Page 63 of Axe-identally Married
“He made a big deal about the Holy Trinity, the three best Swiss watchmakers in the world.”
The collection began when I was a kid. He bought himself a Rolex for his fortieth birthday and one for my mom after that. From there, he got more and more ambitious.
She nodded at the pictures in front of me. “What are those?”
I was not a watch guy, but I’d spent my entire childhood listening to my dad’s lectures, so I could recognize most brands at a glance and could spot the difference between a ten-thousand-dollar watch and a one-hundred-thousand-dollar watch easily.
I pointed to one grouping of photos. “These are less exclusive brands. Rolex, Nardin, Breguet. But this one.” I tapped my finger on another image. “This is a Patek Philippe. Super famous. And this one,” I said, pointing to a diamond-shaped face casing with complicated mechanics. “That’s a Vacheron Constantin. Super old-school.” I continued to peruse the pictures, allowing memories to come to mind as I did. Watches were one thing that made Dad happy, and since I craved his positive attention, I always pretended to care. Somewhere alongthe way, I supposed I absorbed the information. When he gifted me a watch the day I got drafted, I was overwhelmed with the briefest sense of belonging. That was washed away quickly, though, when he launched into berating me about training harder.
“Hold on,” I said, flipping through the book. “There’s one missing.”
“Something valuable?” Parker asked, one brow arched.
I nodded. “It’s an Audemars Piguet. He bought me a matching one as a gift. He gave it to me when I got drafted. It’s engraved with my name and the date. So is his.”
“Maybe he was wearing it when he was arrested?”
I shrugged. That was possible. “It was made of stainless steel rather than precious metals. He said I could wear it to games for good luck.” Not that I ever did. It was hard enough not to get my ass kicked on a minor league hockey team without flashing around a fifty-thousand-dollar watch.
But I’d kept it, moved it with me from city to city. Always tucked safely in its fancy leather box. The moment he’d given it to me, I’d felt a sense of pride I’d never experienced. And I was ashamed to admit it, but the gift had made me feel loved. Now, that notion was ridiculous. But I was a nineteen-year-old kid who’d spent my life feeling left behind by my half brothers and striving to earn my dad’s love.
Pathetic.
On the bright side, at least I’d have plenty to talk about in therapy this week.
“I’ll look into it,” she said. “Do you think someone could have stolen it?”
“Not sure.” I kept flipping, looking at the cars, his beloved boat, and all the other shit he’d accumulated over the course of his life. How was all this worth the crimes he’d committed?
Nice cars were cool and all, but to obtain them by hurting people, bykillingpeople? And destroying his family in the process? The notion turned my stomach.
The longer I looked at photos, the more despondent I felt. No wonder I was such a fuck-up. I never had a fucking chance with this kind of role model.
“You okay?”
Choking back the self-loathing, I nodded. “Sorry, it’s that, sometimes, I can’t believe this is my life.”
“It’s okay,” she assured me as she scratched out more notes. “The watch info is helpful. I’m gonna call some local pawn shops, see if it ended up in one of them. Could be a good lead. Your brothers didn’t know much about the watches.”
Huh. A facet of the investigation I had more knowledge of? That felt surprisingly good.
“Anything else I can help with?”
Without stopping her note-taking, she waved her left hand, gesturing to the room. “Feel free to look around, see if anything jumps out at you. I’d love for you to email me the dates and locations of games he flew to over the past few years.”
I nodded. I could do that, painful as it might be.
With my hands in my pockets, I made a slow circle around the room, looking through the photos she had spread out on one of the tables before moving to the whiteboards. Most of the information she’d collected was related to the lumber business—names of mills, delivery schedules, buyers the company had worked with, photos of machinery and land.
“What’s this?” I asked, pointing to a whiteboard.
She straightened and squinted. “Deimos Industries?”
I nodded.
“No fucking clue. It’s a corporation based in Delaware. Supposedly, they’re in the merchandising business. Owen and Lila found suspicious financial records connected to them, butwe can’t trace anything or figure out how they fit. I’ve spoken to my contact at the Department of Commerce, but they’re swamped and haven’t gotten back to me.”
“I’ve seen this before. It’s familiar.”
