Memory of Murder

by Kathleen Creighton

  A buddy of Alan’s had advised him, in the months following his divorce when he was contemplating getting back in the dating game, never to take a woman to a place where they’d have to eat something messy on the first date. He’d considered it fairly sensible advice, at the time. You’ll look like an idiot, he’d been told, and the woman will never forgive you. Among the foods mentioned as first-date no-no’s, he seemed to recall, had been spaghetti, tacos…and sushi.

  Now, all these years later, he wasn’t sure whether he’d grown wiser, more confident, or whether his priorities had changed, but he was finding there was a lot to be learned about a woman from watching the way she handled sushi with a pair of chopsticks.

  For one thing, he gathered right off the bat, this woman knew her sushi. She’d ordered with confidence and barely a glance at the menu, and prepped her chopsticks as if she’d been born to do it.

  “You like the spicy stuff,” he commented, when the waiter had presented them with a bowl of edamame and pots of tea and then departed. “I’m afraid I have to stick with good old boring California rolls.”

  She smiled as she popped open a pod and scooped the tender soybeans into her mouth, then licked her lips without even a hint of self-consciousness. “I’ve always liked things hot, even as a kid. My dad is a great cook. King of the backyard barbecue, famous for being heavy on the spices. I probably had most of my taste buds burned off by the time I was six.”

  Helping himself to a handful of edamame pods, Alan realized he was watching her for the sheer enjoyment of it, and he knew it was time to remember why he’d invited her to lunch in the first place. Time to get down to business.

  Her face lights up when she talks about her dad. Definitely daddy’s girl.

  “Did you and your mom get along?” he asked, and wasn’t surprised when her gaze quickly dropped to her hands, busy with another edamame pod, so that the thick black lashes hid her eyes from him.

  It was a moment before she said carefully, “I always sensed…I guess you would call it a kind of reserve in my mother. It’s hard to explain it, but I think I always felt there was a part of her she kept hidden away. A part I wasn’t allowed to touch-like the good china, you know? I always tried to be on my best behavior with her-which I think is not true of most kids. Most kids feel secure enough in their mother’s unconditional love, they aren’t afraid to be themselves, even at their worst.”

  “But you weren’t?”

  “No, I wasn’t.” The lashes flew upward and her eyes met his in what seemed almost like defiance. “But I do know she loved my father. And he adores her-that much I know. I grew up with them. And I’ve stayed close to them as an adult. I swear to you, my parents love-loved-” she choked a little on the word “-each other.”

  An image flashed into his mind: Two old people with their arms around each other, faces peaceful as they lay together in bed, blood dried matted and brown in their sparse white hair and soaked into the pillowcases beneath…He pushed it back into the darker closet of his mind where he kept all such images, the ones marked Hazards Of The Job.

  “When did that change?” He kept his voice gentle.

  The tension went out of her shoulders and they seemed to droop under the burden of sadness she carried. A burden he thought had become such a habit for her she was barely aware of it now. After a moment, she took a deep breath and pushed the bowl of edamame away.

  “When did the Alzheimer’s start, you mean?”

  Alan poured himself some tea. “If that’s when the accusations began.”

  “No, not the accusations-not then. She’d started showing the signs about two or three years ago. Probably, from what I know now about the disease, she’d been hiding them for quite a while. Until she couldn’t anymore. We were pretty sure it was Alzheimer’s, and once the doctors had ruled out everything else…” She shrugged and tried to smile, then gave it up as a lost cause. Fiddled with her teacup for a moment. “Then, about six months ago she started behaving strangely. I mean, really strangely, even for someone with Alzheimer’s.”

  “In what way?”

  “She was…furtive. You know, like a frightened animal. She wouldn’t sleep in the same room with Dad-the man she’d been married to for more than forty years. She acted terrified of him.” She paused to pour herself some tea, and he saw that her hands shook slightly.

  “Poor Dad. He was distraught-as you can imagine. One night he called me because she’d run away. Snuck out in the middle of the night.” She threw him an anguished look, then picked up her cup and sipped the steaming liquid. It seemed to soothe her, and after a moment she gave a small, one-shoulder shrug. “He called the police, of course. They found her at the bus station. At the bus station! You know what that part of town is like-to even imagine my mother alone in a place like that, at night…” She set the cup down and crossed her arms on the tabletop. “So, I moved her in with me.” She smiled at him, and it was both wry and sad. “She’s my mom. I didn’t know what else to do. Dad was dead-set against it. But we both knew something had to be done. But…” She shrugged and once again reached for her teacup.

  “Didn’t work out?” Alan prompted.

  She shook her head. “She still didn’t feel safe. It was okay when I was there with her, but I have to go to work, you know? I’d come home and find her barricaded in the bathroom. Or crouched in a closet, crying.” She sipped and swallowed, visibly fighting back her own tears. “Anyway, that’s when we started talking about putting her in a care facility.”

  Alan frowned. “A nursing home? Seems kind of fast. Doesn’t Alzheimer’s usually progress more slowly than that?”

  She nodded. “That’s what makes this so strange. According to everything I’ve read about the disease-and I’ve read everything I could look up on the Internet, believe me-this sort of paranoia and erratic behavior doesn’t normally happen until later stages. And what’s even stranger, when we mentioned the idea of moving her into a care facility-it’s more of an assisted-living situation, rather than a nursing home, but it’s gated and controlled access-instead of being upset, as we’d expected, she actually seemed…relieved.”

  Alan nodded, then they both waited while the waiter presented the first of their orders, artfully arranged on lacquered trays.

  He watched, fascinated, as Lindsey poured soy sauce into the shallow bowl provided for the purpose, plucked up a glob of green wasabi paste with her chopsticks and stirred it into the sauce, then deftly selected a round of spicy tuna roll, dunked it into the sauce and popped it into her mouth. Whole.

  She gave a happy little gasp and made fanning motions with her hand while her eyes watered, and when her mouth was free again, said, “Whoo. I always love that first hit. Really clears your sinuses.”

  A peculiar lightness bubbled up through his chest, and he found himself smiling back at her. “You make it sound like taking drugs.”

  Her eyes widened and a hint of a flush warmed her cheeks. “What? Oh-God, no. That never-I mean, I’ve never-”

  “Never?” he teased her, as he doctored his own soy sauce, with a much smaller-wimpier?-dab of wasabi. “Not even when you were a kid?”

  “Never, I swear. I told you-I had an idyllic childhood. I had perfect parents. I was the perfect child. It never occurred to me to take drugs-it would have broken my parents’ hearts, for one thing. And for another, why on earth would I want to?” Almost angrily, she plucked up another round of spicy tuna and swirled it in the sauce. “I was happy.”

  “Lucky girl,” Alan said, and earned himself a brief, startled glance.

  “Yes,” she said softly. “I was.” The slice of sushi roll went into her mouth and her eyes teared up-from the wasabi, he wondered, or something else?

  “You’re not married?” He nodded toward the hand wielding the chopsticks-she was a lefty, he realized-as he attempted to capture a sushi morsel with his own awkwardly skewed chopsticks.

  “Hmm…no, like this,” she said, laying down her chopsticks and placing her hands
on his.

  Her fingers felt cool and sure and smooth as silk on the backs of his, and he felt a curious sizzle under his skin that rode in waves through his arms and into his chest. A purely physical response to a woman’s touch, and one he couldn’t recall ever feeling before. Or, if he had, it had been so long ago he’d forgotten what the sensation felt like.

  When she had his chopsticks placed correctly and to her satisfaction, she picked up her own and demonstrated the proper way to pinch the tips together. “See? Like this.”

  He copied her dutifully, wondering whether she was using the teaching moment to evade his question and whether or not she’d answer it. And whether she’d felt the same jolt he’d felt when she touched him.

  “Sorry, none of my business,” he said as he concentrated on picking up a segment of California roll. When he had it captured and reasonably secure, he glanced up at her and smiled in what he hoped was a winning way. “Just wondering, because of your name, and the fact that you don’t wear a ring. I’m a police detective-comes with the territory.”

  A hint of an answering smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “Divorced-took back my maiden name. You?”

  He chewed, swallowed, nodded…thinking he wasn’t getting that horseradish “hit” she’d mentioned, and maybe he’d try adding a bit more wasabi next time. “Divorced. Kids?”

  And the lashes came down-lights out. Okay, so that was a tender spot, obviously. Although her voice sounded completely normal when she said, “No. You?”

  “One daughter. Chelsea. She’ll be ten in January. Lives with her mother. And is growing up way too fast. I get her every other weekend, unless the job interferes.”

  She gave him her eyes again, smiled, nodded in sympathy. “That must be tough.”

  The waiter brought another round of sushi and they talked casually as they ate it, talked of things like his daughter’s school and sports and the Internet, the pitfalls of parenting, and why it was a job made tougher by the fact that he was a cop. Being unable to commiserate from the parent’s point of view, Lindsey offered insights on Chelsea’s, the ways they were alike-as only children-and the ways they weren’t-Chelsea’s parents being divorced.

  “But we’re close, Chelse and me-although she’s decided she wants to be called CeeCee, lately. I mean, what’s that? I don’t even know how it’s supposed to be spelled! Initials? Like the Spanish for ’yes yes’? Come on! But…yeah, we have a pretty good thing going-so far. Knock wood.”

  Lindsey had been smiling, laughing with him. Now, she pushed the platters with the few remaining slices of sushi away from her and leaned forward, forearms on the tabletop, eyes bright and fierce.

  “Okay, now imagine it’s twenty or thirty years from now, after you’ve cheered at Chelsea’s graduations, danced with her at her wedding, held her and let her cry until your shirt was soaked when her baby died, and again when her marriage ended. After you’ve given her the money to start up her business and you wouldn’t take a dime when she wanted to pay you back. Imagine her mom suddenly out of the blue one day telling Chelsea you’re not her father, that you’re a monster and a murderer. Imagine how she’d feel.”

  Chapter 2

  They did not try to run or fight back when I took them. They seemed more bewildered than afraid. They said I had made a mistake. Of course, I did not believe them.

  Excerpt from the confession of Alexi K.

  FBI Files, Restricted Access,

  Declassified 2010

  Lindsey knew she sounded pathetic, and didn’t care.

  She thought it probably didn’t matter anyway, doubted even tears would make any difference in whether this life-hardened police detective believed her or not. Oh, he was a good listener, and seemed friendly enough-kind…even charming. The blue eyes reflected sympathy at times, speculation at others. And at others, something else, something she couldn’t even put a name to. But the key word, she realized, was reflected. Eyes, she’d heard, were supposed to be the windows of the soul, but his reminded her of windows in a dark house, mirrors that revealed nothing of what was inside.

  “It must be upsetting,” he murmured, his eyes resting on her now with what looked like genuine compassion. “Alzheimer’s-”

  “If I thought it was just the Alzheimer’s, I wouldn’t be sitting here,” she said, and was unable to keep an edge out of her voice.

  His eyebrows rose. “So, you think there’s something to it? That your father-”

  “No! Of course not.” That was twice she’d interrupted him. What was the matter with her? That was something she would normally be too polite to do, too well-schooled in effective ways of selling, whether an insurance policy, or herself. Reminding herself that she had a selling job to do right now, she took a breath and started again, this time in a calm, measured tone.

  “I’m sorry. But…no, Detective Cameron-”

  “Alan.”

  Thrown off guard by his interruption, she caught another breath, a reflexive breath. “Alan-obviously, I don’t think my father killed anyone. The idea is insane. But I do think something must have happened to my mother, probably some time in her far distant past. Something terrible. It’s just-you’d have to be there, hear her yourself, the way she talks. It’s too vivid, too real to her. I can’t believe it didn’t come from somewhere.”

  He shifted in his seat to allow the waiter to collect the sushi trays, then nodded, encouraging her to go on.

  “What I’m wondering is…” She waited until the waiter had gone away, then leaned toward him eagerly. “Suppose she’s been suppressing these memories all these years, the way victims of abuse do. You know? Then, as the connections in her brain begin to fail, the walls protecting her from the memories begin to break down. But the memories are confusing, and she…”

  “You’re thinking she’s mixing up your father with someone else?”

  “Yes.” She said it on a hiss of exhaled breath, and the easing inside her chest made her feel almost giddy. He was frowning but his eyes were sharp, focused on her now with interest that looked real rather than merely polite. “And this…thing that happened to your mother, it would have to have been…”

  “Before she met my dad. So, probably forty-some years ago, maybe? Anyway, a long time.”

  “And you think it happened here-in San Diego?”

  She held up her hands, a gesture of the helplessness she felt. “I have no idea. I just assumed she’d always lived here, but now…” She gave a small precarious laugh.

  “Has she given you any details? Anything that might help to narrow it down to a time and place?”

  She shook her head. “Whenever she starts talking to me about it, she just cries. And begs me to tell the police.” Overwhelming sadness forced her to smile. “So, now I have. Maybe you can get more out of her. It’s what you do, isn’t it?”

  The arrival of the waiter with the check saved him from having to answer what was, after all, a rhetorical question.

  Obeying protocol, the waiter presented the plastic-bound folder containing their bill to Alan, the male of the party. Lindsey reached to intercept it, and there was a brief comedic moment when it appeared a three-way tug-of-war might ensue.

  “I invited you, remember?” Alan said, smiling at her over the contested prize.

  Lindsey countered with a smile of her own and, “Yes, but I own my own business. I need the tax deduction.”

  “Ah, but if I let you pay for my lunch, it could be construed as bribing a police officer.”

  Lindsey laughed and yielded. “Okay, that trumps me. You win.”

  He took out his wallet, selected some bills and placed them on top of the folder without looking at what was inside, nodded at the hovering waiter, then rose. Lindsey hurriedly snatched up her purse and did the same, and Alan took her elbow and said, “How’s your afternoon?”

  She hesitated, thrown off guard in much the same way she had been when he’d asked if she liked sushi, and again when he’d ordered her to use his first name. She was a
naturally reserved person and tended to be cautious-even timid-when getting acquainted with strangers, thoroughly testing and getting comfortable with the unknown waters before taking the next step. The detective’s abrupt-even snap-decisions were unsettling to her. “I took it off,” she said, recovering. “But you don’t mean you-”

  “Why not? One thing’s for sure, after forty-some-odd years, this case isn’t going to get any fresher.” Alan was thinking about the reports he was supposed to be filling out, waiting for him back at his desk. He smiled into the amazing black-fringed eyes so nearly on a level with his own. “So, let’s go talk to your mom, shall we?”

  They went in separate cars-her choice, not his, but as he followed Lindsey Merrill’s classy silver-blue Mercedes through the streets of San Diego, he had some time to think about what he might be getting himself into.

  As far as this “cold case” went, probably nothing. He was pretty sure it was going to turn out to be exactly what it looked like-a case of Alzheimer’s taking a peculiar turn, a sad story but hardly one that warranted the time and energy of the San Diego Police Department. And he was going to have to explain to his captain why he’d spent the afternoon chasing wild geese when there were open cases he should be working.

  So, why was he doing this? Sure, Lindsey Merrill was attractive, but he was long past the age when his hormones were able to override his good sense. The last time that had happened he’d been about seventeen, and he figured he still had a way to go before he’d reach the age where a desire to recapture those randy days of youth might lead him down those old dangerous paths.

  What it was, he realized, was that he’d reached an age where he was beginning to question the paths he’d already chosen. Questioning how much longer he was going to be able to deal with the constant parade of teenaged-gang-violence victims and domestic violence cases-those were the worst, particularly the ones involving kids-without burning out. He’d seen it happen to guys he’d come up through the ranks with. He didn’t like to dwell on those stories of breakdowns and suicides, and even now pushed them out to the fringes of his consciousness and tethered them there with the mantra, That’s not gonna happen to me, won’t happen to me.