No Safe Place (10 page)

At seventeen, Kerry was as big as he would ever get: five feet ten, one hundred fifty-five pounds. He was a full three inches shorter than his handsome brother, the state senator, that much shorter and sixty pounds lighter than his father, the policeman. Beyond boxing there were not many sports for a boy who was neither big nor fast of foot nor a natural leader, let alone one who still lost his temper in frustration at his own lack of talent. Finally, Kerry made himself a serviceable soccer goalie. “Serviceable” captured Kerry’s senior-year Bs and Cs, no honors won, a slot the next year at Seton Hall University, a few blocks from his home. For the longer range, Michael
suggested that Kerry go into the police department. “It’s enough for a lot
of us,” he said, “and no point worrying about why you’re not your brother. After all, who is?”

Kerry did not respond. His father’s failure was etched in the deepening creases of his face, the bleary eyes, and the only relief he found beyond drink was abusing his wife and belittling his son. Kerry’s mother seemed almost broken. Perhaps, Kerry thought, his father’s women had been the final degradation.

Michael still sat at the foot of Kerry’s bed, but often now he talked of the women he met in bars or on the job, so much younger, so much more admiring. Quietly disgusted, inexperienced himself, Kerry simply hoped that this diversion would help Mary Kilcannon. But the beatings Michael gave her grew worse, especially after his second citation for police brutality: the time Michael had beaten a black man into a concussive state for trying to “escape.” It brought him a reprimand, a month’s suspension, and a dangerous self-hatred; the night after this happened, Mary Kilcannon needed two stitches on her upper lip.

Kerry drove her to the hospital, despair and hatred warring in his heart. When she came out of the emergency room and into the night, Kerry simply held her, cradling her face against his shoulder.

“Leave him, Mom,” he murmured. “Please. It can’t be God’s will that you should stay.”

“It’s only the drink.” Mary closed her eyes. “Divorce is a sin, Kerry. And what would I do?”

The look in her once-pretty face, now so pale and thin, pierced him. When they came home, Michael Kilcannon lay passed out on his bed. Kerry wondered how it would feel to kill his father in his sleep.

Mary watched her son’s face. “I’ll call the priest,” she said. “I’ll call Father Joe.”

Far better to call Liam, Kerry thought. Surely there were policemen who cared nothing for his father, prosecutors who owed Liam Dunn a favor. But the priest was his mother’s wish.

“Yes,” Kerry said. “Call Father Joe.”

The next Saturday, the slender, balding priest came to the Kilcannons’ home and spoke quietly to Kerry’s father. His mother stayed in her room. For several hours, his father sat still and silent,
and then, before dinner, he left.

He returned after midnight.

Kerry heard his feet on the stairs—heavy, decisive—then the ponderous breathing as Michael reached the top. He did not stop at Kerry’s room.

Kerry’s mouth was dry. He lay on his bed, dressed only in boxer shorts, listening for sounds.

His mother screamed with pain too deep for Kerry to bear.

For a moment, Kerry’s eyes shut. Then he stood without thinking and went to his parents’ room.

His mother lay in a corner, dressing gown ripped. Blood came from her broken nose. Her husband stood over her, staring down as if stunned, for once, by what he had done.

Kerry stood behind him. He felt so much hatred that he barely registered his mother’s fear as she saw him.

The look on her face made Michael turn, startled. “You,” he said in surprise.

Kerry hit him with a left jab.

Blood spurted from his father’s nose. “You little
fuck
,” his father cried out.

Kerry hit him three more times, and Michael’s nose was as broken as his wife’s. All that Kerry wanted was to kill him; what his father might do to him no longer mattered.

Kerry moved forward….

“No,”
his mother screamed, and Michael Kilcannon threw a savage punch.

It crashed into Kerry’s shoulder; he winced with pain as Michael lunged forward to grab him.

Kerry ducked beneath his father’s grip and hit him in the midsection.

The soft flesh quivered. Michael grunted in pain but kept coming, eyes focused with implacable anger. Arms blocking Kerry’s next punch, he enveloped him in a murderous bear hug.

Helpless, Kerry felt his ribs ache, his lungs empty. His father’s whiskey-maddened face was obscured by black spots, then flashes of light. Kerry sensed himself losing consciousness. With a last spasmodic effort, he jammed his knee up into Michael’s groin.

Kerry felt his father stiffen. His eyes were great with surprise. Panting for air, Kerry lowered his head and butted his father’s chin.

Michael’s grip loosened. Kerry writhed free, almost vomiting, then stumbled to his right and sent a flailing left hook to his father’s groin.

His father let out a moan of agony, his eyes glazing over. His mother stood, coming between them.
“No,
Kerry,
no.”

Still breathing hard, Kerry took her in his arms and pushed her to the bed with fearful gentleness. “Stay,” he commanded. “Let
me
finish this.”

She did not move again.

In the dim bedroom, Kerry turned to his father.

Michael struggled to raise his fists. Kerry moved forward.

Whack, whack, whack.

His father’s eyes were bleeding at the corners. Kerry hit him in the stomach.

His father reeled back, mouth open. Suddenly Kerry thought of Marcus Lytton.

Just as Michael once had ordered, Kerry brought the right.

It smashed into his father’s mouth. Kerry felt teeth break, slashing his own hand. His father fell in a heap.

Kerry stood over him, sucking air in ragged breaths, sick with rage and shock and astonishment. His eyes half shut, Michael spat tooth fragments from his bloody mouth.

Kerry knelt in front of him. “Touch her again, Da, and I’ll kill you. Unless you kill me in my sleep.” He paused for breath, then finished: “I wouldn’t count on doing that. I’m too used to waiting up for you.”

After that night, Michael Kilcannon never hit his wife again. His younger son never hit anyone.

The next year, at the age of thirty, Kerry’s brother James was elected a United States senator.

When the telephone rang, Kerry let Clayton Slade answer.

He continued gazing at San Diego Harbor, faintly aware of Clayton’s voice, oblivious to the morning sunlight spreading on the water.

Sometime today, he would see her again.

“Kerry?”

Turning, Kerry sensed that his friend had been waiting for some moments; Clayton had the unflinching look that went with reading Kerry’s thoughts.

“What is it?” Kerry asked.

“Mason.” Pausing, Clayton seemed to watch for his reaction. “He’s canceled his campaign appearances.”

Kerry felt surprise pull him back into the present. “He can’t be withdrawing.”

“No way.”

Kerry looked at his watch. It was six-thirty. He had a half hour before the strategy meeting, then sixteen hours of speeches, interviews, shaking hands.

“Then he’s trying something new,” Kerry said, and headed for the shower.

Sitting alone on the patio of the Meridian, Nate Cutler took in the palm trees, the soft ocean breeze, and the curious sub-tropic light he associated with California when seeking out a metaphor: a dream state; perhaps a film set; or maybe a used-car lot in pastels.

He knew better—California was a complex place. But Nate was a child of the East: a boyhood in Manhattan; college at Dartmouth; journalism school at Columbia; a career spent in
Washington. He found it strange that the next President of the United States might be selected by the thin-blooded citizens of this underzoned shopping mall, most of whom got their political education from watching thirty-second spots on television. Nate liked smoky bars, Scotch, and the snap of autumn; the bite of real political argument among people who knew the issues; the crowded, ethnic urban jangle of Manhattan; the monomania of Washington. In a way that Nate saw as Darwinian, Washington evolved the most perceptive and resourceful journalists; the most tenacious bureaucrats; the most dedicated, intelligent, and ruthless politicians; the most sophisticated and self-aggrandizing professional class that any urban center had to offer; and, in seeming contradiction, the most cynical and incompetent city administration in America, partly because it was the one organ of government that few of these strivers gave a damn about. And then there was that sad by-product of obsessive self-promotion, the used-to-bes: ex-congressmen or appointed officials who, once forcibly retired, discovered that they had focused so intensely on becoming who they formerly were that there was no one left inside.

To Nate, the ecosystem of Washington had an awful, endlessly fascinating ability to seduce and destroy. He had long since faced that his own self-image depended on the conceit that he was too smart and too ambitious to fail. That he would shrink from reporting what he had just learned was strange to him.

For the last few minutes, Nate had been holding the Democratic nomination in his hands.

When he first read the document, Nate had been quiet for a moment, stunned.

“How did you get this?” he had asked.

Katherine Jones lit a cigarette. “All that matters,” she said finally, “is whether this document is authentic. And whether the counselor’s story checks out.”

Nate appraised her. Though her short hair was the color of straw, Katherine Jones reminded him of a Buddha figure without the compassion: gimlet-eyed, heavy-lipped, self-satisfied. Her skin was flecked with the pink subcutaneous
bursts of a heavy smoker.

“Not quite
all
, Katherine. You came to
me
.”

Jones drew on her cigarette. Nate sensed that she was trying to appear unperturbed. “Based on what he’s said, Kilcannon is
not
a reliable friend to pro-choice women. This document exposes him as an adulterer and an opportunist—”

“If that’s true,” Nate cut in, “so are any number of congressmen who support your position. Is
that
fair game?”

“If
this
is true,” she replied at once, “Kilcannon’s also a hypocrite.”

“Perhaps.”

Jones stubbed the half-smoked cigarette. “Just say you’re uncomfortable,” she said abruptly, “and we can go to the
Times
or the
Post.
”

No, you couldn’t, Nate thought. You know that the
Times
still dislikes this kind of story, and that the
Post
would have its own reservations. You chose me because the weekly newsmagazines are struggling to compete with TV and the dailies and because, if we’re satisfied this is true, we’ll make sure that everyone reads
Newsworld
when it hits the stands on Tuesday. You can imagine me hyping our story on
CNN Weekend
as clearly as you can envision Kilcannon on the cover …

You, or whoever is using you for camouflage.

“If my editors decide it’s news,” Nate answered in an even tone, “we’ll print it. But they’ll also ask me how my source got a confidential counseling document, whether you’ve spoken to this counselor, and who put you in touch with her.”

Jones paused, then responded with weary patience. “The person I got it from has never met or spoken to the woman who wrote this memorandum.
I’ve
never met or spoken to her—”

“And this lady won’t talk on the record, correct? As you understand it.”

Jones shrugged. “Maybe you or your colleagues can persuade her to go public. As it was explained to me, she’s come to doubt the morality of her work.”

Suddenly Nate grinned. “Politics really
does
make strange domestic partners, doesn’t it?”

Jones arranged her mouth in a perfunctory show of amusement. “Sometimes women don’t get to choose,” she said, then pointed at the document. “You
knew
her, right?
When you worked at the
Times
?”

Nate’s smile turned sour. “As an old editor of mine used to say, ‘we’re equal opportunity destroyers.’”

“You
could
be.” Jones touched the document with her forefinger. “Because if you run this story, it will bury both Kerry Kilcannon and Costello. No matter who put this conscience-ridden counselor on our radar screen. Or yours.”

That was true, Nate guessed. Looking across the table at Jones, he felt very tough and very cold. “You’re willing to do all that,” he asked, “but you’re not endorsing Mason?”

Jones’s face closed. “Anthony’s Legions endorses pro-choice women, period. But sometimes we’re forced to defend reproductive rights the best we can. When fanatics commit murder to force women to have babies, that means stopping ‘pro-choice’ hypocrites like Kilcannon who wring their hands about abortion so they can siphon votes from either side.” Jones lit another cigarette, briskly shaking the match. “But we’re not just passing documents to the press. Keep an eye on Kil-cannon’s Los Angeles event this afternoon …”

After she left, Nate reread the counselor’s notes.

His job was not a simple one. Fairly often, some politician had accused him of betrayal; in one case, through no fault of Nate’s, his source, a legislative aide, had been fired by the offended congressman. But he could not easily imagine ending someone’s chance to be President, let alone that of a man he still believed essentially decent. Far less had Nate conceived of destroying a friend for something that, however ethically complex, was at its heart as private as, judging from this document, it was shattering. But what unsettled Nate most was not his personal reservations but another of those unavoidable truths—his own rush of excitement at the start of what could be the political story of almost any journalist’s career.

It was seven o’clock. He had roughly an hour to get back to the hotel and catch Kerry Kilcannon’s motorcade.

Nate went inside to call his editor.