Off the Deep End (54)

My hands were clammy on the steering wheel. The silence grew louder with each block. What did he know that he wasn’t telling me? Is that why he’d been acting so weird? I thought it was just because Isaac was missing. Was there more to it than that? My mind ran wild, searching for possible scenarios to explain any of this, but nothing made sense.

Mark looked ill. Like at any minute he might ask me to pull over the car so he could throw up on the side of the road. His hair was matted with sweat, and he anxiously rubbed his hands up and down his thighs. You could almost see the wheels spinning in his head. This wasn’t good.

It wasn’t long before we were almost to our neighborhood. Only a few blocks away.

Mark rubbed his legs harder. “Okay, okay, I’ve just got to get inside the house. That’s all. I can pull it together long enough for that. I can,” he muttered underneath his breath. He was practically clawing at himself.

I put my hand on top of his, forcing his hands to be still. “Mark, what’s going on?”

“You don’t want to know.” He shook his head back and forth without looking at me. His forehead was pinched tight like he was battling with his thoughts. “You don’t want to know.”

Alarm bells went off inside me. My gut clenched, and my heart beat faster.

I should’ve whipped the car over to the side of the road and parked so that we could talk about whatever was going on. I should’ve demanded that he tell me exactly what happened and what he was hiding from me.

But I didn’t.

I couldn’t.

Instead, I exhaled slowly and tried to quell the anxiety rushing through me. I brushed the hair off Mark’s face and tucked it behind his ears with shaking hands. “Just keep your head down when we get out of the car, and don’t let them take your picture, okay?”





CASE #72946

PATIENT: JULIET (JULES) HART

“I can tell this conversation is making you uncomfortable. Would you like to talk about something else?” Dr. Stephens asks. It’s been five minutes since I curled myself up into a ball on this chair and settled into silence. I’m done talking about transference. That’s not what happened with Isaac, and it’s definitely not what’s going on with us.

“I feel like we might be running out of things to talk about.” There are still four days left until Isaac’s body shows up in a field somewhere or disappears forever. What does he plan on doing? Coming and sitting with me in these sessions every day until then? Is that what they’ve really hired him to do? Be my fancy overpriced babysitter until the clock runs out of time? I can’t imagine what he costs in comparison to what they pay my babysitters at Samaritan House.

“Oh, I think we’ve got plenty of things to talk about,” he says. “At least enough for today.”

I raise my eyebrows at him. He’s done another quick power play I wasn’t expecting. Every time I underestimate him, he surprises me. Can’t wait to see where this one goes. I willingly take his bait.

“We do?” I bat my eyelashes at him, but not the seductive ones this time. The innocent ones. Those might work better. Maybe he likes his women helpless.

“Sure do.” He gives me a playful nod. “The police paid a visit to Shane last night.”

“They did?” My response is much more subdued than he was probably expecting, but I figured it was only a matter of time before they talked to Shane. I’m surprised it took them as long as it did to get to him.

“Yes. The lead detective went. Detective Hawkins. Have you met him?” There’s a slight twinkle in his eyes. He knows that I haven’t. He knows everything about me. Well, at least he thinks he does. He doesn’t know the half of it.

“No, I’ve never met him,” I respond, taking the bait. I’ll play his game if it means making him feel better about getting played by mine.

“Yes, he’s the lead guy in all of this, and I have to tell you, he’s really amazing. He’s got an impeccable track record too. I’ve only gotten to work with him one other time in my career. Matter of fact, it was another missing persons case back when I worked in Wilmington. That was a doozy there, boy. Much harder to crack than this, but you don’t want to get bogged down in all those details, do you?” He gives me a wicked grin. He’s enjoying this. Whatever he’s setting up. Having the ball back in his court. He most certainly doesn’t like having it in mine. “Anyway, all that to say, Detective Hawkins went and paid a visit to your husband, Shane, last night.”

“And? Did they have a lovely time?” I try not to let my feelings show.

“You know, they did. He had some interesting things to say.”

I bet he did. Twenty-one years of marriage brings all kinds of history and drama to the table. All the garbage. So many stories.

“I was surprised to learn that you weren’t living at home before the train accident. You hadn’t lived at home in over three months. Shane said he didn’t even know where you stayed sometimes and that you often slept on the streets for weeks at a time.” He stops, giving his words a chance to sink in, but I’m not surprised by any of his news.

“It’d been a couple of months since I lived at home. I thought everyone knew that.” My homelessness had been the talk of the town.

“Why’d you leave home?” he asks like I was a teenage runaway.