Charlie

by Elin Peer

  I was looking down, focusing on the pattern in the oriental rug on the floor.

  “It’s a powerful feeling when someone laughs at your jokes and dismisses your flaws as charming. Especially, for someone like you who’s never had a partner before, but I wouldn’t be a friend to you if I didn’t warn you that no relationship would be like that long-term. There will be fights and heartbreak. Are you ready to deal with the downsides of a relationship, hmm? You know you lack skills when it comes to communicating and picking up on social cues. I have no doubt you can get there if we work together, but I’m also sure that now isn’t the right time for you to go all in. I worry you’ll end up burned and bitter if you do.” He pulled me in for a long hug. “I’m only trying to protect you here.”

  “I know.”

  “Tell you what. The worst part is staring at your phone hoping she’ll call you. Why don’t you give it to me?” He reached out his palm.

  When I hesitated, he spoke in a soft voice. “You don’t want to make the mistake of calling her. It’s best if you give me your phone.”

  Looking from his palm to his face, I shook my head. “No, it’s fine. I’m keeping my phone.”

  Conor’s face left no doubt that he wasn’t happy with me. “Do you not trust my judgment?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then give me your phone.” His voice got insistent and people were looking over at us.

  I took a step back. “No. My phone is private and I’m keeping it.”

  He looked shocked and disturbed by my unwillingness to do as he told me, but I’d been pushed too far today.

  Turning on his heel, Conor walked away from me and I retreated to my room with a feeling of having burned a bridge.

  No, that’s silly. It was just a small disagreement. Tomorrow everything will be fine.

  Just like Conor had predicted, I kept looking at my phone longing to hear from Liv. She had called me her boyfriend, but with the way we’d ended things today, I wasn’t sure if that was off. Obviously, Conor was right in saying that I was horrible at being in a relationship and that it was just a matter of time before Liv wouldn’t find my issues cute. I hadn’t even lasted two days before making a mess of things by overthinking and doubting the feelings between us. If I was a normal person, I would have known how to talk to her about the confusing thoughts in my brain, but that was part of my condition. When I couldn’t make sense of something, I would shut down and hide from the world, like right now when I was in my room while my friends were together in the great room.

  Stripping out of my clothes, I got into bed to write in my journal as a way to analyze what had happened today. It was a tool I’d used since childhood and when I was done, I wrote and deleted a number of text messages to Liv without actually sending any of them. I tried reading in a book, but I couldn’t focus and my tics were worse than ever. Finding the meditation app on my phone, I used it to calm myself down.

  CHAPTER 13

  Status Report

  Liv

  I woke up in the middle of the night with my head hammering. Drinking some water didn’t help much. Unable to fall asleep again, I checked my phone to find a number of unanswered calls on my phone—none of them from Charles.

  Kit had left messages, and so had Mr. Robertson. It was three a.m. local time but only nine p.m. in Chicago.

  Sitting up in my bed, I turned on some light and rubbed my eyes before I called Mr. Robertson and filled him in on everything. Even the part about Charles and me being intimate together.

  “What did Conor tell him to make him pull away?”

  “I don’t know, Charles wouldn’t say.”

  Mr. Robertson was quiet for a moment. “I want you to know that I never expected you to have sex with Charles.”

  “I know.” I sighed, “but that attraction Charles wrote about in his diary. It’s mutual.” I felt my throat swell up. “I really care about him, and everything was going so well between us. Now, I wonder if I ruined everything by allowing the physical part of our relationship to get too far too fast.”

  “I doubt it. If he feels anything like I felt for Emmy when I first met her, he’ll have a hard time staying away from you. It was different times back then, but from what I recall, our relationship turned physical quickly too.”

  “How did you meet your wife?” My question was a way for me to shift focus away from my own sad situation.

  “Oh, it’s been so long since I spoke about it.” He coughed on his exhalation. “I was a clerk in a bank and she worked in a diner where I’d sometimes eat my lunch. Emmy was mild and shy by nature while I was full of ambition and drive. She loved me before I became a rich man and I’m grateful I got to marry the woman I loved. Our marriage wasn’t perfect, but we supported each other through hard times, and in the end that’s what I’m most grateful for; her loyalty and trust in me.”

  “Yeah, it’s what we’re all searching for, isn’t it?” I yawned and looked at the clock. It was almost three thirty a.m. “Do you think Charles will reach out to me or should I reach out to him?”

  “My advice is to be patient. There’s nothing as enticing for a man as to chase a woman.”

  “But what if I never hear from him again?”

  “Then he’s a bigger fool than I can even imagine. For now, just stay calm and play your part as a tourist. I’m working with my people to build a case against O’Brien and I think we might be onto something big.”

  “What is it?”

  “Kit has all the details and she can fill you in, but just know that I won’t be satisfied until I’ve closed down O’Brien’s entire cult. He went after the wrong man’s grandchild.” It sounded like a declaration of war.

  “There are children there.” My words came out in a soft voice.

  “Yes, the report said as much.”

  I closed my eyes and exhaled. “It’s different when you meet them in person. I knew about the children from the report, but seeing them and speaking with them makes it twice as awful. I didn’t see any signs of physical violence toward the children. I mean, they had a lot of respect for O’Brien, but they weren’t cowering in a corner and they looked healthy and well fed. My biggest concern was that none of them seemed to interact with children their own age outside of the house. It was like they were experiencing the world through books only. None of them did team sports or had friends in the village. Isn’t that strange? And they’re home schooled. Did you know that?”

  “No, but it doesn’t surprise me. Children are impressionable. Teenagers especially tend to question parental authority and pull toward their friends. By home schooling them, O’Brien can maintain control over them.”

  “I want Charles out, but I want the children out too.”

  Mr. Robertson coughed before he spoke. “You have a good heart, Liv. I sensed it the moment I met you.”

  After I ended the call with Mr. Robertson, I lay with my cell phone in my hand thinking about Charles. There were so many layers to him, from the insecure man when it came to dating to the very assertive lover when it came to sex. Someone had trained him to feel confident talking dirty and taking charge. Maybe it was the female employee who had written the notes to him that he kept in his box back home in Chicago.

  My mind circled everything that had happened these past days, trying to find where I’d gone wrong.

  Maybe I should have tried getting inside the cult before I met up with Charles. If I’d been an insider, maybe Conor wouldn’t have turned Charles against me.

  The thing that bothered me the most was the way Conor had flirted with me. It had been subtle, but I’d picked it up. Why would he do that if he was adamant that he didn’t want me around the cult?

  If only Charles were more like an open book, so I didn’t have to guess at what he was thinking and feeling.

  I managed to get a few more hours of sleep before I called Kit and asked if we could meet up.

  She gave me an address that took me to Liffey Street in central Dublin and when I climbed the
stairs and entered the apartment, it was clear that it wasn’t an office but a private home.

  “You live here?” The place didn’t have much furniture and seemed void of colors. A large sectional leather sofa took up most of the living room where a large TV with game equipment stood. There were nails on the walls but no paintings hung there.

  “No, this is my brother’s place. He lets me use it sometimes if I have business downtown.”

  “He’s not much of a decorator, is he?”

  Kit looked around. “Oh, I see what ye mean, but that’s because his girlfriend more or less emptied the place when she moved out.”

  “How long ago was that?”

  “Two, three months, I reckon. He’s better off without her. Damian has awful taste in women, if ye ask me.”

  “Ye know that I can hear ye…” a deep male voice came from the bedroom, and I turned to see a tall man walk out while putting on a t-shirt. His red hair was copper where Kit’s was close to orange and he had brown eyes where she had blue. The mere glimpse I got of his upper body was enough to see that this man spent a good amount of time in a gym.

  Kit pointed to him and back to me. “This is Liv, who is a client from Chicago, and that’s my little brother Damian. Our da had him with his second wife, Lucy, who he met in Thailand after he split from my ma. That’s why he looks so exotic.”

  “Hello.” He gave me a charming grin that reminded me of Joey from Friends. Like it was a smile he’d studied in the mirror, designed to make women swoon.

  “Hey. So, you’re the SWAT brother.”

  Damian’s brow rose and then he smiled again. “I am. Did my sister already tell ye about me?”

  “Yeah, she mentioned you.”

  “Briefly,” Kit cut in, and something told me she didn’t want him to know how proud she’d been when she spoke about him. “At the same time that I told her about Da and Tommy. Don’t go lookin’ so smug; it’s not like I was trying to set the two of ye up.”

  He gave me an appreciative smile. “I’m single.”

  “Aye, ye are. Again!” Kit rolled her eyes and turned to me. “It’s because he’s a sex addict. Last time I saw Miriam, the poor lass couldn’t walk straight. My brother thinks a normal sex life means feckin’ five times a day, and no woman can keep up with that for more than a few weeks.”

  “At least I have a sex life,” he retorted and didn’t look the least bit offended that she had revealed he had a high sex drive.

  “I do too. A very satisfying one where the focus is on my needs.”

  “That’s because all ye do is masturbate.”

  “So? I always come, and I’ll bet that’s more than ye can say for yer women.”

  Damian threw his hands up with a smile. “I’m a great lover. It comes with practice. Tell ye what, I’m willing to prove my skills. All I need is a volunteer.” He wiggled his eyebrows at me but I just grinned and held up a palm.

  “Sorry, but I’m into a nerdy guy with Tourette’s called Charles.”

  “What a shame.” He turned to Kit. “I’m goin’. Don’t eat all my cookies again.”

  “I’ll make you some new ones. I promise.” When she leaned in and hugged him, she gave him a kiss on his cheek.

  “It was nice to meet you,” I said and reached out a hand to him, but he opened his arms.

  “I’m a hugger.”

  “Oh, okay.” I felt small in his arms, but he smelled lovely and let me go quickly. Once he was by the door, he turned and looked at me.

  “Oi, Liv, how long are ye staying in Dublin? I’ve got an extra room.”

  “She’s not goin’ to be yer roommate, ye silly man.” With a light hand to my elbow, Kit moved me to a table where her laptop and papers lay spread out.

  “Thanks for the offer though,” I called as he smiled and left.

  “Liv.” Kit was already by the table and waving me over. “C’mere to me till I tell ye what I’ve found.” Kit searched through a pile of papers. “While you were kissing with Charles, I’ve been doin’ some serious diggin’. Look at this.”

  I sat down and studied the papers in front of me.

  “What is this?”

  “A police report from Liverpool.”

  There were four pages.

  “Seven years ago, a woman named Patricia Maddox walked into a Liverpool police station and said she suspected her brother had been murdered by a man called Conor Bricks. No evidence was found and since Conor had an alibi and people vouching that he’d been in Dublin, no charges were made against him. Patricia and her brother were known by the police to be hustlers so she wasn’t a credible person to begin with.”

  “Okay.”

  Kit’s eyes shone with excitement as she continued. “Since Mr. Robertson has given us full carte blanche to use as many hours as needed on this case, I took a quick trip to visit Patricia and ye won’t believe the story she told me.”

  My body moved to the edge of my seat. “What did you find?”

  “According to her, Jim, her brother, owned a sleazy bar with a few guestrooms on the first floor. He had a little side hustle where he’d use hidden cameras to film unfaithful husbands getting’ a quickie with their mistresses and then blackmail them for cash.”

  Kit looked me straight in the eye. “But one day, a black woman checked in with her wee fella. She seemed upset and desperate, so when a man showed up, Jim figured there was a story to exploit. He pushed the button in the bar that activated the cameras and went about his evening serving drinks and food in the bar. At one point, the man left with the sleepin’ fella over his shoulder and that’s when Jim turned off the cameras. The next day the woman stayed in her room all day, and when Jim watched the film, he knew why.”

  “Why?” I was eager to hear more.

  “She was dead. That’s why.” Kit leaned back and like the great storyteller she was, she paused for effect. “Patricia has never seen the video but Jim told her how the little fella had been sleeping while the man held a knife to his throat. The mother was pleadin’ for her son’s life.”

  “Did he kill the boy too? You said Jim saw him sleeping. Did that mean he was really dead?”

  “No. To save her son’s life, the mother did as the man ordered. She wrote a suicide note dictated by him, and she ate fifteen pills that he gave her.”

  “She killed herself?” My eyes widened.

  Kit shook her head. “Nah, she didna kill herself. She might have swallowed the pills, but it still counts as murder!”

  “That’s awful. And the boy. Is it Nathan?”

  She nodded. “Aye. I’ve confirmed that his mother’s body was found in the bar that Jim owned, but of course we have no way to prove that Nathan or Conor was there without the video, do we?”

  “Wow.” I leaned back too. “If this is true, Conor Bricks is a sick and very dangerous individual.”

  “Aye. He is.” Kit shuffled some papers around. “Accordin’ to Patricia, she and Jim identified the man as Conor and tried to blackmail him. Conor negotiated a smaller amount than they had first requested over the phone and agreed to meet up in person to pay the money. Only Patricia never saw Jim again.”

  “Conor killed him!” My words hung in the air as the most obvious reason for Jim’s disappearance.

  “Aye. I think he did.” Kit looked grave. “Ye have to be careful, Liv. This man will stop at nothing. He’s a monster.”

  My thoughts went to Nathan and the pain in the boy’s eyes when he’d told me about his mom. “And now Nathan thinks he wasn’t enough for his mom to want to live when all the time it was the man whom he calls father who forced her to kill herself.” It made me sick to think about the unfairness and cruelty of it all.

  “We have to find Jim’s body and the video,” Kit declared. “Once we have that, we can put Conor away for murder and then Charles and the others can see he was always a complete fraud.”

  “But how? If it’s been seven years and if the police closed the case, then how will you find evidence?”
r />   “Leave that to me. In the meantime, I need ye to help me put pressure on Conor.”

  “How?”

  “Keep yer hook in Charles and buzz around like a feckin’ bee that Conor can’t kill.”

  “You just asked me to be careful and now you want me to provoke the sicko?”

  “Aye. My da and I will be dropping by to ask him questions about Nathan’s mom.”

  “What was her name?”

  “Sandra.” Kit found a picture and placed it in front of me. The woman in the photo was a young black woman in a white wedding dress smiling up at her white groom who stood in his formal military uniform.

  “This wedding photo was from about a year before Nathan was born.” Kit sounded as sad as I felt.

  “It’s such a tragedy.”

  “Aye. It is.”

  “Do we have a motive for Conor killing her?”

  “She was tryin’ to get away from him. Hiding with her son in a primitive room above a bar. Don’t forget that other members who left have restrainin’ orders against him. I’d say that Sandra was scared of him.”

  “For good reason.” I sighed and closed my eyes. “How in the world did Charles get messed up in this man’s net?”

  Kit sighed too. “That’s the thing with psychopaths, isn’t it? They don’t go around with warnin’ labels, but they should. Conor is a good example of someone clever and cunnin’ with no conscience. He has developed a fine set of skills to hold power over others. It’s like when I was young and I begged my brothers to play Barbie with me. Tommy would come up with the most twisted plots and I’d be so angry with him because I wanted the dolls to fall in love and play family while he wanted them to rob, steal, and get in fights so his Action Man could come and save the day.”

  “Kit, I’m not really sure where you’re going with that story.”

  “Just that Conor is destroying people’s lives.”

  “Like Tommy destroyed your Barbies’ made-up lives?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  I could tell Kit’s analogy made total sense to her, but I brought her back to what mattered, “Kit, we need to expose Conor to the world.”