Time Release

by Martin J. Smith

  “Where does she learn that stuff?” he said.

  “It’ll all come out when she’s about fifteen,” Brenna said. “At her sentencing hearing.”

  She sat down on the top step and put her arm around him as she poured. “It’s not even fifty degrees out here,” she said. “Not exactly stoop-sitting weather.”

  “Joe DiNardo said it’ll be the warmest day of the year,” he said. “He’s a weather professional. I trust him.”

  His thick wool socks rested purposefully on the front page of the Sunday paper. Brenna reached down and tugged at it, frowned when he resisted. He wanted to put it all behind him, wanted no more of the strange celebrity that had accrued to everyone involved in the final resolution of the case that, three weeks later, KDKA-TV was still calling “Primenyl: The Final Conflict.”

  “Just more fallout, what the crime lab people told us Friday,” he said.

  Brenna tugged again, then gave up. “The chemicals in the oranges and grapefruits?”

  “All cyanide,” he said. “Mine, Sonny’s, and Downing’s.”

  “Nothing else new?”

  “All three samples matched either the poison Rachel put in the yogurt five months ago and in the Popsicle things, or the stuff she put in the cereal. That was powder.”

  “Like we figured,” Brenna said, “How big was the bottle of liquid they found in her refrigerator?”

  Christensen shrugged. “Little goes a long way. Did I tell you what Annie’s teacher said? She’s had three time-outs since all this happened. Walks around pointing her finger like a pistol, greasing the kids she doesn’t like. Pa-chew! Pa-chew!”

  “She’s a kid, Jim. Just talk to her about it.”

  An uncertain drone preceded a small car, an old Toyota, up the street. It stopped at the curb two houses away.

  “I did talk to her, after the first time. She knows it’s inappropriate, but she did it two more times.” Christensen hated when Brenna rolled her eyes. “Look, don’t say it.”

  “You’re such a weenie,” she said. “Just roast her rump once or twice. You’ll have her attention forever. Don’t think of it as a spanking, Think of it as a valuable little life lesson.”

  Months earlier, they’d agreed to disagree on the subject. Brenna had argued that most of the ne’er-do-wells she represented would have benefited by a few well-timed parental strokes earlier in life, long before the first bust. He’d argued against any form of corporal punishment, demonstrating with study results from the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Psychological Association that violence teaches mostly that violence is okay, and little else. He stood firmly on the issue’s high moral ground, he felt. Brenna had called him a weenie then, too.

  “Decided what to tell Downing’s wife?” she asked.

  Tricia Downing’s letter had arrived two days earlier, and he’d given himself until Monday to decide what to do about it. She correctly suspected her husband hadn’t told her the whole truth about his obsession with the Primenyl case. She suspected, too, that he’d confided in Christensen. Widow Downing wanted answers.

  “It seems just as wrong to cover for him as it would be to tell,” he said. “What do you think?”

  “Hey.”

  Christensen looked up, startled that they weren’t alone. Sonny stood at the end of the front walk, maybe ten feet away. His hair was shorter, well above his collar, and he was reasonably dressed in a wool sweater and light jacket. His left hand was in one of the jacket’s pockets, the right in a plain white cast held stiffly at his side. For a fleeting, panicked moment, until Sonny smiled, Christensen won­dered if maybe he had a gun.

  “Hey,” Christensen said, suddenly flushed with guilt. Forget the circumstances—he’d killed Sonny’s mother. In the note he wrote Sonny three days after the shooting, he’d said what he could, but didn’t say what he felt. Melissa was right: He was going to have to work on that. But the note was sincere, and he was disappointed Sonny hadn’t an­swered or accepted his invitation to call.

  “Sorry to crash,” Sonny said. “I just wanted to see you.”

  Brenna put out her right hand, and Sonny seemed to notice her for the first tune. He stepped up and shook it awkwardly with his left. “You must be Sonny Corbett,” she said. “I’m Brenna Kennedy.”

  Christensen stood, too, reaching for Sonny’s left hand. The young man’s grip was firm and warm. Without thinking, without any reason at all, he pulled Sonny into an embrace that caught them both by surprise. When they stepped apart, there was a clumsy silence.

  “So how’re you doing?” Christensen said finally. “When you didn’t call or write, I figured—”

  “Thanks for the note,” Sonny said.

  “I just—”

  “No, really. Thanks for everything.”

  Christensen remembered Sonny’s gray face floating just beneath the surface of the water in his mother’s sink. He remembered Sonny’s expression, almost peaceful. Christensen had in his darkest hours after the shooting weighed his impulse to save a life that night against the years of painful recovery he knew stretched in front of Sonny. Which was the better fate?

  “For everything?” Christensen repeated.

  Their eyes met, but only for an instant; then they both looked away.

  “Listen, I’m going to go check on the kids,” Brenna said. “I think it’s great you came, Sonny. Nice meeting you.” She picked up the empty coffee carafe and went inside, closing the door behind her.

  “I am glad you came,” Christensen said. “A little nervous, maybe, but glad to see you. I’ve wanted to talk to you ever since, but so much happened, and so fast. I wanted to give you some space.”

  “Appreciate it.”

  “Sonny, what I’ve really wanted to say is—” Christensen stumbled. “If there’d been any other way, you know, any way at all to resolve it that night … but there wasn’t. I didn’t think. There wasn’t time. I made a judgment—”

  Sonny reached out, touching Christensen’s arm. “You saved my life.”

  “But I killed her.”

  “She would have killed me, and probably you, from what I heard. That wasn’t my mother, never was. Not her.”

  “Your mother died with her, though.”

  Sonny looked directly into Christensen’s eyes. “She died a long time ago, I think.”

  Christensen stood up and walked onto the porch, settling against the heavy rail overlooking the front yard and Bryant Street. He felt lighter.

  Sonny followed and leaned his left elbow on the rail as well. “Know what else I think? I think the only reason my mother still existed at all was because Rachel needed her, you know, so nobody would suspect. As a cover. What was left of my mom was just—”

  Sonny never finished the thought. After a minute or so, he said, “Why didn’t she just try to kill my father? Do you think she ever talked to anybody about it, like Dr. Root or somebody? I want to know.”

  “Hard to say, Sonny. There’s so much about her I don’t understand.”

  “All those people who died, back then and now. That kid who’s, what, eleven? And my dad. I mean, he knew. He’s known all along. Know what he said?”

  “You’ve talked?”

  Sonny kicked the front-porch railing with the rust-colored toe of his running shoe. “Sort of. He called. Said he was sick, still drinking, but that he’d call in a couple months once he got cleaned up.” He brushed a tear from his cheek. “Said he wants to see me.”

  “You believe him?”

  “No.”

  Fair enough, Christensen thought. “What else did he say?” he asked.

  “That he was afraid she’d kill me if he ever told. He said she told him she would.” Sonny’s tears were coming too fast to hide now. “Maybe that’s why he moved off t
o wherever he is and just kept his mouth shut. It doesn’t make him any less of an asshole, does it?”

  Christensen wasn’t about to answer that one.

  “All these feelings, Sonny, they’re normal. And you’re right for asking the questions. But the questions may not have answers. And if they do, you may never find them. Whether you do or don’t, though, at some point you’re going to need to put them behind you.”

  The young man squinted into the distance.

  “Because they’ll eat you alive, Sonny. As sure as we’re standing here, they’ll eat at you and you’ll lose sight of what’s really important.”

  “Like?”

  “You. You’re here. You’re clear. You came out the other end of a tunnel that caves in on a lot of people. It’s not over. You’ve got wounds you won’t even feel until you’re thirty-five or forty years old. But Sonny, you’re the strongest person I know. You’ll handle it—now, later, whenever.”

  Sonny scanned the length of Bryant Street. It was dry, one of the few times since last fall. “Can I still call you?” he said.

  “You’ve got the phone number,” Christensen said. “And the address. Anytime.”

  Sonny toed the porch rail again, but now he was smiling. “Lost my job at Pitt,” he said. “Didn’t show up for a week after all this happened. I should have called in.”

  “Anything I can do?”

  “You sound like Grady Downing,” Sonny said. “He was always trying to help me out.” Sonny shook his head. “Thanks. Got something else lined up, I think, not far from here. Highland Park Natatorium.”

  “On Highland Avenue? Doing what?”

  “Teaching tadpole classes, life-guarding. A coach I know has a junior team, too, five- and six-year-olds. Said he could use some help through the end of summer. Just five and a quarter an hour, but it’d be a steady nine to five. So I’ll be fine.”

  Christensen watched his breath drift out over the shrub­bery and vanish. He was getting cold, and the sensation triggered a memory of Sonny hoisting himself from the icy Ohio River.

  “Nine to five wouldn’t leave much time for your training, would it?”

  “None.” Sonny shrugged with an indifference that sur­prised Christensen.

  “You’re giving it up?”

  “Maybe. Water’s getting awfully warm, so what’s the point? Anyway, coaching kids that age might be a kick.” Sonny nodded to the front corner of the house, where Annie and Taylor emerged pulling a wagonload of charcoal briquets. They didn’t seem to notice, or didn’t care, that Christensen and Sonny were watching. They stacked a dozen or so briquets in an unsteady pyramid on the concrete walkway alongside the house, then disappeared again. Christensen held an index finger to his lips, curious about where this was headed.

  The children came back a few seconds later with a can of charcoal lighter fluid and a box of wooden kitchen matches. Christensen tiptoed to the side of the porch overlooking the two children. A surprise attack.

  “Do you think that’s a safe thing to do?” he asked, straining to sound casual.

  Annie looked up, but not intimidated. Annoyed. “We’re barbecuing, Dad,” she said, soaking the briquets with a blast of fuel. “Go get that long fork, okay?” She pulled a match from the box and got busy trying to strike it. Sonny snatched the match from her hand before she even knew he’d sneaked up behind her.

  “Matches can hurt you,” Sonny said. “Playing with them is a good way to get a spanking.”

  Christensen cringed.

  Annie wheeled, ready for combat. But when she recog­nized Sonny, she all but swooned. Then she meekly handed him the box of matches. Sonny put them in his jacket pocket. “I remember you!” she said. “You came over that day. And from the pool. You taught me.” She bent at the waist and pantomimed a perfect Australian crawl.

  “Nice rainbow arms!” Sonny said. “You’ve been practic­ing. Who’s your friend?”

  Annie looked at Taylor, her faithful coconspirator, who was waiting wide-eyed to be introduced. “Nobody,” Annie said. “Just some kid.”

  “Annie!” Christensen said. “Sonny, this is Taylor. He’s one of our most special friends. He stays with us sometimes.”

  “I’m four,” Taylor said. “I need floaties or I sink.”

  Sonny’s face brightened. “But you could learn to swim, just like Annie. Want to? I’m going to teach at a pool not too far from here.”

  All three faces turned to the porch, where Christensen was leaning out over the rail. Now that his daughter’s self-immolation was cancelled, he was actually enjoying the scene below.

  “We’ll talk about it.” Christensen said. The thought made him uneasy, and the reason made him feel guilty. He’d allowed Sonny into his personal life in calculated professional increments. Now his patient wanted more, needed more. Was he willing, or able, to give it?

  Sonny got more animated. “I have a late afternoon class with some openings,” he said. “I could even pick them up and drop them off. It’s a great plan. Come on.”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Please,” Sonny said. “I want to do something. I owe you so much.”

  The words washed over Christensen like absolution. Sonny showed such courage, such trust, walking with a virtual stranger into the ghastly labyrinth of his past, not knowing where they were going, or why. What would it be like to trust like that again? To live without a paralyzing fear of pain? To feel, like he did before Molly’s accident?

  Christensen took a deep breath, knowing there were no easy answers. But he drew courage from those upturned faces—all three of them. Because if he read them correctly, Sonny’s was every bit as hopeful as the others.

  Acknowledgments

  Many people helped me research and write this book.

  Chemist James Ellern of the University of Southern California helped make sure the cyanide poisoning scenario in the story would be plausible, but also helped me create a circumstance that probably could never be duplicated in real life. No one, I suspect, will ever die by consuming any form of cyanide dissolved in yogurt, frozen confections, breakfast cereal or injected into citrus fruit, for a variety of reasons. And drug-industry innovations since the 1982 Tylenol killings have made capsules and packaging virtually tamper-proof. In some cases I sacrificed accuracy to create a story that likely will remain fiction.

  For their insights into the workings of memory and human psychology, I thank pediatric psychiatrist Amy Mandel of the Children’s Hospital of Orange County, California, and Ruth Eva Shaffer of Pepperdine University, as well as psychologists Michael and Mindy Sefton and Ann Greeley.

  Former FBI agent John W. Warren helped me understand the scary topic of product tampering.

  Barbara Mitchell of the Orange County Sheriff-Coroner’s Office and F. James Gregris, former deputy coroner of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, were extremely helpful in explaining autopsy procedures and the conduct of a publicly funded morgue. Pittsburgh Detective Rich Meister shared his insights, and Lynne Cox taught me about the mental challenges and physiological responses of a cold-water distance swimmer.

  Marjorie Luesebrink of Irvine Valley College convinced me I could write fiction at a time when, in retrospect, it’s clear that I could not. Members of my two writing groups helped maintain that illusion until this book finally took shape. The contributions of Susan Ginsburg, my agent, are incalculable and very much appreciated, as are those of my editor at Berkley, Hillary Cige.

  Finally, nothing would be possible for me without the sustaining love and support of my wife, Judith Johnson Smith, whose quiet courage inspires me; and our children, Alayne and Parker, who are, quite frankly, perfect.

  —M.J.S.

  More from Martin J. Smith

  MARTIN J. SMITH is a veteran journalist, author, and magazine editor who has won more than 50 news
paper and magazine awards. A former senior editor of the Los Angeles Times Magazine, he currently is editor-in-chief of Orange Coast magazine in Orange County, Calif. His first three crime novels were nominated for prestigious crime fiction awards—the Edgar, Barry, and Anthony. He also is the author of three nonfiction books, including The Wild Duck Chase, Poplorica: A Popular History of the Fads, Mavericks, Inventions, and Lore That Shaped Modern America, and Oops: 20 Life Lessons From the Fiascoes That Shaped America.

  Shadow Image

  The Underhill family has loomed over Pennsylvania politics for four generations as the most powerful in the state. Now, with their youngest son locked in a tight gubernatorial race, a simple accident threatens to derail the entire campaign. After Floss Underhill, the family matriarch, has been discovered alive after falling from a gazebo into a ravine, Brenna Kennedy gets brought in as a defense attorney to the family. The police don’t seem to believe that her fall was an accident, however, and soon neither does Brenna.

  Jim Christensen, a psychologist, memory expert, and Brenna’s partner as they raise their children together, has been studying Floss Underhill for months in a group of Alzheimer’s patients. Her mind ravaged by the disease, her body broken by the fall, Floss Underhill nevertheless knows something, and is trying to tell Christensen a family secret so explosive it could bring down an empire. To help bring it out of her, though, will make them powerful enemies, and bring both the truth—and the danger—very close to home…

  Straw Men

  Eight years ago, Brenna Kennedy defended Carmen DellaVecchio: a loner, a freak, a man accused of a heinous crime. She lost the case, and DellaVecchio was sent to prison for the brutal rape and near murder of Teresa Harnett, a Pittsburgh cop.

  But DNA evidence has cast doubt on DellaVecchio’s guilt. While he waits for a new trial, he is free, and Brenna still believes that he is an innocent man. But if DellaVecchio is innocent, then that means there’s a guilty sociopath out there, and all that’s standing in his way from getting away with a grisly crime is one meddling lawyer…