Haverford’s face darkened as he rearranged the items on his desk and said, “That’s enough, Mr. Taylor. We’re here to talk about your teaching style, not my career.”
“Well, I’m sure they’re just looking for the best candidate.”
“Enough,” Haverford said. He then leaned forward, his lips curled in irritation. “Let me be frank.”
“That would be refreshing.”
“I would not have hired you for your position.”
“I’m well aware of your…”
He held up his hand. “Let me finish. Your academic background is exceptional.” He glanced at his laptop screen. “You received scholarships and graduated magna cum laude from the University of North Carolina, and then again from University of Virginia’s graduate program in history. Your thesis comparing the seeds of the French Revolution to contemporary America was brilliant and received accolades from all the leading periodicals. For some reason you turned down a doctoral scholarship to Yale to become an analyst at the State Department. And although that work is impressive, it seems somewhat…tame when compared with your previous academic work.”
Paul smiled inwardly and thought, If you only knew. He then mentally thanked Shelly for changing his work history from FBI undercover operative to State Department analyst.
“But none of that makes you a Hillcrest teacher. You’re too…”
“Fun? Engaging? Honest…?”
Haverford scowled. “Irreverent. Take your clothes for example: you always wear the same cheap khakis and blue shirt, with irritatingly flamboyant ties.”
“But…but…” Paul goaded. “They’re from Old Navy.”
Haverford’s nose scrunched like he smelled something vile. “And I don’t think you fully appreciate the type of students we have here. Take Mrs. Chenault, for example. Her husband is a very influential lawyer from New York City, with many friends in the federal government.”
“I’d like to point out that Mrs. Chenault isn’t a student here. Her son is.”
“But she is a parent and has a deep concern for how her child is treated. She expects Kevin be treated with care.”
“You mean coddling.”
“Call it what you will, but Hillcrest parents demand their students receive deference.”
Paul leaned forward. “Don’t you see? That’s not real life. If you coddle them here, you’re training them to expect coddling in the real world, which sets them up for failure and misery.”
Haverford slammed his hand down on his desk. “Enough. You’re a teacher. Your job is to instruct. Mine is to create the framework for that instruction.”
“You’re not principal yet,” Paul chided.
Haverford’s face twisted in a cruel smile. “Fine. You want to play that game.” His fingers darted around the keyboard. “I’m officially documenting your harassment of a student.”
“You haven’t even investigated. You’re taking the word of a parent who wasn’t even there over a teacher.”
Chapter Nine
“As acting principal, I will do whatever I think necessary to ensure all teachers meet the Hillcrest standard.” He smirked. “And I will make sure that you do nothing to blemish my tenure as acting principal.”
This was crazy. There was no reason for Haverford to act this way. Then Paul realized that if Haverford got a large donation from a student’s wealthy parents, say the Chenaults, it would go a long way toward ensuring he would become the principal.
Paul knew anything he said would only make things worse. As a lowly teacher, he couldn’t contact the board directly. They’d make any decision based solely on Haverford’s report. And if he got fired, the FBI would send him back to jail.
“That is all, Mr. Taylor,” he said, not bothering to look up.
As Paul stomped out of the administration offices, his phone beeped. He read the text from Shelly.
Conference Room C, Founder’s Museum, he’s there now.
“Shit!” he exclaimed. He’d completely forgotten his appointment. He thought about bailing on the shrink, but the damn subpoena stopped him. If he didn’t show up, he had no doubt the result would be the same as if he got fired: jail.
Paul trudged across the hall. The Founder’s Museum was a rabbit warren of alcoves and passageways. Every few feet were paintings, sculptures, and other artwork displaying former principals or prominent alumni, all illuminated by spotlights. Paul wondered if Haverford’s sculpture would be here one day, and the thought of him warping students’ lives angered him.
As he stepped into Conference Room C, he noticed a man in a blue, three-piece suit and bowtie sitting in an oxblood chair. He looked up at Paul from behind round, tortoise-shell glasses. He was of average height with pale skin and black hair, and Paul thought he had Chinese ancestry.
The room was square with dark green walls. A large window at the end overlooked the lawn and faculty parking lot. A richly upholstered couch sat across from the man’s chair and its vacant partner. A large wooden coffee table rested in the gap between the furniture.
“Paul,” the man said in a Canadian accent, standing and holding out his hand. “I’m Jacob Li. I’ll be helping you.” He took a sip of Diet Coke then held up the can apologetically. “Sorry, it’s a little addiction of mine. On the plus side, it keeps me from smoking.”
Those words reminded Paul of all the other shrinks from the rehab facility. They’d start sharing small pieces of their personal life in a scripted effort to make them seem personable, like real people who’d shared his struggles in life. But they were all the same: ivory-towered academics who’d never experienced real trauma and thought the solution to every problem was drugs that turned your mind into taffy. Paul refused to go through that again, so he decided to try to make the quack not want to come back.
“Great, Doc. Can we start with my nightmares?” he said as he lay down on the couch.
The shrink stared at him quizzically, as if he hadn’t expected him to be so open. “Okay.”
Paul closed his eyes. “Every night I go back to the same dream. I’m tied to a chair. A knife is descending toward me. I try to move away, but ropes lock me in place. At the last moment, I lean to the right, but the knife slices my jaw and plunges into my shoulder. Pain shoots through me. Then a black void swallows me.”
“Can you see anything in the void, Paul?” Jacob asked intently.
Paul cracked one eye open. The shrink was scribbling furiously on a large yellow legal pad. Paul smiled inwardly. He probably thought this was a real breakthrough. “Yes!” he said. “The room is changing. It now has bright steel walls. I’m on a cold table. Several men surround me. Now they’re touching me. Touching me everywhere. Oh no, the people are changing. They’re turning into little green men with long tentacles.” He raised his voice. “They’re probing me! The aliens are probing me!”
Paul sat up on the couch and sighed deeply. “Thanks, Doc,” he said, grabbing Jacob’s hand and pumping it furiously in an I’ll never see you again gesture. “You’ve really helped me make a breakthrough.”
Paul walked to the door. “I’ll be able to take it from here.”
“Sit the fuck down,” the shrink said, accentuating each word like a punch.
Paul turned around.
Jacob Li was untying his bowtie. “You are ordered by the court to be here, and we’ll continue to talk until I think we’re done. And if you don’t give me your best effort, I’ll state as much to the FBI. That will violate the court order and they’ll haul you away in handcuffs.” He tossed his tie onto the vacant chair, then removed his jacket and draped it over the arm of the same chair.
Uh, oh. Evidently, Paul had underestimated this guy, which he didn’t do often. He appraised the shrink again. The pleasant expression had hardened and his jaw was now clamped shut. He looked like an academic soldier getting ready to wage mental war.
It was time for a new strategy: annoying sarcasm. Paul plopped down on the couch again and propped his feet on the coffee table.
“So what’s next, Doc? You going to ask me if daddy diddled my doo-dad?”
He shook his head, clearly annoyed. “We need to cover some ground rules.”
Paul gave his best mocking military salute. “Aye, aye, Captain.”
“Paul, I’m here to help you.”
“Doc, that’s what all the others said before they filled me with so many drugs I couldn’t add two plus two.”
Jacob sighed. He pulled out a thick file from his briefcase and flipped it open. “I’ve read the reports. You are an obstinate patient.”
“Thank you.”
He tossed the file onto the table and rubbed his forehead. “A little about me. I worked with various federal agencies in New York for ten years, specializing in trauma. I recently moved to Montreal to pursue more research-based psychology. I still have Top Secret Clearance, and I was close to Hillcrest, so the FBI asked me to help you with your dissociative amnesia, and that’s what I’m going to do. I won’t stop until you’ve recovered your missing memories.”
Paul had heard it all before. All their declarations of help boiled down to one phrase, “Give me my money.”
Jacob said, “I can see we need to build some trust. I’ll make you a deal.” He tossed the pen and legal pad onto the table. “We’ll talk about anything. I won’t write any notes. I’ll just listen.”
Paul didn’t know if he believed the “just talking” claim, but he seemed unusually determined. There was something else going on here. “What’s in it for you?”
“The FBI is paying me.”
“But they are an institution strapped by a budget. They can’t be paying you a lot. There has to be another reason you’re willing to drive an hour and a half to see me.”
“If we make a breakthrough, they’ll allow me to use the data, not any personal details, in a new technique I’m developing.”
Oh crap. He was probably hoping to be the next Sigmund Freud. Paul doubted anything he did would piss him off enough to make him quit. Shelly had probably guessed what he’d try and made sure to hire a shrink with armor against his attacks.
He didn’t really have a choice. He had to play along until he figured out another way to get rid of this guy. “Okay.”
Jacob flipped through the dossier. “Your file mentions that you’ve recovered some of your memory. Why don’t you take me through what you’ve remembered? Before you do, however, I’d like you to think about a picture or a scene that embodies the complete opposite of what you experienced.”
Chapter Ten
“What?” Paul said.
“I know it sounds like psychobabble, but it isn’t. It’s based on mnemonics. A process for associating a picture or object with knowledge so that every time you see that picture, you remember what you associate with it. I’ve used it with other clients. They’d focus on a specific image as they recalled events. When they came to the mental block, they focused on the image and were able to retrieve additional memories.”
“Any fail to remember?” he asked.
“Yes. I won’t lie to you. This isn’t as simple as it seems. A lot of it depends on the person and the events. And it could happen quickly or not at all. But it has great success with those who wish to remember.”
He put emphasis on the “wish.” It reminded Paul that some of his previous psychologists thought he might not want to remember. Even though he didn’t believe that, he wondered if it was true.
“Paul,” Jacob said, “I’m not going to pretend I understand what you went through. You were tortured nearly to death. I can’t imagine such a horrible fate. But if you don’t face it, if you don’t try to remember everything that happened and come to terms with it, the Grimaldis will forever control your life.”
A fear Paul had always had but never vocalized boiled up in his mind: What if he’d really stolen the money, or done something worse?
Jacob said, “Paul, a lot of times we think about things and go around and around in our heads. That rarely gives us an answer because we, as human beings, tend to overlook our own errors. That’s why, when you talk about what you’re thinking, I can help pinpoint what you’re overlooking.”
Paul’s mind immediately envisioned the map in his room and the continuous circles around the word “who.” He hadn’t made any progress in weeks. Perhaps it was time to do something different. But he wouldn’t start by admitting he might be a criminal.
“Doc, there are just some things I need to think through on my own.”
“Okay. Well, we can start with anything you’d like,” Jacob said. He rested his chin on his hands. A friend waiting patiently for him to continue.
Images of the Grimaldis flashed through Paul’s mind: Papa, Giovanni, Antonio, and Franco. Portia trailed behind them in their parade across his psyche. They had all controlled his life at some point. He didn’t know if he was really ready to face that.
Glancing out the window, he noticed a small group of female students walking by. They had no idea how lucky they were. How fragile their freedom was. But he knew. He’d seen it up close and personal. Then he remembered the things he’d had to do and, more importantly, the things he’d had to ignore in order to destroy the Grimaldis’ operation.
Suddenly, burning anger welled up inside him. They had scarred his mind and body. They’d destroyed the lives of who knew how many people. He couldn’t let them win. No matter what he had to face, no matter how painful it was, he had to do everything he could to remember what happened.
Jacob leaned back in his chair and swigged some Diet Coke. He reached into his small blue-and-white cooler and tossed a fresh can toward Paul.
The can felt cold in Paul’s hand.
“Think about an image that represents the exact opposite of anything you experienced in Italy. Then just talk,” Jacob prompted.
The morning’s sunrise flashed through Paul’s mind. He remembered the calm and peace it evoked in him and thought that was about as far as he could possibly get from the constant fear of death and exposure he’d had in his undercover life. He popped the top on the can, took a long drink, and started speaking.
Chapter Eleven
***
Antonio’s voice yelled, “Get in.” Paul peered into the car. He couldn’t see anyone in the back seat, and both of Antonio’s hands were on the steering wheel, so he didn’t have a gun ready. Maybe Paul was just hyper-sensitive about a surprise visit from killers on the same day he was scheduled to take them down.
Whatever the reason, if he fled now, he’d blow the operation. So, rebelling against the caution in his intuition, he got in the car.
Antonio slammed the stick shift into first gear, and the car accelerated down the street.
“What gives?” Paul asked, trying to keep his Italian words at a normal voice level. He never had his gun with him when he was with Portia, it would have made her too suspicious, so he had no weapon.
“We caught an FBI agent.” He said, glancing at him as he said it. Paul couldn’t tell if he was trying to gauge his reaction or just excited.
Paul’s heart pounded in his chest. He debated if the Grimaldis had actually caught someone or if Antonio was attempting to deceive Paul into blowing his cover. As he glanced out the passenger window, he casually eased the seat back and readied myself for close quarter’s combat. “How did you find him?” he asked.
Antonio smiled. “Papa got a tip. The spy was right here in town, planning a big operation against us.” He looked directly at Paul. “He’s the one who’s been pushing the Sicilians to fight them. Franco grabbed him last night.”
Eric, Paul thought. They had to have caught Eric, but how? He was with the Sicilians. He was as cautious as Paul was. And Antonio had mentioned an FBI agent. Even if Eric had slipped up somehow, they wouldn’t have known he was FBI unless…The ice cubes in his chest turned to glaciers…there was a traitor in the FBI.
Antonio turned to him again with that look that seemed at once suspicious and excited. “Lucky we caught him before tonight, right?”<
br />
“Yeah,” he said, trying his best to hide the ‘fuck’ that was screaming in his head. He thought of Franco flaying Eric alive, Papa Grimaldi slicing divots out of his body with his golf club, and every other form of torture he could imagine. Then his rational mind drowned his fear, and he tried to get as much information as he could without sounding like he was afraid.
“Who tipped Papa Grimaldi?”
Antonio’s smile stretched to both ears. “I don’t know. Someone with contacts in the U.S.”
“Why bring me in?” he asked, paying special attention to where they were going, just in case he had to escape.
Antonio turned down a side road, and they headed toward the river. “The deal tonight is huge. You know how much the turf wars have hurt us. It’s gotten so bad, we’ve had to ask our cousin on the ruling council for help. He wasn’t happy, but he’ll help.
“We’ve tortured the spy, but he’s given us conflicting information. We’re asking everyone close to the deal if they’ve seen him before and where, and if they’ve seen anyone else with him.”
“Makes sense,” he said. But he also knew the other side of that coin. If they brought him in and the spy recognized him, they’d suspect they were working together. And Franco may have seen him with Eric after the club.
As far as the Grimaldis were concerned, Paul had a spotlight on him. He may have saved Antonio’s life the other night, but that didn’t go very far when tens of millions of dollars and family livelihood were on the line.
They pulled up to what looked like a 1960s boathouse large enough to have housed a local fishing trawler. Through the trees, he glimpsed a narrow river that went west to the ocean. The the Port of Gioia Tauro stood downstream. The place seemed familiar.
Antonio noticed his stare. “This is where we brought you after the ambush at the docks. It’s where we bring in our smaller personal cargo. Might not look like much, but it’s private.”
The Italian Deception Page 7