“I do believe you can,” declared the psychiatrist.
With a little nod, Karen stood up. “Thank you for listening,” she said sincerely. “I can’t tell you how much it’s helped.”
And it had. By sharing her pain, she had lightened its load. By letting the ugliness out of the dark, she knew she could begin to put the excruciating episode into some sort of perspective.
“What will you do?” Natalie asked.
“I’m going to take your advice,” Karen replied. “I’m going to tell Ted.”
“And then what?”
Karen shrugged. “We’ll see,” she said.
It was after midnight when Karen let herself back into the house, but Ted was still awake, sitting patiently at the breakfast-room table with a fresh pot of tea ready.
“I waited up,” he said simply, “in case you wanted to talk.”
“I do,” Karen responded, sitting down across from him.
He poured tea for both of them, adding the dollop of honey he knew she liked in hers. Then he wrapped his hands around his cup and waited for whatever was to come.
Half an hour later, they were both drained.
“I should have told you long ago,” she said, “and I’ve felt guilty all these years for deceiving you. But I knew you’d never have married me if you’d known. So I let myself behave very selfishly and kept it from you.” She stared at the bottom of her teacup. “If you want that divorce now, I won’t blame you.”
Instead, he came around to sit beside her. “I guess I can’t honestly say how I would have felt back then,” he said slowly. “But I don’t think it would have been much different than I feel right now, which is appalled and devastated and outraged—but not at you. Never at you.”
“Really?” she breathed.
“Despite what the police or your parents or Peter might have thought, I know you well enough to know that you could never have been to blame for what that man did to you.”
She blinked as though she hadn’t heard properly. “You honestly mean that?”
He put his arm around her and drew her against him. “Of course I do. I guess, on some level, I always knew there was more to it than an automobile accident, because the scars on the inside always seemed so much deeper than the ones on the outside.”
“You could see that?”
He nodded. “You shouldn’t have had to live with this all alone for so long,” he said. “But at least you won’t have to anymore. You’ve got Natalie to help you now, and I trust her. And you’ve got me to support you in any way I can. If you want, I’ll even go out and kill the bastard for you.”
“No,” she murmured with a little smile. “I don’t want that.”
“Whatever it takes for you to work through all this, just know that I’m right here with a shoulder to lean on or cry on, or anything else you need or want.”
They made their way upstairs, into the peach-and-aqua master suite, where they undressed in the dark and got into Karen’s bed and held each other as tight as they could.
“You’re safe now,” he murmured into her sweet-smelling hair. “I’ll never let anyone hurt you again.”
four
Janice Evans hurried down Front Street in the November sunshine, on her way to the Willmont campaign head quarters.
The newly announced presidential candidate and his entourage had been in town for little more than a week and already they had everything organized. Mary Catherine had telephoned her at eight-thirty.
“The senator has agreed to an interview,” she said. “But he wants to make it very clear that he intends to choose the topics.”
“Agreed,” Janice replied. “I can be there in an hour.”
“The senator can see you at eleven,” Mary Catherine informed her.
The pretty blond reporter had come a long way since the day when, as a fledgling staff member of a local television station, she had stuck her microphone in the face of a congressman at San Francisco Airport, and much of her success was directly attributable to the exposure she had received from covering his subsequent campaign.
During his numerous forays up and down the state, Robert had used her as his official press-pool representative—and his unofficial bed companion. He would feed her information that she would then dutifully share with the rest of the media.
The networks got to see a lot of the attractive, well-spoken, well-informed journalist, and liked what they saw. When the campaign ended, Janice was brought to New York as a background reporter for one of the major television news-talk programs. Today, she was one of a quartet of rotating hosts on the show and had earned the respect of her colleagues.
She had kept her figure, but her blond hair now received a lemon rinse every month to hold its highlights. The laugh lines around her mouth and eyes, which used to come and go, now came and stayed, and she found herself using heavier makeup to keep her complexion looking fresh and clean. She was thirty-six years old.
“When I’m elected President,” the newly elected senator promised, “the job of press secretary is yours, if you want it.”
“I want it,” she said.
Janice Evans had developed into more than just a pretty, if somewhat hardened, face. She was also articulate and single-mindedly dedicated. She would eventually have risen to the top of her profession even had she not gone to bed with Robert Willmont, but the shortcut certainly hadn’t hurt. They were two of a kind, the journalist and the politician, and they used each other, with total understanding, at every opportunity.
“Janice Evans to see the senator,” she said when she reached the twelfth floor.
“Is he expecting you, Miss Evans?” a striking African-American receptionist asked with a polite smile.
“I believe he is.”
“Just a moment, please,” the woman said, reaching for the telephone.
The one thing they had each insisted on was discretion. Public knowledge of their relationship would have ruined them both. Janice suspected that Randy Neuburg and Mary Catherine O’Malley knew what was going on, but if they did, it went no further than that. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, she was just another newswoman covering a story.
“I have an idea I’d like to pursue,” she said to her producer on the fifteenth of October. “I think Robert Willmont is going to be our next President, and I’d like to do an in-depth segment on him. You know, give the public an advance peek inside the man.”
“What makes you think he’s even going to run?”
“Come on,” she admonished. “I’ve been on his trail for ten years. I know his organization. They’re gearing up.”
“Well,” the producer said, unconvinced, “we’ll see.”
On October 25, he stopped by her office. “That idea you had about Robert Willmont,” he said. “It’s a go.”
Janice hid a smug grin. “Do I get a free hand?”
“If it’s quality.”
“Have I ever given you anything but?”
“No,” the producer had to admit. “You haven’t.”
It was true. Janice had an uncanny nose for news and a discriminating eye. Her results were frequently fascinating, occasionally explosive, but always in good taste.
“The senator will see you now, Miss Evans,” the receptionist said cordially, turning from the telephone.
“Hi there, beautiful,” Robert beamed as soon as they were alone. “How’s New York?”
“Getting chilly.”
“Well, if you lock that door, I’ll do what I can to warm you up. God, I’ve missed you. Randy’s had me living like a monk for months.”
Janice chuckled. “If the press could hear you now.”
Robert sighed. “I liked it better when the press knew its place. Or at least when reporters recognized that a man’s sex life has nothing to do with his ability to run the country.”
Sex for Robert, while admittedly more pleasurable, was as fundamental as feeding or relieving himself. When he was hungry, he ate, and he wasn’t p
articular what food was put before him. When his bladder was full, he emptied it, and it didn’t matter whose bathroom he used. And when his libido swelled, he thought nothing of turning to whatever acolyte was at hand. And there were always many. Even the reality of AIDS failed to curtail Robert’s appetite. The past few months under Randy’s watchful eye had been pure hell.
“Well, if you’re in real need,” Janice said, “I’ll be home later on tonight.”
She had kept her Cow Hollow flat, well aware that, in the media business, nothing was permanent.
“Unfortunately,” the senator replied with a grimace, “so will I.”
“In that case …” Janice reached back and snapped the lock on the office door.
Randy perched on the corner of Mary Catherine’s desk and glanced at his wristwatch. “What time did she come in?”
“About eleven,” the administrative assistant replied. “They skipped lunch.”
“Jeez, it’s two-thirty,” Randy groaned. “You’d think he’d have more sense. Going at it in his office, for God’s sake, where anyone can breeze right in.”
“They locked the door.”
“Doesn’t he have an appointment or something this afternoon?”
Mary Catherine shook her head. “Time was supposed to be here at three, but the photographer got stuck in Chicago, so they rescheduled for tomorrow.”
“How much longer, do you think? The Chronicle wants a comment on the Yugoslavia sanctions, and ABC wants a statement on the bombing in Beirut.”
“Considering how long you’ve had him on the straight and narrow”—Mary Catherine shrugged—”another hour or two.”
“And it’s only November,” sighed Randy.
five
Karen stepped out of the Jacuzzi that Ted had installed in the master bath as part of remodeling the St. Francis Wood house and began to towel herself dry. She normally used the tub in the evenings, to relax before going to bed, but had chosen to take advantage of it this morning.
On Natalie’s advice, she had thought long and hard about the unique opportunity that fate had given her. Once she calmed down, she could see that the psychiatrist was right— murdering Robert Willmont might provide a momentary pleasure, even a genuine sense of satisfaction, but not much else, and she had no intention of settling for that.
“What will you do?” Ted asked.
“I don’t know,” she replied honestly. “I don’t know what I can do.”
But she knew she would do something. The feelings she had buried for so long could no longer be denied.
It was ironic to think she might have heard or read his name many times, might even have seen a newspaper photograph of him, and it would have meant nothing to her. It wasn’t so unreasonable—she hadn’t been looking for him. Rather, she had stuffed the image of him down inside of her where, over time, he became less and less of a man and more and more of a monster. It was one of the techniques she had developed to cope with the guilt and the shame and the loss.
As much as she had hoped, during the long years of recuperating, reevaluating and refocusing, that he would come to some agonizing end, as all monsters should, she now came to realize that what she really wanted, even more than his destruction, was vindication for herself. She wanted the whole world to know exactly what he was—underneath the slick facade, behind the dazzling aquamarine eyes—and she knew that nothing less than exposing him in some horribly humiliating way would satisfy her.
Her plan was ridiculously simple. She would seek him out, in a public forum, where there were bound to be members of the media interested in a juicy story. They would be able to tell, the moment they saw the shock on his face when she confronted him, that she was speaking the truth. He might live, but he would be politically ruined. And he would never be President of the United States.
The forum she picked was an early-December ceremony in Golden Gate Park where the senator was scheduled to preside at the groundbreaking for the Natural History Museum’s new Drayton Pavilion. In addition to social and political VIPs, the press would be there in full force, hoping to persuade the candidate to make a few off-the-cuff comments that would play well on the evening news. It was a perfect setting.
Karen tucked her towel around her and leaned over the sink to brush her teeth, but the terry cloth slipped and dropped to the floor. She stared at herself in the mirror. In two months, she would be fifty years old, half a century, and she was pleased to note that she had not yet succumbed to middle-age sag. Her figure had retained its slenderness and regular exercise kept her muscles toned. Once clothed, the disfiguring scars could not be seen. Her skin was still good and a trip to the beauty salon every six weeks removed the gray in her dark hair. With just a modicum of makeup, she knew she could pass for thirty-five.
She slipped into a winter-white turtleneck, matching stirrup pants, and a red-white-and-black tweed raw silk jacket. Win ter-white pumps and a pair of Felicity’s chunky gold earrings and matching bracelet finished the outfit. She brushed her hair off her face, catching the shoulder-length curls with a black velvet bow at the nape of her neck.
The ceremony was scheduled for two o’clock. Just after noon, Karen drove her Volvo wagon into Golden Gate Park and down John F. Kennedy Drive, stopping a block and a half from the museum. Traffic-control barricades had already been put in place, personnel in mobile television vans were setting up their equipment, and the area was beginning to fill with curious onlookers who sensed the makings of a media event.
It was one of those magnificent winter days for which San Francisco had long been famous—sunny, windless, and sixty-five degrees. Karen melted into the crowd that milled around the area and waited.
At five minutes before two, a pair of motorcycles with lights flashing led a convoy of limousines into the parking lot that flanked the main concourse and fronted the five museums that shared this section of the park.
The crowd, which had swelled to over a thousand, pushed forward, taking Karen along with it. She was perhaps twenty feet away when he stepped out of the second limousine, and in the first instant of actually seeing him, she thought she might faint. It was only the people pressing against her for a glimpse of the candidate that kept her upright.
The other limousines were emptying now and the party of some thirty dignitaries, surrounded by reporters, television cameramen and still photographers, was making its way to the bandstand at the far end of the concourse.
The new mayor was there, along with several members of the board of supervisors and a fair selection of the city’s most prominent personalities, but Karen didn’t recognize anyone. She barely even looked at them, so focused was she on the self-assured man with the memorable eyes.
She paid no attention to the overblown speeches that honored the Drayton dynasty. She simply waited for the right moment, the brief lull that was bound to come, when she would step forward and face him. She had it all very carefully rehearsed—every word, every move.
“Hello, Bob,” she would say, planting herself in his path. “You remember me, don’t you—and what you did to me? Of course you do. I can see it in your eyes, and now so will the rest of the world. They’re known as the Drayton eyes, aren’t they? Well, the Draytons should have gouged them out the day you were born. You raped me, you beat me, and you left me for dead all those years ago, without so much as a second thought. And now you think the people of this country should elect you President of the United States?”
The moment came and almost went before she recognized it. The speeches were over, the group of dignitaries was moving away from the bandstand toward the museum for the symbolic shovel of dirt. As expected, reporters were shouting out their questions.
“What do you think about the Sununu resignation?” one called.
“Come now, Dave,” the senator admonished the newsman. “We’re here today for something that has nothing to do with politics.”
“Everything you do between now and next November has to do with politics, Senator,” the
newsman replied.
The candidate grinned. “In that case, Mr. Sununu was merely the first of the rats to desert a sinking ship.”
“How about the Keating verdict?” another asked.
“If they put him in jail and destroyed the key, it wouldn’t make up for what he’s done,” Robert replied.
“And the Kennedy Smith trial?”
“No comment.”
“Thank you, ladies and gentlemen,” a redheaded man who looked like a dwarf beside the candidate said smoothly. “The senator would now like to get back to the purpose at hand, the groundbreaking for the Drayton Pavilion.”
He put his hand on Robert Willmont’s arm to guide him through the crowd. But Karen Doniger stood in the way. She stared up at the monster who had invaded her dreams for so many years and opened her mouth to say the words that would damn him to eternity. But he looked right at her, from less than two feet away, with a polite smile that held not so much as a flicker of recognition.
She had taken him by surprise, leaving him no time to prepare. He could not possibly have been that good an actor—he didn’t know who she was.
In the seconds it took for that to register on her, he moved on past, the crowd surging after him. Stunned, she dug her heels into the grass and stayed where she was. The moment was gone, she would have to find another.
Karen turned and hurried away, not looking back and not pausing until she reached her car. With shaking hands, she unlocked the door and scrambled behind the wheel, started up the engine and sped off, coming out of the park onto the Great Highway, which ran along the Pacific Ocean.
She parked the car and, kicking off her shoes, walked along the beach. It was low tide and the soggy sand curled beneath her weight. She went down to the water’s edge and stood there, staring out into the depths, as the frigid foam lapped around her feet and sucked the coarse brown granules from beneath her stockinged toes.
Finally, she went back up the beach and dropped down on the dry sand. Her head was spinning. It was inconceivable to her that the horror which had etched itself like acid into her very core meant so little to him that he wouldn’t even remember her—that the most catastrophic episode of her life was nothing more than a minor encounter he had long since forgotten. Of all the scenarios she had conceived, this had not been among them.
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