The Unforgivable Fix: A Justice Novel

by T. E. Woods

  “It paints a vivid picture,” Lydia said. “Worried, frustrated, helpless.”

  He looked up. “That’s it. I went to see my family doctor…but he ran me through the paces and found nothing wrong. He said I ought to see someone who could help me deal with things. ‘Cope’ is the word he used.” He shrugged. “Said I should come see you.”

  Lydia nodded. “I know Dr. Gallagher. I’m glad he says you’re healthy.”

  “I don’t know if healthy is right.” He looked up and Lydia felt waves of pain coursing from his hazel eyes. “And I don’t see what good talking about this stuff is going to do.”

  She leaned back, hoping a demonstration of a relaxed and calm state would encourage her patient. “Tell me about this stuff.”

  Will glanced away, as though he was looking for the place to begin. Lydia remained silent, allowing him the time he needed to take that first step.

  “You read the papers?” he finally asked.

  “I do.”

  “The story about Kenton Walder?”

  Lydia nodded. The arrest of the head of Walder Lumber was big news in the Puget Sound area. Walder’s family’s company was by no means the largest player in the tree-harvesting industry, but it had employed local workers in its fields and mills for several generations. The Olympia headquarters employed at least a hundred more. Stinson and Weyerhauser were the big boys, but Walder Lumber was a source of local pride, and people were loyal to the company that supported everything from youth soccer to the downtown senior center. When Kenton Walder, company president and grandson of the founder, was brought in to police headquarters last week to answer charges of sexual abuse, news swept Thurston County faster than head lice through a day-care center. Even someone as isolated as Lydia couldn’t avoid the coverage.

  “Emma’s my daughter.” Will’s voice was hushed. “They can’t say it because she’s only fourteen. That ‘unidentified minor’ the papers and television stations keep talking about is my little girl. Kenton Walder is raping Emma Sorens.”

  Sorens’s words were ice pellets stinging Lydia’s skin. “Tell me what you know. Start at the beginning and tell me chronologically.”

  Will clenched his jaw. He huffed several times, struggling to hold back tears.

  “Darlene…that’s my ex-wife…Emma’s mom…she and I met in college.” Will’s voice was stronger now, but he kept his eyes focused somewhere in middle space. “We both started at Puget Sound Community. I studied computers and she studied English. She transferred to Saint Martin’s and finished up there. I took a job with the state.” He glanced toward Lydia. “I’ve been with Labor and Industries for eighteen years. We got married right after she graduated. Bought a house in Tumwater and Emma came along two years later.” His focus drifted away again. “We were happy.”

  Lydia let him have his time of silent remembering.

  “At any rate,” he continued. “When Emma started school Darlene wanted a job. There was really no need. I was secure at the state. But she wanted things, you know?” He looked back to Lydia again. “Women like nice things, I guess. Truth told, I wanted the best for Emma, too. There’s only so much you can do on one paycheck. So Darlene got herself hired at Walder Lumber. Started in the reception area.” He shook his head. “God, she hated that job. Said she wasn’t using her education. I guess there were no openings at Walder for analysis of Shakespearean sonnets.”

  His humor was wrapped in animosity.

  “It wasn’t long before she started moving up. She bought all new furniture for the house.” Lydia saw his smile for the first time. “Emma’s room was fit for a princess. All pink and green. I’ll tell you what, that little girl had more clothes than a department store.” Will shook his head. “But Emma never got caught up in that. She was always more interested in hanging out with us or playing with her friends than shopping. She’s a good kid. Solid.”

  “Sounds like the two of you are giving her a wonderful life.”

  Will’s smile vanished. “When Emma was nine, Darlene got herself promoted to the executive suite. She loved that. Bought herself suits and fancy shoes. Her hours got longer. She started going to conferences and board retreats. Emma and I were okay. We cooked our dinners together and during homework time I learned all about how much elementary-school math has changed.” This time his humor was genuine. “It’s a real comeuppance when you’re reading about stuff you lived through in your kid’s history books.” He was quiet for a moment, as though focusing on the blessed routine of child rearing might hold back the horror of his daughter’s abuse. “My buddies started teasing me about being a single parent, but I didn’t mind it one bit. Emma and I were enough.”

  Lydia had heard too many people recounting too many stories not to know what came next.

  “Darlene came home one Sunday evening about a year later. She’d told me she’d been to a weekend strategy session up in Seattle. I’ve since learned Walder Lumber doesn’t do that sort of thing. Anyway, she started in on how unhappy she was. Said she’d known it for a long time. Hell, that was news to me. She wasn’t around enough for me to know anything about her anymore. Said she wanted a divorce.” His glance toward Lydia was pure disgust. “Guess you can figure where I’m going with this.”

  “She’d fallen in love with her boss?”

  “Bingo. I’m sure she thinks it’s romantic, but all it is is pedestrian.” Will offered a humorless smirk. “Big word for a community college grad, huh? Guess my years with Darlene were good for my vocabulary, at least.”

  “And you have Emma.”

  He breathed in deep and exhaled slow. “Emma is the brightest light in my life. If I had known how things would turn out I’d have spent every last dime in my retirement account to fight for full custody. Hell, I would have bundled her up and kidnapped her. I swear to God I would have.” He shifted his focus, as though he was seeing what life could have been. “But the courts call it fifty-fifty and that’s that. For the past two years, Emma spends a week with me, in a fifteen-hundred-square-foot split-level on a working-class block, then packs up for a week in that big white house behind those fancy gates at the end of Cooper Point.”

  Lydia could feel the helplessness bleeding from him. “Tell me about the abuse. How did you come to learn of it?”

  His features twisted into a mask of revulsion. “I hate to admit that in the beginning I was thinking only about me. How would I stack up as a father against the sainted Kenton Walder? You from Olympia?”

  Lydia considered the cost of revealing information about herself. “I’ve been here almost ten years.”

  “Then you know the man…or at least the image he likes to give out. Pictures in the papers of him handing out carnival-ride tickets to kids at Lakefair. Cutting ribbons at buildings the city couldn’t afford without his oh-so-generous donations. I gotta save for months to make room in my budget to take my kid to a Mariners game twice a season. Walder’s got a private box. Emma comes home from one game with pictures of her in the dugout with the team. I didn’t know at the time it’s all a bullshit front.” He bit his lower lip. “I know that now.” His voice softened. “About a year ago, Emma started to change. My precious little monkey who couldn’t wait to toss the salad while I fried the pork chops started spending all her time in her room with her headphones glued to her ears. She didn’t want to ride bikes with me anymore. Didn’t want to do anything. Started getting a smart mouth. I chalked it up to her entering the teenager phase and belted up to ride it out.” He glanced at Lydia. “You got teenagers?”

  A vision of Maizie scampering up a sandy bluff flashed through her mind.

  “Tell me what happened next.”

  “This was two weeks ago.” His voice caught in his throat. “Emma was in the bathroom taking one of her hour-long soaks and I was doing laundry. I had a basket filled with her stuff. I passed the bathroom. The door was closed. I figure she’s still in there doing whatever the hell it is girls do for so long. I open the door to her bedroom and there she is.�
� He froze. A veil of tears shined in his eyes. “My little girl is sitting on the side of her bed, wearing her nightshirt with the cupcakes all over it, and she’s…” He stopped again. “She’s got a box cutter and she’s…” He couldn’t get the words out.

  “On her legs or her arms?” Lydia hoped her gentle acceptance of his daughter’s self-mutilation would encourage him to tell his story.

  “Her thighs, her belly…my God, it seemed like everywhere.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I dropped my basket.” He huffed out a helpless gasp. “I grabbed that box knife and threw it across the room. Emma started screaming at me about invading her privacy. Like I gave a flying fuck. I just pulled her to me and held her tight. She squirmed and struggled but I just kept holding on.” Will ran his hand across his face. “Then we both started crying. There we were, holding on to one another like we were on the last dry piece of the Titanic and our feet were getting wet, sobbing our eyes out. We cried ourselves to sleep, if you can believe it. We woke up about two hours later. Still holding on to each other. Both of us as zoned as zombies. But it was enough to get her talking. She told me everything.”

  “What did she tell you?”

  Will’s sorrow was instantly replaced with stony hatred. “That Walder monster was forcing himself on her. Making her…” His eyes bore no tears now. “She’s fourteen, Dr. Corriger. She still has Barbie dolls. She should be giggling about boy bands and playing soccer on Saturdays. Instead she’s…she’s…”

  Lydia didn’t need him to say it. A memory flashed of the first time a foster father grabbed her, shoved her into a darkened bedroom, held one sweaty hand across her mouth and ran the other down her pants. She was nine years old. A pang of resentment pushed the vision away. Emma had a father who ached at the thought of his daughter’s abuse. There had been no one to cry for Lydia during her own torment. I’ve come back to work too soon. I’m not ready for this. Lydia squeezed her fist until the pain of fingernails on flesh brought her back to the moment.

  “What did you do next?”

  “What the hell do you think I did? I told Emma it was over. She’d never have to see that asshole again. Then I called. Darlene answered. I told her what was going on. She said she didn’t know about the cutting. Can you believe it? I tell my ex-wife her fancy new husband is raping and sodomizing her daughter and all she hears is Emma’s taking a box cutter to herself.” His hands shook with rage. “Then she tells me it can’t be true. Says she’ll speak to Kenton about it when he gets home. Warns me not to say a word to anybody. Threatens that if I do I’ll never see Emma again. Says they’ve got lawyers who will bury me if I spread one word of what she called ‘Emma’s little lies.’ I felt like I’d stepped into bizarro world.”

  “What happened next?” Lydia needed to control the conversation; keep her own mind focused and contain Will’s rage.

  “I slammed the phone down and called the cops.” Will wiped his hands across his jeans. “I didn’t have the stomach to tell Emma her mother didn’t believe her. I couldn’t listen to Darlene or her husband come up with some smoke-screen story. So I called the cops. They sent someone over. Emma didn’t want to talk at first. Oh, she was pissed at me. Who knows what this Walder asshole told her would happen to her if she told? But luckily one of the cops was a female and she got Emma talking. She asks if Emma could stay with me for the night, even though it was time for her to head back to Cooper Point. I tell her, are you nuts?” His anger mounted. “I say this kid’s staying with me for the rest of her life. She’s never going near that house again.”

  “Deep breaths.” Lydia knew fury was unproductive.

  Will steadied himself and continued. “So Emma stays with me for the night. Next morning she insists on going to school. Begs me. Tells me she needs to be around her friends. I gotta go to work and I figure Walder can’t get her there. So I drop her off and tell her to wait in the principal’s office till I come pick her up. I go to work and not an hour passes before I’m called into my supervisor’s office. I get served with papers for violating a standing custody arrangement. That fast! Some judge has issued instructions that I’m to surrender—the papers used that word, surrender…how about fucking sacrifice? I’m to sacrifice my kid back to her mother’s custody immediately. Well, let me tell you—I run out of that office and straight to Emma’s school. She’s not there. They came and got her. Both her mother and her asshole baby-raping husband. There’s a message from Darlene on my cell saying if I try to see my daughter, they’ll get a restraining order. Darlene says I’m to stay away until—get this—she says until this ‘situation with Emma’ can be explained. It’s a good thing I got that message over the phone or I’d be in jail right now for punching my ex-wife’s teeth down her throat.”

  “Do you have a history of violence, Will? Ever been arrested? Ever have the police called?”

  Will seemed confused. “What? Me? No. No. You can check it out.” He took a few moments to calm himself. “Does it sound like I’m some kind of hothead? I’ve got to protect my little girl, Dr. Corriger. It’s the only job I have. In this whole world it’s the one damned thing I gotta do. Can you understand that? Emma’s in danger and I have got to protect her.”

  Lydia did understand. She wondered what Dr. Gallagher, who had referred Will to her to develop coping strategies, thought would be a more appropriate paternal response to his daughter’s abuse than absolute murderous rage.

  “How did Walder respond to being brought in for questioning?”

  “Like the calming winds on a stormy sea.” His voice was filled with sarcasm. “He called me and told me he understood my reaction. That any good father would do the same thing if confronted with such a story. That’s what he said. He said ‘story.’ You weren’t in that room, Dr. Corriger. You don’t know my kid. She wasn’t lying.”

  “I believe you.” At this point of the intake, it really didn’t matter what the objective facts were. She needed to assure her patient she trusted everything he was telling her. “Where do things stand now?”

  Will settled a bit. “The cops called him in, took his statement. You probably read that in the papers. They want Emma to be evaluated. You know, physical exam, mental exam. Till then the original custody arrangement holds.” Bitter sarcasm jumped back into his voice. “We have Saint Kenton to thank for that, too. Darlene was sputtering that Emma was not to be allowed any contact with me, but Walder told her it was important for Emma to have as much stability in her life as possible during the investigation. He insisted that all things remain the same with the fifty-fifty custody deal. I hate to admit it, but I’m grateful for that. I don’t have the money to go up against his lawyers if he would have fought it.”

  “And you? How are you doing?”

  “I’m miserable. It’s been two weeks. Emma’s been with me one. I stick to her like glue and lock up all the sharp things in the house when she’s over. I stay awake till I’m sure she’s been asleep for an hour. Then I lie on the floor next to her bed and cry myself to sleep. When the time came I had to drive her to her mother’s, I threw up all day. Emma tells me Walder’s not laid a finger on her since the cops got involved, so I’m hanging my hat on that. The asshole knows all eyes are on him.”

  “Has Emma’s evaluation been scheduled?” Lydia knew the importance of securing a qualified therapist to conduct an assessment of an allegation of child abuse.

  “Walder’s got her scheduled with some social worker in Tacoma. Name’s Beth Harton. You know her?”

  Lydia knew all the qualified assessors in the area, but she didn’t know that name. But a lot could have changed in the two years she’d been out of the clinic. “No, I don’t.”

  Will leaned forward, his eyes pleading. “How about you, Dr. Corriger? Dr. Gallagher recommended no one but you for me. I’m a good judge of character and you seem to really understand this stuff. Would you do it? Would you talk to my little girl? See what you can do to help her?”

  Lydia had done scor
es of such interviews. She understood both the psychological importance of being skilled in this special area of assessment, as well as the legal implications of having a less than qualified interviewer conducting it. Whether Emma was telling the truth about her abuse or spinning a tale, any justice would hinge on the judge believing the results of the assessment. She was qualified. But the possibility of her conducting the interview was out of the question.

  “I’m your therapist, Will.” Lydia explained the conflict of interest if she saw his daughter. “I just can’t do it.”

  “I’ll fire you on the spot. Right now. This session never happened.” He was as close to begging as a man can get. “Help her, Dr. Corriger. Help my little girl. I have to keep that monster away from her.”

  Lydia locked eyes with him for several long seconds. He was a father desperate for his daughter. Her mind dialed back to the countless young girls she’d known in similar situations…and then it crashed onto her own experiences. How different her life might have been if someone had believed her.

  Lydia knew what was in store for little Emma. Foreign fingers and icy-cold medical instruments invading her most private parts as the physical exams were conducted. Complete strangers asking questions again and again about topics she’d want desperately to avoid. Police investigators. Lawyers, that Walder could afford and Will couldn’t, earning their keep by dancing with smooth words to lead a frightened child into one small slip on which they could build a case against her, creating a scenario in which the only options were that she was either lying or mentally deranged.

  She’d seen it too many times. She’d lived it herself.

  I came back too soon. This is hurting too much. I can’t shield my soul against what I know is coming. Yet here she was. Lydia hesitated as she calculated her options. She took a shaky breath and made her decision.