The Brooklyn Brotherhood: Just Once - The Brooklyn Brotherhood: Just Once Part 22
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The Brooklyn Brotherhood: Just Once Part 22

When her mother said nothing, her poker face firmly in place, Daphne switched gears. The Rossis' annual Fourth of July party was legendary in Park Heights. Her parents looked forward to it all year, and it was a topic sure to divert her mother's focus from whatever weird place it had traveled to.

"How many people do you and Daddy expect this year?"

"We should be near a hundred, with Gio's in-laws coming in from Ohio."

"Good. Good." Daphne nodded, making a mental note to pick up extra sparklers for her sister-in-law, Tina's, grandmother. The woman was sweet, but she'd practically fought a few six-year-olds for an extra box a few years back. "How long are they staying with Gio and Tina?"

"About a week. Then they're taking a cruise." Giavanna's nose wrinkled, that subtle disdain for her son's in-laws getting the better of her.

Daphne had watched it for years. Her mother vacillated between happiness that she had a relationship with her daughter-in-law and a son who still lived in the area, and that subtle distaste that she had to share him with anyone.

"How nice."

"Your father wants to go on a cruise."

"You should go. One of those Mediterranean ones, or maybe to Alaska."

"And leave you here alone?"

The frustration that had gripped Daphne since the moment she saw her mother behind the desk moved up a few more notches, like a roller coaster slowly headed up an incline. "Me?"

"It wouldn't do to leave you here alone."

"You do realize I carry a gun. Every day. And I know how to use it."

"Of course I know that." The nose wrinkle was back. "Very unladylike."

"Yet very coplike." Daphne rose, done with the conversation and the subtle innuendo that her mother never seemed quite able to quell. "I have to get back to work. I've got the coolers and the sparklers and the dessert I promised. I'll see you on the Fourth."

"With your young man."

"Assuming he's free, my young man will be helping me carry coolers." With a fifth of vodka way down deep inside one, Daphne silently vowed to herself as she escorted her mother out of the squad room.

Since she'd already braved her own mother for the day, Daphne figured it was time to do the same with Landon's mother. Although she'd taken a brief statement from Louisa Mills while they were all at Landon's office, the realizations about possible motives for the server breach had kept her from asking additional questions. Her focus had been bagging the evidence and playing keep-away from Landon.

Plus, she still owed the woman a thank you for the brunch invitation.

She used the end of her lunch hour to walk from the precinct to the brownstone on Cherry Street, climbing the front stoop just shy of 1 PM. She'd briefly toyed with calling ahead, but figured a surprise approach might pay better dividends. Not that she thought Louisa Mills was guilty of anything, but it was still worth keeping the upper hand.

The early July day wrapped around her with sticky fingers, and Daphne fought the urge to tug at her blouse as she listened to the doorbell echo through the large house. She'd rehearsed her approach in her mind-this was a routine case, after all-but somehow the words simply evaporated when Louisa opened the door.

"Ms. Mills."

"Daphne!" Landon's mother was already gesturing her into the air-conditioned house with a big hug and a forward wave. "Please come in."

A few minutes after that Daphne was ensconced at the kitchen table with a fresh glass of iced tea in front of her.

"I'm sorry for the midday drop-in."

"Nothing to apologize for." Louisa closed the laptop in front of her spot at the table, then placed it on a towering stack of papers. "It'll be nice to take a break from reviewing tax documents."

"Tax season's over."

"Not for everyone." Louisa took a sip of her own drink. "Have you gotten a lead on the break-in?"

"Not yet, but I do have some questions. About your history with Gretchen Reynolds." The warm, open smile fell, replaced with a darkness Daphne wouldn't have imagined possible.

"I've spent the last few decades trying to forget those times."

Curious, Daphne couldn't resist asking, "Were you successful?"

"At times. At other times they felt like weights around my ankles."

"It's tough to outrun your past when you're weighted down."

"It's even tougher when you hurt your family in the process." Daphne could only assume Louisa took her silence for understanding when the woman continued. "Landon didn't tell you?"

"He's told me some of the story. Why don't you tell me your version?"

Where she'd expected the need to prod or poke, coaxing a response from Louisa, she got a surprisingly clear-eyed tale.

"I came out of college and went straight into finance. I was on the fast track at Reynolds Investments, well on my way toward partner, when I fell in love with the crown prince."

"Kincade Reynolds?"

"One and the same. It was hot and passionate, and I convinced myself it was meant to be." Louisa traced a line around the base of her glass, smearing the condensation. "Until it wasn't."

"Were you acquainted with Gretchen Reynolds then?"

"I knew of her. Enough to say hello at the annual office holiday party, that sort of thing. She was a difficult woman, and it was no secret around the office that Kincade's marriage was one of convenience more than it was one of love."

Daphne wondered at that, but held her tongue. Although she was still unmarried, as were the majority of her friends, she'd observed her parents for years, as well as her brother and his wife. She'd seen grandparents and aunts and uncles and family friends. She'd observed, as was her nature, and every time she did, she came back to one solid truth: Marriage wasn't easy.

It might be wonderful. Fulfilling. Soul-deepening. But it wasn't easy. She wasn't nave-she did know people married for many reasons-but it seemed like an awfully difficult way to make a life, locked to another person without love at the core.

"Regardless of Kincade's reasons for staying in his marriage, he did stay. And he had two children who didn't deserve what I was doing. It took me a long time to realize that, and an even longer time to compare it with my own experience as a mother and fully understand what I'd done. The impact of my choices."

"You sound sorry."

"For the actions, I am. For the outcomes . . . ?" Louisa smiled at that. "It's how I found my boys. The week I came back home here to Park Heights, I met Landon, Fender, and Nick. I wouldn't change a single moment of that. Of any of it."

"Do you know why Gretchen's targeted you now?"

"I've never questioned the fact that I'm the villain in the story of her life. I can only guess she finally found an outlet for her anger in my bid for borough president."

"She told you that?"

Louisa reached for her laptop. "She sent me several unkind e-mails earlier this summer, telling me how unfit I was for the role. Threatening to go to the press. That sort of thing."

"And then it stopped?"

"It did. I decided to run my campaign anyway and the e-mails stopped." Louisa reached for her laptop and opened it, tapping in her password. "I assumed it was because she realized that she risked her own personal embarrassment vilifying her husband that way. Kincade's been gone for almost ten years. It seemed like something unpleasant to churn up."

"And then Landon's break-in happened."

"Yes." Once more, Daphne saw the weight of years appear on Louisa's face. "My son doesn't deserve this."

"No one deserves it, Ms. Mills. That's why it's called a crime."

Daphne waited while Louisa pulled up an e-mail program, then opened up several e-mails with various dates in May and early June. "Here they are. I can also send them to you if you'd like me to."

Daphne handed over a card. "That'd be great. My e-mail address is on here. I would like to read them, though."

"Of course."

The notes were short and quite pointed. Daphne got a solid picture of vitriol, anger, and a burning rage that hadn't been quelled by the passage of time. She also struggled against the small shot of sympathy for this woman who'd been betrayed. It was foreign-especially because she had no sympathy for the theft perpetrated against Landon-but still, something whispered through her thoughts.

How would it feel to be the one left behind?

"Thank you." Daphne passed the laptop back across the table. "I know this isn't easy."

Louisa tapped the card. "I'll see that you get them."

Her questions answered, Daphne pushed back her chair. "I appreciate your time."

The warm welcome that had carried her into the pretty yellow kitchen had gone stale, the moments now fraught with lingering embarrassment. If things did go somewhere with Landon, there was nothing that would ever erase this discussion with his mother.

"Landon's taken this the hardest."

"Excuse me?"

"The news of the affair. I never told my boys. It happened before I knew them, and it certainly wasn't something I was going to tell them as children. Then they grew up and it seemed so far away. A different life in a different time."

"But they found out anyway."

"That they did. Nick and Fender might not have liked the news, but they got past it. They both chalked it up to that different life in a different time and moved on."

"And Landon?"

"We've struggled to get past it."

Daphne toyed ever so briefly with the urge to play dumb, but pressed on. "He told me that much."

"His life before coming here wasn't easy. His biological mother wasn't capable of caring for him. Wasn't fit due to her addiction."

"I know that much as well." Again Daphne hesitated before adding, "I've got the files, Ms. Mills. I understand his history, even if his juvenile record is sealed."

"You're a cop. Of course you do."

"You don't think his mother is a part of this?" When Louisa only shook her head, Daphne added, "Are you aware she's back in Park Heights?"

"I wasn't until Fender told me this morning."

Daphne filed away the news that Fender shared the details, not Landon, but kept that to herself, too. "Amber McGee is part of my investigation until this is fully wrapped."

"She didn't do it."

"You sure about that?"

"Why would she? What does she have to gain?"

"Access to her son?"

"There are far easier ways to get that access than anonymously breaking into his office." Louisa hesitated before she rushed on. "Please leave her alone. All you're doing is churning up his past. Please don't let her get any closer to my son."

"I appreciate your perspective, but I have to manage my investigation in my own way."

Louisa said nothing more, but Daphne in no way mistook the silence for agreement.

And as she showed herself out, she couldn't help but wonder how much weight of a person's past they could take before they simply broke.

Lunch at Stewey's diner was always the same: A line of grizzled old guys from the neighborhood lined up at the long counter bar, their morning newspapers crumpled and stained with coffee while they shot the shit over any number of topics. Stewey's daughter, Sarah, ran the front counter while also floating around making sure things were running smoothly, while his son, Elmo, helped run the line in the kitchen.

Landon gave Elmo a wave as he sat down, pleased to see the man. No one made crispy bacon like Elmo.

"What would you like, sweetie?" Vicki Bartholomew stood over his table, her green order pad in hand and pen at the ready.

Nick had his head barmaid, Patty, and Stewey had Vicki. The woman was known to one and all throughout Park Heights for her beehive of black hair and flamboyant tights. Leopard print today.

"Belgian waffle-"

"-and extra crispy bacon," Vicki finished for him.

"Yep."

"Brownie for dessert."

Landon laid a hand on his chest. "Am I that transparent?"

"I've been waiting on you for more than twenty years, Landon McGee. Have you ever walked out of this place without a brownie?"

"No, ma'am."

"Then why should today be any different?" Before he could answer she swatted him on top of his head with her notepad. "And don't sass me. Ma'ams are for old ladies."

"Of course."

Landon watched Vicki bustle away and took comfort in the familiar-the sights and sounds and smells-as he waited for his lunch.