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Dr. Jones doesn’t mean to show her cards. Her eyes crinkle at the corners, nevertheless. I don’t take it personally. I’d bet good money it’s not just me. She hates all men. Dr. Jones isn’t the only one who assesses people for a living. “These whims…did they occur often?”
“Whenever it made sense.”
She jots down something else, this time more quickly. I crane my neck, trying to steal a glance at the page. Her handwriting looks like chicken scratch, making reading it impossible, even for me. “Once with a nurse at the facility where you cared for Mrs. Dunaway’s father, is that correct?” When Dr. Jones finishes her question and her note, she makes sure to look up at me. Her mouth is upturned slightly, letting me know she is enjoying herself. She thinks I am a monster.
If she only knew the half of it. “Once, yes.”
“Where did that encounter take place?”
“In a supply closet.”
Her nose scrunches upward, very nearly touching her brow. She believes, deep down, that she’s heard it all. Perhaps it’s my job to remind her she hasn’t. “At the care facility?”
“Yes.”
“And were you rough with her as well?”
“Only as rough as she wanted me to be.”
“But it never happened again? With…” She brushes a piece of string from the leg of her pants. I look on as she attempts to pluck the name from memory. “With Ms. Leon?”
“No.”
“And why not?”
“Neither of us took it seriously.”
Her face remains impassive, but that twitch in her right eye that a little potassium might help remains. “But you had intercourse.”
“Yes.”
As if on cue, she rubs at her lower eyelid. I wonder if Dr. Jones knows about energy. About the power of suggestion. The power of persuasion. About how to get a person to do what you want them to do, without ever having to ask. If she does, she’s not letting on.
“You never did it again?”
“No,” I say, noting the way she repeats the same question in different ways. They all do that. The police, the media, legal counsel, lovers.
“Why not?”
“Probably because right after that there was Laurel.”
“Do you think Ms. Leon resented you for this?”
“Why would she?”
This time, Dr. Jones observes me with a keener eye. Her expression does not hide her assessment. At best, she thinks I’m an imbecile, simply naive at worst. I won’t lie. Her observations make me feel unsettled, as though I no longer know right from wrong.
That encounter back in November, for example. I could sense that Laurel was nervous. I could see that although she was adamant not to let her feelings show, she was in the process of reconsidering. She wasn’t sure she should have come. She wasn’t sure why she had.
I, on the other hand, was well aware of what led her there. I, never one to let a good opportunity go to waste, was adamant not to give her a chance for second thoughts.
It helped the cause that I wasn’t pleased that she was late. Daylight was fading, and I’d promised Nina I’d be home early. We had plans. I hated to let them down.
“He thought I was Doris Day,” Laurel said, removing her coat. I removed the Do Not Disturb tag from the interior side of the door, placed it on the handle, and closed the door behind her. “Doris. Fucking. Day. Can you believe that?”
“I’ve seen worse.”
She surveyed the room. “I’ll take your word for it.” I could see she wasn’t pleased by my choice. If she were trying to hide it, she did a very poor job. “From now on, I’m going to have to do my research,” she confessed, nervously. “Usually it’s someone he knew. Personally, I mean. This one caught me off guard…”
