Side Effects (36 page)

"Dad, stop using that word. You have no right to diagnose her."

"Jared, face the facts. Kate is a lovely woman. I care for her very much. But she is a liar, and quite possibly a liar who completely believes her own fabrications. I know she looks perfectly fine and sounds logical, but the hallmark of a sociopath is exactly that physical and verbal glibness. The only way to realize what one is dealing with is to catch her in lie after lie."

"But--"

"Do you really think someone other than Kate sent that letter to the papers about Bobby Geary?"

"I don't know."

"And the chemist, and the Ashburton Foundation, and the nurse at Stonefield. Do you think they were all lying?"

"I don't--"

"And what about the biopsy? You tell me everyone in Kate's department says she made a mistake. The truth is right there in the slides. Yet there is Kate, insisting she did nothing wrong." Samuels withdrew a cigar from his humidor, tested

the aroma along its full length, and then clipped and lit it.

He motioned for Jared to have one if he wished.

Jared glanced at his watch, made an expression of distaste, and shook his head. "Christ, Dad, it's only eightthirty in the morning."

Samuels shrugged. "It's my morning and it's my cigar."

Jared looked across the desk at his father, trim and confident, wearing the trappings of success and
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power as comfortably as he wore his slippers. Unable to speak, Jared stared down at the gilded feet of his father's desk, resting on the exquisite oriental carpet. A secret weapon, that's what Kate had called him. A source of strength for her. She had spoken the words to his father, but they were really meant for him. With tremendous effort, he brought his eyes up.

"I hear what you are saying, Dad. And I understand what you want."

"And?" "I can't go along with it. Kate says she's innocent of any lying, and I believe her."

"You what?"

Jared felt himself wither before the man's glare. "I believe her. And I'm going to do what I can to help clear her." There was a strength in his words that surprised him. He stood up. "I'll tell you something else, Dad. If I find that she's telling the truth, you're going to have a hell of a lot of explaining to do." Samuels rose, anger sparking from his eyes. "I seem to recall a conversation similar to this. We were in that matchbox office of yours in Vermont. I warned you not to marry that rootless hippie you were living with. I told you there was nothing to her. You stood before me then just as you are now and as much as threw me out of your office. Two years later your wife and daughter were gone, and you were crawling to me for help. Have you forgotten?"

"Dad, that was then. This is

"Have you forgotten?"

"No, I haven't."

"Have you forgotten the money and the time I spent trying to find that woman despite my own personal feelings about her?"

"Look, I don't want to fight."

"Get out," Samuels said evenly. "When you come to your senses, when you discover once again that I was right, call me."

"Dad, I--" "I said get out." Samuels turned his back and stared out the window. As Jared opened the door, he nearly collided with Jocelyn Trent, who was standing up and backing away at the same time. Quickly, he closed the door behind him.

"What were you doing there?" he asked.

"Jared, please, don't make me explain." She took him by the arm, led him to the hall closet, and began helping him on with his coat. "Meet me in ten minutes," she whispered in his ear. "The little variety store on the corner of Charles and Mount Vernon. I have something important for you, for Kate actually." The study door opened just as she was letting Jared out. Winfield Samuels stood, arms folded tightly across his chest, and watched him go.

Even dressed down, in pants and a plain wool overcoat, Jocelyn Trent turned heads. Jared stood by the variety store and watched several drivers slow as they passed where she was waiting to cross Charles Street. He left the shelter of the recessed doorway and met her at the corner. Their relationship, while cordial, had never approached a friendship in any sense. His father had taken some pains to keep the interaction between them superficial, and neither had ever been inclined to push matters further.

"Thank you for meeting me like this," she said, guiding him back to the shadow of the doorway. "I don't have much time, so I'll say what I have to say and go."

"Fair enough."

"Jared, I'm leaving your father. I intend to tell him this afternoon." "I'm sorry," he said. "I know how much he cares for you."

"Does he? I think you know as well as I do that caring isn't one of Win Samuels's strong suits. It's too bad, too, because strange as it might sound, I think I might actually love him."

"Then why--"

"Please, Jared. I really don't have much time, and what I'm doing is very hard for me. Just know that I have my reasons--for leaving him and for giving you this." She handed him a sealed envelope. "Kate's a wonderful woman.

She doesn't deserve the treatment he's giving her. I've been completely loyal to your father. That is until now. I know how hard it is to stand up to him. Lord knows I've wanted to enough. I think you did the
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right thing back there."

"Jocelyn, do you know if my father is lying or not? It's very important." She smiled. "I'm aware of how important it is. I was listening at the door, remember? The answer is that I don't know, at least not for sure. There's a phone number in that envelope, Jared. Go someplace quiet and dial it. If my suspicions about that number are correct, you should be able to decide for yourself which of the two, Kate or your father, is telling the truth." "I don't understand," he said. "What is this number?

Where did you get it?"

"Please, I don't want to say any more because there's a small chance I might be wrong. Let's just leave it that the number is one your father has called from time to time since I've known him. I handle all of the household bills, including the phone bill, so I know. A yea r or two ago I accidentally overheard part of a conversation he was having.

Some of what I heard disturbed me, so I noted down the exact time of the call. That's how I learned this number. I don't want to say any more. Okay?"

"Okay, but--"

"I wish you well, Jared. Both of you. The things I overheard Kate say last night have really helped me make some decisions I should have made a long time ago. I hope that what I've done will help her." She took his hand, squeezed it for a moment, and was gone.

Jared watched her hurry up Mt. Vernon Street; then he tore open the plain envelope. The phone number, printed on a three-by-five card, was in the 213 area. Los Angeles.

He drove to his office, trying to imagine what the number might be. Once at his desk, he sat for nearly a minute staring at the card before he finally dialed.

A woman, clearly awakened by the call, answered on the third ring. "Hello?" she said. Jared struggled for a breath and pressed the receiver so tightly against his ear that it hurt.

"Hello?" the woman said again. "Is anybody there?" Even after so many years he knew. "Lisa?" He could barely say the word.

"Yes. Who is this? Who is this, please?"

Slowly, Jared set the receiver back in its cradle.

Friday 21 December

It was pressure pain from the pipe more than cold that tugged Kate free of a sleep that was deeper than sleep. In the twilight moment before she was fully conscious, she imagined herself buried alive, the victim of some twisted, vicious kidnapper. In just a few hours she would suffocate or freeze to death. Jared had that little time to raise her ransom, and the only one he could turn to, she knew, was his father. The sound of Win Samuels's laughter echoed in her tomb, growing louder and louder until with a scream she came fully awake.

She was on her back. Her lips and cheeks were caked with dried and frozen blood. Dim light from the ends of the culvert barely defined the corroding metal, just a foot or so from her face. Lie still, she thought. Just don't move.

Sleep until Jared comes. Close your eyes again and sleep. The thoughts were so comforting, so reassuring, that she had to struggle to remember that they were no more than the cold, lying to her, paralyzing her from within. For a time, all she could think about was sleep, sleep and Zimmermann's taunting warning that even if she survived, no one would believe her story. Sick, crazy, drugged up, that's what they all believed. It was hopeless for her.

Zimmermann said it, and he was right. Over an dover

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again, in a voice as soothing as a warm tub, the cold spoke to her of hopelessness and sleep. Kate flexed her hands and her feet, struggling against the downy comfort of the lies and the inertia. Remain still and you will die. Surrender to the cold and you tvill never see Jared again; never get the chance to tell him how much his letter and his decision mean to you.

She tried pushing herself along with her feet, but could not bend her knees enough to get leverage. She had to see him. She had to tell him that she, too, was ready to make choices. Aroused by the aching in her legs and the far deeper pain in her side, she twisted and wriggled onto her belly. She had been wrong
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to allow Willoughby to nominate her without trying harder to see things from Jared's perspective. She had been wrong. Now she could only admit that and hope Jared believed it had been he, and not the devastating events, who had helped her see the true order of her priorities. She was less than halfway from the far end of the pipe. The fog seemed to have lifted. She could now make out the silhouettes of trees against the white sky. A few more feet and there was enough light to read the numbers on her watch. Eleven fifteen. She had been entombed for over an hour. Was Zimmermann still out there? Could he possibly have stayed around in the snow and the cold for over an hour?

Driven by the need to see Jared again, to set matters straight, she worked herself arm over arm along the icy metal. A foot from the edge she stopped and listened.

Beyond the soft wisp of her own breathing, there was nothing. Had an hour been long enough? Wouldn't Zimmermann have left, concerned about having his car attract attention? Finally, she abandoned her attempts at reasoning through the situation. If he was out there, waiting, there was little she would be able to do. If he wasn't, she would overcome whatever pain and cold she had to and make it home. There were amends to be made.

With a muted cry of pain, she curled her fingers around the edge of the culvert and pulled.

"We're sorry, but we are unavailable to take your call right now. Please wait for the tone, leave your name, number, and the time, and Kate or Jared will get back to you as soon as possible."

"Kate, it's just me again. Ignore the previous two messages. I'm not going to stay at the office, and I'm not going to speak with Reese. I'm coming home. Please don't go anywhere. Thanks. I love you." Something was wrong. In almost five years of marriage, Jared had never felt so intense a connection to his wife.

With that heightened sensitivity and three unanswered calls home had come a foreboding that weighed on his chest like an anvil. The feeling was irrational he told himself over and again, groundless and foolish. She was at a neighbor's or on a run. With his MG still in the office garage, where it had been all week, he had taken her Volvo; but still, there were plenty of places to which she could have walked. He left the city and crossed the Mystic River Bridge, the rational part of him struggling to keep the Volvo under seventy. She was fine. There was some perfectly logical explanation why she hadn't answered his calls the past hour and a half. He just hadn't hit on it. Certainly, his concentration and powers of reason were not all they could be. It had been one hell of a morning.

The call to California, the sound of Lisa's voice, had left him at once elated and sickened. His father had lied.

He had lied about Lisa and possibly about Stonefield as well. Jared cringed at the thought of how close he had come to siding with the man. Silently, he gave thanks that he had made his decision, set down on paper his commitment to Kate, before he had learned the truth about his father. The man had been paying Lisa off all those years.

That conclusion was as inescapable as it was disgusting.

They were some pair, his ex-wife and Winfield. One totally vapid, one totally evil. Some goddamn pair. Then there was Stacy. As he weaved along past Route 1's abysmal stretch of fast-food huts, factory outlets, budget motels, garish restaurants, and raunchy nightclubs, Jared ached with thoughts of her. What did she believe had become of her father? Would there ever be a way he could reenter her life without destroying whatever respect she had for her mother, possibly thereby destroying the girl herself? Kate would have a sense of what was right to do. Together they could decide. Damn, but he had come close, so close, to blowing it all.

The house was deserted. Kate's running gear was gone, and so was Roscoe. It had been several hours since his first call--far too long. He checked the area around the house and yard. Nothing. There were but two choices: wait some more or call the police. The heavy sense of apprehension, so ill-defined while he was in Boston, seemed more acute. There was no sense in waiting.

As he walked to the phone in the kitchen, he glanced out the front window. Three neighborhood children, all around eight, were trudging up the driveway pulling a sled. On the sled was a cardboard carton. The path to the front door, only as wide as a shovel, was too narrow for the sled. Two youngsters stayed
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behind, kneeling by the box, while the third ran up the walk. Jared met her at the door.