Random Road

by Thomas Kies

  I’m angry, angry at the doctors, angry at God…angry at him.

  I pointed my finger at him and felt tears burning in my eyes. “Just because you’re sick, don’t think you’re going drag me down a fucking black, rat hole of depression. I’m not going to let you take me there and, goddamn it, I’m not going to let you go there either.”

  He blinked and rubbed his head, not really knowing what to say.

  I felt the wet heat of tears in my eyes when I growled, “You’re a wonderful father, a great friend, and a terrific lover. You’re a good goddamned human being. Don’t trivialize that… or the next time I’m breaking your freakin’ nose and don’t think I can’t do it.”

  He blinked again at my harsh words. Then he leaned forward and kissed me, long and hard.

  Oh no, horrible. He’s kissing me and I’m crying.

  Kevin withdrew his lips only slightly from my own and whispered, “I love you.”

  I leaned forward and locked my lips onto his for a second time, sobbing uncontrollably.

  Then I slowly pulled away, wiped the trails of tears off my face and gruffly whispered in a voice I barely recognized as my own, “I love you too. Are you going to let me help you?”

  “Yeah.”

  I touched his face with my fingers, wiping the moistness from my tears off the stubble on his cheeks.

  “Are you going to pull through this so that we can live together and drive each other crazy?” I was having a hard time keeping from falling into another crying jag.

  “You already drive me crazy.”

  “You want to come home with me and have sex? I hear it’s therapeutic as hell.” I tried to laugh.

  “You know what I really want?”

  “What?”

  “For you to take me up to my bedroom and hold me until I go to sleep.”

  I did that.

  We snuck up the stairs and past Caroline’s bedroom. As I crept by her door, I stopped and peeked in. She was motionless under a sheet except for the rise and fall of her breathing. After the tension of the last two days, she must have been exhausted.

  Her hug tonight—so sweet.

  When we got to Kevin’s room, he practically fell onto the bed.

  I crawled in next to him. I laid my head on his shoulder and my hand on his chest. We were both completely clothed, but somehow it was as intimate as I’ve ever been with anyone in my entire life.

  “It’s going to be okay,” I said softly.

  “I know.”

  We lay there holding each other for a long time. No one said anything because there weren’t any words that could possibly be adequate or appropriate for what Kevin was facing.

  For what all of us were facing.

  I know what I wanted to say. I wanted to offer a long litany of encouraging platitudes and advice, some of which I’d already said while we’d been sitting in the backyard. I wanted to rail against God. How could a just and loving deity do something so horrible to such a wonderful human being?

  How could God do this to Kevin’s daughter? She’d already suffered through the awful death of her mother.

  Was she going to have to face it all one more time?

  I wanted to cry again.

  I knew the moment Kevin had blessedly fallen asleep when I felt his breathing slow down and it became deep and regular. I think I dozed off myself because the next time I checked my watch, it was nearly three in the morning.

  I carefully crawled out of bed and covered Kevin up with a blanket. I took a clean sheet of paper out of his printer and wrote him a note that said that I love him and I’ll call him in the morning.

  I went home and walked Tucker.

  Then I drank two more glasses of wine while I curled up on my couch and I cried until I didn’t have any tears left. When I finally fell into my own bed, I swore to all that was holy that I would find a way to keep Kevin alive.

  By God, I’m not going to let him die.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  I was making coffee when my cell phone went off. “Yes?”

  “Genie?”

  It was Laura Ostrowski. For the briefest of terrifying seconds, I irrationally wondered if I was late to work again. Then I recalled that I wasn’t due in the office until three that afternoon.

  “Yeah,” I repeated, watching Tucker eye me anxiously. I hadn’t taken him for his morning walk yet.

  “Did I wake you?”

  “Nope. I’ve been up for a whole five minutes.”

  “Good.” She didn’t sound convincing. “I just got a phone call from Paula Ramos, the attorney who’s representing Jim and Aaron Brenner.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah. Aaron Brenner wants to do a jailhouse interview, against his attorney’s advice.”

  “He does?”

  I heard Laura sigh with irritation. “He specifically asked for you.”

  “When?”

  “Eleven this morning.”

  “Police station?”

  “That’s where he’s being held.” She sounded clearly annoyed. And why wouldn’t she, after all, last night she’d threatened to fire me.

  And now she had to tell me that Aaron Brenner specifically wanted to talk to me.

  That had to piss her off.

  “I’ll be there.” I expected that would be the end of our conversation.

  “One more assignment,” Laura added. “For this evening.”

  I wanted to remind her that, if I was interviewing Aaron Brenner at eleven, I was starting my shift early. And because the company hated to pay overtime, I should clock out early. But knowing how close I was to being terminated, I stayed quiet and listened.

  “A group of paranormal investigators are going out on the Sheffield Seaport Association ferry boat.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Why?”

  “Apparently, on this night sometime during the Great Depression, a rich guy by the name of Bartholomew Gault jumped off his fishing boat and drowned himself in the harbor.”

  That name sounds vaguely familiar.

  “Ring any bells?” Laura asked.

  “Yeah, but I can’t say why.”

  “You wrote about him just a couple of days ago.”

  Now the bells were ringing.

  “The Chadwick house out on Connor’s Landing,” I said quietly. “Bartholomew Gault bought it in 1910.”

  “And died on this very night in 1930.”

  I paused before I asked my next question. I didn’t want to sound like a wise ass. “Okay, what’s that got to do with me?”

  “Ghost hunter by the name of Stella Barry says that a strange light has been seen out on the harbor every year on this night not far from the lighthouse on Fisher’s Island. She’s going out on the ferry tonight to take some pictures and invited one of our reporters to come along.”

  I closed my eyes and counted, one, two, three, four…

  Around the time I got to ten, Laura added, “Stella Barry requested you by name. It seems she read your story on the Chadwick House and its inherent bad fortune.”

  Asked for by name by the Brenners’ lawyer and by a ghostbuster named Stella. Notoriety has its plusses and minuses.

  Any other time I would have wheedled and complained and found a way to get out of a paranormal investigator’s obvious attempt at free publicity, but I was on thin ice here. So I simply said, “What time and where does the ferry leave from?”

  I could almost hear the sound of quiet satisfaction in the short silence on the phone. She knew I hated doing features like this. “Be at the city dock at nine-thirty. I’d bring some bug spray.”

  Without saying good-bye, she hung up.

  Bitch.

  I had time before I needed to be at the police station to talk with Aaron Brenner. There was a shower to be taken, makeup to be applied, cof
fee to be consumed, and a dog to be walked, but first I wanted to spend a few minutes in front of my computer.

  There was something in the world that was more important than my job with The Sheffield Post, an interview with a killer, or even a walk with Tucker.

  Kevin Bell was sick…really sick.

  I had to find a way to save him.

  Hitting the familiar keys to work the magic of my favorite search engines, I looked for information on catastrophic liver failure. It wasn’t good news. Causes could be any one or a combination of factors—hepatitis, cancer, diabetes, overuse of acetaminophen, abuse of drugs, alcoholism.

  Bingo.

  Prognosis was bad. Really bad. He was looking at becoming jaundiced, suffering from a painful buildup of fluid in the abdomen, fatigue, depression, and reduced brain function.

  Oh, and death. Let’s not forget that.

  I reached for my cell phone and found the number for Dr. Paul Durham, a gastroenterologist at Yale. I’d done a piece on him a few years ago when I was freelancing in New York. Durham was articulate, good looking, and arrogant.

  He was also one of the best in his field.

  I reached his answering service and left a message, reminding him who I was and requested a return phone call. I was sure he’d remember me. He’d aggressively hit on me all during the interview. It’s not professional to be seduced by your story subject, not to mention, I was married to a very jealous New York City cop at the time. So I’d gently rebuffed him with the vague promise that we might get together sometime in the future.

  Yes, I was reasonably confident that he’d remember me.

  And I knew that if anyone could increase Kevin’s chances of survival, it would be Durham.

  ***

  “I’ve warned Aaron against doing this interview with you,” Paula Ramos stated. The attorney was in her mid-thirties, about five-three, slightly overweight, and exhibited the warmth of an ice cube. Her hair was brown and unremarkable. She wore black-rimmed no-nonsense glasses through which she stared at me without blinking.

  “I’m not particularly comfortable with this either,” Mike Dillon added.

  The three of us stood in front of a closed doorway. Mike had his arms folded. He said, “Depending on the way the story is presented, it could improperly influence a jury seated at the Brenners’ trial.”

  The attorney nodded slightly. “It could just as easily influence them to be biased against the Brenners.”

  I had my heavy bag slung over my shoulder and the strap was digging into my shoulder. “So what do we do?”

  Mike shrugged. “I guess we do the interview.”

  I knew that if Mike really wanted to keep the interview from happening, he could.

  The same with Paula Ramos.

  They each had an agenda. Mike would be sitting behind one-way glass listening to my questions, hoping that he’d learn something more than he already knew.

  The attorney was hoping that I’d write a piece that would plant the seeds of doubt in the populace of Sheffield, so that when the jury was chosen, part of her job will have already been done by me.

  I wanted a good story.

  I recognized Aaron Brenner immediately from his shaved head, broad shoulders, trimmed beard, and piercing ice-blue eyes. He was seated behind a heavy, wooden table and wore an orange jumpsuit.

  “Miss Chase,” he announced with a nod of his head, “thank you for coming. Pardon me for not standing.” He jangled the handcuffs that attached his wrists to a chain locked around his waist. “I’m afraid that all of this is attached to an eyebolt in the floor.”

  Ramos turned to Mike. “This is unnecessary.” Then she looked at me and ordered, “You will not put the fact that Aaron is chained up like some kind of animal in your story.”

  By way of explanation, Mike stated flatly, “He’s been charged with six counts of murder.”

  I noticed that a uniformed cop had followed Mike into the room.

  “He’s not going to be in here during the interview,” Ramos said, pointing angrily at the beefy officer.

  Mike smiled. “He most certainly is or this isn’t going to happen. I’m not letting two women sit in here alone with a killer.”

  “Alleged,” the attorney reminded.

  “Right,” Mike said dryly. “Half an hour, Genie.”

  “Thanks, Mike.”

  After the door closed behind the deputy chief, both Ramos and I sat down across the table from Aaron. The big cop behind us remained standing, clasped his hands behind his back, and stared silently at an invisible spot on the opposite wall.

  I took my recorder out of my bag and placed it on the table. Switching it on, I asked, “So Mr. Brenner. I’m afraid this is a little different than the last time we talked. Are you doing okay?”

  “Reverend,” he reminded me.

  “Of course, I’m sorry…how are you doing, Reverend?”

  He glanced at the tiny voice recorder and then looked back up at me, nodding. “My faith in the Lord sustains me. That, and Jim and I are innocent.”

  I leaned forward, putting my notebook on the table and holding my pen in my hand. “Where is Jim? How come he’s not here?”

  Aaron glanced at Ramos. Then he looked back at me. “As you probably know, I’m doing this against the advice of our attorney. Perhaps Jim is a better listener than I am. He’s waiting in his cell hoping that I don’t say something stupid.”

  “If your attorney advised you against this interview, why are you doing it?”

  “I want the truth to see the light of day, Miss Chase, because sometimes the truth is trivialized, marginalized, or never makes it into the courtroom.”

  Like the unfair outcome of the Jimmy Fitzgerald manslaughter case last week, I had to agree with Aaron Brenner. The truth certainly didn’t have much to do with that verdict.

  I checked my recorder to make certain it was running. I locked eyes with Aaron. “The last time I saw you, I asked you where you and your brother were last Wednesday night. You told me that you and Jim were home the entire evening. We both know that’s not true.”

  Paula Ramos grunted painfully and then groaned, “I hope this isn’t the tone you’re going to take all the way through this interview.”

  Aaron shook his head and held his hand up as far as the chains would allow. “It’s okay, Paula.” Then he directed his attention back to me, “Ever since Jim and Lynette split up, I’ve been driving down from Maine to comfort my brother on the day of his wedding anniversary.”

  I glanced over at the attorney who appeared to be studying her reflection in the large mirror on the wall. In reality, I knew she was wondering who was behind the one-way glass.

  Aaron continued, “I’m always afraid Jim might do something stupid.”

  “Like start drinking again?”

  “Like start drinking again,” he repeated. “This would have been their tenth anniversary. Over the weeks leading up to it, Jim and I’d been talking on the phone a lot. This particular anniversary was going to be hard for him. He was still hopelessly in love with Lynette.”

  “So you drove down on Wednesday?”

  “I got to Jim’s place at around five,” he stated. “He wasn’t around, but I’ve got a key to his house and let myself in. I waited around for about an hour and then called him on his cell phone.”

  “Where was he?”

  Aaron hesitated and glanced over at his attorney who only shrugged. “Jim was sitting in the parking lot at the Stop-n-Shop.”

  “What was he doing there?”

  He waited again before he answered. “He was following Lynette.”

  “Why?”

  For the first time, Aaron appeared agitated. “It was his anniversary. He wanted to see his wife.”

  “Ex-wife.”

  He nodded.

  I took a deep breat
h and measured my next words carefully. “Did he confront Lynette?”

  “No,” Aaron answered. “I told him that it would be a good idea for him to come home.”

  “Did he come home?”

  “Yes, then I saw he’d been drinking.”

  “How bad was he?”

  “Hammered,” Aaron replied.

  “What happened next?”

  “I told him to go sleep it off.”

  “And did he?” I asked.

  Aaron nodded. “He slept a few hours…until about nine-thirty.”

  “At what point did your brother drive to the club in Matthews Hill?”

  Aaron sat for a moment, thinking about what he was going to say. “When he got up, I could tell Jim was still buzzed. I tried to get some coffee into him and he told me how this wasn’t the first time he’d followed Lynette. He’d apparently done it a number of times over the last few weeks. Three of those times, three consecutive Wednesday nights, he’d followed her and her husband from Connor’s Landing to a house in Matthews Hill, a place he was convinced was a sex club, a place where the wicked perform sinful, perverted acts of adultery.”

  “So, last Wednesday, Jim figured that Lynette and George Chadwick were probably going to be at that house?”

  Aaron sneered with disgust. “On the night of their anniversary, Lynette was going to violate herself with other men.”

  “And this upset Jim.”

  “Miss Chase, have you ever been in a similar situation? When someone you love was fornicating for the amusement of others? Do you know that kind of humiliation and shame?”

  In my own way, I did. I still recall what it felt like when I caught my first husband naked in bed with another woman. It was like he’d torn my heart right out of my chest.

  And then I realized that must have been what Kevin felt when he heard that I’d slept with Frank. For a brief, illuminating moment I wanted walk out of the interview, go out into the hallway, and cry the guilt out of my soul.

  I did my best to shake it off. “Yeah, I’ve been there.”

  “Me too,” Aaron remarked. “I was married when I went to prison. Barb was really better than I deserved. She’s bright, pretty, and deserved better than me. After I’d been in prison for about two months I heard that my wife was sleeping with another man. After only two months, with our next door neighbor. At first I was so angry I wanted to kill them both. Then for a while I wanted to kill myself. But in the end, it was the tipping point in my life that made me find God. God gave me the strength to go on. Now multiply that kind of pain by the number of men that Lynette would lie down with that night.”