The Bootlegger’s Legacy (32 page)

Step one was convincing Mike that they needed to do some major remodeling on Triples as a smoke screen for building a secure room in the basement for their newly found fortune. So within months of purchasing the restaurant, they began expansion. Along with the upgrades, Joe offered jobs to two of the kitchen staff he’d met at La Posta. They brought with them all of the food expertise he’d experienced at La Posta, along with a complete dedication to him for the opportunity he was giving to them and their families.

Joe changed everything about the menu. The flavors of New Mexico blended in with Oklahoma traditions to create unique, delicious offerings in the restaurant and the bar—haute cuisine for the restaurant, with a unique Nuevo Mexican menu, and “truck stop specials” for the bar. Joe’s perfect place. Business doubled overnight.

Joe was energized and enjoyed the daily activity of running a successful restaurant. He still drank a little too much, and on his bad days he still fought loneliness, along with his old friend depression. His new apartment was close to Triples, so on the worst days he just went home and took a long nap. Generally though, Joe was more content with himself.

The years were also very good to Mike. He and Sam started their church, The Legacy Chapel. Mike was in his element. He had a slow beginning, but word soon spread. Before long they were expanding into a much larger building. Joe had never attended, but there were constant stories in the paper and on the television news about the rapid success of Oklahoma City’s newest megachurch. The chapel now had TV broadcasts featuring Mike and Samantha. Joe had watched one and could see why they were so appealing. Mike was a natural on television, and the couple’s interaction was obviously based on a deep love they felt for each other. Sam was still one of the beautiful people. Joe didn’t watch again.

Joe read somewhere that Legacy Chapel had taken in over thirty million dollars in the previous year. How ironic that Mike had no need for the money hidden in the basement at Triples—although, of course, up until a few years ago Joe sent him a check every month anyway.

Mike would call Joe every once in a while and catch up on the business and on how Joe was doing, but the last call had been almost two years before. Joe understood—in some ways Joe represented Mike’s past, something that Mike was no doubt trying to put behind him.

The real estate holdings that came through Emerson had changed. Besides the remodeling of Triples, the office building on Classen had gone through an extensive remodel and was filled with first class tenants on long-term leases. Joe had been surprised that Mike hadn’t sold it, but the last time they’d discussed it Mike had said he wanted to keep it. The buildings on Second Street had become part of an urban renewal project and were sold to the city at a substantial profit. Joe had often wondered about those buildings and their history. He was sad when they were torn down.

Joe handled all communications with the property management company that took care of the office building and the CPA firm that completed the tax returns. Everything had been put under a corporation called BDD II, though Mike’s name wasn’t on any of the publicly available documentation. Joe sent Mike quarterly reports regarding the buildings, but it had been years since Mike had asked any questions.

The one area where Joe felt he had failed was in finding Sally Thompson. Mike had made it very clear from the beginning that he wanted nothing to do with Sally or the package that they’d found in the lock box. Since that day Mike hadn’t asked Joe about the package or ever mentioned Sally. Mike had uncovered a lot about his father and had managed to rationalize most of it to fit his image of his dad, but Sally couldn’t be explained away so Mike just pretended that that part of his dad’s life never happened.

It was only a few months after they’d found the package addressed to Sally that Joe started his search for her. Finding her and delivering the package was the one thing he could do for Pat Allen that his son could not. He did not know Sally’s age when she was involved with Pat, but his guess was she was in her middle to late twenties, so he calculated that she would be about fifty when he started looking for her.

For the first few years, Joe mostly placed ads in newspapers, and he covered as much territory as he could since he didn’t really know where Sally might have gone. He would occasionally get a response, but none of them ever checked out. Then, in 1990, Joe hired a local private investigation company, someone recommended by one of his bartenders—bartenders seemed to know everything.

Price and Pope Investigations turned out to be Bob Jones—Joe never did get an explanation of the company name. Bob had quoted Joe a fair price to try to track Sally down and Joe had given him all the information he had, though he didn’t share anything about the package or Mike’s dad. Bob was mostly a researcher and he seldom ventured out into the world—not exactly your movie PI.

It took Bob almost three months to find out anything about Sally. He asked Joe to meet him at his office. “Joe, I want you to know that I still have a lot to learn but there is something I thought you needed to know right now.”

Joe waited. “Okay, Bob, what is it?”

“She’s dead.”

Joe hadn’t been expecting that, and he felt a great sense of loss. He had never met her, knew almost nothing about her, but she had become more important to him than he had admitted. At a very deep level she had become Joe’s Sally.

“Dead? How do you know? Do you know how or when or where?”

“The where and when, yes. She died in Chicago in 1954. I know because there’s a death certificate and the timing is right for when she most likely would have been in the city. The how, I’m not sure. Based on other information I have, my guess is that it could have been complications during childbirth.”

Joe felt like he just wanted to flee—he was having a panic attack about a woman he didn’t even know. He took a few deep breaths while Bob waited.

“There’s a child?” This wasn’t what Joe had expected either. He’d dreamed about meeting Sally, giving her a great gift from her past, and witnessing her joy. Now it turned out that she was dead and there was a child.

“Well, I don’t know if there really is a child. What I know is that she gave birth to a girl at St. Joseph’s Hospital in 1953. The baby was named Michelle, Sally Thompson was the mother, and the father was listed as unknown. At this point I haven’t been able to determine what happened to the baby.”

Dead end. Literally a dead end. Maybe Joe should just give up. Somehow the sadness of knowing that Sally was dead was overpowering. Why was it so important to Joe? Mike didn’t give a shit, why should he? But it
was
important. The package was a loose end and Joe hated loose ends. He had wanted Sally to know what was in the package from Pat and now she never would.

“Bob, I’m not real sure where to go from here. I hired you to find Sally Thompson and I guess in a way you did. Now I’m thinking that I need to know about the daughter. For me to be able to close this connection I had with Sally, I need to talk to the daughter. So let’s continue with your current hourly rate and see what you can find out about the daughter, okay?”

“It’s okay with me, Joe—this is what I do. But let me caution you. The child would have been a newborn when her mother died. She might have gone to relatives, or she could have been taken by the state and eventually put up for adoption. If she was adopted, my chances of finding her are almost zero. Those records are sealed for the protection of the child and the adopting parents, so it would be another dead end. But if you want me to try, that’s fine—it’s my job.”

Bob didn’t seem to lack self-esteem. “Yep. Continue on and see what you can find out. Any information at all will be appreciated. Thanks, Bob.”

Joe went back to Triples, and in an unusual act had a gin and tonic at the bar—it was only 11:00 am.

Joe felt bad about Sally, and it had stayed on his mind for a few days—but life goes on. He got busy with the restaurant and soon the pain lessened. Maybe part of the sadness was that there was no one to talk to about it. He was the only one who seemed to care, and that made it especially poignant.

As time wore on, Joe heard from Bob once in a while, but never with any real news. Bob told him he had narrowed down the list of likely towns where he might find her to two, Dallas and Chicago. He now knew that Sally once had a brother in Dallas and had a sister in Chicago. He hadn’t been able to locate the sister and had determined that the brother had died in a construction accident. None of this seemed of use to Joe. He decided that Bob’s reports were just depressing him, so he asked him to stop searching and to send his final bill.

Joe didn’t want to completely give up, though, so he continued to run ads over the years in the Dallas and Chicago papers for any information about a Michelle Thompson. As the internet came into his world, he placed some ads in various locations there as well. No responses.

By now Joe hadn’t thought about the ads in months. The last ones he’d placed had probably been over a year before. He thought that someday he would open the package and just see what was inside, but he was still reluctant to do it, as if it might break some sort of spell. Gosh, he was getting more mystical every day.

Joe spent most of his time at the restaurant. It was his business, of course, and he wanted it to be well run, but he was also most comfortable there. People would often comment that they’d never been in the restaurant when Joe wasn’t there. He knew this was a little obsessive—or maybe a lot—but it didn’t matter. It was where he wanted to be.

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Mike was not sure why he sometimes still felt depressed. Everything he’d ever wanted had come true in the last few years. He was successful, respected, and wealthy—there was nothing missing.

For the first time in his life he felt like he deserved Samantha. His beautiful Sam was not stuck with a loser anymore. He loved her so much, but was still uncomfortable around her. They shared intimacy and said sweet things, and that should have been enough, but Mike always felt like it was part of an act in which they played the perfect couple. It didn’t make sense that two people could look so perfect and be so messed up.

The Legacy Chapel was a success beyond anything Mike could ever have imagined. His goal when they’d started had been to be able to make a modest living doing something he and his wife loved. They were most alive when they were in front of people. Telling stories, giving a sermon, or just talking in front of an audience had become Mike’s addiction. It replaced booze and made him a happy man. He realized that he needed to be loved by many people—one just wasn’t enough. Legacy Chapel filled that need.

The adulation of his followers was what Mike now craved and he couldn’t get enough of the thrill of having people praise him. He could no longer stand solitude—he had to have an audience. Somehow this love of the crowd was felt by his followers, but rather than sensing that Mike was filling a void in his own life, they perceived his need for love as a great warmth and affection coming from him to them. He was mesmerizing, and seemed to connect at a very deep level with almost everyone. This connection turned into a huge financial success for his church.

As the church grew more successful, Mike and Sam grew closer in their public roles, but in private they grew apart. Their love was played out on the stage for everyone to see, but when they were alone they were uncomfortable with each other. They adapted to these roles and seemed to find a routine that avoided conflict. They were still sexually active, but it took on the routine quality of a task that had to be done, like taking out the trash. They didn’t discuss their feelings, but settled into a pattern that seemed to fit the couple they’d become.

Mike hadn’t had any contact with Joe in some time. He thought about him a lot, wondering what was happening and how things were going. Mike still felt the old urge to call Joe and meet at Triples for a drink—their friendship and companionship over the years was something he wouldn’t forget—but that just wasn’t who he was anymore. He had given up Joe the way you would a smoking habit—it had been enjoyable once upon a time, but it was harmful to you so you stopped. Joe knew too many secrets. Mike had to wash those secrets from his mind, as it they’d never existed, and Joe was washed away along with the dreaded past. Mike wasn’t going to think about his father’s past—it hurt too much.

Mike had lumped Joe into the mess with his father. He didn’t want to spend time trying to discover why his father’s misbehavior troubled him so much—he just wanted it to disappear. He’d worshiped his dad when he was growing up. Pat had been distant, but his mother had always talked about him as a warm and caring man, only ever saying good things about him, so that was how Mike saw him. His mother had told Mike how wonderful Pat was, how hard he worked so that they could have all the nice things they had, and had said that his dad loved them both very much. His picture of his dad was of a larger-than-life person who could do no wrong.

All the revelations about his father had been shocking to Mike. He’d heard some stories growing up, but it wasn’t the same as knowing they were true. So he was a bootlegger—maybe Mike could have adjusted to that reality. But Pat’s infidelity with Sally was something he couldn’t handle. It made a joke of everything his mother had ever told him about his dad. It was like there were two dads now—the good one and the evil one—and Mike hated the evil one.