Wicked Forest (DeBeers 2)

materialized out of the air itself. Linden's body took form behind a bush where he sat like Buddha staring out at the sea.

He made no effort to attract my attention, nor did he call out to me.

How long had he been there? What had he heard?

My first thought was to call to him, to go to him, but I hesitated, Maybe it was better to pretend I didn't see him just now. Maybe it was better to pretend he was as invisible to me as I apparently was to him.

At least for now, I thought.

I turned and started back toward the beach house. There was no one on the loggia of the main house anymore, except for some servants cleaning up after the Eatons and their guests. They looked my way, but just as they were supposed to behave, they seemed to see no evil, hear no evil. Servants were taught to be invisible here.

Maybe we were all invisible here.

Daddy, I thought. how 1 need you now. If you're inside me, I've got to find away to touch you and hear your wisdom.

There was nothing more fearful than the thought that he was drifting away with every passing hour, every passing minute. Maybe the truth was that the dead lose interest in the living and not, as everyone thought, the other way around. We stop visiting graveyards and looking at tombstones after a while, don't we? We put away our family albums. We forget the sounds of voices we once loved.

And then what?

If we don't find love, we find we're alone. That's where Linden was.

And my mother.

And maybe me.

2

A Lien Against the Property

.

Later that morning I drove into Palm Beach

proper to meet with Leo Ross, my mother's

accountant. He had an office an Via Encantada in a pearl-white stucco building that looked mare like a Spanish hacienda than a business structure. It glistened in the sunlight as if it were really covered in pearls.

The accounting offices themselves were plush with a rather large lobby that had a marble floor, cream marble tables, expensive-looking settees and chairs, and prints of some of the portrait paintings of famous Palm Beach residents done by Ralph Cowan. Whether the implication was that these people used Leo Ross's firm or merely that people of this stature used it. I didn't know, but it had an impressive effect.

From what I could see, there were nearly a half dozen CPAs working in the office, any one of whom could have been assigned to us. I imagine. However, perhaps because my attorney back in South Carolina, Mr. Bassinger, had set all this up. Leo Ross himself came out to greet me. He was a man about five feet eight inches tall with thinning gray-blond hair. Very fair-skinned, he had patches of freckles aver his forehead and along the crests of his cheeks. His eyes were the faded blue of stonewashed jeans and his lips were so orange, they looked tinted. I imagined him to be well into his early sixties.

He extended his soft, well-manicured, strawberry-twirl-skinned hand to me and held on to mine as he introduced himself and spoke highly of Mr, Bassinger.

"I had the occasion to call upon his services once on behalf of a client of mine," he explained. "Small world, wouldn't you say?"

His polished smile was highlighted by his ivory teeth. I had the funny idea that in a previous life, he must have been an ice cream cone, cool, refreshing, and full of cherry vanilla.

"Yes, yes, it is." I agreed. He ushered me back through the wide corridor to his private office. It looked immaculate, almost untouched and unused. Fresh flowers adorned the coffee table in front of the soft leather settee and the right corner of his desk as well. In this office was hung a portrait of himself with his standard poodle. Awards and plaques from various charitable organizations were arranged in the shape of an X on the wall to the right of his large, black-marble-topped desk. A set of what looked like gold-plated golf clubs in a rich leather bag stood against one wall.

I saw immediately that the files for Jaya del Mar were spread over the coffee table and a chair had been brought around for him to sit facing the settee and me while we discussed the situation.

"Please," he said, indicating the settee. "Would you like something to drink? Bottled water, coffee, tea, juice, soda... whatever."

"Nothing, thank you." He looked surprised and waited for me to sit before seating himself For a moment he stared at me with a wide, almost incredulous grin that made me a bit uncomfortable,

"I was expecting Grace to accompany you." he said. was looking forward to seeing her. It's been some time."

"She's not up to it just yet,"