Харлан Кобен - The Boy from the Woods

Like that.

Most of the media scoffed at these theories, which just made the Eggers supporters, coming from both the far right and the far left, dig in their heels and back their man even more.

“You said that you would never tell,” Delia said.

“Sorry?”

“No matter what. Even if it was to stop Hitler. If something was told to you under attorney-client privilege, you’d never tell.”

“That’s right.” Hester didn’t like the way this was headed. “You also told me that there was nothing on those tapes.”

“I didn’t know about that tape,” Delia said. “I had no idea that tape existed. I had no idea Dash helped Rusty dump the body in an alley.”

“Okay.”

“Because I was gone by then.”

Hester felt an icy hand touch down on her spine. “Sorry?”

“The two of them fought a lot. Rusty and Christopher. A lot of it was over me. Thirty years ago. You know how it was. Girls were things. Shiny objects. So I guess they had a big fight in the bar that night. I was dating Rusty then. We were getting serious. Rusty had gotten a plum assignment from the senator. Christopher had been overlooked. I don’t know. Who cares anymore? So Christopher knocked on the door. I let him in. He was drunk. He tried to kiss me. I told him no. He didn’t stop. No girl was going to say no to Christopher Anson, especially not his rival’s girlfriend. You can guess what happened next. I hate the term ‘date rape’ or ‘acquaintance rape.’ Thirty years ago, it was pathetically considered ‘boys being boys.’ When I shouted for him to stop, he punched me in the mouth. I ran into the kitchen. He raped me right there on the floor. He was about to rape me again. Tell you the truth? I don’t even remember reaching into the drawer or picking up the knife.”

Hester just stood there. “You killed him?”

Delia moved over to the window. “I sat on the kitchen floor next to him. The knife was still in his chest. I don’t think he was dead yet. But I couldn’t move. He made gurgling noises for a while. Then those stopped. But I just sat there. I don’t know how much time passed. That’s how Rusty found me. On the kitchen floor. Next to the body. Rusty took over. He cleaned me up. He dressed me. He drove me to Union Station. There was a late Amtrak from Washington to Philadelphia. He got me on it and told me not to come back until he called. I stayed in a Marriott hotel room for three days. Ate room service. Rusty told me he moved the body, so nobody would know. When I came back to Washington, nothing was the same between us. You can imagine, right?”

Hester could feel her heart pound against her rib cage.

“We broke up. And I started dating Dash.”

Had that been, Hester wondered, an arrangement between the two men? Was Delia still just a thing, a shiny object, being bartered for a favor? Or had Rusty really loved her? Had Rusty loved her so much that the politician so many believed would destroy the country sacrificed his own happiness to protect her?

Or does it go deeper than that?

Did Rusty’s actions that night — getting rid of a bloody corpse, living with the awful lies and aftermath, losing the love of his life and then his parents — are those what warped Rusty Eggers? Had all of that nudged the young college student off the straight and narrow and veered him into becoming the irredeemably damaged man he was now?

Delia put up her hands. Her smile was sad. “The rest is history.”

“After all that, you’re staying with him?”

“Dash? We have a life together. A family, kids — especially a boy who suffered a great trauma and is going to need stability. We both kept secrets from each other. I at least know his now.”

“And you won’t tell him yours?”

“That I was the one who killed Christopher?” Delia shook her head. “No, never.”

“Hell of a thing to live with,” Hester said.

“Been living with it for over thirty years,” Delia said. She made a production out of checking her watch. “I better go.”

“People wouldn’t blame you,” Hester said, trying to keep the desperation out of her voice. “You were being raped. You can still come out of this doing the right thing.”

“I am doing the right thing. For me. For my family.”

She turned to leave.

“There was one secret you and Dash both kept,” Hester said.

“What’s that?”

“What did you think when you heard that Raymond Stark had been arrested for Christopher’s murder?”

Delia didn’t reply.

“You both knew the truth, right? You and Dash. You didn’t talk about it with each other, but you both knew that an innocent man had been arrested. Yet you never came forward.”

“And say what?” Delia asked.

“That you did it in self-defense.”

“You think anyone would believe me?”

“So you just let Raymond Stark take the fall.”

“I hoped he’d get off.”

“And when he didn’t?” Hester crossed the room and got into her face. “When he got sentenced to life in prison for something he didn’t do? When he got beaten and abused?”

“I didn’t sentence him. I didn’t beat him or abuse him. Won’t the tape free him now?”

“No, Delia. The tape won’t be enough. Raymond Stark will stay in prison.” Hester took a breath, tried to sound reasonable. “But please, listen to me—”

“No. I’m leaving now.”

“You helped lock him up. You can’t just—”

“Goodbye, Hester.”

“I could tell.”

Delia smiled and shook her head. “No, you couldn’t, Hester.”

Hester stood there, her fists at her side, her body shaking.

“First off,” Delia said, “there is no evidence. I’ll just deny it. But more than that, you won’t violate attorney-client privilege. Even if it meant saving the world from Hitler. Even if it means an innocent man stays in jail.”

The system was flawed, but it was still the system.

Delia Maynard left the office then. For a few minutes, Hester didn’t move. Sarah McLynn came in and said, “Your next appointment—”

“Cancel.”

“I can’t just cancel. He’s—”

“Cancel.”

The tone left no room for argument. Hester circled back to her desk. With a shaking hand, she picked up the phone and dialed the number.

The voice that answered sounded tentative. “Hello?”

“Oren?”

She hadn’t spoken to him in three weeks, not since the pizza date. She hadn’t returned his calls or answered his texts.

“Are you okay, Hester?”

“I need you to take me someplace. I need you to take me now.”

Two hours later, Oren pulled the squad car onto the shoulder of Mountain Road. He turned off the ignition. For a few moments the two of them just sat in silence.

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

When Hester nodded, Oren got out of the passenger side and opened her door. Up ahead, Hester saw the weathered makeshift cross. It was odd for her to see it here — her son had been raised somewhere between agnostic and Jewish — but for some reason, Hester didn’t mind it. Someone had cared. Someone had tried.

Hester walked over to the edge of the highway and looked down the steep embankment.

“So this is where...?”

“Yes.”

Hester had never had the courage — if courage was the right word — to come here. Ira had. Many times. He wouldn’t tell her. He would say he was going out for a ride or to pick up milk at the 7-Eleven, but she knew that he would pull his car over on the shoulder, maybe in this exact same spot, and get out and look at the makeshift cross and sob.

Ira hadn’t told her. She wished that he had.

“Where did the car end up?”