“Why not?” It was impossible to miss the challenge in his voice now.
“Because . . . because most people are not all one thing,” I said, repeating Rebecca’s words to me. “They’re not all good or all bad. They’re not saint or sinner.”
He gave a snort of contempt. “You were there for three run-ins with the guy. You’re not going to try to tell me that Lewis Wallace was some kind of saint, are you?”
I sighed. “Of course not. But he wasn’t some evil monster, either.” And now I knew from both Melanie and Wallace’s ex that the man had at least been trying to change. “You know, Lewis Wallace was barely an adult when both of his parents died. I don’t want to think about who I would have turned out to be without Mom and Dad around.”
I knew by the stubborn set to his jaw that he wasn’t yielding anything to me.
“When you were nineteen were all your choices so perfect that you didn’t need Mom and Dad?” I continued. “Are you really going to try and tell me that you don’t need them now sometimes?”
“I never kicked a service dog.”
I leaned against the counter. “You’re right. And why is that? Because Thea Paulson is your mother. Because John Paulson is your father. They taught you better and when you screwed up—and you did, little brother, because we all do—they showed you how to do better the next time.”
“You’re just making excuses for the guy,” Ethan said.
I shook my head, frustrated that he didn’t seem to be getting my point. “No. I’m trying not to judge, and yes, I did a lot of that at first because the guy did act like a jerk every time I encountered him. Now I’m trying to figure out who Lewis Wallace really was so maybe that will help me figure out how he ended up dead in that meeting room, which, by the way, is something you asked me to do.”
I turned back around and reached for the flour.
“I’m sorry,” Ethan said.
I wasn’t sure if he meant he was sorry for calling Lewis Wallace a flaming bag of crap or for asking me to figure out who’d killed the man.
I decided for now I was happier not knowing.
I went to tai chi class but my focus wasn’t really on the class.
“Is everything all right?” Maggie asked at the end of class as I used the edge of my T-shirt to blot my sweaty face because I’d forgotten my towel.
“I’m just tired,” I said. “Owen decided that quarter to six was the perfect time to get up this morning.” After meowing in my ear hadn’t worked the cat had batted my face with one paw and breathed on me until I finally sat up.
“Tomorrow night is still a go?” she asked.
“Absolutely. I’m looking forward to it.”
I was. I’d been mired in trying to figure out who killed Lewis Wallace for the past several days. It would be nice to think about something else other than that, or the fact that Ethan was leaving in less than two days.
As I drove up to Marcus’s house it occurred to me that maybe I should stop poking around in Lewis Wallace’s death. Maybe this time I should just leave everything to Marcus. He was good at his job, Derek had been cleared as a suspect and Ethan had never seriously been one. Maybe it was time to back off.
When I got to Marcus’s house he was on the phone. He beckoned me inside. Just from his side of the conversation it seemed to involve a case. He ended the call and raked a hand back through his hair.
“Problem?” I asked.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “That case of mine that’s on trial? It’s going to be going to the jury soon. The prosecutor needs to talk to me about a couple of things. I have to go.”
“It’s okay,” I said. I stood on tiptoes and kissed him. “We can have lunch tomorrow and we’re going out to Roma and Eddie’s tomorrow night.”
“Umm, yes to lunch and yes, I remembered about tomorrow night.”
I kissed him again. “I’ll meet you at Eric’s at twelve. If anything changes, call me.”
He promised he would and we walked out together. I headed home and he headed down the hill.
When I got home I found Ethan in the living room, watching a concert on his laptop with a bowl of popcorn and a cat on each side of him. It struck me that I wasn’t going to be the only one who’d miss him. He pulled out one earbud. “Milo and Derek are bringing pizza. You want some?”
I shook my head. “Thanks, no. I’m just going to get a drink and then I have some stuff to do.”
“Okay,” he said. “Just come get a slice if you change your mind.”
I made a cup of hot chocolate and headed upstairs. Hercules glanced in my direction but stayed where he was.
I took my hair out of the ponytail I’d worn to class and pulled on a pair of pajama pants and my favorite Boston College sweatshirt. The grocery list was still sitting on the nightstand. I picked it up.
Dwayne Parker. “Chunk,” Wallace’s ex-wife had called him. Was it even worth trying to find a phone number for the man? What could he tell me that would make a difference?
I thought about what Julie Kendall had told me, that Wallace had said that both he and Parker couldn’t seem to get away from Saint Edwin’s. Everything seemed to lead back to what really was just a minor cheating incident that had taken place at the school.
Finding a number for the man turned out to be easy. I just called the university’s athletic office and they gave it to me without question.
I hesitated and then picked up my phone again.
Dwayne Parker had a big, booming voice that matched the mental image I had of a man whose nickname was Chunk. I explained who I was and asked Parker if Lewis Wallace had been in touch recently.
“Hell yeah,” he said. “Three, maybe four weeks ago he called me outta nowhere. I hadn’t talked to him in had to be ten years.”
“So he just wanted to catch up?” I said.
“Nah, it was more than that. There was a kid that was in one of our classes—Lew and I were taking it for the second time because we hadn’t really applied ourselves the first time.” He laughed. “Anyways, this kid—he wasn’t really a buddy, more a hanger-on if you know what I mean—his name was Carroll. Who the heck gives their kid a name like that anyway?”
I didn’t think Parker was expecting an answer so I didn’t comment.
“So Lew asked if I’d go see the guy’s kid play, see if he was any good. I asked him why he wanted to do a favor for Christmas and his kid.”
“Excuse me?” Had I heard him correctly? “Christmas?”
“Yeah. Lew always called the kid that because his name was Carroll. Get it? Christmas Carroll.”
“I get it,” I said.
Christmas. I had heard Wallace say that word when we were at The Brick that first night. I shook my head, trying to make all the pieces fall into place.
“So was he any good?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Parker said. “I think we’re gonna recruit him.”
All roads led back to Saint Edwin’s. “Do you remember Christmas’s last name?”
He laughed. “Not a chance. I did a lot of partying back then. There’s whole months I can’t remember. Sorry. And the kid uses his mother’s last name. Her and Christmas were never married.”
“Do you happen to have any photos of . . . Christmas?”
“Probably.” His voice boomed through the phone. It was a lot like talking to a big affable dog. “But I don’t have a clue where they’d be.”
I sighed. This wasn’t going to work. “Thanks for talking to me,” I said.
“You’re welcome,” he said. “I was sorry to hear about Lew, you know.”
He was the first person to say that, I realized.
“Hey, you know, if you want to find a photo of Christmas you could try the school’s website. They’ve got pictures going back for years for the football team. You should be able to find Christmas. He was one of the team’s trainers.”
I thanked him and said good night. Then I reached for my computer.
Saint Edwin’s may have been a small school but they’d had eleven members of their football team play professionally in the last twenty-five years, I learned from their website. I scrolled through the photos looking for the years that Lewis Wallace and Chunk Parker had been at the college.