Page 42 of The Lie Maker

“Someplace we can talk?”

Cathi led her to a small break room. There was a table, a fridge, a microwave, and a coffee machine. Cathi pointed to it and asked, “Want some? If I were you, I’d say no, but I feel I should offer.”

Lana shook her head as they both pulled out chairs and sat down. “So the doctor killed herself?” she asked.

“You read the statement,” Cathi said.

“Okay, but off the record, doesn’t it seem kind of strange? And coincidental?”

“Like how?”

“First, that retired judge goes missing and ends up in the harbor. And now this doctor vanishes, and they find her in the water, too.”

Cathi shrugged. “It happens. People do take their own lives. And with Mr.Bentley, that might not strictly be a suicide. There may have been cognitive issues there, so you’re looking at two different things.”

“Maybe,” Lana said.

“And look,” Cathi continued, “there are six to seven hundred suicides a year in Massachusetts, which works out to about two per day, and you figure, in a large metropolitan area like Boston, we’re going to get more than our share.”

Lana knew the stats because she had done some quick online research of her own before coming over here. She said, “Yeah, that’s right, and you know how most people get it done? One of three ways. They either shoot themselves, they take an overdose of pills or some kind of poison, or they hang themselves.”

“Okay,” Cathi said. “And some people might drive full speed into a bridge abutment. Or step in front of a bus. You’ve cited the most likely ways someone might decide to take their own life, but there are plenty of others. Including walking off the end of a pier, which appears to be what Dr.Sloan did.”

Lana considered that. “It seems like, if you’ve decided to end it all, that’s a pretty miserable way to go about it. It’s not like you’re jumping off the Golden Gate. It’s not that big a drop. That won’t kill you. And if you can swim—do you know whether she knew how to swim?”

Cathi said, “I don’t know. That wasn’t in the information that was provided to me.”

“Okay, forget that for now. But your natural instincts for preservation are going to kick in. Maybe you want to end it all by drowning, but I can’t see a person letting themselves slip under the surface without putting up a fight. It doesn’t track for me.”

“You’re looking for a story where there isn’t one.”

“And what about the fact that she was a doctor?” Lana asked.

“So?”

“She’d have any number of pharmaceuticals at her disposal. If she wanted to end it all, she could take something. Something efficient and painless. If she wanted to take her own life, why wouldn’t she have done that? I mean, if it were you, wouldn’t you want to end it all quickly? Just go to sleep and that’d be it?”

“Is there something I can take right now?” Cathi asked.

“Something about it doesn’t seem right, that’s all I’m saying.”

“What do you want from me?” Cathi said. “The detectives involved fill me in, I put out the release. I don’t investigate things.”

“So why am I talking to you?” Lana asked. “Who’s on this?”

Twenty-Five

Earl Givins, sitting on the tiny balcony of his apartment, working on his first early-morning cigarette, figured he had no choice but to walk away from the condos that went down with that building. If he’d had insurance on them, he might have been able to count on that money coming, eventually, although the parties involved would probably be fighting it out in the courts for years. But there was no policy, so no sense worrying about that. He had to look forward.

Not that things looked much better in that direction.

He was behind on his rent. His credit cards were maxed out. He’d posted an ad online to sell his aging Porsche. He’d bought a paint touch-up kit at the local auto supply store, hoping to disguise the rust spots around the wheel wells. If he could unload it for fifteen or twenty grand, he’d count himself lucky.

Too bad about Jack. He should have known better than to hit up the kid—okay, he was hardly a kid anymore—for money. Jack had plenty of reasons to resent him. He had to be pissed that Earl sold his mother’s house and kept all the money for himself, even though that had all happened years ago. And Earl shouldn’t have been surprised that Jack wasn’t swimming in cash from the sales of his two books. It wasn’t as though Earl had seen Jack’s books in the airport bookshops on his trips to and from Florida.

Earl felt he was at least due a modicum of respect. Didn’t he give it his best shot getting that boy through his teen years? Tried to impart whatever wisdom he had. Helped him get his driver’s license. Gave him advice on girls. Drove him to college. That had to count for something, right?

But if Jack really had no money to lend him now, none of that much mattered, did it?