“Let’s talk about him.”
Silence.
“Is he good-looking?”
“Anthony’s very handsome.”
Judd felt a pang of unreasonable, unprofessional jealousy.
“You’re compatible physically?” It was like a tongue probing at a sore tooth.
“Yes.”
He knew what she would be like in bed: exciting and feminine and giving. Christ, he thought, get off the subject.
“Do you want children?”
“Oh, yes.”
“Does your husband?”
“Yes, of course.”
A long silence except for the silky rustling of the tape. Then:
“Mrs. Blake, you came to me because you said you had a desperate problem. It concerns your husband, doesn’t it?”
Silence.
“Well, I’m assuming it does. From what you told me earlier, you love each other, you’re both faithful, you both want children, you live in a beautiful home, your husband is successful, handsome, and he spoils you. And you’ve only been married six months. I’m afraid it’s a little like the old joke: ‘What’s my problem, Doctor?’”
There was silence again except for the impersonal whir ring of the tape. Finally she spoke. “It’s…it’s difficult for me to talk about. I thought I could discuss it with a stranger, but”—he remembered vividly how she had twisted around on the couch to look up at him with those large, enigmatic eyes—”it’s harder. You see”—she was speaking more rapidly now, trying to overcome the barriers that had kept her silent—” I overheard something and I—I could easily have jumped to the wrong conclusion.”
“Something to do with your husband’s personal life? Some woman?”
“No.”
“His business?”
“Yes…”
“You thought he lied about something? Tried to get the better of someone in a deal?”
“Something like that.”
Judd was on surer ground now. “And it upset your confi dence in him. It showed you a side of him that you had never seen before.”
“I—I can’t discuss it. I feel disloyal to him even being here. Please don’t ask me anything more today, Dr. Stevens.”
And that had ended that session. Judd switched off the tape.
So Anne’s husband had pulled a sharp business deal. He could have cheated on his taxes. Or forced someone into bankruptcy. Anne, naturally, would be upset. She was a sen sitive woman. Her faith in her husband would be shaken.
He thought about Anne’s husband as a possible suspect. He was in the construction business. Judd had never met him, but whatever business problem he was involved in could not, by any stretch of the imagination, have included John Hanson, Carol Roberts, or Judd.
What about Anne herself? Could she be a psychopath? A homicidal maniac? Judd leaned back in his chair and tried to think about her objectively.
He knew nothing about her except what she had told him. Her background could have been fictitious, she could have made it all up, but what would she have to gain? If this was some elaborate charade as a cover to murder, there had to be a motivation. The memory of her face and her voice flooded his mind, and he knew that she could have nothing to do with any of this. He would stake his life on it. The irony of the phrase made him grin.
He went over to get the tapes of Teri Washburn. Perhaps there was something there that he might have missed.
Teri had been having extra sessions lately at her own re quest. Was she under some new pressure that she had not yet confided to him? Because of her incessant preoccupation with sex, it was difficult to determine accurately her current progress. Still—why had she suddenly, urgently asked for more time with him?
Judd picked up one of her tapes at random and put it on.
“Let’s talk about your marriages, Teri. You’ve been married five times.”
“Six, but who’s counting?”
“Were you faithful to your husbands?”
Laughter.
“You’re putting me on. There isn’t a man in the world who can satisfy me. It’s a physical thing.”
“What do you mean by ‘a physical thing?’”
“I mean that’s the way I’m built. I just got a hot hole and it’s gotta be kept filled all the time.”
“Do you believe that?”
“That it’s gotta be kept filled?”
“That you’re different, physically, from any other woman.”