MARY CLARK - Piece of My Heart

“How do you and Alex know each other?”

“I’m a white-collar defense lawyer in Philadelphia, but my firm has an office here. We’ve had a couple of cases that overlapped.”

“And you were Michelle Carpenter’s neighbor?” Laurie asked. “I apologize, but I got the impression from her mother that Michelle was living in… difficult circumstances.”

Lindsay barely disguised a roll of her perfectly mascaraed eyes. “Of course you did. Michelle’s mother didn’t even know her own daughter anymore. She probably pictured a rat-infested tenement. Michelle wasn’t rich by any means, but she rented a very well-appointed garage apartment behind the house next to mine. The homeowners are an older couple, snowbirds who spend most of the year in Florida. Michelle and I became fast friends when she moved in. She was one of the best-hearted people I ever met, but she told me her mother was convinced she was a failure and a loser.”

“And why was that?”

She shrugged. “Because Michelle didn’t live up to the big dreams she had as a younger woman. Life threw her a curveball with an unplanned pregnancy, and she made the painful decision to place that baby with a loving family. She said it was the hardest thing she ever did, but also the act that made her most proud. But to her mother, it was like Michelle was marked by a scarlet A for the rest of time.”

“But did Michelle ever suggest her mother could be violent… or erratic? Or if she ever indicated any resentment over her grandson’s adoption?” It was becoming clear that Sandra hadn’t been the most supportive mother, but Laurie was trying to figure out if the woman was capable of kidnapping Johnny.

Lindsay shook her head. “As judgmental as her mother was, I got the impression the adoption was the one decision of Michelle’s that Sandra actually supported.”

“My understanding is that Sandra believed that drugs killed Michelle long before she actually died.”

Lindsay’s eyes sparked with anger. “That’s so unfair. Michelle had been clean for nearly two years. That was the whole reason she moved to Philly. She wanted to get away from old influences and bad habits. Sandra refused to believe she’d turned her life around. Too much disappointment after so many failed attempts in the past, I suppose. So, of course, when the police told her that Michelle died of an overdose, she immediately believed them. The case was open and shut without a second glance.”

“But not for you. You think she was murdered.”

“The night I found her, we were supposed to do takeout and TV at my house. We’d get together every couple of weeks to keep up with shows we both liked, but mostly to gab. I texted a couple of times when she was unusually late. I could see her car parked in the driveway, so I finally went over to see what was going on. I knocked at first, but then opened the door to check on her.”

“It was unlocked?”

Lindsay nodded. “That was her usual, though, at least at that hour. We live— lived , I suppose—in a very safe neighborhood. I knew immediately something was wrong. Her apartment was usually so tidy, but not that day. The place was a wreck.”

“Like someone had ransacked it?”

She shook her head. “No, more just… really messy. There was an open bottle of vodka on the nightstand with a glass tipped over. A bag of chips was left out on the coffee table. Dirty dishes scattered around. Little odds and ends she would normally have tucked away were sprawled all over the place. It just wasn’t like her at all. I found her in the bedroom. The needle was still next to her on the bed, a thick rubber band around her arm.”

Laurie could tell that Lindsay was still haunted by the discovery. “When was the last time you had seen her?”

“Only three days earlier. I had run next door to borrow some red pepper. And I’m telling you, she was clean and healthy, and her apartment was spick-and-span, just like normal. I told the police that I thought someone had staged the scene to make her seem like a drug addict or something, but they didn’t want to listen. It was easier to write her off as yet another junkie.”

“According to Sandra, Michelle struggled for years after her pregnancy. Isn’t it possible she had another relapse and hid the warning signs from you?” Laurie knew that the chances of an overdose were often highest when addicts relapsed after a period of abstinence, because of a decrease in their tolerance for the drug.

“I don’t buy it, not for a second. Michelle was on such a good track. She was actually starting to make a decent living selling her jewelry online. She was trying to sell her designs to one of the big department stores. One of my law partners helped her draw up business plans.”

“Sandra made the jewelry sound like a pipe dream.”

“Of course she did. Michelle had a real talent. She made this bracelet, in fact.” Lindsay held up her right wrist to display a cuff bracelet made of hammered metal. “She was totally committed to her new life. She practiced yoga almost every day, kept a healthy diet, the works. She was trying to make amends, going so far as to track down people from her past to apologize for any grief she caused them. At one point, she was even thinking about apologizing to that jerk who got her pregnant. I told her she didn’t owe him a single thing, but, like I said, she was hell-bent on atoning for every possible sin.”

“Wait a second. Sandra said—”

“Ugh. Enough with Sandra said !” Lindsay recomposed herself after a flash of impatience. “Sorry, she’s not exactly a reliable narrator when it comes to Michelle.”

“Okay, but apparently Michelle told her that she didn’t even know the identity of the baby’s biological father. It was a one-night stand.”

Lindsay scoffed. “Michelle? A one-night stand—with a stranger? Um… no. That would never happen.”

“Then why would she tell her mother that?”

“Because the guy turned out to be married with a kid of his own. When Michelle realized they weren’t going to be raising the baby together, she decided to go through with an adoption. To avoid any complications, she said she didn’t know who the father was.”

“She couldn’t tell her own mother the truth?”

Lindsay shrugged. “Michelle was worried that her mom would cause a major scene with the married man who sullied her daughter. All Michelle wanted was to do the right thing and move on. She managed to avoid the public drama she feared, but didn’t realize her mom would put all the blame on her instead. To be clear, Michelle had no idea the guy was married. They met at yoga, where he’d look for any opportunity to strike up a conversation with her. She was reluctant to date him at first. I think he was a little older? Maybe he was thirty, and she was twenty-two? When he finally convinced her to go out for one dinner, it became a whirlwind romance. She said he was smart and sophisticated and had a good sense of humor. Even all these years later, I could see her eyes light up when she recounted their time together. They were only together one summer, but they were already talking about getting married and having children once Michelle went back to school and graduated from college. The pregnancy was unplanned, but initially she was excited about it. Thrilled, in fact.”

“Was he?”

“She never even told him. She went to his office to surprise him with the good news, and there he was, walking out with a family of his own. He was wearing a wedding band she’d never seen before. She watched him strap their kid into her safety seat and kiss his wife before she took the wheel. When the wife left, Michelle did, too. She simply drove away.”

“And then what?”

“Nothing. She stopped all contact with him. Found a different yoga studio. She saw no reason to blow up another woman’s family, so she removed herself from the picture. It was simply over. So you can understand why I told Michelle she didn’t owe him an apology. She felt so much guilt for never telling him about the baby, but he was the one who lied about being married. I was probably a little too vocal with my opinion, because she changed the subject and never raised it again.”