Why would he take us on? There had to be something wrong with a man who would carry such a burden as to live on the run with my mother, me, and later, Hayden. I loved him in the way that one loves a trusted pet; one who might bite you, so you never get too close. He was solid. Caring. Yet he wasn’t my dad. He was Hayden’s dad. My stomach roils as I think of him nearly pinned to the floor of the kitchen with a knife, like some moth specimen in biology class at South Kitsap. I want to cry for him right now. He deserves that much, but I don’t.

I can’t think of anything but my biological dad and who he was. He was not dog-tag material. He was not the hero. Far, far from that. He was the villain, the worst, most despicable kind ever. The feeling that overtakes me right then as Hayden sleeps in the seat next to me is a mix of sadness, anger, and confusion: If I’m not the daughter of a hero, but the daughter of a killer, then what kind of person am I?

* * *

I sit motionless for a very long time. I almost don’t know the girl on the recording, what she’s thinking, where she’s going. How she plans to use that gun. It’s scary. Even though she’s a stranger to me, I know she is still deep inside me. I don’t blame her for what she’s about to do. I wish that I had one of Maxine’s cats right now. I’d hold it in my arms and tell it how much it means to have someone you can depend on. I’d pet it softly and take in the purrs, the motor-like sounds that would reassure me that there was more good to the world than the evil that seems to surround me.

I pour another tepid glass of wine and head for bed, hoping that slumber will give me relief from what I know is about to come.

Not from the Wheaton case.

I can handle that.

It’s what the tapes are about to disclose.

Who I am.

Twenty-Two

Warrant in hand, I don’t drive alone to the Wheaton place. I bring Bernadine Chesterfield, a social worker and victim’s advocate, a fixture at the county before I arrived. She’s in her late forties with bright red hair and eye shadow that I seriously think would scare off a victim. It’s an iridescent blue. Or is it purple? Pink? I honestly don’t know what hue it is or why she wears it with such abandon. She talks about her son in the Coast Guard. Her daughter lives in Portland crafting beeswax candles.

“I always knew that my beautiful little dreamers would do great things someday.”

“You are so lucky,” I tell her.