“Offered to send her to a spa in Switzerland, a place her mother loved. Said it would help her ‘clear all that nonsense up.’ ” Paul scoffed. “Next thing I know the police show up and start asking all these questions, like if we know anything about Aura being assaulted. Maureen said she didn’t know anything about it, but a few days later, our home is set on fire, and my kid is in the hospital fighting for his life. They said the main suspect was a sixteen-year-old kid, one of Maureen’s students at the nonprofit. Maureen was insistent that she didn’t know anything, and then she vanished. Gone just like that,” Paul said, snapping his fingers.

“But they caught the kid?”

“He wasn’t exactly a criminal mastermind. He was at his mother’s house when the cops busted him. They found bloody clothes, lighter fluid in his bedroom. He took the fall for everything. The attack. The fire. He told the cops that people were ‘hurting Maureen, and they needed to pay.’ ”

“So now this kid is locked up for twenty-five years for something Maureen made him do?” Becca asked.

“It’s fucked up, isn’t it?” Paul replied. Becca nodded in agreement. The more she witnessed what people did to one another, the more screwed up everything seemed.

“I keep telling myself she’s insane. It’s easier to cope if I believe that. Then I think about everything she’s done and it’s all so calculated. I can’t seem to reconcile the two.”

Becca had dedicated her whole life to trying to understand what made people tick, why they reacted to things the way they did. “Ted Bundy was insane. He also knew exactly what he was doing when he murdered those women. If he hadn’t been caught he would’ve kept doing it. Same with Jim Jones before he ordered the assassination of a congressman and the mass death of his hundreds of followers. Crazy people can also be highly functional, rational even. Do I think Maureen’s capable of being rehabilitated? From what I’ve seen, no,” Becca said. “Which means she’s a danger to anyone who gets in her way. That’s why if you can think of anything you didn’t tell the cops…”

“Hold up. I never said I would speak to the cops.”

Becca leaned back, stunned that she hadn’t made herself clear, that she assumed they were on the same side. “Mr. Wilson, the police need your help. Det. Wishard is the lead investigator in this case. If you went to her, asked to speak to Maureen, you might be able to reach her…”

Paul cut her off. “You think I would ever step foot in the same room with that woman after what she did to us?” He shook his head, and she clocked a slight tremor in his hand.