Most Wanted (27 page)

“He's not like Ted Bundy, Zachary's—”

“
Zachary
, now? You call him
Zachary
? Are you on a first-name basis? Does he call you
Christine
? Does he call you by your first name?
Zachary and Christine?
”

“Marcus. We talked, we had a conversation—”

“I don't understand what you're thinking. I don't know how you expect me to hear this.” Marcus started edging away. He wasn't angry; he was anguished.

“I know it's a lot to process, but now we know who our donor is. Now we can put a face and a name to him, and I'm not even sure he's guilty of murder, I think he might even be innocent and—”

“I don't want to
know
who our donor is!” Marcus kept backing away, stricken.

“What do you mean? Of course you do.” Christine got off the chair, in confusion.

“No I don't. I
liked
it anonymous. Don't you get it?”

“No, I don't. You wanted us to
sue
to find out his identity. It wasn't going to be anonymous any longer—”

“That's different, that's
Gary
finding out, that's lawyers finding out, that's corporations battling in court, and on phones, that's insurance companies.” Marcus shook his head, nonplussed. “That's not
you
finding out, my
wife
, meeting him.”

“What's the difference who finds out or how? Now, we know and we—”

“I don't want you to meet him. I don't want you to lie to me about it. I don't want you to be the one who finds out the real father of the baby you're carrying.”

Christine's mouth went dry, hearing the jealousy in his voice. She had expected that he would be angry, even furious, but she hadn't expected that he would be hurt and jealous. “Marcus, it's not like that—”

“You're carrying his child, Christine. You went to see the man whose child you're carrying.”

Christine felt his words hit home, and she felt terrible. “Marcus, I'm sorry—”

“We spent so much time in therapy saying he's just a biological donor, and that's all I wanted him to be. That was the deal.” Marcus shook his head, edging out of the kitchen, his forehead knotted with pain. “Maybe
Zachary
wanted anonymity, but you know what? So did I. It worked for me, too.”

Christine kept going toward him, not wanting him to be so hurt, seeing how much pain he was in. “Marcus, you're getting the wrong idea.”

“No, I'm not. It was never the deal that you would go running off to meet him, that you would lie to me about that.” Marcus's eyes glistened suddenly, an agonized blue. “Whose wife
are
you? Whose
woman
? His or mine?”

“Marcus, of course, I'm your wife—”

“But you're having his baby. Zachary. You don't even care that he's in jail for carving up nurses. You're already on his side.”

“There's no sides—”

“Yes there are sides! You're on one, and I'm on the other. Correction, you and Zachary and the baby are on one, and I'm on the other.”

“No, that's not true!” Christine cried out, but Marcus turned away, left the kitchen, and walked into the entrance hall.

“Leave me alone. Just leave me alone.”

Christine went after him. “Marcus, I'm sorry, I didn't think of it that way, that's not the way I meant it.”

“That's the way it is.” Marcus kept walking away from her, into the living room, flicking on the light. “I'm tired, I've been traveling all day. I had a shitstorm to deal with this weekend. I want to sleep downstairs, I need time to think alone.”

“Marcus, we can still talk about it—”

“I don't want to talk about it. I want to think about it, by myself.” Marcus held her off with a straight arm, so Christine stopped, motionless until Murphy came wandering in, his toenails tapping and his tail wagging slowly, confused because nobody ever went into the living room.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, absolutely.” Marcus motioned to the stairwell. “Please go upstairs. I'm sleeping downstairs. We'll see Gary in the morning.”

“Okay,” Christine said, heartbroken.

“Murph, come.” Marcus whistled to the dog, who trundled in after him.

 

Chapter Twenty-six

Christine and Marcus waited for Gary in his office, sitting in the chairs across from the lawyer's ornate desk, having been served coffee in real china cups and saucers by his niece Theresa. Christine and Marcus had barely exchanged a word this morning, avoiding each other while they'd showered and dressed for the meeting, Christine into a blue oxford shirtdress and Marcus in a tan suit with a silk tie because he was going to work later. She was going home afterwards, so they had driven here separately, which was merciful. Christine imagined that a car ride together would have been miserable.

“Hello, Nilssons!” Gary boomed, clapping his hands together as he entered his office, scampered around his desk, and plopped into his ergonomic throne. “Sorry about that! Nature called! Ring, ring!”

“Good to see you, Gary,” Marcus said stiffly.

“Yes, hi, Gary,” Christine added.

“Glad you could come in. I love that we're jumping right on this, no waiting.” Gary opened a manila folder on his desk, extracted two slim packets of papers from inside, and slid them across his glistening desk, one to Marcus and another to Christine. “I'll take you through our suit papers, so you understand them completely.”

“Gary,” Marcus said, calmly, “before we do that, there's something you should know. I could explain, but I'll let Christine.”

Gary turned to Christine, his good cheer clouding over. “Don't tell me you got cold feet. Did you get cold feet, Christine?”

“No, it's not that.” Christine braced herself. “This weekend, I went to Graterford Prison with Lauren, and we interviewed Zachary Jeffcoat. I pretended I was a reporter and I didn't tell him who I really was. He told me that he's Donor 3319.”

“Are you for real?” Gary blinked in astonishment, then broke into a grin.

“Yes, it's true,” Christine answered, confused. She hadn't anticipated a favorable reaction. She was expecting that Gary would be as angry as Marcus, except for the jealousy part.

“That's amazing! You went right to the source, eh? You used self-help, I love it. I didn't know you had it in you, teach.”

“Neither did I,” Christine blurted out, with an abrupt laugh, like a release of pressure.

Gary laughed. “With clients like you, I'd be out of business.”

Marcus looked from Christine to Gary, incredulous. “What the hell? Are you two insane?”

“Hold on.” Gary held up a hand. “Let me get the facts—”

“Gary, what facts? What other facts do you need?” Marcus shook his head in disbelief, which seemed as fresh as last night. “Don't you realize how dangerous that was, what she did? Going into prison? I looked it up online last night, it's maximum-security. You know the animals that are in there?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow your roll.” Gary leaned over the desk, his smile fading. “I told you before about the plumbers in my family. That's my father's side. My
mother's
side, they're crooks. Petty crooks, not mobsters. Not mob. Not Mafia. Not every Italian-American is connected, is what I'm saying.”

“What's your point?”

“That people in prison are still people. I spent my childhood visiting my uncle and my nephew in prison. They were nice guys. They made mistakes. One was an embezzler, the other got into a fight in a bar.”

Marcus bristled. “I'm entitled to be concerned about my wife and her safety.”

“Your wife was safe. She visited an inmate. People do it every day. She didn't walk around naked in the exercise yard.”

“Gary, the man is a
serial killer
.”

“In a cage. The man is a serial killer in a
cage
.” Gary gestured at his pictures from the Serengeti. “You put a
lion
in a cage and he can't hurt you—”

“Enough with the lions. We're talking about my wife. She didn't even tell me she did it.”

Gary didn't bat an eye. “Marcus, I understand you don't want your wife to do stuff like that without your knowledge. That's a different issue. Don't get your issues confused.”

“But it ruins the lawsuit now, doesn't it?” Marcus motioned at the white papers on the desk.

“No, if anything, it helps the lawsuit.” Gary slid the papers back toward him. “If Jeffcoat told Christine that he's 3319, then I would argue to Homestead that he's waived his right to confidentiality. In other words, I would argue that they don't have to keep his identity confidential because he's already disclosed it. If he didn't follow the agreement, then they don't have to follow the agreement.”

Christine brightened, surprised. She hadn't thought she'd hurt the lawsuit, but she hadn't thought she'd helped it, either.

Marcus stiffened. “But what about the fact that she tricked him, that she got that information by false pretenses?”

“That's irrelevant, legally.” Gary frowned, seeing that Marcus remained not only unconvinced, but unhappy. “Marcus, it's all about what a court would do. It's contract law. The reason Homestead wouldn't disclose the identity before was because they signed a contract with Jeffcoat to keep it confidential. Once the other contracting party, namely Jeffcoat, discloses, then the only other person who would sue them for breach drops out. Jeffcoat could never sue in court for breach of confidentiality to an agreement that he'd already breached. The court would say he has ‘unclean hands' and throw the case out.”

Marcus shook his head again, nonplussed. “Then what effect does it have? What do we do now? I don't want to drop the lawsuit. I want to hold Homestead responsible for their negligence. It's ruining our lives, our marriage.”

Christine swallowed hard, realizing that Marcus was right. It was ruining their marriage. She could feel it, too. She had to admit it to herself. They were in crisis. This was all happening, to them. To her. To their new family.

But Gary only shrugged in response. “Marcus, who said we're dropping the lawsuit? We're not. Now, what I would do is pick up the phone and see if we can do this quickly and more efficiently. I'm going to tell Homestead we have bad news for them—their donor waived, and they need to settle with us. Confidentially. Quietly. Just like before, nobody will be the wiser, they pay us to go away.”

Marcus fell silent.

Christine's thoughts raced. “Do you think they'll settle?”

“I would, if I were them.” Gary paused. “But, but, but. Here's the caveat. There's a possibility that they won't, depending on what their insurance company tells them or their parent company. If they don't agree, then we file our papers, just like before. We haven't lost anything.” Gary slid his computer keyboard in front of him and hit a few keys. “But let me back up a minute. Christine, I need to get the facts about what you learned from Jeffcoat. Tell me what he told you.”

Christine filled Gary in, telling him that Jeffcoat had applied but hadn't gone to medical school, about the religious parents, even the death of his baby sister. Gary typed as she spoke, and Christine could feel Marcus listening hard, realizing that he hadn't gotten any of the details last night. She had a vain hope that hearing the full story might soften him up, which might have been a pipe dream. She also told them how Zachary told her his exact donor number. She didn't say anything about going to Gail Robinbrecht's house because it didn't seem relevant to the fact that Zachary was their donor—and she didn't want Marcus to hit the ceiling. Also she remembered not to call Zachary by his first name.

“So, that's it?” Gary looked up expectantly, his small, slim fingers poised over his keyboard.

“Basically, yes.”

Marcus sipped the last of his coffee but didn't say anything, replacing his cup in the saucer with a loud
clink
.

Gary started typing again. “Christine, do you know if Jeffcoat is represented? I like to know who my opposition is.”

“Yes, he had a public defender but I think he might be getting a private lawyer.” Christine realized that Zachary would be meeting with Griff right now, at the exact same time that she and Marcus were meeting with Gary.

Gary kept typing. “How do you know that, did he tell you?”

“I think he's going to hire a local lawyer named Francis Griffith, from West Chester.”

“Good to know.” Gary typed away. “Griffith's a criminal lawyer, right?”

“Yes,” Christine answered, aware that Marcus was weighing her every word. Suddenly her phone rang in her purse. “Sorry, I should have turned it off.”

“No worries, I'm no phone Nazi.” Gary typed away.

Christine reached down and slid her phone from the outside pocket, seeing that the screen read
GRIFF
. She pressed the red button to decline the call, but Marcus saw the screen, too.

“Wait,” he snapped. “Isn't that the name you just said? Griff? Is that a nickname for Griffith? Jeffcoat's lawyer?”

“Yes.” Christine slipped the phone back in her purse, kicking herself for putting Griff in her contacts list.

“Why is he calling you? How does he have your number?”

“I helped Jeffcoat get him,” Christine answered because there was no reason to lie.

“What do you mean? How did you help?”

“He had a public defender and he wanted somebody local, so I helped.”

Gary stopped typing, listening to them both, his head of glossy black hair swiveling back and forth, shiny under the lights.

Marcus frowned, confused. “You didn't know any local lawyers, did you?”