Claire’s cheeks flushed, and her eyes shut for a moment.
“Mike’s smart,” she finally began. “Sound familiar? He is also devious, unforgiving, and almost inhumanly patient, especially when it comes to revenge. Our divorce wasn’t unique, but it was very, very unpleasant.” She waved her head remembering. “I won’t bore you with how nasty we were to each other. We just were.” She gazed up at the airport’s high ceiling.
“After that whole horrible mess was finished, Mike seemed to settle down. God forgive me, I was lulled into believing it was okay for him to have Jack on his assigned weekends.”
She exhaled an enormous sigh. Fixed her injured eyes on me.
“About four months later my appendix burst. My sister couldn’t get to Minneapolis fast enough, so Mike took Jack. Literally. I didn’t even know they were gone until I got released from the hospital three days later.”
“He didn’t visit you?”
She waved her head. “He was supposed to be watching Jack, right? We spoke briefly on the phone soon after my anesthetic wore off, but by then we weren’t really talking. It didn’t surprise me that he didn’t call again.”
“But more than a year...?”
“Like I said. Mike’s smart,” she repeated, “and vindictive, and patient. I think he’d been planning to kidnap Jack for months.”
“The new identity.”
“Yep. He even abandoned his car on another street.”
The announcement of a flight startled us both. Realizing it was time to go, Claire rose and gathered Jack’s things. I followed as far as I could, pushing the stroller and murmuring soothing phrases to the distressed child.
Parting was rough. Claire stiffened as if consumed by worry, and Jack’s eyes widened with alarm. His past was being severed from him as surely as if we’d cut off a limb, and by the look on his face he sensed it.
He began to cry.
Watching until they were out of sight, I comforted myself with the fresh knowledge that Claire was no witch. She was an ordinary woman with brown hair and hazel eyes, a couple of extra pounds, and a preference for comfortable clothes. She possessed common sense, compassion, and a prodigious love for her child. What else could I ask of Jack’s mother?
Never mind that my insides felt as if they’d been used for a punching bag, I had carried out George’s request.
After I dragged myself across the road back to short-term parking and climbed into my car, I called my daughter.
I inquired whether Eric was home, which meant Chelsea had to push a curtain aside to check for his car.
The answer was, “Yes.”
Chapter 48
WHEN I CALLED Eric to ask if I might stop by, his response was, “Why? Because misery loves company?”
“No. Because I have some information about Cissie you might like to hear.”
He considered for a moment. “A realtor’s bringing somebody. I’m supposed to go out.”
“We could walk to the park.” The weather was ideal for August, seventy-five degrees with just enough breeze to ruffle the trees.
“You’re sure I want to hear this?”
“Pretty sure.”
When he opened the door, he wore faded gray Bermuda shorts, a t-shirt dotted with holes, and flip-flops that must have accompanied him to college. His hair had been shampooed but not combed, and his beard was at least three days old. Having him leave well before the realtor arrived with a prospective buyer seemed like a pretty good decision.
At the nearby park we settled on a cement bench with wooden slats. Lacy shadows from the honey-locust tree shading us wriggled on the naked ground at our feet. Across the lawn, two boys of about twelve more or less hit a tennis ball back and forth inside a chain-link enclosure. An elderly woman walking a fussy Havanese wandered along the edge of a shallow creek, and an occasional car slipped past on the street behind us. Summer in suburbia, USA.
“Now. What’s this about Cissie?” Eric’s hangdog expression conveyed sadness, distrust resignation, and impatience in roughly that order.
“I’ll get to that, but let me clear up a couple other things first. Equally important,” I assured him as if I were swearing an oath.
“Oh?”
“You said Maisie liked to play around with murder methods from the mysteries she read.”
“True.”
“Which made you think she might be suicidal.”
“Yesss...”
I opened my hand. “So you moved in to keep an eye on her, right?”
“I also needed someplace to live.”
“But you didn’t learn about Maisie’s Alzheimers until the psych evaluation, right?”
“How’d you know...?”
Admitting that Dr. Quinn confirmed my suspicion with a silent smile probably wouldn’t fly, so I said, “Mystery lovers usually can’t leave a new book alone, but Maisie didn’t touch the ones I gave her.”
“That’s it?”
“Not entirely, but I do think she stopped reading a while ago.” When her memory began to fail. However, belaboring that wouldn’t get me to my point.
“So,” I said, drawing Eric’s eyes to mine. “How many times did your grandmother try to kill you?”
He jumped as if he’d been zapped.
“Two or three?” I guessed.
Eric rubbed his flaming face. Then he breathed out the word, “Three,” with what passed for relief.
“Her first fall...?”
“Not my fault,” he insisted. “I went upstairs to get dressed, and Gram lunged at me.”
“You ducked out of the way, and...”
“...down she went.” He shook off the vision, then laced his hands together behind his knee.
“The poisoned tea might have done it, but the first sip tasted awful. When I spit it out in the sink, what she used was sitting right there.”
He showed me a faint scar on his left forearm. “The knife scuffle didn’t last long. Took care of that with a band-aid.”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
“Like who? The police?”
“Maisie had Alzheimers. She could have gotten treatment.”
“But I didn’t know that, did I? Anyhow, she couldn’t afford a nursing facility. Neither could I.”
The uncomfortable topics had made him twitchy, so I gestured for us to walk. The woman and her dog were gone, and the intermittent thock of the tennis ball punctuated our conversation nicely.
“You told all this to Cissie?” I inquired as we headed downhill.
“Yes.”
“Even what Dr. Quinn implied?”
“Unfortunately, yes.” Eric paused to place his fists on his hips and scrutinize the horizon. “Cissie’s doubted me ever since.”
“You think that’s why she stopped speaking to you.”
“Of course.”
“Well, it isn’t.”
Eric gawked at me. “What do you mean?”
As we proceeded along the grassy edge of the creek, I reminded him about Ronald threatening to use Dr. Quinn’s suspicions to have him arrested. “Contact between you two became much more dangerous that day. For her, and for you.”
He stopped to face me. “You’re saying Cissie’s trying to protect me?”
“She sort of is,” I answered, “but that’s only part of what’s going on.”
I inhaled. Exhaled. Finally gave up hunting for the right words and just told him.
“Ronald doesn’t just believe he’s better than everyone else. He knows it. There is no doubt in his mind that he’s exceptional, and, therefore, deserves exceptional treatment.”
Eric spat out some choice expletives, while I turned uphill.
Continuing, I said, “Nobody else really matters to Ronald, but he knows better than to let that secret out. In public he acts humble, charming, concerned, whatever it takes to convince people he’s a nice guy.”
“...instead of an angry, controlling sonovabitch.”
“Exactly. Cissie gets just eno
ugh of the Nice Guy act to lull her into thinking the worst might be over. Sadly, it works. Over and over again!”
“He’s really that calculating?”
“He probably doesn’t think of it that way, but yes. Apparently abusers invent so many ways to justify themselves it would make your head spin.”
Eric’s jaw rolled. “Why doesn’t Cissie leave?”
“I asked that, too. Remember, Ronald’s had years to bully her into a corner, but he probably caught on that she would be vulnerable to that early on. Did she tell you her family thought she was marrying up?”
“No.”
“Well, they did, and it didn’t sound like a joke to me.”
Now Eric was blinking mad. “But Cissie’s great. She’s bright. Funny. Sweet. You’ve seen her with Caroline. She’s a wonderful mother!”
“Granted,” I said. “But she doesn’t hear that from her husband, who, by the way, had no difficulty cutting her off her from her family. He also bad-mouthed all her friends until she quit having any. I got that message without him saying a word.”
Eric’s distress was headed toward the red zone, so I spared him the final eye-opener I’d gleaned from Natalie’s reading material.
Ronald’s “Blonde Bitch” lies were more than an excuse for his cheating. If Cissie ever summoned the nerve to turn him in, his friends and coworkers would be armed with years of stories about what a terrible wife and mother she was. Hearing those same complaints herself pretty much every day, Cissie knew precisely what Ronald would tell the judge at a custody hearing. I suspected the prospect of losing Caroline frightened her even more than Ronald’s fists.
I rested a hand on Eric’s arm. “Let’s get to the good news.”
“What?” he challenged, as if there were no good news to be had in the world.
“Dr. Quinn knows you’re innocent.”
“You’re kidding. How?”
I filled him in on how the nurse got delayed giving Maisie the sedative, and my theory about the blood on the edge of the paperback. I also told him I’d learned something interesting about Alzheimers’ medications on the Internet.
“Did you know they can increase the risk of a stroke?”
“Do you think that was what happened?”
I lifted one shoulder as if I didn’t know. “You said Maisie was revved up about Lonny even worse than usual. What do you think?”
Eric ran his hand through his tangled hair. “I don’t know what to think.”
We ambled back toward his house in silence.
“I should have done more for Gram,” he lamented when we reached his sidewalk.
“You did as much as anyone could.”
Eric rolled his eyes.
“You’ve got a lot to process,” I said. “You’ll get there.”
“Cissie still won’t speak to me.”
“But now you know why.”
A tight-lipped sneer.
“I know. Easy for me to say,” I admitted, “but think of it this way. If you leave, you can’t be her soft landing. If you stay, maybe you can.”
Chapter 49
SEPTEMBER 1 offered puffy white clouds and heat nearing ninety. I filled Fideaux’s kiddie pool, purchased on a whim on closeout, and donned cut-off shorts and my Alaska-or-Bust t-shirt. I had no expectations of the day except for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I was slightly wrong.
A florist’s truck chugged to a stop at my mailbox like an angry coffeepot exhaling its last breath.
“Hey, ho, Ms. Barnes,” said the young deliveryman. I thought maybe he was happy his summer job was nearly over so he could go back to school.
“That’s me,” I agreed.
He handed me an arrangement wrapped in green tissue.
I took it inside to the kitchen counter. It wasn’t overly large, nor overly small. It consisted primarily of red carnations enhanced by sprigs of baby’s breath and fern. Stuck into the clear plastic harp they use to hold cards was a rectangle of white that read, “Thank you!”
The envelope that should have contained the sender’s name proved to be empty.
Ordinarily I’d have phoned the florist to ask for more information, but the truck was long gone, and I hadn’t noted the company name. Saying thank-you for a thank-you gift was ridiculous anyhow. The exchange could go back and forth for months.
Speculating was fun, though.
George?
Certainly not Mike Cotaldi or Ronald. Not The Hunter either. We circled wide whenever we encountered each other.
Susan was already in California interviewing for jobs.
Claire? Unlikely. She was too over-the-moon with Jack to give me the slightest thought.
Eric? Chelsea had called three days after my last conversation with her next door neighbor.
“Guess what,” she demanded.
“You’re pregnant.”
“Never say that to me again.”
“Okay.”
“Promise?”
“Absolutely.”
“Eric took down the For Sale sign. Bent it in half and stuffed it into the trash. You know what that means, don’t you?”
Whaddya know? He was sticking around. Good man!
Which Chelsea knew well before I did, so I ribbed her and said, “He can make his recording date after all.”
“You’re having one of those days, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I guess I am.”
I haven’t yet learned who sent the carnations, nor do I care to find out.
What’s life without a little mystery?
#
Dear Reader—
If you enjoyed FOR BETTER OR WORSE, here are two reasons to post a brief review at the online bookseller of your choice (while it’s still fresh in your mind). Fellow readers will greatly appreciate your advice, and it’s the easiest way to make an independent author very, very happy.
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Donna
Acknowledgements
I am indebted to many people for their help with this very personal project: Kristy Carnahan; Lundy Bancroft (as referenced by Gin) for his excellent book, WHY DOES HE DO THAT, and Meg Kennedy Dugan and Roger R. Hock for their book, IT’S MY LIFE NOW. Thanks, too, to my team of experts, Robynne Graffam, Hench Murray, Nancy Winter, proofreader Paula Grundy, Sonja Haggert, April Weston, Elissa Strati, Alan Meeds, and Officer Joseph Butler. Cover designer, Alexandra Albornoz Sarmiento did a splendid job with Eduard Moldoveanu’s beautiful photograph of Philadelphia’s Boathouse Row, and Michael Redmond deserves credit for taking a picture of me.
Most of all I am grateful for my amazing mother, Ruth M. Ballard, for being an exemplary role model of grace under pressure, and for so much more.
Donna
In real life Donna assumes she can fix anything until proven wrong, calls trash-picking recycling, and, although she probably should know better, adores Irish setters.
Donna and husband, Hench, live in the greater Philadelphia, PA, area. They have two adult children.
More @ http://www.donnahustonmurray.com
SNEAK PEEK!
WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU
By Donna Huston Murray
Chapter 1
Holding myself together is tough, but if Corinne’s daughter can do it, I damn well better. Distraction. That’s what I need, a distraction.
All sorts of people are here to pay their respects, but middle-aged mourners and upward predominate–partly because Corinne’s own age was fifty-seven, but also because of her profession. I’m guessing she counseled most of the congregation through their own cancer ordeal.
I’m only thirty, but we met that way, too. I’ve also lived under her roof a little over four years, but probably not much longer. It’s Nina’s roof now.
As if she heard her name, Corinne’s daugh
ter twists around in her front-row seat. For a moment she basks in the sympathy wafting her way; but then she sees me, and her head snaps forward so fast that wiry hair of hers actually bounces.
The florid-faced clergyman steps up to the pulpit. “We have gathered here today to honor a woman who...”
I tune out his soporific voice, stare at the stained-glass window, make note of a loose comb in a woman’s frizzy hairdo, and before I know it greetings are being exchanged, backs patted, coats gathered, purses, programs with Corinne’s picture and prayers typed in italics.
We adjourn to the annex community room where tables covered with yellow paper line up in rows, food and drink on three perpendicular to the rest.
Nina is surrounded, but I catch her daughter Jilly’s eye. A soft-bodied eight-year-old with self-esteem issues, this is surely her first funeral. She sends me a brave smile, and I nod my encouragement. She may be Nina’s only child, but she has a life away from her mother, too. She’ll be alright.
I’ve sidled up to my honorary uncles Norman and Tom, two of my dad’s dearest friends.
“Nice homily,” Norman remarks.
Tom just sipped some fruit punch, so he grunts his agreement. Then he asks, “What did you think, Beanie?” My father’s endearment: Lauren Louise Beck, LLBean...
I open my mouth, but that’s as far as I get. Nina is storming toward me, fists clenched, face aflame. A chair falls by the wayside. “You,” she shouts, “you’ve got a nerve.”
The room goes silent. Faces gape and stare.
“You miserable, goddamn bitch. You killed my mother. I can’t believe you’re here, you you you MURDERER!” Hands covering her face, Nina crumbles into the arms of a man in a business suit, the despised ex-husband.
“Now, Nina,” he murmurs. “You don’t really mean...”
Her head snaps up. “Oh yes I do,” she shouts even louder. Then she wrestles out of his grasp, clenches her fists, growls through her teeth.
The uncles and I have backed up so far we’re literally against the cement-block wall. The whole room is holding its breath.
“Nina, really.” I pat the air. “You’re upset. You don’t know what you’re saying.”
For Better or Worse Page 18
