Chapter 52
Rachel Evans had had a hell of a day yesterday, and this one wasn’t shaping up to be much better. She had spent seven exhausting hours with the Walderman top brass, reviewing security procedures in the aftermath of Charlie’s escape.
Then, against her better judgment, she’d taken a call from Joe Giles on her private line. He wouldn’t say why over the phone, but he’d begged her to meet him in her office as soon as possible. She had planned to go to the office early, anyway, to check for new developments in Charlie’s case. She’d agreed to meet Joe at 7:30 a.m., which didn’t leave much time to get dressed and ready.
Joe’s frantic tone had been more than troubling. She worried about behavioral regression. Given all that she had invested in his treatment and the fact that Joe’s progress was partly responsible for her meteoric rise within Walderman, his well-being was particularly important to her.
Even though she was running late, she couldn’t resist her morning habit of checking e-mail and her favorite news sites before leaving for work. It was then she learned of the all-out manhunt for Charlie. It was the lead story on both Boston.com and the Herald, as well as two other local news sites she’d bookmarked.
Rachel gasped when she read the grisly emerging details of Leon Yardley’s murder in his Concord home. The story named Charlie as a “person of interest.” The political favor Walderman had cashed in with the Belmont police to keep the escape out of the public eye had been a tragic case of poor judgment, she concluded. She had warned her superiors about the dangers of politicizing patient care. That argument held little sway with the facility directors, who constantly battled public opinion and fears of safety to keep the grants, licensing, and tax conditions working in their favor. Without those, Walder-man’s future would be jeopardized and the care of patients threatened. Creating public alarm every time a borderline patient might pose a public threat would create an air of mistrust between the community and the care center.
The perception of security was paramount to the institution’s survival. Only patients classified as an immediate threat to public safety justified a press release and news conference. Otherwise, good relations with the police typically kept such incidents under the radar of public awareness. An escapee would certainly threaten facility funding. Also a certainty, Shapiro would be one of the first to go if the money dried up. He was the one who had convinced Walderman’s board that Charlie would merely continue to fantasize about killing, and had doubted such fantasies would manifest into actual violence. They had put hospital interests ahead of public safety, and it would cost them a lot more than the loss of public confidence.
Rachel finished reading an updated report on WBZ-TV’s local news Web site. Charlie wasn’t named a suspect on that report, either, just a person of interest. But his escape from Walderman was clearly and accurately documented in the piece. She wondered where they had got their information.
Joe was waiting outside her office when she arrived and seemed in a frantic state. He wore a blue T-shirt, ripped slightly at the bottom, a navy blue Windbreaker, and jeans spotted with dark brown stains of varying sizes. His eyes darted about the room, as if he were afraid he might be assaulted, and he continually rubbed his hands together. Rachel observed that he would interlock his fingers, crack his knuckles, and start rubbing his hands together again, as though he were massaging hand cream into the skin. His hair was a tangled, bushy mess. When he wasn’t rubbing his hands together, Joe ran his fingers though his hair and pulled at the roots.
“Sit down, Joe,” Rachel said. “Please sit.”
“I can’t. I can’t!” Joe cried.
Rachel assumed he had already heard the news about his brother and that was why he needed to see her. A guiding principle of her profession was that the patient had to provide all the answers, not the therapist. That philosophy held true even when the answers were obvious.
“Joe, please tell me what is going on.”
“The nightmares are getting worse,” Joe said. “They’re even more violent and real. I’m worried I’m regressing. I don’t want to go back to where I was.” Joe paused a moment. “I won’t,” he added.
Rachel was stunned. He hadn’t read or seen the news this morning. Charlie’s plight might push him over the edge. Even so, concealing the truth, as Charlie’s situation tragically reinforced, was not how she operated.
“Joe, please sit down,” Rachel said.
Joe hesitated. “Do we need to do a full review of my medications?” he asked. “When Mom wakes up, she’ll be heartbroken if I lose my job. I can’t get angry again. I just can’t.”
“Listen to me,” Rachel said. “We have something more immediate to discuss.”
“What?” Joe asked.
Before Rachel could answer, her cell phone rang. She looked down at the number and gasped.
“What?” Joe asked.
“Oh my God,” Rachel breathed.
“What is it?” Joe asked again.
Rachel picked up the cell phone. Flipping it open, she answered the call. “Charlie? Charlie, it’s Rachel. Where are you?”
“Rachel! Rachel! Thank God you answered. You have to help me.”
Charlie didn’t sound scared. He sounded almost euphoric. That was even more disturbing, she thought.
“Why is Charlie calling you?” Joe asked. “Where is he?”
Joe knew about Charlie’s escape, but Rachel was certain he had no idea of the real trouble Charlie was in.
“Charlie, you must turn yourself in to the police. Where are you? Please tell me,” Rachel said.
“Is my brother with you? I thought I heard his voice,” Charlie said.
“Yes. He’s in my office.”
“I’ll call you back on your office line. Put me on speaker. I want Joe to hear this as well.”