by Rachel Kane
He cut me off by laughing and shaking his head. “This is great. Absolutely perfect. I love it.”
“I’m glad one of us is having fun. Explain yourself.”
Now his elbows left the table as he sat back in his chair, loose and relaxed. “Look, I don’t do this anymore. I’m out of the image rehabilitation business. But your agent is very persuasive, so I said I’d take a look. Offer you thirty seconds of advice, so you wouldn’t get led astray. But you don’t need me. You’re a sociopath. You’ll be fine.”
If I’d been a cartoon character, my jaw would’ve dropped to the table, the bone clattering around the hardwood finish. As it was, my mouth was hanging open in a very unattractive way.
“I’ve been called a lot of things in my day—”
“I’m sure you have,” he said.
“—but a sociopath? Are you sure you didn’t just wander in here off the street?”
“Did I use the wrong word? Maybe I mean pathological narcissist. I’m not a psychiatrist, just a retired PR guy.”
“I don’t fucking believe this,” I said, struggling to control my emotions. “There’s some stalker out there trying to make my life miserable, and you…and you…”
He stared at me wordlessly as I calmed myself down. I was not going to show him a single fucking feeling. Who goes around calling people sociopaths? Who does he think he is?
“All done?” he asked.
“Oh, believe me, I’m done.”
“Good. Here’s my advice. You won’t listen, but at least it’ll be off my conscience. First, you need to admit to yourself that this is your fault. If you plagiarized someone, you had to know that eventually it could come back to bite you. Own your mistake. Your lack of guilt over it is what made me make the sociopath remark.”
“But I never—”
“You said you were done. Second, the thing you’re doing here, where you try to control the conversation? You need to realize every guilty person tries to do that. That’s what guilt does. You’re sitting there scrambling to figure a way out of trouble, and your instinct is to manipulate. Being angry, being sad, whatever it takes to force someone to take your side. Classic. If this goes public, it’s that attitude that will turn people against you. People like friendly contrition. They enjoy a good confession. Nobody likes to see big spurts of emotion on display.”
There were a thousand things I could have said. I could have absolutely torn him apart. What the fuck was he even talking about? Classic, what, like he’d already judged me guilty?
“Third, and finally. This is the important one, so if you’re busy being mad at me over those first two, hold off and listen to this one: The internet feeds off dialogue, so don’t give it what it wants. If I had a dime for every time I’d given that bit of advice and had someone ignore it… Well, actually, considering what I used to charge clients, I have way more than a dime for every time it happened. That’s why I’m able to retire on my savings. The temptation will be to fight back. To respond. But the minute you do, it gives validity to your accusers. Silence is your best weapon.”
With that, he picked up the picture from the table, and put it back in his pocket.
I was silent for a second—still fuming—but as he rose, I said, “That’s…that’s it? You come in, accuse me of being a sociopath, drop some faux-wisdom telling me to be quiet, and then you leave?”
He stood and put his hands on the back of his chair. “Yes. Then I leave. Because I spent my entire career watching guilty people not taking my advice, destroying their reputations by trying to defend themselves, all because they couldn’t bear admitting the truth about themselves. Not interested in doing that anymore. So now I’ve done a favor for Jane and Micah, and I’m going back home to my garden.”
At the end of my mysteries, Katie always took a moment to gather the victims, the suspects, and the police, to explain how she had cracked the case. Then Roger would drive her back to the bakery, and they’d say a few closing words about the crime while feasting on pastry.
That seemed to be exactly what this guy was doing. He’d solved the mystery; the denouement had unspooled all the tangles, and it was time for him to enjoy his life.
“There’s just one problem with your advice,” I said.
I wanted to smack that raised eyebrow right off his face.
“And that is…?” he asked.
“I didn’t do it. I’m not a plagiarist. I write my own damn books. Whoever is spreading this rumor, he’s off his rocker. Didn’t they tell you, he came to my house, spraypainted the front—”
He shook his head. “Not likely. The two things aren’t related.”
“Okay, fine, but the fact remains, I didn’t do anything wrong.”
He stared at me, his face expressionless. “Then where did the accusation come from? It’s a very specific one, with promises of detailed evidence. If the evidence doesn’t exist, then you’re home free, and this all blows away.”
“I don’t know where it came from. That’s why this scares me so badly. Come on, forget the sociopath bullshit. Help me. Or find someone who will.”
I couldn’t bear his gaze. Why was he still staring like that? It made me so damn nervous.
“I’ll send Micah some recommendations,” he said. “They’ll all tell you the same thing. Everything goes away, in the end. Just keep your mouth shut, don’t talk to the press, don’t talk to the internet.”
Then he was gone.
I was alone.
Alone, with nobody to help me.
And my phone was pinging with a new notification.
4
Alex
“I don’t know what you did to him,” Micah told me, setting down his knife and spearing the steak with his fork, “but it must have been brutal, the way Jane tells it.”
My shrimp were untouched on my plate.
“I don’t think I was brutal,” I said. “Straightforward, maybe.”
“Bulldozers are also straightforward.”
My fork was in my hand. I turned it so that it caught the light overhead, turned it again so that it caught reflections from the table.
Cam bothered me.
He was lying. That much was clear. There was an ease to his lying, a comfort, that told me he was an old hand at it.
That’s not the part that bothered me. People lie all the time; it’s endemic to the species. You can’t get through a trip to the grocery store without lying to someone, even if it’s only yourself. I really will eat the kale this time.
The problem was that Cam didn’t realize he was lying.
That’s what bothered me.
I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter. He’ll get on with his life. He’ll be fine.”
Micah sighed. “So here’s the thing.”
“Oh no. Please don’t tell me the thing.”
“This business runs on connections. It’s true here in Corinth, as much as it was back when you were in Hollywood. It’s who you know, and, more importantly, who you can keep happy.”
“I already told you, I’m not taking the case.”
“No, no, I know that. But I’m saying you can’t leave a bad taste in a client’s mouth. Word gets around.”
I moved the shrimp around on my plate. “I appreciate that you’re looking out for my future prospects, Micah, but seriously—”
“Not your prospects!” His voice had dropped to a whisper. “Mine. Do you know what happens if Cam starts telling people how unhappy he was with that meeting? You think it reflects on you? It reflects on me. I set it up. It was in my offices.”
“I hardly think that whatever writers Cam knows can have an effect—”
He held up his hand to shush me. “Ever since you came back to town, you’ve been like this.”
“Come on, don’t make it personal.”
“No, this is personal. You’ve had a chip on your shoulder since your so-called retirement. You won’t tell anyone what happened, you’ve been trying to alienate your best friends. Meanwhile, you
’re trying to act like a tough guy in a meeting with a client who is actually scared, like all that matters is that people leave you alone.”
I nodded. “Now you’re getting it. If the world would leave me alone, I think we’d all be happier. It was you who came into my garden, not the other way around.”
Micah checked around us for eavesdroppers, then leaned forward and whispered, “What happened to you? Where is the Alex I used to know, the one who enjoyed this work? Who enjoyed anything?”
That Alex is dead. You can blame David Black for that. Not that you will ever, ever hear me talk about that.
“Look, I’m sorry I steamrolled your client. Was I too harsh? Maybe. What do you want me to do, send him an apology? Flowers? Tell me what I need to do, so we can get back to talking about other stuff.”
“Just tell me whether to take his case seriously,” said Micah. “Then I can make some excuse for your behavior, smooth things over.”
I spend so much of my life trying to unhook my past from me. It’s like walking on the beach, and realizing a sand-spur is caught in your pants cuff; you try to pull it out, but it’s sticking to your fingers, trying to cling to you. No matter what I did, my past kept finding a way to jab me.
Here I was, being asked for my professional opinion, and I didn’t want to have a professional opinion. Didn’t want to admit that I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the case.
I don’t know why. Why did it bother me that he was lying, that he didn’t realize he was lying?
“What can I tell you, Micah? You know the score. Nine times out of ten, this stuff turns out to be nothing. But Cam is hiding something. I don’t know what. He insists this Secret Reader can’t have any dirt on him. I already gave him my advice…but you might want to drill down a little deeper. Find out what he’s hiding, because whatever it is, it makes him vulnerable. Somebody’s going to find out what it is, and then he’s going to have real trouble.”
I hated the smile that Micah gave me.
“That’s the Alex I remember,” he said. “What’s he hiding? No, I know you don’t know, but I’m asking you to speculate. What could he be hiding? Anything illegal?”
I thought about that. “I’ve known guys like Cam. Easy on the eyes, heavy on the drama. Are we talking about crime? Not my first thought. But he’s tricky.”
“Jane told me you called him a sociopath.”
Groaning, I said, “I’ll never live that one down. But look. He writes murder mysteries, okay? So he’s used to playing with the idea of crime. But that’s not what this feels like. I don’t know. I keep thinking this Secret Reader must know him.”
Micah nodded. He picked up his wineglass and swirled it. “If that’s the case, then this is going to get worse. If only I had someone on the team who knew how to handle these things…”
“Come on.”
“No, no, it’s fine. Look, I’ll make the damn apologies. I’ll tell him you gave me good feedback after the meeting. You’ll never have to hear about any of this ever again.”
“Thank god. Can I eat my dinner now? And can we please talk about something else?”
A few minutes later Micah said, “Some of us were planning to go to the lake house next weekend.”
“Have fun with that.”
“See, I was leading into an invitation there. Nothing to do with work. Just taking the boat out, relaxing. Seems right up your alley, with your early retirement.”
“As much as I’d like to play third wheel to you and Jerome—”
“Fifth wheel, technically, since Toby and Matt are also going. But you should bring someone too. Whoever you’re seeing.”
I felt myself freeze, and had to consciously guide my hand. Set the fork on your plate. Pick up the wine. Act normal. Buy yourself a moment or two.
“I’m not seeing anyone.”
“Not even vaguely?”
A sip of wine. A touch of the napkin to my lips. Just the normal things you do when you’re at dinner.
“Not even vaguely,” I said.
Now he scowled. “You really are turning into a hermit. I thought you were just avoiding work. What else are you avoiding in that garden of yours?”
I had tried. I really had. Three separate times, since I left the business, I’d tried to meet men. And each time, I ran them off, left them bitter and resentful of me.
You tell yourself, it’s okay, these things just take time. You say, one of these days you’ll be ready again.
But that isn’t always true. I might never be ready to meet someone, to connect with someone, ever again.
You can blame that on David Black, too.
Yet another piece of my life he destroyed.
I picked up my fork. I stabbed one of the shrimp. The tines of the fork pierced the soft flesh, then hit the plate underneath. Tink.
Micah wanted an answer, but I didn’t know what to tell him. He was one of my best friends, but I didn’t want him peering too deeply into my personal life. Didn’t want anyone to scrutinize that too hard. What could I say? Not the truth: I realized that I don’t deserve someone honest, someone true. The only men I connect with are liars, men with dark secrets who end up hurting everyone. There’s something wrong with me, deep down. I can’t attract an honest man. If David taught me anything, it’s that I will never have honest love in my life. Only manipulation and gaslighting.
“There’s nothing wrong with being a hermit,” I said.
Micah stared as though about to interrogate me. I imagined this was what witnesses on the stand felt when he looked at them, preparing to tear their stories apart with his questions.
Thankfully, he backed off. “Well, if you change your mind, call me. There’s plenty of room for you, even if you want to come by yourself.”
I don’t like guilt. Guilt is heavy, there’s a weight to it. Like pulling on a wet sweater, it’s tight, it’s uncomfortable, it tugs your shoulders down.
I’d been feeling like that a lot lately.
There’d been no call to be brutal with Cam, if that’s the right word. No sense in treating him like a villain, instead of a victim.
Micah had offered to call me a cab to take me home. I’d told him I would walk. Long damn walk from downtown, he said.
I needed the walk. What did I have to go home to, anyway? My garden? Sure, yes. I could sit there in the night, watch the toads hop through my flowers. But I knew myself. I’d go inside, pour myself a scotch, and sit in front of the computer, watching Cam’s drama play out.
There’s a point in every case where you finally have your breakthrough. Your questions make it through the deflections, the array of defenses the client puts up, and you finally get the truth. Yes, I did it.
For me, there was no sweeter moment than that admission of guilt. The admission that yes, someone had made a mistake, yes, they were going to own it…and that from here on out, they were truly putting themselves in my hands, because only I could protect them.
But if I admitted guilt, who was going to protect me?
No one.
I treated Cam like shit because…
Because why? What made me toy with him? What about him got under my skin? It was just a case, and I didn’t want a case anymore.
Downtown was a strange mix. Blocks of new skyscrapers were bordered by older buildings that had been sitting here for a hundred years, sporting the old red brick that had built so much of Corinth’s past.
I’d entered the older part of town, and on the corner was a church, with a couple of trees out front. It looked so strange here, within view of the skyscrapers, that I paused. When I walk downtown, I don’t pay close attention to the buildings. Everything goes by in a blur, while I am deep in my thoughts.
For instance, although I knew I’d passed this church before, I’d never looked at its sign. Now I paused and looked at it.
It was lit up, and in black letters it said, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Galatians 6:7.”
I fou
nd myself staring at the sign. Questioning it. Was it true? Do we reap what we sow? Is there justice in the world?
What did I do, to deserve to feel like this? What did I do to deserve this loneliness?
You reap what you sow. Maybe I was going to be punished forever, for working with David Black. For believing him. For letting him pull me into his world.
Well, no more. From now on, the only thing I would sow were the flower seeds in my garden. It might not be an exciting, glamorous life, but it was one I had control over.
I headed for home, promising myself I’d read a book, turn on the TV, or do anything other than try to follow Cam’s drama online.
5
Cam
“If you don’t turn off that computer, I’m going to throw it out the window,” said Eli, setting the take-out boxes on my table.
I pushed down the laptop’s lid until it clicked. “Sorry,” I said. “I can’t stop staring at it. Waiting.”
He began to dole out noodles onto my plate. “This is insane. I really am sorry it’s happening. I don’t know what I would do if someone came after me like that.”
I glanced back at the computer. “You’d probably sic your big boyfriend on them. He’d throw a few punches and settle things.”
Eli grinned at this idea. “He probably would, yeah. You want to borrow him? Maybe he can pound some sense into your internet troll?”
It was a mark of how worried Eli was about me that he’d come tonight. Ever since he’d settled in with his boyfriend Jake, I’d hardly seen him. He was always doing things, being active, hiking and camping. Disgusting.
I wasn’t going to tell him how grateful I was that he was here…but I was pretty grateful.
“I suppose it’s just the price of fame,” I said weakly.
“Even so, I’m still jealous of you,” he said. “People love your books. They pay you money for them.”
My plate was untouched on the table. I glanced down at it, my stomach turning. Can’t eat, can’t sleep, can’t breathe.
