You Don't Own Me Read online

  “The boss’s idea,” he said with a smile, hitching a thumb toward the living room.

  Alex was already on his feet enfolding her tightly in his arms. He was still dressed for work, but had loosened his tie and taken off his suit jacket.

  “Well, this is a nice surprise,” she said.

  Leo was positioned in his favorite chair. His daily ESPN program, Pardon the Interruption, was on. The format involved the hosts debating the sports topics of the day, and Laurie found herself grateful that the sound was muted.

  “I could tell you were discouraged by the apartment walk-through today,” Alex said, leading her to the spot next to him on the sofa. “I thought we could use a family night at home even if hot-shot Rhoda hasn’t found us our perfect home yet.”

  Leo made a disapproving face at the mention of Rhoda’s name. “Alex filled me in. I can’t believe she suggested that any co-op in the city wouldn’t jump at the opportunity to welcome the two of you and my grandson into their fold. She’s only saying that to make you antsy. She wants you to lower your sights so she can swoop in for a fast sale. You tell her that any building that even inquires about Alex’s old cases can pound salt.”

  Leo’s invocation of the old police phrase was a sign that he was agitated. She was used to Leo rising to her defense, but she suspected that Leo had a specific reason for being critical of Rhoda. He didn’t want Laurie and Timmy to move too far away from his own apartment.

  “Nothing to worry about, Dad. We made it very clear that we have no interest in living in a building that takes issue with either of our professions—or a former profession, in Alex’s case. She also knows that we need enough room for an office and for Ramon, and that we need to be close to both Timmy’s school and your apartment,” she added.

  Leo’s eyes brightened. “And a nursery,” he suggested with a wry smile.

  “Shhh,” Laurie said, with a dismissive wave. “If Timmy hears that, it will be all around his school the next day.”

  Leo laughed. “I don’t hear a denial in there.”

  “Maybe we should change the subject to Chief Judge Maureen Russell,” Laurie suggested.

  “Oh, I saw her today,” Alex said. “Leo, she said how much she enjoyed speaking to you at the reception.”

  Laurie was delighted to see her father blush. “Leo and Maureen, I think it has a nice ring to it.”

  Leo rolled his eyes, but was still smiling. “You win. I tap out. I cry uncle. No more nursery talk. You buy as many rooms as you want, no questions asked.”

  Laurie and Alex exchanged knowing glances. They had, in fact, told the Realtor they wanted room to grow . . . just in case, someday.

  24

  Later that evening, Laurie walked through her apartment, turning off all the lights as her final step before going to bed.

  Alex had told her he had an early morning breakfast scheduled with the judge for whom he had clerked after law school. His judicial mentor was eager to pass on words of wisdom from his years on the bench.

  As she flipped the switch in the kitchen, she marveled at the cleanliness of the room. The granite countertops gleamed, and not a single crumb was visible on the tile floor. She couldn’t remember a time when she’d ever cooked a meal in this apartment without dreading the aftermath. She was going to very much enjoy sharing a roof with Ramon.

  She had just climbed into bed to enjoy the ending of the latest Karin Slaughter novel when her cell phone buzzed on her nightstand. It was Ryan. He never called her this late. In fact, he never called at all.

  “Hey,” she said, already feeling a headache coming on from whatever it was he was about to say.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d still be up.”

  “I just got into bed. What’s going on?”

  “Sorry, but I have to ask. Do you know my uncle Jed?”

  Laurie definitely did not know Ryan’s uncle. She was, however, aware that Uncle Jed had been Brett Young’s college roommate at Northwestern, which most likely played a role in nephew Ryan landing a plum job at Fisher Blake Studios. “Yes, I know who he is. What about him?” she asked.

  “Well, it turns out his publisher’s husband sits on the board of a children’s literacy organization with Martin Bell’s father.”

  “Uh-huh,” she said flatly, trying to recall the chain of connections that Martin’s father had already traced to her boss, Brett. “I think another one of Brett’s college friends is tennis partners with Dr. Bell’s accountant. Apparently Robert has quite the Rolodex. I take it he called you?” she asked, bracing herself for yet another attempt by Ryan to take over the production of her show.

  “He did—just now, on my cell phone, despite the late hour. To be honest, I’m pretty uncomfortable with the pressure he was trying to exert. It’s obvious they think Kendra is guilty and want us to railroad her on television.”

  “Is that right?” she asked, surprised at his disapproving response.

  “I was respectful, but said I’d need to get back to them. Have you made a decision yet about whether to go forward with the case?”

  Laurie was tempted to ask him to repeat what he’d said. He rarely deferred to her when it came to work. “I think it would be a great case for us,” she said, “but we need to make sure that the parents understand that we are going to investigate objectively. We’re not their pawns.”

  “Absolutely,” he agreed. “So what if we go speak with them in person tomorrow? We can present a united front, so they know they can’t push either of us around.”

  “That sounds . . . perfect.” It was the first time she could remember feeling like Ryan was on her side.

  As she hung up the phone, she felt absolutely content.

  She had no idea that less than two miles away, a man was Googling her on his computer, learning more about her life and wondering when to make his next move.

  25

  The following morning, Dr. Steven Carter struggled to turn the locks of his Fifth Avenue dermatology practice while managing to hold on to his briefcase, morning coffee, and the bundle of flowers he’d picked up at the corner deli. As was often the case, he was the first to arrive at the office. He had always been a morning person.

  Not that anyone would know by looking at him, but he liked to start the day with a trip to the gym. A few months ago, he had even started working out with a personal trainer to try to maximize the effects of his exercises. According to the trainer, he had increased his muscle mass by 8 percent, but no one seemed to notice, especially the woman whose affection he’d been trying to win over for more than a decade.

  Steven knew he wasn’t a looker. He was a realist, after all. In college, his writing teachers told him his prose was “stilted.” His philosophy professor said he was “unimaginative.” After two years of Spanish, he couldn’t even manage to order dinner at a Mexican restaurant without earning sympathetic chuckles from the waitstaff. The only classes where he didn’t feel like a loser were the sciences. By his junior year, he realized he already had all his medical school prerequisites down, so he figured, Why not be a doctor?

  And because he was a realist, he knew that his grades were probably only good enough to go to a foreign medical school. Five years in the Caribbean sounded pretty nice after growing up in Iowa. But much to his surprise, he had gotten accepted to SUNY Stony Brook. It wasn’t the Caribbean, but it was on an island—Long Island—and it would mean better job prospects once he was finished.

  But medical school was much harder than those undergraduate science classes. If it hadn’t been for Kendra, he might not have finished. She always made it look so easy and had a way of explaining things more clearly than even the professors could. And she was so beautiful, especially back then.

  He remembered the first time she kissed him. It was the night before the final exam in Neuroscience. He was nearly shaking, convinced that he was going to fail.

  “Steven, why are you like this?” she had asked.

  “Like what?”

  “Like . . . y
ou. What did someone do to you to make you so incapable of seeing your own worth?” And then she had kissed him. It wasn’t passionate, but it was soft and it lingered. Steven was stunned, but Kendra just looked at him with a smile in her eyes. “You deserve to expect more from the world,” she said. Then she went right back to studying.

  The next morning, he managed to get a B on the exam, and he knew to this day it was because he walked into the classroom thinking of himself as someone who was good enough to be kissed by Kendra.

  He started thinking of her as his girlfriend after that, but between classes and studying, there really wasn’t much time for the traditional “dating” activities. In retrospect, it seemed that maybe she just showed him affection now and then to break up the monotony.

  In any event, it became pretty darn clear that they weren’t anything approaching a real couple once she met Martin Bell their last year of medical school. Martin was everything Steven wasn’t. He was a brilliant doctor from a well-known New York City family. He was tall, slender, and handsome. As it turned out, enough to sweep Kendra off her feet.

  She started to miss their nightly study sessions to go into the city to see Martin. By the end of the year, the only times she’d call him would be to ask for help running errands to plan for the wedding.

  And of course Steven had done it. He would do anything for her.

  Steven might not be tall and thin, on television, or a brilliant doctor. In fact, he barely got into medical school, and barely passed once he was there. Nevertheless, it had worked out fine. Only ten years out, he already owned a thriving medical practice. He had chosen to become a dermatologist. He wanted to make patients not only look better, but feel better about themselves.

  He flipped on the sound system that piped into the reception area and treatment rooms. The radio station on the streaming service he used was called “lounge chill.” He filled the aromatherapy burners with eucalyptus oil. He was proud of the number of five-star reviews he had online for making his offices feel more like a luxury spa than a doctor’s office.

  He dropped his briefcase on his office chair and his coffee on his desk, and then carried the flowers he had purchased to the small desk that sat just outside his office—the one with Kendra’s computer terminal on it. He placed the flowers next to the keyboard and then jotted a message on the pad of Post-it notes beside it: K, Hope your meeting last night went well and that you are OK. —S

  Steven was a realist. Kendra may have married Martin, but Steven never stopped loving her. He knew how grateful Kendra was. He had given her a job when no one else would. Now he got to spend five days each week with her. And she had begun to invite him to Bobby and Mindy’s sports games and school recitals. Does she realize I would do anything for her? he wondered.

  It’s all coming together, he thought to himself with a feeling of deep satisfaction.

  26

  As Dr. Steven Carter was opening his medical office, Laurie and Ryan were in the Bells’ penthouse on Fifth Avenue, a few doors up from the Metropolitan Museum. After the doorman phoned for permission for them to go up, a housekeeper let them in. While they waited in the living room, Laurie became distracted by the breathtaking view past the museum to the treetops of the West Side skyline.

  When the Bells came in, they settled on the couch close to each other. They did not seem like the same angry couple that had confronted her at her office two days ago. They seemed polite, even friendly, and Laurie knew that was because they believed Ryan was on their side.

  Dr. Bell immediately invited them to sit down. Ryan had done his homework and was ready with icebreaker conversation. He had learned that the Bells were friends with one of his law school professors. The law school professor’s brother had operated on Dr. Bell’s sister three years earlier. Cynthia interrupted the exchange by offering them coffee, which they both politely declined.

  “So, Laurie,” Robert said, “Ryan told us last night that you’ve changed your mind about Martin’s case, but wanted to speak to us before moving forward.”

  Laurie saw no reason to tell them that Kendra, not Laurie, had been the one with a change of heart. “Yes, I wanted to make sure we were on the same page about the nature of our program.” She gave them the usual introduction she provided when she initially approached family members about cooperating with the show. She emphasized the studio’s desire to unearth new or overlooked evidence and the potential for the show to provide some kind of closure if not final answers for the victim’s family members. “At the same time,” she added, “we are a news program, and we approach each case with the same journalistic standards that any reporter would use. That means we’ll be sensitive to your feelings as Martin’s parents, but ultimately must remain objective. We’ll report the full story, no matter where that leads us.”

  “Of course,” Cynthia said quickly, nodding in agreement.

  Dr. Bell was less convinced. A worried look crossed his face. “You don’t think Kendra did it, do you?”

  Laurie chose her words carefully. “We don’t form those kinds of conclusions until we have the evidence to back them up.”

  “So go find the evidence,” he snapped.

  Ryan leaned forward in his chair to get a word in. “Trust me, Dr. Bell. I have seen Laurie in action. Her ability to put together a case rivals the very best FBI agents I worked with at the U.S. Attorney’s Office. If there’s evidence to be found, she’ll get it.”

  “My point,” Laurie clarified, “is that we don’t decide on the conclusion first and then tailor our investigation to suit that narrative. We go in with an open mind, which means exploring all potential theories and suspects. And of course that will include Kendra. But being objective means that we can’t let the victim’s family members—even parents—run the show.”

  Cynthia watched as her husband’s gaze moved between Ryan and Laurie.

  Finally he said, “We understand.”

  Laurie was surprised when Ryan pulled two participation agreements from his briefcase, already filled out for their signatures. As Dr. Bell signed on the dotted line, he made yet another pitch of his theory that Kendra was guilty. “I’m sure she still has the ability to be very charming,” he warned. “We were quite fond of her when they first got together. But you didn’t see her back then. She obviously has a very ill mind. She got her hooks into our son, and the minute she had him locked into the marriage, she turned into an entirely different person.”

  “Did you ever consider the possibility that she might have had postpartum depression?” Laurie asked, recalling Kendra’s explanation for her deterioration after her children were born.

  “Psssh,” Cynthia said, brushing off the theory. “Why would anyone be depressed about having such beautiful children? I was at my utter happiest when Martin was a little boy.”

  “Surely, Dr. Bell, you are aware that many women don’t have the same experience,” Laurie persisted.

  “Please. A little depression is one thing. Kendra was completely out of her mind. Poor Martin was absolutely miserable. He knew he’d made a terrible mistake marrying her.”

  “What makes you say she was out of her mind?” Laurie asked. She remembered Kendra saying that Martin had been “gaslighting” her by telling others that she was crazy.

  Cynthia was eager to answer. “Martin confided in us that Kendra had had a ‘mental breakdown’ and was growing more and more paranoid. She even accused him of cheating on her and trying to alienate her from Bobby and Mindy by hiring Caroline. For heaven’s sake, the only reason Martin hired that nanny was because he didn’t trust Kendra with the children alone. He was afraid she might just burn the house down—whether an accident or not! Thank God we insisted on an ironclad prenuptial agreement before the marriage.”

  “If the agreement was so solid, why didn’t Martin just get divorced?”

  “He was trapped because of the children,” Dr. Bell said wearily. “His primary concern was for Bobby and Mindy. He stayed for their sake. He had even conferr
ed with a divorce lawyer to assess the likelihood that he would be able to retain full custody of the children if he were to leave Kendra. But you know how it is: he’s the man, and she’s the stay-at-home mom. There were no guarantees, and he wasn’t willing to risk it, and neither were we. Martin was our only child, and so Bobby and Mindy are the last of the Bell bloodline. They must remain within the family.”

  “And you think Kendra was aware that your son had met with a divorce lawyer?”

  “I’m certain she must have known,” he said. “That’s why she killed him.”

  “And you still don’t think she’s capable of raising your grandchildren?” Laurie asked.

  “Capability is no longer the issue,” Cynthia said adamantly. “First of all, she’s never even with them. She’s off working again, even though she gets more than enough money from the trust under the will to live quite comfortably for the rest of her life. We think she only keeps the nanny around so she doesn’t blab whatever she knows to the police. And more importantly, how would you feel if the person who killed your son was raising your grandchildren? It’s a matter of justice.”

  Laurie could tell that she would never get the Bells to see even a sliver of a possibility that Kendra might be innocent.

  “What did you mean about Caroline blabbing to the police?” she asked. “You think she knows more than she lets on?” From all reports, Caroline called 911 immediately after finding Martin’s body. She not only vouched for Kendra’s presence inside of the home at the time of the shooting, she was also the one who told police that it had taken several minutes for her to rouse Kendra from sleep, even though she was telling her that her husband had just been murdered.

  “I’m absolutely certain that Caroline was covering for Kendra,” Cynthia insisted. “She’s jittery and nervous whenever she’s in our presence. I’m sure the guilt is eating away at her. She’s holding something back. Even if Kendra is guilty, Caroline cares about our grandchildren deeply and is convinced we’d fire her if we ever got custody. We have tried to let her know that we would want her to stay on.”