Randy Senior laughed heartily at his own joke, and Just For Men and his friend joined in. I smiled politely. Rob continued to glower. Randy kept on looking sick, and Kristin just looked confused.
“And I’d like to add,” Randy Senior said, when he’d recovered from his laughing fit, “that the wife and I are big fans of your father’s restaurants. Why, we eat at least one meal a week at Mastriani’s. And I’m addicted to the burgers at Joe’s. Aren’t I, Randy?”
Randy nodded, still looking as if he didn’t feel well. I said, “Well, that’s all just great, Mr. Whitehead. But that doesn’t get us any closer to resolving the situation we have here. Your son’s behavior has upset my friend here very much. I mean, his sister is a very young, inexperienced girl. And your son not only violated her—”
“I did not,” Randy Junior cried. “She wasn’t even a virgin when I met her!”
Rob started up from his chair, but before he could lay his hands on Randy Junior, Randy Senior thundered, “Shut up, Randall!”
“But, Dad,” Randy Junior cried. “I didn’t—”
“You shut up,” Randy Senior bellowed, looking very red in the face, “until I tell you different. I think you’ve caused enough trouble for one day, don’t you?”
Randy Junior cowered in his seat, alternating nervous glances between his father and Rob.
Mr. Whitehead looked at me and said, “I apologize for my son’s outburst there, Miss Mastriani, and Mr.—I’m sorry, young man, I didn’t catch your name.”
“Wil—” Rob began, but I cut him off.
“His name doesn’t matter,” I said quickly. “As I was saying, the fact is, your son violated his sister’s right to privacy by filming, without her knowledge, private acts on video, that he then went on to copy and distribute—”
“I had her permission!” Randy Junior cried. “I got her signature on a release form and everything!”
“But that’s not a binding contract,” I said to his father. “Since Hannah is only fifteen years old—”
“She told me she was eighteen!” Randy Junior burst out, causing his father to lift a crystal golf-ball–shaped paperweight from the top of his desk and then lower it, with a crash, against his blotter.
“God damn it, Randy!” he roared. “I told you to shut up!”
Randy Junior closed his mouth. Beside him, Kristin looked ready to burst into tears. She wasn’t the only one, either. Randy Junior looked close to letting loose with a few sobs as well.
“I’m sorry, Miss Mastriani,” Randy Senior, recovering himself, said. “And that apology extends to you, too, young man. I can perfectly understand your outrage. I myself am outraged. I had no idea that my son was engaging in the—ahem—film business. I am as disgusted by it as I’m sure you are. So please tell me, what can I do to make this up to you—to both of you? Because I surely do want to set things right.”
“Well,” I said, “in that case, you can ask your son to turn himself in to the officers who should be waiting in your reception area right about”—I glanced at my watch and saw that it was ten o’clock—“now.”
Fifteen
Both Randys were busy gaping at me when the intercom on Mr. Whitehead’s desk suddenly buzzed.
Randy Senior snatched at it and barked, “God damn it, Thelma, I said no interruptions during this meeting!”
“I’m sorry, Randy,” the receptionist’s voice crackled. “But there are about a half dozen police officers out here who say they need to see you right away.”
All of the color drained from Mr. Whitehead’s face. He looked at me with more venom than a rattler.
“You conniving little bitch,” he said.
I smiled at him pleasantly.
Just For Men and his companion had both whipped out cell phones and were whispering urgently into them. Randy Junior had sunk so low into his chair, he looked as if he were boneless. Randy Senior had taken a bottle of Mylanta from a desk drawer and was measuring out a capful of the chalky white liquid. Only Kristin was glancing around confusedly, going, “I don’t understand. Why are the police here? Who is this Hannah person? And why does everyone keep talking about videotapes?”
I looked at her and said, “Your boyfriend has been secretly filming the two of you having sex, then selling the tapes over the Internet on amateur porn sites.”
Kristin knit her pretty brow. “No, he hasn’t.”
“Yes,” I said. “He has.”
“No,” Kristin said with a smirk, “he hasn’t. And I think I would know. I mean, I’d have noticed a camera in the bedroom.”
“The camera was hidden in the bedroom closet,” I said. “Behind the mirror—which was really two-way glass—over the dresser.”
Kristin blinked her heavily mascaraed eyelashes. Then she said, “Nuh-uh.”
“Uh-huh,” I said. “Kristin. I’ve seen the tapes. You’re wearing a matching red tiger-stripe-bra-and-panty set. You also,” I added, “have a tendency to squeal.”
Kristin went pale beneath her blusher. Her head swiveled towards Randy Junior.
“How would she know that?” she demanded shrilly of her boyfriend. “How does she know that?”
“Because I’ve seen the tapes, Kristin,” I said. “I’ve seenall the tapes. Carly. Jasmine. Beth.”
Quick as lightning, Kristin’s hand whipped out, meeting with Randy Junior’s face with crackling force.
“You told me Jasmine was your sister,”she hissed, tears of fury standing on the ends of her dark eyelashes.
“That’s funny,” I said as Randy Junior tried to shrink into a ball in his chair. “That’s what Jasmine says he told her about you, Kristin.”
Kristin swung an astonished gaze towards me. So did Randy Junior. So, for that matter, did Rob.
“You talked to Jasmine?” Randy Junior breathed.
“Oh,” I said calmly. “I talked to them all this morning, Randy. And you know, I have to say, even though you made sure to select such a wide variety of different girls—blondes, brunettes, redheads, short, skinny, tall—they all had one thing in common. And that was that they didn’t know they were being filmed. And they’re all pretty pissed off about it. Most of them pissed off enough to press charges.”
“Oh, sweet Lord,” Randy Whitehead Senior said, dropping his balding head into his hands.
Randy Junior, meanwhile, had curled into the smallest ball he could. He had to, if he wanted to escape Kristin’s slaps, which she was raining down on him with feminine fury.
“You jerk!” she cried. “You lied to me! You lied! You said you loved me! You said I was the only one! You said you’d always take care of me! Where am I going to go now? Huh? Where?”
“You could go home,” I suggested quietly.
This caught her attention. She stopped slapping Randy long enough to glance my way.
“No, I can’t,” she said with a sniffle. “My dad kicked me out.”
“He’s willing to let you come back,” I said. “At least, he was when I spoke to him this morning.”
“You…you talked to my dad?” Kristin asked as if she didn’t dare believe it.
“If you’re Kristin Pine from Brazil, Indiana,” I said, “then yeah, I did. Your dad was pretty relieved to hear from me, as a matter of fact. He and your mom have been worried about you. Well, who wouldn’t worry,” I added with a glance at Mr. Whitehead Senior, “about their runaway fifteen-year-old?”
“Christ,” Randy Senior said, burying his face more deeply into his hands.
“How…how did you know?” Kristin breathed, staring at me incredulously. “Who my parents were…whoI was?”
“She’s Lightning Girl,” Rob said simply.
I glanced in his direction. I wouldn’t say he’d spoken with extreme bitterness, or anything. But he hadn’t exactly sounded thrilled. He was sitting back in his chair, sort of just taking the drama in as it unfolded in front of him. He seemed almost relaxed. Well, more so than anyone else in the room.