Linwood Barclay - Broken Promise - A Thriller

I hadn’t planned to have breakfast, but Mom had already put a cup of coffee at my place at the table. I grabbed it without sitting down, took a sip, set it on the counter.

“I have to go,” I said. To Dad, who was struggling as usual with the tablet, jabbing it like he was Moe poking Curly’s eyes out, I said, “Ethan can walk today. Scoot him out in plenty of time to get to school.”

“Sure. He gonna have any more trouble with that boy?”

“I hope not.”

Dad nodded. “That’s good.”

There was something different about him today. Actually, I’d noticed it first late yesterday. He was more pensive. When he’d put his arms around me in the garage and intimated he wasn’t the good man I’d always thought he was, I’d wondered what he was beating himself up about. Maybe it had something to do with Mom. I could tell something was going on with her. That she was becoming more forgetful, that Dad was covering up her mistakes. I could see that getting him down, but if Dad was being any less attentive, less supportive, the evidence wasn’t there. He seemed as devoted to her as always.

“I saw that girl,” Mom said, sitting down with her own coffee.

“What girl?”

“The one who came over last night with her boy. She seemed nice.”

“You didn’t even talk to her, Mom. I didn’t even know you’d seen her.”

“I was looking out the window,” she said.

Ethan and I had to get out of this house.

“Yes, she seemed nice,” I said. “But she’s got plenty of baggage.”

“Who doesn’t?” Mom asked. “You think we didn’t have baggage when we met each other?”

Dad looked up from the tablet. “David doesn’t need to take on another woman with a checkered past,” he said. “What did that detective say?”

“What detective?” I asked. “What are you talking about?”

“In the books. There were a whole bunch of them.” Dad had read a lot of crime fiction over the years. “This one had ‘money’ in the title, I think. The detective says something like, ‘Never go to bed with a girl who’s got more troubles than you do.’”

“Donald!” Mom said.

The thing was, Dad, or the detective he was quoting, was right. I didn’t need more problems. I had something of a history trying to rescue damsels in distress and it had not gone well. Sam Worthington sounded like another one. An ex-husband serving time for bank robbery and nasty in-laws who wanted custody of Carl.

That wasn’t a checkered past. That was a shitstorm.

And despite that, I hadn’t stopped thinking about Sam all night.

I needed to get her out of my head. I had more than enough to worry about. I had a new job working for Randall Finley, and was committed to looking into Marla’s situation, hoping I might find something that would help her.

I’d start with that.

“I really have to go,” I said. I took one more sip of the coffee and poured the rest into the sink.

When I opened the door, I nearly ran down my aunt, but managed to stop short.

She was just about to ring the bell. “Aunt Agnes,” I said.

“David,” she said. “I apologize for coming by unannounced.”

“No, that’s okay. Come in.”

As she stepped inside she said, “Your mother’s been calling about Marla, and I thought I’d drop by and bring everyone up-to-date.”

I called into the house. “Mom! Agnes is here!”

I heard a chair scraping across the floor. A second later Mom appeared and hobbled toward her sister. Her leg was still hurting. The two of them threw their arms around each other. Despite my aunt’s reputation for coldness, and the strain that sometimes existed between her and my mother, I guessed that deep down, they still cared for each other. Aunt Agnes just wasn’t very good at showing it sometimes.

“How is she?” Mom asked. “How is Marla doing?”

“She’s okay,” Agnes said. “Hello, Don.” Dad had made his way out of the kitchen to see what was going on. “I know you’ve been phoning and I thought I’d just stop by and tell you she’s probably going to come home today, although frankly, having her at the hospital is great, because I can wander up there anytime I want to see her. But it’s the wrong place for her. She needs to be home. Gill and I are going to spell each other so there’s always someone there.”

“What about...” Dad started to ask. “You know, the baby, and the woman...”

Agnes smiled, clearly understanding what he was trying to ask, but didn’t want to put into words. “The police are doing what they have to do, and we’re doing what we have to do. I’ve got Natalie Bondurant on it.”

“Do you really think Marla should be going home this soon?” Mom asked. “I mean, considering what she tried to do, wouldn’t it be better—”

“I think I know what I’m doing where my own daughter is concerned,” Agnes said.

“Of course,” Mom said. “Of course you do. All I’m saying is, if something did happen again, if there was another... incident... it might be better if she was already at the hospital and—”

“Arlene, please ,” Agnes said.

Mom said nothing, at least for a couple of beats. I guessed she’d gotten the message. Back off .

“I know what you’re thinking,” Mom said. “You think I don’t know anything.”

“I didn’t say that,” Agnes said. “I’m just making the point that Marla is my daughter, not yours, and I resent that you would suggest that I don’t have her best interests at heart.”

“My God, I never said such a thing,” Mom said. “You’re putting words into my mouth.”

“For Christ’s sake, stop it,” Dad said. “Both of you. Arlene, your sister’s going to know what’s best for her own daughter.”

Mom glared at my father for what she surely saw as treason. She took a second to compose herself, underwent an emotional reboot, and said to Agnes, “I’m very sorry if you thought that was what I meant. Anything you need, you just ask. You know we think the world of Marla and would do anything to help her.” She reached out and took her sister’s hand in hers. Agnes didn’t do anything to stop her.

“Thank you,” my aunt said, her voice still slightly frosty.

“And David’s going to help, you know.”

Agnes shot a smile at me that seemed genuine. “I know. And I appreciate that. I truly do. Listen, I must get to the hospital, for more reasons than I can count. David, I seem to have caught you as you were leaving. I’ll head out with you.”

Agnes allowed Mom to give her a half hug and kiss, and Dad offered the same gesture. Heading down the steps, she said to me, “I’m glad I caught you.”

“Yeah,” I said. “This is good.”

“I know the kind of signals I send off. That I don’t need anyone’s help. That I know everything. That I’m too proud to accept assistance.” Maybe she was waiting for me to contradict her. When I didn’t, she smiled. “I know yesterday, when I found you and Marla at the Gaynors’ house, I may not have seemed very appreciative of what you’d done. Trying to get to the bottom of things. And for that I apologize.”

“It was a stressful time,” I offered.

“Indeed.” We had reached her car, a silver Infiniti sedan. “But I have to put my ego aside. This is about Marla. I know she may not always speak highly of me, but she’s the most important thing in the world to me, and all I want is for her to get through this.”

She placed a hand on my wrist, and I could feel it tremble.

“She’s my baby,” she said. “My one and only. I’ll do anything to help her with this.” Agnes kept a grip on my wrist. “I have one request, however.”

Slowly, I said, “Okay.”

“This is very difficult for me.” She swallowed, looked up the street for a second to avoid eye contact. “It’s about your uncle Gill.”