'Only when I'm around this many women.'
'You know, Daddy? I've finally figured out who Grandpa and Grandma remind me of.'
'Who?'
'Uncle Henry and Aunt Em from The Wizard of Oz.'
Decker laughed. 'Yeah, I suppose they do a little.'
'A lot,' Cindy said. 'What I want to know is what happened to Dorothy's parents?'
'Read the book.'
'Poor little girl raised by her aunt and uncle, her only friends three goofy farmhands. Where were the parents? Did they die in an accident? Were they murdered? Did they abandon her? Where were her parents?'
'Some people just have lousy parents, Cin,' Decker said.
He thought of Lita Bellson. A self-proclaimed shitty mother. But at least she never abandoned Marie.
And in turn, Marie didn't abandon her.
He paused.
Aunt Em... Uncle Henry!
Marie turned out to be the stable, dependable one... like my first husband, Henry...
The dependable one!
Decker bit his lip.
Except Marie wasn 't his!
Decker felt a surge of adrenaline. 'I bet that's it!'
'What's it?' Cindy asked.
Decker checked his watch. Plenty of time before Shabbas. He kissed his daughter's cheek. 'Honey, can you do me a favor? I've got to run somewhere. Can you tell Grandpa I'll come help him in the barn in about an hour?'
'Sure. What is it?'
Decker held his daughter's shoulders. 'Cin, you see the news promo on TV? The one of Lourdes Rodriguez getting her baby back?'
The teenager's face lit up. 'She's got Caitlin back?'
'Yep,' Decker said. 'Watch the promo if you can get away from the hen party. It's really touching. And then pat yourself on the back. You deserve as much of the credit for their reunion as anyone else on the case.'
Cindy's eyes moistened. 'That was a real nice thing to say, Daddy. Thank you.'
'You're welcome.'
'I'd make a good detective, wouldn't I?' 'You quit college, you're dead.' 'Just tossing out ideas, Dad.' 'Save your tossing for salads.'
Lita Bellson sat in the sunroom, eyes upon a drawing of a stick couple holding hands. They were girls, wearing triangles for skirts, their faces aglow with smiling mouths disproportionately large for the heads. Decker tiptoed over to the wheelchair and placed his hand softly upon Lita's shoulder.
'Nice sunny afternoon,' he said.
'Nothing but sunshine,' Lita said. 'I hate it. I hate Los Angeles. Weather never changes. Like this place... like my life now. A curse to live this long. Now, with Marie and Leek gone, I'm all alone... double fucking curse. I wish I was dead. Even spumoni ice cream don't mean much to me anymore.'
'It all comes around in a circle, doesn't it, Lita?'
'I guess. Life and death... death and life. One big, fucking big circle.'
'I suppose someone might think that was biblical justice, living all alone in your waning years,' Decker said. 'The one who abandons in the end gets abandoned. Some people might find that... interesting.'
Lita didn't speak for a long time. When she did, it was barely above a whisper. 'I never abandoned anyone. He took her from me. I just didn't bother to put up a fuss. Felt I owed him that much... for all the misery I put him through.'
'Lots of affairs, Lita?'
'I never painted myself as a virgin. Not to anyone, certainly not to Henry.'
'Henry, your first husband?'
'My only husband. I never married Marie's father.'
'What was Henry's last name?' Decker asked.
'Henry Tollan. Nice guy. He couldn't live with me, couldn't live without me. Finally married me. Thought a child would change my ways. It didn't. It never works that way.'
'Why didn't you put up a fuss when he took her? After all, Henrietta was your daughter, too.'
'Guess I felt I owed him that much. Maybe I felt Hetty was better off without me.' She shrugged. 'It's all ancient history.'
But it wasn't. Sins of the past were responsible for sins of the present. Decker said, 'Did you try to keep in contact with Hetty at all?'
Lita shook her head. 'No husband, no child... I got what I wanted... a clean break.'
'How old was Hetty when you walked out of her life?'
'When he took her, you mean. She was five. I insisted that he wait till she had her fifth birthday. I made her a pretty dress that I wanted to see her in. I took a picture of her in that dress. I wanted something to remember her by.'
'Is that how Marie found out she had a half-sister? By the picture?'
'They don't call you Detective for nothing.'
'How old was Marie when she found out?'
'Sixteen. She used it against me. Said she was kind of the person she was because I was the kind of person I was. She was wild because she liked the boys. But you know kids. They use one excuse or another to crucify their parents.'
'Did she go to Berkeley to be near Hetty?'
'To be near Hetty, to be near the hippies, to be near the drugs, to be near the sex and the communes. Of course Marie told me she was going to find the mother she never had.'
Rita laughed softly.
'So right away she messes things up - carrying on with her own half sister's husband.' She closed her eyes. 'I felt bad for Hetty. Really I did. First, I go ahead and mess her up. Then her sister goes ahead and messes her up. She was always kind of a fragile kid. I heard later she had a breakdown - her and the kid. Hetty had a kid - a daughter, I think. She was little when it all happened. That's what got to Marie more than anything. That the kid suffered. That's when she started looking to Jesus. I told her, don't put the blame on me for this one. I may have screwed up in my life. But I never fucked any of my sisters' husbands.'
There was a long, reflective moment of silence. Rita was back in another world. And Decker thought about this one.
No wonder Marie took Tandy under her wing when they met up again as adults. Marie looked upon their relationship as a second chance. An opportunity to cleanse the soul.
The prodigal daughter.
And it might have worked for her, except that Tandy had come across a lock box containing old photos and love letters. Fragile to begin with and still swaddled in grief over the loss of her family, Tandy had never fully forgiven her father. After reading the letters, seeing tangible proof of her father's affair with her aunt, she wasn't about to absolve anyone. She dumped Marie and moved on - to Leek, to buffing, to anything that would keep the voices away.
Deep emotional hurt never really goes away. It always leaves a scar, even if it fades to the faintest of spots. Trouble brews when the pain refuses to heal, left as an open wound just waiting to abcess. And it doesn't take much steeping if the person is unbalanced to begin with.
'Know who your granddaughter is, Lita?'
Lita opened her eyes. 'Who?'
'Tandy Roberts. She's Hetty's kid.'
'Tandy, the fat nurse who used to work here?'
'Yep.'
'She's Hetty's kid?'
'Yep.'
'You don't say.'
'It's the truth.'
Lita was quiet for a moment. 'I can see that. Tandy was strange. A little like Hetty. I always got along with Tandy. I felt sorry for her, but I liked her, too. I'm glad I got a chance to know her even if I didn't know she was my own blood. Sometimes things work out for the best.'
'Sometimes they do.'
'Can you wheel me out of the sun? I'm gettin' hot.'
'My pleasure.' Carefully, Decker wheeled the old lady to one of the dining tables. 'Anything else you need, Lita, before I go?'
'You going to visit me again, handsome?'
'No, Lita. I don't think so.'
'I can dream.' The old woman shrugged. 'What time is it?'
'About four thirty.'
'Dinner's not until five.'
'That's only a half-hour away.'
'It seems like a year when you got nothing better to do.' The old woman picked he
r head up and their eyes met. Lita's face was as hard as stone, as craggy as a mountain ridge. 'Think you can get me some spumoni?'
'I'll do my best.'
She gave Decker a conspiratorial wink. Then she said, 'Think if I'd had boys I would have been a better mother?'
'I don't know, Lita.'
'Maybe.' Lita waited a while before speaking. 'But probably not. Like I always freely admitted, I was a shitty mother.'
Highlighted by the moonlight streaming through the barred window, Marie's face apeared blue and skeletal. Her bony hands rested in her lap, pressing her cotton prison gown between her legs. Her legs were bare and crossed at the ankles, she wore soft shoes on her feet. She refused to turn when Decker entered the cell, refused to acknowledge his presence. His questions fell upon deaf ears.
'Marie, you're not helping Tandy by protecting her,' Decker said. 'Marie, she's sick! She needs medication. She needs help! If you take the heat for her and allow her to go back into society, it's a sure bet she's going to do more damage!'
Silence.
Decker scratched his head. 'Don't you give a solitary damn about Lily Booker"!'
Still staring at the window, Marie finally spoke. 'I care.'
'Then how can you allow her murderer to go free? Even if the murderer wasn't in her right mind?'
'I am the murderer.'
'Taking the rap because you feel guilty about a twenty-year-old affair won't change the past, Marie. It won't help Tandy, either. You want to help her, stop trying to atone for your sins. Your prodigal daughter bit won't play well in the courtroom.'
'I killed Lily Booker.'
Decker felt his blood boil. 'We're bringing Tandy to
trial, Marie. No one is going to believe you murdered Lily then dropped the baby off with the Robertses... or Robleses. Because Leek never saw you with the baby.'
'Leek's an embezzler and a liar. His testimony is tarnished.'
'Marie, no one will believe you murdered Lily Booker, given Tandy's history. So save everyone some grief and tell us what really happened.'
'I went crazy,' Marie said. 'My hormones went out of control and temporarily blocked my rational senses. Everyone knows what hormones gone awry can do.'
'So that's your brilliant defense, huh?' Decker bit back sarcasm. 'I talked to your doctor. Your hormones were in check. There was nothing wrong with your mind that a cat couldn't take care of. Tandy was the one out of control. Tandy's voices weren't in check. Tandy was hearing voices, do you hear me? She was delusionalV
Marie didn't answer.
Decker began to pace. 'The high voice, the low voice telling her to do things. Shrink says they were probably her punitive parents or something like that. I've got to read the report. I'm not a shrink. I don't claim to know all the technical mumbo-jumbo. But I do know this. Tandy is a sick girll We've got lots of professionals who'll testify that, Marie. Why, you ask?'
'I didn't ask.'
'I'll tell you anyway. Because everyone wants Tandy treated! Because everyone truly cares, except you.'
'I care.'
'If you truly cared, you'd want the same thing.'
'I did the murder,' Marie stated flatly. 'I took the baby. I was old and childless and I wanted a baby.'
'So you're telling me you pounded poor Lily Booker with a hammer to get a baby?'
Marie was quiet.
Decker said, 'It was Tandy who walked into the nursery with a hammer, Marie. You know it. I know it. She was probably out to get you. She never forgave you for screwing her father, breaking up her parents' marriage.'
Again, Marie was silent.
Decker said, 'She found Lily and that was good enough. She smashed Lily, took the baby—'
Ttook the baby—'
'Bullshit!' Decker said. 'Tandy took the baby. Then she realized what she'd done and took the baby over to her parents. For the life of me, I don't know why you let her take the baby! Helping her with Lily Booker was one thing. Poor Lily was already dead when you found Tandy with the hammer in her hand. But why did you let her take Caitlin Rodriguez?'
Marie didn't speak.
'Why?' Decker pleaded.
'I took Caitlin because, through my hormonal delusions, I thought she was in danger in the hospital.'
'Danger?'
'I walked in on Lily when she was doing a heel stick on Caitlin. The baby was crying - screaming. Lily was hurting her!'
Decker thought about her words. 'What? Tandy thought Lily was hurting the baby when she was doing a heel stick?'
'Not Tandy! Me! I saw Caitlin cry and got upset. Because babies cry when you do heel sticks. I tried to wrestle her away from Lily but she wouldn't let go. So I struck her... too hard!'
'Marie, you've done hundreds of heel sticks. No one will believe that—'
'I was delusional, for the last time! And yes, Sergeant, they will believe me! Because I, like you, have a reputable psychiatrist's testimony.'
Decker felt his patience burst. 'Fine, Marie. Go nail yourself to a cross, die for Tandy's sins and rot in a jail cell. Meanwhile your niece will remain tormented by imaginary voices and will probably wind up hurting someone else. If she doesn't hurt herself first. Goddamn it, don't you want to help her?'
A slow smile spread across Marie's face. 'She has all the help she needs now, Sergeant. She found Jesus.'
First it was sex, then drugs, then lots of gods until she found Jesus.
Symptom substitution.
Fanatically loyal.
Decker didn't speak.
There was nothing left to say.
It was close to midnight when Decker walked through his bedroom door. Rina was nursing Hannah while attempting to write on a note pad. It was a juggling act worthy of the Ringling Brothers.
Decker said, 'Can I help?'
'Unfortunately, no. You can't nurse the baby and you can't check off my food list.'
'Why can't I check off your food list?'
'Because you don't have any idea of what I have and what I don't have.'
This was true.
'All set for tomorrow?' Decker asked.
'I think so.' Rina gave him a big grin. 'Peter, I'm so excited. I think you should make a speech.'
'A speech?'
'Yes, a speech.'
Decker sat down on the bed. 'Why don't you talk?'
'Me?'
'Yes, you. People would rather look at you than me.'
'Peter—'
'I'm serious. Go on, Rina. Give Mike Hollander a thrill.'
She laughed. 'All right.' She looked down at Hannah who was busy with her midnight snack. 'She is so beautiful, isn't she.'
'Yep.' Decker snuggled next to his wife and child and put his arm around Rina's shoulder. It was time to stop and smell the roses. Maybe Tandy wouldn't get the help she desperately needed. Maybe no matter how hard Pomerantz worked, the jury would believe Marie - that she was delusional and had masterminded everything. Maybe Marie really would die for Tandy's sins.
Some things are just out of your control.
As if to imply that some things are in your control.
Control may be an illusion but it's the illusions that keep you sane.
Decker hugged his wife's shoulder. 'She's gorgeous, like her mom.'
Rina kissed his cheek. 'This is nice, isn't it?'
Decker let go with a full grin. 'Darlin', it don't get much better than this.'
The End
Faye Kellerman - Decker 06 - Grievous Sin Page 42
