The Ravine (25 page)

“Honey, I have to tell you honestly that I’m worried about us in general, and I’m worried that things are never going to get better,” Mitch started. “You seem to be living a double life. You try to keep it together for the kids and the neighbors and even your parents, but behind the scenes and with me, well, it just seems like you’re never going to get over this. And now things are starting to happen that, well, just aren’t good. Half the time you don’t seem like you’re even here.”

She winced at him, and was about to jump on the “double life” comment, but backed off when she saw that he was genuinely concerned. “I know that’s what it looks like, Mitch, but I think I’m getting better, and
I don’t know what else to do. I can’t just wipe Rachel and Evan out of my mind. And sometimes I can see Danny doing that, you know, that night, and I get so damned angry at him, that I want to kill him! I’m going as crazy as he must have been, because I start to think about their last minutes, over and over, and I can’t get these horrible pictures out of my mind.”

“Doesn’t it help to pray about this, honey? And what about that women’s support group at the church?”

“Are you kidding? You see that closet over there?

“Yeah. What about it?

“When I can’t stand it anymore, that’s where I go and kneel on the floor and ask God to let me stop thinking, and stop hating and being so angry all the time. I must do that six or seven times a day, but I still can’t let go of this. It just seems like the world is such an awful place with so much misery. So hopeless and ruthless and random. Then I start to think that something awful is going to happen to you or one of the kids. Particularly the kids, to tell you the truth.

“Sometimes I start to feel a little bit better, and even start to believe everything is okay and that Rachel and Evan are in heaven, but then I think about Christopher and what he went through, and how devious Danny was and how selfish. It’s like this merry-go-round that I’m on and I can’t get off of it. I can’t stop thinking about it.

“And the support group means well, but actually, well, they’re mainly a bunch of women who have had awful things happen, like their kids dying, or husbands who walked out on them, or abusive husbands, and I leave there more depressed than when I walked in . . .”

Mitch looked at her and felt completely helpless and frustrated. He didn’t know what to do but it was obvious that he couldn’t just ignore things and hope for the situation to improve by itself.

“I really think you should see someone about this, Carolyn, and soon.”

“What good would that do? No shrink is going to bring them back or make this pain go away. This isn’t like the
Dr. Phil
show, where you just get fixed like magic!” She looked at Mitch and his heart sank because he knew she was right, but he was scared, so he insisted and finally she agreed to get some counseling.

Their family doctor recommended she see the psychiatrist who was affiliated with the group, and the following week she had her first session. He was a thoughtful man, who listened carefully to her story, nodded sagely, responded with an occasional
hmm
. . . , and constantly jotted down notes. At the end of the session, he set up another appointment and sent her off with prescriptions for a cocktail of antidepressants, sleeping pills, and anti-anxiety medications. Carolyn filled the prescriptions and, when she arrived home, lined up the bottles in a neat row in front of her on the kitchen table. It looked as if she was starting a small pharmacy of her own.

If Mitch thought Carolyn was leading a double life by sinking deeper into depression while putting on a happy face for everyone in the world but him, he would have been astonished had he been able to step back and honestly see the insidious influence the murders were having on him. But that was hardly possible, because the darkness was creeping into his life in imperceptible increments, unbeknownst to him, in much the same way it had crept into Danny’s life. They say you are only as sick as your secrets, so clearly Mitch was sinking fast, because his secrets were multiplying at warp speed and were hell-bent on leading him to destruction.

First the door was nudged open just a crack—just enough to reach him right where he was most vulnerable. That voice in his head started to tell him it wasn’t fair that he was being put in this position. After all,
he was a man who had achieved a great deal from humble beginnings, and now he had to worry that his partner in life might be going off the deep end. Other men didn’t have to put up with such things and, frankly, he deserved a better life than he had at the moment. His marriage was feeling less like a marriage every day; he shouldn’t have to wait forever for Carolyn to get back to her old self. As it so happened, recently someone had come into his life who appreciated him, admired him for his success, and was cheerful and fun-loving. He didn’t mention it to anyone, but she began popping into his mind more and more often.

Mitch couldn’t deny his attraction to Jennifer Brueuer, the young vice president of marketing for the Superfood Supermart. To a man, the guys were gaga over the clever, slender blonde with the dry British wit and fashionable outfits. They would all smile slyly to one another and yuck it up like schoolboys whenever Jennifer walked out of the room, though she was way ahead of them and accustomed to that sort of reaction from the boys. Mitch imagined she had a special fondness for him. Whether she did, or whether she was playing him—getting her way when it came to important design decisions or other areas where Mitch would normally assert his authority—it didn’t matter. He felt powerful when Jennifer would clap with glee and peck him on the cheek when the big man caved in to one of her requests.

So it wasn’t surprising that, increasingly, he enthusiastically anticipated his West Coast trips. It was all harmless, after all, and he deserved a break from the cloud that had descended over his home in Chesterland. At one point, for an instant, it dawned on him that he was thinking the same sorts of things Danny had mentioned that day they built the deck—that stuff about just pointing your car in some new direction and driving off to a new life. But he quickly dismissed that thought for the nonsense it was.

Lately, he felt that if he and Carolyn weren’t talking about the kids or the bills or some upcoming social obligation, they didn’t really have
much to say. Then somehow things would come back to the events in Akron. The concept of the two of them just having fun seemed totally alien. Even his father-in-law noticed something was wrong.

“When’s the last time you two went out on a date, just the two of you?” he asked Mitch, as he and the boys took their seats at Cleveland Stadium on opening day of the baseball season.

“Not since before all that stuff went down last fall,” Mitch replied. “I suggested it a few times, but I almost have the feeling that we wouldn’t have anything to talk about except for doom and gloom. She just hasn’t been the same since then.”

“You think I can’t see that?”

“I didn’t know it was that obvious. Carolyn’s pretty good at hiding her feelings.”

“And what about you, Mitch? Are things okay with you?”

“Sure,” he lied. What could he say? Had he answered truthfully, he would have said, “Now that you ask, Pops, there’s this little matter of a very hot Brit that I’m getting to know pretty well, who makes me feel like a man again, and we’re always at the same hotel and I don’t know where this is going to lead, but I see trouble brewing. But, hell, it’s not my fault because it’s all harmless, and I deserve a little female attention.”

Instead, he switched to the safe subject of sports. “Who’d they say is starting for the Indians today, Pops?”

And then there was the other obsession he hadn’t mentioned to anyone besides Devito, the private investigator he had hired to track down Logan Vonda. He was convinced the conniving creep had had a lot more to do with the crime than had been revealed. This ate at him like a burr under his cap, for months, but in April, he was truly astounded, insulted, and incensed when the inquest was held and it was concluded that Danny had acted alone. No charges would be brought against Vonda. Mitch was furious, but Carolyn didn’t care to discuss it.

“It doesn’t matter, Mitch. It’s over with, and whether that guy helped him or not, Danny did it. Let it go!”

But he wasn’t so easily dissuaded. The same Tooterville police officials who had allowed hordes of people to stomp all over the crime scene had also convinced themselves they had solved the case within twenty-four hours. It was over and done with, as far as they were concerned. Apparently they felt it was totally logical for someone to relinquish his phone, wait around in a car, and even take a nap after his friend announced he was going to murder his wife and then disappeared into the house to do just that. The picture the cops painted was of someone who’d simply been at the wrong place at the wrong time. A poor, innocent sap. A hapless fool. How could anyone have expected him to walk next door to a neighbor and report that a crime might be taking place? Let sleeping dogs lie.

Well, Mitch didn’t think that way. His experience had taught him that when the pieces didn’t fit into place there was always a reason. His staff hated it when he said, “If you are not 100 percent certain, then you are 100 percent wrong! I don’t want excuses. Solve the problem. Period. End of story.” Unbeknownst to Mitch, one of the junior architects did a spot-on imitation of him giving that particular lecture, right down to the flourish he would brandish when sending the underling on his way at conclusion of his tongue lashing.

But the Logan Vonda mystery wasn’t so easily explained. So Mitch decided that he should have a chat with him—except he had apparently departed from the suburbs of Akron and disappeared. Mitch was determined to find him and so had written a few hefty checks to the private investigator in order to track him down, but thus far, he hadn’t had any luck. Then one day his cell phone rang and things started to fall into place, along with an amazing stroke of luck.

“Hi, Mitch, this is Devito, Charlie Devito. I think I have something for you.” The burly detective had spent a few decades with the Cleveland
PD and then left under suspicious circumstances. However, the guy came highly recommended and was known as an absolute bloodhound, even though he was admittedly a bit rough around the edges.

“Great! What is it?”

“This Vonda scum has a rap sheet as long as my grandpa’s nuts, so I figgered it was only a matter of time before this jerk got hisself nailed for doing something stupid, and sure enough he did.”

Mitch tried to contain his excitement. “What did he do this time? Where is he?”

“Well, he got pinched for trying to scam some old biddy out of a few thousand bucks by telling her he was a friend of her grandson’s and that he needed the money to bail the kid out of prison. Wooda got away with it if the bank teller didn’t smell something fishy and start asking questions and then Vonda bolted.”

“And did they catch him?” Mitch could smell his prey.

“Yeah, he went back to his girlfriend’s apartment and they tracked him down a few days later. The guy’s not too bright, ya know.”

“No, apparently not,” said Mitch. “Anyway, where is he?”

“It seems he got out on bail, but he’s not allowed to leave the state.”

“And which state is that?”

Then Mitch got his nice surprise. “Oregon. The guy was last seen in Portland—”

“You’ve got to be kidding me! I’m going there in a week! Where does he live?”

Devito hesitated, and then caved. “By law, I’m not supposed to give you his address. But what the hell, you’re payin’ for it. Just keep your mouth shut, ya hear?”

“You got it.” And with that Mitch found out exactly where to find Logan Vonda. Now the question was whether or not the guy would be willing and able to answer some of the questions that had been nagging at Mitch for so long. He wanted to look this petty thief in the eye and
finally learn the truth, and if he was guilty, he was going to do something about it.

Naturally he didn’t breathe a word to Carolyn about having tracked down Vonda. The fact that he had a trip planned to Portland gave him the cover he needed. If he found out anything useful, he’d just say he happened to run into Vonda; if not, he’d never have to mention it to her.