Self-Defense by JONATHAN KELLERMAN

His jaw flexed. “Daddy did something to her?”

“Like I said, his last poems are grossly misogynistic. If he abused her, I can see why the trial might kick in the memories—sex and violence thrown together. One thing’s for sure, she’s struggling with something major. The recurrent nature of the dream and its intensity—when she talks about it she actually seems to experience it—she’s trancelike. Almost as if she’s going into hypnosis by herself. That tells me her ego boundaries are weakening; this is something potent. So maybe I should’ve been more careful. But there was no profound depression, no hint she’d do this.”

“What about the other two guys in the dream?”

“Could be that part’s fantasy, or maybe what happened to her wasn’t a solo act. And I’ve got another possible participant. That summer, Lowell had a protÉgÉ living with him named Terry Trafficant. Career criminal, history of attempted rape, assault, manslaughter. Locked up long-term till Lowell helped him get parole and publish his jail diary. It became a best-seller.”

“Yeah, yeah, I wasn’t a cop yet, still in college, but I remember thinking how asinine.”

“So did a lot of other people. The last cop who arrested him called him a stick of dynamite waiting to go off. There was a stink about Lowell’s patronage, then Trafficant disappeared. A guy like that, all those years in confinement, stick him in Topanga Canyon with a cute little girl running around, who knows.”

He grimaced. “Trafficant’s record include pedophilia?”

“I don’t remember reading that, but a guy like him might very well not be repulsed by sex with a little girl.”

“Yeah. The other possibility, Alex, is that nothing happened directly to her but she saw something. And not even criminal violence—maybe wild sex, some kind of orgy. A girl and three guys—that would freak out a four-year-old, right? What if the grinding was exactly what she first thought it was and her mind ran away with it? Like you said, sex and violence are all mixed up in her head.”

I thought about that. “It’s sure possible. The half brother said the kids were at the retreat for the opening. A big party took place. The papers described it as a pretty wild scene. And in the dream, Lucy talks about noise and lights the night she leaves the cabin. She could’ve seen something X-rated.”

“Involving Daddy. He and a couple of buddies having their way with a girl,” he said. “Not the kind of thing a little kid could handle easily.”

“And the trial reawakens it. . . . On the other hand, what if she did witness violence and that’s why hearing about Shwandt evoked memories of a crime? Maybe—unconsciously—she was motivated to be a juror in order to right some kind of wrong. Maybe that’s the toughness the prosecutors sensed.”

“Possible,” he said.

“Trafficant was an attempted rapist, Milo. And he dropped out of sight right after the party.”

“On the lam?”

“Why else would he disappear at the height of his celebrity? All those years behind bars, then he’s a best-seller; it wouldn’t have made sense to quit unless he had something to hide. He and Lowell—the publicity would have been devastating. So maybe he took the money and ran. For all we know, he’s on some tropical island living off his royalties.”

He rubbed his face and contemplated the table light. “For that to make sense, there would have to be no witnesses, meaning violence taken all the way.”

“Maybe Lucy actually did witness a burial. Lowell and Trafficant and someone else getting rid of the body.”

He thought a long time. “It’s a helluva leap based on a dream. For all we know, Trafficant disappeared because he died. Blew all his dough on dope and OD’d. He was a psychopath loser. Don’t they always end up doing something self-destructive?”

“Usually. But still, the idea of him and Lucy, up there at the same time, her blocking out that summer, and now she’s dreaming about a dead girl. . . . I could call Trafficant’s publisher and see if they know where he is. If you feel up to it, you could run a background check.”

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