A Guilty Mind (13 page)

 

Chapter Twenty-­Five

G
EORGE TOOK BRE
ATH
after breath, barely hearing Mary Helen. Pot after pot of coffee, salty snacks, and half a pack of cigarettes couldn't stop the cravings or the sudden bouts of nausea. When he could look at her, the disgust and loathing on her face was almost enough to make him vomit again.

“So, let me get this straight . . .” Her teeth clenched, there was no trace of the former debutante in her icy tone. “You went to the river Saturday when you said you were going to work. Then claiming you needed time to think, you drive up to Washington for the weekend. I suppose I should at least be grateful you had the decency to call me and tell me you weren't coming home. Now you tell me you want to move to the river, as if we could just pick up our lives at a moment's notice.” She didn't wait for him to respond. “And to top it all off, yesterday you go to the police station and meet with a detective without a lawyer?” Her tiny hands opened and closed with her words. “Without a lawyer! For God's sake, George, what is your problem? Are you insane or just plain stupid?”

He wrapped his hands around the heavy coffee mug. Her words bothered him less than he expected. He remained quiet, letting her rant. Even so, he was grateful his son and daughter were at school, oblivious to the fight brewing at home.

“What if the detective thinks you're a suspect? What about us? What about your family? Do you know what this could do? The police might start asking questions, talking to our friends. This is unbelievable! Again, you act without thinking of anyone but yourself. What did I ever do to deserve this?” Mary Helen paced the length of the gourmet kitchen, moving around the granite island in circles until he felt dizzy watching her. “My God, do I have to do everything?” She stopped and glared at him. Wagging her finger, she said, “There will be no more statements. You have to cooperate, of course, but I'll call Larry right away and have him talk to that detective. That way, they'll know they can't question you again without him there. And you are to stay here where I can keep an eye on you.”

“It's too late for that,” he said with as much confidence as could muster.

Mary Helen started to object, but something in his quiet manner stopped her. “What do you mean?”

He swallowed but held her gaze. “I signed a document allowing them access to my records with Dr. Michael.”

She frowned, head cocked to one side. “What did you say?”

“I signed away my patient confidentiality.” All the color drained from her face. “They probably know everything by now.” He dropped the bombshell. “He taped all of our sessions, you know.”

His wife fell into a chair, her lipsticked mouth opening and closing, issuing only squeaks of outrage.

He tried to explain. “I was tired of hiding the truth, of living a lie every day of my life. You and I both know I'm responsible for Sarah's death, whether I like it or not.” His wife flinched at his former lover's name. “I couldn't take the secrets anymore.” He paused and sipped the steaming coffee. Under the table, his legs trembled. “It's what Dr. Michael wanted me to do for a long, long time. I wanted it, too, but I was afraid. The truth is I didn't have the courage then, the courage to tell the truth, or . . . or the courage to stand up to you, Mary Helen.”

“And now you do.” She cut into his confession, her words dripping in sarcasm.

Blood rushed to his head and his breath caught in his throat. “Yes, I do.”

“Are you drunk?”

George counted silently until he could speak. “No. For once, I can honestly say I'm completely sober.”

She stared at him, then said, “Well, goody for you.”

They sat in silence, the air charged. The dynamic of their relationship had shifted. He put his hands in his lap and waited, comforted only by the knowledge he'd followed through on his vow and hadn't backed down. It was something he hadn't done in a long time. Still, Mary Helen was not ready to concede him this small victory.

“I'll ask you again, George, what about us? If you don't care about me, how could you do this to your children? How dare you risk ruining their lives?”

He winced. Even more than his fear of his wife, it had been his reluctance to involve his children that had kept him from coming forward these last few weeks. “I wrote them letters.”

“Excuse me?” The red lips curled in scorn. “You wrote them letters? Are you kidding?” She stood up, shoving the chair out of her way. “What did you say to them, George? I'm sorry I'm a murderer, kids, please forgive me?”

“It was an accident,” he said.

Mary Helen stepped toward him, hand outstretched, and slapped him across the face. “I hate you,” she said, and stormed out of the kitchen.

His shoulders slumped. Mary Helen stomped up the stairs and slammed the door to their bedroom, the loud bang echoing throughout the quiet house. He rubbed his cheek, feeling the sting of her hand and the hurt of her words. Had he made a mistake? Had he done the wrong thing again? Shaking his head, he couldn't accept that. Revealing the truth was right, and knowing it gave him strength. By now, Detective Cancini might have listened to enough tapes to know about Sarah, to realize that George bore the guilt of a horrible accident and the subsequent cover-­up. Mary Helen had a point about the kids though. They would be humiliated by him, embarrassed, and maybe even disgusted. Maybe someday they could forgive him and even be proud. After all, how could the truth be worse than the drunken, useless man he'd turned out to be? If they learned nothing from him, he prayed they would recognize they must be true and honest or their lives would be as false as his had been.

George trudged up the stairs. He stood outside the bedroom door, listening to the muffled sound of sobbing. After a moment, he tried the handle. It was locked. “Mary Helen? Mary Helen? Open the door.” Whatever they once had was lost, yet George didn't want to hurt his wife any more than he already had. Over the years, he had shifted a great deal of the blame for his mistakes to her, but in moments of clarity and sobriety, he knew she was as much a victim as he. “Please open the door. I want to talk to you.”

“Go away,” came the choked response.

He jiggled the doorknob again. “Please, I don't want to leave it like this. We need to talk and figure this out. I'm sorry that you have to be involved. I really am. I wish . . .” He hesitated, shaking off the thought. “Well, it doesn't matter what I wish, I'm sorry I ever got you into this.” The sobbing had stopped. He felt like a fool, standing in the hallway, calling to his wife through the door. “Can't we talk about this? Please.”

Silence. Then the soft pad of footsteps across the thick carpeting. He heard the click of the lock before she pulled open the door. He looked down into her tearstained face, smudged with black mascara and eyeliner. The red lips were blurred in her pale face. Mary Helen turned away and flopped on the bed, a wad of tissues in her hand. “There's nothing to talk about,” she said through sniffles.

In two strides, he crossed the room and sat beside her. Reaching over, he held her hand. It lay in his palm, lifeless and cold. She did not look at him. “I never meant for things to happen this way. You know that.” Mary Helen pulled her hand away, sliding farther from him on the bed. “I know you're angry and I understand. It's scary, but we have to be realistic. The damage is done. In truth, it was done a long time ago. We should have told the truth then, but we didn't and now we're both going to pay for that. It's my fault. I don't blame you.” George took a breath, deciding to be honest again. “I did for a while, but I was wrong. It was my decision and I was weak and stupid. I have to say all this because it's on the tapes. Everything about that night is on those tapes. And a lot more than that night.” Without looking, he could feel the heat of her eyes as they shot into his soul. Mary Helen could not have despised him more at that moment. “The police will probably want to talk to you. I'll tell them you were only trying to help, that you were scared for me, that you were young . . .” His heart tightened. Even if she had been hard on him, it wasn't always that way. Long ago, before the accident and before Sarah, they had cared for each other. After, she'd stuck by him when she didn't have to. Why? She huddled against the headboard, her face buried in the pillows. The mother of his children, she looked small and fragile. “We both made mistakes, Mary Helen. You deserved better than me.” He touched her shoulder gently. “I'm sorry.”

“Me too,” came the lilting voice after several long minutes, the soft sound so low he almost didn't hear her. “I'm sorry, too.” Uncurling her body, she squared her shoulders. With her painted fingernails, she pushed the mussed hair off her face. “I want a divorce.”

 

Chapter Twenty-­Six

“Y
OU LOOK LIKE
hell,” Father Joe observed, his eyes glowing in the morning sun.

Both men smiled at the lifelong Catholic's language. “That's what I love about you, Father. You call it like you see it.”

“Aye. The truth shall set you free and all that, you know.”

The smile faded from the detective's face. He heard George's voice in his head. After hours of listening to bits and pieces of Vandenberg's life, the truth seemed less clear and more ambiguous than ever.

“It's true, Michael.” The priest cocked his head to the side, voice soft. “You do look terrible.”

Cancini swallowed the piping hot coffee. After a moment, he said, “I didn't get much sleep.”

“It's the case then? The psychiatrist?”

The detective nodded. He set the coffee aside and talked, outlining what he'd heard on the tapes, including Vandenberg's confession to a death decades earlier and his most recent outbursts of temper.

“Do you think he might have killed his doctor?”

“I don't know yet.”

“It sounds like he's a troubled man.” There was no judgment in the old man's face. “You will find the truth.”

Cancini said nothing. His eyes wandered to the cross hanging over the doorway. He'd once asked the old man why he'd hung it there.

“My mother, a good Irishwoman if there ever was one, believed a cross over the door kept the bad spirits away. The truth is, it's probably just an old wives' tale, but it's a good one, don't you think?” The priest had chuckled telling the story.

Looking at the cross now, Cancini wished he could believe. “It's not as easy for me as it is for you, Father. I don't think I have that forgiveness gene or whatever it is that makes you see the good in ­people.”

“That's not true, Michael.”

“Sure it is. I live in the real world. I can't forgive things like you do and push things out of my mind like they never happened. I think there should be justice, punishment for those that break the law.” He thought of Vandenberg's dead girl, her death unnecessary and unpunished. “There should be a price to pay.”

Father Joe took a sip from his cup, his eyes never leaving the face of the younger man. He spoke slowly. “Maybe there is, Michael. Just because it's not your kind of price doesn't mean it hasn't been paid.”

Cancini's face darkened. “That's hogwash, Father, and you know it. Murderers, thieves, crooks. They walk the streets every day and live their lives any way they want. We do our best to catch them and punish them but plenty get away with it, too.” He hesitated, then added, “Vandenberg killed that girl.”

“I thought you said it was an accident—­”

“Maybe it was and maybe it wasn't. Either way, he ran away. It's not right.”

The priest bent his head. “No, it's not right. Still, I'm sure there has been, as you put it, a price.”

“Maybe,” Cancini admitted.

“Could he be a suspect then?”

Cancini shrugged. “I guess. Possibly.”

“Is the widow still under consideration?”

“Yes. She's a cool customer. Too cool for my taste.” He frowned. “And something doesn't seem right about the marriage. They spent a lot of time apart, multiple cell phones, maybe separate bank accounts . . .”

The two men sat quietly then. After a few minutes, Father Joe stood and set his cup on the side table. He faced the empty street, his starched white shirt reflecting the bright sun. He inhaled deeply, his broad shoulders rising and falling with each breath. When he spoke, his voice was quiet, contemplative. “The distance between what's good and what's bad is less than you might think.” Cancini opened his mouth to say something but thought better of it. He'd heard Vandenberg crying, grieving over the death he'd caused and been unable to forget. He could allow that Vandenberg had suffered, but it didn't compare to what the girl's family and the girl herself had gone through. Father Joe spoke again. “Within each of us lies the ability to go either way. We can do good and strive to be good or we can be led down another path. One path, of course, leads to another.” The priest paused, shoving his hands deep into his pockets. “I believe a man's worth cannot be defined solely by his goodness, but also by his desire to battle that in him which is not good. No man can fully understand another's struggles. We can judge them and we can condemn them, but we cannot truly understand.” He turned back to face his young friend. “That is why I believe in forgiveness.”

The detective stood, shaking his head. He reached out and patted the old priest on the shoulder. “You're a good man, Father, but I'm not you.”

“Of course not, Michael. You are you and you're a better man than you think. And you're a damn good homicide detective to boot.” He grinned. “You have a job to do and I know you will find Dr. Michael's killer.”

“And he or she will go to prison, as they should.”

“Their price to pay?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that is the law,” Father Joe said, then dipped his head, looking Cancini in the eye. “But remember, you are your mother's son, and a more forgiving woman I never knew.”

He left the priest's quarters deflated. All the talk of forgiveness and goodness did not sit well with the detective, and the reference to his mother seemed unnecessary. Why had Father Joe said it? It had nothing to do with this case. It had nothing to do with the brutal slaying of Dr. Michael or with the violent death of the young waitress twenty years earlier. And it certainly had nothing to do with George Vandenberg.

He slammed the steering wheel with his hand. “Damn.”