Fear Nothing (33 page)

“Which was?”

Christi regarded the doctor, her gaunt face intent. “Adeline. In the middle of the night, whatever your sister dreamed about, it always involved you.”

Chapter 28

Y
OU DON’T NEED TO FEEL SORRY FOR HER,
” I said briskly. We’d departed the food court, leaving behind the queasy scent of deep-fried foods as we headed down the escalator and out of the Prudential Center. “My sister isn’t like you and me. She doesn’t bond, feel empathy or receive comfort from other human beings the way you and I would. Just because she’s alone doesn’t mean she’s lonely. Technically speaking, she would feel the same standing in a crowded room, or even in the arms of a man who claimed he loved her. It’s part of her personality disorder.”

“Meaning solitary confinement is hardly punishment for someone like her?” D.D. asked.

“Yes and no. It’s not the company of people she misses; it’s the stimulation. Shana may not feel lonely in her cell, but she does grow bored.”

“Not bored enough to change her ways,” Phil stated.

“The kind of change required is too deep-rooted. Bonding disorders are very challenging. Best odds of success are when the subject is younger than five. Given that Shana has spent her entire adolescence and now adult life behind bars . . .”

“She really stirred blood into her applesauce?” D.D. asked.

“Shock value,” I informed her. “Superintendent McKinnon had assigned Shana a new caseworker, which, given Shana’s limited social life, was basically the equivalent of handing her fresh meat. Shana told the man she was a servant of the devil, and mixing blood into applesauce revealed patterns that helped her foretell the future. For example, the caseworker would be dead by the end of the month. Then, when he had a heart attack just three weeks later . . .”

“No way!” D.D. stopped walking.

“Not a heart attack,” I assured her. “But a panic attack. Most likely brought on by spending three hours a week in the company of my sister. Needless to say, the caseworker retired. And my sister went back to plotting new ways to entertain herself.”

“Like contacting a killer?” Phil asked.

I didn’t know what to say anymore. I felt suddenly exhausted, worn-out. The things I understood professionally about my sister, versus the things I wanted to feel about her personally.

Such as, just because I couldn’t feel pain didn’t mean my family couldn’t hurt me.

She dreamed of me, whispered my name. My big sister. We’d spent only a few years together, one with our parents, two in various foster homes. And yet our lives seemed forever intertwined.

“Have you ever played the bar game?” I asked now.

Both detectives had stopped walking. We were outside the Prudential Center, standing in the middle of a bustling sidewalk, streams of humanity splitting around us. Midday in downtown Boston. Commuters, tourists, residents, all going about their very important business. While we discussed murder, with the late fall air sharp against our cheeks and the sun already contemplating its decline.

“The bar game,” I repeated. “We did it all the time as psych students. Go to a bar, gaze around the tables and deduce the life story of each of your fellow barflies. As soon-to-be-doctors, we prided ourselves on interpreting body language. You’re detectives; I imagine you’d be equally good.”

D.D. and Phil were frowning at me. “Okay. We like bar games, too,” D.D. said at last. “What of it?”

“Bet you could always pick out the fresh divorcé.”

“Sure.”

“And so can my sister.”

They paused as I watched the implication of this sink in.

“You think,” Phil said, “Shana guessed that Frankie was going through a divorce, simply by studying him.”

“It’s not so hard. He used to bring a bag lunch—packed by his wife—now does not. He used to wear a freshly cleaned uniform—laundered by his wife—now does not. Not to mention a change in pattern, such as staying all night at the prison during his time off. Someone as misogynistic as Frankie was reputed to be no doubt was married to a stay-at-home, see-to-all-of-my-needs wife. A woman who cleaned, cooked and otherwise tended him. Meaning when she escaped, the impact on Frankie’s world would be readily visible. In a crowded bar, I’d be able to read him, and so would you. Why not my sister, who had nothing better to do, day after day after day?”

They considered the matter. “But sounds like she knew more than the recent split,” D.D. said.

“Perhaps she gleaned choice tidbits from the prison rumor mill. Others dropped hints; she picked them up. Not to mention, it’s all about the delivery. Not knowing what you know, but
sounding
as if you know what you know. Christi called it voodoo. More likely, my sister is simply very adept at basic parlor tricks. She listens, she analyzes and then she strikes.”

“She listened and analyzed the second guard, Richie, into letting her kill him?” Phil asked dubiously, still looking troubled.

“I think she pegged him as having a conscience. After that, the rest wouldn’t be so hard.”

“Meaning you could do it,” D.D. said, her tone challenging.

“Except I have a conscience,” I reminded her. Reminded myself.

“You think Christi might be telling the truth,” Phil said. “Your sister outmaneuvered both those guards, maybe even got the third, Howard, to kill himself in a car accident, except it wasn’t because she had access to outside information. She simply manipulated them.”

“I think we shouldn’t imbue my sister with too many superpowers. She has enough superior attributes as it is.”

“Which leaves us with what?” D.D. asked.

I took a deep breath. “She didn’t do it.”

“Which it?” D.D., again, already disbelieving. “Kill Donnie Johnson, murder an inmate, shank two guards, manipulate the Rose Killer or all of the above?”

“She didn’t murder Donnie Johnson,” I said, and the moment the words were out of my mouth, I knew them to be true. “Basic projection, right? The three murders in the MCI, the crimes we know the most about, all had motive: to protect. That’s Shana’s trigger. Someone stronger attacking someone weaker. In which case, she identifies with the weaker victim and is driven to intervene. Save this kid today, save the child she used to be. Even the attack on herself, the inmate she killed in self-defense, fits that pattern. It was in the early days of Shana’s incarceration, and that inmate was larger and more experienced. Again, someone strong assaulting someone weak.”

“Except Donnie Johnson wasn’t someone strong,” Phil said.

“No. In fact, Donnie Johnson represents the kind of person she’d be driven to protect.”

“So what happened?” D.D. asked.

I shook my head. “I don’t know. Shana claimed self-defense, alleging that Donnie had tried to rape her. Frankly, it’s never made sense, then or now. Not given the size difference between her and Donnie, and certainly not given their character references. He was cast as a kindhearted, socially awkward science geek, while Shana became the hardhearted street kid who manipulated him into meeting her just so she could slaughter him. The first thrill kill, so to speak. Given the heinous nature of the crime, the jury took less than a day to sentence a teenage girl to life in prison. It was that kind of case. Shana was that kind of defendant.”

“You’re talking thirty years ago,” Phil said cautiously. “Your sister was a kid. Impulsive, hormonal, reckless . . . Maybe the reason that murder is different is because your sister was different.”

“Triggers are triggers,” I said simply. “We only wish we could change them so easily.”

“Then why didn’t she protest it more?” D.D. asked.

“Because she’s Shana. Because she really does suffer from antisocial personality disorder, meaning she doesn’t relate to people well, whether they’re her lawyer, a judge or a jury of her peers. It’s possible she already suffered from depression back then as well. I don’t know. I didn’t meet her for another ten years, so I don’t know the fourteen-year-old Shana. But if that’s the case . . . she would’ve expected the worst. Then when it happened, what’s the point in fighting it?”

Phil nodded. He appeared troubled. Locking away my forty-four-year-old psychotic sister didn’t bother him. Contemplating who she’d once been, the young girl with a troubled past. That was harder. As it should be.

“What about her lawyer?” D.D. asked. “He must’ve put up a fight, a fourteen-year-old client.”

“The best no money could buy,” I assured her.

D.D. rolled her eyes.

“Now, Charlie Sgarzi claims he found love letters from Shana to his cousin, but I don’t believe that, either. Shana abhors submissive types. No way she’d be attracted to a smaller, younger, weaker boy.”

“He has letters?”

“Found them after his uncle’s suicide.”

“Think he made them up? Maybe to sell a novel?”

I shrugged. “Or there really are notes, but he misunderstood them. The letters are really a form of coded communication or not intended for Donnie at all. He was the delivery boy, or . . .” I paused thoughtfully. “Donnie was smart, a bookworm, right? Maybe he was helping Shana write them. Shana wasn’t exactly a model student. To this day, her handwriting, spelling . . . Let’s just say, a handwritten note from her doesn’t do her natural intelligence justice.”

D.D. was still frowning.

“You think she planned this?” she spoke up suddenly. “I mean, all of this.” She made a churning motion with her hand. “You heard Christi. Shana’s basically rotting away in the MCI with no hope of ever seeing daylight. She’s clever, she’s bored, she’s got plenty of time on her hands. Why not concoct an elaborate series of murders, then position herself to emerge as the hero. It’s been more than a decade since she got to save the day by stabbing Frankie what’s-his-name a hundred times. Now she can take on the Rose Killer. Like you said, fresh meat.”

I shook my head. “I think you were right this morning: There is a connection between the Rose Killer and my sister. But it’s not Harry Day; it’s Donnie Johnson. It’s what really happened thirty years ago. It’s whatever secret the Rose Killer doesn’t want Charlie Sgarzi to dig up.”

“So we return to Charlie Sgarzi,” D.D. stated, looking at Phil.

“No,” I corrected her, earning a hard glance. “He hasn’t learned the secret yet; that’s the whole point. We need to find the person who has. And I might be able to help with that. Shana’s foster mother from back in the day. They lived by the Johnsons. Chances are, she remembers a thing or two about the kid. And I happen to have her name and phone number.”

 • • • 

B
RENDA
D
AVIES STILL REMEMBERED ME.
We’d met only once, nearly six years ago, when I’d first started taking over my sister’s mental health care and had interviewed Brenda as part of basic fact-finding into my patient’s history. At that time, our conversation had been focused solely on Shana. She didn’t appear surprised by my call, or that I had fresh questions regarding the murder of Donnie Johnson. According to Brenda, her busy social calendar was currently clear if we wanted to come right over.

We headed into South Boston, Phil doing the driving. Along the way, I had him stop at one of the local Italian delis for fresh pastries. It seemed the hospitable thing to do, given we were intruding on a now elderly woman’s life to talk about a time she most likely had spent the past thirty years trying to forget.

Now Brenda opened the door of her run-down triple-decker, blinking her eyes against natural daylight, though in fact the sun was setting, the day drawing to a close.

“Dr. Adeline Glen,” she said immediately.

Mrs. Davies seemed to have shrunk since the last time we’d met. Her rounded frame was hunched, her gray hair sticking out, giving her a bristly look in her floral green housecoat. I introduced her to the detectives. She nodded respectfully but was already wringing her hands.

I handed over the box of pastries. Her faded blue eyes sparked in appreciation; then she led us down the dark hall of her bottom-level unit to the family room that occupied the rear of the narrow triple-decker. She gestured to a faded brown love seat, then busied herself fussing over stacks of papers that crowded the top of the coffee table. She moved the pile to the floor, where it joined many similar piles. Both Phil and D.D. were looking around cautiously.

I remembered Brenda Davies’s home as being cluttered six years ago. Now she was venturing into hoarding territory. The loss of her foster children? The void created when her husband died, and she now faced the waning days of her life all alone?

I looked around the overflowing kitchen, the cramped family room, and I already felt sorry for the questions we would be asking this nice woman. She’d been one of the good foster homes. Proud of it, too. That was why they’d sent my sister to her and her husband. Except instead of helping my sister find her happily-ever-after, they’d simply become more debris left behind in Shana’s wake, the murder of Donnie Johnson destroying their standing in the neighborhood, not to mention their faith in their work.

It occurred to me that maybe Charlie Sgarzi was onto something. The full story of that one murder had yet to be explored. All the lives it had impacted. Brenda Davies’s. The Johnsons’. Their extended family, the Sgarzis’. My sister’s. And now my own.

One terrible act. So many ripples in the aftermath.

“Coffee, tea?” Mrs. Davies asked. She’d been busy in the kitchen, moving around stacks of dirty dishes, empty jugs of water, until she seemed to have found one clean plate. She loaded the collection of cream puffs, cannoli and macaroons onto it, then carefully carried the platter toward the coffee table, feet shuffling.

Phil graciously took the plate from her. He and D.D. declined coffee. Then, given her crestfallen expression, recanted and agreed coffee would be lovely.

Mrs. Davies’s face once more brightened, and she returned to the kitchen to resume bustling about a space that probably hadn’t seen a mop or sponge in years.

Phil and D.D. sat stiffly on the love seat, D.D. with her left arm tucked protectively against her ribs. I took the ratty recliner at the head of the coffee table. An orange tabby appeared from nowhere and jumped onto my lap. Then two or three more cats started to show their faces. But of course.