Evil Games (33 page)

The grossly overweight man lay sprawled on the bed, face down. He wore light blue boxers and a covering of hair. His right leg dangled off the side of the bed. Aspirin packets sat next to a glass of water.

Stacey sprang into action. She touched the side of his neck. She didn’t remove her fingers until she was sure.

‘Call an ambulance, Kev. He’s still alive. Tell them unconscious but breathing.’

Dawson took out his phone and began to call it through. Stacey grabbed the boxes and started to count.

Dawson was reciting the address and the state of the patient.

‘I make it about twenty-five tablets,’ she said.

Dawson repeated the dose to the dispatcher before ending the call.

They stood and looked at each other.

‘Shouldn’t we be doing something?’ Stacey asked.

Dawson looked around. ‘You could make him a cuppa but I don’t think he’ll drink it.’

Stacey offered him a filthy look.

He opened his arms. ‘What do you want me to say? Can’t give him CPR, thank God. He’s still breathing.’

‘Jesus, Kev, knock it off. Errr … insensitive.’

She moved towards the bed and leaned in close to his ear. ‘Charlie, I’m Detective Constable Wood and …’

‘Bloody hell, Stace, great thing to tell a man already close to death.’

Stacey turned and glared at him as Dawson stepped past her to squeeze the man’s bare shoulder. ‘Alright, Charlie. It’s Kev. Everything’s gonna be okay. Help is on the way. They’ll be here any minute but we’re not going to leave until they’re here.’

Yeah, that was better, Stacey admitted, but only to herself.

‘A cry for help?’ she asked Dawson.

Dawson shook his head and stepped away, lowering his voice.

‘Nah, it’s a serious attempt. He meant to die. No bloke wants to be found like that and then live to tell the tale.’

And at this moment, they didn’t know if he would.

What exactly was Charlie Cook running from?

SIXTY

As she poured the aromatic Colombian Gold, Alex acknowledged that she had planned this session very carefully. Ideally she would have preferred longer to work with Jessica but she was growing impatient for a result. She desperately hoped that Jessica would not be a disappointment to her, like the others.

This was the biggest play of them all. If she could pull this off it would erase the failures of her other subjects. Kim was still a work in progress but Jessica was in a whole different league.

If Alex was interested in helping this woman properly she would be endeavouring to explore Jessica’s past, but that was not her priority. She had limited time. Most women with postnatal psychosis had already experienced an episode of serious mental illness.

Alex was still surprised that the social workers had dismissed it as postnatal depression instead of psychosis even though it only occurred once in every five hundred women. In Jessica, they had found the normal symptoms of depression but hadn’t seen the additional pointers that elevated it into Psychosis.

Jessica had also been prone to severe disturbance of mood, mania, muddled thoughts, false ideas and hearing voices. The onset of the symptoms had occurred quickly after the birth of the child, all indicating post-natal psychosis; a condition that required round-the-clock supervision by competent adults.

Such psychosis often resulted in maternal filicide and Alex needed to establish which major motive was responsible for Jessica wanting to harm her child. She had researched well-known cases for each of the possibilities and they were all fixed in her mind, ready.

She placed the coffee on the table. She really needed to get started.

‘I understand that you told the authorities that you rolled over onto Jamie while taking a nap with him beside you. We both know that’s not true but here I want you to talk openly.’

Jessica looked doubtful.

‘Whatever you say here is confidential. I am here to help you and I can only do that with total honesty. The sooner you tell me everything the quicker I can give you the help that you need.’

Jessica shook her head and stared into the depths of her lap.

Alex had guessed it would be difficult to persuade the woman to divulge her deepest secrets. No mother would wish for Jessica’s thoughts, never mind the burden of saying them out loud. But Alex needed that honesty. She needed those words.

‘Was it anything to do with your husband? Were you angry with him?’

Alex spoke gently and evenly. ‘Spousal revenge is far more common than people think.’ She paused to search for a memory that was stored at the front of her mind.

‘A few years ago a man named Arthur Philip Freeman threw his four-year-old daughter Darcy from the West Gate Bridge in Melbourne during a bitter custody battle. It’s believed he did this purely to make his spouse suffer.’

Alex thought this motive was unlikely for Jessica, as she had said nothing to demonstrate any hostility between herself and her husband. But there was a method to her madness.

‘Were you so angry with your husband that you decided to hurt him by hurting Jamie?’

Jessica slowly shook her head. Good. There was no defence that the incident was accidental. Her head was still cast downwards but the eyes were no longer staring beyond her lap, instead staring at it.

She was listening and that was exactly what Alex wanted. Jessica was not yet ready to admit she was wrong. The judgement of society and her family was responsible for the submission that was weighing her down. What Jessica wanted was understanding, acceptance. Permission. And the knowledge that she was not alone.

‘May I ask if Jamie was planned?’

‘Oh yes,’ Jessica answered immediately. Good, she was alert and connected. And finally she had spoken.

Alex hadn’t seriously thought it was a case of unwanted child filicide but that made no difference to her next move.

She sat back in her chair and just talked.

‘You might not remember but it was all over the news in the mid-nineties. A woman in South Carolina, Susan Smith I think her name was, reported to the police that she’d been carjacked by a black man who had driven away with her two small sons still in the car.

‘Nine days of tearful pleas played out on television for the safe return of her children ended when she confessed to letting her car roll into a nearby lake, drowning her children inside. All to keep her wealthy lover.’

There was no horrified shudder that ran through the body of her patient. Only a slight tip of the head that signalled her attention.

Good. She had achieved the first of the three stages. Understanding. Jessica needed to feel that she was not alone.

‘Honestly, Jessica, the problem is a lot more widespread than people think. You’re not the first person I’ve treated for this condition and you certainly won’t be the last. Your feelings are nothing to be ashamed of. They are part of you and I promise you’ll receive no judgement in this room from me.’

Finally, Jessica raised her head and they made eye contact. Alex smiled sympathetically and continued.

‘I promise I can help you but you have to tell me the truth.’

There was a slight movement of the head. Excellent, they were moving towards acceptance and Alex was left with two possible motives, altruism or delirium, either of which she could work with. From their earlier conversation, she had no reason to suspect Jessica had been delirious. So that left altruism. And in reaching this conclusion Alex had guided Jessica on a journey through successful acts of matricide and now the woman was listening.

Alex sat forward, resting her elbows on her knees.

‘I think you wanted to protect your child, Jessica.’

A single tear appeared and travelled over her cheek.

Oh you fools, Alex thought of the social workers. If they had known the true extent of her illness the child would more than likely have been removed from her care. But that would not have suited Alex one little bit. Social Services could not have sent her a better gift if the woman had appeared wearing a big, red bow.

‘You love Jamie so much you can’t bear the thought of him being hurt. You want to shield him from every bad thing in the world. Am I right?’ Alex asked, softly.

Jessica slowly began to nod her head.

‘He’s so beautiful and perfect and innocent; you can’t bear the thought of him experiencing any pain at all.’

Jessica nodded, more definite.

Alex just needed one last vital piece of information before she could move on to the third part of the process. Permission.

‘Can you remember when the thoughts began?’

The tears dried as she gave the question some thought.

‘It was the news,’ Jessica offered, mechanically. She’d been prescribed medication which had a dulling effect but, of course, it wasn’t the right medication for her condition. Lithium or electro-shock treatment were the most effective but this was further information that it didn’t suit Alex to share with the authorities.

‘Go on.’

‘Not long after I got back from hospital, there was a news report about a bombing in Pakistan. I looked at the pictures and felt frightened of the world I’d brought Jamie into. At first I just tuned into the news programmes now and again, but then I had the twenty-four-hour channels on all day every day. Eventually, I’d be holding Jamie with one hand and checking the news on my phone at the same time. It was like an addiction.’

‘What were you looking for?’

‘Hope. But the whole world was filled with death and destruction and hatred. I couldn’t understand why I hadn’t seen all this before I became pregnant. How could I have brought him into such a terrible world?’

Alex nodded her understanding. Jessica’s motive was the most common: altruistic. She genuinely believed her child would be better off dead, for any number of reasons. The condition often manifested because the mother felt that she could not protect the child adequately from threats, whether real or imagined.

‘Can you tell me some of the things that frightened you?’

‘One day I was reading about bombs exploding, whole families being tortured and killed in third world countries. There was hunger, starvation, drought, civil war. I tried to tell myself that all these things happened in someone else’s country but then I saw articles on car accidents, children being stabbed by other children, a man beaten to death for a bottle of wine, and I realised that it was all getting closer. Too close.’

Jessica stared into the distance without blinking as she recounted all of her fears. And there were quite a few to work through. Alex was pleased that she didn’t have to bother.

‘So, what did you do?’

‘I had Jamie on the sofa beside me and suddenly I felt this overwhelming urge to save him; protect him from the evils surrounding him. I visualised him just falling asleep and being safe. I just lay against him and closed my eyes. For a while I felt calm, as though I was finally taking proper care of my child.’

‘What happened next?’

‘Mitch came back from work early to check on me. I didn’t hear him come in. He pushed me aside, grabbed Jamie and rushed him to the hospital.’

‘How did you feel? And please, for the sake of your recovery, be honest.’

Jessica closed her eyes and hesitated for so long Alex wondered if she’d fallen asleep.

Alex prompted. ‘Jessica, please. I really would like to help you but I can’t unless you tell me the whole truth.’

Jessica sighed deeply but didn’t open her eyes. ‘I felt disappointed. Jamie wasn’t even struggling. It was like he knew what I was trying to do and understood it. He was just going to go to sleep. It felt so right.’

Alex marvelled at just how simple this was going to be.

‘Did Mitchell understand once you explained it to him?’

Jessica shook her head. ‘I didn’t tell him. He’d already assumed I had just fallen asleep and rolled onto the baby. That was what he told the hospital staff but social services got involved and prosecuted me for child neglect.’

Alex heard the disbelief in Jessica’s voice. In her own delusional haze Jessica couldn’t comprehend that anyone would even think that about her. The fact that she’d lied to her husband signalled that the belief in her own motivation was still within her.

‘The judge ordered me to get counselling and that was it. I’ve kept up the charade because it seems to be what everyone wants to hear. You’re the first person I’ve been honest with.’

‘And how does that feel?’ Alex asked, kindly. Trust was important.

‘Better. Everyone around me has the same expression. Even my own mother looks terrified if I go within ten feet of my baby.’

‘Are they right to watch you closely?’

Jessica hesitated. ‘I would never do anything that was not in the best interest of my child. Never.’

Alex noted the play on words. Yes, the motivation was definitely still there. Alex forced herself to go slowly.

Still, Jessica was seeking permission to do what she felt was right. Alex forced the smile out of her face.

‘Strangely it is a Western belief that your motives are wrong. There is a Buddhist belief in transmigration that dictates that a child who is killed will be reborn in better circumstances.’

Alex nodded with a look of ‘go figure’ on her face. She didn’t explain that this was believed by people who were too poor to feed their children and so felt that the child would be reborn in circumstances whereby it wouldn’t starve to death.

Jessica was nodding intently.

Alex really should be alerting social services that this woman was still a danger to her child. She should be informing them that she was not suffering from postnatal depression. She should be telling them that the medication she was taking was not correct for her condition.

However, none of these actions suited her purpose.

Alex removed her glasses and looked up to the left, searching for a memory that was rehearsed, ready and waiting. Jessica’s eyes never strayed from her face. Alex wanted to laugh out loud. She could not have scripted this session any better and real excitement began to form in her stomach. Jessica could be the one.

She lowered her eyes to meet the expectant gaze of Jessica. ‘Actually, come to think of it, your situation reminds me of an American woman called Andrea Yates. She had similar fears to you, only she saw the devil everywhere. She was devoutly religious and loved her children very much.