Blind Rage (8 page)

That flat feeling seemed to be intensifying with every second she spent in that cell-like waiting room. Dropping “Breezy Bathrooms for Less” on the table, she looked at the clock again and double-checked its accuracy against her watch. Yup. Already noon. If she didn’t get in soon, she was going to be late for her next class. She rested her elbows on her knees and dropped her chin in her palms.

She wasn’t a new patient, nor was she very different from the hundreds of other cases this doctor had handled over the years, she suspected. She was just another nut job. He hated when she called herself that.
Nut job.
She told him it helped to laugh.

He didn’t have a sense of humor, this doctor. He’d drum an eraser head on his desk while he reviewed the highlights of her masterpiece. He had high cheekbones and a prominent jawline, and when he read something that piqued his interest or disturbed his sensibilities, both facial features tensed almost indiscernibly. She could always tell when he got to the dirty parts of her little book: his face reddened. She loved it when that happened. At least she could tell he was human.

The blond head levitated from behind the counter and the receptionist cracked open the door leading to the bowels of the office. “The doctor will see you now.”

“Great,” said Klein, Kyra A. She got up with her purse and her books and followed the receptionist down the hall to the doctor’s exam room. She scrutinized his bottom half as they went. Jack Something had a nice butt for a guy who sat at a computer all day. Why was she not surprised that he was wearing boring khaki slacks and geeky brown walking shoes?

“Miss Klein,” he announced, pushing the door open for her.

“Thank you,” she said, offering the receptionist a smile.

“You’re quite welcome,” he said, smiling back. He looked over at the man behind the desk. “Do you need anything, Doctor?”

“I’m good, Charles,” the man said without looking up from his paperwork.

“Would you like some coffee, Miss Klein?” Charles asked her.

“No, thanks. I’m not a coffee drinker,” she said.

Charles nodded and left. Klein stared at the closed door, feeling guilty about not accepting the damn drink.

The doctor looked up and nodded toward a chair parked across from his desk. “Please have a seat.”

She headed to the leather couch planted against the wall. She tossed her purse and her books onto it and dropped down next to them. “I’m breaking in a new pair of boots, and my feet are killing me.”

“Please make yourself comfortable,” he said, pushing his chair back and standing up.

“I will.” She started unzipping the knee-high boots, which were pulled over skintight jeans.

He pulled down on the sleeves of his blazer—his idea of making himself comfortable—and took the patient chair over to the couch. Sitting down across from her with his right ankle propped across his left knee, he opened the file up on his legs. He scrutinized her clothing—a fur vest over a cashmere sweater—and shot a look at her boots and Coach purse. “Did you go on another spending spree?” he asked in that judgmental tone of his. That assistant principal’s voice.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m not off my meds. My brother sent me a pile of money for my birthday.”

“Happy birthday.”

“It was last month, but thanks.”

“How are you doing, Miss Klein?”

Now she was bent over her boots, pulling them off. “I’m as fat as a cow.”

“Weight gain is a common side effect with lithium. So are tremors, diarrhea, nausea…”

“We discussed switching meds.” She dropped her boots on the floor with a thud. “What about that?”

“Valproic acid has side effects as well.”

“Such as?”

“Tremors, diarrhea, nausea, weight gain, hair loss.”

“Dandy. I can be fat
and
bald. Let me think about it.”

“How are you doing otherwise?”

“What do you think?”

He glanced down at her file. “Well, I can tell you that your blood tests—”

“Can we talk?” she asked.

Pulling his eyes off the file, he looked at her. “What’s the problem?”

“This is hard for me.” She folded her arms in front of her, crossed one leg over the other, and nervously jiggled her elevated stocking foot. “I don’t know how to put this exactly.”

“Let’s hear it, Miss Klein.”

“Kyra. The last time I was here, and the time before that, I asked you to call me—”

“Kyra. Yes. I remember now. What’s wrong, Kyra?”

She chewed her bottom lip. “This isn’t working out for me.”

“What isn’t working out?” He glanced down at the folder. “If you really want to switch medications, I’m sure we can find a more agreeable—”

“I want to find
me
. I want to talk about
me
.”

“This
is
about you.”

“It’s the same thing every time I come in here. I get fifteen minutes with you. Twenty tops. You ask me how I’m doing, but you don’t really listen to me. Half the time you’re not even looking at me.” She pointed to the folder. “Your face is buried in that crap.”

“I apologize if you feel I’ve been—”

“You write me a new refill. I disappear for another month or two. I come back. Same thing. ‘How’re you doing? Your lab work looks good.’ We never talk, and I need to talk. Really talk.” Even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t going to go anywhere. Psychiatrists hated when patients expected them to act like therapists. She could have predicted his response.

“You have someone for that aspect of your—”

“He’s a royal dick.” She raked the top of her spiky head with her fingers and waited for him to do his pencil drum.

Instead, he surprised her with a grin. “Well, yes, you’ve made your dissatisfaction known. We can provide a list of other capable—”

“I am so sick of getting shuffled around, shopping for doctors.” She curled her legs up on his couch, sat back, and sighed. “I wish you could do it all.”

He checked his watch. “Tell you what.”

“My fifteen minutes can’t be up already. You kept me waiting forever.”

“I apologize for that,” he said, drumming the pencil on her folder. “If you can come back later this afternoon…”

“I have class.”

“What about the end of the business day? You can be my last patient. We can take a little longer.”

“Will my insurance pay for two visits in one day?”

“I’ll make it a freebie,” he said.

She fingered her purse strap. “By the time we get through, it’ll be dark out.”

“I can give you a ride home, or Charles. Someone around here will be going your way.”

“That sounds good.” She pulled her legs down from the couch and put on her boots, suddenly energized by his offer. She was more than a file tab to him.

The door popped open, but this time it wasn’t Charles. Another male head poked into the room. “You’ll never guess who called me just now, out of the blue.”

“It’ll have to wait.” The doctor closed her file and got up off the chair. “I’m busy with a patient.”

The man in the doorway looked at Klein. “I’m sorry, miss. I didn’t see you there.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m on my way out.” Klein sat up, stared at the man in the doorway, and looked back at her doctor. “This has
got
to be a relative of yours. You could pass for twins.”

“He’s my younger brother,” her doctor said shortly. He went back to his desk and sat down.

“I wish my brother lived in town.” Klein got up from the couch, plucked her purse off the cushions, and hiked the strap over her shoulder. She gathered her books in her arms and started for the door. “It’s nice that you get to see each other.”

The two men locked eyes, and the brother in the doorway laughed dryly. “Sometimes it’s nice, Miss—”

She held out her hand and he took it. “Klein,” she said.

He released her hand and opened the door wider so she could go through. “Have a good day, Miss Klein.”

“Kyra,” she said, smiling up at him as she stepped over the threshold. “Call me Kyra. I’ve been trying to get your brother to remember that.”

He put his hand over his heart. “Kyra. I shall not forget.”

Charles brushed past Klein and the brother.

“I’m sorry, Chaz,” said the brother. “Didn’t hear you coming.”

Charles handed the doctor a file. “If you’re finished with Miss Klein, we’ve got two other patients waiting.”

Klein leaned back into the room and addressed the man behind the desk. “Almost forgot. What time exactly?”

He checked his wristwatch. “Is six o’clock too late?”

“Six o’clock is perfect.” Charles gave her a curious look as he stood at the doctor’s elbow with a file. She didn’t want the golf pro to get the wrong idea about this after-hours session. She added: “Not too much later, though. I have a date tonight.”

“Six sharp.”

“See you at six.” She gave a smile to the brother and the golf pro, turned back around, and went down the hall.

THE YOUNGER BROTHER
turned to watch her go, a crooked smile lifting the right side of his mouth. “Kyra Klein,” he repeated under his breath.

As he exited the doctor’s office, Charles navigated around the grinning man and arched his eyebrows.

“What?” snapped the brother.

“I didn’t say a word,” Charles said.

“You were thinking it.”

“How long have we known each other?” the receptionist asked over his shoulder, and headed back to the waiting room.

“I can look,” the brother said defensively.

“Listen to Charles,” the doctor yelled from the other side of the doorway, his head down while he flipped through another patient chart. “Leave her alone.”

The brother shoved his hands into his pants pockets and groused, “I’m always being misjudged.”

Chapter 8

MENTAL ILLNESS. EATING DISORDERS. ALCOHOL AND DRUG
addictions. Childhood rapes. Physically abusive boyfriends. Emotionally abusive parents.

Armed with a pen and a legal pad, Bernadette spent Wednesday in the cellar continuing the chore she’d started the night before at her kitchen table: immersing herself in the tumultuous lives of seven troubled women. As she plowed through the files taking more notes, the victims’ stories started blending together, becoming indistinguishable from one another. It was as if she’d spent too long in a massive art gallery: her head hurt, her eyes felt dry, and everything looked the same.

“I gotta get organized,” she muttered to herself, and pulled a pad of Post-its out of her desk drawer.

Going back over her notes, she transferred key points to the Post-its. Each victim got her own set of yellow squares listing name, age, date and place of death, college and field of study, emotional and health problems, and family issues.

When Bernadette was through with her transcription, she went over to the bare white wall on one side of her office door and started slapping yellow squares up on the Sheetrock. Each victim got a totem pole of notes, starting with her name and working down to the personal stuff at the base of the column. It wasn’t an organizational method sanctioned by the bureau, but it had always worked well for her.

Like a student fretting over a blackboard math problem, she stepped back and studied the squares, first taking in each victim’s story as she read from top to bottom, and then working across to compare each girl. Did they all share the same major? No, some hadn’t even declared one. Did they go to the same clinic? No, some had never been treated.

“This is depressing,” she said as she stood in front of the wall.

Creed peeked at her from behind his computer screen. “What are you doing?”

“Organizing my notes. Waiting for them to speak.”

“So what do the Post-its say to you?” he asked.

She blinked. “They don’t literally talk to me. You know that, right?”

He hesitated, then said unconvincingly, “Yeah. I know that.”