The Edge of Ruin

by Melinda Snodgrass

  He walked away, then whirled and kept walking backward as he said, “I want you to go back to New Mexico. There never was a reason for you to come here other than to chase me. Well, it’s over. Just leave me the hell alone.”

  And he turned and almost ran toward a nondescript parked car. The three women watched in silence as he drove away.

  “What a fucking prick,” Sam said, but it sounded defensive.

  Pamela realized Angela was crying softly. She put her arm around the smaller woman. “He didn’t mean it. He’s angry. He’ll cool down, and realize he was out of line.”

  Angela stepped back, and wiped her cheeks with the backs of her hands. “Things only hurt this much when they’re true. I’ll get myself home. You guys go on,” and she walked away.

  “Take the car,” Sam ordered. “I’ll keep an eye on Angela and get her home.”

  * * *

  Rhiana walked the darkness until she felt the pull of the gate and then allowed herself to re-form. Not too close to the gate. Truth be told, it disturbed her, too.

  Rhiana scrubbed at her cheeks, feeling the sticky wetness of her tears. The naked boles of the trees marched away from her and stretched bare limbs toward the white sky. The smell of snow was stronger here. Growing up in California she had never seen snow. Once her adopted parents had taken the family to Knott’s Berry Farm just before Christmas, drawn by the lure of man-made snow. It had felt like ice, as if someone had dumped a truckload of sno-cones on the ground. Kids had tried to innertube and sled on the hill, but it had felt like a fake and a cheat, like so much of her life.

  Had he planned this? Had he done this to hurt and humiliate her? He was going to pay. She would find a way.

  But his lips had been warm and soft, the kiss deep and passionate. He couldn’t have faked that.

  But that woman had said that awful thing about her. Rhiana looked down at the dress she had picked with such care, and she suddenly reached down and tore away most of the trailing skirt. It was trashy, not elegant. She’d made a fool of herself.

  She remembered the one time Drew Sandringham had come to her house for a meeting. The way his upper lip had lifted, and his nostrils narrowed, and she realized the house was tasteless and gaudy and she had made those choices.

  Her thoughts jumped away from that memory and became impaled on another. Richard had gone to Angela. Straight to Angela. He had talked only to Angela. What if they had planned this together? He must have told her where he would be. How else could they have found them?

  She coughed out a sob, and walked on through the Virginia forest.

  A lump of darkness caught her eyes. Something lay on the fallen leaves and pine needles.

  “Hey,” Rhiana called, and her voice sounded dull and flat in the darkness. There was no movement or reaction.

  She approached cautiously. It was a young woman dressed in student chic—blue jeans, oversized pea coat, boots. Once, in another lifetime, Rhiana had dressed that way. A small section of the girl’s scalp was bare and bloody. The hank of long hair lay tangled around a branch as if the tree were playing cat’s cradle. Rhiana’s head twinged in sympathy. The girl had been caught, and slowed by the grip on her hair. It was a measure of her desperation that she had pulled so hard she’d let her hair be ripped out. Or maybe Doug had done it just for the fun of it. And then the knife had been applied to her gasping throat. In the cold the blood had coagulated into a viscous pool. Rhiana remembered when this one had been snatched off the campus of UNLV.

  Another of Doug’s toys. Only now he’d taken to breaking them.

  * * *

  It was 3:00 A.M. when Sam entered the room she shared with Pamela and Dagmar. Sam reported that Angela had checked into a hotel. That had ended any hope of sleep, and when Pamela finally emerged from her room she found the psychodrama continued. Joseph had tried to fire Estevan. Richard had intervened and overridden the security chief’s decision, which left Joseph fuming. Estevan was sulking. Sam glared at Richard over breakfast while he ignored her. Dagmar tried to keep up an artless patter of conversation.

  And the judge capped the morning by lecturing Richard about how lack of planning was always a recipe for disaster. Richard had listened in silence, then stood and said, “It was planned, and it would have worked if they hadn’t interfered.”

  “But in fact it didn’t work, and you endangered yourself in this foolish act of bravado. I don’t know if this is a function of being a policeman, but acting like some kind of movie hero is not the way to succeed.”

  “Thank you, sir. Dagmar, don’t we have reports to review?” Richard said, and they left.

  Now it was past one o’clock; Pamela was hungry and frustrated because they seemed to have wasted the entire morning. The judge’s meetings at Justice had proved to be a fruitless three hours. Three of the four people they wanted to see weren’t in, and it seemed to take an inordinate amount of time to ascertain that they weren’t in. The person who did keep the appointment was distracted to the point of incoherence. She kept checking her watch, answering the phone even though it hadn’t rung, getting up to look out the window. Finally Robert admitted defeat, and they went in search of lunch.

  They selected the Tabard Inn, one of Washington’s more elegant eateries. As they approached the front doors, a man stepped out of a parked taxicab and approached them. It was Drew Sandringham, and Pamela greeted him with pleasure. She hadn’t seen him since her mother’s funeral.

  “Drew.” She gave him a hug. “What are you doing in Washington?” she asked. “Where are you staying? We should have dinner.”

  But the glance, smile, and hug he spared for her were fleeting. All of his focus was on her father. She looked over at the judge, and dread settled coldly across her shoulders. She had never seen her father look so forbidding and so furious.

  “How dare you approach me,” Robert said. His tone was low and intense.

  Pamela stared at him in confusion. “Papa?” She was ignored.

  “Hear me out, Robert. After thirty years of friendship you owe me that at least,” Drew said.

  What the hell? she thought as she watched her father struggle with himself.

  “You have five minutes.”

  “I won’t need that long.” Drew took a long steadying breath. “Look, I won’t deny that what happened, happened. It was undoubtedly a bad call, showing poor judgment on my part. But Richard isn’t the innocent in all this. Whatever he’s told you—”

  “He’s told me nothing. Ever. And I have not asked. I learned about … the incident … from another source.”

  “Then you probably don’t know that Richard and I were lovers long before that night. He came to my bed within three weeks of starting to work for me.” Drew rushed on. “And I wasn’t the first. There had been a young man, an actor, but he’d left for California. I was the replacement.”

  Oh my God, now so much makes sense. But I know he was sleeping with my friend Gail. And there was Margo, but he did spend so much time with Paul that summer. Her whirling thoughts bumped against each other in a chaotic game of point/counterpoint.

  “So, he was the aggressor. Seduced you, did he? Or did he force himself upon you?” The judge’s words were as cold and sharp as glass.

  Drew looked wryly amused. “Oh, Robert, you’ve always been oblivious. I’m surprised you managed to father three children. People like me, we recognize each other. I’ve known from the time he was ten that Richard liked boys. When you asked me to give him a job I was delighted. I knew I’d end up fucking that tight little ass.”

  Pamela was shocked by the crudity. It was completely unlike Drew. A dull brick red blotched her father’s pale cheeks, and Pamela realized that it had been calculated. A shot aimed with perfect accuracy to cause the maximum amount of hurt. This was not a man attempting to make peace with an old friend. Something far darker was at work here.

  “I don’t believe you,” the judge said, but the words sounded weak.

  “Alannis knew. I assumed th
at was why she …” Sandringham executed a knowing gesture with no more than a turn of the wrist.

  My God, he’s implying that Richard caused Mama’s suicide. Papa will never buy that. He knows how Richard adored her.

  But all the color had drained from Robert’s thin cheeks. Her father whirled and rushed away. His strides were long and so fast that he was almost running. Pamela dithered, unable to decide whether to follow or confront Drew. Sandringham’s satisfied smile made the decision.

  “Why?” she demanded.

  Sandringham didn’t pretend not to understand. “Payback.”

  “You’d shatter their relationship for spite?”

  “And what relationship is that, Pamela? There’s never been love there. Just fear and the need to be loved on one side, and disapproval on the other.”

  “Then why in front of me?” Pamela cried.

  Drew shrugged. “It just worked out that way.”

  And Pamela realized that the man she’d thought of as an uncle, and a far more acceptable one than her real uncle, hadn’t given a tinker’s damn for her, or Amelia, or their mother. It had always been about Robert and later Richard. Sickened, she turned away, but her father had vanished. She knew where he would go, and feared what he would do. Which meant she had to reach the condo first.

  THIRTY-SIX

  RICHARD

  Dagmar spread another set of reports across the coffee table in front of me. The numbers seemed to get tinier and tinier the longer I stared at them. Meaningless ant tracks across a white desert. I hadn’t really wanted to work. I’d just wanted to get away from my father.

  My mind kept straying back to the events of last night. What could I have done differently? Maybe told Angela my plan, and involved her in the decision. But I’d assumed she’d be jealous. Which was pretty arrogant. She wasn’t an idiot. She would have seen what I was doing. But if it meant I had to be with Rhiana permanently, I couldn’t see Angela agreeing to that … ever. I should have suspected Sam. I should have checked for bugs and tracers. God damn it, I was in charge; she shouldn’t have been spying on me.

  I kept seeing Angela’s hurt expression. And Rhiana’s hurt expression. I looked around the room, seeking a respite from my guilt and fury. Eddie was sprawled on a love seat set at right angles to the long sofa. The faint rumble of a bass line leaked around the edges of the young scientist’s headphones, and his head bobbed in time to the beat. A laptop rested on his chest, and he was typing furiously. I got a glimpse of the screen. More numbers.

  “We’re spending eighty-seven thousand dollars a day,” Dagmar said.

  That got my attention. “Did you just say a day?”

  But before she could answer, the front door flew open, and Pamela hobbled rapidly through it. Her face was blotched red and white, partly from the cold, but I knew from the set of her mouth that she was in distress. The anger I had been nursing faded into alarm, and I hurried to meet her.

  “What’s wrong?” I took her arm and helped her into a chair.

  “Slipped on the ice,” she said. She grimaced and leaned down to rub at a rapidly swelling ankle.

  I dropped onto one knee, slipped off her shoe, and gently palpated the ankle. After years in gymnastics I had a good feel for injuries. This one wasn’t bad. I looked up and said as much, and was dismayed when her gray eyes filled with tears. In all the years of our childhood I had never seen Pamela cry. The only time I’d even heard her weep was when she called to tell me about Mama’s death.

  “Richard, Papa is coming. He’s … he’s …” She stammered to a halt and looked around the room. “Drew talked to him.” The words came out in a whisper.

  Nerves fluttered deep in my gut, but Kenntnis had fixed all this. “He knows,” I soothed.

  The incredulous look I got in response told me that somehow the situation had changed. The front door opened. I could see Rudi’s broad back where he stood guard in the hall. Then every other bit of my surroundings disappeared and all I could see was the expression on my father’s face. I stood up so I could face what was coming on my feet instead of on my knees. Pamela clutched my hand, and I could feel myself choking on fear.

  “Out. All of you. Everyone who is in the condominium, out!” my father commanded.

  Dagmar stood, and moved very deliberately to my side. “Would you like to continue with our meeting, sir?” she asked.

  “No. Go.” My lips felt numb and I could barely force out the words.

  Dagmar went to the love seat and gave Eddie a shake. He lifted one earpiece of the headphones. She gave a terse gesture. He swung his legs off the love seat and sat up. They headed toward the bedrooms.

  “No,” came the snapped command from the judge. “Outside. You, too, Pamela.”

  My sister surprised me. “No. I’m staying.”

  Eddie clutched his computer like a child hugging a favorite toy and scuttled for the front door. Dagmar went to awaken Syd and Estevan, who were sleeping. The seconds stretched endlessly. It was all taking so long. I couldn’t stand it.

  “Sir—”

  “Be quiet! I will deal with you presently and privately!”

  The front door closed behind Syd’s slippered heels. I scanned the chiseled planes of my father’s face, and saw no softness, no love, nothing but anger and disgust.

  Without preamble he asked me, “Are you a homosexual?”

  For one wild moment I considered lying. I’d been lying to him my entire life. Why not continue?

  “Papa, he’s always had girlfriends,” Pamela said, trying to break through the heart-stopping tension. I was touched by the unexpected defense.

  “He’ll answer for himself,” Robert grated and spun back on me. “Do you sleep with men?” The words were enunciated so sharply they seemed to cut.

  “I …” I coughed to clear the obstruction in my throat, and suddenly I was just so sick of it. Of him. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

  My father made a disgusted noise. “This is what your mother was alluding to in her note. She tried to bargain with God for your worthless soul! You caused her death!” Pamela gasped, and I took a step back because of what I saw in my father’s face.

  I knew I was codependent to the point of absurdity, but if there was one thing being a cop had taught me it was how to assign blame. Anger began to lick at the edges of the shame and fear.

  “No, sir. You don’t get to lay that off on me! Grenier’s people played on Mama’s love for me, and her weakness and neuroses, with fears of hellfire and eternal damnation. If you want to bust somebody’s chops you go bust Mark’s!”

  My father’s deep blue eyes looked me up and down. Bitterness, disappointment, and anger were all there. “To get you.” The word dripped disgust. “Alannis risked her health and emotional stability. Because she wanted a son.”

  I wasn’t prepared for the explosion of rage that seemed to scorch behind my eyes. Where was the gut-shivering fear and guilt? Caution was also missing. It seemed like some other person was saying, “Not the way I heard it. Uncle David said you were the one who forced the third pregnancy. Over her doctor’s objections. And when she started drinking and using the pills, instead of helping her, you hid her away in institutions! She was always terrified you’d send her back. So when you’re looking for reasons for her suicide, maybe you ought to look in a fucking mirror!” Pamela made an inarticulate sound.

  The blow came so quickly and was so unexpected that I actually didn’t register it until the pain exploded across my cheek. The force of the backhand slap drove my cheek against my teeth and I tasted blood. Pamela gave a cry that turned into a sob.

  And my courage crumbled. He had never before struck me, and I realized I was about to lose another parent. I raised my hand, a pleading gesture. There had to be a way to fix this. Apologize enough. Twist myself into a new shape. Become what he wanted.

  “Papa, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. Please, I’ll—”

  But he turned away. “Come, Pamela, we’re leaving. We shall go to your si
ster’s.”

  And the world started spinning backward when Pamela said, “No, Papa. I’m staying with Richard.” She got out of the chair, took hold of my arm, and clutched it tightly to her side.

  “I see. Well, when you come to your senses, you may join us.”

  As I watched my father’s retreating back, I explored the vast hollow that seemed to have opened in my heart.

  “Papa.”

  “You will not address me. We are finished.” The bedroom door closed behind him.

  A shiver ran down my arms and into my legs. I turned and headed blindly for my room. Pamela hung at my side like a lamprey.

  “It’ll be all right. He’ll think about this and calm down, and be back. If he can trust that you’ll never do … it … again.”

  I paused, my hand on the door to my bedroom. “I’m bisexual, Pam. I can’t make that promise. And why should I have to? I’ve spent my life twisting myself to fit his image of what I should be. Well, I’m done.” I drew in a shuddering breath. “Just tell me when he’s gone.”

  I shut the door on her worry and desperation. I pressed the heels of my hands hard against my eyes, and my back found the wood of the door. I slid down it until I hit the floor. Suddenly the adrenaline was gone from my system, leaving behind only nausea. I didn’t quite reach the toilet before I hurled.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  The fair head was bent over papers as he sat at the desk. Richard looked up, irritated by the intrusion, and Grenier realized in his agitation he hadn’t knocked.

  “Pardon me, that was rude. I’m sorry, but Richard, I must speak with you.”

  He paused, and Richard growled, “Fine. Speak.”

  “They’re manipulating you. This didn’t happen by accident. They’re trying to force you into an emotional reaction that will play right into their hands. Think, you minored in psychology. Don’t be a fool. They’re isolating you, and—”