The Legacy: A Kimberly & Sykes Mystery Novel (2 page)

Lauren, I am working on a job and the data isn’t adding up. I am trying to figure out what is going on and what to do about it. Hopefully, everything will turn out well and I will live to tell you the story over dinner sometime soon. It’s been too long… I want to change that. I am going to make up for not being the dad you needed. I promise things are going to be different from now on.

On the off chance something goes wrong, and you are reading this, talk to the woman with the casts, she’s helped me a lot…honey, it’s best for you that I don’t tell you anything else. You are safer not knowing. If you are reading this note then things didn’t go as I planned, but you will know that. Get away now Lauren. Put this letter down, pack a bag, and go far away. I’m sorry baby girl, I am so sorry. I never wanted to fail you.

Forgive me.

Dad.

Lauren’s hands were shaking making the letter hard to read. With the paper quivering in front of her eyes, she read the letter again. What on earth was her father talking about? What was he so afraid of?

The words made no more sense to her on her third reading as than they had on her first. Closing her eyes she tried to remember the name of the woman who had cast the custom pieces for many of her father’s prototype inventions. Lauren had been a child and only met the woman occasionally, and then only spent enough time with her to say a polite ‘hello’ before going back to her reading or homework. Why would her father think she would remember her?

Holding the letter in her hand, Lauren paced back and forth struggling to recall a woman from her distant past.

Little by little, the one single thought that kept pushing itself to the front of her mind was “How could he?” How her father could do this to her was mystifying. Lauren ranted aloud at him for getting her tangled up in his mess.

“This is a fine way to come back in to my life dad! Thanks for nothing! ….

Right, pack up and leave, just like that? What were you thinking!”

Lauren couldn’t just up and leave. She had clients who depended upon her. Choosing to quit her job of her own choice was one thing, it was quite another to lose that job by running away from something out of her control. Hell, she didn’t even have a place to run to.

Edvard Munch’s painting, ‘The Scream’ revolved inside Lauren’s mind. Her own silent scream rocked her to her core. Lauren was beside herself as she walked back and forth across the room trying to clear the noise in her head so that she could think clearly. Finally, she collapsed on the sofa and lost herself in a troubled sleep.

******

Wrenched from sleep, Lauren sat bolt upright but couldn’t remember the bad dream. Fully awake, she lay back on the cushion and thought about her father. He may not have been the best on the planet but she knew he wouldn’t have stolen anything from Adam Smith. From what he said in his note, there was a lot more going on than what Smith implied.

Lauren didn’t want to meet with Adam Smith, but she did want to know why her father killed himself. Her mind made up, she got up from the sofa and went to sleep in her bed. She would meet Adam Smith, and she needed to be fresh and ready.

The birdsong woke Lauren at 5:00am the next morning. She lay for a few minutes embracing the warm feelings that resonated through her body before she slowly got out of bed. It was going to be a long day and Lauren was anxious to find the woman who cast her father’s machine parts. She slipped on her slippers and robe and put the kettle on to boil while she took a shower. It was long, and hot. The water brought comfort and Lauren longed to stay under its embrace. Remembering the kettle, she turned off the water and climbed out of the steamy enclosure.

The decision to go to work or stay at home had sorted itself out. Standing in the kitchen with her mug of coffee in hand Lauren looked down to see that she had subconsciously dressed in sweat pants and long sleeved t-shirt; her house clothes. She would take the day off and spend some time after her meeting with Smith to have a last look at her files before her court appearance the following day.

It wasn’t yet 6:0am and far too early to call Beth, her best friend and colleague. Lauren had few friends outside of work and to all intents and purposes, she was a loner. She hadn’t meant to be. She was a social butterfly until she was dumped by the love of her life ten years earlier. Back then, her close friends kept trying to set her up on blind dates and took every opportunity to tell her the best cure for a broken heart was to start dating again.

At the time, Lauren was in too much grief to think about dating and socializing. It was easier not to see her friends than deal with their attempts to find her a hot date. After a while, they stopped trying and she found her solitary routines suited her.

Lauren actually liked being single and doing what she wanted, when she wanted. Her social life these days consisted of an infrequent drink with Beth and her other colleagues after work and dinner or a movie with Beth every few weeks. Lauren didn’t talk about her private life, such as it was, and Beth seemed content to talk about Ministry of Social Welfare policies and practises and the effect of budget cuts on their individual client loads. Lauren’s lips stretched in a smile when she remembered Adam Smith told her not to tell anyone about his phone call. Other than Beth, she didn’t have anyone to tell.

Lauren could call Beth, but, as she had not talked to Beth about her relationship with her father, she would have to provide too much history to bring her up-to-date. She didn’t want to delve into that past today, it was too raw.

Lauren had to focus on finding the cast woman. If all went well, she could give Adam Smith the information he needed without having to meet him later this evening. She felt a pang of guilt about her clients. So many would be unhappy her appointments are cancelled because they relied so heavily on her help. All social workers carried a full client load, and many of Lauren’s clients had been on her files for so long they welcomed the routine. She shook the thoughts from her mind and reminded herself to stay on track. How was she going to track down the cast woman? Her father must have her name and contact info in his paperwork.

Lauren called in sick to work. Once she had left a message on her boss’ voicemail she went back to her den to go through her father’s paperwork again. If the cast woman’s contact information was there, she would find it. Mike Kimberly was a prolific note taker and Lauren felt sure that he would have made a note about the equipment and what, if anything, he and the cast woman did with it. All she had to do was find it and give the information to Smith.

Lauren leaned against the door jamb and surveyed the chaos she had left behind the night before. Papers covered every surface. As she looked at the disarray, her stomach fluttered. She knew the feeling well: it was the first ripple of panic. Lauren swallowed hard and rubbed her belly trying to make it settle down.

Letting her eyes travel over the tossed paperwork Lauren reflected on when the courier first delivered them. She remembered groaning and grumbling when he kept going back to his van for more loads. With client files and personal papers of her own, she had enough to deal with. Lauren remembered feeling angry that in his last act, her father had managed to insinuate himself back into her life. He had refused to reconnect with her when she offered the olive branch yet, by taking his own life, he must have realised she would end up having to deal with his affairs. She had been so taken up in her feelings of victimized she forgot to tip the courier.

Lauren moved from the doorway and into the den pushing papers aside with her foot to make a path to a spot in the middle of the room where she sat down on the floor.

Scanning the wreckage around her Lauren looked for any slip of paper with her father’s handwriting. If her father left her any clues she was going to find them. 

Packing a bag and running away to God-knows-where just isn’t an option Lauren mused. That was her father’s way of dealing with life and she still felt resentful that he left her and her mother struggling alone so many times when she was a child. Those memories are the reason she always told her clients that running away only delayed the inevitable: at some point, they had to come back and deal with the problem. From where she sat right now, she realized that her advice to them to ‘stay in the moment’ served them no purpose at all.

Taking another sip of her coffee Lauren was surprised to find it cold. When she glanced at the clock she saw that her reminiscing and reflection had consumed over an hour. This dwelling on the past wasn’t doing her any good. Lauren knew there was nothing for it but to make a pot of strong coffee and work her way through all the papers again, this time repacking as she did so.

Lauren had repacked eight of the boxes before she put her hands on a small package she had missed during her frenzy the previous evening. Wrapped in a piece of paper bound by a red elastic band she found two keys.

The keys were not unusual; in fact, they looked just like her own door keys; tarnished and well worn. The paper wrapped around the keys was blank. Her father left a letter for her, such as it was, so why didn’t he leave a note indicating what the keys were for. They were obviously important enough for him to keep. Lauren’s face lit up with a smile as she caught herself trying to make words appear by sheer force of will. She gave her head a slight shake. Amused at her own behavior, she tossed the keys several times in her hand. “Hey dad! How about some help here,” she shouted at the ceiling.

Time was passing fast yet no matter how closely Lauren read every piece of paper, nothing miraculously appeared in response to her call for help. In the far reaches of her awareness Lauren knew she was hungry, but she didn’t stop for food or drink.  It was only when her stomach gave a loud and prolonged gurgle that she decided to stop and get something to eat. She was shocked to see it was already late afternoon. “There’s probably not going to be food served at this meeting so I better eat now,” she thought. After a quick sandwich, Lauren carried another mug of coffee back into the den and continued to put all the papers, receipts, and photos back into boxes. She had glanced at each photo the night before but seeing pictures of herself as a young child with her parents was too upsetting. They belonged to happier times. Lauren would go back and look at the photos in the future when the pain of her father’s death wasn’t so vivid.

Having her space in such a mess made Lauren’s brain feel overloaded. She had learned very quickly in university that she felt overwhelmed and out of sorts when her dorm room was a mess. When she couldn’t find things it made her feel as though her whole life was out of control. With no sign of any information pointing to the whereabouts of the cast woman, the sooner Lauren packed the boxes back up, the sooner she could start looking elsewhere.

The only things Lauren had to show after spending hours going through boxes were her letter and the keys. She was beginning to feel the letter was nothing more than drunken ramblings and the keys were probably of no significance.

As a child Lauren was aware her father was focused on himself and sometimes didn’t seem to notice she and her mom were in the room. Mike Kimberly’s center of attention was his latest invention. Meanwhile, her mother worked  long hours and still found time to take her to the art gallery, the museum, and the occasional live theatre.  Lauren couldn’t remember one time that her father joined them. He chose always to stay at home and tinker. Committing suicide was an act that Lauren thought of as more evidence of his selfishness. 

“Why dad? Why didn’t you even try to see me? You don’t contact me for years and then leave me with one of your messes to clean up! I can’t believe this!” Lauren said in frustration.

Her back ached badly from being bent over boxes for several hours. Lauren checked the clock and saw that she had enough time for another hot shower before her meeting. It was while she was in the shower that Lauren had the idea to Google Adam Smith. After she wrapped herself in an oversized white bath towel she hesitated for only a second before she poured a glass of Pinot Gris and fired up the laptop. ‘Thank god for the web,’ she thought. ‘Let’s see what we can find.’ 

The first search brought back dozens of pages on hundreds of people called Adam Smith. Sitting back in her chair, Lauren took a sip of wine and contemplated. She had to narrow the search terms. From the sound of his voice Smith sounded to be in his 60s. This time she searched for ‘Adam Smith, business man, 60yrs’. Bingo! Lauren punched her fist in the air. Google had returned a handful of results. She quickly scanned through them until she found a listing of the most likely candidate.

Adam Smith, if indeed this was the same person who had called her, was a very handsome man in his early 60’s. He had penetrating blue eyes and a full head of silver hair, cut in the standard ‘short back & sides’. His teeth were perfect - must have cost him a fortune, she thought. Adam Smith was looking directly into the camera lens with a huge smile on his face. Lauren paused. This is not the picture of the man she had imagined. Nor does he look like the type of evil guy her dad wanted her to run away from. In fact, he looked very handsome and friendly. Maybe this was not the Adam Smith who called her the previous evening after all.

Lauren looked at the picture as she sipped her wine and thought about calling Beth. She knew Beth would tell her to call the police. When she refused, Beth was likely to call the police herself. Lauren
had
thought about calling them, regardless of the dire warning she had been given, but what would she tell them – her father stole valuable items and the rightful owner wanted to meet with her to get them back? If the police could help, her father would surely have gone to them.

No, she had to do this herself. Adam Smith looked respectable enough and was unlikely to harm her. He was obviously upset about some missing equipment her father had taken – not stolen she reminded herself – and she would be polite, but firm, and tell him once again, she had no idea where his missing items were. End of story.

****

Wearing a stylish white cotton blouse with navy blue linen dress pants and navy penny loafers, Lauren looked at herself in the mirror. She wanted to portray a no-nonsense woman of confidence. These were the clothes she wore when she had important meetings at work, or when she accompanied her clients to court. She had spent a lot of money on them and always felt smarter, taller, and more competent when she wore them. 

Satisfied with what she saw, Lauren added her gold evening watch and her favorite gold pinky ring with the diamond. They both went well with her mother’s wedding band that she had worn on her right ring finger ever since her mother died.

With one last look in the mirror she opened the top two buttons of her blouse to soften her look. After running her fingers through her hair, she let out a sigh. “I may not be as rich as Mr. Adam bloody Smith but I can at least dress well,” she thought. Finally, she added a string of black pearls. These, too, were her mother’s, and just like her mother, Lauren had few occasions to wear them.

The sound of the front door buzzer echoed in her quiet apartment and startled her. With a deep breath and a quick prayer up to her mother, Lauren put on her salmon pink linen jacket, grabbed her navy clutch purse, and walked out of the apartment. She took the elevator down to street level. When she walked through the main door Lauren found a sleek black limousine parked at the curb. Standing at the rear door was a strikingly handsome man. About six feet tall with a swimmers’ body - narrow at the hip with broad shoulders, he looked like a Greek God in a suit. His dark brown curly hair was short, and his eyes were so dark they seemed black. He had smooth olive skin and the cleft in his chin parlayed any hint at softness into pure chiseled marble. Despite the circumstances, Lauren’s breath quickened as she looked him in the eye.

“Ms. Kimberly?” he said as she approached the limousine.

“Are you Mr. Sykes?”

“Just Sykes.”

“Just Sykes?”

Instead of confirming, he tilted his head slightly and smiled. Caught off guard, Lauren gave a smile of her own then stepped into the back of the limousine.