Page 77 of The Lie Maker

“I bought you something,” she said.

I turned around slowly and saw that she was holding a gift-wrapped package, no more than an inch thick, four inches wide, and nearly a foot long.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“I’d seen this a few days ago, before I started making all those calls. Then I wasn’t sure I was going to give it to you, and now I wonder if you’d consider it a peace offering.” She handed it to me. I took it but made no move to tear off the paper. “Just open it, you idiot,” she said.

I slowly tore off the paper, revealing a black cardboard box. I lifted off the lid and set it on the coffee table.

“When you took out your wallet the other night,” she said, “I thought, Whoa, it’s totally falling to pieces, so I decided you needed a new one. This is a Fendi, and I won’t lie, it cost me a fucking fortune, but I just wanted to do it, so none of this ‘oh, you shouldn’t have’ bullshit, because it’s not going back.”

The wallet was made of blue leather and sat in the box in the open position, displaying all its sleeves designed to accommodate credit cards and a driver’s license and whatever other shit a guy might happen to be carrying around with him.

I just stared at it.

“Oh, fuck, you hate it,” Lana said. “Is it the blue? Because I could take it back and get it in brown or something, probably.”

A single tear dropped onto the wallet. I wiped it away with my thumb, then moved it onto the coffee table so as not to make a further mess of it.

“Um, it’s very thoughtful, Lana. But I don’t... thank you... but...”

“Jack, what’s going on? If you don’t like it, that’s fine, but I get the feeling there’s something happening here I don’t understand.”

I shook my head. “Maybe this is actually the perfect time to tell you what I’ve been holding back.”

The story spilled out of me. At least, at first, the stuff that I felt at liberty to tell, since what happened with my father was, for the most part, a matter of public record. And once she knew even a hint of the story, she’d be able to find out the rest, between the Star’s files and any public library’s. I told her I was born Jack Donohue, but became Jack Givins after my mother married Earl. Who my father had worked for, what he’d done, and how he had gone into the witness protection program, and why I’d had such an emotional reaction to her gift.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I had no idea.”

“Of course you didn’t,” I said, and took the new wallet out of the box. “This is pretty nice.”

I explained that my father’s absence had haunted me since the day he’d left, that it was the pivotal moment in my life, and at the core of everything I’d written.

“And all these years, you’ve never heard from him at all,” Lana said.

I smiled. “There’s more.”

She listened intently as I filled her in on all the times my father had visited me. “I have no idea where he is, except that it’s probably within a day’s drive. I don’t see driving here from Oklahoma just to say hello.”

“You ever wonder if he’s watching you and you don’t even know it?”

I smiled. “Always. And once, he showed up when I needed him most.”

Forty

Earl hadn’t been very successful in making Cayden—if that was even his real name—happy. His visit with Jack had not elicited the kind of information Cayden wanted.

The day after Earl’s chat with Jack, a chat intended to draw out some detail about his real father, Cayden had been waiting for Earl in his parking garage. He’d parked his shitbox rental where he used to keep the Porsche and was on his way to the stairs when someone stepped out from behind a pillar and said, “Earl.”

Earl spun around, saw who it was, and said, “Jesus, you gave me a heart attack.”

“Well?”

Earl said, “Look, I gave it my best shot, but I don’t know any more than I did before I went.”

Cayden extended an arm and brushed an imaginary fleck of dust off Earl’s shoulder. Jack’s stepfather flinched, thinking maybe the guy was going to grab him by the neck.

“We had a deal,” Cayden said. “I gave you twenty-five grand for that crap Boxster. I’d like my money back.”