The Imperfects Read online

  Helen never mentioned the diamonds she gave Kenny. When Kenny finally placed a ring on Deborah’s finger a year later, a half-carat he bought at a pawnshop, Helen stared at the ring, nostrils flaring, and told Deborah that it was beautiful.

  “My mother can never be happy for me,” Deborah said to Kenny after they left.

  “I let her think that. I never told her what I did,” Kenny confesses to Beck, staring into his now empty coffee cup.

  It’s been seventeen minutes. Beck remains seated, trying to determine if her father’s story is true. The press doesn’t know about the loose diamonds. They don’t know about the orchid brooch. The only way he could have known those details was if Helen had actually given him the stones. Helen had never liked Kenny, yet she’d entrusted him with her gravest secret. That seemed an even greater act of love toward Deborah than gifting him the diamonds.

  “You know, your mother and I never divorced,” Kenny says as he communes with his disposable coffee cup.

  All at once, Beck feels nauseous. Of course this is why he’s here. How naive she was to listen to this story, to presume there was any part of Kenny Miller that might be sincere.

  Beck grabs her tray. “I have to get back to work.”

  She dumps the barely eaten food into the bin and feels him at her shoulder, so she walks down the escalator, the corridor toward Seventeenth Street. Despite his large belly, his heavy breathing, he keeps pace.

  “I have a legitimate claim to Deborah’s share of the diamond,” he says, his conviction almost laughable.

  “Actually, you don’t.” Beck tries to match his conviction, but she isn’t entirely sure. She didn’t study family law in school, and her firm doesn’t take on divorces. Plus, Kenny and Deborah have been estranged so long. And Kenny was the one that left. Even if he is still eligible for any alimony, Beck is fairly certain that inheritance falls into a special protected category. “You have no legal right to anything that’s ours.”

  “I’m not trying to upset you,” he says when she’s forced to stop at a light on Seventeenth. “I didn’t want to blindside you.”

  “This is you not blindsiding me?”

  Kenny hands her a business card for some bar and grill in Margate, New Jersey. He’s listed as the manager. “I’m trying to do the right thing here.”

  “Unbelievable.” The light changes and the pedestrians create a stream of movement around her. Beck starts to cross the street, then turns to her father. “If you go anywhere near Deborah, I’ll castrate you.”

  With that, she storms off, not looking back until she’s inside the lobby of her building and is sure Kenny hasn’t followed her. She tears his business card in half. As she dangles the card over the trash can, she can’t let go. She puts the torn pieces in her coat pocket and hurries upstairs.

  Once she’s back at her desk, she dials her mother. “You never divorced him,” Beck whispers, furious. She should have called her mother from the lobby, away from lurking ears. She knows the gossip that’s been floating around about her, even before the story of the diamond broke, since Tom dumped her. Suddenly, she doesn’t care.

  “It’s kind of hard to divorce someone when you don’t know where they are.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us?”

  “Would it have made things better if I did?”

  Beck can’t shake that familiar frustration toward her mother for being irresponsible and reckless, for creating a mess where there didn’t need to be one. She debates telling Deborah what he said about fighting her for half her assets. While it might make her feel better in this moment, Beck’s still pretty sure it’s not the law.

  “I was afraid,” Deborah says softly. “Not of being divorced, but of getting one.”

  Finally, it clicks. When Deborah used to tell her that Kenny was coming back, she was trying to convince herself as much as she was Beck.

  “He told me a story, about Helen.” Beck recounts the story of Helen gifting Kenny the diamond, hoping it might make her mother feel better to know what Helen did for her.

  Instead, Deborah grows stern. “Don’t believe anything that man tells you.”

  After they hang up, Beck taps on Tom’s door. He looks up at her with that mix of desire and suspicion he’s taken to giving her. As usual she ignores it and tells him about her father’s appearance.

  “What an asshole,” Tom says. “You’re right. Inheritance is outside the scope of alimony. If you do win, he isn’t entitled to any of the diamond.” Tom taps his index finger on his chin as he contemplates this progression. “What worries me is the story about Helen showing him the Florentine. Hiding the brooch, the dealer on Jewelers’ Row, the secrecy. It makes it look like Helen knew the diamond wasn’t hers. At least, that’s how he could paint it.”

  “Will paint it,” Beck says, leaning against the doorjamb. “So what do I do?”

  “For now? Nothing. Don’t take the bait.”

  They both know she’s never been good at avoiding a net cast for her.

  While Beck vows to ignore Kenny, it proves difficult. The next morning, he’s quoted in the papers, not just the Philadelphia Inquirer, but the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal.

  Ashley calls Beck, irate. “He’s seriously saying Helen paid him in diamonds to leave us?”

  “Ash, I’m at work.”

  “How can they print this? It’s slander.” Ashley pauses. “That’s my other line. It’s Jake.”

  “Please, don’t engage. Tell Jake the same thing, okay?”

  After they hang up, Beck rests her head on her desk collecting her thoughts. She can picture Kenny, belly-laughing with the press as he tells inflammatory story after inflammatory story. It’s always been his greatest attribute, his charisma, some might say his bullshit. Even Beck fell for it, momentarily, when he told her the story about Helen and the diamonds. Had that been a line, too? Only, he’d known details he couldn’t have made up. And something about what he said nags Beck. Over the years, the Millers have had several expenditures miraculously paid, not just Deborah’s ring, but Ashley’s last year of private school—Beck never really believed she’d gotten an alumni scholarship—three sets of braces, supposedly covered by insurance; Beck’s freshman year trip to Rome; Deborah’s surgery after she broke her arm; Jake’s first car. Helen had claimed her friend traded it for a custom suit, but that story, like the others, never sounded right.

  There were other costs, too, that Beck can’t remember. Is it possible Helen used diamonds from the hatpin to pay for all the gifts of their lives? There wouldn’t be records of the sales, at least none she’d be able to find. Still, thinking of all those costs, Beck feels confident that it had all come from Helen, that Kenny’s story is true, that where there were five loose diamonds—the three Deborah found in the doll plus the two Helen gave Kenny—there were more. For the first time since the forfeiture, Beck starts to feel her resolve strengthen. The Florentine was Helen’s. She’d brought it over in the hatpin. Now, Beck just has to prove it.

  Thirteen

  At the end of June, when the thirty-day deadline is up, over one hundred parties have filed claims on the 137.27-carat diamond, including Kenny Miller. Beck wasn’t expecting that. She figured he’d wait until the messy and expensive business of the civil forfeiture was over before trying to take his share. Instead, he’s filed his own claim, stating that Helen promised the diamond to him when he and his wife, Deborah, married. It’s not the sort of answer the judge will weigh in on, but it weakens the Millers’ claim, sullying it with decades-old family drama.

  As predicted, several would-be Habsburgs have surfaced in addition to the official heirs. One man claims to be Karl, the last emperor, insisting that he did not die in 1922, and, at the ripe age of 130, is living in Ithaca, NY. Another declares herself the granddaughter of Karl and a reputed mistress. Others pronounce themselves Medicis, even though the Medici line died o
ut centuries before. One man even offers a clear lineage back to Charles the Bold, rumored to have possessed the diamond in the fifteenth century. Another potential claimant alleges that he found the stone on the shores of Lake Michigan. The Star of Michigan is the press’s favorite claim, although the press enjoys all the connections to the Austrian royal family and the Medicis that modern-day treasure hunters can concoct.

  Beck assures her siblings that the false claims are good for their case because it will slow the prosecutors down. Every claim has to be reviewed by the Department of Justice and dismissed by the court. It will take years for the government to sift through all the files and present them to the court for rejection.

  “So you’re saying we won’t be able to sell the diamond for years?” Ashley asks. The judge in Ryan’s case has already ordered the presentencing report and set Ryan’s hearing for November. Ryan must return the money before he appears in court. The Johnsons do not have years.

  “If we win,” Beck cautions.

  “What if we need the money now?” Jake tries to keep his voice impassive. He’d been hoping, with the sale of the diamond, he’d be able to pay next month’s rent. Either the diamond or Helen’s movie, but he’s stalled again on that front. There’s still a giant hole in his story—how Helen got the hatpin—and without that key plot point, he can’t understand why she kept the diamond, what his script is really about.

  “Until this is over, there is no money. More time is good, though. We don’t have the evidence yet that the diamond is ours.”

  While Beck is right that the baseless claims will slow down the Department of Justice, they do not delay the District Court from advancing the Millers’ claim. With the thirty days passed, four claims move forward: the Austrian government, the Italian government, the Habsburg estate, and the Millers. Not Kenny Miller. Beck wants to celebrate that small victory, but he’s still talking to the press, fabricating stories about their family.

  Judge Ricci, the district judge hearing their case, is in her forties and wears bright, chunky necklaces over her robe. It gives Beck hope that since the judge is young, female, and fashionable, that together, Judge Ricci and Beck stand out in the sea of silver-haired men in dark suits. The judge, however, appears as indifferent to Beck as she is to the other parties.

  “Let me be clear.” Judge Ricci looks pointedly at each lawyer, even Beck, who is not a lawyer, but who, for the moment, is representing herself. “I will not tolerate attempts to unnecessarily delay this case. We are here at the taxpayers’ expense. It may be in your interest to amass as many hours as possible, but it is not in the interest of this court or the public.”

  She sets discovery at ninety days, the subsequent deadline to file motions for summary judgment a month later at the end of October. Three months is all they have to collect their evidence, to depose witnesses, to hire experts. And they will need experts—on WWI, on Austrian law, specifically the Habsburg Law, which allocated all crown property to the state. On the WWI treaty and reparations that might indebt the Florentine Diamond to the Italians. They will need gemologists and jewelry historians, here and overseas. They will need a lawyer, which in thirty days the Millers have not acquired. Viktor secured a buyer for the diamonds, offering fifteen thousand dollars. Not market price, but more than Beck had feared. Still, it isn’t enough to pay for a month of legal fees.

  Beck cannot represent her family, not against the big law firms that the Italians and the Austrians have hired as counsel. The Habsburgs have retained an international law firm that specializes in luxury goods. They were involved in a suit over Elizabeth Taylor’s diamonds and another involving a quarterback and a blue diamond ring. As much as Beck Miller likes a challenge, this isn’t an uphill battle so much as a massacre.

  * * *

  Beck advances the best she can, reading the pages Christian translates and trying to find a lawyer who will be a good fit for her family. Attorneys keep approaching her, but their hourly rates are comical, their plans of attack disconcertingly thin. They’re interested in the money, the coverage, not in Helen. Not in the Millers, either. Writers and businessmen also contact her, calling the firm, claiming to be Beck’s mother, her friend, and, once, her gynecologist. They clog the phone lines and distract the firm’s best paralegal. Now, Beck isn’t even sure she is the best paralegal. She’s preoccupied; even she can admit her work is not up to its usual impeccable standard, which is just another way she feels overwhelmed and disappointed by her own limitations.

  Then one day Karen from HR stops Beck in the hall to tell her that the partners would like to see her in the conference room.

  “Am I in trouble?” Beck asks, trotting to keep up with Karen.

  “I honestly don’t know.” Karen stops abruptly, causing Beck to almost bang into her. “Whatever happens, I’m here.” These words are meant to comfort Beck, who’s now positive she’s about to be fired.

  Of course Tom has to be there. Would it be too much that he recuse himself? Does he really have to bear witness to another humiliating moment in the life of Beck Miller? He keeps his face downturned, focused on the legal pad in front of him, while the partners stand and motion Beck toward an open seat in the middle of the room.

  “Beck,” one of the name partners begins. “It’s no secret that you’re facing some mounting legal troubles.”

  “I’m not being sued,” she says defensively, then reconsiders her approach. “They’re trying to steal my family heirloom.”

  “We’ve read.” She waits for the words she’s dreading. “We want you to consider taking leave while all of this settles.”

  “If you are going to fire me, I’d prefer you do it now.”

  A laugh, and Beck is confused. The name partner smiles. “Beck, you’re the best paralegal we’ve ever had. We’re just concerned this case may be a distraction.”

  “I can’t afford to take unpaid leave. It could be years until this settles.” God, years. Years of appeals, whether she wins or loses. This case will go on forever.

  “We’ve considered this, and here’s what we propose.”

  His offer is so absurd Beck has to periodically turn to Karen to confirm she’s hearing correctly.

  “In addition to our ongoing relationship with you, there are numerous reasons why we’re the best firm for your claim,” the name partner begins his pitch. “First, we’re one of the top firms in Philadelphia. And as you well know, it makes sense to go with a local firm that is familiar with the federal court system in Pennsylvania, the judges, some of whom will be more sympathetic than others. Plus, we have just as much manpower as a firm in New York or DC. We can’t offer to do this pro bono. But we’ll represent you on contingency and will get reimbursed for expenses only if we win.” He doesn’t explain to Beck that the expenses will come off the top before the firm takes its third. It goes without saying that, should they win, they will sell the diamond. “Of course, you should discuss this with your family, but we’d like to put you on the case, full-time. We’ll reassign your other work so you can focus your efforts on this. It will be a top priority for our firm.”

  “I don’t need to discuss it with my family,” Beck says without hesitating. “This sounds like a great plan.”

  “Tom tells us he’s been helping you with the case? Unless you have any objections, we’d like to keep him on as your representation from the firm.”

  She looks skeptically at the name partner. Is he trying to screw with her? When he smiles, she realizes that he doesn’t know about their relationship. While it’s on record, Karen has kept it confidential.

  “So we’re in agreement?” one of the other partners asks. He doesn’t wait for Beck to respond before he says, “Good,” and gets up to leave. The other partners fall in line behind him. Within moments, the conference room empties. Only Beck, Karen, and Tom remain at the table.

  “You good?” Karen asks Beck, who nods warily. As Karen stand
s, she shoots Tom a look that Beck would have paid for, it’s so perfectly lacquered in disgust.

  “I don’t want you on my family’s case,” Beck says as soon as they are alone.

  Tom acts confused. “I’ve been helping you so far.”

  “It means spending a lot of time together, which isn’t a good idea.”

  “Beck, about what happened at the apartment—” Tom begins.

  Beck cuts him off. “It was a mistake. Something to get each other out of our systems.” As Tom starts to protest, she gestures that she’s not finished yet. “I’m over you, but you really hurt me. I opened up to you in a way I hadn’t with anyone before.” Again, she holds her hand up for him to listen. “Let me finish. I appreciate your help, I do. I just don’t trust you with this. There’s too much history between us. I don’t want you knowing any more of the intimacies of my family.”

  Tom looks hurt, which evokes a burst of anger in Beck. He does not get to feel bruised by her words. Before she can tell him this, he says, “I don’t judge you for what you did. We aren’t defined by our mistakes. We’re defined by how we respond to them. I didn’t care that you cheated in high school.”

  “I didn’t cheat—”

  Tom wags his index finger to indicate that this is precisely what he means.

  “Don’t do that with your finger. I’m not a child,” Beck says, feeling childish.

  “It took me a while to figure out why your story bothered me so much. I wanted you to open up to me. And it’s terrible the way your teacher made you feel.”

  “He harassed me. Nowadays, he’d be fired for it and blasted all over social media.”

  “That’s just it, Beck. You didn’t go to the authorities. You took matters into your own hands.”