Ever After (11 page)

And so it went, throughout the rest of the session. After we went through the negative thought/positive thought scenarios, Dr. Ringold informed me that my homework for the evening was that I was to journal about all of the above scenarios, so that I would have it written out. I would have to practice saying the positive statements in my head, because these positive statements had to become second nature to me. She also wanted me to practice thinking about negative thoughts, and then immediately replacing the negative thoughts with the positive ones.

My time was finally up, and I felt like Dr. Ringold and I had covered a lot of ground. I was getting a handle on why the prospect of losing my career was completely and totally devastating to me. If I thought that Nick and I were going to go the distance, I wouldn’t feel so desperate. I would know that he could take care of me until I was able to hopefully get on my feet. And, god forbid, if I wasn’t able to pursue architecture, at least I knew that I wouldn’t end up on the street.

Little by little, I felt that I was uncovering my traumas, and I hoped that I could eventually be completely able to trust Nick. I needed to do that, I knew.

But, when I arrived back in my room, the reality of my life hit me anew, like a spray of cold water on my face. The original issue that caused me to take those razors to my wrist in that bathtub was still an active one. I was going to be blackballed from my chosen profession.

I just didn’t see any way around that.

So, I got into my bed, and pulled the cover over my head, and cried myself to sleep.

Chapter 14

Nick

I felt like crap as I waited for Ryan to arrive at my apartment. I really should have been in the hospital, holding Scotty’s hand and helping her through her latest traumatic incident. However, I knew that I had to do what I had to do. And I had to do it soon. Before Scotty’s reputation completely went to shit.

Unfortunately, I hadn’t had contact with her since I saw her in the hospital. She had tried to call me several times, and she left several text messages that I hadn’t answered. I simply had no way of putting into words what I was about to do, and I didn’t want to answer questions from her as to why I wasn’t there. I couldn’t think of any good excuse as to why I couldn’t be with her, so I just chose to ignore her contacts for the time being. That was shitty of me, I knew, but I felt that it was best. Besides, if I did talk to her and give her some lame excuse as to why I wasn’t there, it wouldn’t have made her feel any better.

And, of course, I could have tried to work seeing her into my schedule. But Ryan was going to be here at any moment, and we were going to spend the entire day going over our plans. I was supposed to teach that evening, but I found a substitute to fill in. I couldn’t concentrate on anything, except my plan, at that moment. I needed to have 150% of my brain power on the plan. If I went to see Scotty, then I knew that I would get sucked into staying with her. And I would have to concentrate much of my energy and intelligence in helping her through. I couldn’t do that. This mission was just too important, and I couldn’t have any distractions, at all. One slip
up, and it would be over for me. I would be dead, or in prison for life. This was just too important, so I had to ignore Scotty completely until the mission was over. As shitty as that was.

I just hoped that she would eventually forgive me for abandoning her right when she needed me the most. I was going to have to come up with some excuse after I took care of what I was going to do, and I was struggling on what I was going to tell her. One thing was for sure, there was going to be a reckoning, and she was going to want to kick my ass.

Ryan finally appeared at my door, and I let him in. He looked very serious, and for a very good reason. What was about to happen was something that was going to be very intricate and tricky and dangerous.

There was no other person that I wanted on my team for this particular mission. Ryan was not only supremely intelligent, but he also was street smart.

“Okay,” I said, as both of us took a seat on my leather couch. “Let’s go through what I need to do. We need to brainstorm this thing eight ways to Sunday. That would give me the very best chance.”

Ryan took a deep breath. “Goddamn, I wish there was a way around this. I really do. But, Nick, I think you’re right. As long as that bastard is alive, Scotty’s career will be basically dead. And, quite frankly, scum like him don’t deserve to live. They really don’t. So, I guess what I’m saying is that I’m totally on board with this.”

“Allright. Then let’s get started.”

I got out a piece of paper and pen, and started writing things down. “Okay, now, what is our objective?” I asked, although I already knew the answer to that question.

“To force Mr. Lucas to commit suicide.”

I nodded my head. “And how are we going to do this? I mean, how am I going to do this? I want you to be in on the planning of this, but no way am I going to let you actually endanger yourself in helping me carry this out. This is going to all be me.”

Ryan started to protest, but I silenced him. “Now, Ryan, we talked about this. You have a wife and daughter who depend on you. There is zero need for you to put yourself in danger. None. That would be pointless, when I am perfectly capable of carrying this plan out on my own. End of discussion on that. Now, let’s get to brainstorming.”

“Okay,” he said. “Well, I think that it goes without saying that you’re going to have to give him an impossible choice between you killing him outright and him committing suicide. If you don’t give him that choice, then he won’t do it.”

“That goes without saying,” I said. “And, how do I convince him to do the right thing and kill himself? What if he says, basically, that I have to kill him? What if he calls my bluff, in other words?”

Ryan looked thoughtful. “That’s the tricky part. He’s liable to call your bluff, and that’s where the danger will be coming in. Because if you actually kill him with your gun, then you probably won’t be able to get away with it. You will be the top suspect in his murder. So, you need for him to pull the trigger on himself, and you also need for him to pen a suicide note. You also have to make sure that nobody ever sees you go into his apartment. Those are the things that you have to consider in order to pull this off.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’ve been doing some thinking about this. Some serious thinking. There is one thing that might actually convince him to do that. To commit suicide as opposed to my killing him. And here’s my idea. I get him on video admitting to what he did. He won’t know that I’m recording him, of course. Then I will basically tell him that he has two choices, and that he would dead either way. If he agrees to commit suicide and pen this letter and do it himself, then I will not release his confession after his death. But, if he forces me to kill him, I will release everything I have.”

“Do you think that he’ll believe you about that? I mean, come on, if you kill him, the last thing that you’re going to want to do is to release a recording of him making a full confession about what he did to Scotty. Surely he knows this. And, how are you going to get him to confess like that? He surely wouldn’t be that stupid to do that.”

“True,” I said. “So, what are some other ideas?”

“Well, you could get into some kind of self-defense situation. You goad him into pulling a gun on you, so, when you actually kill him, you can have the claim of self-defense.”

I shook my head. “Already thought of that. What that would entail is that I still would be arrested for homicide, and then I would have to present evidence that it the homicide was justifiable. That would mean that I would still go through the whole judge and jury rigamarole, and if the jury decides against me, it’s life in prison for me. That’s just too risky. And, unfortunately in this case, New York has a duty to retreat statute. That means that I would have the duty to retreat if I can safely avoid harm or death. All that does it makes a self-defense claim that much more difficult to win.”

It was looking more and more like the odds were going to be against me in this situation.

“Okay,” I said. “Now, this is going to sound stupid, because I’m going to bring up a movie. But, it seems like as good of a scenario as any here.”

“And what’s that?”

“In this movie called
Hard Candy,
a young girl and a child molester hook up, and the young girl proceeds to torture the child molester. By the end of the movie, the child molester confesses to being a part of a murder of another young girl, and Haley, the girl in the film, forces the child molester up on the roof, and puts a noose around his neck. She gives him the choice between killing himself and going to prison, where he would be brutalized. So, he chooses to kill himself.”

Ryan looked thoughtful. “Works as a Hollywood movie, for sure. But, again, that would depend upon that sociopathic pervert confessing to what he did. And, besides, we need him to actually pen a suicide note.”

“Well, one thing is for sure. We have to try to somehow get his confession on record. If I can do that, and tell him that’s it’s suicide or prison or having his reputation go completely down the drain, then perhaps I would be able to get him to actually kill himself.”

“But, Nick, if you can get his confession recorded, then maybe he actually will go to prison.”

“Maybe, but not before he takes Scotty down with him. Whatever that guy does, he’s going to make sure that he takes her with him. If he’s going down, then he’s going to make sure that she’s going to go down, too. I mean, he had one of his cronies call and threaten her the very next day after he was arrested. Do you think that he will have any mercy for her?”

Ryan put his head in his hands and took a huge breath.

“And, besides, Ryan, there is no fucking way that a surreptitious recording of him confessing what he did would ever be used in court. I mean, it’s not illegal, because New York is a one-party consent state, in that, as long as one party to the conversation consents to being recorded, there’s no law broken. But using that as evidence in court? No way. If I record his confession, then I will only use it for one purpose, and that is convincing him that suicide is the only option for him. Because his lawyer will be able to get that thrown out in a heartbeat.”

“Well, then, I agree that getting his confession would be the best way about this, even if you can’t use it in court. But how do you get a guy like that to confess to what he did? That seems to be the sticking point in this entire scenario,” Ryan said.

“Get our hands on some sodium pentothal?”

“That’s an option, except we have no idea how to get ahold of something like that.”

“Surely there’s some available on the black market. You still in touch with any of your dealers?”

“Well, yeah, I am. I don’t use them to buy drugs, of course, but I keep up with them, because you never know when you might need them. Not sure if even they would be able to get ahold of a drug like that, but I can certainly call them and see if they know anybody who would. They’re pretty connected.”

“Ok, if it comes to that, then maybe that’s the road that we need to take.”

We sat and looked at one another for a few minutes more. I think that both of us were actually warming to the idea of getting some sodium pentothal on the black market and injecting Mr. Lucas with it to make him confess to what he did to Scotty.

“You know,” Ryan said, “the more I think about it, the better that idea seems. I can certainly make some phone calls to my old dealers. I’m quite sure that somebody knows someone who can get their hands on that. I think that might be the only way for him to tell the truth about what happened on St. Croix and what happened when Scotty was 13.”

My heart started to quicken. We were certainly getting warmer. But getting the truth serum drug was just the start. We also had to figure out how to administer it to him, and how to get lure him to a place where I could set up hidden cameras and microphones. In other words, how to get him here, in this apartment.

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s just assume that you can get ahold of some sodium pentothal. That’s the first step, of course, in this entire scenario. Now, we need to lure him here to this apartment. We need to lure him here, and then ambush him with the vial of serum.”

“Ambushing him with that might not be an issue,” Ryan said. “You can answer the door, then I can tackle him from behind and you can inject him when I get him onto the floor. The element of surprise will work in our favor. He’s about my size, so I can take him.”

“Alright, that sounds like an excellent plan. Now, do you know how to wire up secret cameras and microphones? If not, do you know somebody who might know how to do that?”

“Oh, god, yes. My dad was the most paranoid person alive. Well, he had a reason to be paranoid, of course. But, yeah, I’m still in touch with his security teams, and they know all about that. So, yeah, that’s not a problem whatsoever.”

I had to smile. Ryan had both underworld connections and wealthy-guy connections. He really was the best of both worlds in this scenario.

I started to rub my hands together with glee. The plan was starting to come together.

“Now, here’s our sticking point,” I said.

“How to lure the bastard here,” Ryan said, reading my mind.

I got up to pace the floor. If we could only get him here, then the rest would take care of itself. I would have him on video confessing to what he did, then present him with the video and tell him that either he kills himself or the video would go viral on the Internet. Even if the asshole knew that the video probably would never be used in court, he would at least realize that public sentiment would be against him, and he would be more likely to be convicted. And, also, the bastard’s biggest concern in life was not losing face with his friends.

“Okay,” Ryan said. “Here’s an idea. Now, you aren’t going to necessarily like this, but just hear me out, okay?”

I nodded my head.

“Do you have access to Scotty’s email account?”

“Yes,” I said, already not liking where this is going.

“Well, let’s say you sent him an email from her account. The email will apologize for the ‘misunderstanding’ with the police, and that she’s willing to clear his name, but he has to come here to meet her first.”

“I don’t want Scotty to be involved,” I said. “In fact, I don’t want her knowing about this, ever. And I mean ever.”

“And why would she be involved? How would she ever know?”

“He sends her an email back, and maybe she checks her email from her smart phone, and there it is. An email from him. I can’t monitor her email account 24/7, so she might check her email before I’m able to erase any message from him. And then what? The entire thing falls apart.”

“You got any better ideas on how to get him here?”

“I’m thinking,” I said.

I snapped my fingers. “Portia had some pretty potent stuff. Stuff that worked in a matter of minutes and caused a loss of
consciousness for almost 24 hours. I have no idea what drug she used on me, but let’s do some Internet searching and find something that would do that. Then we use a decoy to have drinks with him, and, then, he passes out, we put him in a limo, and we drag him here. Then, when he wakes up, I give him the sodium pentothal and get him to confess.”