Gail Bowen - The Nesting Dolls

“You left Abby alone,” Nadine said bleakly. Her face crumpled at the image. This time, she made no attempt to control her weeping. The sound drew Theo out of his bedroom. As always, he was immaculately dressed. He went to Nadine and reached out to her as if to comfort her. She stared at him in disbelief, and then she began to scream. Theo looked blankly at his wife. “Did I make this one cry, too?” he asked.

“Don’t give her a second thought, darling. She’s just a whore, like all the others.” Myra took her husband’s arm. “Come sit by the window where you can enjoy the skaters,” she said silkily. “In a little while, I’ll bring your tea and some of those biscuits you like.” She turned to us. “Get out,” she said and slammed the door.

Nadine’s eyes were wide with horror. “How can she do this?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” I said. I took the cell from my bag and called 911. After I’d described the situation to the police, I called Zack and told him that Theo Brokaw was about to be arrested for murder and he’d need a lawyer. I explained that Myra would be charged as an accomplice and she would need a lawyer too. As I knew he would, Zack said he’d be right there. When I rang off, I dropped the cell back in my bag, and Nadine and I walked out into the corridor to watch the twinkling lights on the ficus, listen to the piano, and wait. At one point, Louise Hunter opened her door a crack and saw us. “Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked.

Pain ravaged Nadine’s delicate features. “Keep playing Bach,” she said.

Louise’s music was the only sound we heard as we waited for the police. The Brokaw apartment was silent. At one point, Nadine’s eyes travelled to the Brokaws’ door. “What do you think Myra’s doing in there?” she asked.

“There’s no way she can prepare Theo for what’s to come,” I said. “I imagine she’s just making him comfortable.”

“Being a good wife,” Nadine said. She shook her head sadly. “Myra had the quotation wrong, you know. It isn’t a wife whose price is beyond rubies. It’s a virtuous woman.”

After the police arrived, everything happened quickly. Nadine and I were escorted back into the Brokaws’ apartment in time to witness what, under other circumstances, would have been a poignant scene. Uniformed officers separated Myra and Theo, so they could be interviewed. Theo appeared dazed and frightened, and as he passed her, Myra took one of the martini glasses of candy from the counter and shook some jellybeans into his hand. Theo gobbled them and gave her a winningly boyish smile.

A male officer stayed with Nadine in the corridor and Debbie Haczkewicz ushered me into Myra’s sitting room. I sat on the cranberry-coloured reading chair. Debbie’s eyes met mine. “I am so relieved that this is over,” she said.

As I answered Debbie’s questions I faced the photographs Myra Brokaw had taken to create the self-portrait of the aging fragmented woman she believed herself to be. I remembered the sympathy I’d felt for her as she’d talked about the “little death” she’d experienced in leaving everything of her old life behind in Ottawa. Then I remembered her cold disposal of the woman Theo had raped and murdered, and averted my eyes.

Zack came. He’d brought another lawyer with him, a man named Tyler Maltman. I recognized him, as we’d been seated across the table from one another at a fund-raising dinner a few weeks before. I remembered Zack had told me that, of all the smart young defence lawyers in town, Tyler Maltman’s name was the one most frequently written on the walls of the cells. According to Zack, a positive jail-house rating was the equivalent of a starred consumer report. As I watched Tyler stride into the room where Myra was being held, I knew he had his work cut out for him.

After Zack embraced me and assured himself that Nadine and I were both all right, he told me that, given the complexity of this case, he might be a while. His excitement was palpable. He wheeled his chair with real vigour towards the room where his new client was waiting. For him, the good times were back.

Nadine and I left together. When we stepped outside, Nadine’s eyes swept the pedestrian mall. People were shopping and skating, and the man who looked like a sumo wrestler was ringing his bell for donations. “Ordinary life,” Nadine said. “All this was going on when we were in there with Myra. How can that be?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “All I know is that you and I have to become part of ordinary life again, and the sooner the better. How would you feel about going back to my place and taking our dogs for a run?”

Nadine’s smile was faint. “You’re the driver.”

Except for Willie and Pantera, the house was deserted. There was a note from Taylor on the kitchen table reminding me that it was our turn to feed the feral cats, and Declan had volunteered to help out because she knew I’d been delayed. I called and told our daughter that all was well and that Declan was on my hero list.

There’d been many times in my life when I’d found physical activity to be the perfect antidote for overheated emotions. That day as Nadine, warm in one of Taylor’s jackets and a pair of her snow pants, ran beside me along the levee, I knew that while the horror of the last few weeks would never leave her, Nadine had not been broken by it.

Later, sitting at the kitchen table waiting for the milk to heat for cocoa, Nadine leaned back in her chair. Our run had drained the tension from her body, and she was ready to talk. “I was aware of Theo Brokaw,” she said. “Not that he was the one; just that Abby and he were acquainted. When she was finishing her dissertation, Abby needed a summer without distractions, and she rented a cottage at Stony Lake. Theo Brokaw was her neighbour. He was working on a book, and he, too, required solitude.”

“Myra wasn’t there?”

“Abby never mentioned her, but she did speak highly of Theo. She said he’d read her dissertation and asked all the right questions.”

“A mentor,” I said. “Someone she could trust.”

“What’s going to happen to him?” Nadine asked.

“Zack should be home in a while, he can give you a general idea, but Theo’s his client, now, so… ”

“I understand.” Nadine stood. “Joanne, is there a church near here where I could go to mass tonight? One within walking distance?”

“Holy Rosary,” I said. “But it’s a long walk.”

“I need a long walk,” she said. “My mind is crowded with thoughts that have no place in a church.”

When she was leaving for mass, Nadine started to put on her pea jacket. “You’ll freeze in that,” I said. “Wear Taylor’s jacket and snow pants. I can drop your clothes off at the Chelton tomorrow morning.”

“Thank you,” Nadine said. “But please don’t bring the clothes to the hotel. I’d welcome an excuse to come back for a visit.”

When Zack came through the front door, he looked like himself again. “I think I could handle a martini,” he said.

“Nothing like a red-meat case to bring a guy back from the brink,” I said.

Zack grinned. “And this case is going to be a doozy.”

“What’s going to happen to Theo?”

“Well, the only way out, if the facts can be proved – and they will be proved – is to show that Theo had no capacity to form intent. There are differing intents for murder and manslaughter. I’m going to be straddling a fine line. I need to prove Theo had no capacity to form intent when he killed Abby, but that will be difficult if the Crown can prove that despite Theo’s brain damage, there were moments when he did remember his relationship with her.”

“And there were those moments,” I said. “There were also e-mails revealing the nature of his relationship with Abby. Myra found them.”