“I think he’s worried that he’s a sociopath,” Decker told him. “He asked me if he fit the description of those I have arrested.”

“What did you tell him?”

“No, of course.”

“And that’s how you feel?”

“Of course.” But Decker hesitated a little too long.

Gruen said, “His life would be much easier if he were sociopathic. Then he’d just do his thing, and with his intelligence and good looks, he’d probably be a top corporate raider. Instead, the kid is saddled with an overly developed conscience and a pathological sense of guilt. He’s ashamed by his recent behavior—the drug use that he has admitted to you—and is terrified that his mother is going to find out. I’ve suggested family therapy so he can admit certain things to her in a controlled environment and rid himself of some of the guilt. But he’s not ready for it yet. He has a big stake in protecting her. Does your wife have a clue as to what’s going on?”

“Much more than he thinks she does.” A pause. “I don’t think she knows anything about the molestation. Jacob’s intimated to me that more went on than he had admitted.”

“Uh-huh,” Gruen said.

“Is it bad?”

“That’s what we’re working on.”

“You can’t say anything more?”

“At this point, we’re trying to sort out fact from fantasy. Even he’s not sure. For instance, one of his recollections is his molester threatening that his mother would die if he told her what went on. That’s the one he admitted to you, correct?”

“Yes.”

“I think the threat might have been more like, ‘If you don’t let me do what I want to do, I’m going to kill your mother.’”

“He said that?”

“No. This is my interpretation. But put yourself in Jacob’s seven-year-old mind. This animal tries to rape and kill his mother. The kid’s got to be thinking that it was somehow his fault. If he had let this pederast do what he wanted to do to him, his mother would have been safe. Which is totally false. Now I can tell him, and you can tell him, and the whole world can tell him, that it isn’t his fault. That a monster is a monster is a monster. And intellectually, he’ll believe you. He’ll say ‘Of course, it wasn’t my fault. ’But getting rid of the entrenched guilt is a whole ’nother animal.”

“How does he get rid of it?”