“Fuck.” The mouth angered again, and I liked that better. The lips turned the color of OPI’s Girls Just Want to Play, the one Ginny insisted we both wear to prom because she liked the name. “You want to do this the hard way, huh?” A hand with clawed fingers swiped the blood from the mouth, smearing it across the chin. A knife! There was a knife in that hand. The mouth grinned at my realization. “Look what you did. I’m gonna have to hurt you now.”
“Do that, and you’ll have a bullet in your head.” A voice—calm and vaguely familiar—came from behind me, and with it, the spell broke. I hurled myself away from the mouth, the hands, the arms, the legs, the feet, the face—the entire man to whom it belonged. He looked scrawnier than his voice let on. Gaunt even. Made of bones and dirt. But his eyes, now that I could see them, had an unexpected power. Darting from Levi to me and back again, they possessed the boldness of a cornered animal.
“And who the fuck are you?” The man danced toward Levi with his fists raised, slaying invisible air dragons as he approached.
“A man who’s brought a gun to a knife fight, evidently.”
“Levi?” The gun tucked close to his chest answered me back. It glinted in the glow of the lone streetlight. I backed up, smacking myself against a tree trunk.
“What are you doing out here alone?” he shouted.
“What am I doing? What are you doing? You followed me.”
“You let yourself be followed.” Levi trained the black-eyed barrel on the man, then waved it down the length of his body as he squirmed. “Clearly.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means you’re in way over your head, Samantha Bronwyn.” Did I tell him my last name? Definitely not. But Ginny shared hers, of course. Along with her Facebook page, Twitter handle, and every other thing you shouldn’t share with strangers. Unless that stranger looks like a Calvin Klein model, she’d whispered when I cautioned her with Levi out of earshot in the airplane bathroom.
While I contemplated my options—Potential Murderer #1 or Potential Murderer #2—the man scurried toward the shadows like a rat. “Where do you think you’re going?” Levi demanded. With two broad steps, he grabbed the man’s shoulder and spun him around. “Give her the money back.”
“And my phone.”
“And her phone.” Levi repeated. His fingers tightened on the man’s arm, reddening with the effort. I waited for the snap, the break of his bird-like bones. The knife dropped from his hand, and Levi kicked it into the gutter.
“Alright, alright, alright. It’s in my pocket, dude. I wasn’t gonna do nothin’ to her. I was just messin’ around.” Levi pulled one pocket inside out. Then, the other, and my things tumbled to the sidewalk, along with a small baggie and a hypodermic needle that explained a lot.
“Now get out of here.”
“Uh, okay.” The man side-eyed Levi’s death grip. “But I can’t move … I—oof.” Leveled by Levi’s punch, the man went down hard. And stayed down. One of his jaundiced teeth skittered from his mouth and mixed with the gravel until I couldn’t tell it from all the other pebbles. I flinched, then flinched again when Levi turned his attention to me, his raised eyebrows issuing a challenge.
“I’m fine,” I insisted. “I mean—thank you, but I’m fine … now.” I gathered my phone and my wad of money so fast, I scraped my knuckles against the sidewalk. Flesh seemed a small price to pay for a hasty exit. “I have to go.”
He shook his head. “You’re not going anywhere.” I hoped he couldn’t hear me gulp. Levi slipped his gun into his waistband and centered his knee in the back of the fallen man, stretching one of his limp, skeleton arms awkwardly behind his back. He’d obviously done this before. Then he looked up at me. “You’re coming with me.”
“Like hell I am.”
He sighed, exasperated. “Are you country girls all this stubborn?”
“It’s a Texas thing,” I said, wondering if I could outrun him. Doubtful. Not with those legs. He had at least six inches on my 5’6” frame. “Didn’t anybody ever warn you about Texas girls?”
He didn’t laugh, his eyes calculated and focused. “Do me a favor. Open my backpack. Hand me one of those zip ties.” I hadn’t noticed his bag until now. He’d dropped it in the darkness, a few feet away.
“Guess you were right about those unsavory characters.” Still nothing—not even a smile or a nod of acknowledgment. “Is he dead?” I asked. Levi prodded the man’s ribs with his knuckles, inducing a low groan.
“Zip tie, please.” Reluctant, I shuffled toward the bag and spread it open wide.
“What else do you have in here? Duct tape? Bleach? A shovel?”
“Funny. You should be thanking me, you know. If I hadn’t shown up, Skinny here would be practicing his knife skills on you.”
“I already said thank you.” I plucked a plastic zip tie from the top of the bag. Underneath, I felt something soft. Maybe a T-shirt. “You gonna use these on me too?”
“Nah. I’m not into that kind of thing.”
“But you’re into following a complete stranger? Bringing a gun on an airplane? How did you even … ?”
“Zip tie.” I shoved the tie into Levi’s extended palm, and he started to secure Skinny. With his hands busy, I grabbed the gun from the holster on his waistband and pointed it at him. That was too easy. I couldn’t believe my luck. It was the same size as the one in Pandora’s box. Finally, my mother’s just in case came in handy.
He studied me with surprised amusement. “Seriously?”
“I’m not going anywhere with you until you tell me who you are and why you followed me.”
“Fine.” I hadn’t expected him to agree. Not that easily. The urgent stiffness in my shoulders loosened. “Just put the gun—” Levi lunged toward me, strong hands on my forearm, and wrestled the gun from my grasp, but not before I landed two strong kicks to his shin that he barely noticed. “—down.”
“What are you—a ninja?”
“Actually, it’s pretty basic self-defense. You lost your focus—I saw an opening.” He grinned. “But you were pretty tricky, grabbing my gun like that. Let me guess, it’s a Texas thing?”
I shrugged, annoyed with myself. “Please. I heard from Ginny. I think she’s with some guy named Marco. Just let me leave. I won’t tell anybody about you.”
He walked to his backpack and rummaged inside, producing his cell phone. “At least read this before you make your last stand at the Alamo.”
I got no further than the breaking news headline before I felt my knees buckle.
Body of SFO employee discovered at Candlestick demolition site, police suspect foul play, fear escaped prisoner Cullen involved.
chapter
six
the wrong clare
I let Levi help me to the curb, then watched as he dragged Skinny deeper into the park. I listened to the sound of his limp body swishing the dewy blades like a grass snake. For the second time that night, I had the feeling of witnessing myself. Who is this girl? What is she doing?
When Levi joined me, I felt grateful for the two feet of space he left between us. “Just breathe,” he said. I was trying.
“I thought you said Ginny would be fine. That she’d turn up.” I spoke through a tunnel of panic—my words echoing strangely in my head.
“That was before.”
“Before what?”
Levi paused, and I knew. Whatever he was about to say was bad. Life-altering bad. “Before I knew who you were.”
Who I was? Who was I? An eighteen-year-old girl from the sticks. A star basketball player, sure, but nothing else. Nothing special. “What do you mean?”
“Your mom … her past.”
I felt like I was back in fourth-period Calculus, Mr. Willett writing gibberish on the board. C’mon, Ms. Bronwyn, you know this one. Derivatives, remember? “My mom? You know
her?”
Another mile of silence stretched between us before Levi shook his head. “No. I’m sorry,” Levi murmured. “I thought she would’ve told you.”
“So you don’t know her?”
“I know of her.”
“I think you’ve got the wrong person. My mom owns a clothing boutique in Bellwether. She has chickens and cows. Lots of them. Her name is Clare—”
“Keely,” Levi finished for me, but it was wrong. All wrong.
“Bronwyn. Same as me,” I corrected.
“And it’s always been Bronwyn?”
I glared at him. “Yes, always. She kept her maiden name when she married my dad and passed it along to me. He’s dead, by the way. Or did you already know that too?” Pity wrote large all over Levi’s face, and it rankled me. He was the one confused. “You’ve got the wrong Clare.”
“Right,” he said. “The wrong Clare.” He stood up, fidgeting with his hands. “We, uh, you should probably get out of here. Skinny’s going to wake up soon. At least let me come with you, wherever you’re going.”
I knew I should stand and start walking. Ginny. I had to go to her. But I felt cemented to the ground. My limbs pinned by four words. Clare, come find me. “So who is Clare Keely?” I asked.
september 6, 1996
Looks like we’re both new around here,” he said. Half of his mouth was smiling at her, and she smiled back. Pleasantries. Not exactly what Clare Keely—Doctor Clare Keely—expected from her first session with Clive Cullen. But then again, nothing about her inaugural week at San Quentin State Prison had gone the way she’d imagined it.
That morning, as she slipped her tweed jacket over a red blouse, she practiced. She’d already broken her supervisor’s first rule—don’t look too nice—so she wanted her introduction to roll off her tongue, effortless. Not like the ink was barely dry on her diploma.
Hello. I’m Dr. Clare Keely. It sounded rehearsed.
Hi, I’m Dr. Keely. Too casual.
I’m Dr. Keely, but you can call me Clare. Bad idea. Very bad. This doctor thing would take some getting used to, but damned if she wasn’t going to use that title. She’d earned it.
Cullen watched, amused. Magnetized, her eyes went straight to his hands. They were clasped on the bare table. Strong and capable. Capable of crushing her windpipe. Splintering her bones. Snapping her neck like the pencil in her hand. Clare tapped its eraser against the thick file on her lap, knowing the only thing between them was the rudimentary push-button alarm she’d checked every morning. It would take at least ten seconds for the officer to make it up the stairs from his post. She’d timed it herself.
“You transferred?” She already knew the answer. It was right there in that file. Everything she needed to know about Clive Cullen. Cutthroat. She had to be careful not to call him that by accident.
“I started down south. Wasco in Kern County. It’s a level four.” Level Four? Clare was certain she should know exactly what that meant—they’d reviewed all this during the orientation—but she couldn’t remember. Neal had been right. The prison was another world with its own language, and its own set of rules. She felt like a newbie, but she nodded anyway. “Then they sent me to Corcoran. Real nice place. Manson’s digs. And now, lucky me, here I am. The prison by the Bay.”
“Why did they transfer you here?”
He cocked his head at her, grinning, and a flush crept up her neck. “You already know why. Are you testing me?”
Clare cursed herself silently. She felt outmatched. Incompetent. And they’d barely begun. “Um, I was just trying to … ” She tested the options in her mind. Build rapport? Hear you tell it in your own words? What would her clinical psych professor say? Her supervisor, Dr. Fitzpatrick?
Cullen laughed. A real laugh. Soft and deep. It was the nicest sound she’d heard all day. “I’m just kidding,” he said. “I’m sure you want to hear it from the horse’s mouth.” He pointed to himself. “Me. Horse.”
She giggled before she could stop herself, then busied her own delicate hands, opening Cullen’s file. Overfamiliarity. It was the first word on the first page of the disciplinary infraction that sent him to San Quentin two months ago. A prison word. Clare had to ask Fitzpatrick what it meant.
“I’ll admit I got too close to her.”
“Who?”
“Gina. She worked in the library where I was a clerk. I know it must sound crazy—no pun intended—to you, Doc, but I thought I was in love.” Cullen ran his fingers through his dark hair, then looked up at her. His stare felt intense. Like he was casting a spell with those eyes as gray-blue and mercurial as the sea. This is what happened to Gina, she thought.
“Have there been others in here?”
“A few. I can’t help it. Prison is lonely, you know? That’s why I got depressed in the first place.”
Clare fingered the diagnosis in Cullen’s file—adjustment disorder with depressed mood. As if anybody could make a seamless adjustment to this place. She made a noise of agreement before the irony hit her like a brick to the face. Or more appropriately, a knife to the throat. “But … you’ve always had … ” She stepped around the land mines selecting her words. “Problems in relationships … with women?” It had the sound, the lilt of a question, but they both knew it wasn’t.
There was that sheepish grin again. “Dr. Keely, that might be the understatement of the century.”
Before Clare knew it, she laughed again. A real laugh.
****
Clare printed five sentences in Cullen’s chart. She selected her words with care, using the example note Fitzpatrick had given her, the morning of their first supervisory meeting.
Inmate attended appointment. He was oriented to person, place, and time. Mood was neutral. Inmate was introduced to the undersigned clinician and reminded of limitations of confidentiality. Inmate discussed criminal and relationship history.
According to Fitzpatrick, “Don’t use their names. It makes things easier.” What things? she wondered. And brevity was key. “Less there for them to hang you with,” he’d said. Whatever that meant, whoever them was, Clare planned to play it safe. Before she closed the file, she turned to one of the pages she’d marked. The autopsy report for Cullen’s last victim. She couldn’t stop reading it. It was as appalling as it was fascinating, the way it reduced human brutality to weights and measurements. Unfeeling science. This is my life now, she thought. These kinds of men.
It was a minor detail—the one missing earring—that intrigued her most. Emily Pierce didn’t seem like the kind of girl who lost an earring, even if it was cubic zirconia. Though she had no reason to be, Clare felt certain of that. She would ask Cullen. Not right away, of course. She imagined his gloved hands as skillful as a surgeon’s, removing the earring, slipping it in his pocket. A sick memento. Without thinking, Clare touched her own gold hoops.
“Clare?” Fitzpatrick barged in without knocking. He wore a standard, sad uniform—a white, coffee-stained button-down, pleated khakis, and scuffed penny loafers. This is where supervisors go to die, she thought, trying to avert her eyes from the gray bags under his. She closed Cullen’s file and arranged it with the others on her desk. “How’d it go with Cullen?” he asked.
“Okay, I guess.”
“Did he hit on you? Say anything inappropriate? Get too personal? He does that. It’s his thing.” She wanted to laugh. He should know. A month ago, after her callback interview, Fitzpatrick had asked her out for a drink, giving her that hand-in-the-cookie-jar face when she’d rebuffed him.
Clare knew she sparkled. It was her curse. She’d known it since that seventh-grade slumber party when Lisa Taylor’s stepfather slipped his hand onto her knee under the vinyl birthday-balloon tablecloth. She was dangerous. Like a siren. The kind of pretty that turns men’s heads, leads them out into deep water. And men are willing to drown themselves for shiny things. Even su
pervisors.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “He was actually … ” Clare shuffled through a deck of words, considering. Funny. Nice. Insightful. “ … polite.”
Fitzpatrick shook his head. “Oh boy. You’re in more trouble than I thought.” Then he winked at her.
september 16, 1996
Clare fiddled with the ruby ring on her finger. Probably not even a real ruby, mind you, but she couldn’t bring herself to part with it. Even though she and Neal—Dr. Neal Barrington by now—had broken up months ago, it was a touchstone. A touchstone of rage.
“You’re seriously breaking up with me because I took a job at a prison? How sexist are you?” Clare sat on the edge of Neal’s bed, fuming, watching him run a hand through his chestnut hair until nothing remained of its gelled perfection.
“It’s not that, Clare, and you know it. I can’t be with someone who won’t acknowledge her own issues. You’re in denial. Complete and total denial.”
“Thank you, Freud. Remind me to never date another shrink. It’s exhausting.”
“Yeah? Well, remind me to never date a shrink who hates therapy.”
It was true. Clare had gritted her teeth through every one of her fifty-two required sessions. Only because she couldn’t graduate without checking that box. Her therapist had reminded her of Neal. Always acting like he knew her better than herself. They both seemed to think Clare’s chosen profession—criminal psychology—had to do with her past. That birthday party and everything that came after. What did they know?
“I’m taking the job, Neal, whether you like it or not. I have to prove to myself I can do it.”
“Prove away. I’m not coming along for the ride.”
She stormed out the door without telling Neal the truth because it sounded ludicrous. Mental, even. But the truth was, she got them. Criminals, the dredges of society, the castoffs, the undesirables. She understood their darkness, as if she’d been born from it herself.
Doctors of Darkness Boxed Set Page 4