The Helper cd-2

by David Jackson

  An hour later he sees Cesario heading toward his office. Cesario glances across, as if to say, Ready when you are, Doyle. Whenever you feel like unburdening yourself. .

  Doyle starts to rise from his chair, ready to pursue Cesario. He hasn’t rehearsed this. Doesn’t know exactly what he’s going to say. The only thing he does know is that he’s about to be crucified for revealing the truth at such a late stage. But it has to be worth it. If it might improve the chances of saving somebody’s life, does he really have any alternative?

  The phone on his desk rings. He looks at it, trying to decide whether to answer it or to follow through with his decision to see Cesario. Out of the corner of his eye he notices another cop looking at him, wondering why he’s hesitating.

  He sits down again, answers the phone.

  ‘Doyle.’

  ‘Cal? It’s Marcus, downstairs. I got someone here says he wants to see you. Won’t say what his business is, though. Won’t give his name neither.’

  Marcus Wilson is the desk sergeant. The station house’s huge black gatekeeper. Three months after Doyle arrived at the Eighth, Wilson took over the desk from the previous sergeant — a man named Hanrahan. Whereas Hanrahan didn’t even notice half the people who walked past him, Wilson rapidly gained a reputation as a man who was not beyond making visitors strip naked if he thought it was necessary to get them to prove they were harmless.

  ‘What’s he look like?’ Doyle asks.

  ‘Geeky-looking kid with red hair and a squeaky voice. Acts like something’s missing upstairs, if you know what I mean.’

  Shit, thinks Doyle. What the. .

  ‘Keep him there. I’ll be right down.’

  Doyle ends the call and heads for the stairs. Cesario will have to wait.

  When he gets down to the first floor, Wilson looks at him, then directs his gaze toward the waiting zone opposite his desk. Gonzo is sitting between two doped-up hookers and looking petrified that he’s about to have his virginity snatched away from him. He holds a black cloth bag firmly on his lap, as though using it as a groin shield.

  Doyle beckons him over with his finger. As Gonzo gets up, one of the hookers pinches his ass, and he scampers across for Doyle’s protection.

  ‘Outside,’ says Doyle.

  ‘But-’

  ‘Outside.’

  They exit through the large double doors of the station house, Gonzo now clutching the bag tightly under one arm. Doyle takes him by the sleeve and drags him along the street.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Doyle demands.

  ‘What do you mean? And where are we going?’

  ‘I said not to come here. I said to call me on my cell.’

  ‘No. No you didn’t. You said your cell number was the only one I should use if I wanted to phone you, but that I shouldn’t phone you on the precinct number. You didn’t say anything about making personal visits. I have a good memory for things like that.’

  Doyle stops and spins Gonzo to face him.

  ‘Did you have to take it so literally? Wasn’t there a small part of that gargantuan brain of yours that said, Hey, maybe that means he wants to keep this under wraps?’

  Gonzo blinks at him. ‘Why would you want to keep it quiet? This is a homicide investigation. You never said it was a homicide. Does Lonnie know about this?’

  Doyle stares back at Gonzo for several seconds. He brings his hand out of his pocket in a sudden move that causes Gonzo to flinch. In his hand is the key to his car.

  ‘Get in.’

  Doyle opens up the car, and they both clamber inside. Doyle doesn’t start the engine.

  He says, ‘How do you know it’s a homicide?’

  ‘This computer belongs to Cindy Mellish. Her name is in lots of her files on here. She’s the same Cindy Mellish who worked in that bookstore, right?’

  ‘Maybe,’ says Doyle. He thinks about it for a while. Realizes he has to admit at least something if this conversation is to go anywhere. ‘Okay, yes. The computer belongs to the homicide victim from the bookstore. Happy now?’

  Gonzo pushes his glasses up his nose. ‘I don’t get it.’

  ‘Get what?’

  ‘This. The cloak and dagger stuff. I mean, it’s really cool and everything, but-’

  ‘Wait! Wait a minute. Cool? Why is it cool?’

  ‘Well. . it’s exciting. Working with you like this. I don’t normally get to-’

  ‘Gonzo! Hold on. We are not working together, okay? I’m not looking to set up some kind of long-term relationship here. I just asked you to do a little job for me. That’s it. End of story.’

  Gonzo looks crestfallen. Like he’s just had his favorite toy snatched away.

  Doyle adopts a more mellow tone. ‘Look, it’s complicated. Don’t ask me to explain. There are things happening on this case that I can’t tell anyone about. It’ll all come out eventually, but right now it has to be kept quiet.’

  ‘A secret,’ Gonzo says.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Just between us.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I won’t tell anyone.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Does Lonnie know?’

  ‘No, not even Lonnie knows about this.’

  ‘Just you and me.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Wow.’

  Gonzo sits there nodding and smiling and staring into space. This is the high point in his week. Maybe even in his whole sad life. It almost pains Doyle to break the spell.

  ‘So. .’ he prompts.

  Gonzo raises his face. ‘What?’

  ‘Did you find anything?’

  ‘Where?’

  Jesus, thinks Doyle, not for the first time.

  ‘On the computer?’

  It’s as if Gonzo suddenly realizes where he is and what he’s doing here.

  ‘Oh. Oh! The diary. What you asked me to look for.’

  ‘Yes. Did you find the diary?’

  Gonzo unzips his bag and starts rummaging around inside. ‘You are gonna love this. You are so gonna. .’

  ‘Gonzo.’

  ‘. . love this. I mean, when you see what. .’

  ‘Gonzo!’

  ‘. . I found on this baby, you will just. .’

  ‘GONZO! Did you find the freakin’ diary?’

  Gonzo pulls out a sheaf of paper and holds it up triumphantly. ‘I found it. It was hidden in her pictures folder and it was encrypted.’

  ‘It was what?’

  ‘Encrypted. It was in code. That’s what took me so long to get back to you. I had to break the encryption.’

  Doyle reaches out for the paper. ‘That’s fantastic, Gonzo. Good job.’

  Gonzo makes no attempt to hand over his document. ‘Don’t you want to know what’s in it?’

  ‘Well, I thought I’d just read it through and-’

  ‘It’s mostly crap. Girly stuff, you know?’ He gives Doyle a knowing wink, as if to lay claim to being a man of the world who knows all about girly stuff. ‘Most of it was written a while back, when she was with her boyfriend. What she thought about him. All that lovey-dovey stuff that makes you want to puke, you know?’

  ‘Okay, Gonzo. That’s great. So if I could just-’

  ‘And of course then he goes and dumps her, doesn’t he? That’s when she gets really emotional, and her whole universe is falling around her ears, and nobody loves her any more, and life isn’t worth living. I mean, puh-lease!’

  Doyle puts his fingers on the papers. ‘Maybe if I was to take a look at-’

  ‘But then there’s the therapist. And that’s when it gets interesting.’

  They both fall quiet. Each studies the other.

  Doyle lets his fingers drop from the printout. ‘Therapist? What therapist?’

  ‘A certain Dr Andrew Vasey. Likes to be called Andy, apparently. She gets depressed about her boyfriend, goes to see this guy, and-’

  ‘Wait a minute. She goes to see a shrink? She’s a college student. Her mom doesn’t look like she ever earned much
. How the hell does she afford to see a shrink?’

  ‘She can’t. It’s a favor. Cindy gets introduced to him by a friend at NYU. She gets talking to him, tells him her woes. Next thing you know, he’s offering to let her lie on his couch. He says it won’t cost her a cent. What he doesn’t tell her is that he’s got a different form of payment in mind.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Gonzo slaps the sheaf of paper. ‘It’s all in here. Guy was a lech. Kept asking her all sorts of weird sexual things. Then he sat real close to her and put his hand on her knee. She got out of there fast. It really freaked her out.’

  Doyle thinks about it. It’s strange, totally unprofessional behavior, all right, and he needs to check it out. But all the same, could this really be a precursor to murder?

  ‘Is that it?’

  ‘That, and the visit.’

  ‘What visit?’

  ‘When he came to see her. Ask me where.’

  Doyle is reminded of the way Norman Chin engages his audience. He wonders if all scientists have such an annoying habit.

  ‘Where?’

  Gonzo practically sings the next bit, which in his voice sounds comical. ‘In the bookstore.’

  Doyle finds himself sitting up straighter. ‘He saw her at the bookstore?’

  ‘Yup. Told her he was crazy about her. When she told him she wasn’t interested, he started getting frisky again. He even touched her on the. .’ Gonzo drops his voice to a whisper and circles a finger in the air close to his chest, ‘. . in the thoracic region.’

  ‘He fondled her breast?’

  Looking a little embarrassed, Gonzo clears his throat. ‘She slapped him then, and when he left he was really pissed. He told her she’d be seeing him again.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘Last November.’

  Doyle stares through the windshield for a minute, thinking that this changes everything. Vasey coming on strong, showing up at the bookstore, making inappropriate comments, then getting his face slapped and threatening a return encounter — well, that’s a disturbing progression if ever there was one.

  ‘Okay, Gonzo. You done good. Thanks.’

  ‘So this Vasey. We need to go see him, right? I mean, the way he’s been acting-’

  ‘Whoa! Did you say we?’

  ‘I looked him up. His practice is on Fifty-second and Fifth. I thought we-’

  ‘Gonzo! Watch my lips. It’s the same message I already gave you. I ain’t looking to do a duet with you.’

  ‘But if you’re working alone-’

  ‘Who says I’m working alone?’

  ‘Well, aren’t you? If you’re trying to keep this so quiet for whatever reason, then I guess-’

  ‘Yes, okay, I’m working solo. But for now it has to stay that way, all right? You did a great job, kid, but you’re not a cop. Your contribution ends here.’

  The disappointment on Gonzo’s face is so unmistakable it almost breaks Doyle’s heart.

  ‘Here,’ says Gonzo, pushing the printout toward Doyle. ‘You better take this.’

  Doyle accepts the document in silence. He has the feeling that anything he adds will only make Gonzo feel worse.

  ‘I better get back,’ says Gonzo. ‘I’m supposed to be on my lunch break.’

  Doyle watches him get out of the car. Before Gonzo closes the door, Doyle says to him, ‘Uhm, you forget something?’

  Gonzo peers into the car interior, then gives Doyle a blank look.

  ‘The computer?’

  ‘Oh. Oh yeah.’

  Gonzo digs the laptop out from his bag and passes it across to Doyle.

  ‘See you around,’ says Gonzo. ‘Good luck with the case.’

  ‘Yeah. Take it easy, kid.’

  Doyle watches in his rearview mirror as the nerdy young man heads down the street with a gait that makes it look as though his shoelaces are tied together.

  NINE

  Gonzo was right.

  The one thing which stands out from all the other entries in Cindy Mellish’s digital diary is the description of her encounters with Dr Andrew Vasey. Prior to that, the text is mostly made up of long flowery transcriptions of her thoughts about the beautiful, delectable, incredible Josh, followed by a series of interminably depressing passages about her longing for the now-absent hero.

  Doyle finds himself deciding that his own daughter will not go through this kind of turmoil when she reaches her teens. He’s not going to allow it to happen. Just to be sure, he makes the further decision that Amy will not go out with boys until she is of sufficient emotional maturity to deal with any unfortunate circumstances. Which, in Doyle’s estimation, means no earlier than her twenty-fifth birthday.

  The first mention of Vasey is in mid-September of last year:

  September 17

  I haven’t written here for a while. This summer was so bad. It just wasn’t the same without Josh. Mom kept trying to cheer me up, but it just didn’t do it for me. I needed Josh. He was all I could think about every day.

  I’m glad to be back at college. It helps to take my mind off things. Plus it’s great to see M again. She’s so nice to me. She can see how upset I still am. Last night she gave me a business card for this therapist friend of her dad’s. His name is Dr Andrew Vasey. She said he’s amazing, and that he could really help me get myself together again. She said he would even do a session for free. I don’t think I’ll call him, but it was a kind thought.

  Nothing much happens for the next few days. Then:

  September 26

  I’ve been a wreck this week. It’s been months since Josh and I split up, and I know I should be over him by now. But it doesn’t work like that. Not for me, anyway. I always thought he was the one.

  M has made a decision for me. She’s booked me in with that therapist. I don’t really want to go, but she’s insistent. Maybe it’ll help. What the hell. It can’t get any worse.

  There is another tedious interlude, but then it really kicks off:

  October 8

  Oh. My. God.

  It still seems unreal. I’m not even sure I can write about this, but here goes. .

  I saw Vasey today. It should have been a good day. It should have helped me. It should have been a lot of things it wasn’t.

  Here’s what happened.

  The session started off OK. He told me to call him Andy, which I did in the session. Now, though, it just seems way too familiar, and that’s the last place I want to go.

  He asked me what was going on in my life, what was bothering me. It didn’t take long for me to get onto the subject of Josh. I mean, what else do I ever think about? He asked me more questions about why we split up and how it affected me. I started crying, just like I always do when I talk about Josh. But this time it was different somehow. I really felt like a weight was being lifted off my shoulders. It was so good to talk to someone who I felt could understand and help me.

  But then the questions started to get weird. I mean really weird. I suppose I expected some intimate questions, because that’s what these people do, right? They get inside your mind. But not like this. I can’t even bring myself to write down the exact words he used. He wanted to know how Josh and I were when we were together. Sexually, I mean. What positions we liked, how I liked to be touched by him, whether we ever had oral sex. I mean, Jesus!

  I asked Vasey if it was all right for him to ask me those things. He said that he needed to appreciate in detail how our relationship worked. I told him I wasn’t comfortable with that. He said all of his clients feel that way at first, but they soon get used to it. I didn’t know what to believe or what to say. He’s the professional, right? What do I know?

  But then he did something which made me reach a decision pretty damn quickly.

  He put his hand on my knee.

  I mean, hello! This is not what doctors do, right? Questions are one thing, even when they get so personal. But touching?? I don’t think so.

  So I was out of there. I muttered somethin
g about this not really helping, I grabbed my coat and I left.

  Sitting here now, writing all this down, it feels like I imagined it. Like I’m telling somebody else’s story. But I know it happened. I’m just not sure how I feel about it. Later, I’ll probably get real upset. Or angry. Or both. Right now I’m just too stunned for words.

  And what will I tell M? This is a close friend of her dad’s. Would it upset her? Would she fall out with me? I don’t know what to do.

  Other than revealing that she decides not to say anything to M, whoever that is, Cindy doesn’t refer to the incident again until November of last year, a month after her consultation with Vasey.

  November 10

  Unbelievable.

  He came back. Vasey. He came to see me at the bookstore today. He tried to apologize. He said he got carried away in the session, and that he wasn’t normally like that. I said it was OK, and that we should just leave it at that. I didn’t really want to speak to him.

  But he wouldn’t go away. He kept saying that I’d had a huge effect on him. He said he couldn’t stop thinking about me. I wasn’t interested. I mean, jeez, the guy is at least thirty-five! And after the way he behaved, did he really think he could sweet-talk me?

  And then guess what? He did it again. He touched me. On the breast this time.

  So I slapped him.

  I mean, I am not one for confrontation. I hate violence of any kind. But this was a reflex action. I didn’t even think about it. I just slapped him real hard across the face and yelled at him to get out.

  He told me I was making a big mistake, and that nobody treats him like that. I don’t know what I said back. I just kept screaming at him. I may have even used some swear words, which isn’t like me.

  But he went. I got him out of the store. He said he was going to come back again, but I don’t think he will.

  And you know what? I feel proud. I stood up for myself. Maybe it’s the new me. Maybe I’m a lot stronger now.

  Maybe my visit to Vasey did me some good after all.

  When he’s finished reading, Doyle gets out of the car. He puts the laptop and the printout in the trunk, then locks them away. Before he goes back into the station house, he checks his watch. It’s a few minutes after two.