Hold Back the Dark (26 page)

“Oh, yes. I think he hero worships him a little. Thomas’s biological dad left us when Thomas was just a baby. He wasn’t much interested in him then, and he hasn’t gotten more interested as time has gone by. Thomas was starved for male attention. Now, with Carl and Sean spending so much time with him, he’s on cloud nine.”

“Sarah, what I have to say to you is difficult. I don’t have proof of what I’m going to tell you, though I expect I will soon. I think it’s possible that Sean may have molested Thomas, or may be planning on molesting him.”

Sarah sat straight up. “What?”

Aimee began to repeat herself, but Sarah interrupted her. “No. Don’t say that again. I heard what you said; it’s simply not possible. I don’t know why you would come here and say something horrible like that.”

“Believe me, I don’t
want
to tell you something like this, but I couldn’t rest until I’d warned you. I think that Sean raped Taylor Dawkin years ago. I think it’s quite possible that he is a sexual predator, and that the time he spends with Thomas is being used to gain your son’s confidence and forge a bond that Thomas will be too frightened to break.”

“No. That’s not true. We can call Thomas in here right this second; he’ll tell you himself. I’m
sure
Sean has never touched him inappropriately or anything like that. Thomas would have told me. I would have known. I would have seen it! What kind of a mother do you think I am?” Sarah stood up, her whole body shaking.

Both women froze as they heard the sound of the garage door opening and a car pulling in.

“That’s Carl now. He’s home for lunch. He’ll tell you you’re wrong, too. And then you’re going to have to leave.” Sarah headed for the kitchen.

Aimee hadn’t expected Carl to show up in the middle of the afternoon. Maybe she
should
have waited until they had everything set with search warrants—but that could take days. If there was any chance that she could make sure Thomas didn’t become a victim, or put a stop to his victimization, it was worth it.

Carl strode in ahead of Sarah, a concerned look on his face. “Dr. Gannon, what kind of accusations are you making against my son?”

And then Sean walked in.

J
osh called Aimee’s office number. After four rings, it went to voice mail and he hung up. Then he tried her home number, which also went to voice mail. When her cell phone did the same, he slammed the phone down with a curse.

“No luck reaching Aimee?” Elise asked.

“None.” He drummed his fingers on the desk. Where the hell was she? She needed to know about the car, that she’d been right. It was all tied together. “How long do you thing that search warrant is going to take?”

“I have no idea.”

“I’m going to talk to the captain. Maybe he can turn some screws.” Josh headed up to the administrative offices on the upper floor.

How could she salvage this situation? She could leave and let the police handle it the rest of the way. But how could she leave Thomas here? How could she walk away, knowing what kind of danger he was in?

She couldn’t.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Walter. I know this kind of information is hard to hear, but I don’t feel I can keep quiet knowing there’s a young boy in this house who, if he hasn’t been victimized yet, probably will be soon. I suspect that your son, Sean, is a pedophile.”

Sean’s face went a ghastly white. Carl’s went beet red. “You think Sean is
what
?” he thundered, crossing the room to loom over Aimee.

“I think he might be a pedophile. I’m reasonably certain he raped Taylor Dawkin when she was about eight years old.” Aimee refused to cringe from Carl. She was done cringing. It was what he wanted, but it was not going to work for him today.
Not ever.

Sean pushed forward. “Did Taylor tell you that? Has she started speaking?”

“Sean, be quiet.” Carl kept his eyes on Aimee.

Aimee held his gaze. “No. Not yet. She will soon, though—now that I know what to protect her from.”

Sean sank down into the chair behind his father and buried his head in his hands. “It’s almost a relief.”

“I told you to be quiet, Sean,” Carl said from between clenched teeth. “This woman doesn’t know anything. She’s just throwing around a bunch of psychological mumbo jumbo to get a rise out of us.”

“No, Dad,” Sean said, sitting up and looking at his father. “It’s not mumbo jumbo. I should know—I’ve been seeing a therapist for close to seven years now.”

“You what?” Carl glanced back over his shoulder at Sean.

Aimee started to edge toward the door. Sarah now had enough information to watch out for her son, and the moment of confrontation was often a violent one. She needed to get out of here now.

“I’ve been seeing a psychologist, Dad. I had to do something. I wasn’t going to live to see twenty-one if I kept on the way I was.” Sean looked up at his father.

“What the hell did you need to see a psychologist for?” Carl demanded, now looming over Sean.

Aimee moved closer to the door.

“Dad, don’t you think it’s a little late to pretend that everything’s okay? I’m twenty-two years old. I’m an alcoholic and a reformed drug addict. And Dr. Gannon’s right: I raped Taylor Dawkin when I was thirteen years old and she was eight. I did it in our garage—practically under your nose.”

“It’s ridiculous to haul us up here and drag us over the coals for not making progress on this case, and then refuse to help us get a goddamn search warrant.” Josh was on his feet, hands braced on the captain’s desk, leaning forward to get right in his face.

Captain Gonzalez ignored him. He’d been on the force too many years to be intimidated by anyone yelling at him. “Sit down, Josh. I’ll make some calls.”

Josh sat down and looked at his watch. It was already after noon. “This thing is coming to a head, and I’m sure I’ll find some answers in that house.
If
I can get there before Sean Walter destroys whatever evidence might still be there.”

“I’m calling, all right? Sit tight for a second, will you?” Gonzalez started dialing.

Josh sat down.

“I told you to shut up, Sean.” Carl backhanded Sean across the face.

Sarah screamed.

Aimee made a break for the door. She didn’t make it two steps before Carl grabbed her by her hair. She tried to twist away from him, but he grabbed her arm and twisted it up behind her back.

With her head yanked backward, Aimee could see the vein pulsing in Carl’s forehead. His breath sounded harsh in her ears. “Where do you think you’re going?”

A small voice from the doorway said, “What’s going on?” Thomas had come down the hall and stood now in the entry into the living room.

Sarah started toward him, but Carl whirled and glared at her. “Stay right where you are,” he said, his voice quiet but full of menace.

She cowered back toward the kitchen and dropped her gaze to the floor.

“Dad, don’t do this,” Sean said. “You don’t have to do this.”

“Will you shut up?” Carl screamed. “How many times do I have to tell you to shut your trap?”

Sean stood, blood dripping from his nose. “I’m done keeping quiet, Dad. I have been trying and trying to keep the lid on all this, but it’s too big. It’s going to come out, and you might as well accept it. I can’t protect you. No one can protect you.”

“Accept it? Are you insane? Do you have any idea what I’ve done to keep your little secret about Taylor? Do you have any idea the lengths I’ve gone to? And you just blurt it out to little Miss Fancy Pants?” Carl gave Aimee’s arm a vicious jerk.

Aimee cried out. Thomas still stood in the doorway, tears welling in his eyes. She mouthed the word “run” to him, but he took a step toward her instead.

“I know exactly what you did, Dad. You killed them, didn’t you? You killed Orrin and Stacey.” Sean buried his head in his hands.

Carl’s grip on her arm loosened. “You knew?” he whispered. “You figured it out?”

“It didn’t take a rocket scientist, Dad.”

“Do you know why?” Carl hissed.

“I’m guessing it had to do with Orrin’s embezzling.” Sean shut his eyes. “I should never have told you. I should have gone to Orrin and let him straighten it out himself. I had no idea you’d do something like that. Not to Orrin.”

“I had no choice,” Carl screamed, yanking Aimee’s arm up again and bringing tears to her eyes. “You left me with no choice.”

“And how did I do that, Dad? You didn’t have to murder him. You could have called in the authorities.”

“Not when he knew that you raped his daughter.”

Sean stepped backward as if shoved. “Orrin knew?” he whispered. “He knew?”

“He’d figured it out. Thanks to this bitch.” Carl shoved Aimee away and she fell to the floor, landing hard on her left arm. She felt a snap and screamed as pain shot up her arm.

Thomas dashed past her and into his mother’s arms at the other side of the room. Sarah crouched and grabbed her son to her, pressing his face into her chest as if to shield him from seeing any more.

Carl glared over at Aimee. “Orrin said the doctor here had started asking questions. When did Taylor’s personality change? Did she seem afraid of someone or something in particular? What might have happened to make her change again? Once he had someone showing him how to put it all together, it didn’t take him long to figure it out.

“Orrin told me that if I went to the authorities about the embezzling, he’d tell them about you. I couldn’t let him do that. You were just a kid. The stupid girl was probably asking for it anyway, following you around like a puppy dog all the time. She should have expected to get kicked.

“I couldn’t let Orrin keep bleeding the company dry of all our cash, either. So like always, I did what I had to. I do what needs to be done, and I don’t look back.”

Aimee’s mind reeled. She had been right, and terribly wrong. All of this had its roots back in Taylor’s past. She looked over at Sarah, whose horror was clear on her face.

Sean stared at Carl. “He was your business partner and your friend for over a decade, Dad. And that’s all you have to say? You did what needed to be done?”

“Do you want me to cry? What difference would it make? It’s done. I wish it hadn’t come to that. Orrin and I were…uniquely suited to each other. It’s going to be extremely difficult for me to find someone to replace him.”

“That’s
it
? You regret that you’ll need a new business partner?” Sean shook his head. “I think my shrink was right, Dad. I think you’re a fucking psychopath.”

Carl’s face turned purple. “Watch it with the name-calling, sonny boy. It won’t be hard to tar you with the same brush. Who lured Taylor Dawkin into the garage?”

Sean braced his shoulders and confronted his father. “And who taught me to be the way I am?”

“What the hell does that mean?” Carl demanded.

Sean’s Adam’s apple went up and down. “That was the real issue, wasn’t it, Dad? You were afraid that if people found out about what I’d done to Taylor, then they’d find out about the years you spent raping me.”

The phone rang on the captain’s desk. “Gonzalez here,” he said, then listened a few seconds.

Josh was up and out of his chair.

“How long?” he asked and waited again. “He’ll be right over.” He hung up and looked at Josh. “You’ve got a search warrant. Judge Leal’s assistant has it waiting for you.”

Josh took off at a run. The first stop was downstairs to pick up Elise.

She took one look at him barreling down the narrow hallways, grabbed her jacket off her chair, and was right behind him by the time they hit the parking lot.

“It’s signed?” she asked as she buckled herself into the passenger seat.

“Yep, and we’re on our way.”

“Have you been able to reach Aimee?”

He shook his head as he squealed out of the parking space. “Still no answer.”

“She’ll just have to find out about all the fun and games later.” Elise braced her hand on the dashboard as Josh took a corner fast. “It would be nice if we actually arrived ourselves, though, don’t you think?”

Josh tried to calm down. Elise was right. Five minutes one way or another wouldn’t make a difference—he hoped. “Call crime scene, will you? We’re going to want them there fast.”

Elise was already pulling her cell phone off her belt. “What’s our ETA?” she asked after she hung up.

“Five minutes,” Josh said.

“Rape you? Is that what your mother told you? Is that why she said she left? Because I raped you?” Carl snarled at Sean.

Aimee tried to get up, but pain flashed through her like lightning as she put weight on her left arm.

“Mom didn’t tell me anything.” Sean faced his father squarely. “I’m not sure she even knows. She did know there was something seriously wrong with me, and sent me to one therapist after another until we found one who could help. I’m pretty sure he saved my life. At least what’s left of it.”

“And he’s the one who told you that you’d been raped?” Carl stepped closer to Sean, attempting to intimidate as he had with Aimee.

Sean cowered for a second, and then gritted his teeth and stood straight. Aimee’s heart clenched. She should have seen it before—old habits die hard. Sean was frightened of his father. He might be older and stronger now, but the memory of being a small child completely at this man’s mercy would never die.

“No one had to tell me I’d been raped, Dad. No one had to tell me who raped me. You stopped doing it by the time I turned nine, but that doesn’t mean I don’t remember it.”

“The memories of a child are unreliable. Any lawyer or judge will tell you that. I don’t know what you think you remember, but you’re wrong.”

“I’m
not
wrong, Dad. Where do you think I got the idea to rape Taylor? Normal kids don’t rape other kids. I don’t know how much worse it would have gotten if Mom hadn’t wised up and taken us as far away from you as she could.”

“And yet here you are, crawling back for more,” Carl sneered. “How bad could it have been if you wanted to come live with me again?”

“I only came back for one reason: to stop you from doing to Thomas what you did to me.”

Josh dug his cell phone out of his pants pocket and tossed it to Elise. “Call Aimee again, will you? Her numbers are all in my contact list.”

Elise took the phone, but didn’t start dialing. “She’s probably in the shower or something. You know she got home safe and sound.”

Josh took a turn at ten miles more per hour than he should have. “I have a bad feeling. Call Aimee.”

Elise’s eyebrows rose, then she flipped open the phone and started dialing.

“To Thomas?” Sarah Barlow finally spoke. “You were going to…do those things to Thomas? My Thomas?”

Thomas whimpered and buried himself deeper in his mother’s arms.

Aimee finally made it into a sitting position, her left arm useless, nausea and pain rolling over her in deep, throbbing waves. She fought back the urge to vomit.

“I would never hurt Thomas,” Carl said, his tone suddenly syrupy smooth, the rage gone from his face.

Chills went up Aimee’s spine. The man was a chameleon, switching from one emotion to another in the blink of an eye. Aimee suspected he didn’t feel any of them. He’d just learned how to show them to the outside world. Sean was right; Carl was a psychopath, a man without a conscience.

“I love Thomas. You know that. I want us to be a family. Don’t listen to what Sean is saying; he’s jealous. If I’m such a monster, why didn’t he report me to the authorities?” Carl smiled at Sarah.

“Fifteen years after the fact? Who would have listened, Dad? What authorities would have done anything with that? Besides…” Sean’s eyes filled with tears.

“What?” Carl asked. “Besides
what?”

Tears rolled down Sean’s cheeks. “I still love you. Despite everything, you’re still my father. I couldn’t do that to you. I couldn’t expose you like that to the whole world.”

Aimee saw the anguish on Sean’s face and also the shame. She knew all too well the paralysis shame caused. She knew the anguish it left in its wake as it boiled through one’s system.