F Paul Wilson - Secret History 02 (15 page)

           
"My mother says
Cosmo
exploits women."

           
He looked up. The little girl was
still concentrating on her own magazine, rapidly paging through it. Since there
was no one else around…

           
"I'm sorry. Did you say
something?"

           
"
Cosmo
exploits women," she said without looking up.

           
"Really?"

           
"Yep. My mom says."

           
She still hadn't looked up.

           
"So you said. But what do
you
think?"

           
"I think so, too."

           
Oh,
great. A feminist munchkin.

           
"How come?"

           
Finally she looked up. Her eyes were
a pale, pale blue, and she was more than cute. Adorable. Rob's heart warmed
instantly at the sight of her face.

           
"Look at that cleavage,"
she said, pointing to the cover.

           
Rob bit his lip to keep from
laughing.
Cleavage
? What did this
little thing know about cleavage?

           
"How old are you?"

           
"I'm nine."

           
"No, you're not. You're
thirty-nine
, at least. Maybe
forty."

           
She smiled, showing straight, white
teeth that seemed too big for her mouth.

           
"I'm nine. And a half."
She pointed at the
Cosmo
cover.
"And
that's
cleavage."

           
Rob looked down at the cover.

           
"Oh, my!" he said.
"You're so right! Look at that cleavage! It's awful."

           
He quickly pulled out his pen and
began scribbling on the cover.

           
"What are you doing?" the
girl said, craning her neck to see.

           
"Getting rid of the
cleavage!"

           
She hopped out of her chair and
plopped down next to him. Her expression was concerned as she watched him
filling in the model's exposed pectoral areas with black ink. She glanced at
the receptionist who was busily typing out the dictation coming through her
earphones, then back to Rob.

           
"You can't do that!" she
said in a loud whisper.

           
"Of course I can!" He
scribbled harder. "I'll teach them to exploit women!" He opened the
magazine, then slapped it closed. "Oh, no! Full of cleavage! Cleavage
everywhere!"

           
The little girl was giggling. Rob
found that he loved the sound. He didn't want her to stop. He handed her his
pen and began pulling magazines at random from the pile.

           
"Here! We'll become cleavage
police! Take these! We'll search every one of them!" She was laughing now.
He pointed to the cover of another issue of
Cosmopolitan.
"More
cleavage!" He opened a
Time
and gasped. "Oh, my Lord! This is the worst yet!"

           
When she saw what he was pointing
to, she began to belly laugh, loud enough to cause the receptionist to look up
from her dictation.

           
The sound of her laughter broke Rob
up. He began laughing along with her.

           
"Quick!" he said, handing
her the
Time
. "Do something
about that! Cover her up!"

           
Dr. Lawrence Gates was insufferably
arrogant. And Kara thought that was a generous assessment.

           
Throughout her carefully reasoned
plea for information, he had sat and watched her in the way one of his patients
in the waiting room might watch the fish in the tank. Her words beaded up and
rolled off him without marring his impenetrable surface.

           
Cold. Aloof. Remote. Oblivious to
Kara's anguish at being in the dark about what had led her twin to her death on
the sidewalk in front of the Plaza Hotel. He just sat there twirling a key ring
on his index finger. Two twirls and then he'd grab it; then he'd do it again.
Twirl-twirl-stop. Over and over. It was annoying the hell out of Kara,
especially since she wasn't getting anywhere.

           
"So you see," she said,
"I need to explain to myself why Kelly had slutty clothes hidden in her
apartment. We had a good upbringing. We were taught to respect ourselves. Who
was she hiding those clothes from? Who was she afraid of? The police will want
to know too."

           
"I'm sorry," he said
abruptly, as if a bell had rung. "I sympathize with your plight, but it
changes nothing. I do not discuss my patients with anyone—not with their
parents, not with their spouses, not with their siblings, not even with their
identical twins. You'll have to go now."

           
Kara stared at him in shock. That
was it: he had a timer in his head and he had been sitting there waiting for it
to go off. Suddenly furious, she went on the offensive.

           
" 'Go now'?" she said,
keeping her voice low with an effort. "Fine. I'll go. But I'll go from
here to a lawyer. And I'll be back with a subpoena for your records, and maybe
a summons to boot. The police are talking about the possibility that my sister
committed suicide. If that turns out to be true, I'm going to want to know why
her psychiatrist didn't spot the risk and do something to head it off. You may
find yourself trying to explain that at a malpractice trial, Dr. Gates."

           
Kara saw him stiffen. She'd broken
through to him. Finally.

           
Suddenly she heard a faint noise
from the waiting room. Laughter. Jill's. She'd recognize that laugh anywhere.

           
"Excuse me for a moment,"
she said to Gates, and went to the door. She pulled it open, stuck her head
through, and froze.

           
Rob was there. Oh, God, and he was
with Jill.

           
Jill looked up and saw her. Her face
was flushed from laughing so hard.

           
"Mom, look!" she said,
holding up the
Time
magazine on which
she'd been scribbling. "I'm drawing clothes on this naked Perdue
chicken!"

           
Rob looked up, too. His smile
vanished, replaced by frank surprise.

           
"Kara! What are you doing
here?"

           
"The same as you are, I
imagine," she said, masking her anxiety as she stepped out into the room.

           
She sensed movement behind her and
saw Rob's eyes focus over her shoulder.

           
"Dr. Gates?" he said,
reaching into his breast pocket and pulling out a leather folder. He flipped it
open to reveal a gold badge. "I'm Detective Harris, NYPD homicide. I'm
investigating the death of Miss Kelly Wade and I'd like—"

           
Gates stepped over to the
receptionist's desk and fanned through a small stack of letters. He didn't
bother looking up as she spoke.

           
"Save your breath,
detective," he said in a voice that dripped with
ennui
. "As I told you or one of your underlings on the phone
this morning, I do not discuss my patients with anyone. That includes twin
sisters and their
gendarme
boyfriends."

           
"Now just a minute—!" Kara
said.

           
"Nor will I be intimidated by
threats of lawsuits or police state tactics."

           
"You're carrying this privilege
business to a ridiculous extreme," Kara said.

           
Gates casually stepped over to the
door to the hall and held it open. He looked at Kara with expressionless eyes.

           
"You wouldn't say that if you
were one of my patients. Please leave. Both of you."

           
Too angry and frustrated to dare try
to speak, Kara took Jill by the hand and led her out. As she strode toward the
elevator, she heard Rob speaking to Gates. She couldn't make out the words, but
his tone was angry. She hoped the elevator was already on this floor so she
could get away without talking to him, but he caught up to her while she was
waiting.

           
"What a tightass," he
muttered as he stopped at her side.

           
Kara glared at him. She couldn't
keep the anger out of her voice.

           
"Your timing was
flawless!"

           
"Me?"

           
"You! He thinks we're in this
together, that I brought you along to twist his arm!"

           
He reddened. "What? That's
bullsh—!" He glanced past her at Jill as she stood at Kara's other side.
"That's crazy. I didn't even know you were in town. If you'd have told me—"

           
The elevator arrived then. It was
empty. The three of them got on. Kara let Jill press the lobby button. She
realized she was overreacting. Maybe it was seeing him with Jill.

           
As the car started down, she turned
to Rob.

           
"I wasn't aware that I had to
let you know whenever I crossed the river. Anyway, I'm getting out of this city
and away from its cold, uncaring, selfish people as soon as I can. God, I hate
it more than ever!"

           
"How about lunch?" he
said.

           
"No, thank you."

           
He nudged her gently and smiled.
"Even if you hate the people, you've got to like the food. And I bet my
friend Jill's as hungry as a horse."

           
"Yeah, Mom," she said,
tugging on Kara's arm. "I'm starved."

           
"We'll eat at Aunt Ellen's.
She's expecting us." She turned to Rob. "You remember Ellen, don't
you?"