Suspicious Origin

by MacDonald, Patricia

  “Britt, listen to me. I don’t want Zoe to know that I suspect this,” Alec insisted. “Ever. Not for any reason. I don’t want her to ever think for a moment that her mother was willing to let her die in that inferno. Zoe could never be expected to understand it or forgive it. And she’d never get over it. No. Not if it means I have to spend my life in jail, I don’t want her to know.”

  “But if you were convicted, she would think the same thing of you. Worse. That you’d killed her mother and tried to kill her.”

  “She’d never think that,” said Alec. “Nothing in this world would ever convince her of that. Not as long as I have breath in my body to tell her the truth—that I didn’t do it. She’ll believe in me. She’s my girl.”

  Britt looked at him and saw the implacability in his silver-gray eyes. “You would do that? Go to prison…?”

  “I’d die for Zoe,” he said sharply “She’s my only child.”

  His eyes were dry, and his gaze was steady. But Britt felt tears, rushing to her own eyes. She blinked them back. She could see that he meant it, and the realization was humbling. “She’s lucky… to have you,” Britt said sincerely.

  “I don’t want her to know,” he repeated forcefully.

  “I understand,” said Britt. “She’ll never hear it from me. I promise you.”

  Alec peered at her as if he was trying to see inside her soul. Then he said abruptly, “Okay.”

  “Okay,” Britt whispered.

  Alec sighed and leaned back in the chair. “I have to admit, it feels better just to say it out loud. It’s been the most oppressive thought. You can’t imagine…”

  Britt shook her head. “I just can’t believe it of Greta. She adored Zoe. I mean, from everything I’ve seen and heard…”

  “I didn’t want to believe it either. But the more I’ve thought about it…” he said.

  “I understand,” said Britt. She wished she could reach through the Plexiglas partition and cover his knotted hands with her fingers. “I understand. And I can see why you think that. But, maybe…Have you told Kevin about all this? I mean, he could have used it to defend you…”

  Alec glared at her. “Haven’t you understood a word I said?”

  “No, of course…I’m sorry.”

  The guard stepped up behind her and clapped a hand on her shoulder. “All right,” he said. “You’re done. Let’s go.”

  Britt looked frantically at Alec. “I have to go.”

  On Alec’s side of the partition, the guard was likewise nudging him from his seat. “In my office desk at the dealership,” Alec called to her. “There’s a box in the bottom drawer with a VHS tape in it. Greta didn’t want to keep it in the house, in case Zoe accidentally looked at it. But you should watch it.”

  “I will…I’m sorry,” Britt called after him helplessly as the guard directed her toward the door. She didn’t know what she was sorry for. You saved him from a life in prison, she reminded herself. But as she watched him being handcuffed again and led away, she knew. She was sorry for how she had misjudged him. She was sorry she had not realized sooner who he really was.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Britt opened the tinted glass door of the Lynch Rides showroom and stepped inside. She couldn’t help remembering her first visit here, when Alec had taken her out to ride on the snowmobile. What should have been an enjoyable outing had been nightmarish, thanks to her suspicions. She had thought the worst of Alec, and of Lauren, that day. And she had pursued those suspicions. She had been so sure. And so wrong. There was one couple looking over snowmobiles but otherwise the place was quiet. Lauren Rossi was chatting and laughing with two of the salesmen. Britt felt a little surprised. She had not expected to see her here. All three looked up as Britt walked in, and abruptly they all fell silent. Lauren’s eyes narrowed as she watched her approach.

  “Lauren,” said Britt, pretending not to notice their obvious hostility, “how are you?”

  ‘What do you want?” Lauren said.

  “Alec wanted me to get something out of his desk,” said Britt.

  The two salesmen exchanged a glance, and then drifted off to their offices. Lauren glared at Britt. “Oh, right,” she said.

  “He said there’s a videotape in his desk drawer. He told me to pick it up.”

  “I don’t believe you,” said Lauren. “The police chief probably sent you. You’re probably looking for evidence against Alec.”

  Britt sighed. “I don’t blame you for thinking that. But actually, it’s just the opposite. He’s going to be getting out of jail. Very soon, I think. I kind of… accidentally…found his alibi witness.”

  “You did,” Lauren said scornfully.

  “I’m afraid I misjudged Alec,” Britt admitted. “It seems that everything he said about…Everything he said was true. At any rate, he told me to come and get the tape, so here I am.”

  Lauren folded her arms across the tight pink sweater she was wearing. “If Alec’s getting out of jail, why doesn’t he get the tape for you himself?” Lauren countered.

  “I guess he wanted me to see it right away. But I admire your loyalty,” said Britt. “I do.”

  “I never should have listened to you,” said Lauren angrily. “I betrayed him because of you.”

  Britt sighed. “Well, I see he didn’t hold it against you. You’re still here. Besides, all you did was tell the truth. That’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

  Lauren sniffed. “That’s what Alec said. But I’m still sorry I did it. And for your information, he’s not having an affair.”

  “Look, I’m not trying to hurt him, no matter what you think. I was just over at the jail. Alec told me that the tape is in a box in the bottom drawer of his desk. Why don’t you look there? If there’s no tape, you can call me a liar.”

  Lauren tossed her hair. “All right,” she said. “I’ll look. But you stay here.”

  Britt felt awkward standing in the middle of the showroom, and she could sense that the salesmen were studying her from their glass cubicles, assessing her with dislike. Britt pretended to admire the snowmobiles that were on display. She circled around them, pretending to be curious about their unique features, but apparently the salesmen weren’t fooled. No one came out, or offered to help her.

  Britt was relieved to see Lauren round the corner formed by the glass wall and approach her. In her right hand Lauren held a black VHS tape in a cardboard sleeve. Britt thought about Alec’s warning. Don’t let Zoe see it. Britt had a good idea of what was on that tape. It had to be Jean Andersen. She felt her heart start to pound at the thought of seeing her mother’s face again. A face she could scarcely remember. The thought of hearing her long-forgotten voice.

  Lauren handed the tape to her. “All right, here,” she said. “But if you try to use this against him, whatever it is…”

  “Don’t worry,” said Britt, stuffing the tape into her satchel. “It’s nothing like that. I’ll bring it back. I promise.”

  The house was gloomy and unwelcoming when Britt returned. She pushed up the thermostat and turned on a couple of lights. She poured herself something to drink and checked her phone messages, all the while aware that she was putting off the inevitable. She looked at her watch, calculating how long she had before Zoe got out of school and she needed to go and pick her up. Finally, she turned on the television, pushed the tape into the VCR and sat down on the sofa.

  The images on the tape began abruptly, a series of shoebox-like brick buildings, shot, obviously from a moving car. “That’s it,” said a woman’s voice, clearly the operator of the camera. Then the camera panned for a moment on a sign that was too blurred to read except for the words “For Women” at the bottom of it. Abruptly, the sign and buildings vanished, and were replaced by a plain, bisque-colored room furnished with molded plastic chairs and formica-topped tables. The camera panned around the room to reveal bookshelves at one end, a couple of sofas and a coffee table, and a woman in a police uniform, standing by the door of the room, a gun tuc
ked into the leather holster at her waist. There were people milling about, greeting one another in unintelligible voices, and there was the sound of laughter and loud remarks in the background.

  “Why don’t you sit down, honey?” the camera operator, a male voice this time, asked.

  A familiar-looking woman wearing a barn jacket moved hesitantly in front of the lens, and then looked back at the camera operator. “Here, do you think?” she asked.

  Greta, thought Britt, and her heart flipped over at the sight of her sister. Greta’s blond hair was arranged in a loose bun, but there were wisps that had come loose all around her face, forming a land of halo. She was as pretty as she had ever been, although her face was thinner, and there were dark circles around her beautiful eyes.

  “That’s good,” said the camera operator, and Britt realized at that moment that it was Alec making the video.

  Greta sighed, massaging her hands, and sat down in a plastic chair. Nervously, she brushed her hair off her face and gave her husband a wan smile. “I’m nervous,” she said to the camera. “I wish I still smoked.”

  Greta smoked? Britt thought. For how long? The thought was fleeting as she watched this stranger, her late sister, in fascination. Greta took a magazine off a pile on the shelf and flipped through it, crossing her legs and nervously bouncing one of her feet. She looked up again at the camera, a worried expression in her eyes.

  “You’re okay,” said Alec from behind the camera.

  The lens of the camera swung around to the door of the room, just as Britt heard a voice say, “Hi there,” from near the door.

  “Here she is,” the cameraman said, his voice sounding loud to Britt’s ears.

  “Oh my God,” said Greta. Alec jerked the camera back toward his wife, and then at the woman who was coming through the door. The woman had long, coarse brown hair pulled back into a severe graying ponytail. Her skin was pallid, and she was wearing glasses so that her eyes were difficult to see. She was pudgy in the face, and there was a roll around her middle which was plainly visible despite the loose-fitting sweat suit that she wore. The remains of a pretty face lurked somewhere in that murky visage, but any beauty was long gone.

  “Oh my God,” Greta cried again, in that tone people always used when they had won a big prize on a game show. “Mother.”

  Jean Andersen suddenly became aware of the camera and reared back, looking at it warily.

  “Its just Alec,” Greta explained. “My husband.” Her voice broke, and tears were running down her cheeks. “Oh, Mom,” she said.

  The two women approached one another, Greta with her arms wide, while Jean kept her arms at her sides. Jean allowed Greta to embrace her and then mumbled something. “Sit down,” she said.

  Obediently, her face glowing, Greta did exactly that. She sat down and patted the seat of the chair beside her. Jean sat cautiously on that chair, her putty-colored skin a blank mask. My mother, Britt thought. That’s my mother. She could feel herself perspiring in the cool room.

  She had vague memories of her mother, but in no way did they resemble this woman sitting in the molded plastic chair, her arms resolutely pinned to her sides.

  Wiping her tears away, Greta reached for the woman’s limp, puffy hand, and placed it gently between her own slim fingers. “We brought you all kinds of stuff but we had to leave the bag at the entrance for them to look through it.”

  Jean nodded, and began to cough. “That’s what they always do,” she said. “Did you bring the…” She turned her head and her voice was too muffled to be understood.

  “I brought everything you asked for,” Greta said kindly, and suddenly Britt could remember Greta saying those very words to her, when she would come home from a trip to the mall, around her birthday, or in the days before school started.

  Jean nodded, and submitted herself to another of Greta’s fierce hugs. Greta kept on touching the older woman, on her arm, her shoulder, her knee. As if she wanted to convince herself of the physical reality. Her mother, seated there beside her.

  “This is a helluva place to meet after all these years,” said Jean with a gravelly laugh, squirming slightly in the chair seat.

  “It doesn’t matter,” said Greta, sniffing, and wiping her eyes again. Jean regarded her curiously, but did not seem to have any trouble holding her emotions in check. Britt thought about what Alec had said. How elated Greta was to track down their mother. How devastated she had been when Jean decided to disappear all over again.

  Suddenly, Britt understood why Alec had wanted her to see this tape. Not simply to see her long-lost mother. But to see Greta. To imagine how this weeping woman—who was alternately embracing someone she thought to be gone forever, and thanking her lucky stars—how she would react when this, too, proved to be an illusion.

  Britt stared at Jean Andersen and felt absolutely no desire to weep. This was the person who had changed their lives forever. Left Greta and Britt and their father behind, and never looked back. Made them, all three of them, feel expendable and unloved. And for what? To embark on a drifter’s life of petty crime. Part of Britt wanted to know her story, wanted to know where she had been, and what she had done. But didn’t this meeting place tell it all? Jean was incarcerated in a women’s correctional facility. She was passing her time in prison where Greta had found her. Now, captured at last in this video, Jean was studying Greta, her older daughter who was overcome with emotion, with a kind of reptilian detachment. Greta, who had tried to live a good life, a useful life, and always hold out hope. “You didn’t deserve her love,” Britt said aloud to the image on the screen.

  As if in answer to this, Jean turned and faced the camera. “Turn that damn thing off,” she said. Alec kept the camera trained relentlessly on her ruined face.

  “Aunt Britt?”

  Britt jumped at the sound of Zoe’s voice and pushed the off button. She stood up guiltily from her seat on the couch. Zoe came into the room as the image faded from the screen. “What are you watching? Who were you talking to?” Zoe asked.

  “Nobody,” said Britt anxiously. “You’re back. How’d you get home from school?”

  Zoe shrugged. “I got a ride from Sara’s mom.”

  “You and Kayley friends again?”

  “I guess. How did Vicki like the scarf?”

  Britt thought of Vicki’s hospital room, and Dave, the alibi witness, sitting there right in front of her eyes. She wanted to tell Zoe everything, but she hesitated. Maybe she should wait until it was official. Until Alec was actually coming home to her.

  “She liked it,” said Britt. “She was really touched. Maybe you two can keep in touch, since you have her address.”

  Zoe chewed the inside of her mouth and didn’t reply.

  She seemed so downcast that Britt wanted to tell her about Dave, just to give her something to be happy about. It wasn’t as if she was giving her false hope. This was the real thing. Dave was the key to Alec’s freedom. “Zoe,” she began. “Something did happen today that…”

  But Zoe was preoccupied. “Homework,” she murmured, and before Britt could halt her, the girl was already pounding up the stairs.

  I’ll tell her later, Britt thought. She sighed, but her stomach was fluttering. She wanted to see the rest of the tape. She went back into the living room and waited until she heard the door to Zoe’s room close. Then she went back to the TV, and furtively turned on the VCR again, muting the sound.

  Jean Andersen swam back into view, staring into the lens of the videocam, the light glinting off her glasses. Without the sound, Britt watched as Greta fussed over the older woman, smoothing her clothes and timidly caressing her, while Jean Andersen remained rigid in her chair, glaring occasionally at the videocam as if furious that her order to turn it off had been defied.

  He knew it right away, Britt thought. He had seen, even in this first meeting, that no good would come of this, and, by refusing her command, he had let his newfound mother-in-law know that, unlike her vulnerable daughter, he was not
duped by her. He was busy recording it for Greta, hoping someday he could make his wife understand that she wasn’t to blame. How was he to know that she could never understand? That this longed-for encounter would finally destroy the woman he loved.

  Britt felt her grudging respect for Alec grow as she watched the taped scene unfold through his unforgiving eyes. Jean Andersen was sitting beside her faithful, long-lost daughter, already planning her escape. You could see it in her eyes. And Alec knew it. And hated her for it. “Good for you, Alec,” Britt said aloud, as angry tears made the scene swim before her eyes.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  All evening, Britt waited for the phone to ring. She was waiting for the call from Ray Stern saying that Alec was free. That they should come and get him. She put off telling Zoe any more about it as the hours ticked away. Her own agitation was making it difficult to wait. She thought about calling the Carmichaels to see if Kevin had heard anything, but she hated to interrupt their first night with the new baby. She didn’t want to wake him up, or tear Caroline away from caring for him.

  Finally, at nine o’clock while Zoe was glumly watching a sitcom on TV, Britt called the police station. Ray Stern was still there, and quickly got on the line.

  “You’re working late,” said Britt, trying to sound confident and cheerful.

  “Things piled up while I was at Mid-State Medical Center today,” he said.

  “What happened with Dean?” she asked.

  “He admitted it,” Ray said shortly. “He wanted to turn the screws on your brother-in-law.”

  Thank you, God, Britt said silently. “Well, we haven’t heard from you. Did Dave Kronemayer come in?” Britt asked.

  “The so-called alibi witness?” said Ray, and Britt’s heart sank. “We haven’t seen him. He hasn’t been here.”

  “Dammit,” said Britt.

  “Nope. No sign of him.”

  “Dammit, he promised me,” said Britt.