The Happy Housewife (Samantha Sherman Book 1) (20 page)

“Tell me about Dan. I met him for two seconds at Helen’s house the Sunday before he died. He seemed nice.” Actually, Sam really couldn’t tell what Dan was like from meeting him, but Helen’s description of him made him sound like a decent person.

Marjorie’s face lit up and she gave a small, shy smile. “He was a sweet guy. He was a believer in our cause but he always tended toward the side of convincing people instead of forcing them. He was kind of a gentle giant. He was so great to me when we were active in the movement. I was always with Clint, but Dan was there a lot to pick me up after Clint and I had one of our fights. In fact, after a while, Clint started accusing me of having an affair with him. I kind of wanted to, but I was never sure Dan felt the same way. We went our different ways when things in the movement fell apart. When we were brought back together a couple of years back, Dan hadn’t changed. All that time had passed and he hadn’t changed.” She paused and Sam wisely didn’t say a word, sensing that Marjorie had much more to say. She continued softly, “He wanted to take me away. I couldn’t leave Clint, not just yet, but we started having an affair. It was wonderful, but finally he said that what we were doing wasn’t healthy and that I either needed to leave with him when he moved to Chicago or he was going to go alone. In the end I just couldn’t break away from Clint. Too much history there, I guess.”

Sam wasn’t sure just how to proceed. What was this hold Clint had on Marjorie? She wasn’t sure it was physical abuse but, from what she had seen, it sure seemed like verbal abuse and, at the least, a bad belittling problem. Sam had volunteered, while at one of her first Coast Guard duty stations, as a counselor for a battered women’s shelter. She had answered the hotline and tried to convince women to come to the shelter to get away from abusive relationships. She knew from her training that you couldn’t badger someone into leaving an abuser nor could you just tell them what to do. Women in these situations needed to make the decision to leave their abusers themselves. What you could do was offer them options and express concern for their safety. In a non-physically abusive situation sometimes just building confidence could help.

“Clint is lucky to have someone who loves him enough to stay with him,” Sam finally said back.

“I suppose so. Clint and I have been together so long it’s hard to let go of that security. You see, I don’t have a family anymore. Besides, he needs me.”

Ah, emotional manipulation
, Sam thought. “Needs you?” she questioned.

Marjorie sighed, “Clint is complicated. I know he comes across like a jerk sometimes but he means well. You see, he suffers from depression and has toyed for years with committing suicide. If I left … I … I just don’t know what he would do.”

“I’m so sorry, Marjorie. That really puts you in an awful position. It doesn’t seem like you would stay with him if he was well.”

Marjorie looked away with a guilty face, “The truth is I would have left with Dan if I didn’t think Clint would hurt himself. Awful, aren’t I?”

“I’m no expert, but I would say you weren’t awful at all. I mean, Clint doesn’t seem like that nice a person and you deserve to be happy. Is he willing to get help?”

“No.”

Sam could tell Marjorie was bordering on defensive again so she decided to stop. “Well it’s none of my business, of course. I hope you are able to find a solution. If you ever want to talk or need information on people who can help you, please feel free to contact me.”

“What do you mean ‘people who can help me’?”

“Several years ago I worked in a shelter for victims of domestic violence. Now, I realize you aren’t physically abused but what I learned at the shelter was that there were all kinds of behaviors that can be labeled as abuse. If someone threatens to kill themselves when you want to leave, well, the shelter termed that abuse. Anyway, while you might not need to go into a shelter for your safety, they do have counselors who would be happy to speak with you.” Sam paused. Marjorie seemed to actually be considering what she was saying. Sam dug her nail into her palm to prevent herself from saying anything more. She wanted to add that Clint also had treated Marjorie over the years in an abusive way but felt that she needed to let Marjorie process what she had said.

“Maybe I would take your number. If that’s okay. I don’t really have a lot of friends.”

It wasn’t quite what Sam was hoping for but at least it was something. She smiled and nodded simultaneously pulling a pen and paper from her purse. As she wrote her number down, she added, “If you don’t mind, though, could you not tell Clint about this conversation? I would be nervous if he knew we had talked like this.”

Sam expected Marjorie to protest, protecting Clint, but she only nodded, “I understand and no problem.”

As they said their good-byes, Marjorie smiled and Sam thought again how attractive she was.

Sam felt oddly content as she walked out the main door of the school. She would run the pictures to Helen later or maybe not at all. She wondered why she felt so much better. Perhaps it was because she finally felt like she had done something positive, in helping Marjorie. She sang along to the radio and spontaneously stopped at the grocery store on her way to get Lindsey. She picked up ingredients to make two kinds of cookies. Doug would be back tomorrow night and it would be fun to have to have a special dessert to mark the occasion.

She reached the gymnastics studio in time to watch the last half an hour of the camp. Lindsey was doing much better on the uneven bars. Sam had taken gymnastics as a kid. She hadn’t continued with it and she wondered what Lindsey would do. It was so interesting to introduce your children to new things and then see where their interests lay.

Lindsey had spotted her mother just prior to the end of the class, so when it finished she ran right over to where Sam was sitting. She gave her a big hug which felt great to Sam. They chatted all the way home. As they pulled into their driveway, Sam reminded Lindsey that Doug would be coming home tomorrow night.

“Can we go to the pool when he gets home?” Lindsey loved going to the pool in the evening with Doug. He would throw her around and they would race the length of the pool. The only thing better for Lindsey was going to the pool with her dad on raft night, the one night of the week that kids could bring all their blow up rafts and play in the pool with them.

“Probably not tomorrow night, Lindsey. Your dad will be tired from his trip. But, we’ll most likely be able to go this weekend. How about if we make cookies for your dad to surprise him when he gets home?”

“What kind of cookies?”

“I got the stuff to make Hershey’s kiss sugar cookies and chocolate chip bars.”

“Yummy! Can we have some tonight?”

“Well, maybe we’ll have to test what we bake. Just to make sure they are good enough for your dad.”

Sam and Lindsey had a great night together. Sam marveled at what an easy child Lindsey was. She almost never had to discipline her and she was sweet and sunny most of the time.

As she tucked Lindsey in that night, about an hour after her normal bedtime, Sam once again counted her blessings and was so glad for her ‘conventional’ life. She drifted off to sleep with a smile on her face thinking about what they could do together as a family during the coming weekend.

S
am rolled over around 5:00 a.m. and padded to the bathroom. She came back and sank into her bed, happy to be able to pull the covers up and go back to bed for a couple of hours.

She was tired but still felt like she had already gotten a good night’s sleep. Her mind began to drift and Marjorie’s face appeared in front of her. Sam hoped that she would call her or get help elsewhere. She mentally ran over bits of their conversation and then ran over it again; this time she was more awake. Something was bothering her. She sat up and thought again about her meeting with Marjorie. This was crazy. She needed to go back to sleep and let that take care of this weird idea. Instead, she pulled a pen and sticky pad from the drawer of her night stand and jotted a couple of notes.

When she finished, she mentally rebuked herself for letting the past week back into her head. She told herself it was just her concern for Marjorie, but she knew that wasn’t true. Sam tried to go back to sleep but now her mind was racing. She finally began to drift off around 6:00 a.m. and felt like she had been drugged when the alarm went off at 7:00 a.m.

She immediately remembered her weird 5:00 a.m. thought process and decided she would check it out after dropping Lindsey off. It was a wacky idea …

Sam was reminded why she and Doug kept Lindsey to a strict bedtime as she had to try extra hard to wake her sleepy daughter. Lindsey took a while to get out of bed and was uncharacteristically grumpy.

Sam found herself being unusually grouchy right back given how distracted she was. She was barely focused on what she was doing because she was so busy running over the events of the last week, now in a whole different light.
Calm down
, she told herself. Odds were that this was probably nothing.

She quickly logged onto the computer while Lindsey was getting herself ready for the day, and checked a few things. They eventually ran out of the house with just enough time to make it to the camp. Sam was so preoccupied that she and Lindsey were halfway to the gymnastics camp before Sam realized she had forgotten Lindsey’s lunch. They tore back to the house, grabbed the lunch and made it to the camp ten minutes late. Lindsey was looking at Sam warily by the time she was dropped off and felt compelled to remind her crazy mother of the performance the kids would give their parents at 3:00 p.m.

Sam left the parking lot feeling guilty but ready for her next task. She arrived at the Kings Park drugstore and slowly began searching the shelves. When she found what she was looking for, she stopped and stared for a long time. It still wasn’t anything definite but it was weird to say the least. She would go and ask about it.

Once she was back in her car, she remembered the police. She shrunk back in the car seat not wanting to face a possible confrontation with Don, whom she had bothered too much already, or Nathan, who would probably go ballistic. She knew that she needed to let them know what she was doing. But, she wrestled with herself, what’s wrong with stopping by and asking a few questions? It wasn’t like it was anything dangerous.
Just like Pete wasn’t dangerous? Right, Sam.
Argh
, she was going to feel like an idiot calling Don, yet again.

Sam turned on her car engine. As usual the heat was intense inside her car. The weather report was for thundershowers in the afternoon. Monday’s showers had done little to cool things, so, hopefully, this afternoon’s showers would last longer and get rid of the humidity. With the air-conditioning starting to cool her down, Sam fumbled in her purse for her cell phone and then found the detectives’ business cards.

She tried Don’s number first and felt relief when the phone rang several times and then went to voice mail. She sighed happily and hung up without leaving a message. How would she leave this message anyway? Her relief was short lived, of course, as she realized that she would need to call Nathan.

She decided she would call him from the road. She pulled out of the drugstore parking lot and headed down Braddock Road. It was a short trip so after a few minutes she reluctantly picked up her phone again.
Sam, you know you aren’t great with the cell phone,
she scolded herself.
Why are you doing this from the road?

She finished dialing the number but then waited so long to push ‘send’ that the number cleared out before she could dial it. The next time she dialed it and pushed send all in one motion. She then held her breath.

Unfortunately, her luck had run out and she quickly heard a gruff voice, “Barrett.” He would answer the phone curtly, that just figured.
Oh, this was going to be ugly
, she thought.

“Hello. This is Detective Barrett.”

He had spoken again before she could get any words out. Sam finally answered, “Hi. This is Sam. Sam Sherman.”

To his credit he only paused for a couple of seconds and then with an only slightly impatient tone asked, “How can I help you, Sam?”

“Well, I tried to call Don but he didn’t pick up his phone.” Why was she explaining herself? She needed to be direct, to the point.

“Isn’t it nice that he had a doctor’s appointment so you and I get to chat again?”

“
Uh
, sure.” Sam was too nervous to respond to the teasing sarcasm in his voice. “Look, I had these pictures of Helen’s that she left at my house so I went by the school to drop them off …” Sam continued telling Nathan what had happened Thursday and Nathan didn’t interrupt her once. She finished up with what she came up with at 5:00 a.m. and her trip to the drugstore. Then she told him where she was going. “Given our conversation the other day, I wanted to keep you all informed, even if this doesn’t mean anything.”

When she was finished, she held her breath again, waiting for the tirade that was to come. She was surprised when an even-toned Nathan said, “Interesting, very interesting. Look, however safe you may feel, I would like to be there. I don’t want you going in without me. Where are you now?”

“Actually, I just pulled up to Helen’s house.”

“I’m probably twenty minutes away. Just hang out there in your car, okay?”

Sam reluctantly agreed and hung up. She was glad she had called him. It probably was the better way to handle things. She pulled out her ‘to do’ list for the week and decided to make a new list for next week. Clearly nothing she had on her list, except one grocery trip after her talk with Helen, was going to get done. She wanted to have a nice family weekend so it probably wouldn’t be until Monday before she could start working on her list again.

Sam reworked what she wanted to accomplish next week for a couple more minutes then jotted down some grocery items to pick up for the weekend. Depending on how things went with Helen, she might have time to put away the laundry before checking out Lindsey’s performance at 3:00 p.m. Sam paused for a minute and checked her watch. She had filled about five minutes
.
Great. She reached to flip on the radio and looked up at the house. Helen was staring at her from her kitchen door.
Darn it!
Sam fumed silently. Now what? Helen looked equally surprised and then half waved. Sam wondered how long she had been standing there.