‘I will,’ Marla said.
‘Good, because between me and you, I don’t trust him.’
‘Do you think he had something to do with the break-in?’
At which point Jim Cray – the ex-marine head of security – popped his shaved head in the open door. ‘What happened?’ he asked, and then looked past the two women into Barrett’s office. ‘You have got to be kidding!’
SEVEN
Jerod stared out the window of his locked cell-like room at a sweeping expanse of green lawns and fruit trees shedding the last of their vivid pink and white flowers. Further in the distance he caught the sparkle of the Hudson as it snaked its way through the landscape. The room was sparse, a platform bed and thin mattress, a brown metal chair bolted to the floor and a wood dresser carved with layers of graffiti from past residents – mostly names and dates, etched with teeth and fingernails. In the back, behind a floor-to-ceiling oak partition, was an uncovered toilet and small sink with no mirror. There were no hooks or knobs on the dresser and no closet. Even the sink had squat rounded handles and a retracted faucet, just in case anyone was looking for a place to attach a noose, or do some other mischief.
Early last night he was told he was being transferred to Croton Forensic. The nurse had given him more of the pills to put under his tongue, and the cramping and shakes and waves of sweats and chills had receded. Physically, he was better, but the pictures in his head and the ache in his chest were unbearable. He saw Bobby and Ashley, just lying there, not moving. He squeezed his eyes shut as he remembered the feel of putting his mouth against hers and then his, trying to give them CPR, pounding on their chests, begging them to please wake up, to not be dead. He thought of Carly – her wild brown hair and soft smiling eyes – and felt a gripping fear like someone had grabbed him around the throat and was squeezing off his air. ‘They’re going to kill you,’ a familiar voice whispered over his right shoulder. When he’d first heard it he was only twelve. He’d assumed that everyone heard voices, a belief that was quickly shot down when he’d told his mother and she’d dragged him to the emergency room and from there to a locked psychiatric ward. It had started as just a grumble, or at times like static on the radio, but then it had started to speak, most of the time just commenting, ‘Jerod, brush your teeth,’ or ‘Jerod, wear the blue shirt.’ But sometimes, like now, the grumbling male voice tortured him. ‘They’re coming to get you. They killed Bobby, they killed Ashley. Carly is dead. Kill yourself. Kill yourself. Do it now. Put the sheet around your neck, kill yourself. Do it now. Do it now.’
He heard steps from down the hall and then a key in the steel door. He looked up and saw Dr. Conyors; she was in a gray suit and her pretty face looked angry. He could tell she was mad at him – people often were. He knew that he’d scared her yesterday and he was sorry for that, but she didn’t understand, how could she? Behind her was a tall man with a half-scarred face dressed in a brown suit and a male nurse in a short white lab coat carrying a maroon plastic binder with J. Blank written on the side.
‘Good morning, Jerod,’ Dr. Conyors said. ‘Are you feeling any better?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘I’ve brought my friend Detective Ed Hobbs of the NYPD today, do you mind if he comes in?’
Jerod looked at her stern expression, and then at the tall detective in the dark-brown suit with the burned face, his eyes seemed kind.
‘Sure. I mean it’s OK.’
‘Any muscle aches?’ she asked, as they moved into his room. She took the single bolted-down chair and Detective Hobbs turned his back to the room and stared out at the magnificent late spring morning on the other side. The nurse hung back by the door, the chart open in his hands, apparently waiting for something.
Jerod tried to think, he was sore, but not as bad. ‘A little.’
Dr. Conyors shot questions at him, briefly waiting for his answers. ‘Any runny nose, tearfulness, muscle cramps, sweats, nausea, diarrhea, chills, anxiety, restlessness …’ When she’d finished she took the chart from the nurse and wrote a few lines. ‘Give him eight milligrams three times a day, that should cover it.’
Jerod wondered at her coldness, it made him feel small and like he’d done something to hurt her. The voice whispered, ‘Idiot, idiot, idiot.’ She’d been frustrated with him in the past, always wanting him to take the medicines that made him feel drugged and dead inside. At one point she’d pleaded with him to stop smoking pot, told him it was only making the voices worse. He’d kind of followed her directions; problem was he went from pot to dope, and at least when he’d first started, it was the most wonderful feeling he could have imagined. Those first hits of snorted dope, and the first few times he’d shot it into a vein, the voice suddenly silent and a sense of unimaginable peace and happiness, as though nothing in the world was wrong, and that he was perfectly good, perfectly happy. He waited as she sent the nurse away.
‘I’m glad you feel better,’ she said.
Jerod sat on the edge of the bed and watched her remove a small tape recorder from her pocket. She turned it on, a red dot blinked and then stayed lit.
‘Jerod, I have to tape today’s interview. You need to know that it could be used as evidence, and possibly as evidence in a case where you are the defendant. Do you understand? What you say today is not covered under the usual rules of doctor–patient confidentiality. What you say could be used to incriminate you. Do you understand?’
‘Yes … and no,’ he said, wishing she’d at least crack a smile.
She looked at him. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Am I charged with something? I didn’t hurt them. I just found them like that. I would never hurt them.’ The tears were close, and not from the dope sickness. He saw Bobby’s quirky half smile, Ashley’s pretty hair, and Carly … her smell, the feel of her next to him in bed.
‘I believe you, but you did come into my office with a loaded gun; there are probably going to be charges.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘I didn’t know where else to go. I’m sorry I got you involved.’
‘It’s done,’ she said curtly. ‘Who were they?’
‘Bobby and Ashley,’ he replied, please don’t be angry with me.
‘Do you know their last names?’ the detective asked, still staring out the window, keeping his ruined face hidden.
‘Let me think.’ His stomach was quiet, and the cramps had gone. He’d agreed to take a small dose of the antipsychotic medication she always pushed on him, it was meant to stop the voice. He never quite understood what she had against the voice, but it wasn’t there right now, maybe just a little noise in the background. ‘Bobby Dix, and Ashley … she was a student and lived in the dorm on 13th Street. She wanted to be a fashion designer. She made pretty things. She sewed me a shirt, no one has ever done that for me … and for Christmas she made us all matching scarves … I wish I had mine.’ He remembered the four of them last winter bopping through the streets of the East Village, hopping in and out of the shops, buying each other ridiculous little presents like the vintage doll with the hair that could be long or short that Carly had wanted, said she’d had one as a little girl.
‘Was Bobby a student too?’
He looked down at the floor, remembering that doll and that time, or just a couple weeks back when Carly had kissed him and taken him to her bed in the room next to Bobby’s. Tears slid down, and there was pain in his chest, like someone squeezing the life out of him. How could something hurt so much, he wondered, when there’s nothing broken or cut?
Barrett’s train of questioning was broken by the metallic ring of a cell phone; it came from Hobbs’s direction. ‘How the hell did they let you bring that in here? That should have been checked at security.’
‘I told them I needed it and flashed my shield,’ he replied, looking at the caller ID and then answering the phone. ‘Hey, Bryan, what’s up?’
She waited, and watched Jerod trying to read the shifting expressions on his face. Caught in a shaft of light he
appeared even younger than twenty-two, something in his face like a tortured angel. She imagined him as a boy and wondered what it must have been like when he had his first psychotic break at twelve and his parents, overwhelmed by the needs of their crazy son, had abandoned him. He was crying now. Is it an act? She reached into her pocket and pulled out the small packet of tissues she always carried; she handed them to him.
‘What are you thinking about?’ she asked, figuring it would be rude to try and listen in to Ed’s conversation with his partner, Detective Cassidy.
‘They’re all gone.’
‘Who?’
‘My friends, Bobby, Ashley … Carly. Carly … she was kind of my girlfriend; I haven’t seen her in over a week. I miss her. I know something happened to her. Something bad.’
‘Tell me about Carly.’ She noted the depth of his anguish, the way his face contorted from the combination of physical pain, withdrawal and grief. She tried to throw herself into the interview, finding the rhythm, but her thoughts kept shifting back to her office, and to the long car ride down with Hobbs, as they worked through all possibilities.
‘She’s really pretty and kind, and when I’m with her she makes me feel like there’s nothing wrong with me. She once told me that lots of people hear voices.’
‘That’s true,’ Barrett said.
‘I know, but coming from her it made it OK. Coming from you, it’s like a doctor telling you that lots of people have brain tumors.’ He tried to smile, but it was more of a grimace. ‘The four of us would hang out, get high, that place where Bobby and Ashley were is where we lived, except Ashley would go back to the dorm some nights. She made all the pillows and curtains. It was like a home … a family.’
‘When did you start to shoot heroin, Jerod?’
‘Few months,’ he said. ‘I liked it, especially at first. It made me feel like everything was OK, where I’m OK and nothing’s wrong and nothing can hurt me.’ He shrugged. ‘All those pills you give me … none of them make me feel that good. Like I’m at peace.’
‘Who gave it to you?’
He looked at the recorder, and then at Ed, still talking on his cell, and shook his head no.
‘Were you dealing?’
He wouldn’t answer, and she saw a new emotion cross his face – fear. What do you know that you’re not telling? ‘So it was the four of you living in that apartment. Anyone else?’
‘I can’t,’ he said.
‘Why not, Jerod? Why can’t you tell me these things?’
His blue eyes, moist with tears, met hers. ‘It’s not safe, Dr. Conyors. Look what happened, they’re all gone. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt, or to disappear … I don’t want you to get hurt. You should have let me shoot myself. I shouldn’t have dragged you into this. You’ve been good to me; I shouldn’t have called you.’
What aren’t you saying? she wondered again, at the same time noticing that the Jerod sitting in front of her, despite his intense emotional state, seemed more rational than the psychotic young man she’d evaluated several times since his release four years ago from his last DFYS group home.
Hobbs clicked his phone off and put it in his pocket. He’d listened to their conversation. ‘Why do you think someone would hurt Dr. Conyors?’ he asked. ‘Jerod, if you know anything, you need to tell us.’
Jerod shook his head, tight-lipped.
Frustrated, Hobbs shot Barrett a look and then pulled a sealed plastic bag out of an inside jacket pocket. In happier times Barrett had kidded Hobbs about his custom-made suits from an 8th Avenue tailor who worked almost exclusively with cops. His jackets had several concealed pockets, side vents for easy access to his gun and handcuffs, and a bit of added roominess in the shoulders and underarms to give him maximum flexibility and to conceal his holster. He opened the bag and held a cell – one of the two that had been in Jerod’s possession.
‘Do you recognize this?’ Hobbs asked.
Jerod nodded.
‘Good, there’s a video file on here and I want you to tell me if you recognize the girl.’
Jerod said nothing as Hobbs pulled up the file and held the phone a few inches from his face.
Jerod’s eyes widened and then squeezed shut; he pushed back on the bed. His mouth opened as though he might scream, but instead what came out was a strangled sound, as though in tremendous pain. ‘No!’
‘Who is she?’ Hobbs gently asked.
‘Carly! That’s Carly. Is she alive?’ He looked up at Hobbs, and through the tears he seemed to feel some new emotion … hope. ‘Is she breathing?’ He scrambled forward and stared at the tiny screen in Hobbs’s hand. ‘I can’t see if she’s breathing. Why isn’t she moving? Where is she? Please tell me she’s OK.’
‘I don’t know,’ Hobbs said. ‘She looks drugged, and on a bigger screen you can tell that she’s alive.’
Jerod relaxed slightly and sat back wiping his nose with the back of his hand, his eyes on Hobbs. ‘Who would do that to her? Who would film somebody who’s passed out? Why did they take her clothes off? Why would they do that?’
‘I don’t know,’ Hobbs said. ‘But we need to find out. That phone call was my partner. They’ve made a positive ID on your two friends, Bobby Dix and Ashley Kane. I know that you’re frightened, and I know that you’re in pain, but we need your help. We need to know where you and your friends were getting dope.’
He shook his head again. ‘I can’t.’
Barrett’s frustration bubbled over, ‘Why, Jerod? Someone intentionally overdosed your friends, why won’t you help us?’
He looked away from Barrett and back to the cell phone in Hobbs’s hand that had the video of Carly. ‘I can’t,’ and he stared down at the speckled gray linoleum floor.
‘Jerod,’ Hobbs said, his voice insistent. ‘Jerod, look at me.’
He wouldn’t.
‘Jerod, we want to help you. We can help you find your girlfriend.’
He shuddered, and looked at Hobbs. ‘Don’t let anyone know you have that.’
Barrett felt as if ice had just frozen in her veins. So that is what they were looking for. She struggled to keep the mounting anger and fear from her voice. ‘Jerod, you called me yesterday to that building. What was it you wanted me to do? Why won’t you let us help?’ and felt like adding, And what the hell have you pulled me into?
The side of his mouth twitched. ‘I wanted you to save them. I thought you could save them.’ His voice trailed. ‘But they were already dead. She might not be.’
For another forty-five minutes Barrett and Hobbs chipped away at Jerod, but he was too frightened. ‘Please stop,’ he begged, covering his head in his hands and retreating to a corner of his bed.
Barrett looked at Hobbs, shook her head and turned off the recorder. He’s shut down, she thought, and knew they would get no new information.
As they left his room and headed down the long door-lined corridor, Barrett sensed the quiet weirdness that had grown between her and Hobbs. The car ride from Manhattan to Croton in his unmarked Crown Vic had been focused on the break-in, but under that, there was so much unsaid. She thought back through the near-fruitless interview with Jerod; while he was clearly in agony, she’d never seen him look so … sane. She listened to their footsteps, his rubber-soled Oxfords and her walking shoes landing on ancient waxed linoleum. ‘There wasn’t much in that,’ she commented.
‘No,’ he agreed, leaving it with the one syllable.
‘Jerod believes the overdose was no accident,’ she added, hoping to spark some normal give and take of human interaction.
‘Agreed,’ and they came to the outer locked door, ‘we’ll have to wait for the toxicology reports, and even then they might not be conclusive.’
Barrett swiped her ID across the electric eye and punched in her eight-digit access code. It clicked and Hobbs pushed it open, letting them into the manned checkpoint, where all visitors and staff needed to pass on their way in and out of the high-security hospital for the criminally insane. Behi
nd the counter sat two guards, who passed them their belongings. Barrett grabbed her cell, pager, and large black shoulder bag, while Hobbs pocketed his keys and filled out the paperwork for his firearm, a Detective Glock Model 19.
A red light flashed on her phone and her beeper was chirping at one-second intervals. She’d missed two calls, and the LED readout on her beeper displayed one of the same numbers – an extension at the Forensic Center. The other call was from her mother, at her condo taking care of Max. Like gas on a burning ember, her anxiety spiked. She grabbed the handrail and felt her heart pound in her chest. Cruel thoughts slammed through her mind. Max is sick. Something’s wrong with Max. She flashed on the stolen picture, had someone done something to him – her mind flew into catastrophe mode – Someone’s taken him.
‘You OK?’ Ed asked.
‘Not really,’ she said as she pressed the redial button.
‘You’re having a panic attack, aren’t you?’
‘It’ll pass.’ She tried to keep her breathing in control, feeling like she might black out, as she mashed the phone to her ear.
‘I thought those had stopped.’
‘Well, they’re back,’ and wishing this weren’t the topic that led Ed into talking with her she heard the line click and her mother’s voice.
‘Barrett?’
‘What’s wrong?’ Barrett asked.
‘Sweet Jesus,’ her mother responded, ‘I was just calling to see if you’d be home on time. I can’t be late again for work.’
‘Sorry,’ Barrett said, thinking about George’s suggestion that maybe she should go on meds to get her anxiety under control. ‘So everything’s OK … with Max?’
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