Third Degree: A Novel Read online

  Laurel refused to acknowledge the gun’s existence, yet it filled her mind with terrifying power. Where had Warren gotten a pistol? He owned a rifle and a shotgun, but so far as she knew, there wasn’t a single handgun in the house. Yet he was holding one now. Should she acknowledge it? Was it riskier to pretend the gun wasn’t there? Would that reinforce the idea that she was lying? Warren was almost hiding it from her, though. For now, she decided, she would pretend she hadn’t seen it.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said in a level voice. She pointed at the letter on the coffee table. “What is that?”

  He slid the letter toward her. “Why don’t you read it?”

  She picked up the note and scanned the words she knew by heart, her eyes swimming.

  “Aloud, please,” Warren said.

  “What?”

  “Read the letter aloud.”

  She looked up. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Do I look like I’m kidding? It’ll be so much more powerful that way.”

  “Warren—”

  “Read it!”

  “Will you give me the injection when I’m done?”

  He nodded.

  She’d read Danny’s last letter so many times that she could recite it from memory. She reminded herself not to glance away from the paper as she read, a mistake she might pay for with her life. She began reading in a lifeless monotone: “ ‘I know the first rule of this kind of relationship is Never Write Anything Down. But in this case I feel I have to. A—’ ”

  “You skipped the salutation,” Warren said coldly.

  She sighed, then backed up and gave him what he wanted. “ ‘Laurel,’ ” she said. “Blah, blah, blah. ‘A transient wisp of electrons won’t do it. There’s no need to go over the facts. We’ve both done that until we’re almost insane. But before I say what I want to say, let me remind you that I love you. I feel things for you that I’ve never felt before—’ ”

  She looked up and spoke sharply, “Warren, this is bullshit. Where did you get this?”

  He looked back at her without speaking.

  “Did someone give you this?”

  An odd smile touched his lips. “I actually found it in your copy of Pride and Prejudice. But then you know that already, don’t you?”

  “I told you, I’ve never seen this before in my life.”

  He shook his head. “Deny till you die, huh? I really expected more from you than this. Where’s the woman of principle who’s always criticizing people? Why can’t you tell me the truth? Because this guy dumped you? Are you scared to leave me without another man to run to?”

  The words rolled right over her. She couldn’t get past the gun. It seemed unreal in Warren’s hand, a mockery of everything he stood for. He had never liked guns. He knew how to shoot, of course, like any man raised in a small Southern town. But he wasn’t like a lot of the men she knew, who had fetishes about guns. Many homes in Athens Point held half a dozen firearms, and some forty or fifty. A couple of doctors actually carried guns on their person and had built pistol ranges on their property. She’d heard Warren make disparaging comments about those men, something to the effect that they used the idea of self-defense to justify the macho feeling that guns gave them. Laurel agreed, but Warren’s take on things had surprised her, because unlike most people, he had actually used a gun to defend his family.

  When he was fifteen years old, a prowler had broken into his parents’ house, looking for anything he could steal to buy drugs. Warren had awakened, crept down the hall, and found a hopped-up teenager pointing a gun at his father’s chest and demanding money. Without thinking, Warren rushed to his parents’ room and grabbed his father’s loaded .45 from the top shelf of the closet. Then he ran back to the front room and shot the yelling prowler in the back. He didn’t yell out a warning or call 911. He saw his parents in mortal danger, and he responded with deadly force. The police saw things the same way, and within hours, Warren Shields was a local hero. A week later, the NRA sent a reporter to town to get the story, to run it in their “The Armed Citizen” column in American Rifleman. Warren and his parents declined this celebrity. As it turned out, the boy Warren had shot was only three years older than Warren himself. Warren had played baseball against him when he was still in high school. As far as Laurel knew, Warren had never fired another pistol since that day.

  Yet now he was holding one in his hand.

  Don’t look at the gun, she told herself. “Somebody’s screwing with your head, Warren. That’s the only explanation for this.”

  Another faint smile, as though he could appreciate her efforts to deny the obvious, the way Grant tried to deny peeing on the toilet seat. “Then it shouldn’t bother you to keep reading,” he said. “Maybe together we can figure out who wrote this.”

  “Warren—”

  “Read!”

  She closed her eyes for a few moments, then continued. “ ‘I think of you in everything I do. You’re as much a part of my being as I am. This emotion feels unselfish, but it’s not, because you are my salvation. And not only mine, as you know. No lesser thing could keep me from coming to you. I know you know that, and that’s not why I’m writing you. I’m writing to tell you something else you already know, hopefully to give you the last push you need.

  “ ‘You deserve more than I can give you, and that’s why we’re not together. But you also deserve more than Warren can give you. Much more. You have to leave him, Laurel. He can never make you happy, and you know it. He doesn’t even know you. If he did, he would never have let you give up so much to come here.’ ”

  Over the top of the letter, she saw Warren’s mouth tighten into a grimace of hatred. She stopped, but he motioned for her to go on.

  “ ‘You and Warren are complete opposites. He is cold, logical, held-in, almost sterile. You’re warm, vibrant, creative, sensual, all the things you’ve shown me this past year. I’m not trying to denigrate him. I know he has good qualities. He’s an honest man, a good provider. I don’t care much for his parenting style, but I’m not sure we have much choice in that. We’re all victims of our fathers that way. But your needs are so deep. Emotionally, sexually, intellectually . . . while his seem so limited and concrete. You’ve told me that yourself. He doesn’t really want a wife, but a beautiful servant. That role will never be enough for you, and the sooner you admit that, the better off you’ll be. Warren will be, too. The only way you could stay with him is by becoming a lifelong martyr to your children. I’ve known women who did that. Zoloft for the daytime, sedatives at night, a vibrator in the drawer, and too many glasses of wine at parties. They all regret it later.’ ”

  Laurel paused for breath. Too afraid to look up, she pushed forward on autopilot.

  “ ‘Please don’t choose that life. Don’t sell yourself short. The simple truth is that you married too young. Should you pay for that mistake for the rest of your life? I know, I know . . . Do as I say, not as I do. But we’re in very different situations. Grant and Beth will be all right. No matter what you choose, I’m going to abide by our agreement. I never thought of myself as weak until I was inside you. Now I know how weak I truly am. I’ll never get myself out of you, and I’ll never get you out of me. I’m sorrier than you’ll ever know.’ ” She paused, trying to blot Danny from her mind, as though not thinking of him might somehow protect him. “It’s signed, ‘Me.’ ”

  “How convenient,” Warren said acidly. “Don’t you think? And the writer seems to have his finger on the pulse of our marriage, doesn’t he? Or he thinks he does, anyway. Who do you think might know us that well?”

  She kept staring at the paper, wishing harder than she had as a child forced to sing in front of her father’s congregation that she could magically be transported elsewhere. As she stared, the periphery of her vision shrunk and went dark, until she was staring at the letter through a round window. Her dread of pain returned with enough force to take her out of the moment—almost.

  “Just tell me
the truth,” Warren said softly. “Please. I won’t be angry.”

  Glancing up at his slitted eyes, she felt she had just heard a rattlesnake hiss, Just step right here on my tail, I promise I won’t bite you.

  “I have told you the truth. You don’t want to hear it.” She dropped the letter on the floor. “I got a migraine aura thirty minutes ago. If I don’t get that injection, I’ll be flat on my back all afternoon, unable to speak. You won’t be able to continue this ridiculous interrogation.”

  He regarded her coolly. Withstanding his scrutiny as best she could, she tried to make a plan of action. Given the as-yet-unmentioned gun, she should probably get out of the house as fast as possible. But that wasn’t as simple as it sounded. She couldn’t outrun Warren, and no one could outrun a bullet. It seemed inconceivable that he would actually shoot her, but if someone had asked her whether Warren would threaten her with a gun, she would have declared that impossible, too. No . . . she was going to have to talk her way out of this. Talk and bluff.

  “Is that a gun in your hand?” she asked in a neutral voice.

  He lifted the pistol into plain sight. “This?”

  “Yes, that.”

  “It is.”

  “Is it loaded?”

  “Of course. An unloaded gun is useless.”

  Oh, boy. “Where did you get it?”

  “I bought it a couple of months ago. Some punks hassled me one night when I was riding my bike on the south end of town. I carry this in my seat bag now. I’ve got a permit for it.”

  Warren was still an obsessive cyclist; he’d won dozens of regional races, and even a couple of nationals a few years ago. He rode countless miles in training, but she’d heard nothing about any gun, or any incident where he’d needed one.

  “You keep that in the house, with our children?”

  She’d tried to sound suitably shocked, but Warren ignored her apparent concern. “I have a lockbox for it in the storeroom. Top shelf. It’s kidproof, don’t worry.”

  It’s not the kids I’m worried about right now. “That doesn’t mean it’s Grant-proof.”

  A smile crossed Warren’s face as he thought of his mischievous son.

  “Why are you holding it now?” she asked.

  “Because I’m very angry. And this makes me feel better.”

  Oh, God—

  “Apparently,” he went on, “you don’t want to tell me the truth. But you should know this: you’re not leaving this house until I know who wrote that letter.”

  “I don’t want to leave the house, Warren. I want a shot of Imitrex.”

  He frowned as though he were being greatly inconvenienced. “Give me your cell phone.”

  A shiver of panic went through her, until she remembered she was carrying both phones. There had been days when she’d only had her clone phone in her pocket.

  “Hand it over! Your car keys, too.”

  She slid her hand into her right front pocket and drew out her legitimate Razr. Warren reached out and took it, then laid it on the coffee table.

  “I’ve already gone over your cellular records online. I’ve got a couple of questions for you.”

  She shrugged. There was no danger there. She had always used her clone phone to call Danny.

  “The keys, come on.”

  She drew her car keys from her left front pocket and passed them to Warren, who shoved them into his own pocket. She hated to give them up, but she couldn’t risk him searching her and finding the clone phone in her back pocket. Danny was probably trying to call her right now. He would be sitting in the clearing on his four-wheeler, expecting to see her Acura come rolling between the big oak trees. He’d wait awhile, thinking she was only running late. Then he would start to worry. She had to contact him. A sickening wave of nausea hit her, and she tensed against it. As it passed, she got an idea about how to text Danny.

  “I want your computer, too,” Warren said. “Where is it? In the kitchen?”

  The blood drained from her face. There were things in her computer that could destroy her. Danny, too. “I’m going to throw up,” she groaned.

  She ran for the master bathroom.

  “Goddamn it!” Warren cursed, jumping up and rushing after her.

  She ran all the way to the toilet cubicle, hoping that Warren would stop in the bedroom, but he didn’t. He stood over her as she fell to her knees and put her face in the toilet bowl. She had no choice now. Retching loudly, she stuck her finger down her throat and brought up what remained of her breakfast.

  Warren didn’t flinch. He’d seen things in his medical career that made a little vomit look like a picnic. She was terrified that he would notice the flat, rectangular bulge of the second Razr in her back pocket, but he suddenly walked out of the cubicle. She heard him rummaging in the medicine cabinet on his side of the marble-floored bathroom. Could she risk texting Danny now?

  “Is the Imitrex in there?” She coughed. “Did you find it?”

  “I’ve got it. Come lie on the bed, and I’ll give you the shot. Stay away from the bathroom windows. I noticed Mrs. Elfman nosing around out there this morning.”

  Laurel’s throat constricted in terror. She prayed that the e.p.t box still lay behind the hedge beneath the bathroom window.

  “Hurry up!” Warren said irritably, suddenly standing above her again. “You’re done, aren’t you?”

  “I’m still nauseated.”

  “The sooner the better, then.”

  He grabbed her pants right above the pocket that held the Razr. As she screamed and tried to protect the phone, he yanked down her waistband and jabbed a needle into her hip. After what seemed a savage twist, he yanked it out again.

  “Ow!” she cried. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “Me? I’m ‘cold, logical, held-in, almost sterile.’ ” He slapped the spot where he’d injected her, something nurses did to distract patients from the pain of injections—usually before the needle went in—but his slap was hard enough to bruise. “Tell me who wrote that shit. Tell me who else has been looking at that ass.”

  His voice had a proprietary edge. “No one! I told you.”

  “When was the last time you fucked him?”

  Laurel tried to stand, but Warren seized her neck and pressed her back down. In twelve years of marriage he had never laid a hand on her in anger. Fresh fear twisted her insides. “Warren, that hurts! Please think about what you’re doing.”

  “You want to talk about pain? That’s funny. I don’t need to think about this.”

  “Yes, you do. I haven’t cheated on you. I’d never do that to you!”

  “You’re a liar.” He shoved her against the toilet, then walked away again.

  She scrambled to her feet and ran to her side of the bed. There was no point in trying to flee the house unless she could slow him down first. Pulling back the comforter and sheets, she crawled under them and pulled them up to her neck.

  “Get up,” Warren said from the foot of the bed. “I want to check your computer.”

  “Go get it, then. I’m going to lie here until the aura goes away.”

  “If I leave you here, you’ll climb out the window.”

  Damn right I will. “Ten minutes in the dark, Warren. Please. If the aura stops, I’ll do whatever you want.” She closed her eyes. “You can lie here with me, if you want to.”

  “I don’t,” he said, but he flicked off the light switch. “The windows are locked, by the way. All of them.”

  She shifted under the covers, then slid her hand into her back pocket and eased out the clone Razr. In one continuous motion, she opened the phone and slipped it into her front pocket. Warren was a black silhouette in the dark, leaning on his bureau.

  “When I read that letter,” he said hoarsely, “I felt like someone had stabbed me in the heart.”

  She slid her thumb lightly over the Razr’s keypad. Keying in a message was child’s play, but blindly pressing the proper sequence of buttons to put the phone into text mode wasn’t. She tu
rned her head and looked at Warren as she worked her thumb over the faintly tactile buttons, trying to keep his eyes focused on her face.

  “I’m not having an affair,” she said softly. “I haven’t had one in the past, either. I would never do that to Grant and Beth.”

  Warren flipped out the cylinder of his revolver and spun it. “I wouldn’t have thought you could.” The cylinder snicked home. “But the letter says different.”

  “That letter is bullshit.” Laurel had the Razr in text mode. She began keying her message to Danny, her eyes never leaving her husband’s face. “Someone faked it to mess with your head.”

  To her surprise, Warren seemed to be considering her suggestion. “Who would fake something like that?” he asked, as though talking to himself.

  “Somebody who wants to drive you crazy. And it’s obviously working. Warren, if you lift a hand to me again, I’m calling the police and hiring a divorce lawyer.”

  This was pure bravado. Even in near darkness, she could see his neck and jaw muscles tightly flexed. Danny’s letter had utterly transformed him. With an infinitesimal movement of her right thumb, she pressed SEND and slid her hand out of her pocket.

  “I still have the aura,” she said with genuine anxiety. “My arms are tingling, and I’m craving ice cream.”

  “Imitrex only shortens the headache, you know that.”

  She closed her eyes again.

  “You’ve got to get up,” Warren said. “I want to see your computer. You can lie on the sofa in the great room.”

  Laurel prayed that Danny was already reading her message. She’d risked a lot to send it, and she hadn’t sent the message Danny would have wanted her to. But she still had the phone, and in her heart she still believed she could talk Warren down from this flight of rage—so long as her computer concealed its secrets. At bottom, the idea that Warren Shields, M.D., might shoot the mother of his children was preposterous. But what he might do to a man who had fornicated with and impregnated her was another matter.

  “Get up, goddamn it!” Warren snapped, kicking the side of the mattress.