Nick mulled that over. “I can’t say I ever did. Maybe they weren’t close. I don’t think Graham and his brother are.”

“Either way, the kid in the picture isn’t his cousin. His mother lied to me today, and his father didn’t refute it. The monthly payments—stretching twenty years—the weekly phone calls, catching his parents in a big, fat lie, the startling resemblance to the senator… It doesn’t take a detective to add it all up, Nick.”

“But why…wait.” He went perfectly still. “One weekend a month.”

Baffled, she said, “Excuse me?”

“He required one weekend a month with no commitments. Usually the third weekend. Never would say what he did with the time. In fact, he was always kind of weird about it, now that I think about it.”

“And you just thought to mention this now? What the hell, Nick?”

“I’m sorry. It was just so much a part of our routine that I didn’t think anything of it until right now.”

“I bet if I do some digging, I’ll find him booked on a regular flight to Chicago.”

All the air seemed to leave Nick in one long exhale. “Why didn’t he tell me? Why would he keep something like this hidden from me? From everyone?”

“I don’t know, but I’m going out there tomorrow to find out.”

“You are?”

“I’m on an eleven o’clock flight.”

“Does she know you’re coming?”

Sam shook her head. “Element of surprise. I don’t want to give her time to put away the pictures or send the kid out of town.”

“And you think this has something to do with his murder?”

“I can’t say for sure until I’ve spoken to the mother, but for some reason they’ve kept him hidden away for twenty years. I want to know why.”

“Politics, no doubt.”

“How do you mean?”

“A teenaged son with a baby would’ve been a political liability to the senator. I should know. As the offspring of teenaged parents, I can attest to the embarrassment factor in a family with zero public presence.”

Sam ached from the pain she heard in his voice.

“Graham O’Connor would’ve wanted this put away in a closet,” he concluded.

“His own grandchild?”

“I don’t think it would’ve mattered. The O’Connor name wasn’t always the powerhouse it is now. He had a few contentious campaigns around the mid-point of his career. If the timing coincided, this could’ve ruined him. He would’ve acted accordingly.”

“At the expense of his own family?”