Page 47 of Guess Again
Milwaukee, Wisconsin Tuesday, July 29, 2025
DR.
LINDSAY LARKIN FINISHED HER MORNING MEETINGS, SKIPPED lunch, and took the cup of coffee her assistant handed her.
“What’s my afternoon look like?”
Lindsay asked.
“Busy,”
Beth said.
“You’ve got six clients scheduled from noon until six o’clock.
Then the evening board meeting until seven.
Then the fundraiser at The Box.”
“That’s tonight?”
“Yes.
Should I cancel?”
“No.
I have to make an appearance.”
Lindsay walked into her office and sat behind her desk.
She lifted her cup.
“Keep the coffee coming this afternoon.
I’m exhausted.”
“Will do.
Let me know if you need anything else.”
After Beth closed the door, Lindsay logged onto her computer and opened the case file for her first session of the afternoon.
She scrolled and clicked through the encrypted screens until she was granted access to the virtual meeting room, where she waited for her client to arrive.
Eventually, the link connected, and her client’s face popped onto the screen.
Lindsay turned on her microphone.
“Eugenia, good to see you.”
Lindsay watched Eugenia Morgan smile into the camera and knew immediately something was off.
Eugenia was an assigned client Lindsay had taken pro bono for the work she did for the state of Wisconsin Department of Corrections.
The Anonymous Client had a long history of working with inmates to improve their mental health.
Occasionally, a case like Eugenia’s got passed to her, and Lindsay took it.
Eugenia Morgan suffered from hybristophilia, which was defined as the phenomenon of an individual being sexually aroused by and attracted to a criminal offender.
Years before, Eugenia had fallen under the spell of a man convicted of kidnapping and raping a teenage girl.
Eugenia had started a relationship with the man in prison, writing him letters and visiting him frequently.
She had even agreed to marry him.
When the convict sent Eugenia a letter instructing her to kidnap a girl and share photos with him, Eugenia had broken out of the spell long enough to go to the authorities. The convicted man was charged and tried for conspiracy to commit abduction and sex trafficking, found guilty, and sentenced to another two decades in prison.
In exchange for her cooperation, Eugenia was granted immunity but required to complete one hundred twenty hours of court-supervised therapy to deal with her hybristophilia.
She’d been seeing Lindsay for months.
As Lindsay observed her client, she had a sense that Eugenia had regressed.
“How have you been, Eugenia? Since we last talked?”
“I don’t know.
Good, I guess.”
“You don’t sound convincing.
Tell me about it.”
Eugenia took a deep breath and looked away from the camera.
“I don’t want to get in trouble.”
“Eugenia, anything we discuss during a session is protected by doctor-client privilege.
Nothing you tell me will get you in any trouble.”
“Yeah, but the judge who is making me meet with you, won’t he find out what we talk about?”
“Absolutely not.
I have no contact with that judge other than filling out the paperwork to show that you are completing the required therapy.”
“You don’t ever talk to him?”
“Never.
And I wouldn’t even if he contacted me.
By law, I’m not allowed to divulge anything you and I discuss during our sessions.”
There was a long pause.
Lindsay was careful not to break the silence.
It was important to allow Eugenia to initiate the discussion.
“I went to see him.”
Lindsay slowly nodded.
“Francis Bernard?”
Eugenia nodded.
“Yeah.
I visited him.”
“When?”
“A few weeks ago.
Just after the Fourth of July.”
Lindsay was careful not to react to this.
Instead, she nodded and kept an even tone to her voice.
“Relapses happen.
We should never feel ashamed about them.
I could tell when you logged on that something was bothering you.”
Lindsay paused.
“How do you feel about going to see him?”
Another long pause
“I wouldn’t have gone if I didn’t get a thrill from it.”
“Getting a thrill from visiting Francis Bernard is one thing,”
Lindsay said.
“Visiting a criminal in prison is not a crime, Eugenia.
What got you in trouble last time was how far you allowed your relationship to go.
You nearly became an accomplice in a crime.”
Eugenia nodded.
“I know.
But I didn’t.
I went to the cops.”
“What happened when you visited Francis?”
“We just talked.
You can’t, you know, touch each other or anything where he’s at.
He’s behind glass the whole time.”
“Did he ask any favors of you? Did he ask you to do anything for him that would put you in jeopardy of breaking the law?”
There was a long pause, longer than the others that had taken place during the session.
“No.”
Lindsay knew she was lying.