Part 4 (2/2)
”Confusion, I should say so,” Frank said. ”Doug Drinan, he's Bill's son?”
”I know who he is,” Lucy said, nodding, trying not to make that little can we hurry this up please sign with her hand.
”Well, he's up there, having the locks changed,” Frank told her. ”He says he doesn't know anything about you having a claim on the place. I didn't know what to tell him. Your sister tells me she's staying there, I got no reason to doubt her, but Doug was Bill's son-”
”And we are his wife's daughters.” Lucy smiled, completely professional. ”No worries. We'll clear this up in no time.” She took a couple of smooth steps over to the elevators and pressed the call b.u.t.ton; as far as Lucy was concerned, this was as good as done. Frank smiled at me, relieved. When she isn't being annoying as h.e.l.l, Lucy does have that effect on people. You know who's in charge.
Doug Drinan and his pal the locksmith were, sadly, not quite as easy to snow. We more or less fell over them on that eighth-floor landing-that is, I stumbled out of the elevator with all my packages, while Lucy popped out like a genie and presented Doug with a huge stack of doc.u.ments.
”Mr. Drinan? Hi, how are you? I'm Lucy Finn, Olivia's daughter, it's a pleasure to meet you after all this time,” she announced, talking quickly. ”As you are aware, our mother pa.s.sed only a few days ago, so obviously we are reeling, completely caught off guard, so I'm sure this is our fault. But I think there's been some confusion about the status of the estate. We spoke with Stuart Long just yesterday. He was in possession of your father's will-have you seen it? I brought an extra copy in case you hadn't.” She handed it to him and kept talking. ”Anyway, there is some real question about who the beneficiaries of the estate are at this time. Your father seems to have expressed in no uncertain terms that our mother was to inherit everything, largely meaning the apartment, it's unclear what else is included, but in any event I'm going to have to ask you to hold off on changing the locks for now. Until we get this sorted out.” She smiled at him, very pleasant, but there was a definite don't-f.u.c.k-with-me edge behind it all. She works in PR and she can be very daunting.
Doug Drinan, unfortunately, didn't get on board with what she was saying. He barely glanced at the papers she handed him, then tossed them on top of the old radiator that was hissing in the hallway. ”I'm aware we're going to be in a holding pattern for a little while with regard to the dispensation of the will,” he told her. ”Which is why I thought it important to secure the apartment. Obviously we can't have just anyone wandering in and out, disturbing the effects before we've even begun to probate this situation. I hate to say it, such a sad time-I mean really, condolences on your loss-but it sounds to me like this is going to get pretty complicated. This is just precautionary. Don't want things to get ugly down the line or anything.”
Okay, the speech was good, but he was not as good as Lucy. He pressed those thin lips together, trying to smile and explain things like a nice guy, but he couldn't be bothered to pretend all that hard, so it came off like what it was, condescending and mean and like he was kind of enjoying messing with us. Which maybe he was. The more I saw of this guy the less I liked him. His hair really was dirty, and he had too much disappointment in him. Sometimes those are the worst people to deal with because they aren't even thinking anymore, they're just hoping they can make you as miserable as they are.
Lucy didn't care. Honestly, she has ice water in her veins, so this guy and all his unhappiness were just no match. ”I completely agree,” she said. ”That's why we felt it was best to have Tina camp out here for the time being, to have someone on site making sure nothing untoward happened to the property while we sorted this all out. For instance, I think you and your brother stopped by in the middle of the night last night and removed some items?”
Doug Drinan stared at her, aghast at her nerve. She looked right back at him. ”My mother's wedding ring,” he said finally, as if the righteousness of the situation would mean something to her.
Lucy shrugged. ”We have no way of ascertaining that.”
”Except that she saw it.” Drinan turned his cold stare on me, like I was the one who was f.u.c.king with him.
”I never said it wasn't, I didn't-ah-” I started.
Lucy raised her hand, fearless, and cut me off. ”Tina, your actions are completely blameless in this matter.”
”How do you figure that?” asked Drinan. ”We got there, she'd already completely cased the joint.”
”I was looking for my mom's perfume,” I explained again.
”You went through my father's underwear drawer,” he sneered. ”You managed to find his wallet, which was conveniently empty by the time we got there.”
”I didn't-”
”It doesn't matter what you were doing, Tina,” Lucy said. ”The point is, you did not remove anything from the premises, nor are you-or I or Alison-doing anything except insisting that we hold to the status quo until our lawyers and their lawyers have a chance to work through the doc.u.ments and finalize the legal status of the estate. That's all we're trying to do. Protect everyone's rights.”
”Look, I don't know what any of this is about?” said the locksmith. ”But somebody's got to make a decision about these locks. There's a kill fee, you call to have your locks changed and then you change your mind, that's a fifteen-dollar charge.”
”Not a problem,” Lucy said, reaching into her purse.
”I don't agree to that,” Drinan snapped. He put his hand out, stopping the locksmith from pus.h.i.+ng for the elevator b.u.t.ton. ”I want the locks changed, and I have every right to change them.”
”You legally have no right to change the locks,” Lucy said. She was so coolheaded there was no way the locksmith would not do what she told him. But he did feel bad about it.
”Listen, man, I'll wait downstairs and let my boss know what's going on. If the situation changes, I can come back up and do the job. But I can't get involved in something that might, you know, be illegal.”
”This is my apartment. I grew up here, this is my apartment.” Drinan's temper was fraying again.
”Unfortunately, we have a stack of legal doc.u.ments indicating that there is a very real chance that in fact it is not your apartment,” Lucy said, not quite so nicely anymore. ”And if you insist on pursuing this course of action I will be forced to call the police-”
”Go ahead. My brother is a detective with the NYPD, and you want to know something? They take care of their own.”
”Listen, buddy,” the locksmith said, desperate to get out of here. So was I. Bringing up the cops just made everything ickier.
”Wonderful. Your brother works in law enforcement, and I work in publicity. He can bring in his friends, and I can bring in mine. I know several writers for several prominent newspapers who would be only too happy to write about the NYPD superseding the law and forcing people from their homes.”
”This isn't your home!” he shouted, starting to lose it.
”It is Tina's home,” she told him in no uncertain terms. ”Our mother died here, and every legal doc.u.ment I have studied so far tells me that this apartment is now our apartment, and she has no place to live, so for now she's living here, and it is her legal right to do so.”
”I don't even know you people,” Doug observed, as if that mattered.
”I suspect we will have plenty of time to get acquainted,” Lucy said. She looked at the locksmith like she couldn't believe he was still standing there. ”If you want to call your boss, now would be the time. I think we both know what he's going to tell you.”
”Yeah, I don't have to call him; I'm not getting involved in this,” he said. ”But I do need that kill fee.”
She reached into her purse, lifted out a neatly folded bill, and handed it over to him. The whole move took three seconds. ”Keep the change,” she announced. ”For your trouble.”
”Thanks.” He nodded, then ambled over to the exit sign, pushed through that crummy brown door, and went on down the stairs. I didn't blame him. I wouldn't want to hang around waiting for an elevator under those circ.u.mstances either.
Drinan likewise didn't want to wait. He picked up his pile of legal doc.u.ments and followed the locksmith.
”Perhaps you'd like my card,” Lucy cooed, holding one out to his back.
”When I need to talk to you, I won't have any trouble finding you,” he said as the door to the stairwell slammed shut behind him.
”What a lovely character,” Lucy said, putting the card away. ”I thought you said he was good-looking.”
”The other one, the cop,” I said.
”What does this one do?” she asked. ”Run a charm school? Let me have the keys.”
I handed them to her. ”I don't know what this one does. Last night he didn't say much. They were both drunk.”
”You should write down everything that happened last night. Have you done that yet?” she asked me.
”No, of course not-why would I write it down?”
”Well, we're going to need a paper trail on everything, Tina, this isn't a joke. I want it established that we are keeping records. Things are going to happen really quickly, and obviously the Drinan brothers have no compunction about playing hardball. We need to be prepared, as much as we can, for whatever they throw at us. What the h.e.l.l is this?”
We had stepped into the front room, now filled with light from top to bottom. In spite of the hideous wall-to-wall s.h.a.g, and all the crazy trouble with Doug Drinan, that room was really gorgeous, so I got distracted for a minute just staring at it and didn't know what she was talking about.
”Tina, h.e.l.lloooo,” Lucy said, waving her hand in front of my face and snapping her fingers.
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