Love You More: A Novel (37 page)

Then the adults in their lives failed them.

And the police failed them.

And so it went.

I love my daughter
.

“Gonna stop ahead,” Bobby spoke up, flipping on the right turn signal. “Need food. Want anything?”

D.D. shook her head.

“How about some dry cereal? Gotta eat something, D.D. Low blood sugar has never been your strong suit.”

“Why do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Take care of me.”

Bobby took his eyes off the road long enough to regard her evenly. “Bet Alex would, too. If you’d let him.”

She scowled. Bobby shrugged off the glare, attention back on the treacherous highway. It took a bit to ease the Crown Vic over, find the exit, then work their way into the parking lot of a small shopping plaza. D.D. noted a dry cleaner’s, a pet supply store, and a mid-sized grocery store.

The grocery store appeared to be Bobby’s target. They parked up
front, most customers scared off by the wintry conditions. When D.D. got out of the car, she was surprised to see how much snow had already accumulated. Bobby came around the vehicle, wordlessly offering his arm.

She accepted his help, making her way gingerly along the snow-covered sidewalk into the brightly lit store. Bobby headed for the deli. She lasted five seconds before the smell of rotisserie chicken proved too much. She left him to wander on her own, commandeering an apple from produce, then a box of Cheerios from the cereal aisle. Maybe one of those fancy organic fruit drinks, she thought, or a premade protein shake. She could live on Ensure, next logical stage of the life cycle.

She found herself in the small pharmacy section, and that quickly knew what she was going to do.

Fast, before she could change her mind, before Bobby could appear: family planning section, condoms, condoms, and of course, when the condoms broke, home pregnancy kits. She snatched the first box she found. Pee on a stick, wait to see what it tells you. How hard could it be?

No time to pay. Bobby would spot her for sure. So she high-tailed it for the restroom, apple, cereal box, and home pregnancy test clutched tight against her chest.

A green sign declared that no merchandise was allowed in the restroom.

Tough shit, D.D. thought, and pushed through the door.

She commandeered the handicap stall. Turned out it had a changing station bolted to the wall. She unfolded the plastic table and used it as a workbench. Apple, Cheerios, pregnancy kit.

Her fingers were shaking. Violently. To the point she couldn’t hold the box and read the words. So she flipped the box over on the changing table, reading the directions as she worked the button on her pants, finally shoving her jeans down to her knees.

Probably this was the kind of thing women did at home. Surrounded by the cozy comfort of their favorite towels, peach-painted walls, maybe some floral potpourri. She squatted in an industrial gray tiled public restroom and did the deed, fingers still shaking as she tried to position the stick and pee on command.

Took her three tries to get it done. She set the stick on the changing table, refusing to look at it. She finished peeing. She pulled up her pants. She washed her hands at the sink.

Then she returned to the stall. Outside, she could hear the bathroom door opening. Footsteps as another woman entered, headed for the neighboring stall. D.D. closed her eyes, held her breath.

She felt naughty, the bad schoolgirl caught smoking in the loo.

She couldn’t be seen, couldn’t be discovered. For her to look at the stick, she needed absolute privacy.

Toilet flushing. Stall door opening. Sound of water running at the sink, then the blast from the automatic hand dryer.

Outside door opened. Outside door closed.

D.D. was alone again.

Slowly she cracked one eye. Then the other. She stared at the stick.

Pink plus sign.

Sergeant Detective D. D. Warren was officially pregnant.

She sat back down on the toilet, put her head in her hands, and wept.

L
ater, still sitting on the edge of the toilet, she ate the apple. The rush of sugary fruit hit her bloodstream, and suddenly, she was ravenous. She consumed half a box of Cheerios, then abandoned the bathroom in search of a protein bar, mixed nuts, potato chips, yogurt, and bananas.

When Bobby finally caught up with her, she was standing in the checkout line with her apple core, opened Cheerios box, opened pregnancy kit box, and half a dozen other groceries. The checkout girl, who sported three facial piercings and a constellation of star tattoos, was regarding her with clear disapproval.

“Where’d you go?” Bobby asked with a frown. “Thought I’d lost you.”

Then his gaze fell upon the pregnancy test kit. His eyes widened. He didn’t say another word.

D.D. handed over her credit card, accepted her grocery bags. She didn’t say a word either.

They’d just made it out to the car when her cellphone rang. She checked the caller ID—Phil from headquarters.

Work. Just what she needed.

She punched Talk, listened to what Phil had to say, and whether from his news or her feeding frenzy, she finally felt better about the day.

She put away her phone, turned back to Bobby, who stood beside his car in the snow.

“Guess what? Tessa Leoni placed a phone call while under the fine care of the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department. Nine p.m. last night, she contacted her childhood BFF, Juliana Sophia Howe.”

“Sister of the guy she shot?”

“Exactly. Now, if you were arrested for murdering your spouse, what are the odds you’d call a family member of the last person you killed?”

Bobby frowned. “Don’t like it.”

“Me either.” D.D.’s face lit up. “Let’s go get her!”

“Deal.” Bobby opened his door, then paused. “D.D.…” His gaze flickered to her grocery bags. “Happy?”

“Yeah,” she said, nodding slowly. “I think I am.”

W
hen Bobby and D.D. finally completed the treacherous drive to Juliana’s house, they discovered the small home lit up bright as day against fat, slow falling snowflakes. A silver SUV and darker sedan were parked in the driveway.

As Bobby and D.D. approached, the front door opened and a man appeared. He wore a suit, still dressed for his workday, but now lugging a baby and a diaper bag. He met Bobby and D.D.’s gaze as they stepped onto the front porch.

“I already told her to call a lawyer,” he said.

The caring husband, D.D. deduced. “She need one?”

“She’s a good person and a great mother. You want someone to prosecute, go back and shoot her brother again. He deserves this abuse. Not her.”

Having said his piece, Juliana’s husband pushed past both of them and strode through the snow for the dark blue sedan. Another minute to strap the baby in the back, then Juliana’s family was out of the way.

“Definitely expecting our visit,” Bobby murmured.

“Let’s go get her!” D.D. said again.

Caring husband hadn’t fully closed the door behind him, so Bobby finished pushing it open. Juliana was sitting on the couch directly across from the door. She didn’t get up, but regarded them evenly.

D.D. entered first. She flashed her creds, then introduced Bobby. Juliana didn’t rise. Bobby and D.D. didn’t sit. The room was already humming with tension, and it made it easy for D.D. to reach the next logical conclusion:

“You helped her out, didn’t you? You picked up Tessa Leoni this afternoon and drove her away from her daughter’s burial site. You aided and abetted a fugitive. Why? I mean seriously.” D.D. gestured around the cute home with its fresh paint and cheerful collection of baby toys. “Why the hell would you risk all this?”

“She didn’t do it,” Juliana said.

D.D. arched a brow. “Exactly when did you take the stupid pill and how long before it wears off?”

Juliana’s chin came up. “I’m not the idiot here. You are!”

“Why?”

“It’s what you do,” Juliana burst out in a bitter rush. “Police. Cops. Looking but never seeing. Asking but never hearing. Ten years ago they fucked up everything. Why should now be any different?”

D.D. stared at the young mom, startled by the violence of the outburst. At that moment, it came to D.D. What the husband had said outside. Juliana’s inexplicable agreement to aid the woman who’d destroyed her family ten years ago. Her lingering rage with the police.

D.D. took the first step forward, then another. She squatted down until she was eye level with Juliana, seeing the tear tracks on the woman’s cheeks.

“Tell us, Juliana. Who shot your brother that night? It’s time to unload. So you talk, and I promise, we’ll listen.”

“Tessa didn’t have the gun,” Juliana Howe whispered. “She brought it for me. Because I asked her to. She didn’t have the gun. She never had the gun.”

“Who shot Tommy, Juliana?”

“I did. I shot my brother. And I’m sorry, but I’d do it all over again!”

Now that the dam had finally broken, Juliana confessed the rest of the story in a sobbing rush. The first night her brother had come home and sexually assaulted her. How he’d cried the next morning and begged her forgiveness. He’d been drunk, hadn’t known what he was doing. Of course he’d never do it again … please just don’t tell Mom and Dad.

She’d agreed to keep his secret, except after that he’d raped her again and again. Until it’d been half a dozen times, and he was no longer drunk and he no longer apologized. He told her it was her fault. If she didn’t wear those kind of clothes, if she wouldn’t flaunt herself right under his nose …

So she started to wear baggier clothes and stopped doing her hair and makeup. And maybe that helped, or maybe it was just because he went away to college, where it turned out he’d found lots of other girls to rape. Mostly, however, he left her alone. Except for the weekends.

She lost her ability to concentrate at school, always had dark shadows under her eyes, because if it was Friday, then Tommy might come home so she had to be vigilant. She added a lock to her room. Two weeks later, she came home to find her entire bedroom door splintered into bits.

“Terribly sorry,” Tommy had said over dinner. “Shouldn’t have been running in the hall like that.” And her parents had beamed at him because he was their oldest son and they adored him.

One Monday morning Juliana broke. Went to school, started to cry, couldn’t stop. Tessa tugged her into the end stall of the girl’s restroom, then stood there until Juliana stopped weeping and started talking.

Together, the two girls had devised a plan. Tessa’s father had a gun. She would get it.

“Not like he’s ever paying attention,” Tessa had said with a shrug. “How hard can it be?”

So Tessa would get the gun and bring it over on Friday night. They would have a sleepover. Tessa would stand guard. When Tommy showed up, Juliana would produce the weapon. She’d point the gun at him and tell him if he ever touched her again, she would shoot off his balls.

The girls practiced the phrase several times. They liked it.

It had made sense, huddled in a bathroom stall. Tommy, like any bully, needed to be confronted. Then he would back down, and Juliana would be safe again.

It had all made perfect sense.

By Thursday, Tessa had the gun. Friday night, she came over to the house and gave it to Juliana.

Then they sat together on the sofa and, a bit nervously, started their movie marathon.

Tessa had fallen asleep on the floor. Juliana on the couch. But both had woken up when Tommy came home.

For a change, he didn’t look at his sister. Instead, he’d kept his eyes glued on Tessa’s chest.

“Like ripe apples,” he’d said, already lurching for her when Juliana triumphantly whipped out the handgun.

She pointed it at her brother. Screamed at him to go away. Leave her and Tessa alone,
or else
.

Except Tommy had looked right at her and started laughing. “Or else
what
? Do you even know how to shoot that thing? I’d check the safety if I were you.”

Juliana had immediately raised the gun to check the safety. At that moment Tommy had lunged for her, going after the weapon.

Tessa was screaming. Juliana was screaming. Tommy was snarling and pulling Juliana’s hair and making grabby grabby.

The gun, squished between them. The gun, going off.

Tommy staggering back, gaping at his leg.

“You bitch,” her brother had said. Those were the last words he’d spoken to her. “You bitch,” he’d said again, then he’d fallen down and, slowly but surely, died.

Juliana had panicked. She hadn’t meant … Her parents, dear God her parents …

She’d thrust the gun at Tessa. Tessa had to take it. Tessa had to … run … just get out.
Get out get out get out
.

So Tessa did. And those words were the last Juliana had spoken to her best friend.
Get out get out get out
.

By the time Tessa had arrived at her house, the police were arriving at Juliana’s. Juliana could’ve admitted what she’d done. She could’ve confessed what her brother was really like. But her mother was screaming hysterically and her father was shell-shocked and she couldn’t do it. She just couldn’t do it.

Juliana had whispered Tessa’s name to the police and, that quickly, fiction became fact. Tessa had shot her brother.

And Tessa never said otherwise.

“I would have confessed,” Juliana said now. “If it had gone to trial, if it looked like Tessa was really going to get into trouble … I would’ve confessed. Except the other women started coming forward and it became clear that Tessa would never face charges. The DA himself said he felt it was justifiable use of force.

“I figured she’d be okay. And my father … by then, he was a wreck. If he couldn’t accept Tommy had ever assaulted other women, how could he believe what Tommy had done to
me
? It seemed better to just keep my mouth shut. Except … the longer you go without speaking, the harder it becomes. I wanted to see Tessa, but I didn’t know what to say. I wanted my parents to know what happened, but I didn’t know how to tell them.

“I stopped speaking. Literally. For an entire year. And my parents never even noticed. They were too busy with their own nervous breakdowns to bother with mine. Then Tessa disappeared—I heard her father had kicked her out. She never told me. Never stopped by to say goodbye. Maybe she couldn’t speak either. I never knew. Until you showed up yesterday morning, I didn’t know she’d become a cop, I didn’t know she’d gotten married, and I didn’t know she had a little girl named Sophie. That’s my middle name, you know. She named her daughter for me. After everything I did to her, she still named her daughter for me.…”