Garden of Stones - By Sophie Littlefield Page 0,94

the office door. He went around the desk and lowered himself back into his own chair, grunting from exertion.

Now that they were ensured privacy, Patty didn’t bother with the fake smile. She pulled the copies of Forrest’s photo album out of the envelope and spread them in front of Van Dorn.

There he was, thirty-five years ago—with his hand between a young woman’s knees as she sat next to him on a couch. Here was a shot of him and Rickenbocker, toasting with highball glasses while a young Jessie Kadonada stood like a ghost in the background. Half a dozen more, with Van Dorn featured in each, drinking and laughing and exploring the flesh of young women and, in one case, with his arm slung around Jessie’s shoulders.

“Reg Forrest is dead,” Patty said. She spoke quickly, knowing she had very little time. “The police are questioning my mother. My grandmother was Miyako Takeda.” She tapped her index finger on the photograph of her mother sitting on Rickenbocker’s lap. “My mother is Lucy Takeda. I believe you knew her.”

Van Dorn’s convivial grin vanished and his brow wrinkled with confusion and irritation. “Hey. What the hell is this?”

“I want the investigation stopped. I believe there is some question as to whether Forrest’s death was a suicide. I want you to make that official.”

“It was your mother who offed him?” Van Dorn demanded. “I should have guessed.”

“No.” Patty stabbed her finger on Rickenbocker’s image. “She’s innocent. I don’t know who killed him, and it doesn’t matter. I just want her left alone.”

Van Dorn raised an eyebrow. “You sure about that?” he said. “What I hear, they have a couple people ready to swear she was there that morning.”

So he’d been following the case.

“I know you and the police scratch each other’s backs,” she said quietly. “You may have to call in a few favors, but I’m guessing you’ll be willing to do that.”

Van Dorn laughed. “Why’s that? ’Cause you’ve got a few shots of me at parties with pretty girls? You think every man in the district isn’t going to take one look at those and wish he’d been there?”

Patty pointed to Jessie’s frightened, pale face in the photo of Van Dorn and Rickenbocker. “Jessie Kadonada was abused by Reg Forrest. Raped. Repeatedly.”

Van Dorn’s face reddened, his soft jowls quivering. “So? What does that have to do with me?”

“Well, for one thing, you were there. You knew it was going on. You didn’t do anything about it.”

“So you say,” Van Dorn said, starting to get up again. With considerable effort, he pushed back his chair and gripped the desk, struggling to lift his mass.

“And for another,” Patty continued, “you abused him too. You took advantage of a position of power to indulge your perverted desire to have sex with children.”

“I certainly did not!” Van Dorn was so taken aback that he sat back down. “I never touched that boy.”

Here it was—the moment for Patty’s great gamble, the lie that could change the rest of her and her mother’s lives. “Jessie Kadonada is willing to say you did.”

The color seemed to drain from Van Dorn’s face. “I don’t believe you.”

Patty shrugged. “Believe what you want. I talked to him just today. He’s very successful now, a sales manager up in Portland.” Now that she’d gotten started, the embellishment was easy. She justified it by reminding herself that she was protecting Jessie as well as her mother. Regardless of the truth, both of them had reason to hate Forrest, and either of them could have killed him.

Or maybe Forrest really had done it himself. Patty wondered what it must have been like to live with himself all those years, knowing what he had done. Forrest had once dreamed of being in the movies; instead he’d ended up in a broken-down apartment, spending his life in a stinking basement, alone. Was he haunted by Jessie Kadonada’s face? Did he see him crying in his dreams?

How tempting would it be to end those memories once and for all?

“You slant-eyed, devious little cunt,” Van Dorn muttered. “You know your grandmother couldn’t wait to open her legs for George, don’t you? She was hot for him like a bitch in heat.”

“That’s a lie.”

“And your mother, she would have been next. She came looking for it, you know. She came around one night when we were partying. Gave George a taste of her sugar. Couldn’t wait to have what her mama had.”

“You’re wrong,” Patty muttered, but it came out in a