Flesh and Blood

Flesh and Blood

Alex Delaware [15]

Kellerman, Jonathan

Ballantine Books (2008)

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Lauren Teague is a beautiful, defiant, borderline-delinquent teenager when her parents bring her to Alex Delaware's office. But for all Alex's skill and effort, Lauren resists--angrily, provocatively. Reluctantly, the psychologist chalks Lauren up as one of the inevitable failures of a challenging profession. But years later, when Alex encounters Lauren as a stag party's featured entertainment, both doctor and patient are stricken with shame. And the ultimate horror takes place when, soon after, Lauren's brutalized corpse is found dumped in an alley. Alex disregards the advice of his trusted friend, LAPD detective Milo Sturgis, and jeopardizes his relationship with longtime lover Robin Castagna in order to pursue Lauren's murderer. As he investigates his young patient's troubled past, Alex enters the shadowy worlds of fringe psychological experimentation and the sex industry, and then into mortal danger when lust and big money collide in Southern California.

Jonathan Kellerman's L.A. is evil, seductive, erotic, and unforgiving, and Flesh and Blood is mind-opening in its drama of a driven man's personal quest, breathtaking in its ingenious plot, filled with unforgettable characters, and topped off by a terrifying climax. This is suspense fiction as its best.

Flesh and Blood

Alex Delaware – Book 15

By Jonathan Kellerman

To my children—

Jesse, Rachel,

Ilana, and Aliza

1

SAD TRUTH: Had she been just a patient, I probably wouldn't have remembered her.

All those years listening, so many faces. There was a time I recalled every one of them. Forgetting comes with experience. It doesn't bother me as much as it used to.

Her mother phoned my service on a Saturday morning soon after New Year's.

“A Mrs. Jane Abbot,” said the operator. “She says her daughter's an old patient. Lauren Teague.”

Jane Abbot's name meant nothing to me, but Lauren Teague sparked an uneasy nostalgia. It was an 818 number, somewhere in the Valley. When I'd known the family they'd lived in West L.A. I searched my old case files before returning the call.

Teague, Lauren Lee. Intake date, ten years ago, the tail end of my Wilshire Boulevard practice. Shortly after, I cashed in some real estate profits, tried to drop out, met a beautiful woman, became friends with a sad, brilliant detective, learned more than I wanted to know about bad things. Since then I'd avoided the commitment of long-term therapy cases, stuck to court consults and forensic work, the kinds of puzzles that removed me from the confines of my office.

Lauren had been fifteen at referral. Thin file: one history-taking meeting with the parents followed by two sessions with the girl. Then a missed appointment, no explanation. The next day the father left a message canceling any future treatment. Unpaid balance for the final session; I'd made a halfhearted effort to collect, then written it off.

When old patients get in touch it's usually because they're doing great and want to brag, or exactly the opposite. Either way they tend to be people with whom I've connected. Lauren Teague didn't qualify. Far from it. If anything, I was the last person she'd want to see. Why was her mother contacting me now?

Presenting problems: poor school achiev., noncompliance at home. Clin. impressions: fath. angry; moth. possib. deprssd. Tension bet. moth. and father— marital strss? Parents agree re: Lauren's behavior as the prim. prob. Uneventful birth hx, only child, no sig. health probs., contact pediatric M.D. to verify. School: per Mom: “Lauren's always been smart.” “Used to love to read, now hates it.” B2 aver. till last year, then “change of attitude,” new friends—“bums” (fath.), some truancy, C's and D's. Basic mood is “sullen.” “No communic.” Parents try to talk, get no resp. Suspect drug use.

As I leafed through the file, Jane and Lyle Teague's faces came into semifocus. She, thin, blond, edgy, a former flight attendant, now a “full-time mom.” A heavy smoker— forty-five minutes without tobacco had been torture.

Lauren's father had been slit-eyed, blank-faced, reluctant to engage. His wife had talked fast . . . nervous hands, moist eyes. When she'd looked to him for support, he'd turned away.

They were both thirty-nine, but he looked older. . . . He'd done something in the building trades . . . here it was, elect. contractr. A powerful-looking man, fighting the advent of middle age with long hair, sprayed in place, that fringed his shoulders. Black pelt of beard. Muscles made obvious by a too-tight polo shirt and pressed jeans. Crude but well-balanced features . . . gold chain circling a ruddy neck . . . gold I.D. bracelet— how did I remember that? Put him in buckskins and he could've been a grizzly hunter.

Lyle Teague had sat with his legs spread wide, consulted his watch every few minutes, fondled his beeper as if hoping for intrusion. Unable to maintain eye contact— lapsing into dreamy stares. That had made me wonder about attention deficit, something he might've passed on to Lauren. But when I raised the topic of academic testing, he didn't stir defensively, and his wife said Lauren had been examined two years before by a school psychologist and found to be “normal and extremely bright.”

“Bright,” he said, putting no praise into the word. “Nothing wrong with her brain that a little discipline won't cure.” Accusing glance at his wife.

Her mouth twisted, but she said, “That's what we're here to learn.”

Lyle Teague smirked.

I said, “Mr. Teague, do you think anything else is going on, besides Lauren's being spoiled?”

“Nah, basic teenage garbage.” Another look at his wife, this time seeking confirmation.

She said, “Lauren's a good girl.”

Lyle Teague laughed threateningly. “Then why the hell are we here?”

“Honey—”

“Yeah, yeah, fine.”

He tried to tune out, but I stuck with him, finally got him talking about Lauren, how different she was from the “cute little kid” he'd once taken to job sites in his truck. As he reminisced, his face darkened and his speech got choppy, and by the end of the speech he pronounced his daughter “a real hassle. Hope to hell you can do something with her.”

* * *

Two days later Lauren showed up in my waiting room, alone, five minutes late. A tall, slender, conspicuously busted, brown-haired girl, treated kindly by puberty.

Fifteen, but she could've passed for twenty. She wore a white jersey tank top, skimpy, snug blue-denim shorts, and ludicrously high-heeled white sandals. Smooth, tan arms and long, tan legs were showcased by the minimal clothing. Pink-polished toes glinted at the tips of her sandals. The strap of a small black patent leather purse striped a bare shoulder. If she'd been studying the hookers on Sunset for fashion tips, she'd learned well.

When young girls flaunt, the result is often a comic loss of equilibrium. Lauren Teague seemed perfectly at ease advertising her body— like father, like daughter?

She favored her father in coloring, her mother in structure, but bore no striking resemblance to either. The brown hair was burnt umber sparked with rust, thick and straight, hanging halfway down her back, parted dead center and flipped into extravagant wings at the temples. High cheekbones, wide mouth glossed pink, dominant but perfectly proportioned cleft chin, heavily lined, azure-shadowed blue eyes— mocking eyes. A strong, straight, uptilted nose was dashed by freckles she'd tried to obliterate with makeup. Lots of makeup. It stuccoed her from brow to jaw, creating a too-beige mask.

As I introduced myself she breezed past me into the office, taking long, easy strides on the impossible heels. None of the usual teenage slump— she held her back straight, thrust out her chest. A strikingly good-looking girl, made less attractive by cosmetics and blatancy.

Selecting the chair closest to mine, she sat down as if she'd been there a hundred times before. “Cool furniture.”

“Thank you.”

“Like one of those libraries in an old movie.” She batted her lashes, crossed and recrossed her legs, threw out her chest again, yawned, stretched, folded her arms across her torso, dropped them to her sides suddenly, a cartoon of vulnerability.

I asked why she thought she was there.

“My parents think I'm a loser.”

“A loser.”

“Yup.”

“What do you think of that?”

Derisive laugh, toss of hair. Her tongue tip skated across her lower lip. “May-be.” Shrug. Yawn. “So . . . time to talk about my head problems, huh?”

Jane and Lyle Teague had denied previous therapy, but Lauren's glibness made me wonder. I asked her about it.

“Nope, never. The school counselor tried to talk to me a couple of times.”

“About?”

“My grades.”

“Did it help?”

She laughed. “Yeah, right. Okay, ready for my neurosis?”

“Neurosis,” I said.

“We have psych this year. Stupid class. Ready?”

“If you are.”

“Sure. I mean— that's the point, right? I'm supposed to spit out all my deep, dark secrets.”

“It's not a matter of supposed to—”

“I know, I know,” she said. “That's what shrinks always say— no one's gonna force you to do anything.”

“You know about shrinks.”

“I know enough. Some of my friends have seen 'em. One of them had a shrink give her that shi— That stuff about never forcing her, then the next week he committed her to a mental ward.”

“Why?”

“She tried to kill herself.”

“Sounds like a good reason,” I said.

Shrug.

“How's your friend doing?”

“Fine— like you really care.” Her eyes rolled.

I said nothing.

“That, too,” she said. “That's the other shrink thing— just sitting there and staring. Saying ‘Ah-ah’ and ‘Uh-huh.’ Answering questions with questions. Right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Very funny,” she said. “At what you charge, I'm not coming here forever. And he's probably gonna call to make sure I showed up and did a good job so let's get going.”

“Dad's in a hurry?”

“Yeah. So give me a good grade, okay? Tell him I was good— I don't need any more hassles.”

“I'll tell him you cooperated—”

“Tell him whatever you want.”

“But I'm not going to get into details, because—”

“Confidentiality, yeah, yeah. It doesn't matter. Tell them anything.”

“No secrets from Mom and Dad?”

“What for?” She played with her hair, gave a world-weary smile. “I've got no cool secrets anyway. Totally boring life. Too bad for you— try not to fall asleep.”

“So,” I said, “your dad wants you to get this over with quickly.”

“Whatever.” She picked at her hair.

“What exactly did he tell you to accomplish here, Lauren?”

“Get my act together, be straight— be a good girl.” She laughed, arced one leg over the other, placed a hand on a calf and tickled.

“Be straight,” I said. “As in drugs?”

“They're paranoid about that, along with everything else. Even though they smoke.”

“They smoke dope?”

“Dope, tobacco. Little after-dinner taste. Sometimes it's booze—cocktails. ‘We're mature enough to control it, Lauren.’ ” She laughed. “Jane used to be a stewardess, working all these fancy private charters. They've still got this collection of tiny little bottles. I like the green melon stuff— Midori. But I'm not allowed to touch pot till I'm eighteen.” She laughed. “Like I'd ever.”

“Pot's not for you?” I said.

“Pot's boring— too slow. Like hey, man, let's pretend we're in the sixties, get all wasted and sit around staring at the sky and talking about God.” Another gust of laughter, painfully lacking in joy. “Pot sure makes them boring. It's the only time she slows down. And he just sits and vegges on the TV, munches nachos, whatever. I'm not supposed to be talking about their bad habits, I'm the one who needs to change.”

“Change how?”

“Clean my room,” she singsonged. “Do my chores, get ready in the morning without calling my mom a bitch, stop saying ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ and ‘cunt.’ Go to class and pay attention, build up my grades, stop breaking curfew, hang out with decent friends, not low-lifes.” She rotated one hand, as if spooling thread.

“And I'm supposed to get you to do all that.”

“Lyle says no way, you never will.”

“Lyle.”

Her eyes got merry. “That's something else I'm supposed to not do. Call him by his name. He hates it, it drives him crazy.”

“So no way you'll stop.”

She played with her hair. “Who knows what I'll do?”

“How does he react when you do things that irritate him?”

“Ignores me. Walks away and gets involved in something else.”

“He has hobbies?”

“Him? Only thing he does is work, eat, smoke dope, stuff his face, watch TV. He has no faith in me. In you, either.” Conspiratorial smile. “He says shrinks are just a bunch of overpaid clowns who can't screw in a lightbulb by themselves and I'm gonna just end up conning you like I con everybody. He's only paying for this because Jane's really getting on his nerves with all her nagging.”

“Mom has more faith in shrinks?”

“Mom's totally worried,” she said. “Mom likes to suffer. They're— Here's a juicy one for you: They only got married 'cause they had to. One day I was looking for a bra in Jane's drawer and I found their wedding license. Two months before my birthday. I was conceived in sin. What do you think of that?”

“Is it a big deal to you?”

“I just think it's funny.”

“How so?”

“Here they are being all moral and . . . whatever.” Lifting the tiny black purse, she undid the clasp, peered inside, snapped it shut.

“Mom likes to suffer,” I said.

“Yeah, she hates her life. She used to work private charters, fly all around the world with superrich people. She regrets ever coming down to earth.” She shifted to the edge of the chair. “How much longer do I have to be here?”

Rather than pick apart the fine points of free choice, I said, “Half an hour.”

Opening the purse again, she pulled out a compact, checked her reflection, plucked an eyelash and flicked it away.

“Half an hour,” she said. “No way do I have half an hour of problems— want to hear all of them?”

“Sure.”

She launched into a long, droning speech about stupid girlfriends getting on her case, stupid ex-boyfriends foolish enough to think they were still in her good graces, stupid teachers who didn't know anything more than the students, stupid parties, a stupid world.

Talking nonstop in the flat tones of a rehearsed witness, looking everywhere but at me.

When she was through I said, “So everyone's getting on your nerves.”

“You've got that right. . . . How much longer now?”

“Twenty-five minutes.”

“Shit. That much? You should have a clock up there. So people can keep track.”

“Usually people don't want to.”

“Why not?”

“They don't want to be distracted.”

She favored me with a bitter smile, scooted forward on the chair. “Well, I want to leave early. Okay? Just today. Please. I've got some people waiting for me, and I need to get home by five-thirty or Jane and Lyle're gonna freak out.”

“People waiting for what?”

“Fun.”

“Friends are picking you up.”

She nodded.

“Where?”

“I told them to meet me a block from here. So can I go?”

“Lauren, I'm not forcing you—”

“But if I split early you'll fink, right?”

“Look,” I said, “it's a matter of twenty minutes. As long as you're here, why not make good use of the time?”

I expected protest, but she sat there, pouting. “That's not fair. I told you everything. There's nothing wrong with me.”

“I'm not saying there is, Lauren.”

“So what's the point?”

“I'd like to learn more about you—”

“I'm not worth learning about, okay? My life's boring, I already told you that.” She ran her hands over her torso. “This is it, all of me, nothing exciting.”

I let several seconds pass. “Lauren, is everything really going as well as it could for you?”

She studied me from under grainy, black lashes, reached into the purse again, and extricated a pack of Virginia Slims.

When she produced a lighter, I shook my head.

“Oh, c'mon.”

“Sorry.”

“How can you do that? People coming here all stressed out. Don't they complain— wasn't Jane climbing the walls? She's a chimney.”

“Mostly I see kids and teens,” I said. “People manage.”

“Kids and teens.” She gave a short, cold laugh. “Every teen I know smokes. Are you allergic or something?”

“Some of my patients are.”

“So why does everyone have to suffer because of a few? That's not democracy.”

“It's consideration,” I said.

“Fine.” She jammed the pack back into the purse. “How much time left now?”

2

THE SECOND TIME she was twenty minutes late, hurried into the office muttering what might have been an apology.

Same getup, different color scheme: black tank top, sunburn pink shorts, lips coarsened by bright red paste.

Same precarious sandals and cheap little purse. She reeked of tobacco and a rose-heavy perfume. Her cheeks were flushed, and her hair was mussed.

She took a long time settling in the chair, finally said, “Got hung up.”

“You and your friends?”

“Yeah.” Hair flip. “Sorry.”

“Hung up where?”

“Around . . . the pier.”

“Santa Monica?” I said.

“We like the beach.” She massaged one bare, bronze shoulder.

“Nice sunny day,” I said, smiling. “Classes must have let out early.”

Sudden, bright laughter tumbled from between the crimson lips. “Right.”

“School's a drag, huh?”

“School would have to be on uppers to be a drag.” She produced the cigarette pack, bounced it on a shiny knee. “When I was little they tested my IQ. I'm supposed to be supersmart. They say I should be studying more. I say I'm smart enough to know it's a waste of time.”

“No interest in any subject?” I said.

“Nutrition— love that garlic bread. Is today when we talk about sex?”

That caught me off guard. “I don't recall our scheduling that.”

“They scheduled it. I've been instructed to talk to you about it.”

“By your parents?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“It's mostly Lyle's idea. He's positive I'm doing the dirty, gonna get pregnant, stick him with a ‘little nigger grandkid.’ Like if I was, talking to you about it would help. Like just because I don't talk to them, I'm going to throw up my insides to some outsider.”

“Sometimes talking to an outsider can be safer.”

“Maybe for some people,” she said. “But explain me this: When you're young everyone's always knocking into your head never talk to strangers, beware of strangers, watch out for strangers. So now they're paying for me to tell my secrets to a stranger?”

She ran a fingernail under the seal of the pack, slit it open, played with the foil flap. “What bullshit.”

“Maybe they're hoping eventually you won't consider me a stranger.”

“They can hope all they want.” Low, tight laugh. “Hey, I'm not trying to be rude, it's just coming out that way— Sorry, you seem like a nice guy. It's just that I shouldn't have to be here, okay? Face it: They're just using you to punish me— like grounding me or threatening not to let me get my license next year. None of that worked, and this won't either. You have to care to be controlled, and I don't do caring.”

“What are they punishing you for, Lauren?”

“They say it's my attitude,” she said, “but you know what I think? I think they're jealous.”

“Of what?”

“My happiness.”

“You're happy and they're not.”

“They're making themselves out to be all . . . in control. Especially him.” She lowered her voice to a hostile baritone parody: “‘Lauren, you're screwing up your life. This therapy crap is goddamn expensive. I want you to go in there and spill your guts.'”

Last week she'd talked about spitting out secrets. The emetic approach to insight.

“So,” I said, “your parents aren't happy, they're taking it out on you, and I'm the weapon.”

“They're stuck where they are and I'm cool, free, enjoying my life, and that bugs them. Soon as I get my own money, I'm out of there, bye-bye, Lyle and Jane.”

“Do you have a plan to get money?”

She shrugged. “I'll figure something out— I'm not talking right now. I'm not impractical, I know even McDonald's won't hire me without their permission. But someday.”

“Did you try to work at McDonald's?”

Nod. “I wanted my own money. But they said no. ‘No outside work until your grades come up.’ Which they won't, so forget that.”

“Why won't your grades come up?” I said.

“'Cause I don't want them to.”

“So it's a few more years of this.”

Her eyes shifted. “I'll figure something out— Listen, forget sex. I don't want to talk to you about it. Or anything else. No offense, but I just don't want to spill my guts.”

“Okay.”

“Okay, great.” She shot to her feet. “See you next week.”

Ten minutes to go. I said, “No way you can stick it out?”

“Are you going to tell them I split early?”

“No, but—”

“Thanks,” she said. “No, I really can't stick it out, this is hurting my head— Tell you what, next week I'll come on time and stay the whole time, okay? Promise.”

“It's only ten minutes.”

“Ten minutes too long.”

“Give it a chance, Lauren. We don't have to talk about your problems.”

“What, then?”

“Tell me about your interests.”

“I'm interested in the beach,” she said. “Okay? I'm interested in freedom— which is exactly what I need right now. Next week I'll be good— I mean it.”

Next week. Conning me or did she really intend to return?

“I've gotta get out of here.”

“Sure,” I said. “Take care.”

Big smile. Hair flip. “You're a doll.” Swinging the purse like a slingshot, she hurried out. I caught up with her in the waiting room, just as she whipped out her lighter.

Jamming the cigarette in her mouth, she shoved at the door. I watched her trot down the hall, a girl in a hurry, haloed by a cloud of smoke.

I thought about her a few times— the image of selfdestructive escape. Then that faded too.

* * *

Six years later I was invited to a bachelor party the weekend before Halloween.

A forty-five-year-old radiation oncologist at Western Pediatrics was getting married to an O.R. nurse, and a consortium of hospital physicians and administrators had rented the presidential suite of the Beverly Monarch Hotel for the send-off.

Steaks, ribs, buffalo wings, assorted fried and grilled stuff on the buffet. Iced tubs of beer, serve-yourself bar, Cuban cigars, gooey desserts. My contact with the honoree— a mumbling loner lacking in social skills— had been a few stiff, unproductive discussions about patient care, and I wondered why I'd been included in the festivities. Perhaps every face helped.

There was no shortage of faces when I arrived late. The suite was vast, a string of mood-lit, black-carpeted rooms packed with sweaty men. Penthouse level— no doubt a great view— but the drapes were drawn and the air felt heavy. Suit jackets and neckties were heaped on a sofa near the door under a hand-lettered sign that said, GET CASUAL! I made my way through testosterone guffaws, random backslapping, blue cigar fog, the strained glee of boozy toasts.

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