Lisa Gardner - Live to Tell

“My sister.”

“Feel free to extrapolate.”

“She’s institutionalized. Will be for life. And the hospital the state’s willing to pay for is more like a prison than a mental health facility. She’s my sister. I couldn’t leave her there.”

“So you found her a new place?”

“Private institution. But that means more money. State pays some. I make up the difference. To the tune of twenty grand a year.”

“Twenty grand?” D.D. asked incredulously.

“Matter of economics. Supply versus demand. When it comes to mental health, we don’t have enough supply, and every year, we have more demand. Ask Karen about it sometime. We used to see a handful of genuinely psychotic children a year. Now we make those same numbers within a month. We don’t know what the hell to do with these kids; how are the parents supposed to know?”

“What about your parents?” D.D. asked. “Can’t they help with your sister?”

“No.”

“Again, feel free to extrapolate.”

But Gym Coach Greg suffered from a sudden attack of muteness. He stared at the table, fidgeted with the beveled edge.

“Hey, Danielle,” D.D. said after another minute. “Take a hike.”

“No,” Greg spoke up. “She stays.”

“Then you talk.”

He sighed, seemed to be debating something inside himself. “My parents are dead,” he said abruptly.

“When?”

“Eighteen years ago.”

D.D. did the math in her head. “You’d be, what? Twelve?”

“Fourteen.”

“Okay. Parents die. It’s fourteen-year-old you and your, what… mentally ill older/younger sister?”

“Older. Sixteen.”

“She take care of you?”

“Couldn’t.”

“Because she was mentally ill.”

“No.” He looked up, sighed again, seemed to finally reach some kind of decision. “Because she was under arrest for my parents’ murder. She’d poisoned them. With strychnine.”

“Look, I don’t know all the details,” Greg told them. “I was a kid and my sister… I don’t know. I’ve heard a lot of different stories over the years. At her trial, her attorney argued self-defense. That my father had abused her, and my mother didn’t intervene, so Sally killed them to escape. Then she suffered a breakdown. The experts diagnosed her with severe depression, as well as borderline personality disorder. My sister’s attorney argued the borderline personality was a result of the abuse; it all got very complicated. Eventually, the state agreed to waive the charges as long as my sister was institutionalized. My grandparents were serving as our guardians at the time. They made my sister take the deal and that was that. My sister went bye-bye, and we all pretended it never happened.”

“Where was this?” D.D. asked, making notes.

“Pittsburg.”

“How’d your sister get the strychnine?”

“Don’t know.”

“How’d she administer it?”

“Don’t know. I was at a Boy Scout camping weekend when it all went down.”

D.D. eyed him skeptically. “I want dates, place, and at least two corroborating witnesses.”

Greg rattled off dates, place, and the name of two former Boy Scout leaders. The guy had apparently been asked to supply that information a couple of times before.

“You believe your father was abusing your sister?”

“I never saw any signs of abuse.”

“So maybe your sister simply wanted to off your parents?”

“I never saw any signs of violence.”

“Well, which is it, Greg? A or B? Your whole family history comes down to two choices, an abusive father or a homicidal sister. You can’t tell us you’ve never considered the matter.”

“Consider it all the time,” he said matter-of-factly. “Still don’t have an answer. Welcome to mental illness.”

“But you’re breaking your back-not to mention a few rules-to fund better housing for your sister. That’s gotta mean something.”

Greg fell silent. When he spoke again, he didn’t look at D.D., but at Danielle. “There are answers about my family I’ll never have. But maybe it doesn’t matter. My sister either killed my father because he was doing something terrible, or because she was suffering from something terrible. Either way, not her fault. Either way, she’s the only family I have left.”

Danielle didn’t say anything. Her expression remained shuttered, her body language tight. Apparently, the nurse wasn’t the forgiving type.

“Your grandparents?” D.D. asked Greg.

“Died several years back. The murders, the trial, my sister’s hospitalization… it took a lot out of them. They never recovered.”

“So you’re on your own and working here. Then you decide to upgrade your sister’s hospital, which means you need more money. A lot more money. Good news, the world is filled with desperate parents overwhelmed by their psycho kids, so revenue opportunities abound. You take the first respite job, then what?”

“They referred me to another family, then another. And sometimes, on the unit, maybe it would come up in conversation.”

“So maybe,” D.D. filled in for him, “you did prey on vulnerable parents.”

“No.” Greg said it firmly. “They might ask. It’s a natural segue. Here I am, qualified to assist with their kid, and there they are, needing assistance. They ask, I answer.”

“They ask,” Danielle confirmed quietly. “I’ve even heard parents pester Karen to make staff available to babysit. Parents are desperate for options.”

“How did it start with the Harringtons?” D.D. asked.

“I knew them from the unit. Ozzie was a very active kid and, you know”-Greg shrugged-“I don’t have a problem with that. We can wrestle and chase and I can keep a handle on things. That’s my job. And Denise and Patrick Harrington wanted that. So we arranged that one morning each week-it depended on my schedule here-I’d come over and take Ozzie to play. We’d go to the park, maybe bike. Something physical. They’d get time to themselves, Ozzie could blow off steam. It worked for everyone.”

“When did it start, when did it end?”

Greg had to think about it. “September last year. Couldn’t give you an exact date. Soon after they discharged Ozzie. It lasted nine months, then Patrick lost his job, and respite wasn’t an option anymore.”

“What did you do?”

“What do you mean?”

“They fired you,” D.D. stated impatiently. “What’d you do?”

“Fired me? They ran out of money. Not their fault. Frankly, I felt bad for them. Life was already tough. But they were good people. And Ozzie was doing a lot better by then. I figured they’d be okay.”

“What do you mean, ‘Ozzie was doing a lot better’?”

“You know, with Andrew.”

D.D. cocked her head to the side. Studied Danielle and Greg. “That’s right. The Harringtons were using services from both Gym Boy and Healer Boy. Any other additional services?” She stared at Danielle.

Danielle shook her head. “I’m a nurse. Even to babysit, you couldn’t afford me.”

Greg, however, had turned a deep, dark shade of red.

D.D. leaned forward, regarded him steadily. “Come on, spit it out. Confession’s good for the soul.”

“There, um, there might be a reason the Harringtons used both me and Andrew.”

“Really? Do tell.”

Danielle was staring at him, too, the expression on her face wide-eyed, the person standing on the tracks seeing the train coming.

“Andrew found out about my respite work. Coincidentally, a family who hired me also hired him. He put the pieces together.”

D.D. arched a brow. So Lightfoot had something on the good-looking MC. So much for Karen’s little spiel about knowing everything about her staff.