Walt’s expression changed. He looked like someone who’d just remembered where he set down his missing car keys. “You know, you got me thinking. Let me check something for you in my files. Hang on a second. No promises.”
Angie agreed to wait. She drank her water and looked out at the lawn, watching Louise hard at work, thinking about her mother and how much she’d enjoyed gardening.
Angie read e-mails on her phone and the time slipped away without her noticing, but it seemed like he had been gone for a while. She held out hope for a minor miracle, a piece of paper, some sort of official document to explain the unexplainable.
But Walt returned empty-handed. “I’m sorry, Angie. I thought there might have been something in my old files, but I was wrong. My guess is your dad never had a trial. That had happened before. He gave up information and in exchange, no charges were filed.”
Angie gave Walt a big hug. “A friend of mine said the same thing. Thanks for looking, but I’m not giving up. I’ll figure this out with my dad, one way or another.”
Walt held Angie’s shoulders and looked deeply into the eyes. “I have every confidence you will.”
CHAPTER 56
Home again, home again. Angie used her key to go in through the front door. The TV wasn’t on, but then again the Nats weren’t playing. She called out to her dad, knowing he was at home because his Lexus was in the driveway. If he happened to be taking a walk, it would be downstairs on his elliptical in the basement where he had a second television set up.
“Daddy? I need to speak with you,” Angie said, setting her purse on the little desk in the kitchen that had become a catchall for odds and ends.
As she had expected, her father was at home—in the first floor office, judging by the sound of his footsteps.
She was already rummaging through the refrigerator when he came into the kitchen. She needed a bit food to calm what felt like a caffeine overdose, and found a bowl of egg salad on a shelf and half a loaf of bread misplaced in the drawer where the vegetables go. Her mother never would have put the bread there, though she did keep it refrigerated.
Angie took the items over to the kitchen island and only then acknowledged her father’s presence. Gabriel had on faded jeans, a denim work shirt, and looked quite relaxed, not at all like someone carrying a burdensome secret for years.
Angie took down a plate from the cupboard and set it next to the food. She poured herself a glass of water. “Do you want a sandwich, Dad?”
“You’re not done with this, are you?” Gabriel said.
“Nope, not even close,” Angie replied. She retrieved a dull knife from a kitchen drawer and heaped some egg salad onto the bread. She spread the egg salad evenly, then cut the sandwich in two, took a bite, and chewed slowly. She washed it all down with a drink of water. “I hope you don’t have plans today, because we’re going to get to the bottom of this.”
“Angie, please.”
She took another bite, leaning against the kitchen island, acting as though she had all the time in the world. “No more, please. No more lies. Somehow your former business and Mom’s former life are connected to Isabella Conti, and I’m determined to figure out how.”
“I told you all I know.”
“Please, Dad, that doesn’t work anymore. I checked. There’s nothing about William Harrington in any archives I searched. Nothing about your Ponzi scheme or the trials where you turned state’s evidence. And I’m pretty good at this stuff. There should be something, but there’s nothing. So either you’re not giving me the whole truth or you’re forgetting some key details, but either way, I’m not leaving until we sort it out.”
It was a test. If he came up with the same explanation Bryce and Walt had offered, she might be inclined to believe him.
But instead of a valid explanation, Gabriel shook with anger. His face turned red and his eyes flared in anger. “I will not be spoken to this way by my daughter.”
Angie refused to be rattled. She took another bite of her sandwich, chewing slowly, keeping her eyes fixed on her father, intending her actions to be interpreted as a show of defiance. “Then tell me what I want to know,” she said after swallowing her bite.
“No.”
“Tell me or I’m going to find the Conti family, dammit.” Anger seeped into Angie’s voice. “I’ve got a friend with the Marshals now, or did you forget? He’ll help me. He’ll run this up the damn flagpole if he has to. I promise you, we’ll dig up whatever secret you’re hiding. So let’s do this on your terms, not mine. What is the connection to the Conti family and my mom? Why aren’t there stories about you in the news? Why aren’t you being forthcoming with me?”
Her father’s face turned bright red. “Enough!” he said, stomping his foot so hard he rattled the dishes in the cupboard. He stormed over to the kitchen island, picked up Angie’s plate of food, and hurtled it across the room against the wall.