“Reginald!” Bobby yelled, chasing after Uncle Eddie. “Reginald, we talked about how the cold is bad for your leg.” Bobby reached for Eddie’s arm, but Eddie jerked away.
“Can’t you see my family is here, doc?” Eddie glanced at Garrett, who stood wordless amid the throng. “All except that one. I don’t have a clue about that one.”
“I see that, Reg,” Bobby said. “And I’m very much looking forward to meeting everyone…inside.”
“I don’t know why,” Eddie said. “Bunch of worthless freeloaders. Never showed up before…” He spoke under his breath, the ramblings of a crazy man.
“Come on, Reg.” Bobby gestured for the door. “Let’s go in.”
Slowly, the group made their way onto the rickety porch and through the big front doors. The stairs creaked. The floor moaned. And Kat’s father just kept smiling, clipboard in hand.
“Now, Reginald, won’t you introduce me to your friends?” Bobby asked.
“They’re not my friends. They’re my family.”
Bobby gave a hearty laugh. “Oh, Reg, you are the life of the party.”
A nurse walked by, and Eddie winked at her. The expression on his face was exactly like the one Reginald had worn in the family movies, and Kat must not have been the only one to see the similarities.
“Hello, Reginald,” Hale’s aunt said very, very slowly. “I’m Elizabeth. I am Hazel’s daughter. That makes me your niece.”
“I’m crazy, Liz,” Reginald said. “Doesn’t mean I’m stupid.”
“No. No.” Bobby gave a hearty laugh. “As you’ll see, your uncle is in very good health for a man with his history.”
“And who are you, exactly?” Hale’s father puffed out his chest and looked skeptically at Bobby, who never wavered.
He just held out his hand and said, “Sorry about that. I’m Dr. Nathaniel Jones. I’m your uncle’s primary physician.”
In the dim, quiet room upstairs, Kat whispered to Simon, “And the real Dr. Jones…”
“Has a Ph.D. from Harvard and an M.D. from Johns Hopkins, but recently decided to retire on a blissfully quiet beach in Belize.”
“Perfect,” Kat said, and kept her eyes glued to the screens.
Senior was walking through the foyer, staring at hastily patched walls and out-of-date fixtures. “What is this place?” he asked.
“This is your uncle’s home.” Bobby looked at W. W. Hale the Fourth as if he didn’t know how a man could be so insensitive. “In fact, we’re home for dozens of people like Reginald. People who have special needs. People for whom life in mainstream society might be stressful or even dangerous. For our residents, this isn’t just a house—it’s a haven.”
“So it’s an institution?” Senior said.
“Well…” Bobby hesitated, but then finally admitted, “that term is appropriate, but we do not prefer it.”
“I would have preferred not to think my uncle was dead for five decades, but no one asked me.”
“Would you like a tour?” Bobby asked, sweeping the clipboard out wide.
“I want some questions answered.” Hale’s uncle stepped forward. Kat watched the way his eyes cut around the room, taking everything in. “Such as, why hasn’t our family physician ever heard of you or your facility?”
“Oh, well”—Bobby gave a throaty laugh—“we cater to patients who, shall we say, place a premium on discretion.”
“What does that—” Senior started, but Hale cut him off.
“He means rich people.” Hale looked at Bobby. “Isn’t that what you’re saying? This is where the über-rich send their über-embarrassing, über-crazy branches of the family tree?”
Bobby lowered his gaze. “We’ve been entrusted with the care of some very special patients through the years. And we guard their privacy as ardently as we’ve guarded your uncle’s.”
Bobby gave a glance toward a series of photographs lining the walls. Bobby with a retired, reclusive senator. A member of the royal family playing dominoes with Uncle Eddie in the game room.
“Uncle Charlie forged those?” Kat asked.
“Uh-huh.” Simon nodded, but Kat didn’t feel any better.
“They’re not buying it.” She watched Garrett, who was still silent, almost bored, going through the paces of someone else’s con. “He’s going to squeal on us,” Kat said.
“If he were going to squeal, he would have done it by now,” Simon said. “He doesn’t care about this. He just wants to sell his prototype and disappear. Now be quiet.”
The tiny room that Simon had transformed into the communications base felt crowded, and Kat finally knew what was harder than running the long con: sitting on the sidelines and watching your long con go on without you.
“I’m hot. It’s hot in here.” She was all nerves and sweat, and spoke rapid-fire, fanning herself with an old magazine. “Is the computer room always so hot?”
“Sometimes the computer room is in an outhouse. In Mexico. In July. So, stop squirming.”
Kat did as she was told. She didn’t say a word when Simon picked up a microphone and said, “Uncle Felix, it’s time.”
Somewhere in the depths of the building, there was a cry, and then a very old, very naked man ran down the hall.
“Was it just me, or did we agree on underwear?” Kat asked.
“You know Felix,” Simon said with a shrug. “He likes to improvise.”