In the Nick of Time (57 page)

“And what is your conclusion?” Oliver delicately opened up his carton of milk and took a hearty gulp. Nick paused before answering as he took in his surroundings. He couldn’t ignore the eyes that were glued to them during their public seating arrangement; after all, they’d had a brawl, and now here they sat as if it were all water under the bridge, as if they were old chums. He ignored the glares and continued on.

“I believe that you are a sexual predator, and it is a compulsion. Your wiring is all fucked up. Nevertheless, I also believe that you want to stop, but will only do so if the object of your desire is not in your reach. You need to be in treatment for the rest of your life, and I’m telling you emphatically to never be around any minors alone, under
any
circumstances.”

Oliver said nothing; his expression didn’t morph or crack. The man that was previously quick to react to such words in group, to lie and defend a tainted soul, simply continued to sit there, taking it all in as if it were nothing more than a dress rehearsal.

“So what do you advise me to do, Officer Vitale?” he finally asked after another sip of his milk, this one leaving a white, frothy frame around his pale, thin lips.

“I advise you to stay in treatment and to live some place where people will be watching your every move. No one can get you out of this; only you can. As I said, you don’t want to be this way, you don’t want to hurt people, and that is
truly
your only saving grace.” He glared at the man as his throat tightened with fury. He hated Oliver, yet the ping of sorrow for the guy kept wrapping itself around him. “If I felt you actually
enjoyed
being this way, there would be no hope for you whatsoever and I’d leave you to the wolves.”

Once again, the man kept quiet, seemingly stewing in his own reflections.

“You may be correct, Nick,” he said, his tone void of connection, as if he spoke from a recording, had left his body to simply go through the motions. He imagined Oliver was accustomed to having to break free from himself during times of tremendous stress—as though he’d sent a representative to take care of the messy details, while the real Oliver/Don stayed in his room, safe and secure under layers of threadbare bed sheets.

“Tell me something.” Nick picked up his turkey sandwich, and skillfully removed the saran wrap, causing a slight crinkling noise. He took a big bite of the thing. His teeth sank into the cold iceberg lettuce, the crunch a relief as he worked it around in his mouth. “This is a bit off topic,” he said around a mouth full of food as he looked about the place, “but why did you call Taryn a ‘rich girl’ if you are actually from a family that is wealthy yourself?” He turned in his direction.

The man’s mouth twisted in a stilted smirk. “Oh, that’s simple. I needed to ensure my secret, hide my identity and…I resented her. Taryn was the normal one of our group. She didn’t have a seedy background. She was no black sheep; she was adored, almost worshiped.” The man’s smile grew disturbingly larger. “She’s pretty. She had it all…the money, the looks, the fame, the adoration…and yet she ended up here in treatment. I hated her for squandering it all away…”

She almost died! She had cancer you piece of shit, you rancid bastard!

But…he maintained his outer calm for a bit longer.

“She didn’t have a hard life as a child.” He rolled his eyes. “Her family loves the hell outta her. You should see how they act on visitation days. The woman is a goddamn model, a famous one, not one of these locals in the blurry newspaper advertisements making thirteen bucks an hour. You can feel her presence as she walks into the room. She has a way about her; she makes friends quickly, everyone likes her… I was… jealous.”

True…very true…

Nick gritted his teeth, swallowing down his dismay at the words.

“She is the type of woman I could never have, the kind that never paid attention to me… She also is quite cunning, and I resented that, too. I saw her dodging cameras one evening, so I learned to do it, too. No one else seemed to see what she was doing, but I finally figured it out. And worst of all… she was on to me.”

“What do you mean?” He swallowed down a bite of food.

“No one knew why I was here, my past. My father donated a lot of money to Firststone, so, I got left alone.”

Nick shook his head in disgust.

“Anyway, one day in group, I guess I had pissed her off, and she came after me.” The man smirked, dropped his head. “It was before you’d arrived. She got real close to me, leaned over and said, ‘You like to fuck kids, don’t you?’ It sent chills up my spine. I became paranoid, worried. I didn’t know
how
she knew, but she knew, and if my cover was blown, I’d be in big trouble. To this day, I don’t know if it was a lucky guess or if she was just screwing with me. But ever since then, I’ve
hated
her.”

Nick gripped his can of soda and suddenly had an untimely, ultimate urge to take it hard and fast and brutally bash Oliver’s fucking face in with the damn thing. He hated when those vicious impulses would come through him, make him roll in a bevy of evil thoughts and wish to do treacherous things. The grizzly monster inside of him was trying to grow again, take him over, make him do unscrupulous things. He knew better, so he controlled himself. But something inside of him couldn’t stand it when anyone said something about Taryn that made him pause—some mean spirited shit, regardless of the context that it was stated in.

“Okay, well.” He took a hearty sip of his cola and set the can back down on his tray. “As we were saying before, you’ve got some serious problems but based on what I know about people like you, watching you and taking everything in, you are in fact in trouble.” He shot him a look, taking note of that damn black eye again. “And I believe he will kill you, just like you said. So, I’m gonna help you.”

The man started to tremble, threw his fork down, and covered his face, no doubt hiding tears of relief. “Thank you so much… thank you, Nick!”

“Yeah…don’t touch me…don’t even think about it,” he cautioned Oliver when he caught him reaching out. He didn’t want that fucker around him and it sickened him to be sitting so close to him in the first damn place. But this was important; the guy was going to end up six foot under if he didn’t intervene. “I need you to promise you will never stop treatment.”

“I promise.”

“This has to be settled right here, right now. Trey will follow you wherever you go at this point, so leaving, even if it didn’t violate the court deal worked out on your behalf, is not an option. He isn’t going to let this go. If you try to wave your dad in, all of that shit, I have some consequences that you won’t want to deal with. I work around and live in the same area as the boy you hurt. All I have to do is make a phone call… just one, if you go against this agreement I’m about to lay down. Do you understand me?”

“…Yes.”

“First things first. I need you to promise me you will stay
completely
away from children. You will never be alone with them, at any time.”

“I promise.”

“Yeah, you promise, you promise,” Nick sneered. “Like I’d trust your word. You’re what is called a fixated child offender. In most cases, you can’t stop the behavior. You’re hard wired to be attracted to children, Oliver, particularly little boys. What is strange about you, however, is that you’re not a sociopath. That means you may respond to some therapies, but you have to be open to it and you have to stick by it. You know it, and I know it, too. To ensure that, I want you to enroll into a program I know about but before I continue, I want to know what you think about what I’m saying to you.”

“I agree with you, and I’m not just saying that to save my own ass.” He took a final gulp of his milk, sucking the straw dry. “I know exactly what I’ve done, how I feel when I’m doing it, and I am able to tell you almost everything about it, except why I do it and why I can’t seem to stop. I truly can’t answer that… I wish I could.”

“Have you ever been on any hormonal therapy for these urges?” He picked up his soda and took another sip.

“No, but I’m open to it.”

“Look, there is a program in Long Island. The residents live there. I’ve had some guys that I arrested that had to go. You live there, you’re safe; no one is trying to kill you because you are all the same. You get treatment. It’s an expensive place, but it looks like you could swing it.”

The man picked up a bag of Cheetos, tore it open, popped one of the bright orange, crinkly things in his mouth, and crunched down loudly.

“They do hormonal therapy, Oliver. It would basically be a regimen of anti-androgen drugs and—”

“I know what it is, Nick. I’ve had psychotherapy, electric shock even, which is illegal, but I allowed it.” He turned towards him forcefully, his brows bunched in anger. “I want to stop this!”

He knew the man was telling the truth—he was a truth finder, and it was written all over the sick fucker’s face.

“Okay, well, I want you to get into this program. I’ll make some calls on your behalf. They have a long waiting list. Their treatment is more effective than any other program that I know of. Some of the fellas get out in like a year or two. Some stay there for the rest of their life. It all depends. I’m going to be honest with you… I’m no shrink, but I think you’ll be in there a long ass time.”

The man nodded in understanding.

“If you agree to go, I will make sure Trey doesn’t snuff you out…I’ll have a talk with him. I don’t know him personally, but I’m familiar with his affiliations, even though I don’t work gang intelligence and control. I know who
does
, and they will assist me.”

The man nodded once again. Nick sighed and rose to his feet, tray in hand.

“Finish your lunch. I’m getting ready to go. We will never talk about this again, but if I find out that you didn’t do what I said, Oliver, after I call in some favors and get you set up, there’s going to be some big fucking problems.” He paused, stared down at the man, watched him move nervously about in his seat.

“I will hunt you down and give that motherfucker your home address, social security number, and birth date, and drive him over there my damn self!”

Oliver looked up at him, his mouth dropped.

“I’m a cop, but I’m from the streets, Oliver. I don’t just help protect the people; I’m
one
of the people!”

The man looked away, the color draining from his face. He bit his lip, surely resisting getting smart, saying something witty and coy… for he was no dummy.

“Guys like you think you are better than everyone else. I could even see it in the shit you wrote in your journal… thinking so-called minorities are stupid. My half Puerto Rican ass has stood amongst motherfuckers like you and heard you sharing your racist jokes, thinking I was part of your tribe. I’m from Brownsville! Born and raised! The same streets you snubbed your nose at, and the boy you molested who you believed didn’t matter, that no one cared about him, that you could use him as some goddamn toy—that’s my world! His story is
my
story! I
was
that little boy! The one that so many believed wouldn’t amount to anything, the throw away kid!” He pointed to himself, pushing his finger into his chest. “He trusted you, his father trusted you, they
all
trusted you, and you abused their hope and faith in mankind!”

Oliver’s eyes glazed, but his expression stayed solemn.

“I’m going to do the right thing, Nick…”

“You fucking better! Drug addicts, prostitutes, thieves, alcoholics, all of us can love…all of us can love our children, even a hardcore gangster that is now stuck in rehab and instead of focusing on his treatment, all he can do is dream day and night about getting his hands on the man who stole his son’s innocence. He sent someone to swing on you, but that was just a warning to let you know he was coming! What? You thought a gangbanger’s child didn’t matter, Oliver? Fuck you, you hear?!” His body burned with rage as he looked down at the spoiled lunatic, his emotions dancing around like popcorn kernels in a heated bag. “You better be ready to put in the work, because if you don’t, I’ll do
exactly
what I promised. I’m never late for my appointments, Oliver, and you best believe, if you mess this up, I’ll be right on time. You can set your watch by it…”