Blameless (34 page)

Diana swiped at her face with her napkin and stood, dumping her uneaten food into the sink. Slowly, deliberately, she pushed it into the garbage disposal. Turning on the switch, she watched, mesmerized, as the swirling water washed her dinner down the drain. She imagined it spilling into the sewers and traveling under the city until it merged with the sea.

Craig brought his plate over and they cleaned up in strained silence. “If you don’t need me anymore,” he said, “I think I’ll go pack.”

Diana nodded. Pushing a sponge across the already clean counters, she listened to him muttering and slamming drawers and closet doors. When there were no more surfaces to wipe, she went down to her office and turned on her computer. She had to focus. She had to think about something besides the emptiness.

She pulled out her notes and flipped through the introductory section of her article. Finding her place in the document, she ordered herself to write. But she couldn’t concentrate. Her mind wandered to an article she had read in the
Globe
. It had described a new “humane” program in a women’s prison in New York in which incarcerated women who gave birth were allowed to keep their babies for a year. The program was run much like a kibbutz, the article had explained, allowing visits for nursing and special play hours, but separating the babies from their mothers at night. The women took parenting courses that continued even after their children were placed in foster care. This “humane” program taught mothers how to care for their babies—and then it took their babies away.

Diana pressed her hands to her stomach, searching for the butterfly kick. “Don’t you worry,” she whispered to her child, her voice cracking. “I won’t let them take you away from me.” But she felt nothing under her palm, and despair surrounded her like a shroud.

Although she tried to force her mind back to her research, her heart ached and images of her childhood filled her vision: herself as a four-year-old, skipping along the beach, her tiny hand encircled by her mother’s large, warm one; standing in a boat gliding under Niagara Falls, her head tipped back to catch the spray as Scott and her parents laughed; eating Thanksgiving dinner with the whole noisy extended family clustered around her mother’s not-quite-large-enough dining room table.

Then, in a strange mental juxtaposition, she flashed to sharing a turkey sandwich with James that day at the Public Gardens. She had known it wasn’t quite right, and her every sense had been heightened by the faint aura of wrongdoing. When James’s arm had accidentally brushed hers, Diana had felt the heat of the contact long after it had ended. She imagined she could still smell his cologne.

Craig stopped down around nine and told her he had forgotten something at his office. Diana waited up for him to return, wanting to reconnect with him, to make sure he was still her ally, to convince herself that their marriage wasn’t dead. When he didn’t come home by midnight, she dragged herself up the three flights of stairs and flopped onto the bed. She lay there, waiting. But still he didn’t come. He didn’t return until well after she had fallen into a fitful sleep.

The next day, despite Craig’s protests, Diana took him to the airport. As they drove through the exhaust-filled tunnel, Craig was the perfect robot of a concerned husband and she of the dutiful wife. He reminded her to take her vitamins and lock the door, and promised he would phone every evening. She agreed to all he suggested, only requesting that he call early so she could get a good night’s sleep.

But she was too smooth. And his eyes were too hard. He was so distracted that he misstated his airline, first telling her to go to Delta, then changing to American. She made a wrong turn leaving the airport and found herself stuck on a highway with few exits, driving away from Boston, headed north toward Saugus.

As she had planned, Diana went straight to Ken’s after dropping Craig off. She knew Marcel had seen her when she walked into the restaurant, that he was just pretending he hadn’t. She noticed his eyes flicker toward the door as her own were adjusting to the dimness. Then he turned his back and put a drink before his lone customer.

The hostess seated Diana at a tiny corner table at the far end of the service bar. Whenever the waiter came up with a drink order, Marcel would place the filled glass diagonally on the counter so that he could avoid looking over the waiter’s shoulder and right into Diana’s face.

While Marcel ignored her, Diana tried to eat. She ordered a chef’s salad and a glass of milk, but found she could do little more than move the meat and vegetables around in the bowl. She knew that worrying about Craig wasn’t going to help, but she couldn’t stop herself. His anger terrified her, her complicity in his anguish tormented her, but the thought of her life without him was something she couldn’t even begin to contemplate.

She chewed on a piece of turkey for what seemed an inordinately long time, finally forcing it down with a large gulp of milk. She had to get rid of Levine and his allegations; she had to get him out of her house and out of her life before he tore apart everything she had. If she cleared herself, Craig would be able to forgive her. If she cleared herself, they could still be a family.

Diana stood up. While Marcel was at the cash register making change for a waiter, she positioned herself behind the man so Marcel would have no choice but to look in her direction when the waiter stepped away. “Hi,” she said as soon as she caught his eye.

Marcel grunted.

“I never did find Ethan,” she continued, as if he had actually greeted her. “I went to talk to his landlady, like you suggested.” She flashed Marcel what she hoped was a sympathy-elicting smile and shrugged. “But she hadn’t seen him either.”

“Must’ve split town,” Marcel mumbled, picking up his rag.

Encouraged by the fact that he had spoken, Diana leaned against the bar. “Now I’m looking for James Hutchins’s sister—the tall one with the curly red hair?”

“Maybe you should stop looking for so many folks.” He turned and headed toward the other end of the bar.

Without conscious awareness of what she was doing, Diana thrust out her hand and grabbed Marcel’s upper arm. Caught completely off-guard, he grew rigid. He turned his head slightly and stared at her. “I can’t stop.” Diana’s voice was soft but firm. “If I don’t find these people, I’m going to be arrested.” She dropped her hand and felt her eyes filling. In that split second, she decided to let Marcel see the tears. “I don’t want my baby to be born in prison,” she added.

He looked at her coldly for a long moment, and Diana was sure she had lost him, that she had overplayed her part. But then his shoulders dropped and his eyes visibly softened. “They’re a fucked-up bunch,” he said. “Every last one of them.”

“I know,” Diana said, smiling slightly. “I’m their therapist.”

Marcel snorted. “Guess I’m not telling you anything new.” Noticing the waving hand of his customer, he nodded and poured a Scotch on the rocks. After he had delivered the drink, he returned to Diana. “That professor one of your patients?” he asked.

“Professor?”

“Boyfriend of the one you’re looking for—what’s her name, Jane?”

“Jill,” Diana corrected. “Jill Hutchins.”

“The professor’s the one acting like he’s headed for the loony bin.”

“Has Jill been acting strange too?” Diana pressed, not the least bit interested in Jill’s professor. “Has she been in lately?”

“Don’t think so.” Marcel shrugged. “But the professor’s been in a lot. Crying in his beer, so to speak. Romance is on the skids. And someone told me he’s having money troubles.”

“Who isn’t these days?” Diana said in an attempt to change the subject. “But what about Jill? Has she been upset also?”

“Like I told you, she hasn’t been in much.” He shook his head and picked up his rag again. “Way I figure it, you should be more concerned about the guy.”

“Why do you say that?” Diana demanded as Marcel turned away. “Why should I be more concerned about him than about Jill or Ethan?”

“Don’t really know,” he answered. “But I’m telling you he’s on the edge. Looks to me like he’s the kind likely to do just about anything.” He picked up his rag and walked to the other end of the bar. Clearly the conversation was over.

Deflated, Diana returned to her table and sat down. She watched Marcel from her shadowy corner as he signaled the hostess to replace him and slipped out from under the bar. He walked into the kitchen without even a nod in her direction. So Jill had a crazy boyfriend. If Jill had a boyfriend who
wasn’t
crazy, Diana would have been surprised.

She took a last sip of milk and pushed the salad bowl toward the middle of the table. She and Mitch were just going to have to go to Levine with what they had on Jill: a strong motive and a criminal background. If it weren’t for the damn alibi, Jill would be a far better suspect than Diana. Molly was the connection that needed to be broken. Molly was Diana’s only hope. It was time to get in touch with Adam Arell. Time to go back to Norwich. She would call Mitch and regroup. Diana signaled for her check.

As she waited for her change, Diana stared at the leaded panes of the heavy wooden entrance door. She watched the door swing open and admit two men in wrinkled business suits. Absently she followed their progress as they walked to the far end of the bar and sat down. When one offered the other a cigarette, she turned her eyes back toward the entrance. The door swung open a second time and a couple emerged from the shadows: a tall woman with wild curly hair, followed by a much older man about the same height. It was Jill. And behind her was Adrian Arnold.

Jill and Adrian didn’t see Diana in her dimly lit corner. They waved to the hostess and seated themselves at what was apparently their usual spot, a small table kitty-corner to the front door. They began talking immediately, gesturing and touching each other.

Diana stared at them, unable to believe what she was seeing. Jill and Adrian couldn’t possibly know each other, let alone be lovers. She was their only connection, and she had certainly never introduced them. They were so different: in age, in education, in temperament. It wasn’t possible. But there it was.

She nodded her thanks to the waiter, but didn’t move from her seat. Could this have anything to do with James’s death? Were they plotting against her? She closed her eyes and reminded herself that everything didn’t have to do with her. Her paranoia was just running amok. There was some logical explanation. Some explanation that had nothing to do with either James or herself.

Then she remembered. When Jill had come north to find James a therapist, she had interviewed a number of people in the Boston area—and Adrian had been one of them. Could Jill and Adrian have been having an affair all these years? It didn’t seem possible, but that would explain why Adrian had been at James’s funeral. And how Jill had known the baby was a girl. In its own bizarre way, the whole thing made sense.

As Diana stared, another thought crossed her mind. Between the two of them, there was plenty of motive, and with another person in the picture, Levine might be convinced that there
was
opportunity, that Jill and Adrian had killed James together. Diana’s palms began to sweat.

The scenario would have to have been premeditated murder: Jill and Adrian killed James and set up the fake suicide so that Jill would inherit the money. Then, when it turned out that Diana was the beneficiary, they decided to ruin Diana so that the money would revert to Jill—and as an added bonus, save Adrian’s career by keeping Diana’s research from being published. But would Levine buy that? It had possibilities, but also seemed rather farfetched. Then Diana remembered what Mitch had told her. All she had to do was convince the police that it was possible. Reasonable doubt was on her side.

Marcel’s words echoed through her brain:
Looks to me like he’s the kind likely to do just about anything
. Gail would attest to Adrian’s financial difficulties, Marcel to his instability, someone else in their peer group would explain how discrediting Diana would save Adrian’s future book royalties. Combined with Jill’s own money problems, her ambivalent and sometimes violent relationship with James, her criminal record …

Watching them from her corner, Diana realized that Jill and Adrian were having some kind of disagreement. Jill was sitting back in her chair with her arms crossed, a petulant look on her face. Adrian leaned toward her, talking and gesturing rather frantically. Jill remained impassive.

It just might work, Diana thought. She had heard of much weaker motives for murder. Jill and Adrian might be the alternative plausible suspects she had been searching for. They did it together to get out from under, to start a new life. James and Jill had had a huge row right before his death. And hadn’t Levine just told her that Mrs. Manfredi claimed to have seen Jill’s boyfriend at James’s apartment?

The waiter stopped by and asked if she wanted anything else, blocking her view of Adrian and Jill. Diana shook her head, and, as he stepped from her line of vision, she peered once again at the small table by the door. But now Jill and Adrian were not looking at each other. They were both looking straight at her.

28

T
RANSFIXED
, D
IANA STARED ACROSS THE DIMLY LIT RESTAURANT
. It seemed to her that the tables and the chairs and the few other scattered patrons didn’t exist; there were only she and Adrian and Jill, locked together by the intensity of their fixed gazes. Then Adrian blinked, his expression of abashed surprise taking on even stronger shades of guilt. Jill’s gaze remained unwavering. At the first moment of recognition, a gleam of hatred, almost a physical aversion, seemed to flash from her eyes, supplanted swiftly by a look Diana could only describe as cordial. Jill smiled slightly and nodded. She waved and motioned for Diana to come over to their table.

Diana hesitated, her brain function returning slowly after the shock of eye contact. She remembered Jill’s rages in her office, at the funeral, at Jill’s apartment. She remembered James’s stories of slashed tires and dead tropical fish—and the police report of assault with a deadly weapon.
We’ve got to watch this woman
, Mitch had said.
She was a real hothead
, Adam Arell had told her.
No way to figure what she was going to do next
. Diana knew a friendly little chat was hardly what Jill had in mind.