I grew up on the North Side of Pittsburgh in the 1950s in a typical lower-middle-class family—mother, father, sister, brother—and by the time I was forty-six they were all dead. My mother was the last to go, adrift in a gentle fog of senility that seemed to spare her the heartache of outliving two of her three children. She and I were close and I missed her terribly, but as the years rolled by it was my sister Eileen’s suicide at the age of twenty-seven that nagged at me like a pebble in my shoe. Eileen had been working as a secretary in San Bernardino, California, and was married to her high school sweetheart, Vic Zaccagnini, a police officer. They had no children. I had always known her as a happy, bubbly girl, the brightest smile in the room. Then, suddenly, she was gone.
Details about Eileen’s death were sketchy, nothing much more than the fact that she had died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. But we also knew that Vic was in the house when the fatal shot was fired, and I wondered how we could be certain that she had commit- ted suicide and Vic had nothing to do with her death. My parents, who were nearly catatonic with grief, asked me to talk to him and try to sort it out. I had known Vic since he was sixteen years old. His mother was my mother’s best friend. When he arrived from California for Eileen’s funeral, the two of us sat down in my parents’ kitchen and talked. The story he told me was long and sad, but the gist was simple—Eileen had been having an affair with her boss, and when that fact was revealed, she shot herself in a fit of remorse. Vic met my eyes openly, his face filled with bewilderment and grief. He answered all my questions, never stumbling or contradicting himself. In short, I believed him. I told my family what he had told me and we got on with our lives as best we could.
Nearly three decades later, I started to write a novel about Eileen. I assumed the book would be fiction, my imagination filling in the blanks in the story I’d been parroting to myself and everyone else for so many years. But everything changed when I uncovered the police reports from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department. According to those reports, Vic had beaten up Eileen shortly before she died, called her a “whore,” and threatened to kill her in front of another cop; moreover, the lead detective appeared to have made up his mind about the case before he ever left the office and never bothered to interview the two women Eileen had talked to on the telephone in the last hour of her life. To me, what had been ruled a suicide now looked like a cover-up, the Sheriff’s Department protecting a fellow officer.
I have spent years searching for the truth about my sister’s death. This is the story of my quest. In the TV world my tale would unfold like one of those true-crime dramas where a dedicated cold-case investigator tracks down every lead and suspect, forensic experts unravel the mysteries of blood and fibers and bullets, and a verdict is rendered with the tap of a judge’s gavel in a court of law.
But I do not live in the TV world.
The last leg of my journey took me to a motel room near the Seattle airport. I was sitting by the desk, one knee bouncing nervously while I doodled on a message pad, waiting to go to a meeting with Vic. I hadn’t seen him since the day of Eileen’s funeral. The meeting had been arranged by Darryl Carlson, a private detective who had become my guide and unflagging companion on my quest. Darryl had said we should go to the meeting empty-handed, no briefcase or notebooks—no hidden recording device—and I agreed. The only exception was a copy of Eileen’s letter in my shirt pocket, the one she wrote to our parents on the day she died. I was certain Vic did not know the letter existed, and I wanted to see the look on his face when he read it.
Darryl glanced at the big Rolex on his wrist and said, “Time to go.” “Okay. Should I leave the police reports here in the room or take them in the car?”
“You got extra copies, right?” I nodded.
“Let’s take them. Maybe he’ll want a set.” “You think?”
Darryl twisted one corner of his mouth in doubt, or maybe it was hope, but didn’t say anything. We put on our coats and walked out to the rental car. It was a dank February evening, pink haze around the arc lights in the parking lot. I pulled out onto the road and asked him how far it was to the restaurant.
“About three miles. You can’t miss it. It’s up on the right.” “What’s it called again?”
“Thirteen Coins.”
“That’s a terrible name. Sounds like bad luck.”
Darryl grinned, then explained it was from an old wedding custom.
The groom gives his bride thirteen coins for Jesus and his disciples.
We stopped at a red light, the windshield wipers mewling as they cleared the mist. I asked him if we should have some sort of signal in case I got nervous and went off track.
“Sure, I’ll just stab you in the leg with my fork?”
My turn to grin. Darryl had a way of talking me down off the ledge. The driver behind me tapped his horn. I looked up and saw the green light and eased ahead.
“Is Vic definitely bringing his wife?” I asked.
Darryl said he thought so. “We want her there. Helps keep things in balance.”
Another mile up the road, Darryl pointed at the sign for 13 Coins, and I found an empty parking spot about fifty yards past the entrance. I turned off the engine and let out a long breath like a runner before a race.
Darryl put his hand on my shoulder. “We’ve come a long way, Jim. You’re gonna be fine. Just take it nice and slow.”
As we walked toward the restaurant in the chilly night air, my feet felt sluggish while my mind rushed ahead. I caught a glimpse of Vic the moment I stepped through the door. He was standing alone near the hostess station, his face in profile. He turned and saw me and lifted his chin in recognition. As I walked toward him, he gave me a wary smile. More than thirty years after Eileen’s death, my journey had come full circle, taking me back to its beginning—I, a jury of one, trying to decide if the hand he held out to me was the hand that had held the gun.
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