by Lois Greiman
He had told me about his diary on more than one occasion. Originally, it had been my idea that he record those moments that were most important to him, but he assured me with a boyish spark of enthusiasm that he’d been doing so for years.
Since that day, I had filled many a spare evening with the thought of him sitting in front of his hearth, maybe on a bear rug, shirtless, of course, after a grueling day on the battlefield. His golden hair would gleam in the firelight as he bent over a leather bound notebook.
I had asked him if he’d like to share his diary with me sometime, for professional reasons only, of course. And he’d said he’d maybe like that, once we got to know each other better.
I stifled a girly sigh and brought myself back to the present.
“You must have problems of your own,” he said and caught my gaze. “Don’t you need to share them sometimes?”
I knew I should bring the conversation back to business. I knew it beyond a shadow of a doubt, but I felt something stir deep in my belly. It might have been hunger, but I had a bad feeling it had something to do with my glands, so I cleared my throat, shuffled some papers, and imagined being smeared with tar as the smell of chicken feathers filled my nostrils. “But it’s my job to address your problems,” I said, maintaining an admirably steady tone and managing to keep a good four feet of air space between us.
“But don’t you ever just wanna . . .” He shrugged and lifted his glass. “Let your hair down?”
I could imagine the feel of those blunt fingers against my scalp, skimming through the heavy waves of my mahogany hair as it slipped from its stylish coif to my shoulders.
But wait a minute! The purple images screeched to a halt. Maybe I was thinking of a romance novel. My own hair was confined to the back of my head with enough hair spray to stick a cat to the wall. It was straight as a stick, tended to be overly fine and, without the assistance of Madame Clairol, strongly resembled the color of dirt. “Perhaps we should confine our discussion to your problems, Mr. Bomstad.”
“You must have problems, too.”
“But I’m not paying you a hundred and fifty dollars an hour to discuss them.”
He laughed again. The sound was deep and tantalizingly masculine. My stomach did a funny little double loop. “Maybe I’d listen for free.”
I sighed internally. It took me a minute to recognize the sound, but when I did I gagged it with manic haste and straightened in my chair. “That’s very nice of you,” I said, pretty sure my polite but dismissive expression was firmly back in place. “But I can’t help you if you don’t—”
“You’ve already helped me.”
“I have?”
He glanced down. He exhibited endearingly boyish expressions sometimes, as if he couldn’t quite meet my eyes.
“Immensely,” he said, and raised his gaze.
“I’m glad to hear that. Still, I think—” I began, but then he brushed his jacket aside.
My eyes popped like peeled grapes and my jaw ricocheted off my desk top. There, between the spread edges of his jacket, I saw that his jeans were unzipped. He wore no underwear and voilà . . . it looked as if that impotency problem was pretty much taken care of.
“Well?” he said. I raised my attention with a jerky effort. His elbows were propped casually across the back of my couch as he watched me. He grinned. “What do you think?”
“Damn,” I croaked. “I’m good.”
He chuckled and rose slowly to his feet, a big man fast losing his boyish demeanor. “Yeah, you are,” he said, “and I’d like to thank you.”
“You could double my pay,” I suggested and rolled my chair cautiously backward. It was one thing to fantasize about an illicit affair with a hunky client. It was quite another to have that fantasy unzip in front of God and everybody.
“That’s not the kind of payment I had in mind, Doc,” he said, and placed his hands on the edge of my desk.
“As I’ve told you before, Mr. Bomstad, I prefer to be called Ms. McMullen.” I sounded like I was lecturing a twelve-year-old. Or giving an order to the bartender. Not at all like I was talking to a guy whose genitalia was draped over my desk like berries on a vine.
“Whatever,” he said. “You done good, and now I’d like to do a little something for you. Or should I say . . . a big something?” Removing one hand from my desk, he brushed his jacket aside again.
Crimony! It may have been smaller than a bread basket, but it blew a button all to hell.
He smiled as I stared. “I’ll lock the door so we ain’t disturbed.”
It was those words that set the alarms exploding in my head. I reached for the phone, and his hand, still large and clean and square-nailed, thumped suddenly atop mine.
“Who you calling?”
I glanced up. The boyish expression had been replaced by something less appealing. My stomach pitched.
“I think you’d better leave, Mr. Bomstad.” My voice was still steady, but my knees were bumping together like wind chimes gone mad.
“Leave?” he said, and wrapping his fingers about my hand, eased around the corner of the desk. I rose to my feet. I’ve never considered myself weak, but all things are relative. “After you done such good work?”
My heart was banging against my ribs and my head felt feather-light. “I’m flattered that you attribute your umm . . . newfound health to my services,” I said, “but I’m afraid I still must insist that you leave.”
He grinned and edged closer. “I like to hear you talk.” I could feel the heat of his body now, and my own temperature rose so that my face felt hot. “All slick and high-class, but I wonder . . .” He touched me with his knuckles, brushing them against my cheek. “I wonder what you’re like when you get riled.”
“My secretary will be returning any minute.” It was an out-and-out lie and not a very good one, apparently, because Bomstad didn’t even acknowledge it.
“Always dressed so classy.” He ran a hand over my shoulder. “Always smell so good.” He leaned in, taking a deep breath near my neck. “But sometimes I think there might be a touch of animal in you. A little white trash.” Bending his neck, he nipped at my throat. I was no longer sighing.
“Let go of my wrist,” I warned. The words only warbled a little.
He grinned. “There’s a stain on your blouse,” he said, gazing down at my breasts but not loosening his grip. “Almost hidden. What else you got hidden, Doc?” Raising his free hand, he brushed his fingers down my throat, pressing my blouse aside during his descent. I shivered as he touched the slope of my breast.
“You like that, Doc?”
No, I didn’t like it. Only a moron would like it, but I closed my eyes and dropped my head back slightly. A moan would have been a nice touch, but acting’s not my talent. Still, I didn’t need that extra drama, because apparently Bomstad was a big believer in his own overwhelming charm.
“Been a while for you, has it, Doc?”
I said nothing, but forced my muscles to relax.
“Good thing the Bomber took you up on your offer, huh?”
“Offer?” I opened my eyes, but kept my body carefully pliant.
He chuckled again. “Little late to be playing hard to get now, ain’t it?” he asked. “Little late when the Bomber is all hot and ready.” He slipped his hand inside my bra, cupping my breast.
I gasped. My stomach heaved. What would happen if I hurled on his perfectly polished shoes?
“You like that?”
Like porcupines in my underwear, but I forced a sigh. It sounded more like a growl to me, but he didn’t seem to notice, because he stepped forward.
I struck immediately, snapping my knee up with all the strength I could muster.
But even in his current state Bomstad had a professional athlete’s reflexes. My blow made only minimal contact with his newly regenerated area before it was deflected by a tree-sized thigh. Still, he stumbled backward, holding his offended parts and cursing.
I didn’t wait to enrich my v
ocabulary but bolted around the other side of my desk and dashed for the door. My hand closed over the doorknob, but there was a growl behind me and I was snatched away and flung across the room. I scrambled for footing, lost a shoe, and bounced off a wall, but I was still free and sprinted behind my desk, my breath coming hard.
“Don’t do this, Andrew,” I panted. “You’ll regret it.”
He was breathing hard, too. Still bent, he stalked me. “You’re a tease is what you are, Doc.”
“I’m not a tease,” I said, searching wildly for my professional voice. “I’m sorry if you got the wrong impression.”
“No wrong impressions,” he said and lunged forward, grappling across my desk.
I shrieked like a B-movie starlet and bolted sideways, making for the door again. He lunged after me. I skidded to a halt at the end of my desk, teetered on one shoe, and dashed off in the other direction. He was close behind. I screamed again. His hand closed on my jacket. Fabric tore. Buttons popped. I turned in desperation. There was no hope now. He was twice my weight and strength, but there was nothing to do but fight, so I swung with all my might. My fist thudded against his ear like the swat of a swallow’s wing. He caught my wrist with little effort and grinned into my face as he pushed me toward the floor.
I was blubbering something incoherent, promises or threats or prayers. Who knows? Then suddenly, his grip gave a little. I scrambled backward, trying to gain my feet. He stumbled, grabbed his chest with clawed hands, and dropped to his knees. I lurched toward the phone, jabbing at numbers with spastic fingers and yammering into the receiver.
Bomstad rolled his eyes up toward mine. I dropped the phone and staggered against the wall. Then, like a melodramatic overactor, he fell to the floor, dead as a thumbtack.
2
Even choosing the perfect dinner wine loses its earth-shattering importance if your guests happen to be cannibals and you, the unsuspecting entrée.
—Dr. Candon,
psych professor
“MA’AM. MS. MCMULLEN.”
I tried to concentrate. The police had arrived with head-spinning haste. Apparently someone had heard my scream and dialed 911. My own call had probably gone to a hang-glider in Tibet.
Everything seemed foggy and unfocused, except for the body lying immobile on my overpriced Berber. That was as clear as vodka. His eyes were open and vividly blue, his hands limp, his fingers slightly curled. He lay on his back, but his jacket had fallen across his crotch with blessed kindness. Still, my stomach threatened to reject both the yogurt and the dehydrated orange.
“Ms. McMullen.”
“What?” I dragged my attention shakily away from Bomstad’s blank-eyed stare and supported myself with a hand on the top of my desk. The oak grain felt coarse and solid beneath my fingers. But the world still seemed strangely off-kilter. Maybe it was because I was wearing only one shoe. Maybe not.
The man addressing me was dark. Dark hair, dark skin, dark eyes, dark clothes. “Are you Christina McMullen?”
“Yes. I’m . . . Yes.” I sounded, I thought, about as bright as a Russian olive.
He stared at me for a good fifteen seconds, then, “I’m Lieutenant Rivera.”
I said nothing. My gaze was being dragged mercilessly toward the floor again. Those sky-blue eyes, those large, open hands.
“I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You’re a psychiatrist?”
I pulled my attention doggedly back to the lieutenant’s face. It was devoid of expression, except possibly anger. A shade of distrust. Could be he looked cynical. Maybe devoid wasn’t exactly the right word.
His brows were set low over coffee-colored eyes that matched the dark hue of his jacket, and his lips were drawn in a straight, hard line.
“Psychologist,” I said. “I’m a . . .” My voice wavered a little on the vowels, making me sound like a prepubescent tuba player. “Psychologist.”
He didn’t seem to notice or care about the distinction. “This your office?”
“Yes.”
“You work here alone?”
“Yes. No. I . . .” Three men were examining the body and muttering among themselves. A fat guy in a wrinkled dress shirt that was miraculously too large said something from the corner of his mouth and the other two laughed. My stomach heaved.
“Yes or no. Which is it?” asked the lieutenant. Patience didn’t seem to be his virtue. Or empathy. Apparently, the fact that there was a dead guy staring at my ceiling didn’t faze him much, but it wasn’t doing a hell of a lot for my equilibrium.
“No. I usually have a . . . secretary.” For a moment I completely forgot her name, but then she’d only been my best friend since fifth grade, when she’d kissed Richie Mailor and declared him to have lips like the spotted pictus our science teacher kept in his aquarium. “Elaine . . . Butterfield.”
He was staring at me again. “Have you been drinking, Ms. McMullen?”
“I . . . No.”
“There are two glasses.”
“Ahhh . . .” My mind was wandering again. My focus crept in the direction of the corpse.
“Ms. McMullen.”
“Mr. Bomstad brought wine,” I said.
“How long have you two been lovers?”
My eyes snapped back to Dark Man. “What?”
“You and Bomstad,” he said. His tone was as dry as Bond’s martini. “How long have you been lovers?”
“We weren’t lovers.”
I can’t actually say he raised his brows. Maybe one. Just a notch.
“We weren’t lovers,” I repeated, more emphatically. “He attacked me.”
“Do your customers always bring . . . refreshments to their sessions?”
I stared at him. I’d worked my damn ass off to become a high-class psychologist and I didn’t like his tone. “I can’t dictate what my clients do with their time,” I said.
“It’s your office. I would think you could.”
So that’s the way it was. My brother Pete and I used to have spitting contests. I had been declared the indisputable winner. But perhaps spitting wouldn’t be appropriate here. Just a stare-down, then. “You can think anything you want, Lieutenant . . .”
“Rivera.”
“We weren’t lovers, Mr. Raver.”
Something like a grin appeared on his face, or maybe he was just curling a lip as he sized up his prey. There was a shallow scar at the right corner of his mouth. Maybe that’s why his expression looked more like a predatory snarl than a smile. The romance novelists would have called it sardonic. I didn’t read romance anymore. Now I was studying Tolstoy and thinking deep thoughts. Mostly I was thinking of giving up reading.
“What was he doing here after hours with no one else in the office?” Rivera asked.
“Elaine had a yoga class.”
“Did she?” he asked, and I wondered if he actually saw some significance in my blathering. “There’s a stain on your blouse, Ms. McMullen. Is it blood?”
“No.” I had never had a stain that fascinated people to such an extraordinary extent. “Why would you think—”
“What was he doing here?”
I felt breathless. As if I’d run a long way. I don’t like to run a long way. I’d tried it on more than one occasion. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, in fact, if you call three miles a long way. I do. “What?” I said, struggling with the fog that threatened to engulf the interior of my cranium.
“Lover boy.” He nodded toward Bomstad’s body. “Why was he here?”
“For therapy,” I replied, “like all my clients.”
Two more men and one woman had joined the mob by the corpse. One of the men squatted by the body, suit crumpled, pen and clipboard in hand.
“What were you seeing him for?”
The fellow with the clipboard reached for Bomstad with his pen.
I jerked my attention back to Dark Man and raised my chin. I was pretty sure I looked like Hester Prynne. A first-rat
e martyr, but I felt a little faint. “Impotence,” I said.
“Hey.” The suited fellow’s voice was loud enough to wake the dead. Almost. “Looky here. He’s got a woody.”
Rivera’s eyes burned. I could almost meet them. “Damn, you’re good,” he said and my knees buckled.
I woke up in my own bed. I didn’t remember much about getting there. My head felt fuzzy and my stomach queasy. It took a minute for the memories to come rolling back into my brain. It was a dream. A bad dream, I told myself. But I’m nothing if not a realist. Which was what had convinced me to become a therapist in the first place. After years of depraved dating it had become apparent that all men are psychopaths. Therefore half the population needs professional attention. It was bound to be a lucrative field, and easy.
How many times could I be wrong?
I shut my eyes, trying to block out the previous night, but a dead body with a hard-on pretty much etches itself into one’s memory. A noise distracted me and I rolled over, listening. My doorbell rang, making me wonder foggily if that was what had awakened me in the first place.
Questions rolled around in my head like BBs in a walnut shell but I fought off my bedsheets and staggered toward the door. It took me a minute to realize I was still wearing one shoe. It was a Ferragamo and matched my skirt. My jacket and blouse, however, were gone. I stopped dead in the middle of the floor. The doorbell rang again, drawing my gaze up from my not quite willowy body.
“Who is it?” I asked.
“Police.”
A dozen thoughts garbled through me. Not one could be voiced in polite company.
“Just a minute,” I yelled and plucking off my shoe, staggered back to my bedroom for a shirt. But once there I merely gazed around in disjointed uncertainty. I’m tidy enough, but I don’t like to be obsessive about it. I’d thrown my robe over the foot rail of my bed and left my horoscope beside it before galloping off to work on Thursday morning. I was an Aquarius and yesterday was predicted to be my lucky day.
I dragged on the robe. Classy, it was not. Nor did it exactly match my rumpled skirt or the irritably discarded shoe that still dangled from my fingertips.