For Whom the Minivan Rolls: An Aaron Tucker Mystery - By Jeffrey Cohen Page 0,65

opened one of the kitchen cabinets he had hung from the cathedral ceiling he raised in the kitchen. You had to be as tall as a tree to get any food in this house, but luckily Mahoney’s wife was close to six feet tall herself. I had to rely on the kindness of strangers.

“But nobody ever called Beckwirth to ask for his money,” he said, grabbing a family-sized bag of Ruffles from the cabinet and tearing it open carefully. “Madlyn wasn’t kidnapped. She went away on her own.”

“So we focus on the sex?” I suggested.

“Nah,” Mahoney said through a mouthful of Ruffles. “That’s just what they want us to do. Remember what Woodward and Bernstein said.”

“Follow the money.” I gave him back what he wanted to hear.

“Exactly. Follow the money.” Suddenly grabbing the softball again, he rifled it toward me, and I caught it neatly and without pain. “Now you’re getting it,” Mahoney said.

Chapter 13

I got home just in time to receive a lecture from my son about the continued necessity of being inside the family residence whenever he got home from school in the afternoon. He’d actually had to use his key to get in the door, and had been watching television himself for an entire eight minutes. For crying out loud, what kind of father was I, anyway?

It got worse when I turned off the TV and reminded him that he had homework to do. He leapt at the remote control, switched the set back on, and screamed, “I was WATCHING that!” just as Ren and Stimpy appeared to sing “Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy.” This was what happens whenever you throw him off his routine. His discipline collapses like a house of cards.

“I don’t care what you were watching,” I said. “It’s time to do your homework.” And, because I was born towards the middle of the twentieth century, walked over to the TV and actually knew how to turn the set “off” manually—by pressing the power button.

He stood, dramatically, knowing that the remote’s infrared beam couldn’t reach the TV through the all-too solid body of a father. And he was about to wail when he saw my face, which must have resembled that of the Devil, and my hand, which was in the perennial parent pose—forefinger pointing directly upward, at God, since he/she/it is the one who created this whole parenting system in the first place, and therefore deserves all the blame.

Ethan stopped, considered his options, and in a rare display of common sense, decided against trying to knock me over and turn the television back on. He made a screeching noise, then stomped over to his backpack and began getting his books out.

It was going to be another great day at the old homestead, and Abigail had already let me know she’d be home late tonight. One of the partners in her firm was retiring, and there was a dinner that night, attendance mandatory.

While Ethan slammed his books down and started working, talking to himself all the while, Leah walked in the door, gave me the customary hug and kiss, and started in immediately on that most odious of tasks, penmanship. Today’s assignment was to write about 154 “R”s on a page for no particular reason. She smiled through it, on the opposite side of the coffee table (excuse me, the homework table) from her brother, who was working himself into a lather over having to read a chapter from a book that he actually liked. A study in contrasts, from the same set of parents. Go figure.

I decided to start following the money, but I couldn’t go out and do that just now, so I’d have to follow it from my office. This was difficult, since I didn’t know where the money had gone, or indeed what money we were discussing. It’s very hard to follow something when you haven’t a clue what it is or where it started. They don’t teach you that in journalism school—I’m pretty sure—but it’s still true.

Since I am not, never have been, and never will be a business reporter, I didn’t have a prayer of deciphering Gary Beckwirth’s finances. And since Beckwirth was the only person involved in this whole mess who seemed to have an inordinate amount of money, he would be the logical jumping-off point. So instead of rooting around in his business and its dealings, which could have been swindling every person in the entire state of California for all I’d know, I decided to start