“I knew it,” she said. “In any case, it took a lot of finagling on my part, but I found the right lawyers, we paid off the right gangsters. And he was free to disappoint us again and again.”
I looked at her for a long while. “This is enlightening,” I said. “It doesn’t make me want to take this case. But it is enlightening.”
Lydia let out a sigh. “Sunny,” she said, “you take your job seriously.”
“I do.”
“I could tell that just from reading that article,” she said. “You care about people. You care about families.”
“Not all people,” I said. “Not all families.”
She opened her mouth as if to say something, but drew a sharp breath instead. She seemed to be at a loss for words—unusual for her, I was sure. Surprisingly, it made me feel kind of bad.
“You know, I’m not as great as that article would have you believe,” I said.
“Modesty,” she said. “Yet another virtue.”
“Full disclosure, I used to date the guy who wrote it.”
She smiled. “That speaks even more highly of you. Anexportraying you that way.”
I sighed. “You get your mind set on something, you don’t let go, do you?”
“Like a dog with a bone,” she said. “It’s how I got Bill to propose.”
I watched her for a few moments. “I’m assuming you want to offer me more than your husband did.”
“Absolutely.”
I thought about the second home on the Jersey Shore. “How much more?”
Lydia opened her Birkin bag. She removed a piece of ivory-colored stationery and a Montblanc pen. She wrote a number on the stationery, turned it face down, and slid it across the desk. “I know this is corny,” she said.
“I’ve only ever seen it done in movies.”
“Same here,” she said. “But some numbers are better off written than said out loud.”
I turned the paper over. Looked at the figure—enough for a down payment or at least a year’s rent on a very nice, dog-friendly apartment in Asbury Park.
I cleared my throat. “Can I ask you something, Mrs. Welch?”
“Lydia.”
“Lydia,” I said. “How do you know that Dylan is missing?”
“Pardon?”
“He’s a grown man. He leads an active lifestyle. Would it be that out of character for him to take off somewhere for…How long has it been?”
“Two weeks.”
I exhaled. “That doesn’t seem like a very long time.”
“Have you ever gone that long without talking to your mother?”
“Yes.”
“Truly?”
