Buried Evidence by Nancy Taylor Rosenberg Read Free Book Online Page B

you have the gall to bring up my therapist. Are you implying that I’m sexually dysfunctional? I might have had a problem right after the rape. That’s not abnormal, you know.” Her words came in short bursts. “I’m fine now. Just fine. I’ve had a number of lovers. No one has complained.”
    “Stop it,” he said, seizing her shoulders. “You don’t have to prove yourself to me. I care about you, that’s all. You’re getting upset over nothing.”
    “It’s been six years, Richard,” Lily shouted. “Where the hell have you been?”
    “I tried to get in touch with you,” he protested. “You never returned my phone calls.”
    “How many times did you call me?” she said, flinging her arms around. “Once, twice? My ex-husband calls me. My stockbroker calls me. After everything we went through, couldn’t you manage more than a few lousy phone calls?”
    “Good grief, woman,” Richard exclaimed, his brows furrowing. “Haven’t you figured it out by now? You confessed to a police detective. They could have subpoenaed me as a material witness. I was terrified I might end up responsible for sending you to prison.”
    “Bruce Cunningham moved back to Omaha,” Lily said, her anger subsiding at the thought of the big homicide detective with the scuffed shoes and worn suits. “No one else knows the truth.”
    “Have you talked to him?”
    “I called the Omaha Police Department,” she answered, tearing a leaf off a tree. “Cunningham retired three years ago. He’s working for a company called Jineco Equipment Corporation. I pulled up their Web site the other day, thinking I’d e-mail him and say hello, then decided I’m probably the last person he wants to come crawling out of the woodwork.”
    Richard looked up at the sky, thinking she was probably right.
    “Since you’ve made it a point to remind me that I’m a murderer,” Lily went on, “maintaining our ethics regarding the Middleton case seems almost hypocritical. What do you think?”
    “I think I love you,” Richard said, a wild look in his eyes. “No matter what, I’ll probably always love you. You know that, though, don’t you?”
    Lily held up a palm, warning him to back off. Unleashing their feelings for one another at this point was premature, particularly under the circumstances. “Was it Middleton’s idea to keep Betsy on life support, or did you explain what kind of charges he would be facing if she died?”
    Richard started to answer, then stopped himself. First she didn’t want to see him because he was Middleton’s attorney. Now she seemed to be heading in exactly the opposite direction, hinting that he should conspire against his own client.
    “She has terrible seizures,” Lily told him. “Her limbs have atrophied. How do we know she isn’t experiencing pain duringthese convulsive episodes? It’s almost as if they’re keeping a corpse alive.”
    “Read my lips,” he said, pointing at his face. “Betsy Middleton is not your daughter!”
    “I’m going to petition the court in her behalf.”
    Richard stared at her in a renewed state of awe. When she became excited or angry, her eyes shifted from blue to green. This was the woman who haunted him, scared him, ignited his passion to the point where he felt totally alive. Not the rape victim but the storm trooper, the avenger, someone with enough courage to place her neck on the line for the benefit of others. “Do whatever you feel is right.”
    Lily remained standing in the driveway as he got in his car and sped off.

5
    D ad,” Shana called out from her bedroom, “where’s my ice cream?” John Forrester was asleep in a brown leather recliner in the two-bedroom duplex he shared with his eighteen-year-old daughter. Located on a tree-lined street in North Hollywood, the exterior was constructed out of stucco, the pale pink paint cracked and faded. The yard consisted of a small patch of grass. Even though the living room was sparsely furnished, it appeared cramped