Colleen pressed the buzzer and stood at the intercom by the stone gate of a mock Tudor house the size of a small castle in Sea Cliff, her collapsible umbrella flapping ominously over her head. The rain was still falling steadily and now, out by the ocean, the wind blew with menace.
Assemblyman Patrick Skinner lived alongside people of similar social stature. Although no competition for the Copelands’ residence in Half Moon Bay, the house was impressive, with views of both the Golden Gate Bridge and the Presidio.
A woman answered. She had a Latin accent. Colleen announced herself as Carol Aird, claims handler.
“I called earlier,” she said. “You said Mr. Skinner was home and might spare a few minutes to clear up a matter regarding an auto insurance claim?”
“That’s right, Ms. Aird. Do come in.”
The gate hummed and let Colleen in as a gust of wind pulled her two-dollar umbrella inside out. Down a stone walkway, a dark wooden front door with a diagonal antique nail pattern on it opened and a middle-aged Hispanic woman in a maid’s outfit greeted her.
“This way, please,” she said, offering to take Colleen’s dilapidated umbrella. She had a perfect poker face.
“It’s in a sad state,” Colleen said, handing her the umbrella. “Maybe just do me a favor and toss it out.”
“Of course,” the maid said coolly as she took the umbrella and showed Colleen into a study, seating her at a small divan by a fireplace. No fire had been built and the room was on the chilly side. “Mr. Skinner will be with you in just a minute.” She exited the room, leaving the door open.
Colleen stood up to examine the many photos on the mantelpiece and walls. Assemblyman Patrick Skinner was a big-boned, hearty-looking man of Irish extraction, with a head of thick red hair in his younger days, and a broad smile. He had been photographed with his arm around, or shaking hands with, many prominent people and people who appeared to be prominent. There was even a photograph of him and several other men on a golf course with Richard Nixon.
But what caught her eye were photos of his son, Kieran. The Skinners had three children—two daughters and a son—and Colleen was able to pick him out easily. That was because there was a preponderance of photos of Kieran in comparison to his sisters and mother. Black-and-white pictures of a little dark-haired boy blowing out candles on a cake, playing with a toy car with one of his sisters, then in a Cub Scout uniform. A substantial recording of his early life. Later on, the photos switched to color, with Kieran wearing a fencing outfit, standing at the tiller of a sailboat, in front of the Vatican in Rome, and many other locales. But one thing remained constant throughout—the detached, empty look in his eyes, which were set in a narrow, rawboned face, at odds with his father’s.
And the fact that Kieran Skinner wore thick glasses from an early age.
The photos seemed to stop around the twenty-year mark. Why was that? By Colleen’s calculations, Kieran Skinner would be in his early thirties now. In addition, pictures of his mother, a small dark-haired woman who tended to look past the camera, unsmiling, stopped after the late sixties.
This looked promising.
Out in the hallway, descending the stairs, came the sound of heavy footsteps. Colleen turned to the door, readying her best smile.
Patrick Skinner entered the room, all two hundred-plus pounds of him. He wore a double-breasted gray suit, white shirt, and green stripe tie. His reddish hair had turned to a dashing gray but was just as full as in the photographs. His big ruddy face beamed with a smile that was disarming.
“Ms. Aird!” he said as if they were long-lost friends, coming over to throttle her hand in a shake that probably worked like a charm on the campaign trail. She gave him one of her business cards and he offered her a seat, after which he sat down in a crewel-embroidered chair to one side of the divan. “And how can I help you today?”
“I’m sorry to take up your time,” she said, “but I’m trying to clear up a matter for a client.”
“Your client being …?”
“I’m with The Pacific All Risk Insurance Company.”
“Never heard of them.” He frowned. “What do they want from me?”
“Well, there was a recent claim made, referencing a vehicle registered to your son.”
“Can’t be.” He screwed up his eyebrows. “Kieran doesn’t own a car. Hasn’t for years,” he added with a jovial smile.
That surprised her. A young man from a well-to-do family might own more than one car. Since she was lying about everything else, she simply pushed ahead. She unhooked her shoulder bag and removed a file folder and extracted a letter on 24-pound bond paper from several she’d had typed up at a local temporary agency. One for each Falcon. The letterhead was a copy of the lawyers who had handled Colleen’s court case in Santa Cruz last year. It xeroxed well enough to create the right impression if one didn’t look too closely. “I’m afraid”—she pretended to reread the letter—“that a green 1967 Ford Falcon belonging to a Kieran Skinner was involved in an accident last month in Santa Monica. A hit-and-run …” She held up the letter, in case Patrick Skinner wanted to see for himself. When he didn’t, she slipped the letter quickly back in its folder, but left the folder open on her lap.
“How odd.” Patrick Skinner grimaced as he put one hand to his face, suitably confused. “Have any charges been filed?”
“Not yet,” Colleen said. “I’ve been assigned to investigate first. But it sounds as if a mistake has been made. I hope we can sort things out before we go off on some wild goose chase and the police are called in.”
She saw a telltale flicker of concern cross Patrick Skinner’s face at the word police.
“Good thing, too,” he said. “That car was sold eleven years ago—before we even got plates on it.”
“Aha,” Colleen said. “It was a mistake then.”
“The new owner should have registered it.”
She nodded. “Who did you sell it to?”
“Why, back to the dealer—Serramonte Ford.”
“May I ask why?”
“You may indeed.” Patrick Skinner dropped his voice to a discreet level. He rose from his chair, went over and shut the door to the study, returned to his seat, pulled the knees of his trousers up as he sat down and leaned forward to speak to her. He was a good actor, and it was an act.
“That car was a graduation present for my son, Kieran,” he said. “Only he was not one hundred percent honest with us about actually graduating from Riordan.” He gave a big grin. “He’s got the gift of BS, like his old man, and he flat out lied to us. Can you believe it?”
Colleen smiled. “So you took the car back when you found out your son hadn’t actually graduated from high school?”
Patrick Skinner nodded. “I did indeed. Took it back. 1967, it was. That taught him to make things up. I have no idea who Serramonte Ford sold it to after that, however.”
Colleen shut the file folder and slid it back in her shoulder bag. She slipped the bag over her shoulder, stood up. “Thanks so much for clearing this up, Mr. Skinner. I’m very sorry to have disturbed you.”
“Oh, just one thing.” Patrick Skinner frowned again, as if he were slow witted, which of course he wasn’t. “May I see that letter? The one you had out just now? From your company?”
Colleen’s heart skipped. “Why, of course.” She unhitched her shoulder bag, got her file folder out, extracted the fake letter, handed it to him.
He took it, read it, shaking his head. “Unbelievable.”
That’s what she was worried about.
“But I do believe we’ve cleared the matter up.” She reached for the letter.
He held it up, away from her. “Mind if I get a copy—for my records?”
“Why, of course not. I’ll see that you’re sent one as soon as I get back to the office.”
“No need,” he said, smiling. “I’ve got my own Xerox machine.” Her stomach dropped. “You do?”
“Upstairs. My secretary is out at the moment. I’ll just run off a quick copy myself—if you don’t mind.” Big beaming smile. “I’ll be right back.”
Patrick Skinner bounded out of the room with her counterfeit letter. She could hear him jogging up the stairs.
She’d seen all she needed to of the sitting room. She’d wait in the hall.
When she did, she heard two people talking upstairs, in voices that soon became heated. One of them was Patrick Skinner. She wandered over to the bottom of a carved staircase where she could hear better.
She still couldn’t distinguish what was being said beyond the fact that the other voice belonged to a young man. Kieran Skinner was her guess. She took a few steps up the stairway, cocked her head.
“You best be keeping your nose clean,” she heard Patrick Skinner say.
“I’ve done nothing—unlike some people I can mention.”
“Don’t tell me you’re back on that, after all these years. I won’t tolerate it. I can always send you back, boy.”
“I’ll take care of this!”
Lighter footsteps came hurtling along a hallway upstairs, and Colleen’s heart leapt. She flew down the stairs to the doorway where she composed herself as she studied an elegant bouquet in a cloisonné vase on a side table. She pretended not to notice the young man storming down the stairs.
“Who the hell do you think you are, accusing me of hit-and-run?” he said. “Do you have any idea who my father is?”
Colleen turned nonchalantly to see a man in his late twenties or early thirties, wearing a wrinkled yellow bathrobe that only amplified his lean stature, his stick legs, his bare, boney feet, toe nails that needed cutting. His gaunt face was the same as the one she had seen in the photos in the study, albeit a decade older, and he had grown a bushy black Fu Manchu mustache and thick sideburns as if to compensate for his weak chin. His wild dark hair stuck out in an uncombed frizz. He looked like a reject from a porno flick. Thick-framed glasses amplified his unyielding dark eyes.
He stood on the bottom step and gripped the banister with a vibrating hand.
“Carol Aird,” she said with a smile calculated to upset him further. “You must be Kieran Skinner. Nice to meet you.” She walked over, put her hand out, and was not surprised in the least when he did not take it.
“Nice to meet me?” He stepped down onto the floor. “Then why are you harassing me?”
“I do apologize. It was just some confusion. It’s been cleared up.”
“Tell those assholes you work for we’ll sue.”
“O-kay.” She nodded sagely. “I’ll be sure to do that.” Again, she returned her winning smile.
A second set of footsteps came thumping down the stairs, more deliberate than Kieran’s. Patrick Skinner appeared with Colleen’s letter in his hand, his plastic smile replaced by an angry scowl.
“How dare you talk like that to a guest in my house,” he said to Kieran. “Apologize immediately.”
Kieran’s eyes shot to the floor. “I just …”
“I have no interest in hearing what you were just doing,” Patrick Skinner growled. “Apologize. And get out of my sight.”
Kieran Skinner looked down at the floor. “I apologize,” he said through his teeth.
“It’s no problem,” she said. “I understand how frustrating something like this can be.”
He turned, walked up the stairs with a furtive scowl, eyeing her.
“Here you go, Ms. Aird,” Patrick Skinner said, pushing Colleen’s letter back at her, staring at her with sharp eyes. “Please contact my attorney for any further questions.”
“That won’t be necessary.” Colleen took the letter, placed it back in her shoulder bag.
The maid reappeared as Patrick Skinner headed back up the stairs. “I’ll show you out,” she said. She had obviously overheard the exchange.
Outside, the rain had eased up, but the wind hadn’t. Colleen gauged how long it would take her to get to her car without an umbrella before she was soaked again.
But she didn’t much care.
She’d just scored a direct hit.
Kieran Skinner wore glasses. Kieran Skinner had a powerful father who was covering up for him, a man he seemed to carry a deep grievance against. She recalled what Millard Drake, the forensic analyst who had signed Margaret Copeland’s autopsy report, had said about repressed rage. Kieran Skinner once owned a car that was supposedly returned for some silly reason, a car that Colleen bet was the same one Larry the maintenance man at Stow Lake had seen eleven years ago, parked near the murder site where Margaret Copeland had met her demise.
A dark satisfaction washed through her gut.
It was finally coming together.