Kevin O'Brien - Disturbed

The phone to her ear, Molly was frowning. “How did he figure you knew me?”

“My guess is he went on the Internet, looked up Molly Wright, and found your paintings on our website. He didn’t seem like a stalker. There was something kind of snaky about him, but it was more professionally snaky, if you know what I mean. I think he may have been a private detective or something along those lines. Anyway, I didn’t tell him anything about your family — or your brother. Like I say, when his questions started to veer in that direction, I figured something was fishy, and I gave him the heave-ho. I hope I did the right thing to tell you about this — I wasn’t sure.”

“No, I’m glad you did, thanks,” Molly said. She rubbed her forehead. If this guy asking questions about her was indeed a private detective, it didn’t take much guesswork to figure out who had hired him. This had Angela written all over it. Jeff’s ex and her buddies were always trying to stick their noses into her background and personal life. Hell, Kay was just grilling her about Chicago earlier tonight.

“So — are you still living in Alexandria?” Doug asked.

She suddenly realized that they hadn’t said anything for a few moments. “Oh, no, I–I’m married now. I moved to Seattle.”

“So who’s the lucky guy? Another artist?”

“No, Jeff’s an executive for Kendall Pharmaceuticals.”

“Pharmaceuticals? Well, then I guess you guys must be doing okay.”

“We’re doing all right,” Molly said.

“Are you?” he asked, a sudden serious change in his tone. “I think about you a lot, Molly, and everything you’ve been through. I’ve always wished I was more— there for you when things got so horrible. Anyway, I hope you are okay. You deserve to be happy.”

“Thanks, Doug,” she murmured, staring down at the kitchen table.

They talked for another ten minutes. Doug had been seeing a concert cellist named Kate for the last year. She was the one . And if Molly had any new paintings, he wanted her to send him some slides. And should that guy come into the gallery again asking questions, Doug would find out who the hell he was — and who had sent him.

Molly already had a pretty good idea who might have hired the man. She just told Doug to keep in touch.

After she clicked off the phone, she remained seated at the breakfast table. So what if Angela and her gal pals find out about Charlie?

They were bound to learn about him eventually. Jeff already knew. Molly had planned to tell Chris about her brother sometime soon. Still, it was just so damn creepy that Angela had gone to the trouble of hiring someone to go to Chicago and pry into her family past.

Molly imagined some snaky, fiftysomething guy talking out of the side of his mouth as he asked her old family doctor about Charlie’s condition.

Her brother had been bipolar, which seemed like a blanket label for all kinds of emotional problems. Seventeen months younger than her, he was a very handsome, charming little boy with black hair, beautiful blue eyes, and long lashes. Maybe that had been why everybody cut him so much slack. He’d do something wicked, then start crying and apologizing, and people just caved. He was a bit of a manipulator that way.

But by fifth grade, Charlie started getting into trouble at their grade school, and it just wasn’t so forgivable anymore. That was when her parents had him diagnosed. They talked about putting him into a special school. He begged Molly to intercede so they wouldn’t send him away. Early on, she’d felt responsible for him. She was always trying to neutralize things when her crazy, erratic kid brother acted up. Sometimes, he’d go nuts and hit her — or he’d mess up her room, or destroy some drawing she was working on. And then, he’d be so sorry.

Molly always forgave him — eventually. He started collecting elephant figurines — like her. By the time he was thirteen, he had a hundred elephants to Molly’s thirty. Whenever he did something really awful, he’d give her one of his elephants, and tell her it was his favorite — a total lie, of course. She knew Charlie’s favorite: a detailed, six-inch gray marble elephant with its trunk up. But she also knew giving up any of his prized elephants practically killed him. So she always sucked it up, thanked him, and assured him that all was forgiven.

By the time Charlie hit puberty, he became more and more unpredictable. The guys he’d befriended were trouble-making morons. Molly couldn’t have any girlfriends over, because he was always hitting on them — or hitting them, anything to get their attention.

One Friday night while their parents were out at a party, Molly heated up a Lou Malnati’s pizza for the two of them. She was sixteen at the time and had gotten away with renting The Big Easy from the video store. Charlie was so excited, because of the video’s R rating. He anticipated ninety minutes of nonstop sex and violence ahead. He was hyper to the point at which he started to go out of control. Molly kept telling him to calm down. They were waiting for the pizza in the oven when he picked up the pizza cutter and started shaking it at her.

“Cut it out!” she yelled, backing against the kitchen counter.

“Cut out what, your heart?” Laughing, he moved closer to her, waving the cutter in front of her face. “I’m the Pizza Killer, and I’m gonna slice you up!”

But Molly wasn’t laughing. She threw the oven mitt at him. “Stop it! I’m serious, Charlie! I mean it, back off. You’re getting too close with that thing. . ”

He wasn’t listening. He brandished the pizza cutter, slashing an X in the air — just inches away from her nose.

“Damn it, Charlie!” she screamed, putting up her hand. “I said, back off!”

Suddenly, she felt the cutter slice into her arm — inches below her elbow. For a few seconds, Molly thought he’d merely grazed her. She saw a pink line along her pale skin — a long scratch.

Charlie was still laughing. He raised the pizza cutter as if ready to strike again.

Then the two-inch line below her elbow turned red. Blood seeped out and started dripping down her arm.

“Oh, shit!” Charlie said, dropping the pizza cutter.

Grabbing a dish towel, Molly hurried over to the sink and stuck her arm under the cold water. She frantically wrapped the dish towel around the wound. “Damn it, Charlie, what did I tell you?” she cried. “Why do you have to be this way? Oh, God, I think I’m going to need stitches. . ”

She glanced over her shoulder at him. He sat at the breakfast table, sobbing.

Molly kept her arm up over her head, and with a second dish towel, she had Charlie make a tourniquet and wrap it tight above her elbow. She had to coach him through the whole process. Taking her mom’s Chevy Celebrity, Molly drove to Highland Park Hospital. She’d gotten her driver’s license only two months before. While she steered with one hand, she kept her right arm raised. Charlie sat in the passenger seat, silent. By the time they reached the hospital’s emergency room, her makeshift bandage was drenched with blood.

Three hours and fifteen stitches later, Molly was back home, sitting at the breakfast table with a bag of Birds Eye frozen peas on her bandaged arm. And she was lying to her parents about what had happened. A burnt, dried-up Lou Malnati’s pizza sat on the rack inside her mother’s oven. Charlie had retreated to his room, claiming he didn’t feel well.

Molly wasn’t sure if her mom and dad really believed that she’d accidentally cut herself while fooling around with the pizza-slicer.

She tried to convince herself that Charlie’s condition had nothing to do with what had happened. Two years ago, her friend Cathy Brennan had had her nose broken when her brother had accidentally hit her with the rim of a tennis racket. Screwy mishaps like that happened in families all the time. But Cathy’s brother had owned up to it, and he’d been three years younger than Charlie at the time. Cathy didn’t have to cover up for him.