The Admirer's Secret (21 page)

Chapter 42

T
he pressure had been building all morning. After what seemed like endless hours of waiting, and watching as heads bobbed back and forth on the other side of the tiny rectangular window, Haley thought she’d explode. Detective Patella returned to the interrogation room. His piercing glare announced her fate. But she couldn’t go without a fight, for she had written the letters out of love, not hate. She would never intentionally hurt Marc.

“I think I’ve been framed,” she blurted.

“Sure.” The detective humphed.

Patella ran his hands through his buzz cut of salt-and-pepper hair.

“And who do you think would want to frame you?” Haley noted how he talked down to her, as if reasoning with a child.

“I
don’t know. Maybe Allen Michaels, but I wouldn’t write something threatening to Marc. And I certainly wouldn’t kill his dog.”

“Sure you would. If the dog was a direct threat to you getting to Marc, or if you were trying to get his attention. Which is it? Because something’s not quite right in your story, Ms. Montgomery. You quit your job out the blue—never bothering to call your employer to let them know why. And we have already confirmed that the handwriting in the letters came from your own hand. Everything matches, Haley. Then you see Marc—your alleged boyfriend—with another woman—a Miss Julie Carter—who just so happened to report someone following her in her car Sunday night. Coincidence? I don’t think so.” 

“I know it looks bad, but you’ve got to believe me!”

“Haley—” His voice suppressed an urgency that Haley immediately picked up on. He was about to tell her something big, something life-changingly big. “Marc Vincetti is not your boyfriend, is he?”

The words sunk into her very soul, but her heart rebuked them. Marc loved her. She loved him. They were going to get married and have children together someday.

“And Marc loves Julie Carter and has been dating
her
for the past few weeks.”

Lies
! She shook her head. He was wrong. He was just trying to manipulate her. It was a police tactic to get her to confess—to what, she didn’t know.

“And you realized you lost him, so you threatened him. You killed his dog to get his attention after you saw him with Julie. Then you left him phone messages as a warning, dropped off all the letters to let him know it was you, and then followed Julie last night to scare her off. You threatened him, and you backed it up with action.”

He pushed a letter at her. There it was—her handwriting, her last letter to Marc. She couldn’t contain the monstrous tsunami of tears that waited to be unleashed. “None of what you say is true! I love him and he loves me! You can’t make me believe your lies!”

But Detective Patella, cold and callous, continued right on through her crying.

“You’ve never had a relationship with Marc. You’ve imagined it all. You’ve been playing make-believe with him since you met him. He was nice enough to befriend you, but instead of taking his friendship for what it was, you blew it up into some made up love affair. But when he and Julie started dating, you couldn’t stand it. Here she comes, his old high school sweetheart, sweeping him off his feet, stealing him from your grasp. But he was never yours, Haley. The night you saw them together at the Ice Festival, you couldn’t take it. So you lashed out. You thought that by threatening him you could make him leave her. But of course, revenge wouldn’t be complete without stalking Julie.”

The detective threw a nod at the blue-uniformed officer standing by the door, a motion that Haley made note of. The officer at the door tipped his chin up in return.

“You may think I’m crazy, but she’s the home wrecker. I had every right to chase her away,” she spat back. “I did what I had to do to protect Marc. And I never would have killed his dog if it hadn’t nearly attacked me when I was taking pictures—”

“So you admit you were
trespassing on his property.”

“Yes, but I swear, that dog was vicious
—”

“
So you killed his pet and stalked him.”

“He wanted me there! You may assume I’m the one at fault here, but I’m not. I’m simply doing what I have to in order to protect Marc. I’m not going through it again. I’m not going to lose someone
else I love. I already lost Jake, my father, and I’m not losing Marc. He’s the only one who believes in me. And that woman is not going to ruin what Marc and I have!”

The last words echoed against the hushed room. No one moved. No one spoke. Her anger waned as quickly as it had surfaced. All of the frustration was replaced with a sense of loss. Haley had never asked for much out of life. There were two things she cared about and both had been taken from her.

Haley loathed her existence. Finally a wonderful guy overturned her bland existence and some eyelash-batting, hair-tossing tart struts in and sweeps Marc right from under her nose. All she wanted was to be with the only man she ever loved. Yearning for his arms around her, it didn’t faze her that her entire future would be determined in the next few moments.

“Well, I guess that explains it, then,” the detective said placidly. “We are arresting you on the charges of stalking, communication harassment, and animal cruelty. You’ll be detained in a mental institution to await trial.” His detached nod signaled the successive moments that would bankrupt Haley of all she had left:
her freedom. 

The policeman who had been standing near the door approached her from behind and pulled her arms back. The sharp edges of the cuffs squeezed shut around her meaty wrists. One final click pinched her flesh, sealing her fate as the officer led her to the door.

Chapter 43

June 2009

“S
omeone was watching out for us, Marc.” Julie’s words echoed off of deaf ears. Marc had heard her, but he didn’t want to. So he simply ignored her.

The television was a blank screen in Marc’s living room, and the fireplace was empty. Julie was sitting across from Marc on his recent makeshift bed—the living room sofa with a pile of pillows and blankets in the middle. Marc glanced over at her with droopy eyes as she squeezed her long legs up to her chest, then he hunched over and rested his chin in his hands. He could feel the dark rings circling his eyes from weeks of sleepless nights.
Sheba’s recent vacancy from her spot next to him in bed was a constant reminder of what happened, making it nearly impossible to fall asleep without her as a bed pillow. That’s when he moved to the couch.

With the trial now over, Haley’s glare no longer haunted him from across the
Westfield Village Justice Court. And though she was convicted, with a mandatory sentencing to Dunkirk Mental Hygiene Clinic, she still sauntered into his nightmares. He couldn’t get her out of his head. He often relived the court hearing, except the ruling ended up different in his dreams: Haley was released, with her ghostly figure looming in his entryway. Then he’d wake up. That single nightmare repeated like a broken record, torturing him with nightly fits of sweat.

An assaulting fear had resurrected from the ashes of the past, leaving an imprint that would forever scar him. It wasn’t subtle, either. At night, when he walked past his window, he’d imagine her face peering in—those big
, green eyes probing his house in search of her victim. And a moment later he’d realize it was his own reflection. When driving, he’d think he saw her headlights following him, until the car behind him would eventually disappear into the night. When he found remaining tufts of Sheba’s hair in his bed or in the corners of his floor, he’d remember what Haley did. The shrine of pictures, the threat letters, the breathing voice mail—every moment was burned into his memory, and he doubted it would ever go away.

Marc was a mess. Pulling his head back up, it took all his strength to meet Julie’s pitying stare. He couldn’t believe how together she seemed. Her posture showed no trace of the weariness that caused his own haggardly shoulders to slump. How was she copi
ng with everything, he wondered? It was strange to him that his former self—a six-foot, lean, independent man—could be reduced to a hunchbacked invalid in a matter of days. Where did her strength come from?

Julie’s frequent visits consisted of picked-over home-cooked meals she made for him—which he couldn’t even appreciate since he’d lost any
appetite for food—barren conversation, and housecleaning. Julie offered to add laundry to her to-do list, if there were any dirty clothes to clean, but the shirt on Marc’s back had been worn and slept in for three days now—and smelled like it, too. He knew it had to be bad if even he got sick from his own stench. He hadn’t seen a shower since his last change of clothes, and his face hadn’t felt a razor for over a week.

Though wallowing was comfortable for now, Marc knew he had to eventually join society again.
Get back to work before his business crumpled. In the pit of his empty stomach he knew that his and Julie’s relationship couldn’t survive for very long under the strain of his emotional angst. Heck, relationships were hard enough without added stress. If money problems were enough to spur a divorce splurge across America, then a crazed stalker could easily spell doom for a mere boyfriend-girlfriend relationship.

Marc admonished himself; with Haley now gone for good, there was no need to worry. Julie was right, and Marc knew it. Someone had protected their lives thought it all, and it wasn’t the police. Had it been up to the police to take care of it, Marc would have been long dead before they found his attacker, or his corpse.
Somehow something kept Haley Montgomery at bay. Even so, weeks after Haley’s incarceration and mandatory sentencing to a mental institution, Marc still found it hard to accept that some unknown entity was in charge of their lives.

“Do you think that i
f God was watching out for us, He would have stopped all these awful things from happening? I mean, why do bad things have to happen to good people?” Marc asked viciously.

Everything was silent in response to his question
—the question everyone asks but few possess answers to. It had been deathly quiet all evening, every evening for the past couple weeks, as neither wanted to talk about what happened or relive it. But it was toying with both of their minds, and probably would be for a long time to come. Certainly the memory was enough to make him question what he did to deserve it. And certainly he felt he earned the right to be bitter over it.

“I guess that’s the million-
dollar question, Marc. Why do bad things happen to good people? But here’s another one for you—why do you expect that no bad things will happen to you?” Julie asked defensively. “Why is it that we all think we’re too good to suffer? That we have a right to perfect lives with no trouble. Have we forgotten that we are the ones who screw up—we lie, we cheat, we steal, we break hearts… why can we do all of that stuff and expect no troubles along the way?”

“Hey, I was innocent in all this. I was only trying to be nice to her, and look at what happened. No good deed goes unpunished,” he seethed.

“Look, certainly innocent people suffer undeservingly. Babies die, children starve, good people lose jobs, loving parents get sick… it’s not fair. I get it. But why
shouldn’t
bad things happen? We aren’t in heaven or living on some kind of utopia, so for you to blame everyone else for Haley Montgomery’s obsession with you isn’t right, Marc. Is it because her father died? Maybe. Is it because she’s lonely? Maybe. But no matter how many factors you add up, you can’t always control them. Stuff happens.”

“Then what’s the point of it all?”

“To make the survivors stronger. To build character and compassion. Bad things happen so that we can be better people.”

Marc heaved a sigh in response. Everything she was saying was true, but he couldn’t understand how she was
able to surrender all the fear. In a way he felt chained to his fear, but he couldn’t find the key to release himself. Was there any such thing as a key? Yet it seemed like Julie had found it. Somehow Julie was able to think with clarity and understanding so soon after everything, but he wasn’t there yet. He didn’t know if he’d ever be there.

“You were protected, Marc. You are still sitting here—maybe a little smelly
and disheveled, but here and alive nonetheless. I know it’s not exactly a silver lining in your eyes, but we’re breathing, and we stuck together through it all. You and I—we’re still here. In the same room. On the same path toward a future together. I still want to marry you, Marc. I love you. And I know you love me too. And we have our whole future ahead of us. Isn’t that enough to be grateful for?”

She was right again. Why was she always right? Though he wondered if it was easier for her to preach at him when she didn’t go through the worst of it like he did. Julie had been tailed, sure, but the death threats and pictures
and carrying Sheba’s lifeless body… everything else was aimed solely at him.

“You didn’t hold your dog’s body in your arms, or get a package of letters, Julie.” Though he knew he was picking a useless fight, he couldn’t stop himself. His anger overruled
all rationale. “You don’t know what it’s like from my perspective. She wasn’t after you; she was after me.”

“You know what,” Julie intercepted, “one way or the other, you have a destiny and Haley is just human. She doesn’t determine your life. Ultimately, you determine your future. Whether it’s within good or bad circumstances, it’s up to you. You have always wanted control over everything. Even back in high school when we were dating you just
had
to have control. But you simply can’t control everything. You can’t control Haley or her thoughts or anyone else for that matter. But you can control your own actions, and you can let the past go and put it behind you… for your sake and for our sake.”

Marc pried his jaw from his cupped hands and leaned back, looking upward. Examining the knots in the wooden beams of his ceiling, he let Julie’s words wash over him. True, Haley was just a person. She was no more in control of his life than anyone else.

Marc turned to his girlfriend, whose eyes carefully observed him.

“Marc, do you want peace?” Julie asked softly, leaning to
ward him. Her fingers lingered on his back and, like comforting a child, she stroked him tenderly.

He thought about it for a moment. He could harbor enmity for the rest of his life and never see another fulfilling day, and then bitterness would win. Or he could forgive and let it go a
nd truly live each day in peace…

“Peace would be nice, Julie. I would love to be able to move on with my life and put it all behind me, but you make it sound like it’s easy. I don’t think it’s that easy to forget something like this.”

“I didn’t say ‘forget.’ I said put the past behind you. So, do you want peace?”

It sounded simple enough, though he knew it wouldn’t be. “I suppose.”

“Then you have to forgive her.”

What?
This time he thought it out loud. It was a ridiculous idea. There was no way he could, or should, forgive her for what she did to him. That would be like saying it was okay, that she was welcomed back into his life. There was no way Marc would condone what Haley did. Haley Montgomery not only deeply wounded him, but she hurt Julie too. So how could Julie even say that?

“How can you even ask me to forgive her after what’s she’s put me through? Put us through? I can’t do it.”

Yes, you can.
The words didn’t come from Julie’s lips, but from a voice inside of him.

“No, I can’t forgive her,” Marc retorted to both Julie and the voice. “I hate her. Because of her I will never trust anyone again. Ever. And from now on I’m in control of my life. I don’t know when I suddenly got weak, or stupid, or whatever it was, but never again. I just don’t want to forgive her, Julie.” And that was it. There was no other reason for why he couldn’t do it other than he simply didn’t feel like it.

Julie’s sigh was intentionally heavy. “Then you know what, Marc? I don’t want to live like this.” She stood from the couch as she said it, emphasizing each and every vibe hidden within the threat. Pivoting toward his forlorn figure, she continued tersely, “I love you, but I am not going to sit here and watch you waste away at the hands of bitterness. It breaks my heart to see you like this.
You
are breaking my heart. Maybe when you’ve decided you want to live again, call me. But until then, you need to let your heart heal.” Her voice turned cool, sincere. “And I’ll be here if you need me.”

“Fine. Go!” he
yelled, color rushing to his face.

“Do you remember what you promised me that night at the Ice Festival?” Her words were soft and wistful—annoyingly so to Marc, who didn’t want to end the fight. “You promised not to hurt me. But I took that to mean that you wouldn’t hurt yourself, either. I guess promises are meant to be broken, huh?”

Her sarcasm shot arrows into his heart. He remembered his promise, alright. But back then he had never expected it to mean doing something this hard, something against every human fiber in his body. If not hurting her required him to reject his own flesh, maybe Julie wasn’t worth it.

She spun around to face the
front door, and Marc said nothing. She walked slowly past the television, past the fireplace, past the loveseat, slowly approaching the entryway. Still he said nothing to stop her. As she rounded the beam that hid her from Marc’s view, Marc stood, mouth open to find words to stop her, but nothing came out. When he heard the sound of the closing door, he regretted letting her walk out the door like that.