“He couldn’t do that. Your mother would not have taken it well.” Wendy sighed and set her glass of scotch on the coffee table. “You do know, don’t you, that your mother was mentally ill?”

Jade had said as much, but she also said that my mother had never been diagnosed with anything. I had been fifteen when my mother took her own life and Talon only twelve. We remembered her as children remember their mother—as a loving, protective woman. Mentally ill? I didn’t know. But her half-brother certainly was. Maybe mental illness ran in the family.

“Jade said she was never diagnosed with any mental illness.”

“Not that I know of, no,” Wendy said. “Your father tried to get her help on several occasions, but she always said no.”

Something was wrong with this story. Something big. Talon and I needed to do some investigation on our own and then talk to Wendy again. She hadn’t told us anything we didn’t already know, except that Larry had confided in his father and that was how our parents found out.

“Wendy,” Talon said, “Jade said there were things you promised only to reveal to me. I need you to reveal those things now.”

She sighed. “Are you sure?”

Talon leaned forward, his dark eyes brooding. “Joe and I drove most of the night to get here. And now we want the truth.”

Chapter Thirty–Four

Melanie

Gina Cates first walked into my office on a Friday afternoon. Fridays were tough all around, especially the afternoons. I was tired and ready for the weekend, and so was the patient. But this particular appointment had been my first time available when Gina called Randi to schedule, and Gina had been adamant about getting in as soon as possible.

She was a young and pretty girl, with dark—nearly black—hair cut in a shoulder-length bob, brown eyes, and olive skin. She was shy at first, and I had a difficult time getting her to talk at all. Finally, halfway through the session, she broke down in tears.

“I can’t do this.”

“You can,” I told her. “If you want to heal from whatever is troubling you, you can.”

“It’s too awful.”

“I know. And I’m so sorry about that. But we’ll go at the pace you’re comfortable with, and anytime you need to stop, you just tell me.”

She nodded and stood. “May I? I’m more comfortable standing.”

“Of course,” I said. “Some people are more comfortable sitting, some lying on the couch. If you’re comfortable standing, I want you to stand.”

She looked around my office, her gaze finally resting on the globe on my desk. She walked toward it and lightly touched its surface. “I’ve always wanted to travel,” she said.

“Where would you like to go?”

“Someplace warm, where life is easy. Maybe somewhere in the Caribbean, where I would have no worries.”

“You can’t run away from your problems, Gina.”

 

“He would wait until I was alone and vulnerable. That’s how he got close to me. For a while, he would just cuddle me in his lap, telling me how beautiful I was, how he wished he had a little girl just like me.”

“Did your uncle have any children of his own?”

“No. He wasn’t married.”

“How did it feel when you sat in his lap?”

Her lips curved up into a smile but then quickly reverted to the straight thin line I was used to seeing below her nose. “I don’t want you to think badly of me.”

“I would never think badly of you, Gina.”

“You want the truth, then?”

“Yes, I want the truth. The only way we can work through this and get to your healing is if you’re honest with me. I won’t be able to help you otherwise.”

She looked down, not meeting my gaze. “At first…I liked it. It made me feel…special.”

“Why did it make you feel special?”

“Someone was paying attention to me.”

“Hadn’t anyone paid attention to you before?”

She blew out a breath in a whistle, Gina’s version of a sigh. “I didn’t have any brothers and sisters, and I didn’t have very many friends. I was really shy and never made friends easily. My mom and dad both worked. I think they were more interested in their college students than they were in me.”

“Did you ever sit in your mother’s lap? Or your father’s?”

“Very rarely. They weren’t very affectionate to me. Or to each other for that matter.”

My heart went out to the young girl. Children needed affection. If they didn’t get it from their parents, they would go looking for it elsewhere—sometimes a teacher, a friend’s parent, a coach. Gina had gone to her uncle.

“Some people just aren’t as affectionate as others,” I said. Not that I excused her parents’ lack of affection toward her. I wasn’t quite ready to voice that thought, though. We’d only had a few sessions.

“I know I must sound like a needy little kid,” Gina said, shaking her head.

“All children want affection,” I said. “There’s no reason for you to feel like you were any needier than anyone else.”

“I look back…” She closed her eyes, shuddering. “I can’t believe I actually liked it in the beginning.”

“Gina, you’re not alone. You’re not the first child yearning for affection who got taken advantage of by an adult you trusted. It’s more common than you know, and though I don’t expect that fact to offer you any solace, perhaps it will make you feel a little better just to know that you’re not alone.”

She opened her eyes, tears emerging. “I wish, Dr. Carmichael. I wish it did make me feel better.”

“Believe me, it’s okay that it doesn’t. So you said you liked sitting on your uncle’s lap at first.”

She nodded.

“What was his name? What did you call him?”

“I called him Tio.”

“Why did he want you to call him that?

“I don’t know.”

“It’s Spanish for uncle. Was your uncle Spanish?”

“No. He was my mother’s brother. They were both born here.”