So Sweet a Changeling: A Novel of the Terribly Acronymed Detective Club (Book 6)

Chapter Two: Johnny, Saturday

"Yeah."

"Where did you find this?"

"In the blue toolbox." No other explanation was needed.

Joe looked like he was going to be sick. "He kept this letter in the blue toolbox, all this time? Didn't he think Mom would see it?"

Johnny shrugged lugubriously. "Maybe Mom never went in there."

"Jesus," Joe said. "If this letter says what I think it does, Dad was paying Mrs. Anderson booty calls."

Johnny's mouth twisted. "I don't know if I'd put it in quite those words, but, yes. She didn't give her name, but Dad called only one person Signora."

Joe read the letter again. "Maybe it only happened the one time," he said, desperate for something to grab on to. "It looks like this letter was written after the first time, but maybe Dad didn't do it again."

"Jesus, why would he even do it the first time?" Johnny asked. "Mrs. Anderson had to be at least thirty years older than him."

Joe shrugged. "A kind woman teaching him English, welcoming him to this new country. Maybe a kind of affection blossomed from such close contact. The two were always close even after we left Queensborough."   

Johnny sighed in frustration. "We have to burn this. We have to forget we ever read it. This wasn't for our eyes, and I bet Dad forgot he even had it in his final years."

Suddenly the doorknob turned, but because the door was locked, Mom couldn't get in. She knocked hard and shouted, "Hey! Whaddya doin' in there?"

Joe sprang from the bed as if caught doing something indecent. Johnny grabbed the letter, crammed it and the envelope in his pocket, then opened the door. "Sorry, Ma," he said. "I think the door was locked by accident."

Mom's red-rimmed eyes glared at him, and he could tell she didn't believe him, but she made no comment. "You find the suit?" she asked.

Shit. The very thing she'd asked him to find in the first place. "Yeah, it's in the closet, right?"

She looked at the toolbox and its emptied contents on the bed. "Why you lookin' at that?"

"Dad had some cash in there, I meant to tell you about it. I don't know if you knew."

She grunted in disgust and flicked her hand. "'Course I know. Whoddya think pay for everything since Dad get sick?"

Johnny met Joe's eyes. Joe made the tiniest grimace.

Mom strode forward and shoved everything back into the toolbox. Then she paused and gently took every piece out again, stopping to examine every bit of paper. She whipped around and stared hard at both of them. "Where the letter?" she asked.

No point denying they knew about it now. Johnny gulped and pulled it out of his pocket, and slowly handed it to her. 

She stared at it for a second, then put it back into the toolbox along with everything else.

"Ma," Joe said. "You knew?"

Mom sighed and seemed to deflate. "We gotta talk about this now?"

"No, Ma, not if you don't want to," Johnny said.

She didn't, apparently. Instead, she spun on Joe and demanded, "Why Lauren no come tonight? Why Naomi and Toshiro no come?"

Joe looked like a deer in the headlights. He was never good at defending his wife to his parents. Johnny, who'd always thought Lauren had gotten short shrift from them, and who secretly had a small crush on her himself, came to her defence instead. "Ma, it's already a full house with Val and the boys here," he said. "You know Lauren's not Catholic; the rosary wouldn't mean anything to her. And the kids wanted to see their friends and be happy for another day or two before the funeral; they'll be there then, don't worry."