Naked Hope (23 page)

Gavin fit his long body next to hers, reached for the lamb’s wool afghan, and wrapped it around her feet. “Better?”

She nodded. “What happened the day of the accident?”

After a moment, he said, “Everything changed.” He shook his head, his eyes heavy-lidded and shadowed.

Jill drew his head into her lap where she could stroke his forehead and place her hand over his heart. “Yes, it did.”

“Things had gotten so bad between Vivienne and me. We’d been in separate bedrooms for years. I spent all my time with Liv creating music.”

Gavin sat up, his elbows on his knees, rocking and holding his head. “Oh, hell, Jillian. The accident was my fault. We fought—” He looked around and began again. Every word plummeted like a rock. “She hated me and I didn’t even care enough to hate her back.” Voice cold with resignation, Gavin described the events leading up to the accident.

Fifteen Months Earlier…

Vivienne had just finished filling her fourth suitcase when Gavin found her. “You’re leaving?”

“Yes, I’m leaving, and I’m taking Olivia. I’ve been offered a contract for an off-Broadway production.” She tossed her head. “We won’t be back. I’ll email you our address so you know where to send the checks.”

“Don’t bother.”

“You don’t want to know where to find your daughter?” She wore an ugly smile.

Gavin fingered one of her suitcases. “This is all very amusing. Go ahead and go, but Olivia stays.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” She rolled a bottle of perfume into a sweater and frowned at the door. “Where in the hell is Baines? I need help.”

“Baines has other duties. You’re on your own. Take anything you want—clothes, jewelry, whatever but make sure you take it all. Because when you leave, you aren’t coming back. And, Liv stays.”

Vivienne scoffed. “You think you can always have things your way. But no court in the land will separate a mother from her child.”

“You don’t want her. You’ve never wanted her. Most days, you won’t even look at her. I can produce witnesses to testify you tried to abort the pregnancy, and that you’ve been diagnosed as a somatic narcissist. No one will give Liv to you.” He moved into Vivienne’s personal space and towered over her. “Care to see if I’m bluffing?”

“I might not want her, but you do—which is exactly why I’m taking her,” she sneered. “What will you do when you don’t have your little prodigy? You see? I can still hurt you. I can take the one thing that matters.”

Vivienne slammed shut the armoire.

Gavin’s heart stopped. Olivia had been hiding behind the open door, her little face, stricken. “Liv, honey.” He reached for her but she ran out the door, sobbing. He started to follow, but Vivienne stepped in his path. “Get out of my way, Vivienne.”

“What’s the matter, Gavin? Can’t take it? And that little scene’s just the start of the misery she’s going to feel. Divorce is painful, you know—especially for the children.”

Gavin clenched his fists and jammed them deep into his pockets.

“Hit me, Gavin,” she taunted. “Go on, hit me. You know you want to.”

When he didn’t, she jeered, “What’s the matter? Not man enough? You never were. You have no idea how to make a woman happy. You’re a ghost. I don’t know how I ever stuck it out here for sixteen interminable years.”

****

Gavin blinked several times and looked at Jill wondering if he was crowding her shock threshold. “I was so done with it all—I just wanted her to leave. To finally be free. I started to go after Liv, but Vivienne came at me, kicking and screaming. Our relationship was always this way. The colder I got, the more violent she became. In the early days, I tried to comfort her. Eventually, I stopped. I’d stay until she calmed down. But this time was different—I just wanted her gone. When she wouldn’t stop kicking and biting, I pushed her away and told her I was through. That I should have tossed her out with the rest of the trash years ago.”

He turned to Jill. “Not one of my finer moments.”

She took his hand and lifted it to her lips. “Go ahead. Finish it, Gavin.”

“When I pushed her away, she fell. The fall was theatrical—she wasn’t hurt. But she was shaken because I’d never pushed her away before. She laid there and when I turned to walk away, she shrieked, ‘you’ll regret this. If it’s the last thing I do, you’ll regret this for as long as you live’. She’d threatened me so many times before I didn’t pay any attention. But I should have realized that this time, there was something different. If I’d been paying better attention, I would have known what she was capable of.”

Gavin stood and paced the room. “After that, I went looking for Liv. I found her with her grandmother. When I saw she was all right, I left, intent on keeping my appointment at the lake cabin.”

“The final inspection.”

He nodded. “Vivienne had already loaded boxes and suitcases into my car. She must have chosen it because it was larger, and so I took the Jag. I stopped for a late breakfast just outside of town where Adrienne and I often ate. She arrived just as I was leaving.”

Gavin hesitated and looked at Jill. “When she heard I was on my way to the cabin, she said she’d love to come along. I thought she’d be good company but the drive bored her. By the time we got there, I regretted bringing her. I finished the inspection and we were just about to hit the road when Baines arrived.”

He paused before launching into his final admission “The police ruled her death as a suicide with intent to commit homicide.” He stared at Jill. “Do you know how many times I've wished they found me on that bridge? I never dreamed Vivienne would deliberately try to hurt Olivia.”

“And you feel responsible?”

****

Jill waited, her heart aching for this man so scarred by a woman who’d held nothing but scorn for him.

“I should have—how could I have not known what she was capable of. I baited her. I let things escalate out of control and didn’t even try to mitigate the damage. She hated me so much. How could I not know?” He jammed his fingers through his hair. “But who tries to kill their own child?”

Gage’s words floated back,
before they ruled it an accident, he was the major suspect in his wife’s death
. “Gavin, did you by any chance tell the police Vivienne’s death was your fault?”

“What?” He frowned then his expression relaxed. “Yes, I guess I did.”

Jill held Gavin’s face in her hands. “Look at me, Gavin. You are in no way responsible for Vivienne’s actions. The two of you fought. Ugly things were said. You both hurt the other, and what occurred afterward is shockingly sad. But you did not cause that accident. You did not cause your wife’s death. You are not the reason Olivia has TBI. Vivienne, and Vivienne alone, is responsible for her actions.”

His body went rigid and he pushed away. “But they’re connected. What happened between us drove Vivienne to kill herself and our child, just to keep Olivia away from me.”

Jill fought the urge to be overly sympathetic knowing he would despise her pity. “I don’t think so. Please, come sit back down and listen.”

Gavin eyed the sofa, and sat back down next to her.

“Something doesn’t make sense. You said Vivienne was leaving you to start a new life for herself. You also said she’s a diagnosed somatic narcissist. They’re provocative, often sexually compulsive, exploitative, and almost always pathological liars.” Jill crossed her legs and tucked her hair behind her ears. “But narcissists have too much self-love to commit suicide. To kill herself would go against every natural instinct she had. Narcissists are about
indulging
their natural instincts. She’d leave you, but she’d never kill herself. Her instinct for survival would be far too strong.” Jill examined his face, hoping he’d embrace this new information.

“You were her target, not Olivia, and certainly not herself. Narcissists have no empathy for others so for Vivienne, Olivia would hardly exist. From what you’ve described, Vivienne was obsessed with
you
, and angry because your attention to Olivia kept you from paying attention to her. That would make her want to hurt you, not Olivia.” Jill leaned forward and smoothed her index finger against frown lines etched deep between Gavin’s eyes. “As a narcissist, nothing would ever be her fault, so she’d have no reason to hurt herself.”

He caught her hand and stared into her eyes.

“Do you see what I’m getting at, Gavin? You feel guilty because you should have known fighting with Vivienne would drive her to kill herself and your child.” She squeezed his fingers. “But you couldn’t have known that because it’s statistically improbable that a somatic narcissist would commit suicide. Or have enough passion about Olivia one way or the other to bother trying to hurt her.”

She waited for him to process her words, and then folded both hands over his. “Parents almost always feel guilty when their child gets hurt. I’ve seen the emotion in the eyes of every parent I work with. A few minutes ago, you stated you would give anything for it to have been you on the bridge that day instead of Olivia. But how terrible would her life be if Olivia had lost you instead of her mother?” Just in time, she pulled back the words,
and how terrible for me.

Moments became minutes. At last, he turned and swept her into his arms. “I’ve been afraid that if you knew the truth

”

Jill closed her eyes briefly, let out a silent breath, and kissed the rest of that sentence into oblivion and wrapped his arm around her waist. “Let’s get a little fresh air. We could both use it.”

Their breath hung in the brisk air as they walked the asphalt path past the cluster of renovated lofts that made up Jill’s neighborhood. They continued over the little stone footbridge to the Wilson Institute grounds, and beyond the pond into the woods.

She reached for his hand. “Tell me about your block.”

He shrugged. “I haven’t composed a note since the accident. There’s just nothing there.”

“What about at the cabin?”

“That?” He flicked his wrist. “That was nothing. Just something that came to mind.”

“Isn’t that the very definition of composing? How about when we waited out the storm? That was new, wasn’t it?”

His mouth pulled into a crooked line. “That was less than nothing.”

“What I heard didn’t sound like less than nothing. Do you feel guilty that Olivia can’t compose, and you still can?” She squeezed his hand. “Just mull that over for awhile.” Giant flakes twirled as they fell from the November sky and melted on impact as if they’d never been. Jill hoped one day, like November snowflakes, Gavin’s unfounded guilt would melt away.

On their way back, they stopped into Leo’s to warm up and have lunch. Over tomato basil soup, he asked, “What’s next on your list?”

“Adrienne.”

“Okay. She and I go way back.”

Jill took an experimental taste of her soup. “How far back?”

He shrugged. “About as far back as you can go. We met in fifth grade. All through middle and high school, she was my best friend. During our first year in college, she fell in love and moved to Europe. When the marriage was over several years later, she came back and made quite a name for herself in public relations.” His fingers played with the pepper shaker. “After the accident, my agent of many years was so broken up about Olivia, he quit the business. I needed an agent and Adrienne was an easy choice.”

She blew on a spoonful of minestrone. “Was she with you in New York?”

“Of course.” His eyes widened. “She almost always travels when I do.”

“Oh?” Jill couldn’t keep the surprise out of her voice.

“But you knew this.” His gaze narrowed. “Wait, I see what you’re asking. We don’t travel
together
. Not
together-
together anyway. Often, we’re not even on the same flight. When we are, I’m in first class but she flies coach. She travels on her own dime and then bills me a percentage of her travel costs. She’s there to do a job.”

Jill bit into a perfectly baked popover and considered her next question. “I’m not one to talk about past relationships. The past is private and best left in the past. But Adrienne said the two of you were an addiction, and that photo would certainly…”

Gavin took both her hands in his. “The photo is gone. I didn’t know she took it, much less with my phone.”

Jill wiped her mouth with her napkin, hoping she looked more composed than she felt. “But you knew she took one—the two of you posed like that?”

“Did you see the condition I was in? I vaguely remember that night. You had just turned down Olivia, and I’d lost another concert date. Liv came into the music room and pounded on the piano. My dad came home and gave me the third degree about why Liv didn’t get into the program I wanted. I left in a huff to meet Adrienne.” He glanced at Jill. “We were meeting for a business dinner. But instead, I got drunk in the bar. She pulled me out of there and made me eat. While I ate, she stripped.”

Astonishment gripped her whole body, and her eyes rounded. “In the restaurant? In public?”

He nodded, his gaze darting to the side. “We were in a back booth. What can I say? Adrienne likes taking chances. She’s always been a danger monger. My point is

”

“You were eating and she just happened to take off her clothes—in a restaurant—in public. I heard you.” Jill pushed up her sleeves and crossed her arms. “I think you’re darn lucky that Warner fellow didn’t get wind of it and show up. But why was the photo still on your phone?”

“I had no idea it was there. I don’t use my phone for photos. Look.” He placed his cell phone in her hand. “No photos, see? I keep them here.” He took out his wallet. Several photos of Olivia dropped out, and one of Jill.

She recognized the photo from the back cover of her children’s series and picked it up. “Where did you get this?”

He colored. “Downloaded it.”

“Remind me to give you a better one.” Jill sat back and leveled her gaze on Gavin. “So, she just opened her sweater and took a photo of the two of you? You say she’s a danger monger. Does she often flash you?”

Gavin’s jaw ticked. “Look, she likes sex. She has almost no boundaries.”

Jill frowned and drummed her fingers. “What you’re saying isn’t at all reassuring. What were you fighting about the day she showed up at the cabin?”