Amelia never got a chance to ask her about it. Lily was a no-show for her next appointment, and unresponsive when Amelia tried to reschedule with her. That isn’t unusual in this business. She warns new clients that not all cases end in happy family reunions, and that they shouldn’t embark on a search unless they’re braced for possible heartbreak. Many people step back to digest that information and pop up months later ready to proceed with finding their lost loved ones. She’d hoped Lily Tucker would be one of them.
Now it turns out she wasn’t Lily Tucker, and she’s been murdered, along with her mother.
“Look, Amelia, I was planning on turning the ring in to the hospital’s lost and found, but I was upset about Wash that night, and I forgot about it. Lousy, I know.” Barnes slumps back in his seat as if crushed beneath three decades of guilt.
But he didn’t steal the ring. People find, and keep, far more significant things without a hint of remorse. Calvin Crenshaw had scooped up a baby from the church pew like a dropped handkerchief or loose change—assuming what he’d told Amelia was even true.
“That night, right after I left the hospital, I met Delia. It was just a one-night stand,” Barnes adds, as if Amelia’s opinion of his promiscuity matters. “She got pregnant. I moved. By the time she tracked me down, the baby was about to be born. When I found out what Delia had named her, I couldn’t believe it. Charisse. She didn’t know my father was Charles. Listen, I’m a detective, and I’m not supposed to believe in coincidences, but . . .”
“Life is full of them, and I’ve seen bigger.”
“So have I, Amelia. So have I.”
“Like your finding my ring?”
“I obviously didn’t know it was your ring, so—”
“Then why not mention it from the start? I request full disclosure from my clients, and if that was the one thing you gave your daughter, then it’s important.”
“It isn’t.”
“No detail is too trivial when I’m searching for someone’s—”
“I don’t mean it’s not important. I mean it’s not the only thing I gave Delia for Charisse. Look, I—”
“Here you go.” The waiter sets Cabernet and cheese fries in front of Barnes and glances at Amelia’s food, untouched, cheese goo congealing. “Everything okay here?”
Barnes waves him away. “Everything’s fine.”
The waiter moves on to clear an adjoining table. A few booths away, a middle-aged woman is finishing a sandwich. The place is otherwise empty.
Barnes resumes his account in a low voice. “My daughter was born prematurely. When I saw her, tiny and fragile and helpless, I wanted nothing but the best for her. In my mind, that meant that I would not—could not—be a part of her life.”
He’d told Amelia all of this when they’d met—that he wasn’t cut out to be a family man, and certainly not the kind of father his little girl deserved. That if he tried, there’d come a day when she’d need him and he wouldn’t be there—because of the job, or because he couldn’t get along with her mother, or any number of reasons fathers break their children’s hearts. He’d decided she was better off without him, and he’d walked away.
Amelia may not have agreed with his logic, but she accepted his story. She’s heard it hundreds, thousands of times.
“I knew I’d do everything in my power to protect that little girl. I couldn’t be there with her, but I figured my dad could. That’s why I left the ring. But guardian angels can’t cover expensive medical care, and neither could her mother and I. Delia was divorced. Unemployed and homeless. I was broke. I was also young and stupid, and I did a stupid thing.”
He avoids her gaze, stamping wet interlocking rings on his paper place mat with his water glass as he goes on. “Ever hear of Perry Wayland?”
“Sounds familiar.”
“He was a hedge fund millionaire—or billionaire, if you believed the tabloids. He disappeared in October ’87, a few days after the stock market crash. His Mercedes was found on the GW Bridge—staged suicide. And . . . this doesn’t go any further, okay? Strictly confidential.”
“Got it.”
“My partner Stef and I tracked Wayland to . . . it doesn’t matter where. I didn’t see him myself, but Stef did. Wayland said he’d run off with his mistress, and he bribed Stef to look the other way. Stef knew my daughter was fighting for her life in the ICU. He handed me a wad of cash.” Barnes looks Amelia in the eye. “I didn’t hand it back. I gave it to Delia, and the ring, too, and then I walked away. Wayland left the country with his mistress, and I never told a soul.”
Ah, no wonder. He isn’t just harboring guilt about the ring. All these years, he’s been hiding something much bigger . . . if his story is true.
“You told me you looked for Charisse, a few years after she was born. And you met Alma.”
He nods. “I went out to where they’d been living, in the Marcy Projects. Alma was still there, and she had a little daughter of her own.”
“Brandy Harrison. So that’s how she got the ring.”
“Probably. Alma said Delia had taken off with Charisse, and she hadn’t heard from her. I hoped they’d found a better place. The projects were dangerous back then.”
“And dangerous now. I mean . . . they were murdered.”
“Yeah.”
He looks around for eavesdroppers. The waiter has disappeared. The middle-aged female customer is in earshot, but appears to be lost in her own thoughts.
Barnes leans forward, voice dropping to a whisper. “A few months ago, when I was on vacation in Cuba with Rob and Kurtis, I ran into Perry Wayland. I guess he thought I’d come looking for him—like after all these years, his case mattered to the NYPD. Anyway, he made some threats, and . . .” He heaves a deep breath. “That’s why I hired you to find my daughter. Wayland said he already had.”
“And you think he got to Alma and Delia?”
“I don’t know what to think. But there’s one more thing. Do you remember—”
He breaks off, pulls his phone from his pocket, and holds up a forefinger, indicating he has to take the call. “Yeah, Barnes here . . . yeah . . . yeah, I’m on my way.”
He hangs up, stands up, throws some cash on the table, and pulls on his coat. “Sorry. I’ve got to go. It’s the job.”
“But you said there was one more thing.”
“Yeah, not important.”
She frowns, watching him walk away as the waiter approaches.
“Can I get you anything else?”
“Just the check, please. And I’ll take hers as well.” Amelia points to the woman, who reminds her of Bettina Crenshaw, with world-weary posture and tired brown eyes.
“Should I tell her you—”
“No, I’d rather be anonymous. Someone once did the same thing for me.”
Nineteen years old, she’d just stepped off a bus in Ithaca, determined to meet the famed Cornell University molecular biology professor Silas Moss. He’d been on television the night before, talking about his pioneering autosomal DNA research project.
She’d walked into Moosewood Restaurant, ordered a meal she couldn’t afford, and the waitress told her an anonymous stranger had paid her bill.