least, I find it hard to forgive him for killing April’s dad and Mr. Zamar-and even if Freddy and Bron made the plant burn down, I think it was really because of Aunt Jacqui, and-and Dad, that Mr. Zamar is dead. I even love Mom, and, of course, my grandparents, they’re great people, they really are, but-but I think they’re shortsighted.”

He curled his hands in Peppy’s fur and spoke to her, not to me. “It’s fu

“Your grandfather wants to talk to you. If we did it in my office, would you come?”

He worked furiously on Peppy’s neck. “I guess. I guess.”

So the day before Thanksgiving, much against Lotty’s wishes, I went to my office for a meeting with Bysen and his retinue. For once, I had enough people in my office to make me glad of my huge space. Billy’s mother was there with his grandparents, Uncle Roger, and Linus Rankin, the family lawyer. Jacqui’s husband, Uncle Gary, had also shown up. Of course, Mildred was in attendance, gold portfolio in hand.

My team included Morrell and Amy Blount. Mr. Contreras insisted on being present, with the dogs-“just in case those Bysens try anything on you in broad daylight; I wouldn’t put nothing past them.” Marcena’s parents also attended, curious to see the people who had nearly killed their daughter. I’d had to borrow five chairs from my warehouse mate’s studio so everyone could sit down.

In the middle, stubbornly sitting next to Peppy after giving his grandmother a hug, was Billy. He wore an old fla

When Billy’s grandmother said she was sure Linus could work something out with me, Mr. Contreras bristled at once. “Your son darn near killed my girl here. You think you can come in here and wave your big fat wallet around and ‘work something out’ with her? Like what? Give her back her health? Give the Loves back their daughter’s skin? Give that poor sick girl on Cookie-Vicki-on Ms. Warshawski’s basketball team her daddy back? What’s going through your head?”

Mrs. Bysen frowned at him, sadly, as if at one of her grandchildren who was fighting at mealtime. “I’ve never involved myself in my husband’s business, but I know he works with hundreds of small companies. We both admire Miss Warshawski’s courage and her tenacity; we’re sorry our son was so-well, did what he did. His behavior doesn’t reflect our values, I assure you. I think if my husband started giving some of his investigative work to Miss Warshawski, she’d find herself amply rewarded as her business gained in importance.”

“And in return?” I asked politely.

“Oh, in return you’d get rid of all those copies of that silly tape. We don’t want that out in public, it doesn’t help anyone.”

“And I can probably get it suppressed as evidence, if William ever comes to trial at all,” Linus Rankin added helpfully.

I rolled up my sweater sleeves and looked thoughtfully at my purple flesh. I had let Morrell photograph me, although I’d hated it, hated the sense of exposure. Now I didn’t feel any embarrassment, didn’t say anything, just let Grandma and Rankin look at my swollen, discolored skin.