The Good Lie by A.R. Torre
CHAPTER 6
I woke up to the smell of toast and coffee. It was comforting and familiar, reminiscent of my childhood, and I closed my eyes for an extra moment before jerking fully awake.
My bedroom was in perfect order, as it always was. Dresser clean and uncluttered. Curtains pulled closed. Clock at a forty-five-degree angle to the vase of lilies, which were beginning to wilt. My watch on the bedside table, next to the novels.
The smell of food was out of place. So were the footsteps coming from downstairs. The lawyer. I pinched my eyes closed and tried to place his name. Robert. Robert without a last name. We’d debated the death penalty during the cab ride here. Oh my God, my car. It was still in the parking garage three blocks down from the funeral home.
I slowly sat up, appreciating the sore ache of my muscles. Robert had been . . . A grin pulled at my lips. Fantastic. Was that what sex was supposed to be like? God, to think of all the years I had wasted on mediocre lovemaking. I pulled back the covers and swung my legs over the side of the high bed, surprised that I was naked except for an oversize Star Wars T-shirt that I’d purchased online. Robert had liked the shirt, chuckling as he had returned from my closet with it in hand. I looked around for my underwear but didn’t see it. Pushing to my feet, I winced at the pain in my head. I should have taken that B12 . . . or B6, or whatever it had been. Just the fact he was up and cooking breakfast was proof it worked.
I brushed my teeth and pulled on a fresh pair of underwear and a pair of faded jeans. Buttoning up the fly, I quietly made my way down the stairs and toward the kitchen.
The grin that stretched across my cheeks fell as soon as I passed the open double doors to my office and saw Robert standing at my desk, looking down at an open client file. John Abbott’s file. I’d left it out, my review abandoned yesterday afternoon when I’d stopped to dress for the funeral. As I watched, he lifted up the edge of a page.
“What are you doing?”
He looked up, unperturbed by my tone. “I thought you said you were Brooke’s friend.”
I entered the office, my anger growing at his lack of apology. “These are confidential patient files.”
“Confidential patient files for John Abbott.” He tapped the page. “John was a patient of yours?”
“You need to leave,” I snapped, my warm and fuzzy feelings fleeing at the thought of what he had seen. What was the liability here? I’d left patient files out in the open, but in the privacy of my own home. Had he broken any laws? Had I?
He dropped the file and stepped away from the desk.
“What are you doing in here?” I closed the file and wrapped a rubber band around it. “Is this what you do? You sleep with someone and then go through all their things?”
“I had to check my work messages. My cell’s battery is dead.” He nodded to the phone on my desk. “I didn’t have a charger, and you don’t have a phone in the kitchen. This was the first room where I found one. I’m sorry. His name caught my eye.”
I opened my drawer and pushed the folder into it. “You should go. I can order a car for you if your phone is dead.”
He didn’t move, and my frustration grew.
“You know what confidentiality I’m bound to. You have a very similar one with your clients,” I said.
“You should have told me that you were John’s shrink.”
“Why?” I gave a strangled laugh. “You were a stranger in a bar. I didn’t owe you confidential information about a client.”
“A dead client,” he pointed out.
“It doesn’t matter. My legal obligations don’t change.” I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at him.
“Okay,” he said finally, his jaw tight. “Fine. No need to call me a car. Thank you for the hospitality.”
He picked up his jacket from where he’d folded it over a chair and walked into the hall. I stayed in place and listened as his dress shoes sounded down the hall and out the front door. There was a quiet click as it latched back into place. From the kitchen, something wafted smoke in the air.
I picked up the phone’s receiver and listened to the dial tone. I studied the bank of buttons, then reached forward and pressed the redial button. An unknown number with a 310 area code displayed. Holding my breath, I listened as the phone rang once and then went to a voice mail for Cluster & Kavin Law Firm.
I hung up. So, he had called his office. Cluster & Kavin . . . I paused halfway through to the hall and inhaled sharply, suddenly aware of who Robert was.
Robert Kavin. The father of Gabe.