Baby Please Don't Go: A Novel

by Frank Freudberg

  “Whose woods these are, I think I know,” Natalie recited, “his house is in the village, though. My little horse must think it queer, to stop without a farmhouse near.”

  Lock grinned. “So I’m your little horse?”

  “I saw White-Mane on your mantle. Sweet of you.” She hugged him.

  He didn’t resist.

  “Still not warm enough,” Natalie said, her breath condensing and visible in the moonlight. “I want heat.”

  He put his arms around her and held her.

  “That’s better,” she said. “That’s better. Now I’m warmer out here in eighteen degrees than inside next to the fire.”

  She turned and looked across the pond, ringed by a silhouette of trees. She moved to the bank and tested the ice with her foot.

  “Solid enough,” she said. She made an effort to simulate skating on the ice in her bare feet, but the pond’s surface wasn’t slippery enough. The ice cracked, and she laughed and scooted back to the shore.

  Natalie took his head in her hands and pulled him to her mouth.

  Inside, on a blanket thrown hastily on the floor in front of the fire, Natalie sat naked and cross-legged behind Lock, her arms wrapped around his chest.

  He exhaled slowly and broke what had been a long silence.

  “This feels right, Natalie,” said Lock. “This is perfect.”

  “I know.”

  “The only thing missing is a bunch of little kids making a racket in the next room, and us yelling at them to settle down.”

  “That’s not that far off,” she said. “We’ll have to plan. We have to be smart.”

  “And patient.”

  “I hate that. I want what I want when I want it.”

  “Of course,” he said. “Instant gratification. That’s the real root of all evil.”

  “I thought money was the root of all evil.”

  “That’s what they say, but money is usually used to facilitate instant gratification, so I stand by my statement.”

  Natalie poked Lock in his side and reached around and tousled his hair. “I was poor growing up and there wasn’t anything I wanted more than the security that comes with money, and now that I have it, it’s the last thing in the world I care about.”

  “Easy to say when you have it, though.”

  “True enough,” she said.

  “But you’re not ready to march out into the world without a dime in your pocket.”

  “No. No one would. And Witt owes me. He owes me according to the law, and he owes me because it’s the right thing to do, to pay the girls and me so we can live happy, healthy, comfortable lives. It’s just a question of me figuring out what to do.”

  “What’s there to figure out?” he asked. “You’ve got a good case.” He turned around and looked at her.

  “Not good enough. With his lawyer, he’ll probably get fifty percent custody. Maybe more. How am I going to live without seeing my girls every day?”

  “He’s a jerk, but he’s not that bad of a father,” Lock said. “Unless he’s still drinking and driving. Divorce is hard, and a lot of things are going to change for you.”

  “He is a bad father,” she said. “He doesn’t hit the kids or anything, but mostly he ignores them. That might be worse. He just wants them around because he thinks they’re his property.”

  “Well,” Lock said, “that may be true, but the court won’t take that as evidence of anything.”

  “I know. But if Witt got caught doing something stupid again, it’d be different.”

  The look in her eye made him study her closely. “Something you want to tell me?”

  She took a deep breath. “What if something would happen?” she began. “What if some girl was to identify Witt as the man who flashed her someplace? Indecent exposure. Something that wouldn’t look too good for him in court. That would take the wind out of his sails. I don’t owe him any allegiance. The prick had me followed.”

  “With good reason.”

  Natalie glared, then grinned. “Anyway,” she said, “with an indecent exposure charge, even if he can get out of it, he won’t want to go to court. He’d want to settle.”

  Lock shook his head and said, “You can’t frame him. First, it probably wouldn’t work. The courts see this kind of stuff all the time. Also, as much as I don’t like the guy, he has a right to see his kids as long as they’re not in danger or not being neglected.”

  She sighed, frustrated. “But he shouldn’t have the right,” she said. “Do you think he’s not still drinking and driving? Witt’s not going to change just because CPS came to the house.”

  “You still need proof.”

  “I just keep thinking that if I don’t have some sort of plan, I might end up visiting my own kids every other weekend or something. I know he has rights as a parent, but I also know that right now he’s thinking up some plan to screw me. So what am I supposed to do? I play fair and I lose. I don’t play fair and I’m a bad person.”

  “As of right now, I don’t know what to tell you,” Lock said. “I wish I did.”

  “Primary custody’s all I want. He can have lots and lots of visitation. I don’t care. I know the kids need a father figure, not that he’s much of that. Plus, the girls are with me most of the time as it is, so he—or they—won’t be missing anything.”

  He held her and touched her hair. “I know it’s scary, and the truth is, you might not get what you want. All I can recommend is you let the courts handle it. No matter what people say, most of the time family court judges do the right thing. Just make sure you get a lawyer, a good one.”

  “Oh, I did. I forgot to say. He says pretty much the same things you do, which sucks.”

  “How’d you find him? How do you know he’s any good?”

  “He’s my friend’s friend, and he’s an aggressive lawyer, too. He helped her get primary custody in a tough situation, so I think he’s pretty competent.”

  “Okay. As long as you think he’s taking you seriously and not seeing you only as someone who’s generating revenue for him.”

  She sighed again. “I’m changing the subject. Make love to me again.”

  Lock put more wood in the fire and they lay down in the warmth it shed.

  12

  Natalie called Lock two nights later. Witt had been home, and he knew that she didn’t always have the chance to do more than send a quick text.

  “Hey, it’s my favorite yogi,” he answered.

  “Hi, Lock,” she said.

  She sounded stuffed up. “Did you catch that cold?” Lock asked. “Half my office has it, but I swear you didn’t get it from me.”

  “He hit me, Lock,” she said.

  “What? When?” He felt his rage build. He gripped the arm of his chair and took a deep breath. “What happened?”

  “He came home at lunch today all pissed off. His lawyer heard I’d retained a lawyer. I took money out of the joint account for the retainer, and he started yelling and then he hit me. Slapped me across the face. Hard. You can see the mark.”

  “What the hell, Natalie, are you okay? Did you call the police?”

  “No,” she said, and she started crying. She sniffed and said, “His lawyer’s protecting him. Witt said the record will show that he was in a meeting with the lawyer at lunch. Who’s going to believe me?”

  “You still have to report it,” Lock said.

  “Why?” she wailed. “It’s just going to be a he said, she said thing, and I’m going to look like a liar because he’s got an alibi.”

  “Is that what he told you?”

  “Yes! He said he’d say he thought I was having another affair and my boyfriend hit me. He’s got proof of when that happened before, so what am I supposed to do?”

  “Does he know about us?” Lock felt bad for asking it, because for a momen
t he was more worried about his job than about her.

  “No,” she said. “But it doesn’t matter. How am I going to go to the police? And what am I going to do now? How can I live in this house with him?”

  “You can’t,” Lock said. “You have to move out.” He didn’t like it, but he thought she was right. The police weren’t going to do anything besides interview Witt, and if he had an alibi from an officer of the court, it probably wouldn’t go any further than that.

  “How? I don’t have any money—Witt drained the joint account, and I can’t stay with you. And what about the girls? I can’t just take them—his lawyer would be all over me. What am I going to do?”

  “I don’t know, I have to think. Is there any way you can get away tonight or tomorrow?”

  “He’s leaving tonight on business for the weekend. I have no evidence, but I’m sure he’s got a girlfriend stashed somewhere.”

  Lock despised him for it, though he saw the irony, too.

  “Candice will be at your house tonight, right? Come over after the girls are asleep and we’ll figure something out.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Okay.”

  Just as he was hanging up, he heard her say, “I love you, Lock Gilkenney.”

  He almost called her back to tell her he loved her too.

  Later that night, they drank tea in front of the fire after making love.

  “So?” Lock asked.

  “So what?” she said.

  Lock took a deep breath.

  “So how’s he going to get identified?”

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “I know a girl. She’ll swear to anything as long as she gets money for her crystal meth habit. She’ll say they did drugs together. She’ll say he made her do drugs and have sex while her two young children were present. He won’t want that story to circulate.”

  “A false report.”

  “It’s already all worked out,” she said. “You don’t need to know any more than that. I know it’ll work. I know it.”

  “You know it. Want to know what I know? You’re staging a crime, Natalie. That’s a felony. And, you’re bearing false witness. There’s a reason that’s one of the Ten Commandments. Plus, you need the girl, an addict. That’s your weak link. I have a boss who’s pretty smart. The first thing he’ll do when he reads the report is scratch his head. Then when he learns about a divorce in the offing, he’ll burst out laughing. And when he stops laughing, he’s going to get mad. And when it gets to that point, he’s going to call the D.A., and the D.A. will squeeze your lowlife friend until she pops—and her guts are going to splatter all over you.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” she said. “She has a good incentive to keep quiet. She’s got plenty of street smarts. And believe me, I don’t want to go to jail. Already did that once. When I was twenty, I spent six weeks inside for shoplifting. I had the money, sort of, to buy what I needed, but I guess the thrill of getting away with it was what I wanted.”

  “You’re going to pay this girl out of your take,” Lock said.

  “It’s not a take.”

  “Sure it is.”

  “It’s equitable distribution,” she said. “I’ve put up with Witt Mannheim and his abuse for six years. Raised the kids while he made tens of millions. That’s not worth anything?”

  He sighed. “I know how repugnant he is, I really do. It’s taking all my strength not to go find him right now,” he said. “And it will never work. You’ve been in jail. You don’t want to go back, do you?”

  “I’m already in a prison. Our farmhouse is just a comfortable cell.”

  “Maybe. But now, you get plenty of time off for bad behavior.”

  She smiled. It faded fast. “I can’t stand him anymore. I’m nauseated when he’s near me.”

  Lock massaged her shoulders. “I know. Let’s drop this for now.”

  Warmed by the fire in the stove, Lock and Natalie fell asleep in each other’s arms. An hour later, Natalie awoke, looked at her diamond-studded wristwatch, and cursed.

  “I have to get out of here,” she said, rocking Lock off her arm.

  He rolled over to free her and sat up. Natalie stood and dressed quickly. She took a blanket from the sofa and placed it over Lock, handing him a pillow from the recliner. “No need to get up, Lock. You stay here by the fire. I’ll let myself out.” She left.

  Lock went to the window and watched Natalie start her car, and a few seconds later, he watched her get out to brush snow off her windshield. He knocked on a pane to get her attention. She looked up and blew him a kiss before getting into the car and pulling out of the driveway.

  What could he do? Witt Mannheim was a piece of shit, and she made a good case that he was no good for the kids, but that alone wouldn’t make a strong court case. There was no smoking gun sure to convince a judge that Witt was any kind of real danger to the kids. That DUI incident wouldn’t influence the court enough, and if Witt’s lawyer was a scumbag, there was no value in reporting the domestic abuse. So Natalie was screwed unless Lock helped her. Who else would protect her, or her kids?

  On the other hand, was it Lock’s moral responsibility to do anything beyond what the CPS policies and procedures called for? If he took his desire for Natalie out of the equation, he wondered, would he be thinking about protecting her children from their father’s dangerous behavior?

  Was he thinking clearly? Not really. Would the relaxing effects of just one drink calm his emotions down so he could think more clearly? Maybe. But then what? Ten drinks wouldn’t be enough—and one was too many. Maybe going to a meeting would give him some clarity. He couldn’t get her out of his mind. He knew this was lust and infatuation, not true love, but he didn’t care.

  Witt was in love with his money, not Natalie, not his children. But that wasn’t Lock’s concern. Lock thought he loved Natalie, but maybe it was just lust, or the kind of love that lasted only weeks or months. Maybe, someday, their relationship might be more than that. Witt driving the kids while drunk was of real concern to Lock, and him hitting Natalie made him want to choke the guy. Someone was eventually going to get hurt, or worse, and that was a problem Lock couldn’t ignore. The question was what to do about it. CPS and the courts weren’t going to solve this, so that left Lock to fix it. He’d be giving up much of who he had become since working at CPS—an honest, by-the-rules guy, someone who believed in the system. But even while debating with himself, he knew that what he might gain—Natalie, love, a family—outweighed all that.

  Natalie and Lock lay intertwined on the floor in his living room. Logs burned in the woodstove.

  “Natalie, I want to tell you something,” Lock said.

  She propped herself up on an elbow and faced him with a sour expression, as if she expected a lecture.

  “Your plan is strictly amateur night. One hundred percent third-rate.”

  “Amateur or not, I have to do it.”

  “I’m telling you not to do it,” he said. “It’s a textbook loser.”

  “Desperate times call for desperate deeds,” said Natalie as she picked a piece of lint from the blanket they were laying on.

  “Your husband has no history as a deviant,” Lock said. “If he was convicted, it would be a first offense. But he’ll never get convicted. Your witness is unreliable. Your husband’s lawyer will demonstrate that in five seconds. She’ll have to make it through interrogations without flinching, not even once. And she’ll fail. Then you hope to get your husband to walk into court and fold a good hand. For what? Being accused of flashing or doing drugs and a DUI? And what about his lawyer? He won’t sit there sucking his thumb. They’ll figure out it was your idea and that’s all they’ll need. You’ll wind up being prosecuted. Maybe it’ll stick and maybe it won’t, but your divorce will drag out for years.”

  He took her hands in his. “Too many things to go wrong,” he
said. “Your idea has ‘please put me in prison’ written all over it. In indelible ink. Baby, you have no idea how to make it work...”

  Her eyes closed and she looked away. She wrapped the blanket around herself like a cocoon. He took her chin in his hand and turned her face back towards him.

  “You have no idea how to make it work,” he said. “But I do.”

  She froze for a beat. Then she placed her hands on his cheeks and rained kisses all over his face, neck, and shoulders. He pushed her away.

  “Listen,” Lock said, “I’ve seen frames blow up in people’s faces a million times. And I’ve seen them work, too. I know how to play the family court system and I know how we’re going to do it.”

  She hugged him.

  “Do you know what you’re saying?” she asked. “Have you thought about this?”

  “I can’t stand here and watch you bury yourself and expose the kids to God-knows-what. And I worry about myself, too, if I’m honest. If he hits you again, I don’t know what I’ll do.”

  She held him tight. “I don’t want you to get involved if—”

  “Little late for that.”

  “Okay, Lock. Then what’s your idea?”

  “Don’t worry about that for now,” he said.

  “What about Abner? You said he’ll be suspicious.” Natalie raised her eyebrows and looked at Lock as if to challenge him.

  “He would be—if he found out about it. But he won’t. I’m going to close your file as unfounded. CPS will be officially out of your lives. And whatever happens from here on in won’t make it onto his radar, because the agency will no longer be monitoring the situation. We don’t track closed cases.”

  Natalie looked at him in the living room mirror. “I love you,” she said.

  He sat up and said, “Me too. But you should go home. I have things to think about.” He reached out and touched her breast, and he watched himself doing it in the mirror. “I have to go over this, under it, around it—and after that, we’re going to go through with it. Very carefully. As I said, I don’t like small rooms with steel bars. But I need to help you.”