The Cinderella Hour (24 page)

The Wind Chimes Towers doorman permitted Luke and Bea access
to the Towers’ commercial floors. Although he was arriving later than expected,
Luke’s name was on the WCHM guest list.

The doorman could not, however, grant access to the
residential levels. As nice as Bea seemed, she couldn’t simply appear at Dr.
Vail’s door, at any resident’s door, unannounced. But he would be more than happy
to call to see if the doctor wanted him to send her up.

“Let’s defer that for fifteen minutes,” Luke said. “I’d like
to be with you when you talk to Thomas. But right now, I don’t want to miss the
chance to see Snow before she leaves for the night.”

“I don’t want you to miss that chance, either.”

As soon as they entered WCHM, the sound of Snow’s voice
surrounded them. A receptionist guided them to
The Cinderella Hour
studio, to the control booth where they could watch her and listen to the closing
minutes of the show.

“I’m often asked,” Snow was saying as they made the winding
journey, “whether
The Cinderella Hour
has any meaning beyond its literal
one of midnight. The answer is yes. When midnight arrived, Cinderella fled. She
didn’t believe in herself enough to let Prince Charming see her for who she
truly was. That may sound a little odd to my male listeners. A
little
? I
know, a lot. But I believe I’m speaking for many women when I say that it’s a
challenge for us to embrace ourselves, rags and all.

“Tonight I would like to share with you a discovery about
myself that I’m just beginning to embrace. The discovery is recent, although it
has been a terribly important part of me for sixteen years. As Dr. Prescott
explained, postpartum depression can occur following a miscarriage. I’d like to
tell you one woman’s experience of the way it feels.”

Snow’s words traveled with Luke and Bea to the control booth.
Once there, through soundproof glass, they saw Snow herself.

She sat at a table for two, its guest chair vacant, its
single microphone where, in a different setting, a tapered candle might have
been. Her headphones were off. Her quiet soliloquy would be the end of the
show. Her head was bent in concentration, staring—perhaps unseeing—at her
hands.

“I was a teenager when I became pregnant. I was thrilled
about my baby. I sensed her presence inside me even before I believed I could
feel her move. I say ‘believed’ because I was wrong. I thought the fluttering I
felt was her, a flutter of happiness. In reality, it was the beginning of the miscarriage.
I’ve since learned that I wasn’t far enough along in my pregnancy, especially
since it was a first pregnancy, to feel her move.”

She paused, and they heard her in-drawn breath.

“A few hours after I felt the fluttering,” she began again, “I
experienced a sense of dread. That was the onset of my depression. As we heard
tonight, postpartum depression can happen that quickly. The moment the baby has
been delivered—or lost—the hormones that supported the pregnancy disappear and
the changes begin. My baby girl died shortly before midnight, shortly before
the Cinderella hour, the night before. But it would be almost twenty-four hours
before I passed the tissue that would tell me I had miscarried.

“By then, I now realize, my depression was profound. I lost
all track of time. And although the decisions I made seemed rational to me,
they weren’t. I had no idea I was in trouble. But I wouldn’t have cared. I had failed
to keep my baby safe. What happened to me didn’t matter. There was help nearby.
A lovely woman, a nurse, lived four blocks away. She’d had miscarriages. She
would have understood. I could have gone to her. The baby’s father would have helped
me, too. He didn’t love me, but he would have—”

“He did love you.”

“Luke.”

He sat across from her, his green eyes glistening with unshed
tears. “
I
loved you.”

“You don’t have to say that.”

“But I do, Snow. It’s the truth.” A truth she wanted to
believe, he thought. But she didn’t, couldn’t, yet.
I’ll spend all night
convincing you, Snow, if you’ll let me. All night, once we’re alone.
“Keep
talking. There’s more your listeners—and I—want to hear.”

“I . . . where was I?”

“Knowing there was help nearby, but not letting yourself
reach out for it—or wait for it.”

“I didn’t think I needed help. And even if some rational part
of my brain urged me to get it, I would have rejected the impulse. I didn’t
deserve
it. I’d let my baby down. And my baby’s father.”

“Never,” he said softly. “What did you do? Where did you go?”

“I called a cab. My plan was to go to O’Hare and catch a
flight to California. Or Atlanta. I couldn’t decide which. We were only about
two miles from Quail Ridge when the prospect of having to choose a destination
became overwhelming. I asked the cab driver to stop at the first motel that had
a vacancy. I remained there for several weeks.”

“Several
weeks
? Two miles from Quail Ridge? Didn’t you
hear me shouting your name?”

“I was a million miles from Quail Ridge. And you.”

“What did you do during those weeks?”

“I curled up in the bed. In darkness. I never even opened the
blinds. There was a vending machine at the end of the hallway near my room.
When my body demanded food, I would get something. It took all those weeks for
me to decide between California and Atlanta. I decided Atlanta. It had meaning
for my mother and me. I moved to another motel. Then another. It took me ten
months to get to Atlanta. After that it was a year before I returned to school.
The depression that began in a heartbeat wasn’t in such a hurry to leave.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“Or yours.”

“No. But . . .”

“But what?”

“I have never—not for one second—viewed my friend’s
postpartum depression as her fault. Nor is it the fault of any of the women who
have shared their stories tonight. I
know
it’s not. Any more than they
would be to blame if a bolt of lightning struck them from a clear blue sky. But
when it comes to my own depression, I’ve been feeling ashamed. I’m
still
feeling ashamed. As if there’s something wrong with me that made me
susceptible.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you.”

“I’ve bought into the mental health stigma, though, haven’t
I? That there’s something fundamentally different between coming down with
pneumonia and coming down with depression.”

“You’ve bought into it for yourself. Not for others. That’s
why you chose the topic for tonight’s show.”

Tonight’s show
. It should have ended by now. But it was only as Snow
glanced at the red on-air light that it finally blinked off.

The clock read
1
:
14
.

“Helen?” Snow looked toward the control booth.

It was empty. Its two inhabitants were joining her and Luke.

“I just couldn’t cut you off,” Helen said. In truth, she had been
so captivated by what was unfolding—Snow’s story, Luke’s love—that she lost
track of time. She wasn’t the only entranced listener, she discovered, when her
computer screen filled with the first of what would be several days of calls
and emails.
Luke loves her so much
, the messages would proclaim.
Does
she love him, too?
If not, there were countless single women ready and
willing to step into
The Cinderella Hour
host’s vacant shoes.

“I wouldn’t have let her cut you off,” Bea added.

“
Mrs. Evans
?”

“Bea. And yes, sweet girl, it’s me. Older . . . and, in the
past few minutes, a whole lot wiser. I had it, too, Snow. Postpartum
depression. I didn’t know it until tonight. I was ashamed of losing the babies
I wanted so much but failed to keep safe. I was also ashamed of how long it
took me to recover from the loss.”

Bea insisted on a hug. Snow willingly obliged. Their faces
touched, damp cheek to damp cheek.

“Mira,” Snow whispered, remembering. “How is she?”

“She was badly injured,” Luke answered. “She’s still in
surgery.”

“I left a message on her machine earlier this evening. She
invited me to have lunch with her. I called to tell her yes. It was very
thoughtful of her.”

“Yes,” Luke concurred quietly. “She is very thoughtful.”

Bea’s watery eyes became more so. “You’re going to like her,
Snow.”

“I’m sure I will, Bea. You always said I would.”

“Speaking of Mira”—Luke drew a breath—“we should move forward
on letting Thomas know what has happened. Mira is in love with a man who lives
in the Towers,” he explained to Snow. “The doorman has to get his permission
before sending us up to his condo.”

“Thomas who?”

“Vail.”

“Thomas”—
and Wendy
—“lives across the hall from me. I’ll
take you there.”

The officer to whom Ellen provided the initial information
was young. His youth was evident in his voice and in his obvious excitement at
what she was telling him.

The voice that reached her twenty-two minutes later was that of
a mature man. And a mature law enforcement professional. But Ellen, who knew
men, believed she also heard a mature excitement—the anticipatory thrill of a
hunter zeroing in on his prey.

Lieutenant Patrick Cole cut to the chase.

“What makes you think Blaine Prescott murdered his sister and
mother?”

“He told me he did.”

“When?”

“Three weeks after he committed the crime.”

“And you’ve waited thirty-two years to come forward.”

“Until tonight my memory of his confession wasn’t clear. But
tonight . . . Lieutenant? Why don’t I just tell you what I remember?”

“Go ahead.”

“We met on Friday, June first. He was in Chicago to attend a
wedding. He and I hooked up in his hotel room at the Drake. Drugs were
involved. I only knew his friends’ nickname for him. Doc. He didn’t know my
real name, either. Sixteen years later, we ran into each other at a party.
Seeing him again didn’t make me remember what he’d told me. But it made me
wonder if there was
something
. For the past two weeks I’ve been trying
to remember what that something was. I’d made a little progress and when I
heard him talking tonight,
lying
tonight, everything gelled.”

“Where did you hear him?”

“He was on a radio show in Chicago.
The Cinderella Hour
.
It’s live online. For reasons I can’t explain, but which proved to be true, I
thought if I could hear him discuss why he’d chosen to devote his career to
women’s mental health I would learn what I’d been trying to remember. I sent an
email suggesting that question be asked.”

“I gather it was.”

“Yes.”

“At which point Blaine talked about his manic sister pouring
pre-mixed poison into her culinary extravaganza as she spoke of a family
reunion with God?”

“I take it he’s told you—the police—that story, too.”

“Me,” Patrick affirmed, “and large audiences, radio and
otherwise.”

“It’s a lie.”

“I’m listening.”

“He was the chef that day, for a Mother’s Day brunch, not
dinner. It was all his idea and every detail was planned, including leaving
remnants of a broken egg in a carton in the refrigerator. He wanted to plant
the idea that contamination with uncooked eggs had caused their deaths. He even
ate a couple of raw eggs hoping to make himself sick. It didn’t work. He had to
pretend to be ill.”

“It wasn’t uncooked eggs that killed them.”

“No.”

“Do you know what was?”

“Antifreeze. He said it tasted sweet. Like sugar. He flooded
the waffles he made with syrup that was mostly poison—but tasted good. His
mother and sister raved about the meal and urged him to sit down and join them.
He didn’t. It was their day, he told them, and he enjoyed feeding them.”

“Did he ingest any of the syrup?”

“Not that day. He’d done a taste test a week before. He knew
he was going to beg the medical examiner not to do autopsies. As a first-year
medical student, he had witnessed postmortem examinations. He couldn’t bear the
thought, he planned to say, of that being done to his loved ones. Besides,
since he was a living victim of whatever had killed them, every imaginable test
could be run on him.”

“What happened to the poisoned food?”

“Oh. Sorry. I’m getting ahead of myself. I have this all written
down. I’ll email it to you if you like.”

“I’ll want to see it. Right now I want you to tell me whatever
you remember in whatever order it comes to you.”

“Okay. It’s pretty gruesome. He took pleasure in describing
the grisly details. His mother and sister became ill within an hour of being
poisoned. He had known they would. He’d given them a lethal dose. It was an
awful death. He took pleasure in that, too. They were in great pain and
bewildered by what was happening—and why he was doing nothing to help.”

“He was there when they died.”

“Oh, yes. He was cooking the dinner he would later claim his
sister had prepared. That was what he’d suggested the three of them spend that
Mother’s Day doing, reminiscing about their life as they watched his sister
cook. As a result, she had already bought the food for their evening meal. Blaine cooked it, disposed of what the three of them would have eaten, and left the rest
in the refrigerator for the crime scene investigators to examine. He had, of
course, gotten rid of all traces of the brunch.”

“What time did he leave the residence?”

“I don’t know the time, only that he complained about having
to stay in the house with the corpses until anyone who saw him leave would
conclude he was returning to his dorm following a leisurely dinner. He cleaned
the house, and them, while he waited. He wanted their deaths to appear
peaceful. That’s when he took his sister’s ring. As a memento, he said. And a
reminder.”

They had almost reached Thomas’s
condo when Snow turned to Luke. “Do you know that Thomas has Wendy?”

“I do. She won’t recognize me. She was looking at Daniel as
he handed her to me, and when it was best for her to stop looking, I held her
face against my chest. Once we got to the helicopter, a medical team took over.
I sat next to the pilot during the flight into town. She was in the ambulance
before either of us unbuckled our seat belts.”

“You could have . . .”
sat beside her during the
helicopter flight
. Snow looked at the father who had lost his own baby
girl. “No,” she whispered. “You couldn’t have.”

“Not if she didn’t need me. And she didn’t.”

“You had already done what she needed most.”
You had saved
Daniel’s daughter, even though you couldn’t save yours. Ours.

“Neither could you,” he said.

“Neither could I what?”

“Save her, Snow. No one could.”

Luke’s assertion ended with a wobbly smile for Snow—and for Bea,
who didn’t even pretend not to have overheard. She nodded with affection and a
sense of déjà vu. She had witnessed their love years ago. She was seeing it
again.

“We should probably let Thomas know we’re here,” Bea said.

With a nod, Snow moved to the door and knocked softly.

Thomas was in the living room. Pacing.

He had expected Mira to phone by midnight—even if it was just
to tell him she was still at Vivian’s and would call later.

She hadn’t phoned. And he had resisted calling her.

She was fine, he told himself. And, despite her nap with Eileen,
in need of sleep. She had looked tired, and had admitted to being a little low
on rest. Maybe she had tucked herself into bed, planning to call him, and had fallen
asleep.

Or maybe she had decided on a late-night visit instead of a
late-night phone call. She wouldn’t have called ahead. She would have known he
would tell her no—she needed sleep before driving—as much as he wanted to say
yes.

Now she was here, and Thomas rushed to open the door. With
relief came the exhilaration of seeing her.

Both were short-lived.

“Snow.”

“Hi. Thomas, this is Bea Evans and Luke Kilcannon.” No
further clarification was necessary. Thomas recognized both names. And it went
without saying that a middle-of-the-night visit was far from social. “There’s
been a fire at Mira’s home.”

“Oh, no.”
No!
“How is she?”
Alive. Please. And not
hurting too much.
That was Thomas’s wish for her. But the physician who had
cared for myriad burn victims knew that pain was good. It meant the burns weren’t
full thickness. The nerve endings had survived.

“She’s in surgery,” Bea said.

“Surgery?”

“Her injuries aren’t related to the fire,” Luke explained. “She
was attacked by the arsonist.”

A new array of worries flooded the trauma specialist’s
mind—and Thomas’s heart.

“If you’d like to go to the hospital—”

“I would.”

“—I’ll be happy to stay with Wendy. We could tell her I’m
Mira’s veterinary assistant and that I’ve dropped by to check on the kitten,
and keep them both company, while you have errands to run. Or whatever.”

“Thank you, Bea. Wendy’s sleeping. I’ll want to introduce you
to her before I go.”

And you’ll only go, Bea thought, if she’s comfortable with
the prospect of your leaving. As much as Thomas wanted to be with Mira, and Bea
saw how much, he wouldn’t leave the little girl if she didn’t want him to.

“Good,” Bea said. “We’ll do fine, Wendy and I. You’ll see.”

“Mira wants Eileen to get her second dose of antibiotics at
two-thirty.”

“She’ll get it on the dot.”

Thomas looked at Luke and Snow. “Were you planning to stay
here, too?”

“No,” Luke said. “I’d like to go back to Quail Ridge.”

“To Mira’s home.”

“Yes. I’m hoping Snow will come with me.” Snow was surprised
by the invitation, Luke realized. And why not? She might have heard his “
I
loved you.” But she hadn’t believed it. He knew the truth. She didn’t. She knew
only the lies. “Will you, Snow?”

“Yes, of course. If you want me to.”

“I do.”

Thomas was eager to begin the process that would get him to
Mira. But he said, “Before you go, Luke, what you did for Wendy—and
Daniel—well, there are no words.”

“I didn’t do anything anyone else wouldn’t have done.”

“But you’re the one who did it.”

“I didn’t help Daniel.”

“Yes, you did. You would have helped him by saving Wendy,
even if he’d died. He would have died in peace.”

“Even
if?”

“I got a call earlier this evening. Daniel is alive. He’s
being transferred to the Grace Memorial ICU. He should arrive within the hour.
He’s in bad shape. The doctors in the community hospital where he spent the
past two and half days didn’t expect him to survive the first few hours. But he’s
fighting, Luke. Fighting to be reunited with the little girl you rescued.”