Guilt (7 page)

“You must have fantastic views.”

“It’s nice.”

“Bet it is,” she said. “I’d have loved something like that.”

T
here are many reasons I became a psychologist. Some I understand, some I’ll never even be aware of.

One motive I think I do get is the urge to protect, to make up for the abandonment that ruled my childhood. It’s a trait that usually fits the job well, earning patient gratitude and delusions of godliness.

Sometimes I get heavy-handed, offering armor-plate when a thin sweater will do. That’s why figuring out how much to tell Robin about the bad stuff has always been an issue. I’ve learned to include her, but I’m careful about the details.

On this one, I didn’t even know how to start.

Robin’s an only child. Her mother’s a difficult woman, emotionally stingy, self-centered, competitive with her daughter. The loving parent was her dad, a master carpenter. He taught her what he knew about wood and the joy of craft, died when Robin was young. Now she works with power tools, doesn’t take well to being smothered by testosterone, no matter how well intended.

For all the support I got from my older sister, I might as well have been a singleton. Mom was too up and down mood-wise to be of use
when Dad drank and went hunting for prey. I learned to value solitude because alone meant safe. Inherently a friendly child, I learned to be sociable and genuinely empathic, but more often than not any group of people makes me feel alienated.

Two people like that and you can see how it would take time to work out Relationship 101.

I believe Robin and I have done a pretty good job. We’ve been together for a long time, are faithful without strain, love each other madly, press each other’s erotic buttons. All that bliss has been ruptured twice by breakups, neither of which I understand fully. During one separation, Robin got pregnant by another man. The pregnancy and her time with him ended badly. I’ve worked with children my entire adult life but have never been a father. Robin and I haven’t talked about that in ages.

I hope she doesn’t spend too much time wondering.

I drove home thinking about tiny bones, a life barely lived, a nurse who could be anything between saint and monster. I still hadn’t figured out what to divulge when I reached the top of the old bridle path that snakes up to our property.

To look at the house, free of trim or artifice, high white stucco walls sliced into acute angles where the trees don’t shroud, you’d think emotionally distant people live here. The original structure, the one I bought for myself as soon as I had a bit of money, was tiny, rustic, all wood and shingle and quirk and creak. A psychopath burned it down and when we rebuilt we were looking for change, maybe a fortress.

Inside, matte-finished oak floors, comfortable, slouchy furniture, and art biased toward pretty rather than politics combine to warm things up. The square footage isn’t vast but it’s more than two people and one small dog need, and my footsteps echo when I cross the living room and head up the skylit corridor to my office.

Robin’s truck was parked out front but no sign of her in the house, so she was out in her studio, working. I postponed a bit, checking email, paying bills, scanning news sites and reassuring myself that the world continued to spin with all the logic of a grand mal seizure.

By the time I poured a mug full of coffee in the kitchen and walked down to the garden where I stopped to feed the koi, I was still unresolved about what to say.

“Baby bones,” I told the fish. “Don’t even know if it was a boy or a girl.”

They slurped in gratitude.

I was dawdling by the water’s edge when the door to the studio opened. Blanche, our little French bulldog, trotted toward me, twenty pounds of blond charm and Zen-serenity. The breed tends to be stubborn; Blanche isn’t, preferring diplomacy to artillery. She nuzzled my pant leg, snorted coquettishly. I rubbed her head and she purred like a cat. She’d rolled on her back for a belly tickle when Robin emerged, fluffing her mass of auburn curls and brushing sawdust from her favorite red overalls.

Mouthing an air kiss as she hurried toward me, she arrived smiling, planted a real smooch on my lips. Her breath was sweet with cola, the black T-shirt under the overalls fragrant with wood dust. Spanish cypress, a material that holds on to its perfume for centuries. The feather-light flamenco guitar she’d been working on for weeks.

I kissed her back.

She said, “What’s the matter?”

“Who says anything?”

She stepped back, studied me. “Honey?”

“What was the tell?”

“The shoulders,” she said. “It’s always in the shoulders.”

“Maybe it’s just a kink.”

Taking my hand, she guided me toward the house. Blanche trotted at our side, checking me out every few seconds. Between the two of them, I felt like a patient. As we reached the door, Robin said, “The new case?”

I nodded.

“Especially bad?”

“Maybe.”

She put her arm around my waist. When we got in the kitchen, I offered her coffee.

“No, thanks, just water.” She fetched a bottle from the fridge, sat down at the table, propped her perfect chin in one hand. Chocolate eyes were soft, yet searching. Her lips parted. The slightly oversized central incisors that had turned me on years ago flashed into view.

I filled a second mug, joined her. “A baby. A baby’s skeleton.”

She winced. “That must have been terrible for everyone involved.”

She stroked my fingers.

I told her everything.

When I was through, she said, “One of the girls at that hospital changed her mind and had her baby? Gave it to that nurse to take care of and something went wrong?”

“Could be.”

“
Wrong
doesn’t have to mean a crime, Alex. What if the poor little thing died by accident? Or from a disease and it couldn’t be buried legally because officially it didn’t exist?”

A new tremolo colored the last three words.

She said, “A thing;
it
. Can they do DNA, find out the sex?”

“Theoretically.” I told her about the case’s low priority.

She said, “Every generation thinks it invented the world, no one cares about history.”

“Are you sorry I told you?”

“Not at all.” She stood, got behind me, kneaded my shoulders. “You are one block of iron, darling.”

“Oh,” I said. “Perfect. Thanks.”

“Full-service girlfriend.” She worked on my muscles some more, stepped away, unsnapped the overalls, let them fall to the kitchen floor. The black T-shirt and a navy blue thong contrasted with smooth, tawny skin. She stretched, flexed each lovely leg. I stood.

“I’m filthy, hon, going to shower off. After that, we can figure out what to do about dinner.”

I was waiting when she emerged from the bathroom, armed with a few restaurant suggestions.

She unpeeled her towel, folded it neatly, stood there naked. Holding out a hand, she led me to the bed. “Time for you to be a full-service boyfriend.”

Afterward, she ran her nails lightly over my cheek. Bobbled my lips with the side of an index finger the way kids do when they’re goofing. I let out a high-pitched moan, did a fair imitation of a leaky drain. When we both stopped laughing, she said, “How are you doing now?”

“A lot better.”

“High point of my day, too. How about Italian?”

I
’d heard nothing new about the bones for two days when the
Times
ran a follow-up piece.

The article was stuck at the bottom of page 15, trumped by water issues and legislative ineptitude, a shooting in Compton, the usual petty corruption by various civic employees. The byline was Kelly LeMasters, the reporter Milo had belatedly called.

The coverage boiled down to a space-filling rehash ending with the pronouncement that “A priority request to analyze the bones for DNA at the state Department of Justice lab is LAPD’s best hope for yielding fresh information on a decades-old mystery.”

The newspaper was in Milo’s hand when he rapped on my door at ten a.m.

I said, “Pleasant surprise.”

He strode past me into the kitchen, flung the fridge door open, did the usual bear-scrounge, and came up with a rubbery-looking chicken leg that he gnawed to the bone and a half-full quart of milk that he chugged empty. Wiping the lacto-mustache from his nearly-as-pale
face, he thrust the
Times
piece at me. “Compelling and insightful, call the Pulitzer committee.”

I said, “Pulitzer was a tabloid shlock-meister.”

He shrugged. “Time heals, especially with money in the ointment.” He flung the article onto the table.

I said, “So you spoke to LeMasters.”

“Not quite. I spoke to His Grandiosity’s office begging for DOJ grease. That was yesterday afternoon. Next morning, voilà.”

“The chief leaks?”

“The chief plays the press like a harmonica. Which is fine in this case because everything’s dead-ended. Social Security can’t turn up records of our Eleanor Green, and I can’t find dirt on Swedish. Even the oldest vice guy I know doesn’t remember it, one way or the other. So if they were breaking the law, they were doing it discreetly.”

He got up again, searched the pantry, poured himself a bowl of dry cereal. Midway to the bottom, he said, “The bones aren’t why I’m here. I never really thanked you for last year.”

“Not necessary.”

“I beg to differ.” He flushed. “If ensuring my continuing survival doesn’t deserve gratitude, what the hell does, Alex?”

“Chalk it up to the friendship thing.”

“Just because I didn’t get all sentimental doesn’t mean I’m not aware of what you did.” Deep breath. “I’ve been thinking about it every damn day.”

I said nothing.

“Anyway.” He used his fingers to grasp the last few nuggets of cereal. Drawing his big frame to its feet a second time, he loped to the sink, washed the bowl. Said something I couldn’t hear over the water.

When he turned off the spigot, I said, “Didn’t catch that.”

“The T word, amigo. Gracias. Merci. Danke schoen.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Okay … now that we’ve got that out of the way … how’re Robin and the pooch? She working out back?”

“Delivering a mandolin.”

“Ah.”

His jacket pocket puffed as his phone squawked.

Moe Reed’s pleasant voice, tighter and higher than usual, said, “New one, boss.”

“I could use something fresh, Moses.”

“It’s fresh all right,” said Reed. “But I’m not sure you’ll like it.”

“Why not?”

“More bones, boss. Same neighborhood. Another baby.”

A city worker, part of a crew planning a drainage ditch at the western edge of Cheviot Hills Park, had spotted the scatter of white.

Unruly toss, strewn like trash, barely concealed by bushes. What might pass for dried twigs at a distance was an assortment of tiny skeletal components.

This baby appeared even smaller than the one unearthed in the Ruches’ backyard. The skull was the size of an apple. Some of the bones were as thin as drinking straws and some of the smallest—the phalanges of the hand—were thread-like.

These remnants were clean-looking. Silvery white, luminous in the sunlight.

I thought: Scrubbed clean, maybe polished.
Prepared?

The orange-vested laborer who’d found them was a huge, muscular guy named George Guzman who kept dabbing tears.

Moe Reed stood next to him, pad in hand. His expression said he’d been offering continuous sympathy, wasn’t sure he liked that gig. At Reed’s other side stood Liz Wilkinson, impassive but for soft searching eyes, tool cases on the ground next to her, white coat draped over one arm. Ready to have a go at the skeleton but waiting for the coroner’s investigator to release the victim for further analysis.

The C.I. hadn’t shown up yet. Neither had the crime scene techs, but Liz had gloved up in anticipation. She stood right up against Moe, hips pressed against his. Hard to say who was supporting who.

Guzman stared at the white bones and sniffled.

Reed’s mouth twisted. “Okay, thanks, sir.”

“For what?”

“Calling us.”

“There was a choice?” said Guzman. He took another look. “Man.”

Reed said, “You can go, now.”

Guzman said, “Sure,” but he lingered. Reed prompted his exit by pointing at the yellow tape.

Guzman said, “Sure, sure,” took a step, stopped. “I’ll never forget this. We just had one.”

“One what, sir?”

“Baby.” The word came out strangled. “George Junior. We waited a long time for him.”

“Congratulations,” said Milo.

Guzman looked at him.

Reed said, “This is my boss, Lieutenant Sturgis. Sir, Mr. Guzman is our first arriver. He called it in.”

Guzman said, “I’m always here first. Since we started the job, I mean.”

“What’s the job?” said Milo.

“Making sure water doesn’t collect and ruin the roots of all those trees.” Guzman pointed. “We need to check out the entire area, taking samples of what’s below, then if we need drains, we put ’em in. Few years ago it was done wrong, flooded the archery field.”

“It’s your job to get here before anyone else?”

“No, no, not officially,” said Guzman, “but that’s what happens, I make it at seven ten, fifteen, the other guys not till seven thirty. ’Cause I take my wife to work, she waitresses at Junior’s on Westwood. I drop her off, she gives me coffee, I drive a couple minutes and I’m here.”

Guzman’s eyes drifted back to the bones. “I thought it was a squirrel or something. Dead animals, we see plenty of that. Then I got close and …” He blinked. “It’s definitely human?”

Everyone turned to Liz Wilkinson. She said, “Unfortunately.”

“Damn,” said Guzman, biting his lip. His eyes misted.

Milo said, “Appreciate your help, sir. Have a nice day.”

His prompt was more directive than Reed’s, a nudge to Guzman’s
elbow that got the giant in motion. Guzman plodded toward the tape, ducked under with effort, walked several yards, and joined another group of orange-vests hanging near a yellow city truck. The group stayed there, listening as Guzman regaled them.