No one disagreed.
Sherlock said, “Dillon and I met your father at a charity benefit at the Bentley Gallery in Georgetown not too long ago. You weren’t there. Neither of us even knew about you.”
“I don’t remem— Wait, yes, it was a last-minute deal. One of Jimmy’s lady friends took me to New York to shop because he was throwing a party for me; he was going to introduce me to everyone, including handsome young men who would trample each other trying to get to me.” She smiled, shrugged. “There was never any party. He was dead the next week.”
Sherlock said, “Did you know your father was a friend of Dillon’s boss, Jimmy Maitland? He was one of the pallbearers at his funeral. Mr. Maitland always called him John, as I recall, never Jimmy. Given they’re both Jimmys, I suppose Mr. Maitland didn’t want to deal with the name confusion.”
“I didn’t know that. I mean, I stood in a receiving line with all the other Abbotts, including my two half sisters, to greet all the people who came to his funeral. I don’t remember a Mr. Maitland. But that day was such a blur.”
“After his funeral,” Savich said, “you simply dropped out of sight. The funeral was nearly three weeks ago. Why would they leave you alone for three weeks, then try to kill you? Why not kill you right away, in another accident? How do you explain that, Rachael?”
“Well, in truth, there wasn’t time for me to be on the radar. Jimmy and I only had about six weeks together before his death.” She paused, head down. Jack saw her twisting her fingers in her lap. Then she raised her face and said, voice composed, “They didn’t have a chance to kill me because I left Washington the day after Jimmy’s funeral. I just knew I’d be next. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going, not even my mom. I got back to Jimmy’s house last Tuesday. Well, now it’s my house, since Jimmy left it to me. It only took them three days to act.”
“Where did you go?” Jack asked.
“To Sicily, to a little town on the coast, not yet discovered by tourists. I hunkered down, I guess you’d say. I had a lot of thinking to do, but I knew I had to come back to Washington, I had to deal with his estate and his family—and his murder—and so I came back nearly two weeks to the day after his funeral. I wasn’t even back a week before they threw me into the lake.”
Sherlock said, “Let’s back up a bit. You think your father was murdered, but his death was ruled an accident. But there was a thorough investigation, everyone was convinced. Do you have any proof otherwise?”
“Not hands-on proof, no.”
“Tell us what you have,” Jack said.
“Okay. Two days after I came back, Jimmy’s lawyer, Brady Cullifer, called. He was rather upset with me since I’d taken off without telling him and he hadn’t known where to find me. There was Jimmy’s new will, you see. Jimmy left me his house and split the rest of his estate among his three daughters. Mr. Cullifer told me he’d already notified Laurel Kostas and Quincy Abbott about what was in Jimmy’s will, told them Jimmy hadn’t left them anything. Oh yes, I forgot—Jimmy adopted me. It came through only days before his death, so I was legally his, surely a record, Mr. Cullifer told me.”
Sherlock said, “Was your father’s divorce messy?”
“You’re thinking his ex-wife could have killed him? I don’t think so. I met Jacqueline and their two daughters, my half sisters, Elaine and Carla, and their husbands at his funeral. They were all very kind to me, very civilized. Jacqueline was very distant, as if she were bored with all of it. His daughters were in shock, quiet, withdrawn, but it seemed to me they were thrilled to leave Washington, which they did the very next morning, and I left three hours after they did.
“I returned from Italy last Tuesday night. Friday night I drank a bit of the red wine that was evidently drugged. When I came back to the house later that night, the wine was gone.”
Jack said, “Do you think the lawyer, Brady Cullifer, was part ofit too?”
“I thought he was for maybe ten seconds. But it just didn’t make any sense. He’d been with Jimmy for years and years. He had no reason to hurt me. Laurel and Quincy put the drugged wine there, I know it.”
Savich said, “Okay, let’s get to the root. You were telling us why you believe your father’s sister and brother murdered him. Keep going, Rachael. Convince us.”
“It’s a long story, and it’s not my story. Since it isn’t about me, that’s why I didn’t say anything right after his death.” She looked miserable. “I don’t know, I just ...”
“Too late for that,” Jack said. “Come on, Rachael, spill it all. This is about your father, isn’t it?”
She nodded.
“And a major disagreement with his siblings?”
She nodded again.
“You call your father Jimmy,” Sherlock said, backing off a bit.
“Yes. I wasn’t comfortable yet calling him Dad. Look, the rest of it, I simply don’t know if ...”
“Anything you tell us doesn’t go out of this room,” Jack said. “Everyone agrees?”
She looked at each of them as they nodded.
Still, it was difficult. To even think about what had happened was hard, but to speak about it, openly, she didn’t know if she could. But, finally, she knew she had no choice. “All right, I have to trust someone, and you guys seem like my best bet. But it’s got to remain a secret. You’ve agreed, right?”
They all nodded, Jack’s head to the side, frowning at her. “What’s the big secret, Rachael? Senator Abbott was a spy or something?”
“No, no, but ... all right. If I can’t trust you folks, then I might as well hang it up.” FOURTEEN
“I told you that Jimmy overwhelmed me with his welcome, his generosity to me. He was open, he was loving, he wanted to hear every detail of every year of my life.” She smiled at that. “But I began to notice that he would fall silent at odd moments, that he seemed disturbed and despondent about something. When I pressed him on it, he finally told me what he’d done. I believe he wanted to tell me, that I was like this miracle, and if he told me maybe he’d at least partly make up for this bad thing he’d done. And he was so desperately alone, so desperately afraid.
“About a year and a half ago, Jimmy was driving through Delancey Park on his way home. It was late, sunset, he’d had a couple of martinis with colleagues. He was talking on his cell, not really paying much attention. A little girl on a bicycle came pedaling in front of his car. He hit her, killed her. He panicked and drove away, called his senior aide, Greg Nichols, who came to him immediately.
“His aide—you need to understand about him. Greg is maybe in his late thirties. He’s very smart—intuitive, I guess you’d say—and driven. His ambition was to see Jimmy in the White House. Jimmy trusted him, admired his brain, his drive, his commitment. Greg convinced Jimmy to keep it quiet, that if it got out he’d killed a child— accident or not—his career, his life, his family, would be ruined, he could even go to jail, convicted of vehicular homicide and leaving the scene of an accident.
“I’m not trying to excuse what he did, but Greg is the king of persuasion; he could convince the Pope to convert to Islam. Fact was, Greg himself would also be ruined if Jimmy confessed to killing the little girl. He’d be done in Washington, that’s for sure, and so he worked very hard to convince Jimmy that the best thing, the smartest thing, the only logical thing, was to keep his mouth shut and simply leave the little girl right where she was. Bottom line, Jimmy told me, he wanted to be convinced, and so he was. And yes, he knew very well that Greg was being self-serving, but who cared? He was too concerned about his own future.