The Governor's Wife by Michael Harvey

a thumb behind him. “Just poured a new patio out back. Gonna be a beer garden for the summer. City’s bitching about the licenses.”
    “Let me guess, you’re gonna take care of that?”
    “I still got a little pull. Neighborhood pull, but what the hell. It’s what I know. It’s fun.”
    Darryl showed up with two bowls and a basket of bread. Bones was right. The soup was good—hunks of chicken, rich broth, and lots of rice.
    “My daughter,” Bones said and ripped off a crust of bread. His hands were thick and strong. In the barroom light they reminded me of my father, who beat his children sometimes because he liked the sound.
    “What about her?” I said.
    “We’re not close.”
    “I’ve heard that.”
    “We did the thing for the press when Ray was governor. Family pictures. Magazine articles. All that happy horseshit. The truth is we haven’t been close in years.”
    “Before Ray?”
    “The problems go back earlier than Ray, yes. But they got worse once she was married.” Bones used the crust to soak up some soup. It was hot and made the old man’s eyes water.
    “Did you and Ray get along?” I said.
    “I liked him. I wasn’t part of the inner circle, but we’d talk politics from time to time.”
    “Did you want to be part of the inner circle?”
    “In 2006, Ray Perry went from never having held public office to governor of Illinois. And did it without breaking a sweat. It was like an old baseball skipper looking down his bench and finding the next Mickey Mantle at the end of it. You bet your ass I wanted to be part of it.”
    “But you weren’t?”
    “On the political side, no. But Ray was always good to me. Too smart not to be. And we never talked about Marie. Smart there, too.”
    “You think your daughter helped him disappear?”
    Bones shook his head. “She wouldn’t put herself out like that.”
    “Did she love him?”
    “Marie isn’t capable of love. At least not how you and I understand it.”
    I put down my spoon and leaned in, resting my forearms on the table. “You got something else to tell me, Bones?”
    He gestured to my bowl. “The soup.”
    “It’s not that good.”
    Bones stopped eating and hunched forward so his head hung between his shoulders. “Things happened after my daughter got married. Things the public never saw.”
    “The corruption charges? The trial?”
    “This was personal.”
    An image of Karen Simone flashed before my eyes. “Another woman?”
    Bones waved the notion away. “Marie might not have cared about Ray, but he loved my daughter. Almost as much as he loved himself.”
    “So what was it?”
    “Once Marie got married, she went off the tracks. I mean she was always troubled, even as a kid, but this was different. Withdrawal, paranoia, deep bouts of depression. From what I understand, Ray had her on a heavy dose of meds and considered institutionalizing her.”
    “How about now?”
    “No idea. She seems stable. At least from a distance.”
    “When was the last time you spoke with her?”
    “A word hasn’t passed between us since Ray skipped. I called. Left messages. Nothing.”
    “What do you want from me?”
    “Did Marie hire you?”
    “Confidential, Bones.”
    “Doesn’t matter. I want you to let this whole thing go. Ray’s not coming back, and we all need to move on. Especially my daughter.”
    “Maybe she doesn’t want to move on?”
    “So you help her. Make up something. Tell her whatever she needs to hear. Just put Ray Perry to rest. That’s what I want. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
    “And why would I help you?”
    “It’s Chicago, Kelly. That’s what we do.” Bones ripped off another hunk of bread and dipped it in his soup. I got up to go, then stopped halfway.
    “What if I told you your daughter already agrees with you?”
    “In what way?”
    “She’s convinced Ray’s never coming back. Believes he might be dead.”
    The old man shoveled the bread into his mouth and creased his face into a skeleton smile.