After the Golden Age

Suzanne said, “We’ll stop the surveillance on one condition: you come back to live at West Plaza, where we can keep an eye on you.”

She didn’t even have to hesitate. “No, Mom. I can’t do that.”

“You didn’t even think about it.”

“Hey, Mom? My stop’s coming up, I really have to go—”

“You’re not still riding the bus, are you?”

“I’ll talk to you later, okay? Say hi to Dad for me.”

She clicked off the phone.

FOURTEEN

WEST Corp’s connection to the Leyden Industrial Park hit awfully close to home. She had the next key to the puzzle, and she could keep going—if she could get access to West Corp’s files. If she did, she could find out if Sito had been working for West Corp, and if West Corp had compensated Sito well enough to pay for Greenbriar. She could maybe even find out what Sito had been doing when he had his initial breakdown.

And if she learned all those answers, what was she going to tell Bronson about it? Not to mention her parents.

Jacob West, her grandfather, had headed the corporation then. Her father hadn’t been born yet. No one could have known back then what Sito would become. It didn’t mean anything. Unless the tabloids got hold of the information, of course.

She made good on her offer to have her parents over for dinner.

Her mother fussed, still worried about Celia after the latest kidnapping attempt. Suzanne wanted to cook for her—in her own kitchen no less—but Celia managed to put her foot down. She ordered pizza to be delivered, as she’d threatened, but Suzanne seemed relieved that Celia wasn’t actually going to do any work.

Her father, on the other hand, was in a snit. “It has to be the Destructor masterminding this. We know these hits are all connected. Only the Destructor is capable of organizing a citywide spree.”

“He’s under suicide watch at the Elroy Asylum,” Suzanne said. “He can’t organize a crime spree under those conditions.”

“He’d find a way.”

Celia toyed with a leftover crust of pizza. Something didn’t ring true about that. The targets of the robberies were too odd. The kidnapping attempts were too haphazard. Like it was all some kind of distraction, a means rather than an end.

“I don’t think it’s the Destructor,” she said.

“Why?” Warren demanded.

“It’s not his MO. The Destructor would have pinned the flayed koi to the mayor’s desk. He’d have sent the Stradivariuses back to the symphony in splinters.”

He said, “Is that a fact?”

“It’s a hypothesis.”

A few moments of silence passed before Suzanne said, “She’s right, Warren. This isn’t how Sito operated.”

“Then there’s someone else,” he said. “A new mastermind.”

Suzanne considered, her brow furrowed. Celia used the pause in conversation to start clearing the table. She wasn’t thinking about the Destructor or masterminds—the less she thought about such topics the happier she was. Instead, she’d spent most of the evening trying to figure out how to ask her father for a favor.

The pause lengthened, and she decided to take the chance.

“Dad, do you know anything about a building West Corp owned about fifty years ago? It’s in the northeast industrial district. It used to be called the Leyden Industrial Park.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. That long ago, it would have been one of my father’s projects.”

“Do you think West Corp still has the records on it?”

“Probably. We never throw anything away.”

“He got that from his father,” Suzanne said.

“Do you think I could have a look?” She held her breath.

“What’s your interest?”

It wasn’t an accusation. Just a natural question. She had to remember that. “I stumbled across it at work. The building came up with West Corp’s name attached to it. I got curious, but I’m having trouble finding records from that far back. I thought it couldn’t hurt to ask you.”

Suzanne watched Warren with as much focus as Celia did; her mother might have been holding her breath as well.

Warren took a drink of water. “Just curious?”

“Yeah.”

“No conflict of interest—you wanting to dig up something that’ll come back to bite the company later.”

Of all the … “It’s fifty-year-old data. It should be completely irrelevant.”

“Then why is it important to you?”

Whatever she said, she refused to bring up Sito and feed her father’s paranoid fantasies. Even if those fantasies might be correct.… Softly, she said, “I didn’t think it would be that big a deal.”

“Come on, now I’m curious. What’s so interesting about this building?”

“I won’t know that until I find those records, will I?”

Warren glared. He broke walls with that glare. “It’s not like you’ve ever taken an interest in the company before.”

“You don’t trust me, do you? I can see the wheels in your brain inventing some plot that I must be hatching—”

“Oh, give me a break!”

“Warren—” Suzanne said, her voice a warning.

“If it’s so harmless, then tell me how you found out about this building.”

“It came up at work—”

“So now you’re using personal connections for professional gain.”

“You’d do the same thing!”

“I wouldn’t have to!”

“Warren! Celia! Both of you, sit down!”