Blind Spot (3 page)

“He’s dead.”

“Alexa—”

“I saw him,” Alexa cried, her voice rising with each word. “In the woods. He was shot. It was awful. There was blood everywhere. All over the leaves.”

“Alexa, honey, you’ve got to calm down,” Suki pleaded. “The detective said the police didn’t find anything. Did anyone call Jonah’s house?”

“Mrs. Ward says Jonah’s at a basketball game, but I know that he’s not. I know, I know …”

“I’m on my way,” Suki said. “I’ll be there in about—”

“I want to go home,” Alexa wailed. “I don’t want to be here.”

Detective Pendergast came on the line. “Why don’t I take Alexa to your house?” he suggested. “I’ll stay with her until you get there.”

“I’ll meet you in twenty minutes. Maybe less.”

“The boy’s mother is going over to the high school. She promised to call as soon as she gets there,” he said. “But, as we’ve no reason to believe he’s anywhere but on the basketball court …” He cleared his throat and Suki waited for him to continue, but he didn’t say any more.

“I’m a psychologist, Detective,” Suki finally said into the awkward silence.

“Oh, good.” The relief in Pendergast’s voice was obvious.

As Suki hung up the phone, she glanced up at the prison, at the rows of barred windows marching down the long concrete facade. She thought of her mother, of her mother as she had last seen her, almost fifteen years ago, her eyes blazing with the same wild intensity she had heard in Alexa’s voice on the phone. Blazing with insanity.

CHAPTER TWO

S
uki and Stan had bought the house on Lawler Road when Suki was pregnant with Kyle. They were living in an apartment in Boston, but decided it was far too small for a family of four—the truth was, it was far too small for a family of two. Although they agreed that a quality school system was their top priority, Suki wanted to stay close to the city, while Stan wanted trees. Suki wanted Victorian, Stan wanted contemporary. Suki wanted to underbuy, Stan didn’t mind being house-poor. They ended up twenty-five miles from Boston, in Stan’s hometown, the proud owners of a modern home on a wooded lot, with a mortgage well beyond their means. And now, except for the mortgage, Suki wouldn’t have it any other way. She loved the open floor plan, the multiple levels, the huge windows that brought the outside in—although she could have lived without the too-small rooms, the shoddy plumbing and the leaky kitchen roof. And she adored Witton: the safety, the small-town friendliness, the quiet, the trees.

When Suki got home from the prison, Alexa was curled up on the couch in the family room, alone. “Detective Pendergast got beeped a couple of minutes ago,” Alexa explained. “He didn’t want to leave, but I told him it was all right.”

Suki sat down next to Alexa. “Are you okay?”

Alexa nodded, but kept her eyes cast downward.

“Alexa.” Suki gently raised Alexa’s chin with her forefinger. “What happened?”

“I saw Jonah and he was dead.”

Suki stared into Alexa’s eyes, dark and swimming with tears. Her mother’s eyes. “Did you stop along River Road on your way home from school?” Suki asked calmly. “Rest for a bit, maybe? Could you have fallen asleep? Had a dream?”

“I was awake.”

“An hallucination, then. Because of the insomnia.” Suki reached out and smoothed back the hair on Alexa’s forehead. “One of your waking nightmares? We’ve talked about how fuzzy that line between wake and sleep can be.”

“No!” Alexa jerked away, her eyes aflame. Suki had seen that look before, and the memory cut deep. “It was no hallucination,” Alexa said more softly.

For a moment, Suki’s years of training deserted her, her doctorate in clinical psychology as useless as if it had been a degree in Sanskrit. “Honey,” she tried again. “You know what sleeplessness can do. We’ve been through this before.”

“No!” Alexa collapsed back into the couch and covered her face with trembling fingers.

Suki squatted down and gently pulled Alexa’s hands from her cheeks; the fingers were damp with tears. “Why don’t you go take a little nap?” Suki suggested. “We’ll talk about it when you get up.”

Before Alexa could answer, the phone rang. It was Detective Pendergast. He apologized for leaving before Suki arrived home and then told her he just received a call from Darcy Ward. “Jonah’s not only alive,” Pendergast said, “he’s already scored twenty-two points against Acton-Boxborough. We’re leading by fourteen.”

Alexa went to bed before dinner and didn’t wake until morning. Suki was reluctant to send her to school, but Alexa insisted, claiming she felt fine and had a calculus quiz that was crucial to her final grade. “Mrs. McArthur takes off ten points if you miss a test unless you have a doctor’s note,” she explained. When Suki offered to call the doctor, Alexa gave her an exasperated look and headed out the door. Suki rearranged two meetings so she could be home when school let out.

She called Mike Dannow while she waited at the kitchen table with a cup of tea. “The timing’s just too tight on Kern,” she told him. “And it’s not really my kind of case.”

“Oh?” His voice was skeptical. “I would’ve thought otherwise. Interesting. Challenging. Not your typical forensic eval.”

“Look,” she said, “it’s personal. Loaded with all kinds of baggage you don’t want to know about.”

“You’re a pro, Suki.” Mike was so smooth, buttering her up for the kill. “The best. I’m sure you can see your way through any baggage.”

“Can you do me a favor and try and find someone else?”

“And if I can’t?” he asked.

“Then we’ll talk.”

“Great,” Mike said. “Let’s talk on Monday.”

As Suki hung up the phone, the back door slammed. “How are you doing, honey?” she called down the stairs. “Feeling better?”

Alexa came into the kitchen and dropped her backpack on the floor. She headed for the refrigerator. “I told you this morning, Mom. I’m perfectly fine.” Annoyance was crisp in her voice.

“You are?” Suki was almost relieved at the return of Alexa’s irritating mood swings. She had discussed Alexa’s seesawing emotional states with her office mate and friend, Jen Kreischer, who specialized in adolescent psychology—a more frustrating specialization Suki could not imagine—and Jen had assured her it was all extremely normal. “Especially girls and their mothers,” Jen said. “As soon as she sees you, she goes into a state of frenzy. She loves you and wants to be with you, yet desperately needs to be free of you, and everything you represent. This sends her into a rage which she, on some level, recognizes is irrational, yet is powerless to control. The fact is,” Jen had added in her distinctive professional manner, “they just can’t help being assholes—it’s their job.”

“Today’s today, yesterday’s gone,” Alexa declared with all the philosophical depth of her seventeen years. She spun in a jerky circle, started to lose her balance and righted herself by grabbing the refrigerator door. Her laughter peeled across the room.

“Still …” Suki said. It had only been twenty-four hours since Pendergast had found Alexa on River Road, and Suki wasn’t sure denial was the best defense mechanism.

“Jonah’s an idiot,” Alexa continued, her head in the refrigerator. Last year, Alexa’s life had revolved around Jonah, a fresh-faced gangly basketball star; now she couldn’t stand the sight of him. Suki knew all too well how hurtful abandonment could be, and she empathized with Alexa’s pain. Alexa turned, holding a diet Coke in her hand, her eyes filled with loathing. “I don’t even care if he dies,” she added. “It’d be the best thing that could happen.”

“I wish you wouldn’t talk like that,” Suki said.

Alexa lifted her chin, but didn’t say anything, and Suki could see from her expression that no purpose would be served by arguing the point.

“Then how about eating something?” Suki asked, another point she knew was senseless to discuss. But she was unable to help herself: If Alexa weighed ninety pounds it was a lot, and even at barely five feet, that wasn’t nearly enough. She
did
need to eat something.

“I had
something
for lunch, Mother.” Alexa closed the refrigerator door with her hip and raised the soda can. “Want to split it?”

When Suki pointed to her teacup, Alexa began digging through her backpack. She waved a report and placed it triumphantly on the table. It was titled, “Before Their Time: Kate Chopin and Edith Wharton, Nineteenth Century Feminists.” A large A+ was scrawled beneath the title. “I analyzed
The House of Mirth
and
The Awakening
,” Alexa said. “Mrs. Eisner said it’s as good as anything she’d expect from someone in college.”

Suki gave her daughter a hug. “That’s fabulous, honey,” she said. “Just fabulous. Princeton will be lucky to get you.” There is no pride like parental pride, Suki thought, at once your own and yet better than your own. And no anxiety like parental anxiety.

Alexa laughed happily, a completely different girl from the one who had sobbed in her arms yesterday. “What’s that old Jewish proverb Grandpa’s always saying about lips and God’s ears?” Before Suki could answer, Alexa leaned toward her mother. “I did real well on my calculus quiz, too. Do you think I could take the car to go to the movies with Brendan tonight?” she asked with a fetching smile. “Please? I promise we’ll be home early. We haven’t had much time to see each other this week. What with studying and all.” She raised her A+ paper hopefully.

Suki sighed. This year, Brendan had replaced Jonah as the center of Alexa’s universe, and although Suki preferred Jonah, she had to admit that Brendan was one very smart kid. Since Alexa had begun dating him, her grades had improved almost to the level of Brendan’s and she was spending much less time moping around the house—although the rapidity of her mood swings had increased to a dizzying pace. “Oh, Alexa,” Suki finally said, “I don’t think so. Not after what happened yesterday. I think you should just stay home and relax. Go to bed early. Sleep in tomorrow.”

“But, Mom,” Alexa cajoled, “I told you, I’m fine. You were right, I must’ve just fallen asleep and had a weird dream. I don’t even know why I was so freaked out.”

Suki scrutinized her daughter. “You were freaked out because you were exhausted—
are
exhausted,” she finally said. “You need a good night’s rest.”

“I’m not exhausted—I’m wide awake.” Alexa jumped up and stood in front of her mother. “Do I look exhausted?”

Suki had to admit that Alexa didn’t; she looked bright and young and healthy, albeit a bit too skinny. “Well …”

“Thanks,” Alexa said, giving Suki a big hug. “You’re the best.”

Against a background of human screams and ear-piercing sirens, a swarm of militia men, dressed in full jungle livery and clutching enough semiautomatic weaponry to destroy a small country, barreled through the wide door of the Senate Ways and Means Committee conference room. Within moments, the entire committee was taken hostage.

“You see that, Mom?” Kyle demanded. “Pretty cool, huh?”

“Cool,” Suki concurred, although without much enthusiasm. This was Kyle’s week to choose a movie, and fourteen-year-old boys are not known for their sophisticated taste in cinema. She’d get him back next Friday night.

Suki and Kyle were indulging in their favorite activity: watching a video and eating popcorn in the family room. The upside of Suki’s decision to let Alexa take the car was that she and Kyle were now free to enjoy the movie without Alexa’s caustic commentary. The two of them were much more willing to suspend disbelief than Alexa, who needed every plot sequence and every bit of backstory to make what she referred to as “minimal sense.” According to Jen, Alexa’s demand for perfection in everything from movies to her mother was a “normal teenage response”—an oxymoron if there ever was one—and Suki couldn’t help wondering how Brendan, with his ripped jeans and buzz cut, fit into this scheme.

Kyle sat on the beat-up leather chair across from Suki, his eyes riveted to the television screen, his left arm rhythmically pecking into the popcorn bowl with uncanny blind precision. It used to be the four of them on Friday nights, going out for Chinese food and stopping at the video store for Alexa and Kyle’s inevitable argument over which movie to rent. That was before Stan decided he had made a mistake, that he just wasn’t cut out to be a stockbroker and live the “straight suburban life.”

Suki suddenly remembered a bright summer day when Alexa was about six. They were climbing the craggy boulders that lined Rockport harbor, a favorite family outing, when Alexa cried out. Fearing Alexa had hurt herself, Suki hurried over. But the little girl wasn’t hurt. “Daddy’s gone, Mommy,” she cried. “He’s gone.” Suki pointed to where Stan was standing, atop a tall rock, but Alexa would not be consoled. “No, no!” she had screamed hysterically. “Not today! In the future. In the future!” And, of course, now Stan
was
gone.

Alexa. Her inexplicable firstborn. So like her own mother with her petite prettiness and wild blond curls, so unlike herself. Could a physical resemblance presage other resemblances? Suki wondered. It was a well-established fact that talents and mental illnesses ran in families. Had her mother passed on more to her granddaughter than good looks?

Suki stared, unseeing, at the TV screen. Maybe taking the Kern case would be a way to find the answer. Instead of running from her questions and her guilt, she could face them, challenge them. It wouldn’t be the first time a psychologist had taken on a patient because the puzzle he or she presented had personal resonance. Suki decided she would call Mike first thing Monday morning and tell him she had changed her mind. The sound of a car in the driveway interrupted her reverie. Rapid footsteps hurried along the side of the house.

“Alexa’s gonna wreck everything,” Kyle muttered.

Suki reached for the remote control and stopped the video with a quick punch at the button. Alexa never came home before curfew.

Kyle crossed his arms and glared at the PBS special that had replaced his movie. “Oh great,” he muttered. “Aphids.”

The back door slammed open, and Alexa appeared in the doorway. Her face was gray and her blouse had worked its way from the waist of her jeans. One of her earrings was missing. She covered her face with her hands. “Oh, Mom,” she wailed.