Little Girls(92)

“Teresa Larosche,” said Freeling. “She was your dad’s nighttime caretaker.”

Laurie shook her head. “No. That can’t be.”

“Her fingerprints were in the third-floor room—on the inside of the doorknob, around the windowsill where your father went out. I went back to her apartment for a second interview, just to sew up the loose ends, and she must have figured that I knew something that I didn’t. When I started asking about the fingerprints, she broke down and confessed.”

“When did this happen?” Shock had dried out her mouth, making it difficult to speak properly.

“Early this morning. She’s in lockup now. Been cooperative all morning.”

“I don’t . . . I don’t understand. What . . . what exactly happened?”

“She’s a very disturbed young lady, Mrs. Genarro. You’ve met her once, correct?”

“Yes. She’s the one who gave me the key to the room on the roof. She seemed worried about something—scared, even—but she didn’t strike me as someone who would . . .”

He showed her his palms, as if to say, Well, folks, there you have it.

“Why did she do it?”

“Because he frightened the hell out of her,” said Freeling. “When she first started talking, I thought she was setting herself up for a self-defense argument, but she didn’t go there. My guess now is that a good lawyer might try to get her to plead to temporary insanity.”

“Because he frightened her?”

“I know, it sounds ridiculous.”

No, she thought. It doesn’t. Even now, she could hear Teresa Larosche’s words thundering through her head, clear as a bell: And do you want to hear something ridiculous? After a while, he started to convince me of it. And I started to think, shit, what if he’s right? He seems so certain, what if he’s right? Soon, I started waking myself up just to go around the house and make sure the doors were all locked. And, see, that freaked me out even more because, you know, just like I said—what if his dementia was contagious? What if it had somehow seeped into me?

“It doesn’t sound ridiculous at all,” she said. “Not after last night.”

“She asked to speak with you.”

“Teresa?”

“Normally, we wouldn’t bother, but in this case . . . well, it would be strictly for your benefit, not hers. Unless you don’t want to, of course.”

She didn’t know how to feel about this.

“I just thought you might have some questions,” Detective Freeling said. “This whole thing came out of nowhere. I just thought it might do you some good. Like I said, she’s been cooperative. She hasn’t even requested an attorney, despite her boyfriend’s protestations.”

“Toby,” she said.

“Ah, you’ve met the inimitable Toby.”

“No. Teresa mentioned him the day we met.”

“He’s a piece of work.” He stood up. “Like I said, Mrs. Genarro, it’s up to you. If you just want to get home, I’ll have Freddy take you back right now.”

“No,” she said. “I’d like to speak with her.”





Chapter 29


Teresa Larosche sat in a cell by herself at the end of a cellblock that was rank with the stink of perspiration. Detective Freeling led Laurie down the cellblock past other jailed offenders, each one looking like a caged animal awaiting euthanasia. There was a folding chair set up in the hall facing Teresa’s cell. It reminded her of when Jodie Foster went to talk with Anthony Hopkins’s character in The Silence of the Lambs.

Teresa Larosche was seated on a bench, her head down, her bleached hair hanging over her eyes. She wasn’t wearing the Hannibal Lecter–style jumpsuit that would have completed the visual, but a plain black T-shirt and jeans. The laces had been removed from her sneakers and she wore none of the jewelry she had worn on the day Laurie had met her for coffee. When the young woman looked up at her, she could see that there was no makeup on her face, either. Her eyes looked haunted.

Detective Freeling placed a hand on Laurie’s shoulder. “When you’re finished, just come back down the hall and push the intercom button by the door.” He smelled like aftershave lotion.

“Okay. Thanks.”

Once Detective Freeling was halfway down the hall, Laurie sat in the folding chair. In the cell, Teresa’s eyes were red, bleary orbs that leaked wet tracks down her cheeks. She looked much older than the woman whom Laurie had met at the Brickfront coffee shop, though only slightly more frightened.

“I’m sorry for lying to you,” Teresa said.

“But not for killing my father,” Laurie said. “Why did you do it?”

“Because he was poisoning me. Because he was getting into my head and I had to stop him from doing that.”

“Why didn’t you just quit?”

“It wouldn’t have done any good. Even when I wasn’t there—you know, during the day—it was like he was still inside my head. Remember that movie I told you about? The crazy guy and the psychiatrist or whatever?”

“I remember.”

“You know what I’m talking about, don’t you? You feel it, too.”

“In the next few days, there will be a story in the news about my father. I can’t tell you about it now, but you’ll know what it is when it happens. So while I don’t know exactly what you’re talking about, it isn’t hard for me to comprehend just how horrible he might have been toward you. Believe me on that.”