The touch of murder, p.20
The Touch of Murder, page 20
Veronica made a face.
“Yeah, I understand. Can I...” She indicated the chair.
“Please, sit.” Veronica did. “To be honest, I’m surprised to see you back here at all, after how things ended last time.”
Ah, yes, another man I told to fuck off.
This was becoming so commonplace that Veronica was tempted to start a journal to keep track.
“Sorry about that.”
“Happens.” Dr. Patel shrugged. His demeanor had once again become calm. “What can I help you with today?”
“I...” Veronica was suddenly tongue-tied. She’d rushed over here directly from the church, angry at Freddie, at Father Murphy, and pretty much everybody. But now that she was sitting in this chair, what was she supposed to say?
I almost ruined an entire investigation into a serial killer because I couldn’t compartmentalize my distaste for the church? That my boyfriend—ex-boyfriend—said the exact same thing you did? That I can’t forgive myself for what happened when I was young, but I can forgive everyone else?
That I’m really messed up, and I need serious help?
That I killed two people and I’m worried that I’ll kill again?
“Remember, nothing you say to me will ever leave these walls.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that before,” Veronica muttered under her breath. This wasn’t exactly fair assessment of Dr. Jane Bernard. As far as Veronica knew, it was her father who had shared information with her ex-psychiatrist and not the other way around. Still, Jane kept things from her. Important things about her past that might have—no, would have helped Veronica understand her condition.
Her behavior.
“I saw you on the news early this morning,” Dr. Patel said, changing the subject. “Does your being here have anything to do with the missing persons you mentioned?”
“They’re not missing persons. They’re dead. Three of them, murdered. So, yeah, it’s about that… and about a lot more.”
As psychiatrists were apt to do, Dr. Patel said nothing; he just stared.
“Why do you guys do that?” Veronica demanded. “Why do you guys just look at us and expect us to open up?”
Dr. Patel shrugged.
“Well, I don’t know why ‘us guys’ do it, but I know why I do it.”
Veronica took a page out of the psychiatrist’s book and simply looked at the man. After a few seconds, the corners of Dr. Patel’s lips turned upward ever so slightly.
“Well, two reasons, really: the first is exactly what you suggested. Silence can make people a little uncomfortable and encourage them to speak; and two, I don’t want to bias you in any way. If I suggest what to talk about, we might miss what is really on your mind. Does that answer your question?”
“It was mostly rhetorical, anyway.” Veronica paused and looked at her hands. She was once again rubbing them back and forth in an attempt to feel burn scars that were no longer there. “I—I need help. You touched on something last time. Forgiveness. I-I need to… I need to learn how to forgive myself.” Her voice cracked, and her eyes became unexpectedly moist. This sudden outpouring of emotion was nearly impossible to stem. “I killed them… I killed my family. Then I killed Gloria and then Dante and… and… and I’m afraid I’ll kill again.”
When Dr. Patel still didn’t say anything, Veronica rubbed her eyes and finally looked up. Her ears were hot, and she wondered if she’d made a mistake.
Dr. Patel’s face gave nothing away. He was stoic, unaffected by her damning confession.
The man cleared his throat and adjusted the iPad on his lap, the screen of which Veronica saw was dark.
“There’s a lot to unpack there, Veronica. A lot. I’m familiar with your file, of course, and I know what you went through as a child was extremely traumatic. You ask me to help you forgive yourself for what happened, but I don’t need to do that. Nobody does. I don’t want to diminish your feelings, but what happened to your family was not your fault. You didn’t choose anything. Those men… they chose you. You can’t blame yourself—”
“But that’s the thing—I do blame myself. Because I was bad before. I hurt people before Trent and Herb broke into my house. Everyone says that they selected my house randomly, but what if they didn’t? What if they picked me because they knew what I was capable of?”
Veronica’s mind turned to what Dante Fiori had shouted at her on Donovan’s Bridge. That Benny had told him that she’d cut her dad’s finger off. That she’d tried to poison her mother with bleach.
Veronica had no recollection of these events. This, in and of itself, wasn’t surprising—much of her memory of her childhood was clouded.
But the fact that she couldn’t definitively say that these two things hadn’t happened was telling enough.
Wasn’t it?
Veronica had searched high and wide for any sort of record of these events, going as far as to look into hospital records for incidents involving her birth father, Trevor Davis.
Nothing.
There was nothing.
But that didn’t mean that it hadn’t happened. Veronica knew firsthand that there were ways to change one’s name, to redact pertinent information, and to just make things disappear.
“I can’t speak to what happened or didn’t happen in your past, because I wasn’t there,” Dr. Patel said suddenly. “The point is, however, that while there is no denying that our pasts shape us, only the past itself is indelible. The future is undecided. Now, I don’t want to belittle the impact that your trauma has had on you, Veronica, but you must realize that you don’t have to do today what you did yesterday. You don’t have to be who you were yesterday. The person that we project onto others and even the way we consider ourselves can change from day-to-day, week to week, even moment to moment. We just need to be careful and precise with our actions.”
Dr. Patel had said a whole bunch of words, but all Veronica heard was Peter Shade’s voice.
The past is boring; it’s already happened. The future is far more interesting.
“I’ve tried, though,” Veronica protested. “I’ve tried to stop myself, but I can’t. And that… that scares me.”
Dr. Patel stared at her for an uncomfortably long time before saying something wholly unexpected. Something that surprised Veronica so much that she instinctively sniffed the air to determine if the man was lying.
She detected not even a hint of gasoline.
“When I was eleven, I was diagnosed clinically as a psychopath. Now, we don’t like to use that term anymore; we prefer antisocial personality disorder. But back then, that’s what they called me: a psychopath. Basically, they did some tests, and they found out that I had a region in my brain that doesn’t light up normally when I’m bombarded with sad or violent imagery. I don’t feel empathy, and because of this, it can be challenging to interact with others.”
Veronica’s shock must’ve shown on her face because Dr. Patel held up his hand.
“Don’t worry; I’m not violent. Never have been, in fact. The movies and books might portray all psychopaths as being aggressive, but that’s not the case. There are triggers, of course, and if I don’t control my actions, I may inadvertently hurt someone because I don’t understand their pain. This scared the hell out of my parents, but it’s also probably what drove me toward this profession. I’m not ashamed to admit that at least part of my motivation as a psychiatrist is to better understand people so that I can fit into society. But my disorder provides benefits to my patients, as well. For instance, I am almost painfully unbiased, and I can speak as bluntly as I need to, to get my point across. No social grace hurdles to overcome—and, yes, they typically exist, even within the walls of a psychiatrist’s office.”
“That’s... sad,” Veronica said.
Dr. Patel shrugged.
“If you say so. And maybe it is, I don’t know. But the way I look at it, I can’t miss something I never had.” Veronica opened her mouth to speak, but Dr. Patel wasn’t done yet. “I know what you’re thinking, Veronica. You’re thinking that you might be a psychopath, too. But I can assure you, you’re not.”
“How can you know? I’ve only spoken to you for—what? A half-hour?”
“Because you’re here. It’s as simple as that. I know that your previous session was mandated, but this one isn’t. And you must be aware that I didn’t report you for leaving the way you did last time and not finishing the session.” Dr. Patel leaned forward. “Veronica, you came here because you want help. Someone with antisocial personality disorder wouldn’t seek help.”
“But it doesn’t help.” Veronica was aware of the fact that she was whining but thought nothing of it. “It… it doesn’t.”
“Just showing up isn’t enough. You’ve gone through terrible things in your life, and understanding, like healing, takes time.”
“But I’ve been going to a psychiatrist since I was a kid.”
“Right. Well, a person who wants to stay in shape has to keep going to the gym for their entire life,” Dr. Patel countered. “And with your history, you’re like Sisyphus pushing a boulder uphill. You make progress one day and the next your line of work exposes you to more grief. This reignites feelings inside you, mostly of guilt, and before you know it, you’ve crested the hill and the boulder is racing down the other side. And then it’s like you’re starting all over again. Veronica, these feelings you have won’t just disappear on their own. Let me guess, when things get bad inside your head, you start drinking a little more?”
Spot on, Veronica thought but didn’t say anything.
“Sorry to break it to you, but that doesn’t help—it won’t help. You need to keep talking about it. You need to work these things out. I know Dr. Bernard, well, know of her, anyway, and I know she’s good. But I also know that you guys were close. Sometimes, closeness can be helpful. Sometimes it can hinder how open and honest we are.”
“That’s a pretty damn good sales pitch, Dr. Patel,” Veronica joked.
“It’s not a pitch—it’s based on my experience.”
Dr. Patel was stone-faced.
“Riiiight. Well, I—”
There was a soft knock on the door and the secretary peered in.
“Dr. Patel? Your next patient has arrived.”
“Right. Give me just a moment, would you?”
“Sure.”
The secretary closed the door and Dr. Patel addressed Veronica.
“I’m sorry about that, but this meeting was impromptu.”
Veronica rose to her feet.
“No, I understand.”
“Should I have the secretary book you another appointment?”
Veronica considered everything the man had told her since she’d burst through the door unannounced. Like her being able to project a different person into the world. Like being able to change who she was from moment to moment.
Was that possible?
Veronica didn’t know.
Then there was the man’s odd confession about being diagnosed as a psychopath. Dr. Patel claimed that he wasn’t prone to violence, but others with his disorder definitely were.
Veronica sucked in her bottom lip.
The psychiatrist across from her had also admitted that he used these sessions to learn about how normal people behaved in an attempt to mimic them.
An idea began to form in Veronica’s brain, one that centered around a more reciprocal relationship.
Maybe even a symbiotic one.
If he can learn from me, maybe I could learn from him.
“Yeah, you know what? I think I would like another appointment. I’ll be back to push that damn stone up the hill.”
Dr. Patel nodded but his overall expression didn’t change at all. If he was happy about her decision, there was no way for Veronica to know.
Yeah, he had a lot of learning to do.
“And I’ll be here to try and stop it from rolling down the other side.”
Chapter 44
Cole’s PI skills were definitely lacking in one very specific department: tailing a suspect. Or person.
Essentially, just following someone in a car.
He lost Kevin Byers and the black Mercedes after less than ten minutes. Cole drove around Needle Point looking equal parts junkie and narc for perhaps twice that long, before giving up.
Instead of wasting any more time, he grabbed a coffee and sat with his laptop in the parking lot.
Then Cole spent the next three hours scouring video footage from pretty much every camera he could access in Matheson: traffic lights, ATMs, even some unsecured footage from outside several local businesses he got into by just guessing the password.
Everything he saw, which, granted, wasn’t much, supported his theory regarding what really happened to Dylan Hall. There was only one piece to the puzzle that he was missing. One final piece of evidence that he needed to assuage any doubt in his mind.
Cole picked up his cell phone and scrolled through his contacts.
“Hey, Lily, it’s Cole. How’re you doin’?”
“Oh, you know, livin’ the dream,” a female voice replied. “How’re you? Sittin’ on a beach somewhere now that you’re retired?”
Cole grimaced.
“You heard already, hey?”
“I heard? I heard? Of course, I heard. An ex-partner of mine goes all rogue, spits directly in the man’s face? Bucks big corporate to go solo? Damn, boy, you’re livin’ the dream.”
Cole rolled his eyes.
“Right. I mean, after the boss broke us up, I just couldn’t handle it, you know? Just wasn’t the same without you.”
Lily Chen laughed. Cole always liked Lily’s laugh. They’d worked together for just under two months until budget cuts and rampant misconduct—likely related—inspired a departmental reorg, and the two had been separated. But during their short time together, Lily’s laugh had managed to keep things light, almost palatable.
“What’re your plans? And don’t hold back on the details—I need to live vicariously through you.”
Well, first up, I’m an unpaid, unofficial private investigator working for my girlfriend who threw me out. I’m investigating an ex-con named Dylan Hall who was caught with a kilo of heroin. The thing is, Lily, he was set up. And the best part? You’re not going to believe this…
“Well, I’ve started a PI firm.” A little white lie. “And, you know, times are tough. Need a little help to get things off the ground, you know?”
“Like using my name and password to access red-light camera footage?”
Cole’s jaw tightened.
“You know about that?”
“What can I say? Maybe I’m a natural PI?” There was an airy silence. “This time only, okay, Cole? I don’t have a backup plan, and if brass finds out—”
“I understand. I’ll delete your username and password. But... but there is one favor I need to ask.”
“One more favor.”
There was that laugh again.
“Yeah, one more. I don’t have access to video footage from inside Matheson PD.” Cole let this sink in. “Specifically, their evidence locker.”
No laugh from IA Chen this time.
“I know, I know,” Cole continued, anticipating her response. “But this has nothing to do with Matheson or Greenham PD.” A not-so-white lie. “It’s about the DEA, so it won’t blow back on you if—”
“The DEA? Cole, what the fuck? Those guys are pricks, and you know that. Assholes who hold a grudge and—”
“I know, Lily. Trust me, I know. But this...” Cole sighed. “I don’t want to ruffle feathers. And, if I do this right, I think I can make sure that no one gets plucked. But I need footage from inside the Matheson evidence locker. That’s the missing piece I need.”
“Oh, right, just that?”
“Just that.”
Cole heard what sounded like Lily Chen working her mouth, probably chewing the inside of her cheek the way she always did when she was mulling over a problem.
It was cute... she was cute. They’d had a fling when they’d worked together, nothing serious, just a one-night thing after a particularly stressful day at work. They hadn’t pursued a relationship because they worked together and then when they didn’t, they’d already moved on.
“Okay, fine. Tell me the date and time. Last time, though, okay, Cole? I mean it. And delete my damn password.”
Cole smiled.
“I will. And, yeah, last time. Promise.”
After giving Lily the date range he wanted footage from, she told him she’d send it his way as soon as possible.
While he waited, Cole looked at the montage video he’d put together with just basic video editing software. It was disjointed and jumped around, switching from color to black-and-white, but he thought it was good enough.
The video started with Randall Byers being escorted into the Matheson police department. The cop who had cuffed him was carrying a brown package in one hand. Time skipped ahead about thirty minutes and that’s when DEA Agent Troy Allison arrived and retrieved Randall from the Matheson police. The red-light camera outside the DEA headquarters picked up Allison and Byers shortly thereafter.
Fast forward several hours and Freddie Furlow is seen visiting the DEA stronghold. He leaves alone, empty-handed.
The following day, Veronica and Freddie were spotted outside Matheson PD. They entered the building and spent about three hours inside. If Cole hadn’t been paying such close attention to Freddie, hell, if Freddie hadn’t lost so much weight and he was marveling at how large the man used to be, he might not have noticed it.
The odd square bulge amongst many round ones.
When Freddie got to his car, he turned and it looked like there was an object tucked beneath his shirt, at the back, two corners of which jutted oddly against the already taut fabric of the detective’s white shirt.
Cole let the rest of the video montage play out, except he stopped it right before Freddie had his heart attack.
Don’t let me down, Lily.
Satisfied with his work, and not wanting to watch it again, Cole called Veronica.
There was no answer, and he opted against leaving a message.
With time to kill, Cole decided to dig a little deeper into Detective Freddie Furlow. He may have promised Lily to delete her credentials from his laptop, but neither of them actually thought he would do it.
