by Merry Jones
“Of course not.” I didn’t want to explain. “But why would he have a gun?”
“Wait. If you didn’t look in it, how do you know it’s there?”
“I spilled it. It fell out.”
Again, he scratched, this time his armpit. “Wow. I don’t know. Lots of people have guns.”
Go ahead, I told myself. You might as well ask. “Tony, I know he’s your brother. But how much do you know about what Sam does for a living?”
Tony folded his arms, cocked his head. “What are you getting at?”
“Those deals he’s always making. The way he’s always trying to get people to invest—”
“You think Sam’s running scams.” Tony said that too quickly. Had he been thinking it himself?
“Maybe. Or worse.”
“Worse?”
“What if he’s involved in something bigger than scams?”
Tony’s eyebrows furrowed. “Zoe, what exactly are you saying?”
“Why would he carry a gun? Why would he bring it into my house, where there are children? He must be up to something dangerous. Maybe something with drugs. Maybe Sam was the one who was supposed to meet that woman—maybe he was her contact.”
Tony’s neck tilted so far that his head was almost at a right angle to his body. As if he was trying to see me sideways. “Are we talking about the same guy? Sam. My brother.”
Go ahead, I urged myself. “Think about it, Tony,” I began but stopped. My mouth was dry, my voice unsteady. “If he has a gun, maybe he’s involved in this. Maybe Sam killed her.”
“What?”
I couldn’t repeat it. I waited for him to replay what I’d said in his mind.
“You think he killed her?” His voice sounded so loud. “Sam?”
I shrugged, ready to point out how Sam had been unperturbed about the dead woman, how he’d never mentioned anything about carrying a weapon, how he might be using his so-called international investment deals as a front to cause a diversion—
But I didn’t say any of that. Even if I had, Tony wouldn’t have heard me. My words would have been drowned out, lost in his peals of uproarious laughter.
THIRTY-THREE
“SAM?” TONY GUFFAWED. “SAM? You can’t be serious.”
My face was red-hot.
“He passes out when he gets blood drawn. He faints at the sight of a needle. Sam went fishing. Once. He threw up not because he was seasick but because there was fish blood on the deck. The man can’t eat rare steak. He might look like a bully, tries to act like one. But, and you can take this to the bank, Sam Stiles is a wimp, pure and thorough.”
“Really? He wasn’t the one who ran to the bathroom when he saw the body on the deck.”
“But, if you recall, he didn’t stand up, either. He sat plastered to the upholstery. If he’d had to stand up, he’d have hit the floor. I promise you. Sam’s all bluster. A marshmallow. A pussycat.”
He’d seemed that way, amusing Molly with jokes, cuddling Luke. But that might be part of his cover.
“Relax, Zoe. I can’t swear that he doesn’t scam people. In all honesty, I’ve suspected that some of his business deals might be a little shaky. But a killer? No way. Besides, the jogger wasn’t shot. She was cut. Sam can’t even cut rare steak.”
“But why the gun?”
“I don’t know. Maybe for protection. He’s got two pissed-off ex- wives, remember. And he’s involved in megabuck deals, whether they’re legit or not. Whatever his reason, though, it’s not to kill anyone. Not Sam. You’ve got him confused with Eli.”
Tony was still chuckling as he said good night and walked out of my office. I stayed, thinking about what he’d said. Maybe I was wrong. Or maybe Tony was so close to his brother that he couldn’t even imagine Sam doing anything truly evil.
Either way, I wasn’t going to figure out his password or find anything on his computer. I hoped Tony wouldn’t say anything to Sam or Nick. Would he? I told myself he wouldn’t, that Tony was honorable; our conversation would remain private.
I knew I should go up to bed and try to sleep. It was only a few hours until morning, less than that until Luke would wake up. But my pulse was still racing, alert. As long as I was in my office, I might as well read some of the e-mail that had been piling up for weeks.
I booted up my computer and typed in my password, and the electronic voice welcomed me, telling me that I had mail. In fact, I had 393 messages. Good Lord. I hadn’t been online in two months, since Luke’s birth, but I’d had no idea I’d missed so much e-mail. I scanned the list, most recent at the top, eliminating some of the spam as I went, noticing message after message from edmdbry. Bryce Edmond had e-mailed me over and over again, maybe twenty times. What had been so urgent? Why had he pestered me almost to the point of harassment? At random, I picked one of his early e-mails and opened it, expecting to find a request for a signature for some employee benefit program or maybe an informal notification that my position was about to be eliminated. But I was wrong.
Bryce Edmond’s e-mail was a few paragraphs, followed by a list of names. I read his note. And, suddenly chilled, I knew why he’d so doggedly tried to reach me.
THIRTY-FOUR
BEFORE I’D TAKEN OFF for maternity leave, I’d known that the Psychiatric Institute was floundering financially. A drastic reduction in federal funding and grant money had led to the loss of several important research programs and elimination of staff positions, and “nonessential” employees like me had their hours slashed. My art therapy program had been chopped in half, affecting not only the patients but also my health insurance and retirement funds.
Bryce had written to inform me of the latest, even more dramatic changes. Recently, due to further funding cuts, a number of patients whose care had been paid for by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania had been released. Some of these patients had been institutionalized by court order due to criminal acts, but having been treated for multiple years, they had aged and been deemed harmless or rehabilitated by Institute staff and the Commonwealth. As a courtesy, Bryce was writing to inform me of those newly released, formerly violent patients with whom I’d worked.
Slowly, cautiously, I let my eyes move down the list, recognizing the first name, Kimberly Gilbert. Kimberly? Oh my. How could they let her leave? The Institute was the only home she’d known for decades. What would happen to her? How would she survive? Kimberly was a schizophrenic who, years ago, had slaughtered her family, believing that demons had disguised themselves as her husband and mother. Kimberly, even medicated, wobbled in and out of reality. I was appalled that they’d set her out on her own.
But Kimberly wasn’t the only surprise. They’d also released Troy Dunbar. I pictured Troy, a too-handsome forty-some-year-old man, lanky, charismatically intense, Nordic looking and bipolar. At the age of twenty, he’d shot his grandmother to death, nearly killed his sister and himself. I wondered if he’d try again, on his own.
I scanned the list, stunned, unable to believe that some of the most disturbed patients I’d worked with, who had committed the most violent crimes, had simply been released. I told myself that most of them were no longer dangerous. Most of them had responded well to medication and had probably mellowed over time. But how could anyone be sure these people would take their medication? Bonnie Osterman, for example. Her name was on the list. Bonnie Osterman was the woman who, years ago, had sliced open the bellies of pregnant women. Now, she had been set free. She was out in the world again on her own.
Bonnie Osterman. The very thought of her made my toes curl. She was a solid, squat woman, probably in her mid-sixties, hospitalized for maybe thirty years, ever since a gas company worker had discovered tiny human bones in Bonnie’s backyard. Investigators, as I recalled, had turned up the remains of five infants behind her house and pieces of a sixth in her freezer. Bonnie, it turned out, had craved the tender flesh of unborn infants, killing their mothers to get them, pulling them from the warmth of the womb and tossing them into the heat of a ste
w pot.
According to Bryce, the Commonwealth had determined that, after decades of intense psychiatric treatment, Bonnie Osterman had overcome her ghoulish appetite and been cured. But I wasn’t entirely convinced. Before I’d gone on leave, Bonnie had been unusually attentive, fascinated by my expanding middle, commenting on the chic styles of my maternity clothing, asking if I’d learned the baby’s gender. Her attention had chilled me at the time, but I’d assured myself that she was harmless, safely contained within the brick and concrete walls of the Institute, guarded by security staff, nurses and orderlies.
But now, she was free. Out on the street.
And a woman’s belly had been slit open on my back porch.
I stared at the computer screen, rereading the message. Unconsciously, my hands had risen, protecting my middle. Slow down, I told myself. It’s just a bizarre coincidence. Bonnie Osterman could not have killed the jogger.
No? Myself answered back. Why not?
Because—I fumbled for an answer. Because she’s old now. And probably passive—she’s been institutionalized for thirty-some years. And authorities have determined that she’s no longer criminally insane.
None of that convinced me. The jogger’s gaping wounds reappeared in my mind, almost exactly duplicating those inflicted by my former patient.
But wait, I reasoned. Even if she still wanted to, Bonnie Osterman couldn’t overpower a lithe young jogger. Bonnie wasn’t fit or strong enough. And, most important of all, the dead jogger hadn’t been pregnant—whoever killed her had opened her up, but not to get a baby. The killer had pulled out her intestines. Searching not for a baby but for drugs.
No matter what I told myself, though, I was unnerved. I worried about Kimberly, Troy, Henry, Olivia and the others—those patients, without care and supervision, were likely more dangerous to themselves than to others. But Bonnie Osterman. She was unlike any patient I’d ever worked with. No matter how I tried, I couldn’t relate to her, could find no common ground, no vulnerability, no empathy for others. Her art projects included tangled, sinuous abstract distortions, detailed but minuscule, lost in emptiness of indifferent space. She seemed, even at her best most- medicated times, to be a monster. And now, she was among us.
I read the list of names again and again, thinking about Bryce. He’d been determined to tell me something, and now he was lying in a coma. Was there a connection? I replayed the hit-and-run in my mind, trying to recall the driver. Could it have been one of the patients? Kimberly? Troy? Henry? Bonnie?
Of course not. How would any of them have known that Bryce would be on the corner of Fifth and South streets at that exact time on that date? They couldn’t have. None of them. Unless the driver had been following Bryce. But why would a patient—any patient—want to follow Bryce Edmond? Bryce wasn’t involved with patient care. He was in administration. The patients probably didn’t even know him.
But they knew me. All of them. What if the driver had been following not Bryce but me? I closed my eyes and saw it again, the car plowing over the curb, charging right at me—and Bryce pushing me away. It was possible, maybe even likely, that I had been the target. But who had been behind the wheel? I tried to remember, to picture the driver, but saw only Bryce’s body flying at me followed by a great commotion of motorized steel.
Again, unbidden, Bonnie Osterman popped into my thoughts. “You’re beginning to show, aren’t you?” Her questions had made me queasy. “You want a boy, honey? Or a girl?” She’d eyed my belly, pursuing me even as I ignored her, guiding her attention back to her art project. But she’d persisted. “Is it moving? Can you feel it kicking?” Whenever she’d been in art therapy, I’d felt her creepy gaze following me no matter where I went, even as her fingers worked.
Oh Lord. Wasn’t that the same creepy feeling I’d been having lately? Of somebody watching me? Oh my God. Could Bonnie Osterman be stalking me?
Impulsively, quickly, I closed the e-mail and pushed delete, erasing Bryce’s message and Bonnie Osterman’s name from the screen, if not from my mind. I got up, stood at the window, paced the office floor, as questions too horrible to articulate began to hammer at me. Had I been sensing Bonnie’s presence? Had she been obsessed with my pregnancy? Planning to come after me to steal my baby? Had she been driving the car that hit Bryce?
Oh God. In a heartbeat, I ran from the room, sped up the stairs, found Luke safe in his crib. I didn’t care if he woke up. I grabbed him and held him close. And then, watching the street outside through the window, I sat in the rocking chair, holding on to him for the rest of the night.
THIRTY-FIVE
FIRST THING TUESDAY MORNING, I called the hospital to check again on Bryce. His condition had not changed. I told myself it wasn’t my fault he’d been hit, even if the driver had been a patient. I hadn’t released anyone from the Institute. I hadn’t told Bryce to chase me. Still, guilt hounded me, and I spun through the morning, unable to rest.
Before the others were awake, I took Oliver out, congratulating him for performing his business in the bushes, only to realize when we came back inside that he’d gnawed the backs off yet another pair of Molly’s sneakers. I searched the hall closet and finally found her old blue pair, as yet unchewed, and put them up on a dining room chair, safe from his jaws. I fixed a pot of coffee for Nick and the brothers. I fed Luke. I kept moving as if being busy would protect me from thinking, but it didn’t. No matter what I did, the events of the night stayed with me. There was no escape. I needed to go someplace quiet to think, to sort things out. Of course. A shower.
Not wanting to wake up Nick, I used Molly’s bathroom down the hall. Hot water cascaded over me like guilt about Bryce, suspicion about Sam. I thought about what to say to Nick. Should I tell him about Sam’s gun? Would he laugh at me as Tony had, dismissing my concerns because of “blood”? Would he scold me for snooping? Defend Sam’s basic right to bear arms? Probably. And what about the Institute patients? Nick would no doubt reassure me, tell me not to worry about them. But he had never met Troy Dunbar or Kimberly Gilbert, didn’t know how off-kilter they could get. He didn’t know Bonnie Osterman, had never seen the mocking evil glint in her eyes. Nick would remind me that I could do nothing for patients who’d been released, and that, surrounded by three strong men, the kids and I were perfectly safe.
With steamy water pouring over my head, I could hear Nick’s comments almost as if he’d actually spoken them. What was the point of talking to him, I wondered, if I already knew what he was going to say? Did I really know him so well? I soaped myself, smiling, thinking about Nick. About how, in a few days, we’d be married.
Married? I stopped washing, stood stock-still. In just four days, it would be the weekend. The weekend of our wedding—there. I’d said it: our wedding. I said it out loud, again and then again. Somehow, with all the upheaval that had been going on, the w word had become less threatening. Under hot water, I pictured the ceremony, candlelight and roses. My white-haired father, elegant in his tux. Molly, angelic in her flower girl dress. Susan, glamorous as matron of honor. Nick—but at the thought of Nick, something surged in my chest, and I actually felt dizzy, had to put a hand on the tiles to steady myself. Oh God. It was really going to happen. Nick Stiles was going to be my husband.
My husband. What was it about that word that made my knees buckle? What would husband mean with respect to Nick? Would he and I be different next week after the wedding than we were now? What would change? And I would be a wife again. Thoughts of last time, my last marriage, swirled in my head; I closed my eyes, ducked my head under the faucet, trying to rinse them away. No. Michael, my ex, was not welcome in this shower. Not today. Not ever. My new marriage would be different. This one was about respect. And love. But wait—hadn’t I loved Michael, too? Stop it, I scolded myself, re-soaping my body. You’re older, more mature. Plus, Nick is different from Michael. You can trust—
But I stopped right there, mid-thought. Trust had been an issue between Nick and me, a big one. I’d come
to terms with it, though, accepting that Nick was secretive by nature. Plus, as a cop, he kept the truth close and under his control, sharing only what he had to. Trusting Nick didn’t mean thinking that he would always be open with me or even that he’d always be truthful. Trusting Nick meant having faith in his intentions, believing that he would never willingly hurt me. See that? I turned, letting hot water flow down my back. I’d learned a lot since Michael. I was more mature now, had more realistic expectations.
Besides, it wasn’t just us. Nick and I had Molly and Luke. We were a family; the wedding would make it official. Nick would be my husband, I his wife—
Somebody knocked on the bathroom door.
“Yes?” I thought it was Nick. “Nick?”
No one answered. I shut off the water, squeezed my hair, stepped out of the shower, grabbed two towels, one for my body, one for my head. Wrapped in terry cloth, I opened the door, glanced up, then down the hall. Nobody was there.
I peeked in on Molly, but her alarm wouldn’t go off for a few more minutes. She was still asleep. Luke gurgled in his crib. Nick snored softly, undisturbed. Obviously, Tony or Sam had come upstairs. One of them had knocked on the bathroom door.
I dried my hair and, by the time I was finished, Molly and Nick were awake. The day, our normal routine, had begun. But no matter what I did or where I went, I felt as if someone unseen was watching me. I spent the day off-balance, as if surrounded by secrets. As I made Molly’s lunch or took Oliver and Luke for a walk, my thoughts ricocheted, bouncing from Sam’s hidden gun, to plans for my wedding, to Bryce’s condition, to the possibility that a psychotic former patient was stalking me, and as I met with Anna to finalize the musicians’ contracts and selections, my emotions continually seesawed between terror and joy.
THIRTY-SIX
A LITTLE AFTER NOON, Nick surprised us, coming home unexpectedly, bearing cheese steaks from Pat’s. Just the way I liked them, with grilled onions and mushrooms. We ate at the dining room table, right off the white wrapping paper. No plates. A can of soda or of beer. Lots of ketchup. Neither Sam nor Tony had eaten these Philly specialties before, but they dug in with the same gusto I did. In minutes, the steaks had been inhaled in silence; no one had stopped chewing long enough to make conversation. But when we were finished, Nick straightened his back, folded his hands on the table as if calling a meeting to order.