Unzipped

by Lois Greiman

  It growled at me—something it did when the weather was unfavorable, or when I turned it on.

  My search for information about Stephanie Meyers was more successful than most I’d tried. Despite her death, or maybe because of it, her photos were everywhere. I stared at the pictures on my screen. She was young, trim, and beautiful. One would think that would be enough. But there was more. It wasn’t just that she was sexy, though she certainly was that. There was something about her expressions. She always looked as though she knew secrets you weren’t privy to, but that she might be willing to share the fun if the spirit moved her. She oozed seduction.

  Rivera had implied they knew each other socially. Had it been more than that? Had they shared a common bond? Had they shared a bed? Not that I cared on a personal level, but certainly it would have a bearing on how he treated the case. Wouldn’t it?

  I dug a little deeper and found a plethora of information regarding Ms. Meyers, most of which was completely useless. After an hour and a half I gave up and flopped onto my bed. I fell asleep before I came up with the cure for cancer, but by morning I had an idea. I chewed some coffee beans on the drive to work and fantasized about the chocolate volcano I had shared with Miguel Rodriguez. Actually, he hadn’t eaten his share, bless his Latino soul. Spanish men, it is said, know the way to a woman’s heart. I just hadn’t realized they knew it involved large doses of chocolate and cream cheese.

  Two clients and three cups of coffee later I got a chance to leave a message with Dr. David’s secretary.

  In some obscure piece of literature I had noticed that Stephanie Meyers had spent time in a rehabilitation center called Hope Everlasting. It was a facility I remembered David speaking of, and since I had nowhere else to go, I had contacted him for information.

  It was good to hear his voice when he returned my call.

  “I’ve been meaning to get in touch with you,” he said. “How are things going?”

  “Good.” It was a knee-jerk response. I’d been trained from infancy to give a polite answer, and barring decapitation, would probably always do just that.

  But it seemed like I failed to fool him, because he insisted we meet so that I could talk.

  C hrissy.” David must have seen me coming even before I entered the restaurant, because he hugged me as soon as I got through the door. “How are you holding up?” He stepped back to hold me at arm’s length. There was something about his voice or his touch or his presence that made me want to curl up in his lap and confess everything. If I was his patient I would have brought a box of tissues and a pillow to every session. If I was his basset hound I would have died happy.

  “I’m fine. Really,” I said. “Thanks for meeting with me.”

  “Of course.” He touched my back as we followed the host to a deep-seated booth. I had always liked the way men touch women’s backs as they escort them along—a tender mix of possessiveness and consideration. For a moment I pretended we were together. Me and the classy guy with the great wardrobe and skyrocket IQ.

  “How are things, really?” he asked.

  I thought of lying again, but I was sure he would know the truth. David would always know. “Not great.”

  “Tell me.”

  I gave him the short version, adding that the board of psychology was at least temporarily off my back.

  He was shaking his head when I finished. Again. “But this Lieutenant Rivera still suspects you?”

  “I don’t know.” I felt more relaxed than I had in a long while. Maybe it was due to David’s presence, but then again, maybe it was the booze. I’d ordered a Cosmopolitan because it seemed classier than a hot mint sundae with cashews and extra whipped cream. “I’m just . . .” I took a sip of the drink. It wasn’t ice cream but it would do in a pinch. “Sometimes I think I’m going crazy.”

  He smiled at me and leaned across the table. “You’re not.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Absolutely.”

  I sighed. “Then it must be the rest of the world.”

  “Now, that,” he said with a nod, “is entirely possible.”

  I sipped again. He lifted his hand, motioning the waitress for another, one for himself and one for me. “Is there any point to it?” I asked. Alcohol tended to make me introspective . . . and prematurely drunk. Probably because of my minuscule weight. “Therapy, I mean.”

  He held my gaze. “I don’t know.”

  I straightened, shocked to consider, for the first time, that Dr. David might be human, just like the rest of us?

  “It seems like a giant scam sometimes, doesn’t it?” he asked. “As if we’re just taking their money for no earthly reason?”

  I tried to formulate a response. Nothing came to mind.

  He chuckled a little, but his eyes looked tired. “Forgive me. I have a client . . .” He paused and cleared his throat. “A young woman tried to commit suicide today.”

  “Oh, no. David, I’m so sorry,” I said and felt like wrapping him in my arms. “I didn’t know,” I said, “or I wouldn’t have called you. You probably want to be at home.”

  He shook his head and ran a finger around the edge of his glass. “Kathryn knows I need time with my colleagues.”

  So she was gorgeous and understanding. I hated her more with each passing moment. “She seems very nice,” I said.

  “She’s a wonderful woman. Beautiful, intelligent, warm.” He drank and then laughed at himself. “I’m sorry. We came here so you could talk.”

  “No. Please.” Pour lemon juice on my paper cuts. “Go on.”

  “Suffice it to say, I’m a lucky man,” he said and, reaching across the table, took my hand in his. “She’s completely secure. No issues about my meeting an attractive associate for dinner. What did you want to talk about, Chrissy?”

  Attractive? I thought dizzily. “I just . . .” Why had I come? My world felt a little crumbly under my feet. Dr. David thought I was attractive. Wow. “I read somewhere that Stephanie Meyers spent time at Hope Everlasting.”

  Our meals arrived. He turned his plate just so, thanked the waitress, and gave me a nod to continue.

  “I know you sometimes recommend that particular facility, and I was just wondering if you had heard anything about her case.”

  He sat back, ignoring his steak for a minute. If I had ordered a steak it would have been gone before it had left the waiter’s hand. And maybe the hand would be forfeit as well. But I had ordered the mandarin salad. The waiter was safe.

  “Stephanie Meyers,” he said. “The actress.”

  I explained things to him, how Rivera was investigating both deaths, how I thought he might believe they were somehow interconnected. How he seemed to blame me. . . .

  “So I thought . . .” I took a sip of my drink, washing down a water chestnut. Yum. Those Asians really know how to eat. Maybe that’s why they’re the approximate width of my eyeteeth. “I thought you might know who had been counseling Ms. Meyers.” I gave him a hopeful smile, mostly hoping there was no spinach in my teeth.

  “I’m not sure if I can help you,” he said. “Considering the necessary confidentiality.”

  “I understand the difficulties, of course,” I said. “But she’s been dead for nearly a year now.” I played with a radish that had been cut to look like a rose. It didn’t seem any more appetizing as a flower than it would have as a vegetable.

  “Ten months,” David corrected.

  “What?” I abandoned the radish.

  He sighed, letting his shoulders droop, and suddenly he looked entirely his age. “She was my client, Chrissy.”

  “Your . . . Really?”

  He smiled, but the expression was faded. “For more than a year.”

  “I didn’t . . . I’m sorry. I had no idea. I didn’t mean to bring up more painful memories.”

  He shook his head and pushed his steak aside. “The media . . .” He sighed and picked up his Scotch. “They always portrayed her as a sex kitten. And God knows she was lovely. But . . .”
He scowled at his drink, but didn’t seem to see it. “She was so much more,” he said, and I wondered suddenly if he had been a little in love with her, too. “Fragile. Insightful. Funny.”

  “Please forgive—”

  He stopped me with a wave of his hand and sipped his drink. I followed suit. If there was ever a time to get drunk, this was at the top of the damned list.

  “It was a difficult time, knowing I should have done more, thinking that if I had tried this or that things might have been different. But I’m glad now that I didn’t give up my practice.”

  I stared at him, trying to keep my world from spinning out of control. “You were thinking of quitting?”

  He smiled. I suppose I looked like a slack-jawed doofus, but it seemed as though a god had trembled. It was said he had counseled Alec Baldwin. I’d give my second virginity to meet Alec Baldwin.

  “It was a low point in my career.”

  “You should have told me. I would have . . .” What? Sent ice cream and fed him in bed. “. . . liked to help.”

  “Thank you. But in the end, I think it was something I had to work out on my own. Still, it was . . . well, it was painful,” he said. “The loss of someone so young and vivacious. But if I’m honest . . . if I’m really truthful . . .” He leaned across the table and his gaze, earnest and hurting, bored into mine. “You know what bothers me the most?”

  I shook my head, stunned by a dozen revelations, not least of all the idea that he was sharing secrets with a girl who had once dared her cousin to pee on his electric fence. My excursions to my uncle’s farm had always been a barrel of laughs—and some shock therapy.

  “The fact that I don’t know what hurt more—her death or my failure,” he said and finished his drink.

  “Failure. You can’t believe you—” I began, but he interrupted me.

  “I was in Seattle when she overdosed. Speaking at a convention with my peers.” He closed his eyes for a moment. “Being important.”

  “You couldn’t possibly have known she planned to kill herself.”

  He was silent for a moment, then, “She called my office that evening.” He paused and drew a slow, steady breath. “But I didn’t check my messages until late that night. I called her from my hotel room, just to make sure she was all right, but there was no answer.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “I assumed she’d just gone out. She had a thousand friends. Everyone wanted to know her—from busboys to billionaires. Some of them were a bit . . . unsavory maybe. But still, I didn’t think . . .”

  He shook his head. I couldn’t come up with anything helpful to say. But “life sucks” came to mind.

  “Well, that’s just it, isn’t it?” he said, his voice quiet. “I didn’t think.” He sipped his drink. “Not about anything but my own self importance.”

  I felt stunned and empty. The words “I’m sorry,” seemed sadly inadequate, but I tried them again anyway.

  He gave me a weary smile. “Well,” he said, “I was expecting this to be a cathartic meeting. I just didn’t expect me to be the one to purge.” His smile lifted into a shadow of true amusement. “You’re a hell of a therapist, Ms. McMullen.”

  I t was nearly ten o’clock when he pulled his Mercedes up to the curb beside my house. I was grateful for the darkness. If he had seen my yard I would have had to fake an out-of-body experience and babble on about my life as an Abyssinian in Egypt.

  As it was, my security light had burned out three days ago and I had failed to replace it. Good planning on my part.

  He walked me to the door in utter darkness. Or, more correctly, he walked while I tottered. I’m afraid I may have overimbibed. Okay, truth is, I was drunk as an Irishman. But then, I’m part Irish.

  I smiled at him from my stoop. I imagined myself as seductive yet classy. But my perceptions might have been a bit skewed, because on the following morning I found dried leaves stuck to my blouse, which meant either my wardrobe needed weeding or I had stumbled into my withered tea roses.

  “You didn’t have to drive me home, David,” I said, finding my footing with graceful aplomb.

  He grasped my elbow and steadied me. “I think I did,” he said, and smiled as he stepped close for added support. “Besides, I appreciate you listening to me whine.”

  “You didn’t whine,” I said, but my words may have been a little breathless. He was standing pretty close, and even though I knew I was zonkered I didn’t think I was misreading his signals.

  “You’re a kind woman, Chrissy, and a beautiful one.”

  Really? I felt wobbly and very near tears, but I kept my mouth shut. If there’s one thing I had learned from my brothers, the cretin three, it was to keep quiet when inebriated. Almost anyone can seem intelligent if he’s silent long enough.

  “I’m sorry for the trouble you’ve been through,” he said. “But it’ll blow over.”

  “Will it?”

  “Certainly. You’re entirely innocent. The LAPD will figure that out eventually. And your life will return to normal.” He pushed a tendril of hair behind my ear. I’d aimed for a sophisticated business look that evening. But sometimes my hair forgets its mission.

  “Normal.” I think I laughed, but I hope I didn’t, because I tend to snort when I’m drunk and/or amused. “Is that a good thing?”

  He took my hand in his. His fingers felt warm and gentle. “Isn’t it?” he asked.

  “I don’t know.” My eyes felt a little watery, and I’m afraid I may have forgotten the only worthwhile lesson my idiot brothers had ever taught me. I felt lonely suddenly, and hideously vulnerable. “This deal with Bomstad.” I swallowed. “It’s been tough. I mean, he’s put me through hell, and yet, when I think of him I remember . . . Well, you know, he was so . . .”

  “Accomplished?” he finished. “Well spoken?”

  “Hot,” I said and he laughed.

  “You can’t blame yourself for being attracted to him,” he said. “You’re flesh and blood.”

  “But he turned out to be such a . . . turd.” I knew even then that I should have thought of a more sophisticated term, but hell, if Bomstad wasn’t a turd, no one was. “I’m a trained professional. And I still can’t judge men.”

  “I think you’re a pretty good judge, Chrissy.”

  I shook my head and managed not to fall off my feet.

  “You like me, don’t you?”

  I gazed up at him and resisted the urge to drool. He smiled and cupped my cheek. I tried not to lean in like a harp seal at feeding time.

  And then a door slammed. I jerked. David turned. Someone was striding up my driveway. I squinted through the darkness.

  “Rivera?” I asked, but when he spoke there was little room for doubt. His voice was as soothing as sandpaper.

  “We need to talk,” he said.

  His tone set off a dozen warring emotions. I’m pretty sure the predominant one was anger. After all, he had no right invading my privacy at such unorthodox hours. But sometimes it’s hard to tell mind-numbing fear from outrage.

  “Lieutenant Rivera,” David said. “I’m Dr.—”

  “I remember you,” Rivera said.

  “You know each other?” I asked, trying to catch up.

  “A little late for a consultation, isn’t it, Doc?” Rivera said.

  “I was about to say the same thing,” David countered. “What do you want with Chrissy?”

  Rivera turned his feral eyes on me. The corner of his mouth lifted. I could tell that much in the darkness. “That’s between Chrissy and me.”

  David straightened. “I believe you’ve harassed her enough, Lieutenant.”

  “How do you know each other?” I asked.

  “Really?” Rivera ignored me as he stepped onto the stoop. I considered saying something clever like “This stoop isn’t big enough for the three of us.” But in retrospect I’m pretty glad I didn’t. “Because I don’t think I’ve harassed her nearly enough.”

  “She doesn’t need to speak to you,�
� David said. “Not without legal representation.”

  Rivera barked a laugh. “Why the hell would she need legal representation? Unless she’s guilty of something.”

  “If I were you, Lieutenant, I’d be careful about throwing around false accusations.”

  “False accusations,” Rivera scoffed. “Cozy as you two look here, I guess she didn’t tell you about her late-night excursion to the Bomb’s—”

  “How the hell do you two know each other?” I almost shouted the words. They turned toward me in tandem, as if they’d only just noticed my existence.

  “Didn’t he tell you?” Rivera asked. “Your Dr. David here was Stephanie’s psychiatrist.”

  “I didn’t cause her death,” David said. “Just as Chrissy had nothing to do with Mr. Bomstad’s demise. If you were capable of doing your job, Lieutenant, you’d know that.”

  “And if you’d done your job, Stephanie would still be alive,” Rivera said and stepped closer to David. They squared off like a pair of Cousin Kevin’s roosters.

  “Back off, both of you,” I said, and stepped into the fray before it became unraveled beyond recognition. “David.” I turned toward him, feeling hideously sober, but a little sick to my stomach. “Thank you for coming to my defense, but I’d best speak to Lieutenant . . .” I was tempted almost beyond control to screw up his name, but it seems my consuming desire to appear mature in David’s eyes won out. “Rivera.”

  David calmed himself with no visible effort and took my hand gently in his. “I’ll stay if you like.”

  “No.” I gave his fingers a squeeze for the gallant gesture. “But thank you.”

  He turned toward Rivera. “Hurt Chrissy,” he said, “and you’ll be out sweeping streets for the city of Santa Monica. I don’t care who your father is.”

  I stared after him wide-eyed as he strode down my tilted walkway, and I think in some inebriated corner of my mind, I actually thought the words “my hero.” But a moment later his Mercedes purred to life, and I was left alone with Lieutenant Laugh-a-Lot.

  23

  There is no surer road to perdition than to let your glands dictate your direction.