“You think this wasn’t hurtful? And what about Richard?”
“I didn’t mean to hurt him. Can we save the lecture for another time?”
She leaned back, her eyes defeated. “No lectures.”
Was she just tired or had she given up on me?
That’s right, Resnick, twist every word into a slight
—
every phrase into a hurt, and every sentence into a condemnation
. But how could I blame Brenda if she no longer wanted to bother with me?
“Where’s Rich?”
“The hospital. He went to talk to Dr. Marsh about your treatment.”
“She’s not treating me.”
“See those needle marks on your arm? If you didn’t inject yourself, we figure she did. We want to know with what. Don’t you?”
I was back riding that perfect wave of shame. I’d known something was terribly wrong, yet I hadn’t been able to confront Krista.
What
had
she done to make me feel so damned intimidated?
“You hungry?” Brenda asked.
I met her dark-eyed stare. “No.”
She pushed the chair back and rose, heading for the living room. “Well I am. I’m going home to make waffles. You can cook the sausage.”
I stayed put.
Brenda paused in the doorway. “You don’t think you’re going to lie around all day feeling sorry for yourself, do you?”
“I’d sorta planned on it.”
“You better get up right now or I’ll resort to my Daddy’s answer to malingering children—instant up!”
“What’s that?”
“Ice cubes down your jammies.”
She’d do it, too.
I heaved a sigh and hauled myself out of bed to follow, too beaten to argue with her.
Tired as
he was, he wasn’t going to blow it. At least, that’s what Richard had told himself over and over again as he’d driven to the hospital. He wasn’t going to accuse Krista of anything. He wasn’t going to raise his voice. Losing his cool would ruin his chances of nailing her. For the time being, it might be smarter to just let her think she’d gotten away with something.
Richard shifted his briefcase to his left hand. Michael’s report felt heavy inside it. Without Jeff’s side of the story, Richard knew he didn’t yet have enough to go to the Medical Director.
Patience
.
The door to Krista’s cubbyhole of an office was unlocked. He opened it and stepped in. A whirring, grinding noise filled the small room. With her back turned to the door, Krista hadn’t heard him enter. He walked up to her, tapped her on the shoulder. She whirled, her face filled with guilty panic.
“Richard!”
“Good morning, Krista.”
The shredder finished chewing through a handful of pages, plunging the room into silence.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, closing the file folder she’d been emptying.
Richard leaned against her desk, hoping he appeared more relaxed than he felt. A shower, shave, and a fresh change of clothes made him look more presentable, but he knew his bloodshot eyes were a dead give away on his fatigue.
“I wanted to talk to you about Jeff.”
“I don’t know what he told you about Saturday night,” she started, defensively, “but—”
“To tell you the truth, Jeff hasn’t told me much of anything for the past couple of weeks. I was hoping you could fill me in on what you two have been up to.”
Krista’s brown eyes were sharp and assessing. “That would be a breach of patient-doctor confidentiality.”
“Then you
have
been treating Jeff?”
“Well, no. But he’s been helping me assess the emotional distress of one of my patients.”
Richard crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m concerned about the ethics of his assisting you.”
Krista straightened, indignant, her clingy, sleeveless v-necked dress hinting at the abundance of cleavage beneath it. “My patient gave her written consent.”
“You wouldn’t happen to have a copy of that handy, would you?”
Krista hesitated. “Not here. Her files are back at my home office.”
“Did Jeff sign anything? A consent form—any kind of legal document?”
“What are you insinuating?”
“I’m concerned about my brother. Helping your patient could negatively impact his emotional welfare.”
Krista turned, settling on her client couch, her short skirt rising as she crossed her shapely legs. Richard hadn’t before noticed how provocatively she dressed for the office. “As a matter of fact,” Krista began, “I tried to call him yesterday to discuss that very subject. He hasn’t gotten back to me.”
Richard straightened. “I’d appreciate it if you’d refrain from contacting him. At least for the time being.”
Her bland expression darkened. “You have a savior complex, Richard. Always trying to rescue Jeff from imaginary dangers. He’s a competent adult. He can take care of himself.”
“Yes,” Richard said, lying through his teeth, “he can.”
“That was
a waste of time,” Richard muttered under his breath, heading for the exit. There was nothing left to do but try to wring the truth out of Jeff and go on from there. A call to his attorney to find out Jeff’s legal options wouldn’t be out of order, either. First—sleep. After that, he’d be able to think clearly.
The lobby doors were in sight when Richard saw Wes Timberly coming toward him. He didn’t have the patience to deal with that jerk, and did an abrupt about face.
“Hey, Dr. Dick. Got a minute?”
Richard stopped dead, jaw clenching in barely suppressed irritation. He turned. Timberly hurried to catch up with him.
“Actually, no,” Richard said, about to take off again, when Timberly’s voice stopped him once more.
“I was going to ask my receptionist to set up a meeting so I could turn the Foundation records over to you. You’ll save her the trouble if you take them now.”
Warning bells went off in Richard’s mind. Wes, being affable?
“I guess I could do that.”
“Fine.” Timberly slapped him—hard—on the back. “My office is up on the third floor. Come on.”
Wary, Richard followed a step behind.
“That was some party Saturday night,” Timberly said. “You were the belle of the ball.”
Richard didn’t comment.
Timberly paused at the bank of elevators, pressed the up button. They waited in silence until the car arrived, then got on.
On edge, Richard stared at the elevator’s burnished metal doors, grateful Timberly hadn’t decided to engage in more idle chit-chat.
Jeff should be awake and functioning by now. Maybe today Richard would get a rational explanation of what went on in those counseling sessions with Krista and her patient.
The doors opened onto a well-lit corridor. Preoccupied, Richard followed Timberly to his office.
And what if Jeff still couldn’t remember? Would he let Richard hypnotize him to get the answers? Should Richard even try? After Jeff’s experience with Krista, Richard knew his brother would resist speaking with another member of the psychiatric community. And who could Richard trust for a recommendation? He’d trusted those who’d vouched for Krista.
“Norma,” Timberly addressed his matronly receptionist. “See that Dr. Alpert and I aren’t disturbed.”
The grim-faced woman gave a curt nod.
Timberly ushered Richard inside the well-appointed office and shut the door.
Trapped.
“What have you got, lists of donor names?” Richard asked, taking in the rich paneling and sumptuous carpeting, definitely not regular hospital issue.
“Something better.” Timberly nodded toward a stand in the corner of the room, housing a television. “I’ve got this great porno flick I think you’ll be interested in.”
“You asked me here to look at porn? What’s the matter with you?” Richard turned, disgusted. “I don’t have time for this.”
Timberly clasped his shoulder, pushing him into one of the chairs in front of his desk. “Make time.”
The television screen flashed from static to a soft-focused image of naked stick figures writhing on a mattress.
“Wes—” Richard tried again.
“Do you recognize the industry’s latest male star?”
Moans of ecstasy mingled with piteous cries of fear. Richard forced his gaze to the screen. He felt his face go lax, his eyes widening in horrified recognition.
Jeff.
Richard sprang up, grabbed the remote, hit the stop button, and then extracted the disk from the side of the set, his stomach knotting in sick revulsion. He turned on his colleague. “Where did you get this?”
“That’s not important. What’s important is keeping it out of certain hands. I assume you’ll want to help me do that.”
The knot in Richard’s gut tightened.
“How would it look for the Foundation’s new capital campaign chair to be tainted with scandal so early in his tenure?”
It was all Richard could do to keep from wiping that maddening smirk from Timberly’s face.
“Keep that disk. As you’ve probably already guessed, it’s a copy. The original is in a safe place.”
“What do you want?” Richard asked, trying to keep his voice level.
“My chairmanship back. The one you took from me. And I wouldn’t mind a cash bonus. Sort of a finder’s fee.”
“Blackmail, Wes? I never thought you’d go that far.”
Timberly’s mouth twisted in a malevolent smile. “You’ve got twenty-four hours to announce you’re stepping down.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I don’t think you realize just who the other participant in that video is. Grace Vanderstein, handicapped daughter of the late Senator Vanderstein. The press would love that.”
Richard felt the blood drain from his face.
Smug, Timberly shook his head. “Is there anything lower than a rapist who drives his victim to suicide.”
Richard’s head jerked up. “Suicide?”
“Yesterday afternoon. Poor sad woman. She couldn’t live with what that scumbag did to her.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Check the ER records. Better yet, visit the morgue.”
“Where did you get that DVD?” Richard demanded.
Wes didn’t answer, but Richard already knew: Krista Marsh.
That explained an awful lot: the needle marks, the holes in Jeff’s memory.
Richard threw open the office door, stalking away.
“Twenty-four hours,” Timberly called after him.
“More hot chocolate?” Brenda asked.
I glanced across the kitchen table, littered with plates gummy with congealing syrup. Not the fake stuff—real Vermont dark amber. Only the best for Brenda.
I pushed my empty cup toward her. “What the hell.”
She got up, poured whole milk into a clean saucepan to warm. No instant, water-based cocoa for Brenda, either.
I heard the car before I saw it. The engine quit right outside the kitchen window.
My heart pounded. Cold sweat broke out on the back of my neck before the back door handle even rattled. Richard hadn’t instilled such fear in me since that chilly March afternoon twenty-three years earlier when I saw him waiting for me outside my high school and knew our mother was dead.
The door opened and closed. Richard came through the pantry to the kitchen, pausing in the doorway.
It took every ounce of courage I possessed to meet his gaze. We stared at one another for a long wrenching moment. Richard looked rumpled, a state I’d never seen him in. I didn’t have a clue what he was feeling.
Brenda broke the ice. “Jeffy ate a whole waffle and two sausages for breakfast.”
“If I eat all my dinner, will you let me watch TV tonight?”
Richard didn’t react to my poor excuse of a joke. Instead, he dropped his briefcase on the floor, took off his suit jacket, tossed it on the chair next to me, and loosened his tie. Then he grabbed the chair in front of him, scraped it across the tile floor, and practically fell into it.
“I’m so fucking tired I can hardly think,” he said, wiping a hand across his red-rimmed eyes. He had to be, to use the “f” word in front of Brenda.
“Jeffy and I are having cocoa. Do you want some?” Brenda offered.
He nodded.
Brenda grabbed the milk from the fridge, pouring more into the pan.
Richard took a weary breath and our eyes locked. “How do you feel?” His voice was much gentler than I deserved.
“Rocky.”
“I’d be surprised if you didn’t.” He leaned his elbow on the table, settling his weight on it for support. “I know you don’t like spilling your guts, but this is one time you’re going to have to.”
“I guess I owe you that.” I wished time could speed forward and we’d be three months beyond all this.
“What, exactly, were you doing with Krista’s patient?”
My insides squirmed. Not the question I’d expected.