Compulsion (43 page)

"I’ll see you later?"

"Later," he said.

I watched him as he made his way to the house.  Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Julia standing inside the picture window of the living room, staring at us.  Then I sensed another pair of eyes on me, looked up, and caught a glimpse of Billy on the second-floor deck.  He turned and walked back inside.  When I looked at the picture window again, Julia was gone, too.

I lingered where I stood until Garret disappeared through the front door.  As he closed it behind him, I could imagine how the psychosexual tension would begin to rise inside Candace’s pristine island retreat, could almost see the flames of an emotional bonfire start to lick at the pristine windowpanes.

*            *            *

Dr. Mossberg called my cell phone from the medical records department of the Cornell Medical Center at 1:20
P.M.
  The data she had gleaned from the Bishop’s charts supported my theory that Darwin Bishop, while a violent man, was probably not Brooke’s murderer.  It pointed directly, in fact, to the person I suspected.  As I hung up, the weight of that fact weakened my knees.  I had to breathe deeply and swallow hard to stop myself from vomiting.

One of the darkest dramas imaginable had resulted in Brooke’s death, and I had unwittingly played into it.

I was still feeling shaky when someone knocked at the door to the cottage.  I struggled to my feet and cautiously opened it.  Billy, again.

"You look like you’ve seen a ghost," he said.

"I didn’t eat yet," I said.  "That’s all."

He walked past me and sat right down on the couch.  "Garret told me about you and Mom," he said.

As I expected.  "Oh?" I said.

"You’re eloping?" he said.  "Tomorrow?"

"So long as your mother says yes," I said.  "I haven’t asked her yet."  I walked over and sat at the other end of the couch.

"She’ll say yes," he said.

"How do you know that?" I said.

"She has trouble saying no," he said.

"Meaning?"

"Meaning," he said, leaning toward me, "that not everyone around here is deaf, dumb, and blind."

"I’m listening," I said.

"I don’t want to break your heart, but you’re not the first guy she’s hooked up with.  Not even close."  He paused, blinking nervously.  "She doesn’t stay interested very long.  Okay?"

Keep the pressure on, I told myself.  "I can handle it," I said.

"You’ll ruin everything," he deadpanned.  "She’ll just freak out and leave you, and we’ll never be able to live together."

"You’re overreacting," I said.  "Everything will work out.  People change."

He tilted his head, squinted at me.  "What are you trying to do here?" he said, studying my face.  "Is this the real reason you wanted me out of the way, at that Riggs place?  My mother has you that fucked up in the head that you need Garret off to Yale and me out on that funny farm?"  He stood up.  "You were never going to come through for me."

"You have it all wrong," I said.

"I can’t believe I trusted you," he said, shaking his head.

"You can always trust me."

He walked out.

I stood at the window of my cottage and watched him walk away, in the direction of the main house.  Then I picked up the phone and dialed the home of Art Fields, director of the State Police crime laboratory in Boston.

Fields confirmed that I had drawn a scientifically valid conclusion from the blood-typing data Laura Mossberg had provided me.  That meant direct forensic evidence linked Brooke Bishop and her killer.  Fields cautioned me that the evidence was still circumstantial, but allowed it was powerful.

I hung up, glanced at the clock.  It was 1:29
P.M.
  All I needed to do was wait for Julia.

*            *            *

Two o’clock came and went.  So did 3:00 p.m. and 4:00.  I started wondering whether my plan wasn’t going to net me the quick result I had expected.  But then, at four-fifteen, Julia finally called to me from just outside my door.  I opened it to find her in a sheer, pale yellow sun dress.  The shading of her nipples showed through the cloth.  "No looking back," she said.  "It’s really a deal?  The past is the past?"

"Deal."

"Cross your heart and hope to die?" she said.

I stepped outside, pulled her into my arms, and kissed her.  I felt myself getting hard as she pressed against me.

"Let’s go inside," she said.

I shook my head and ran my hand up her thigh, raising her dress to her hip.  My fingers moved under the hem.  She was wearing no panties.

"C’mon," she said, trying to wriggle away.  "No public displays."

I let her dress drop back into place, kissed her more deeply.  "Take me somewhere outside again.  Somewhere out of the way.  I have surprise for you."

She glanced at my crotch.  "You’re giving it away."

"You once mentioned a private place," I said.

Julia smiled.  "Okay," she said.

She walked me past her mother’s house, through the backyard, then onto a path that cut through a dense grove of trees.  An enchanted little forest.  About thirty feet inside, I stopped her and pushed her against one of the slim trunks.  I ran both my hands up her legs and under her dress, moving my finger deep inside her.  She leaned to kiss me, but I leaned away.  I dropped my hands, letting her dress fall into place.  I stepped back.  "Not here.  Take me where we’re going."

Julia turned her face away from me.  For a moment, she looked as though she might be angry.  Then she grinned impishly.  "Catch me," she said.  She bolted down the path.

I chased her.  She was moving fast.  I had to run almost full tilt to keep up.  But even with the sound of my own feet hitting the ground, the wind whistling in my ears, I thought more than once that I could hear footsteps behind me.  I hoped they weren’t an illusion.  If my plan was unfolding perfectly, then Julia and I were being followed, and the cauldron was really starting to boil.

I had almost caught up with Julia when she ran into a clearing.  A stream cut between two low hills, gurgling over its rocky bed.  The air smelled of lavender.  I stopped and watched her jog to the water’s edge, then turn around, breathing heavily.  Sun filtered through the branches, painting her with ribbons of light.

She untied the lace at the neck of her sun dress, pushed it off her shoulders, and let it slide to the ground.  She was naked.  And perfect.  Eve before the fall.  Sinfully beautiful.

I walked up to her, knowing in my gut that we were being watched, but also knowing that I was in no immediate danger; the eavesdropper would never strike out at me with Julia present.  He couldn’t risk being discovered.  It was time to bring his pathological jealousy to a fever pitch.

I got down on one knee in front of Julia and forced myself to kiss the slopes of her abdomen, running my tongue into her navel, amazed I could still be excited by her, even with what she had done.  I looked up, into her eyes, more luminous than ever.  "I want you to marry me," I said.  I moved my tongue to the top of her groin.

"Frank," she said, closing her eyes.  She took a deep breath and trembled as I moved my tongue even lower

I took hold of her wrists.  I could feel her pulse racing.  I stood up.  "Marry me," I said again.  I brushed my fingers along her cheek.  I understood now that Julia was addicted to at least three things:  sex, money, and glamour.  I wanted to offer her a cocktail of all of them.  "We charter a jet to fly us to Vegas tomorrow, get married, and spend the rest of the week in Paris.  I already booked a suite at the Ritz.  I want to spend my life with you."

She ran her fingers over my lips.  "I want that, too," she said.  " just..."

"Just say yes," I said.

She looked into my eyes.  Several seconds passed.  "Yes," she said.  Then, without another word, she melted to her knees and unbuttoned my jeans.

Chapter 24

Wednesday, July 24, 2002

It was just after 1:00
A.M.
  I had turned out all the lights of the cottage at midnight.  Only a hint of the crescent moon seeped through the slats of the window shutters.

I lay awake in bed, fighting exhaustion, fully clothed under a sheet.  My Browning Baby handgun filled the front pocket of my jeans.

I was confident I had put enough bait on the hook.  Julia had already begun to pack for our elopement.  I was claiming the sexual prize Brooke’s killer thirsted for.  He had to come for me.

The cottage had a back door with a chain lock.  I left it dangling.  I also left the back two windows of the cottage wide open — invitations to murder.

I was pretty sure who to expect in my midst, but the forensic data at the heart of my theory wasn’t foolproof.  My own attempted murder would be the definitive piece of evidence.

My eyes were getting heavier by the minute.  I had had no sleep the night before.  I hadn’t had any real rest in weeks.  I got up, walked to the kitchen sink, and splashed cold water on my face  It didn’t do much.  I got back into bed, pinching my thigh now and then to stay awake.

That didn’t work, either.  I drifted off and woke in a panic.  Five minutes might have passed.  Or fifteen.  Or fifty.  I couldn’t tell.  My heart raced, and my eyes darted left and right, searching the shadowy cottage.  I saw nothing.  I was alone, safe, for the moment.

I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the mattress.  Maybe a very quick, very cold shower would help, I thought to myself.  I stood and started toward the bathroom.  But then I froze, hearing footsteps outside the cottage, somewhere beyond my back door.

I felt for the Browning Baby in my pocket and walked toward the sounds.  Someone was stepping on the leaves and fallen branches outside.  I listened a little longer.  The sounds went away.

I stayed close to the wall and carefully pushed aside one of the little drapes that covered the window in the back door.  I squinted into the night.  Then my breathing stopped as my worst nightmare gripped me.

Garret was perched on the lowest branch of a majestic elm, about nine feet off the ground, fifteen feet from the door.  The moon’s glow barely illuminated his muscular torso and the noose around his neck.

I rushed outside, horrified to see my life repeating itself in the worst way.  I had lost a young man to suicide once — Billy Fisk, whose memory had finally drawn me into the Bishop case.  Was I about to witness the lethality of my failings again?  I had obviously pushed Garret too far, not to the edge of murder, but to suicide.

Seeing Garret’s bookshelf the night before, stocked with titles by the poet Yeats, had clued me in to his guilt.  Julia had quoted Yeats in the mystery letter:

My temptation is quiet.

Here at life’s end.

I had finally realized that Julia had intended that letter for Garret, not her therapist or some business associate of Darwin’s.  She had taken Garret as her lover.

Garret had been the one who had attacked me in a jealous rage outside Mass General Hospital, uttering a line from Yeats before plunging a knife into my back:

What could she have done, being what she is?

"Good morning," Garret said softly.

I looked up at him.  The muscles of his chest twitched.  He was closing and opening his fists rhythmically.  Wired.  "Don’t do this," I said.

"You need her so badly," he said.  "Take her."

"Let me help you," I said.

He laughed a gruesome laugh, craning his neck toward the dark sky, like some sort of deranged animal.  Then he looked down at me, his eyes wide.  "You wanted this," he said.  "You made this happen."

A wave of nausea swept over me.  Was it possible my psychological strategy — increasing the sexual tension in the house to a fever pitch — had actually been an unconscious way of finishing off my last rival for Julia’s attentions?  Darwin was in prison, charged with murder.  Garret might soon be dead.  Had I designed to vanquish father and son alike?  "Your mother used you, Garret," I said.  "She manipulated you, just like she did me and North Anderson and who knows how many other men.  I see that now.  I know you’re not fully to blame for what happened to Brooke.  Or Tess."

He stayed silent.

"I think I know what happened," I said, keeping my tone even.  "After your mom had the twins, she stopped the ‘special relationship’ you two had.  She had somebody else to love.  Brooke.  And Tess.  And when she moves on, she moves on.  Cold.  It’s brutal.  And it’s painful."

"Billy didn’t kill any cat," he said.  "You deserve to know that.  You care about him."  He lifted one foot off the branch.

"Please," I said.

"You asked for this," he said.

I looked down and shook my head, trying to come up with words that would give Garret hope.

"Good-bye, Frank," Garret said.

I looked up just as Garret leapt off the branch.  I closed my eyes, picturing Billy Fisk’s face, bracing for the sound of his spinal column fracturing with the force of the rope.  But, instead, I felt the full weight of Garret’s body drop on top of me, knocking me to the ground.  My head bounced off the dirt, leaving me dazed.  The partially healed muscles in my back gave way, and a searing pain ripped through me.

Garret crouched over me, smiling, holding a knife in one hand and the end of the rope in the other.  He lifted the noose off his neck, dropped it.  "It wasn’t tied to anything," he said.  "The proverbial loose end.  You should have checked."

I reached for my gun, but Garret dove toward me before I could get to it.  I barely managed to raise my knee as he fell, burying it in his abdomen and knocking the air out of him.

The knife landed between us.

We both scrambled for it.  His hand found it first.  I grabbed his wrist and forced him onto his back.  I nearly had him pinned when he rammed his forehead into my chin.  I lost my grip on one of his arms, and he rammed an elbow into my face and pushed me off him.