Read Online Good Intentions by Joy Fielding - Free Book Online Page A

her. “How did it feel?”
    “It hurt.” Kathryn stared at the bandages as if she could see through them. “It hurt a lot. That’s probablywhy I didn’t cut very deep.”
    “Was there a lot of blood?”
    “Oh, for God’s sake …”
    “Yes,” Kathryn answered, ignoring her sister’s exclamation. “I looked like I was taking a bath in tomato juice.”
    Debbie giggled, and surprisingly Kathryn joined her.
    “Which way did you make the cuts?” Debbie asked, leaning forward.
    “Like this.” Kathryn ran a trembling finger across the short width of her wrist.
    “If you want to kill yourself, you’re supposed to slice lengthwise,” Debbie explained dispassionately. “I saw that in a movie once. They said that if you only want to go to the hospital, you cut widthwise. If you really want to die, you cut the same way your vein runs. That way nobody can sew you up again. Of course, the fastest way is probably with a gun. My dad has a gun. He keeps it in the night table beside his bed.”
    “Can we please talk about something else?” Renee begged, her queasiness returning.
    “I think this is interesting,” Debbie told her stepmother.
    “That was not a request,” Renee informed her curtly, deciding to move the gun elsewhere at the earliest opportunity. She’d always objected to its presence, in any event. Why had Debbie even mentioned it? Did the girl have no sense at all?
    Debbie’s hand formed a brisk salute. “Aye, aye, Captain.”
    Renee turned toward her sister. “I just think that we could find something else to talk about.”
    “My mother tried to kill herself once,” Debbie announced. “Did you know that, Renée?”
    “No, I didn’t,” Renee admitted, too stunned to say anything else.
    “She was a mess after my father left. Of course, I was just a kid at the time but I guess she must have felt a lot like you feel now.” Debbie smiled at Kathryn, who was watching her intently. “She started drinking and taking sleeping pills to get her through the night. One night she had too many drinks and too many pills. We rushed her to the hospital. They had to pump her stomach. It was pretty gross.”
    “Excuse me.” Renee hurried into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water, drinking it quickly before reaching into the fridge and tearing another chocolate bar out of its plastic bag, swallowing it in three quick bites. In the living room, she heard Debbie rattling on about her mother, telling Kathryn how beautiful she was, how thin she was, very much like Kathryn, she was saying. Nothing at all like Renée.
    It was true. Renee had seen pictures of Philip’s former wife, Wendy. She was beautiful. And thin. And unbalanced as all get-out. Renee couldn’t think of Debbie’s mother without recalling the story that Philip had confided in her early in their relationship. Apparently, she’d once provoked a fight while they were getting ready for bed, and when Philip had insisted that he would spend the night in a hotel rather than listen to any more of her ravings, she had actually run down the street after his car, totally naked. Running after his car like a dog, he had said tearfully, then confessed that he’d never told that story to another living soul, he’d been so ashamed.
    “I think that Kathryn should probably lie down now,” Renee said, reentering the living room to find Debbie on the sofa next to her sister, Kathryn wrapped gently in Debbie’s arms, her eyes closed in sleep.
    “Don’t worry about Kathryn,” Debbie said sweetly. “I’ll take care of her.”
    “That’s very nice of you, Debbie,” Renee said, softening, feeling grateful all of a sudden for her stepdaughter’s presence.
    “And then I’ll take care of you,” Debbie said, and turned to stare serenely out at the ocean.

FIVE
    T he phone had been ringing all morning. Lynn Schuster glanced up from her paper-strewn desk at the well-groomed young woman who stood in the doorway to her small, tidy office. “For you.