What youve done a romant.., p.1
WHAT YOU'VE DONE: A romantic suspense thriller, page 1
What You’ve Done
A Novel
J.A. Schneider
Publisher Information
WHAT YOU’VE DONE is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, institutions or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2020 J.A. Schneider.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, store in a retrieval system, or transmit this book, in any part thereof, in any form or by any means whatsoever, whether now existing or devised at a future time, without permission in writing from the author, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews.
Find out more about the author and her other books at http://jaschneiderauthor.net
Books by J.A. Schneider
The EMBRYO medical thriller series, 6 books
Homicide Detective Kerri Blasco Police/Psychological Thrillers:
FEAR DREAMS
A sensitive woman fears insanity. Intuitive Detective Kerri Blasco tries to unravel the truth of what really haunts her…
HER LAST BREATH
Mari Gill woke to horror in a strange bed next to a murdered man, and can’t remember the night before. Detective Kerri Blasco battles her police bosses believing Mari is innocent…but is she?
WATCHING YOU
A serial killer texts his victims first – but how does he get their phone numbers? Detective Kerri Blasco vows revenge. He comes after her.
SHOELESS CHILD
A little boy has seen a horrific murder but is too traumatized to speak. Detective Kerri Blasco struggles to connect with him…
Standalone Thrillers
INTO THE DARK
A perfect marriage deteriorates as a woman starts to fear that her husband is a killer.
GIRL WATCHING YOU
A young woman, suspicious of a man she considers a predator, climbs a fire escape and thinks she sees a murder.
WHAT YOU’VE DONE
A small town divorce lawyer blames herself when a client’s teen daughter is murdered. She investigates and finds herself the killer’s next target
For Bob and Danielle. Without your great good humor and loving feedback, this book would have had a much harder time getting written.
What You’ve Done
Title Page
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Chapter 76
Chapter 77
Chapter 78
Chapter 79
Chapter 80
Chapter 81
Chapter 82
Chapter 83
Author’s Note
About the Author
1.
I love to watch.
It almost substitutes for squeezing those tight little butts in their teeny shorts, those jouncing breasts in their flimsy tops. Such energy they have at sixteen! The whole girls’ track team yakking and laughing, feet never still as they point and shout over the noise, the heat, the acrid metallic smell of this train platform. They’re eager to get back. School just ended; time to lose being so-damned-good all year and par-tay!
I am shocked, just shocked. Why were they allowed to come to the city dressed like that?
Joke question, of course. That age listens to no one.
Between hoots they steal flirty peeks at the track boys in their own horny clusters. Hyped male faces just pretending to talk team stats, trying hard not to ogle those long, slender legs, those wonderful, squirming bodies.
My breath quickens as I watch them, letting my gaze stop, for careful seconds, on my special one. Her name is Kelly. The back of her graceful neck is sheened with sweat. Her blond ponytail swings as she gestures, shakes her head, leans forward to peer down the track wondering what’s making the train late. When she does that…bends forward, makes me gasp…her mini black shorts ride even higher; the pink ribbing pulls nearly up to what isn’t going to be the next generation…
…because she has taunted me. Cruelly.
But enough. Time to stop torturing myself. Tonight’s the night to finally, oops-
Look away quick.
Their chaperone sees me; checks me out so I, too, crane in annoyance down the track. Relax, Self. Deep breaths, Self. I’m invisible, just another guy in a wig and dark glasses. Terrific disguise.
I’ve checked her out too, the good-looking, oh so competent chaperone. Mia Peale by name, age thirty-one, dark-haired and dressed conservatively in her blue, below-the-knee dress because that’s what lawyers do, right? Dress conservatively? She’s also an assistant track coach and do-gooder volunteer new in town. Family law, says the sign before her quaint little office. What a joke, she’s a divorce lawyer. She’ll also draw up a prenup for you unless you’re too dumb-
“Track twenty-six, Grand Central to New Haven train arriving,” bursts the overhead male voice, sounding almost congratulatory to those lucky enough to be leaving the crowds and hot grime of Manhattan. “Greenwich, Stamford, Grand Cove…stand clear of the doors, please!”
The train squeals in, rolls to a stop, and the crowd moves forward. Mia Peale looks only a little stressed as she herds the team on board, reaches to one who stumbles (“Oh shit!” he whines), points another to the backpack he’s left on the platform. These kids are really idiots. It must feel like herding runaround babies.
But she’s patient, and really quite pretty with large, emotional eyes, hair worn up, strands of it flopping from her barrette onto her tired brow. It’s exciting moving toward her but I keep my gaze down, pass inches from her as I enter the glorious cool of the car. It feels so good that for seconds I forget why I’m here. Ahead, leafy suburbs and swimming pools and beach! Relief fills the air.
The kids are fast. They push through one crowded car after another – metal doors slam; I follow – then they slide into cliquey, close-together seats before drooping commuters can reach them. Overhead, the audio barks again: “Stand clear of the doors, please!”
With a swishing sound the doors close and the train starts to slide north, humming metallically through the black tunnel beneath the city. Faces glance out, see nothing but feebly lit service platforms, more black tunnel, and their own flushed, adolescent reflections. They fuss with their phones that get no reception.
Ah, Kelly, special one, did you have to sit next to Mia Peale? Look at me!
No, she won’t, the tease, the little bitch. Too bad, but I’m watching her. What fun, my getup really does make me invisible. Gray wig, bushy brows and wire-rimmed shades under a floppy canvas hat. No one would recognize me like this…although the hat worries me.
Who wears a canvas hat in this heat?
No one notices, though. They’re too self-absorbed to notice anything. How nice.
Kelly in particular looks suddenly out of it, her expression drooping as she talks to Peale. She’s had a bad semester, poor thing. A second girl facing them seems to be in on the conversation.
I keep my chin down, three seats away and across the aisle. At intervals I glance subtly up from behind my shades, keep my fingers fake-busy with my phone.
I wonder what they’re talking about.
Oh, well. I’ll see you tonight, Kelly.
The train surges, and lights flicker. The car goes scary dark like the tunnel outside, then the lights come back on again.
2.
“Just a little?” I ask.
Kelly Payne shrugs painfully. I see her
“Sorry, dumb question,” I say, wishing I could find the right words. I’d had hopes that today would help her.
She forces that straining-to-seem-happy look that breaks my heart. “No…not dumb,” she sighs. “I loved the show. It was coming out of the theater that sucked, feeling reality hit again.”
“Reality, what a concept,” I mutter.
“And Madame Tussauds after?” Her hands crunch the team’s printed program. “I hated it! Those figures are all dead.”
“They’re wax.”
“The Adriana Lima figure looked really dead. That place is depressing!” Kelly glances out at the speeding tunnel; then sees in the glass, like a veil hung before the ancient, blackened stones, her own reflection with dark-circled eyes.
She looks back, and starts tearing at the team’s program. It’s on blue paper with the word “CONGRATULATIONS” at the top. They won the Connecticut State Championship, and the day was a gift from the town. (What special kids we have!) The program, listing train schedules and the Broadway show Aladdin and other stops, appeared in the local newspaper.
Shredded blue bits drift from Kelly’s fingers to the floor. My eyes stay on them, knowing what it is to feel heartbreak.
Across from us, her best friend Jordan Clark groans and leans to pick them up. “Jeez, Kell, mess! Do you know what you’re doing?”
“No.” Kelly stares down at the blue bits. “I have no idea what I’m doing.”
I fear those words will haunt me.
But for now I just sigh, feeling exhausted from the heat and stress of the day. School ended on Wednesday; today is an unseasonably hot, early June Friday, and running around Manhattan ever is not my idea of fun. I speak from experience. So what am I doing here?
We have a head coach and two other assistant coaches, making four of us. (“Once a trackie always a trackie” we smile, and try to keep the weight off.) We pinch hit for each other because none of us has much spare time, but Kelly’s mother asked me to do today. “For, you know, support and…watch her,” Terry Payne said tearfully over the phone. My desk in my little bungalow was piled with work and briefs and appointments, but I said sure.
Jordan is stuffing the torn blue bits into a paper bag. “Depression sucks,” she tells her friend feelingly. “Just try to hang on, okay?”
They’re sixteen. I listen to them discuss how to hang on.
Kelly is the only child of a divorcing couple. I represent her mother. As if adolescence isn’t hard enough, she feels lost and grieving and angry…only she doesn’t know who to be maddest at: her philandering father or her difficult mother. For months she continued to live with Terry Payne in what had been their family home. Terry loves her, but they fought a lot. Five nights ago Kelly stormed tearfully out and into Jordan’s home. Terry gave reluctant permission, and the Clarks were welcoming. Jordan’s had her problems too. There was optimism that the pair would help each other.
“…because your parents are nuts,” Jordan is saying, squeezing Kelly’s hand, her long dark ponytail falling forward. “You gotta save you.”
I give another helpless sigh, search for words to intervene, and come up empty. Give them a few minutes for this.
My background is really in criminal law, five years of it in Manhattan. Three years of assistant D.A. work started to get soul-crushing and dangerous - one angry relative pulled a gun on me – so after two more years with a criminal defense firm – less real violence, several falsely accused clients - I hit the books and switched to this, a different kind of heartache. Probably not the best choice for someone getting over gut-wrenching loss…
I am reminded of soft, loving eyes, of Ted, and tears sting. Since my own parents’ divorce, I’d been sad for years until he buoyed me, made me believe in happiness again. Images come at me, too fast to handle. Ted’s death mixed with close-ups of my mom and even long-ago flashes of my father. Happy times. Birthdays and pony rides and memories that explode when your dad walks out…
Stop.
Deep breaths. Look out at the flickering black tunnel…
Divorce law is the most emotionally laden part of the law; you get drawn into families’ worst pain. “Worse than dying,” one client said. Conflict between parents and children is at its peak.
Jordan means well, but forget it. Nor does it help Kelly to hear from others on the team, at least you have us. The seniors are heading off to different colleges, and most of the juniors – Kelly’s age – are from homes that at least seem okay. She’s a good, sweet kid, an honors student but slipping, and the last several weeks have been bad. It’s terrible to see her spiraling out of control.
They’re talking about a party at the beach tonight. A big, end of year bash.
“Cannot wait,” Kelly says, flopping miserably back against her seat. “Because the only answer is booze and I’m going to get shitfaced, find oblivion.” She looks at Jordan. “Is Hank bringing pot?”
Alarmed, I jump back in. Booze and drugs aren’t the answer! The highs just last minutes, then make you feel worse!
“Not to mention,” I try to say delicately, raising my brows to Kelly, “the physical pain of a hangover. Remember?” I give her a firmer look.
Three nights ago, she had another cry. Around two in the morning, they snuck down to the Clarks’ liquor and went through more than a half bottle of gin. Both were sick until yesterday. The Clarks now feel less optimistic about Kelly in their midst.
They’ve made it known.
Jordan raises her shoulders defensively. “We’ll be careful,” she whines.
Sure they will.
3.
The train bursts from the tunnel into low sunlight. Bright shafts flicker through the car, and sweep outside over 125th Street and then the warehouses and overpasses of the Bronx.
Suddenly Kelly hunches forward with her left hand shielding her eyes, and her right hand gripping her phone. She’s staring at it, reading a text, not listening to Jordan still on the subject of tonight: the party! It will be a blast and Kelly will forget her troubles and meet new guys. Last year’s seniors are coming and bringing friends; how awesome is that?
Kelly starts texting, so excited that the blue butterfly tattoo on her hand seems to fly. “No new guys,” she says. “I’ll be with Brian.”
Jordan’s jaw drops. “You’re kidding.”
Kelly avoids my stare, but must feel it. “Remember, in the theater, when my phone vibrated and I went to the john? It was him. He called.”
“But you broke up with him! He’s trouble!”
“We miss each other. I didn’t mention it ‘cause I wasn’t sure.” Her lips press in resolve. “Now I am. He wants to give it another try.”
“Brian’s the last thing you need!”
“He says he loves me. He’s going to pick me up.”
I feel my breath catch.
“I drove you two down and I’m driving you back,” I say firmly. Neither has her driver’s license yet. “I promised your parents.”
Kelly holds her phone up pleadingly. “But Brian’s waiting at the station. He’s already there.”
I gape at her, look helplessly back to Jordan. She’s still dismayed but just sinks uncertainly down in her seat. Kelly dives back to reading her text, and her cheeks flush. She feels loved again. Her fingers tremble as she texts furiously back.
Now what? I can’t be an insistent begging parent, which doesn’t work anyway - and I can’t start madly calling or texting Terry Payne which would be obvious and harmful to whatever relationship I have with Kelly. I wrestle with it. She’s really gotten too needy, calling and crying over problems as if I’m a girlfriend or some kind of parent substitute. Let her shrink deal with it, I storm at myself, not for the first time. I’m just their lawyer!
So the train rumbles on and I sit here getting worked up, not seeing the getting-prettier Connecticut landscape whiz by. At only eight months in town, I’m still pretty new in my practice. Older lawyers tell me to harden up or it’ll kill you.
Last March, I feared that literally. A husband came after me, drunk and threatening. The police told me he owns a Beretta. And I’d thought I had escaped the violence of the city; ha, surprise.
I feel Kelly’s eyes on me.
“I hope you’re not mad,” she says anxiously. “Are you?”
“Oh Kell,” I sigh, “it’s not about being mad.” Her eyes drop and we’re both lost for words. I fret, then realize we’ve stopped at the Stamford station. Outside, the soaring, glass-and-steel buildings of international banks and brokerage houses, sun glinting lower on them, shadows moving in. It’s been such a long day, and it’s hard to think. Commuters get off and the train starts up again. Jordan looks out at the receding platform, then woods and rooftops and shimmering Long Island Sound.
