With Every Breath (16 page)

Leslie put a brief hand on her shoulder, patting once, as she stepped into the living room. "I heard."

That was when Maddie realized that Joe must have summoned her. She was almost overwhelmingly grateful. It was one problem she wouldn’t have to deal with, getting down to the big island to find a phone to call the psychologist.

"Have you been up all night?" Dr. Mendehlson asked, studying her.

Maddie shrugged. "I was afraid ..." She trailed off. Of so much, she finished silently. I am afraid of so very much right now. And that was irrational, too. The only thing she had to fear was Rick, though he was certainly bad enough. Still, she had the strange, heart-pounding sensation that danger was pressing in on her from all comers.

"Is Josh still asleep?" Leslie asked.

"Yes."

"For how long now?"

Maddie sighed, comforted and grateful all over again. Dr. Mendehlson knew her stuff. "Too long." She looked at her watch again. "About thirteen hours now."

Dr. Mendehlson nodded. "He’s hiding again."

"If he keeps it up, he’ll run out of places to go!" she snapped.

"Right now I’m more concerned about what he’ll find when he comes out."

"What do you mean?"

"Whatever it is you’re trying to protect him from, you’ve got to know that it’s impossible to do it on your own. Sooner or later, you’re going to have to sleep."

"I know!" It was a wail of frustration. She wanted, needed, to stay with him, awake and alert.

"For now," Dr. Mendehlson said quietly, "how about if we settle for a shower?"

Maddie’s expression twisted. "Do I smell?"

The woman laughed. "Not yet."

Still, Maddie hesitated.

"I’ll be right here," Leslie Mendehlson said. "Josh won’t be alone, and I won’t let anything happen to him." Maddie nodded reluctantly. "All right."

It took fifteen more minutes for her to realize just how grungy she’d felt. With her hair wet and clean, dressed again in fresh jeans, with a touch of blush and lipstick—habit, she told herself; it had nothing to do with the fact that Joe had said he’d come back that morning—she felt like a new person. A stronger person. She peered into Josh’s bedroom to find him still out of it, then she went to find Leslie.

The woman was seated at the dining-room table. She had made two cups of coffee. Maddie took hers gratefully and sat down across from her.

"Joe said this might be the work of your ex-husband," Leslie began.

Maddie nodded. "I have no doubt now." She went back to the kitchen to get the circular and pushed it across the table at the psychologist.

Leslie studied it for a moment. "And you think this means what?"

Maddie looked at her disbelievingly. "He gave his name and my address to that department store, or at least to some mailing list. He’s taunting me, telling me he knows where I am and that I can’t hide from him." "Not necessarily," Leslie said mildly. "The store could have gotten their list from anywhere. Or they could have taken your social security number and matched it up to the address you gave the utility companies here."

"Within four days?"

"It’s no more farfetched than assuming your ex-husband managed to act within that same period of time."

Maddie’s heart started pounding. "Cassie Diehl called to have the electric turned on in my name weeks ago," she realized.

Leslie nodded. "And presumably your social security number would be connected to a mortgage that Rick shared, or a joint credit card—"

"No," Maddie argued. "The mortgage is in my name. I bought the house long before I met him. Same with the credit cards. They were—are—all mine."

"I’m just outlining a rough scenario here," Leslie said calmly. "Something like that could have happened." Maddie’s eyes narrowed. "You don’t think he did it, do you? You don’t think he’s here or that he killed the kitten? You think I’m nuts." She remembered the way the doctor had tricked her with Doe Carlson, and she had the sinking, helpless sensation that she was on her own again after all. No one was going to believe her about Rick this time either.

Leslie moved carefully. "I think your ex-husband is just one possible culprit. I don’t want to rule anything out."

"One? Who the hell else would do something like this?" She lowered her voice carefully, embarrassed to realize she was screeching a little. Her nerves were stretched so thin.

"Gina?" she went on more quietly. "I don’t think Joe really believes that, and I don’t either, not after this." She crumpled the circular again in a trembling hand.

"Gina is a troubled young woman," Leslie said vaguely. "She’s one more possibility. But I was thinking more along the lines that it has something to do with your parents."

Maddie gaped at her. "My parents?"

"That’s right."

"You think my parents did this to Josh?"

"Not likely. Maddie, I want you to listen to me. Calmly and quietly."

She didn’t like the sound of this. Everything was rearing up inside her, protesting. No, I don’t want to hear this, and I don’t want to have to deal with any more. Why are you doing this to me today? "I’m listening," she said hoarsely.

"Maddie, your parents are probably dead."

Surprise burst into her. It wasn’t what she had expected to hear.

"Well, yes," she answered. "I know that’s the legal assumption. They were declared dead, right, after seven years? That was what Karen Eagan said. And they never tried to reclaim any of their ... their assets or whatever."

"Most likely because they couldn’t. Maddie, what exactly do
you remember of that day?"

Maddie frowned at her.

"There are conflicting rumors racing all over the island," Leslie went on, "that you remember nothing, that you remember a little bit. What’s the truth? Think back. Take your time."

Maddie jumped to her feet, stared at her, then sat slowly again. She shook her head. "It’s not necessary," she admitted, exhaling hard. "I could sit here until next Friday, and the answer would still be the same. There’s nothing."

Leslie blinked. "Nothing at all?"

"Very little. Why? You don’t think that’s normal?" she challenged.

"That’s another issue entirely," Leslie evaded.

"I remember Angus," she protested defensively, then

she sighed. "Sort of. The way I remember you. With an instinctual ... good feeling. Where are you going with this?"

"Have you had any bad
feelings about anyone?"

"You mean, unaccountably? Like someone rubbing me the wrong way for no reason? Well. Cassie, but I guess I have some cause for that." She was getting impatient. And angry. "You’ve got a point here. What is it? Why would Josh’s kitten have anything to do with my parents leaving me?"

Leslie decided that the best way to handle this was probably what she called the Band-Aid Approach. Jerk the bandage—the blinders—away all at once. Crash through the wall with one sharp blow.

"When Dave Bramnick, the chief of police back then, found you here that day, you were in the pantry."

"The pantry?" Maddie looked over her shoulder, in the direction of the kitchen, frowning.

"You were not clothed."

Maddie shivered.

"You were streaked with blood, and it was not your own. We have reason to believe that your parents were killed, Maddie, and that you saw it. You know what happened that day. You know who did it. No, I honestly don’t believe that your ex-husband killed your kitten. I think that whoever killed your parents killed your kitten. I think he—or she—did it to scare you off this island before you remember and point a finger."

Maddie was reeling.

She felt the room spin out of control. She was dizzy, and then she was furious. Temper shot through her like liquid fire. She stood up again very, very carefully.

"I don’t want you treating Josh."

"Pardon me?"

"How c-c-can you c-c-call yourself a psychologist?"

"It was better that you hear it from me than from someone else. And you’ve been here long enough to know now that you would
have heard it from someone else. Someone would talk, and it would either be within your hearing or to your face."

Maddie clenched her hands to keep them from shaking noticeably. She leaned forward a little, staring at the woman hard. "I’ve got a problem here—a big problem— and you land this on me now?"

"Because your problem isn’t what you think it is." "You don’t know that. Get out."

"Maddie—"

"Get out of my house."

Leslie didn’t move, but another knock came at the front door. Maddie spun that way. Joe. Suddenly she felt like someone had thrown a bucket of ice water in her face. Joe must have known this, too.

All that talk last night about Gina, about Cassie, about Rick and Angus, and he had known! Suddenly she felt wild, out of control, because it was happening just like Florida, she realized again. She needed help, but no one would help her, no one would believe her.

This was Rick. It felt like Rick, the way he wandered through shadows, not too close but not too far away, tormenting her with glimpses of him. Oh, yes, this was Rick. He was going to try to take Josh again, and God help her, but she’d kill him herself before she would allow that to happen. She would have to kill him herself, because just like Florida, no one believed her enough to help her. Damn them all.

She moved jerkily to the door and yanked it open. "Don’t come in," she said sharply. "Leslie’s not staying." She had the satisfaction of seeing a flash of surprise touch Joe’s eyes at her tone. Then his face hardened. He looked past her into the house.

"Leslie—" he began.

"Is leaving," she interrupted. She held the door pointedly, amazed that she wasn’t stuttering, but then, she was angry, not scared or nervous.

The fear would come back later.

She swallowed carefully and waited, and Leslie came in from the dining room. She passed Maddie quietly, stepping out onto the porch with Joe.

"We’ll talk later," Leslie said calmly, "when you’re ready."

"Like hell we will." Maddie slammed the door hard on both of them.

She had to get back to Josh. He was all that mattered. She had to wait with him, to be there when he woke.

She put her back to the door and sank slowly down it, covered her face with her hands, and sobbed.

"What the hell kind of brilliance was that?" Joe snarled. He stopped at Leslie’s car, behind Maddie’s, in the driveway. "Why didn’t you wait for me to get here?"

"Because I’m the psychologist," Leslie said evenly, "and you’re the cop. Because, theoretically, I’m the one with the expertise and the training to break something like that to her. Last night you gave me credit for knowing a thing or two about the human mind. Well, hitting her with it like that was one way of getting her to remember."

He grunted, still angry. "Did it work?"

"I don’t know yet."

"So you could have put her through that for nothing."

"It was a shock for her," Leslie admitted mildly, "but such a reaction is perfectly understandable under the circumstances. It’s human nature to whip the bearer of bad tidings."

"Yeah, well, I didn’t bear anything."

"She needs some time to calm down. And you were right. Josh is in need as well. I’ll give her a couple of hours and come back. What are you going to do?"

Joe scrubbed a hand over his jaw. "Dig up a kitten. Turns out they
can
autopsy a cat. It’s called a . . . uh, a necropsy when they do it to animals."

Leslie smiled. "I could have told you that. It’s a living thing—"

"Not anymore."

"Well, cutting it could at least tell a learned professional how it died." She hesitated. "Is there some doubt?"

Go for the obvious, Joe thought again. And then turn it this way and that, upside down and inside out, until you make sure it really is obvious after all.

"Just a hunch," he said shortly. He looked back at the house. "Goddamnit, she needs somebody."

"She’s stronger than she looks."

Yeah,
he thought,
and so am I. But cuts bleed regardless, and when hearts break, it hurts.

He moved away from Leslie’s car. "I’m going to hang around for a while."

He went back to the Pathfinder and got the old towel and the biohazard box he’d brought. He took the spade from the side of the house where he’d left it last night, then he dug up the little corpse.
One crazy bastard.
He wondered again at the kind of mind, the sort of heart, it would take for someone to kill a defenseless animal, not to mention an animal that a little boy had loved.

He wrapped it up and put it in the box. Leslie had gone. He was just sliding it into the back of the Pathfinder when he heard the front door open again at the house.

He looked that way quickly. Maddie’s eyes were