An Anonymous Girl(107)

That last part would be a lie because I still intended to find a way to turn in Dr. Shields. But if I could shock her into saying something incriminating on my secret recording, I’d at least have evidence to offset whatever story she concocted.


Now, as I sit in the library watching Thomas wipe his mouth with a napkin, I know I need to figure out a new strategy—fast.

I can’t believe Dr. Shields just told Thomas she knows he slept with April and that April was his client.

Thomas suddenly looks like a completely different man than the confident, take-charge guy who pulled off his jacket and covered the elderly woman who was hit by a taxi outside the museum.

My mind swirls as I try to reframe everything I thought I knew. I was right; April went to Thomas for therapy. But Dr. Shields doesn’t realize I’m aware of this, or that I already knew Thomas slept with April. It’s an explosive secret, one that could cost them everything. Why was she so cavalier about stating that information in front of me?

All of Dr. Shields’s moves are premeditated. So this wasn’t a slip. It was deliberate.

My stomach clenches like a fist as I realize she must already be certain that I’m not going to tell anyone.

A secret is only a secret if one person holds it.

What is she going to do to ensure I won’t reveal it?

My mind flashes to a vision of April, slumped on the park bench.

I shrink back against my seat as my entire body begins to tremble. My mouth is so dry I can’t swallow.

Dr. Shields tucks back a stray tendril of hair and I see the vein on her temple throb, a blue-green blemish on an otherwise-perfect sheet of marble.

The tasteful platter of hors d’oeuvres, the crackling fire, the elegant library with leather-bound volumes lining a shelf—how could I ever have thought bad things couldn’t happen in such an enviable setting?

Focus, I instruct myself.

Dr. Shields isn’t a physically violent person, I tell myself again. Her sharpest weapon is her mind. She wields it mercilessly. If I succumb to panic, I’ll lose.

I force myself to stare at her as Thomas gasps, “Lydia, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

She interrupts him: “I’m sorry, too, Thomas.”

Then I hear it: the disconnect between her words and her tone.

She doesn’t sound furious or cuttingly sarcastic, as a wife should in this moment.

Compassion fills her voice instead. It’s as though she believes she and Thomas are aligned together against the adulterous affair; as though they are both innocent parties.

As my gaze seesaws between them, it hits me why Dr. Shields hasn’t simply left Thomas: She can’t.

Because she’s desperately in love with him.

She didn’t give April the pills only because she was jealous and furious. She also did it to protect Thomas, so that April could never reveal she’d been his client. I told Dr. Shields that I’d seen what love looks like in other people. And now I realize it’s true: I see it on her face whenever she talks about or gazes at her husband. Even now.

But her love for Thomas is as twisted as everything else about her: It’s all-consuming and toxic and dangerous.

Dr. Shields replaces the visitor’s log under the laptop. Then she takes a seat on the chair opposite me. “Shall we begin?”

She appears completely composed, like a professor in front of an audience, conducting a lecture.

She spreads out her hands. “Now, I’ll ask my question again, this time to both of you: Do either of you have anything to confess about the true nature of your relationship?”

Thomas starts to say something, but Dr. Shields cuts him off immediately: “Hold on. Think very carefully before you reply. So that you don’t influence one another, I’ll speak to each of you privately. You have two minutes to decide how you are going to answer.” She glances down at her watch and I push up my sleeve to check mine.

“Your time starts now,’ Dr. Shields says.

I look at Thomas, trying to read what he’s going to say, but his eyes are tightly shut. He looks so awful I wonder if he’s going to get sick again.

I feel nauseated, too, but my mind is leaping through all the scenarios and the possible repercussions.

We could both confess the truth: We did sleep together.

We could both lie: We could stick to our script.

I could lie and Thomas could divulge the truth: He might sell me out to get the visitor’s log.

Thomas could lie and I could disclose the truth: I could blame it on him, say he pursued me. If I do this, Dr. Shields claims she’ll give me the digital recording. But will it really end then?

No, I realize. There is no right move.

Dr. Shields takes a sip of wine, her eyes staring at me from over the rim of the glass.

The Prisoner’s Dilemma, I think. That’s what she’s re-creating. I read about it once in an article someone posted on Facebook. It’s a common tactic in which suspects are placed in solitary confinement and given incentives to see if they’ll rat each other out.

Dr. Shields sets down her wineglass, the crystal making a delicate chime as it touches the coaster.

There can’t be much time left.

Images collide in my brain: Dr. Shields alone in the French restaurant at a table for two. I see her stroking the crest of the falcon, and feel the warm press of cashmere around my shoulders as I sobbed in her office. A line from her notes in her precise, graceful script: You could become a pioneer in the field of psychological research.