The Murderer's Daughter

Chapter 28

A hotshot attorney would be shielded by layers of assistants so Grace decided to show up in person. Her research in the hotel room had lasted until just after five p.m. and the drive downtown would be wretched but what else did she have to do? She ate a handful of mixed nuts, chewed a stick of beef jerky to pulp, washed the gourmet meal down with a sixteen-ounce bottle of water.

Exiting the room with watchful eyes, she took the stairs to the garage, revved up the Jeep, and was gone. An hour and twenty minutes later she was driving past the gray stone edifice that housed Knutsen, DiPrimo, Banks and Levine and figuring she’d arrived too late, everyone would be gone.

The building was seven stories tall, august and spotless, one of a few older, elegant structures lining one of the more presentable avenues in an inelegant downtown. Parking in a pay lot a block away, she walked, found brass doors open, and rode the elevator up to the sixth floor. Knutsen, DiPrimo, Banks and Levine took up half the square footage; the rest was leased to an accounting firm. Both operations were entered through large, bright, glass-walled waiting rooms that faced each other across a plush-carpeted lobby the color of ripe blueberries.

The woman behind the desk at KDBL (bold brass letters) was young, pretty, alert, and locking her desk.

Grace smiled and said, “Mr. Knutsen, please.”

“The office is closed.”

“If Mr. Knutsen’s in, he’ll want to see me. Dr. Grace Blades.”

“Doctor,” said the receptionist, doubtfully. “He’s tied up.”

“No problem, I can wait.” Grace took a chair, picked a copy of a thick, crisp glossy titled Beverly Hills Dream Homes out of a wall rack, and pretended to be fascinated with vulgar Xanadus. This year, kitchens were the size of ranch houses, forty-seat IMAX theaters the requisite display of wealth.

The receptionist punched an extension, stated Grace’s name, and hung up looking astonished. “You’ll still need to wait and I’m leaving in five minutes.”

Ninety seconds, her phone beeped and she got on, mumbled furtively, frowned. “Come this way.”

The office was the predictable corner suite, with two walls of glass offering miles of view to the north and the east. The desk was ten feet of bleached maple semicircle with built-in phone and computer docks. Degrees and other impressive papers were silver-framed and mounted artistically on a rear wall covered with beige grass cloth and capped by shiny bronze crown molding.

Two huge photos, each around two feet square, perched on a matching maple credenza: The nearer showed present-day Wayne Knutsen and another man, younger but not young, maybe sixty or so, slim and gray-haired. The two of them were conspicuously red-nosed, wearing sunglasses and baseball hats, grinning. The other man grasped a fishing rod. A sizable halibut balanced in Wayne Knutsen’s pudgy hands.

The second shot was of the same pair, again happy, wearing matching tuxedos and holding hands, standing before a woman wearing ecclesiastical garb and a crucifix necklace. Rice and confetti speckled the carpet below.

No one in the office, then a voice behind Grace said, “Thanks, Sheila, go home, you work too hard.”

Studying Grace as he walked behind his desk, Wayne Knutsen, Esq., leaned across the glossy surface and extended a meaty paw. His complexion was florid, his body a collection of loosely assembled, bobbling balloons. But for the tiny chin beard, his face was shaved exquisitely close. Santa Claus after a session of advanced grooming.

If he’d been smiling, Grace might’ve expected Ho ho ho.

He was dead serious and maybe a bit alarmed.

As Grace’s hand approached his, she saw a broad platinum band circling his left ring finger. His clasp was brief, warm, dry.

Whatever had tied him up didn’t require formality: He wore a bright-yellow polo shirt and seersucker pants, neither of which did a thing for his physique, narrow cuffs barely touching blue suede boat shoes worn sockless. Sunburned bald dome, spotted brown; Grace noticed the baseball hat he’d donned in the fishing photo hanging on the finial of a lamp.

He said, “This takes me back. Doctor Grace Blades? I’m not surprised.” His stare had intensified but his voice sounded tentative.

Grace said, “I’m not surprised, either.”

He blinked. Eased his bulk into a throne-like chair and motioned for Grace to settle in one of three facing chairs.

“Grace Blades... this is a huge surprise. What kind of doctor are you?”

“Clinical psychologist.”

“Ah.” Nodding as if that were the only logical choice.

He thinks I’ve compensated.

“When did you get your Ph.D.?”

“Eight years ago.”

Mental calculations caused his eyes to travel horizontally. “You were...”

“Twenty-five, almost twenty-six.”

“Young.” Soft smile. “You still are. Well, congratulations, that’s quite an accomplishment. So what brings you here?”

Grace said, “I need to hire you.”

“For...”

Opening her purse, she removed her wallet. “What’s your retainer?”

“Whoa,” said Wayne Knutsen. “I can’t really tell you that until you let me know what you need.”

“Confidentiality, for starts.”

“Ah... well, money doesn’t need to change hands for that, Doctor — may I call you Grace?”

She smiled. “You’d better. I want to pay you.”

“Really, it’s not necessary. Mere contemplation of hiring a lawyer bestows confidentiality.”

“I know that.”

His soft belly heaved. “Very well, fork over... ten bucks.”

“Seriously.”

“I am serious, Grace. I’m still trying to process your being here. I must confess when I heard your name I was a bit... startled!”

“Sorry for popping in out of the blue but what was startling?”

He clicked his teeth, looked at the ceiling, then back at Grace. “For all I knew you harbored some kind of resentment. For something I might’ve done a long time ago. Though for the life of me I couldn’t imagine what it might be.”

Still, he’d welcomed her in. Curiosity trumping worry. Grace grew hopeful.

“On the contrary,” she said. “You were the only one worth a damn. That’s why I’m here.” Peeling off five twenties, she placed them on the desk.

“Interesting version of ten bucks,” said Wayne Knutsen. “Funny, I remember math being a strong suit for you. Then again, everything was your strong suit. You were the smartest kid I ever encountered on the job.”

“Then let’s call this a higher-order calculation.”

Wayne Knutsen sighed. “Okay, I’ll give the rest to charity. Any preferences?”

“Your call.”

“We keep Lhasa apsos — my partner and I — correction, my husband, I’m still getting used to that. So perhaps Lhasa Apso Rescue?”

“Sounds good,” said Grace.

“All right, Doctor Grace, you have hired me and your secrets are inviolate. Now, what might they be?”

“First of all, thanks are in order. For caring enough to bring me to Stagecoach Ranch.”

His skin went from pink to crimson as he waved that off. But he was clearly pleased. “Just doing my job.”

“You did more than that. It made a huge difference, I should’ve thanked you long ago.”

His mouth ticced. “Glad to hear things worked out well. Yes, she was a great woman. How long were you at the ranch?”

Grace said, “Till I was eleven. Ramona died.”

“Oh. Sorry — was she ill?”

“Heart condition,” said Grace. “She never said anything to the kids but she started looking tired and taking pills and one day she collapsed and fell into the swimming pool.”

“My God, that’s ghastly,” said Wayne Knutsen. “For you as well as her.” He shook his head. “How sad. She was an exceptional person.”

“She was.”

“Poor Ramona,” he said. “Had I stayed with the department, I’d have known but I finally left.”

“Law school full-time.”

“I’d been attending a non-accredited school and it was a waste of time, just a moneymaking scam. But the real reason I left, Grace, is that I’d had enough. Of the entire system, the way kids were treated like property, shuttled back and forth, minimal supervision and certainly no attempt to get to know them in depth. Then there were those cases of abuse, not a rule, an exception, but still... I won’t get into that.”

He rubbed one eye. “I’m not exempting myself from critical judgment, Grace. I was part of it, did far too much by the book. The caseloads they saddled us with made it impossible to work properly. I suppose that’s as good an excuse as any.”

“Yet you managed to rise above it,” said Grace.

He was taken aback. Searched her face for sarcasm. She made sure to let him know she meant it.

He said, “You’re being kind but I didn’t rise nearly as often as I should have. In your case, it was easy. You made it easy. Because you were so darn precocious, I felt there was hope for...” He smiled. “I hoped. When I checked one last time with Ramona to see how you were doing — the day before I handed in my walking papers — she said you were fine but shy, keeping to yourself, totally bored with the curriculum. My mind was elsewhere, psychologically I’d quit a long time ago, so I told her there was nothing I could do. Ramona said fine, she’d handle it herself, and hung up. Obviously, she handled it well.” Another tremble of lip. “No doubt better than I could’ve.”

Grace said, “It was a job, not a life sentence, Wayne. The way you helped me says you probably helped a lot more kids than you’re admitting.”

His smile was broad, amused. “I can see you’re an excellent therapist, Dr. Blades — gawd, that sounds terrific. Doctor. Good for you!.. so what brings you here?”

Grace said, “You gave me your card, said if I needed anything to get in touch.”

He flinched. “Did I? You must’ve caught me in a weak moment. Trust me, by then I was effectively gone. Wondering how I was going to make ends meet. I had to start from scratch, ended up at Hastings, moved north, figuring to do family law. Work for change within the system and all that good stuff, right? By the first semester I felt so free being away from the system that I changed my orientation completely and went for the boring stuff.”

He laughed. “Boring lucrative amoral stuff. I drive a Jaguar now, Grace. Sometimes I’m cruising along and I laugh at myself.”

“I drive an Aston Martin.”

“Really.” He whistled. “Clinical psychology’s been good to you, has it? So what’s this about? A patient in a fix?”

“A therapist in a fix.”

He sat back and rested his hands on his paunch.

Grace told him only what he needed to know.

Three wild-haired children in homemade black uniforms, a probable child murder by the oldest brother, a second murder by extension.

Two decades later, reappearance by the younger brother, still burdened by terrible secrets and seeking expiation.

Likely dying because of his secrets.

She ended with two components that she hoped would evoke the feelings that had led him to treat her with kindness decades ago.

Her research leading to the Fortress Cult.

The intense personal danger she now found herself in.

No mention of the man in her garden, rolling a body into a ravine, tossing guns, a knife. Living like a fugitive.

Wayne Knutsen listened without interruption, took a moment to contemplate. “Well, Grace, this is quite... I don’t know what to say, it’s almost like something out of a movie.”

“Wish it was, Wayne. But it’s real, Wayne. And I’m scared.”

“I understand... twenty-three years ago...”

“And a few months.”

He looked at her the way a doctor examines a new patient. “We’re talking the majority of your life, Grace. A significant slice of mine... I’m rambling, this is so unexpected — you really think that older boy killed the sick one — Bobby?”

“I’m sure of it. He had all the early trappings of psychopathy and there’s no way that oxygen tube could’ve come free on its own.”

“What if Bobby experienced a seizure and yanked it hard enough — I’m just being lawyerly.”

“Bobby could barely walk, let alone muster the strength to rip loose his dressings. Ramona was careful, she taped the tube tight. I know because sometimes I was the one to untape him in the morning.”

“She used you as an aide?”

“I insisted on helping, it made me feel strong, in control. And I could tell her own strength was fading.”

“I see... this is going to be a terrible question, but I’m an attorney, I have to ask.” He shifted in his chair. “Given Ramona’s fading health, growing attached to this Bobby, is there the remotest possibility that she would have—”

“Euthanized a child?” said Grace. “No way. When she discovered Bobby dead, she was horrified. I’m certain the shock is what finished her off.”

“My God,” said Wayne Knutsen. “What a nightmare... poor Ramona. Poor child — and there was no one else who could’ve—”

“It was him, Wayne.”

“Yes, yes, you’d know. You say his name was Sam? That’s not much to go on. How old was he?”

“Thirteen, fourteen, give or take.”

“Old enough, I suppose,” he said. “What with all the crazy stuff one keeps hearing... all right, it’s a horrible thing to consider but I defer to your judgment. What happened to you after the ranch closed? Though I’m not sure I want to hear what I suspect.” His head shook; his jowls vibrated. One hand swiped clumsily at his eyes.

Grace leaned over and took his hand, comforted him the way she would any patient.

“Actually,” she said, “everything worked out fine.”