Burying Ben (33 page)

“I’m
curiou
s
. How
m
uch was I wort
h
?
”

“
W
here are you going with this, Dot
?
”

“To the press, the police, the Board of Psychology.”

“This is about you resenting
m
e for being happy, for having a f
a
m
ily. You should
m
ove on.”

He pushes his chair back and stands up. So do
I.

“Get a life, Dot. Find a
m
an. Leave
m
e and Melinda alone.”

I slap hi
m
, really hard. A ghostly imprint of my hand bloo
m
s on his cheek and then fades. He clenches his f
i
st
and
raises
it
reflexively.
I
watch it
m
ove through the air in slow
m
otion and then drop to his side.

“
W
hat do you want?” he asks.

“I want to
k
now why you set t
h
at
b
o
y up.
W
hy you accepted Belle Patcher’s money.”

“Jesus, what’s wrong with you?“

He gra
b
s
m
y arm and pulls
m
e forward. I reach for the wine bottle with my free hand and
swing it, catching him
in the temple and sending him
to his knees. He grabs my ankles
and pulls
m
e to the floor, rolling
m
e on my back.

“
W
hat are you trying to do?
Get
m
e to lea
v
e Melinda and co
m
e back to you?
Is that what you want
?
”

He lifts
m
y shoulders and sla
m
s
m
e into the floor. Jagged white lines and sparks explode behind
m
y eyes. I bring
m
y knee up bet
w
een his legs and crush it against his groin. He gasps and bends over hi
m
se
l
f. I scra
m
ble up the stairs and into my bedroo
m
. I can hear him
retching. I slam
the bedroom
door and hit the silent alarm
with the flat of my pal
m
. My heart is pounding.
I’m
out of breath. He co
m
es up the steps and stops outside
m
y bedroom door.

“This is ludicrous, Dot. Open the door.” He pants between words. “It’s the wine. We’ve never been violent before, never,
not even during t
h
e worst of it.”

Surge after
s
urge of adrenalin has s
o
bered
m
e into survival mode. Eddie R
i
m
bauer’s warning infiltrates the pounding in
my ears. “
W
h
en a
m
an co
m
es into your bedroo
m uninvited,
he’s up to no good. Next ti
m
e, if there is a next t
i
m
e, don’t hesitate and for godsakes, don’t
m
i
ss.”

“Co
m
e out, Dot. Please. I’m
not going to hurt you. I pro
m
ise.”

“Like you pro
m
ised to love
m
e forever? Like you pro
m
ised to be faithful?”

“Open the door. I have to tell you s
o
m
ething. I won’t do it unless we’re face to face.”

I wi
p
e away
m
y
t
ears and crack open t
h
e door. Mark is sitting on the floor with his head in his hands.

“Go on. But talk fast. I pushed the ala
r
m
. The police will be here in a
m
i
nute.”

He looks up. “I’m
asking you to set asi
d
e your feelings toward
m
e and open your heart.
W
hat I have to say is very delicate.
You cannot go to the press with this. You can’t tell anybody.” He pauses for a
m
o
m
e
nt. “I
didn’t do Ben Gomez’s evaluation. Melinda did and I signed it. She’s been asking for
m
ore responsibility. I was behind schedule and had a pile of reports to
w
r
ite, so I said
yes. It
w
as just this
o
ne assess
m
ent.”

“You risked both our reputations bec
a
use you couldn’t say no to your trophy wife?
This is unbelievable.”

“Melinda’s terrified. If this gets o
u
t, the Psychology Exa
m
ining Com
m
ittee won’t l
e
t her
sit
f
or her license. Her
c
are
e
r
is over, everything she’s worked for.”

“How about everything I’ve worked for
?
”

“She is so upset she almost had a
m
i
scarriage.
I
can’t
risk
e
x
posing
her
to
m
ore stress. I’m
afraid she’ll lose our baby.”

“You bastard. First you throw
m
e down to protect Melinda, and now you’re throwing her down to protect yourself. I don’t believe you.
S
he didn
’
t do the report, you did. I’m
going to call her
a
nd tell her what you said.”

“Don’t do that, please.”

“Then tell me the truth.”

“I a
m
.” He starts to cry. Except for when his father died, I don’t think I have ever seen Mark in tears. “It won’t help you to talk to Melinda. It
w
on’t change what’s happened. Don’t do this, please.
F
i
nd another way.”

“Then you go to the chief and the press. Tell them what happened. Tell them about the bribe. About the phony psych e
v
al that you signed, done by an unqualified, unlicensed non-psychologist.”

“I ca
n
’t.”

“
W
hy not
?
”

“Because t
h
e part about the bribe is
n
’t true.” He looks up at
m
e and holds out his hand, like a beggar. I notice
the hair on the top of
h
i
s
head
is
getting
thin.

“I’ll be honest with you, Doc.” Manny lays his clipboard down on
m
y new coffee table. “This is a ‘he said, she said’ kind of situation.”

“He threatened
m
e, Manny. I was afraid.”

“That doesn’t change the fact that you
hit him
with a bottle, and he has a gash on the side of his head. The
m
edics just called from
t
he hospital. The doctors want to keep him
overnight to see if he has a concussion. You don’t have any injur
i
es. There aren’t any witnesses, so it’s just his word against yours.”

My bruised shoulders are days
away from
declaring the
m
selves. “He’s a foot taller than I am
and seventy pounds heavier.”

“He has no priors for d.v.”

“Neither do
I.”

“Has he ever tried to hurt you before
?
”

I shake my head. My neck hurts.

“So why now
?
”

I tell him
that Mark had taken a bri
b
e to fake Ben’s psych report, and that he thought I was going to expose hi
m
.

“That’s civil, not cri
m
inal. Do
m
estic violence is cri
m
inal. You
m
i
ght want to take out a restraining order first thing in the morning. It’s the D.A.’s decision about
w
hether or not to file charges against you. This is serious, this is felony d.v. If your ex wasn’t safe in the hospit
a
l right now, I’d have to take you to jail.”

When I call the hospital the next
m
orning,
Mark has been released. That
m
eans he doesn’t have a concussion. I’m
relieved. The les
s
er his injuries, the lighter
m
y sentence. Bluish
m
arks are beginning to bloom
on
m
y a
r
m
s and shoulders. My neck aches with whiplash.

I start with the California Code for Men
t
al Health Professionals and
m
ove on to the internet. By the ti
m
e the t
e
lephone rings,
m
y eyes are blur
r
y. It is Mark’s attorney. He infor
m
s
m
e
i
n a so
m
ber and sonorous voice, that he is about to file a cri
m
inal co
m
plaint against
m
e. However, in light of
m
y long
relationship with his client, he
w
ould recom
m
end negotiating out of court.
Quid
pro quo
. Mark won
’
t pursue his co
m
plaint if I agree, in writing, not to pursue what the
attorney calls an unfortunate pro
f
essional
m
i
sunderstanding. He tells
m
e I have twenty-
f
our hours to think about it.

I tell him
to do whatever he needs to do for his client. I am
not going to negotiate or settle.

Mark is still pretending that Mel
i
nda did Ben’s testing.
W
ith the code propped open in front of
m
e, I tell Mark
’
s attorney that I am going to file charges in civil court for healthcare fraud, billing for services render
e
d by a lesser qualified
person, failure to properly supervise a psychological assistant
a
nd ensure that the extent, kind and quality of the functions performed by said assistant are consistent with his, in this case her, training and experience, and failure to inform
t
h
e clie
n
t in w
r
iting t
h
at s
a
id assi
s
tant
w
as unlicensed.
I
advise
the
attor
n
ey that Mark is also in v
i
olation of Section 1032 of the California
G
overn
m
ent Code that e
x
plicitly
states that any p
s
ychologi
s
t conducting
pr
e-e
m
ploy
m
ent
scree
n
ing
o
f
peace officer applica
n
ts
be licensed and have at least the equivalent of five full-ti
m
e years of
e
xperience in the diagnosis and treat
m
ent of e
m
otional and
m
ental disorders, three of which must be accrued postdoctorate.