He smiled, his eyes unfocused, remembering. “She drew herself up to all five foot two, eyes flashing, and said, ‘I’m going to make the world more beautiful. What are you going to do? Make money? I’m so impressed.’ She whirled around and left the kitchen. For days, Ray was furious that he hadn’t formulated a single retort while she was standing there.
“A week later, I ran into her in the coffee shop. She asked if I was as anti-art as my friend. I’m no dummy, so I exclaimed, ‘No way—I know how essential art is in the expression of the human condition!’ So she invited me to an exhibit she was having, and told me I could bring Ray. I immediately regretted telling him at all, because he was determined to impart those clever comebacks he’d been formulating since the night they met.
“The gallery was squeezed between a liquor store and a furniture rental place. As we walked to the door, Ray made a remark about the ‘more beautiful world’ she wasn’t making, and I wanted to kick myself again for bringing him.
“Rose walked up wearing a gauzy dress, her hair twisted up—very art student. With her was a smartly dressed blonde—Ray’s usual type—who she introduced as her best friend, and also a finance major. Ray barely noticed the other girl. ‘Where’s your stuff?’ he asked Rose. His question seemed to take the bite out of her. She was fidgety as she led us to the wall showcasing her paintings—watercolors. We all waited, tense, for Ray to pronounce judgment.
“He examined each piece without comment, and then he looked down at her, and said, ‘They’re beautiful. I don’t think you should ever do anything that isn’t this.’ She graduated three months later, and he had a ring on her finger that night. Once he finished his doctorate, they got married, and he started his career with a vengeance, as he’d always planned to do.
“Oddly enough, I ended up with the pretty finance major, and we married not long after they did. The four of us stayed close friends. Landon is like an older cousin to our three.”
Dr. Heller stopped and took a deep, sad breath, and my uneasiness returned.
“Ray was working for the FDIC. Lots of travel. I was teaching at Georgetown; we lived maybe twenty minutes from each other. When he couldn’t get in touch with them that night, Cindy and I drove over to check. We found Rose in her room, with Smith’s body, and Landon in his room.” Dr. Heller swallowed and I couldn’t breathe. “He was so hoarse from screaming he couldn’t speak, and his wrists were zip-tied to the bed post. He’d dragged that bed until it ran into other furniture and couldn’t go any further. His wrists were lacerated, trying to get loose from those ties to get to his mother. There was dried blood on his arms and the corner of the bed. That’s where the scars came from. He’d been like that fifteen, sixteen hours.”
My stomach heaved and tears streamed down my face, but Dr. Heller’s voice was flat. I sensed he was holding himself apart from the memory as much as he could. I felt cruel for making him relive such a horrible night.
“Rose was the emotional heart of the three of them. Ray adored her, and losing her that way, when he wasn’t there to protect her… He shut down. He’d made tremendous strides in his career, but he quit it all. Moved the two of them to his dad’s place on the coast, went back to the fishing boat he’d been so determined to never have any part of when he left home at eighteen. His father died a couple of years later, left him everything.
“Landon shut down in a different way. Cindy and I tried to tell Ray that he shouldn’t be uprooted from everything he knew, that he surely needed therapy, but Ray was out of his mind with grief. He couldn’t stand to be in that house or that city.”
He looked up at me then, pulling a tissue box from a desk drawer when he took in my face. “I think you need to get the rest from Landon—I mean, Lucas. He changed his name to his middle name—his mother’s maiden name—when he came here for college. Trying to reinvent himself, I guess. An eighteen-year habit is hard to break, and he hasn’t called me on it enough in the past three years.” He peered at me and exhaled. “I wish I’d never seen you leaving his apartment. As far as I’m concerned, any student/tutor restrictions are over. Just… so you know.”
I dabbed a tissue under my eyes and thanked him.
University restrictions were the least of my worries.
Chapter 22
“You’re a good cook.” I grabbed the empty glasses and followed Lucas to the sink. He rinsed the bowls of pesto remains and turned to take the glasses from me.
“Pasta’s easy—the college-version gold standard for impressing a date with your mad culinary skills.”
“So this is a date?” Before he could do an about-face, I added, “And you made the pesto from scratch—I watched you. That was impressive all on its own. Besides, you’ve never lived in a dorm, where the pasta choices are usually Chef Boyardee from a can, or two-for-a-dollar ramen noodles. The occasional Lean Cuisine. Trust me, your skills are positively epicurean.”
He laughed, treating me to the full smile I craved. “Oh, really?”
I returned the smile, but it felt counterfeit—as though someone else had shaped my mouth into a happier contour than I was capable of feeling. “Really.”
Every minute, I battled a mounting dread over what I’d learned on the Internet the previous night, and from Dr. Heller hours before. Lucas had been through such hell, and shared it with no one, as far as I knew. He’d said there were things I didn’t know about him that he might never be able to reveal, and instead of respecting those secrets, I’d unearthed them. I wanted to be the one he let in, but my prying could easily be turned into an excuse to shut me out.