Chapter Twenty-Two
Twenty-two
“Tell Sonya about your pod, Cody,” Elizabeth said.
My sister’s content creator boyfriend didn’t reply. He was completely absorbed in his phone. He had been all evening. We were nearly done with dinner, and he’d maybe said three sentences, all of which started with “Pass the…”
“Babe?” said Elizabeth.
Cody looked up. “Huh?”
“The new podcast, babe. Tell Sonya.”
He turned to me and smirked. “Three words. Serial killers’ last meals.”
“That’s four words,” I said. “But go on.”
We were nearly done with dinner. I’d been measuring the evening in bites of scrod, and I was about four bites away from sweet release.
I hadn’t mentioned Melanie Joan or the case, because no one had asked me about it.
Dad had tried, only to be interrupted by Mother, who preferred talking about Richie’s job and why he had “chosen it over his future family” tonight.
“So, like, for each episode I spotlight a different killer,” Cody was saying. “I talk for maybe ten minutes about what they did to get on death row. Murders, trial, bla, bla, bla…But then we get to the meat.”
“The meat?” my father said.
“Their court-sanctioned last meal,” Elizabeth said.
“Ah.” Dad said it genially. Dad was always genial.
“Every episode, I describe what the murderer ordered before his execution. And then…” Cody peered around the table, a gleam in his eyes. “I eat it.”
“Spoiler alert,” I said.
“I also critique it from a culinary and societal perspective,” Cody said.
“The meal,” Dad said.
“The whole, entire meal. Unless the serial killer didn’t finish it. I only eat as much as he did, for accuracy’s sake.”
“It’s got something for everyone,” Elizabeth said. “True-crime fans. Foodies.”
“That’s not everyone,” I said. “But go on.”
“It’s a significant portion of the podcast-listening population, Sonya,” Elizabeth said.
“How many of these recordings have you made, Cody?” my mother said.
“A dozen,” Cody said.
“How industrious,” Mom said.
“And filling,” I said.
“You’re telling me,” Cody said. “John Wayne Gacy ordered a whole bucket of KFC original recipe, twelve fried prawns, an extra-large order of fries, and a pound of strawberries. Oh, and a Diet Coke. Irony. Anyways, he ate the whole thing, so I did, too. It was a lot. But, you know. The pod wants what the pod wants.”
Elizabeth beamed at him.
“Such devotion to craft,” my mother said. “You creative people never cease to amaze me.”
“I can’t do anything half-assed,” Cody said. “It would be an insult to the Cody Culture.”
“Cody Culture?” Dad asked.
“That’s his fandom,” Elizabeth said.
I managed to keep from gagging.
My dad said “ah” again, without a hint of sarcasm.
It didn’t faze me. It was our family dynamic, and I knew it well.
My dad humored my mom and they both humored Elizabeth (and anyone she happened to be involved with, whose egos tended to be even more fragile than hers).
Nobody humored Dad or me, which was fine.
But get-togethers like this one exhausted me.
I wished Richie was here, so that at least I could have somebody to roll my eyes at.
“So, Sunny,” my father said. “This case of yours—”
“I imagine it must be going quite well,” my mother said, “seeing how it made you an hour late for dinner.” She polished off her glass of Chablis and poured herself another.
I exhaled. Took another bite. “Great scrod, Mom.”
“Gerald James Bordelon ate fried sacalait fish as part of his last meal,” Cody said.
“I don’t know that I’m familiar with sacalait,” my mother said. “Is that a white fish?”
“I want to hear about our daughter’s case, Emma,” my father said.
My mother sighed dramatically. She drank more wine and started clearing the table.
I told my dad about the case. I covered everything—except for my Hail Mary phone call to Desmond Burke back in the car, when I’d asked if he could set me up with a good hacker.
Former police captain Phil Randall would not have approved of uncovering someone’s identity without a warrant, or, for that matter, a crime.
At any rate, Desmond had said he might know of a guy.
Barring miracles (which had been known to happen, but not very often), that guy was Melanie Joan’s and my only hope.
When I was through talking, Elizabeth piped up first. “I love Book Babe,” she said.
This surprised me. Elizabeth had always been an avid reader, but not of the genres favored by Book Babe. I’d known her as something of a literary snob.
“Really?” I said.
“Don’t look so surprised,” she said. “I’m actually in a book club, where we read nothing but Book Babe’s five-star books. Right, Cody?”
Cody said nothing. He was back on his phone.
“It’s a lot of fun,” Elizabeth said. “I’ve discovered so many good authors I’d never heard of before.”
“Like who?”
“Leila Donnelly. She’s fantastic.”
“Seriously?”
“Why does that shock you?”
“Because,” I said, “you don’t read romances.”
Elizabeth stood up. She collected her place setting, as well as Cody’s. “Yes, I do.”
“Since when? You always said they were silly and childish.”
“People change, Sonya,” she said. “I know that’s hard for you to believe. But you should try it sometime. Expand your horizons. Stop doing the same old tired, boring things everyone expects you to do.”
Like dating someone born in the same century as me? I wanted to say that, but she swept into the kitchen before I could get a word in.
“Are you sure the actress was telling you the truth?” Dad said once I was through. “Actors can be very convincing liars.”
“Natalie Blythe?” I shrugged. “I feel like if she was that talented an actress, Melanie Joan wouldn’t have been able to derail her career.”
“Good point,” he said.
“Any other ideas?” I said. “What would you have done back in the day, hypothetically, if Book Babe was at large and suspected of an actual crime?”
Behind me, I heard the kitchen doors swing open, the clack of my mother’s heels. “Sonya, you know that I don’t like you getting your father involved in your cases,” she said.
“Your hearing is excellent, Mom.”
“I’m serious,” she said. “You know it’s bad for his health. His blood pressure. His stress levels. Yet you keep persisting. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were a terribly insensitive and selfish person.”
My cheeks heated up. On one hand, my mother calling me insensitive and selfish was a pot-meet-kettle kind of thing.
But on the other, she had a point. My dad did have high blood pressure.
He’d been shot a couple years ago and still walked with a cane.
He wasn’t getting any younger or healthier, and here I was indulging the very thing that had sapped so much of his energy: his drive to investigate.
Was this another symptom of main character syndrome?
“That isn’t fair, Emma,” Dad said. “It isn’t insensitive or selfish to treat an old guy like me like he’s got something worthwhile to say.”
“No, no. Mom’s right,” I said.
My mom nearly dropped the glasses she was carrying. “Really?” she said.
“Yes, and I’m sorry.”
I picked up the two serving trays and brought them into the kitchen, following my mother. My dad started to get up, too, but I told him to stay where he was. “You’ve got to rest that leg,” I said.
“That’s a load of bull.” He struggled to get up, his body trembling. Slowly, he eased back into his chair. He gave me a sad smile. “Hey, who am I to argue with the smartest detective I know?” It broke my heart a little.
“Be right back,” I said.
Cody stayed where he was, his entire being absorbed in his iPhone screen.
Bombs could have gone off, he wouldn’t have budged.
I grabbed the remaining glasses from the table, set them on top of the two trays, and brought them into the kitchen.
Elizabeth was sitting on a counter stool, reapplying her makeup.
My mother was supervising the housekeeper, Donna, as she loaded the dishwasher.
When I placed the trays and glasses on the counter, my mother stopped and turned to me. “I’m sorry I was harsh with you, Sunny, but I worry about your father,” she said. “He’s so good at taking care of everyone but himself.”
“I get it, Mom.”
She gave my arm a quick squeeze. It wasn’t lost on me that she’d called me Sunny, a nickname I knew she personally loathed. Just like my father, she was changing with age. There was a softness to her now, an awareness and vulnerability that I didn’t want to think too hard about.
When I left the kitchen, my dad was on his feet.
“Dad. You should be resting.”
He ignored the comment. “You know what we would have done,” he said. “We’d have talked to the family of the fugitive. Or maybe the significant other. Someone they cared about. Put them on the five o’clock news.”
I looked at him. “Get them to make a direct appeal.”
“That’s right,” he said. “Thinking about what the equivalent of that would be now, if you got Melanie Joan to make a video and post it on YouTube. Just like that other author did.”
“Leila Donnelly.”
“Yep,” he said, “only it would be an apology. If she wants Book Babe to come forward, Melanie Joan would really have to humble herself.”
I snorted. “That’s a tall order.”
“I know. I’ve met her.”
“She was rather sweet on you, if I recall.”
Dad laughed. I laughed, too. When it came to women who were handfuls, Phil Randall was catnip and he knew it. He leaned on his cane and winced. I told him again that he should sit down.
“You wanna do me a favor?” he said.
“Anything.”
“Don’t worry about me.”
“That’s an impossible request.”
“Like asking Melanie Joan to humble herself?”
“Just like that.”
Elizabeth left the kitchen and made her way over to Cody. She sat in his lap. He didn’t look up from his phone. “Isn’t he wonderful, Sonya?” she said.
And then my phone rang. I’d never been so happy to take a call. I didn’t check the screen. For all I cared, it could have been a scammer or a heavy breather. (Did people heavy-breathe into phones anymore?) But when I heard Desmond Burke’s Irish lilt, I was doubly glad to have answered.
“My technological expert will meet you,” he said. “Midnight at Icon. He’ll be in the VIP lounge.”
I cast a quick glance at my dad and spoke very quietly. “Name?” I said. “Description?”
“The hostess will bring you to him,” Desmond said. “Ask for Swinging Dick.”