Under a Maui Moon, Page 2

  Why hadn’t she seen this before? She was vulnerable. Here, in her own home, she was at risk. Richard had never come out and told her so, but his actions indicated that she was in danger.

  Counting back the months and years to the day the Sellwood case broke, Carissa realized that was the day that a silent fear had entered their home and their marriage like an invisible gas. It had been slowly smothering her. Was that the heaviness she had been carrying around for so long? Or was it that Richard kept so much of his world hidden from her?

  As soon as Carissa looked the unspoken fear-phantom in the face, it morphed. She was no longer silently afraid. She was furious.

  Stomping over to the kitchen sink, she poured herself a glass of water and drank it quickly, as if the cool liquid could douse the embers that now burned inside her.

  I’m not safe here. In my own home I’m not safe. That’s not okay. That’s wrong. Just then she heard the front door open. For a moment she didn’t move. A sharp pain shot through her jaw. She unclenched her teeth.

  Her broad-shouldered husband entered, rubbing his forehead and looking agitated. His thinning blond hair needed attention. His blue, button-down shirt was crumpled, and his khaki trousers showed blotted evidence of a stain from whatever it was he had eaten for lunch. Richard lowered himself onto the couch and said nothing.

  Carissa took a seat opposite him and started with a question to which she already knew the answer. “He was a client, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “One of your dangerous ones?” She tried to keep her words slow and even.

  “I wouldn’t call him dangerous.”

  “But they handcuffed him. Obviously he has a record. What did he do?”

  Richard glanced over at her, barely making eye contact. “He’s not a predator, if that’s what you’re worried about. He’s just in a bad place right now. His wife left him. She took the kids and cleaned out the house. He’s frantic. He called me earlier, but I didn’t take his call. That’s why he came here. He was trying to see if my car was in the garage and didn’t want to bother you if I wasn’t home.”

  While Carissa felt a slight twinge of sympathy for the man, it wasn’t enough to quell her fears. “Why did she leave him? What did he do?”

  Richard hesitated. He stretched his neck from side to side, as if trying to release the tension, but didn’t respond to her question. That infuriated Carissa. She knew her husband could be trusted to keep the confidences of his clients, but now she was the one who needed to be trusted, and he was shutting her out.

  “Richard, what was he convicted of?”

  “Voyeurism and domestic violence.”

  Carissa felt her heart pounding and her anxiety elevating. “And you dismissed him from any charges? A convicted Peeping Tom, who comes to our house and looks in our windows?”

  “The domestic violence was dismissed, and the voyeurism conviction was more than five years ago. He hasn’t had another incident since—”

  “You wouldn’t call tonight another incident?”

  “He’s really a level one, Carissa. No human contact. He’s not dangerous.”

  “How do you know that? What about the predator from the Sellwood case? Did you know for a fact that he wasn’t dangerous?”

  Richard sat up straight, as if her comment had sent a shock through the couch. “There is no comparison. You’re making this into more than it is. Nothing happened.”

  “Nothing happened?” Carissa leaned forward, her patience gone. “Richard, I can’t believe you’re taking this so lightly. Our home, our private space, was violated tonight. I was sleeping in the hammock when Murphy heard this client of yours on the side of the house. Do you know how terrified I was when the security light went on and I heard footsteps in the gravel?”

  Carissa didn’t give him a chance to respond. “No, of course, you don’t know. How could you know how terrified I was? You didn’t even come in the house to check on me when you got home. You went to him! You defended him. You’re still defending him! Do you see the problem here? I’m your wife. You’re supposed to defend me and protect me, not your volatile clients!”

  “You’re overreacting, Carissa. I told you, he’s not volatile.”

  “I can’t believe you’re still defending him! Will you listen to yourself? Richard, I’m telling you, I don’t feel safe in my own home. What happened tonight is not okay. I am not okay.”

  Carissa hadn’t expected the tears to come the way they did, fast and hot, racing down her cheeks. The tears angered her. But Richard angered her more. Why wasn’t he seeing the severity of the situation?

  Leaning back and turning his steady gaze toward her, Richard said with calculated inflection in his voice, “I can see how you would feel—”

  “No!” Carissa shot to her feet and put her hand up to stop him. Her enraged voice trembled, and her tears stopped immediately. “Don’t you dare start with that soothing tone and that concerned-counselor look. Not with me. You can go be the big savior to all the lost men in the world and tell them you understand their pain. But don’t pretend to understand what I’m feeling. Not like that. Not when you won’t even hear what I’m saying. All you really care about is your clients and their demented issues! You’re losing touch with reality.”

  Richard was suddenly on his feet with a stern finger pointed at her. “Don’t ever say that to me! You’re the one who is out of control here!” His eyes were wild, and he looked as if he might throw something.

  Stunned by his unexpectedly intense reaction, Carissa gave into her instincts and fled to their bedroom, slamming the door.

  The white heat of her fear and anger incinerated her tears before they could leak out. She couldn’t believe this was happening. Trying to calm her spirit, she waited for Richard to come to her. She was certain that once he cooled off he would open the door and diplomatically suggest they sit down and talk things through. That’s what he did. He repaired broken relationships. He restored order and brought understanding. He initiated forgiveness.

  But not tonight. Richard didn’t come to her to make things right. And Carissa didn’t open the door and go to him.

  2

  “A hele akua, A luhi no, a uhi mai kapo

  Maluna o’u

  Ku’u mele ‘oia mau

  E pili E ku‘u Iesu ou la wau.”

  “Though like the wanderer, the sun gone down,

  Darkness be over me, my rest a stone;

  Yet in my dreams I’d be

  Nearer, my God, to thee.”

  CARISSA SPENT THE NIGHT curled up in the overstuffed corner chair in their bedroom. As the morning sun stretched its long fingers of groping light in through the small spaces between the shades and window frame, she recoiled from its grasp.

  Stumbling into the bathroom, she cast a critical glance at her sallow reflection in the mirror. The cinnamon highlights in her shoulder-length brown hair gave off the impression that even her head was still smoldering after last night’s battle. Her intense, pale blue eyes had turned the shade of a bottomless sea. All the lines around her mouth appeared dark and deep. Nausea accompanied each bend and turn, as she showered and dressed for work.

  Delaying as long as she could, she finally opened the bed room door. She didn’t know what she would say when she saw Richard. They had crossed into unfamiliar territory last night. Anything could happen next.

  But nothing happened. Richard wasn’t on the couch where she expected to find him. Nor was he in the guest bed.

  Murphy was stretched out on his rug by the back door. He opened his eyes, raised his head, but made no effort to come to her.

  “Come on, Murphy. Outside. Move.” Not a hint of kindness accompanied her commands. With his head lowered, the stiff old dog stepped out on the back patio. The freshness of the new day rushed in through the open door, reeking of warmth and beauty. Carissa wanted none of it. She shut the door, locked it, and checked inside the garage. Richard’s car wasn’t there.

  Carissa told
herself she didn’t care. She backed her car down the driveway and pressed the button to close the automatic door as she drove down the street. With a glance at the front of the house, seeing the doors all locked and the shades pulled, she felt a second wave of sadness come over her.

  I love that house. But I’ll never feel safe here again.

  The same churning thoughts that kept her tossing in the chair last night returned. What’s going to happen to us? To our marriage? We’ve never had a fight like this. Can a couple as disconnected as Richard and I are ever recover from what happened last night? Why didn’t he try to fix things? Has he given up on us?

  A single tear marked her painful thoughts with a straight, clear line down the left side of her face. One tear. That was all. Twenty-four years of marriage, one grown son, a thousand memories, yet only a single tear.

  And that, she decided, was Richard’s fault.

  He should have come to her last night. He should have fought for her. That was the real problem in their marriage. He no longer cared about her. Because if he cared, he would have come to her last night. The Richard she married would have broken down the bedroom door, if he had to. They would have talked things through for hours, and he would have made her cry, cry so hard that this morning her eyes would be swollen and red. Her closest colleagues at work would immediately know something was wrong, and they would extend silent nods of understanding, the only solace she would accept from them.

  Instead, her tear ducts were dry. And she was alone. Solitary.

  Carissa didn’t turn into the Coffee People Drive-Thru, as she usually did on her way to work. Her stomach couldn’t handle coffee. If this had been any other morning when she felt this miserable, she would have ordered a chocolate-filled croissant to go with her medium, extra-hot Velvet Hammer. Today she was neither hungry nor thirsty. She was numb. And she knew she couldn’t fix numb with pastries or mochas.

  Pulling into the back lot of the medical offices, Carissa tried to compartmentalize what had happened last night. This was work. She was a professional. Whatever she and Richard needed to resolve, that would happen later. Not at work.

  With her choice of parking places, Carissa noticed that Dr. Walters’s car was parked in its usual spot. This was early for him. At sixty-nine years old and the senior M.D. among the six physicians in the group practice, Dr. Walters kept fewer hours than the other doctors. He usually came in after ten and took off Thursdays. Here it was, Thursday, and he was at the office a little after 8 A.M.

  Carissa parked next to Dr. Chan’s car and realized all six doctors were there early this morning. As the office manager of this small medical practice, Carissa always knew about staff meetings. Had she forgotten today’s meeting? She didn’t think so.

  Rushing from her car, as if she were late, she found she didn’t need her key to enter the back door of the Hillside Family Physicians’ office. It already was open. Carissa kept her footsteps soft, listening to see if she could hear the doctors gathered in the front waiting room.

  The scent of freshly brewed coffee wafted from the break room. Who is here doing my job?

  “Molly?” Carissa stood in the doorway to the break room.

  Dr. Garrett’s twentysomething niece nearly dropped the glass coffeepot. “Carissa, you freaked me out! I didn’t see you come in.”

  “I’m early. I didn’t realize a meeting was scheduled for this morning.”

  “I think it was sort of a last-minute meeting, you know? You probably didn’t have reason to know about it.”

  In the eight months Molly had worked in the office as a part-time receptionist, she consistently went beyond her required job description. It didn’t seem that out of the ordinary for her to be there this early, yet Carissa couldn’t figure out why she didn’t know about the meeting but Molly did.

  “Would you like some help with the coffee?”

  “No, that’s okay. I have it covered. Do you want some? I was going to make a second pot.”

  “No, none for me. Thanks.”

  Molly turned her head so that her jet-black hair picked up a bluish sheen in the fluorescent lights. “Are you okay?”

  Carissa turned away. She opened the refrigerator, busily looking for something. As casually as possible she said, “I’m fine.”

  “You look …you look sort of tired.”

  “I guess I am a little.” Carissa pulled a bottle of water from the back of the refrigerator and made her way to her office without grilling Molly on why she knew about the meeting. A low echo of the doctors’ voices filtered down the hall from the front waiting room. As curious as she was to know what the meeting was about, Carissa knew the doctors’ discussion would be tag-team-tattled through the office before lunch. All she had to do was wait. The details would come to her soon enough.

  Turning on her computer, Carissa glimpsed the picture frame next to the monitor. The photo was of Richard and their son, Blake, at his college graduation. She gazed a moment at the image of these two men in her life and then took down the picture and put it in her top drawer. She couldn’t handle their smiling faces looking at her. Not this morning.

  Carissa went through a stack of folders on her desk. At least half of her workday was spent organizing the aging Dr. Walters. He had come to depend on her, as if she were his personal assistant. Every time she found a file he had misplaced or she managed to decipher one of his scrawled notes, she felt a personal sense of accomplishment because he always thanked her heartily.

  Carissa was in the midst of a hunt for a prescription dosage in the file of one of Dr. Walters’s patients when a tap sounded on her door.

  “Come in.”

  She turned to see Richard standing only a few feet away with a ragged but determined look on his face. He was wearing the same clothes he had worn last night. He quietly closed her office door behind him.

  “We need to talk.” This was not his counselor voice speaking.

  “I agree.”

  He didn’t reply. It seemed he was waiting for her to speak first, as if she owed him an apology.

  Carissa blurted out the question foremost in her mind. “Where did you go last night?”

  “Back to my office. I had paperwork to finish up.”

  “Then where did you go?”

  Richard lifted his chin. “I stayed at my office.”

  His crumpled clothes backed up his claim.

  “Why didn’t you come home and try to talk things through?”

  “You weren’t ready to talk. Not after the way you walked off and slammed the door.”

  “I was mad.”

  “You’re still mad.”

  “So are you.”

  Richard crossed his arms and tilted his head just right. She knew that no matter what she said now, he would disagree with her.

  A tap sounded on her closed office door. Before she could say, “Come in,” the door opened, and Dr. Walters entered. His white lab coat was buttoned crooked.

  “Well, hello, Richard.” Dr. Walters extended his hand. “Good to see you. How is everything with you these days?”

  Richard responded with an automatic and almost believable, “Fine. How are you, sir?”

  Dr. Walters leaned back. His lower lip protruded slightly, as it always did when he was thinking through a list of symptoms and was about to offer a diagnosis. “Well, I guess I could say I’m doing all right, all things considered. Do you mind if I borrow your wife for a few minutes? I need to give her an update on our meeting this morning.”

  “I was just leaving.” Richard’s voice sounded cordial to Dr. Walters, but Carissa could still hear the sharp edge just under the surface. Richard moved to the open door of Carissa’s office without turning back to look at her.

  In frustration she tossed out, “If you’re going home, Murphy’s in the backyard. I didn’t feed him before I left.”

  “I’ll take care of him.” Richard’s words were firm and even. As he exited, Carissa felt her face warm.

  You’ll take care of
the dog, but you won’t take care of me.

  Dr. Walters closed the door almost all the way and looked at Carissa over the top of his glasses. “Everything okay?”

  “I forgot to feed the dog this morning.” She shrugged, as if that would help him to believe that the obvious tension between Richard and her was over something petty.

  Dr. Walters closed the door the rest of the way. Carissa had the feeling he was about to give her one of his rare fatherly lectures, the way he had several years ago when she came to work with strep throat and wouldn’t agree to go home until he made her take a throat culture and then walked her to her car.

  “Carissa, I need to tell you about some decisions we’ve had to make here. I’m afraid this will not be good news for you.”

  “What sort of decisions?”

  “I have decided to retire.”

  Carissa let out a breath of relief. She had heard these same words from Dr. Walters many times before. Each time he announced his retirement, he ended up reconsidering based on his abiding love for his patients. He always ended up going back on the roster but scheduling himself for fewer hours and fewer patients each time.

  As it was now, Dr. Walters saw patients only seven months of the year. The other five months he spent with his wife at their vacation home on the island of Maui.

  “So, does this mean you’re cutting back to only being in the office for six months a year?”

  His half-grin acknowledged that she was on to his predictable ways. However, a somber sadness clung to the corners of his mouth. She could see that this time it was different.

  “No, I’m making my retirement official this time. It’s not fair that the other doctors have to carry so much of my patient load in the months when I’m not here. I need to hang up my stethoscope. Most importantly, Betty wants me to be home with her. She has a Honey Do list that reaches all the way to the ceiling.”

  “I can’t believe you’re really going to retire.”

  He nodded and took on a more serious expression. “We discussed the details at the meeting this morning. It was agreed that Dr. Garrett would take over here as the head physician.”