“Fine,” I said. “Don’t tell me. I can find out anything I need to know about you by looking around the room.”
“Really, you’re that perceptive?” she said.
I noted that Ms. N. Crouch was on the edge of mocking me, despite her best effort to keep all emotion out of her voice.
I stood up. “Shall I demonstrate?”
“If you feel it necessary.”
“Your face tells me you’ve been beautiful your whole life, but you’re older now, in your late fifties, and your clothes and hair style reflect your acceptance of that fact. You’ve aged gracefully, and you believe you’re smarter than your friends, even those who have surpassed you professionally. You keep but one picture on your desk, two young boys who appear to be Japanese-American. They’re your sons, but neither you nor their father is in the picture. If your husband had taken it, you’d be in the photo with your sons. If you’d taken it, he’d be in it. If your husband were dead, you’d have his picture on your desk to honor him. But there is no picture of the husband, which tells me you’re divorced. Based on your current age, and the age you had to be to give birth, these pictures are at least ten years old. You haven’t updated them because they remind you of a happier time.”
I looked at her to see if she was impressed. If she was, she was hiding it well. But no matter, I’d only just begun.
“You struggle to remain proper at all times,” I continued, pointing to her diploma. “You hide behind the name N. Crouch because you think Nadine pegs you as a hick from the sticks. You suffer from feelings of inadequacy because your contemporaries graduated from prestigious colleges while you were stuck at the University of Pittsburgh School Of Medicine. You feel you haven’t lived up to your potential.”
“Why’s that?”
“There are no books or articles on display, which means you’re unpublished. What kind of big money psychiatrist is unpublished at your age?”
N. Crouch pursed her lips. “I see,” she said. “Anything else?”
“Your sons are off in college or working and they don’t call as often as you’d like. To compensate, you keep two dogs as pets.”
“What,” she said. “Not the breed?”
I smiled. “Akitas,” I said. “Japanese dogs brought to our shores by returning American servicemen, after WW2. Twin dogs from the same litter.”
I bowed and sat back down on the leather throne chair. I may have smirked.
“That’s amazing, Mr. Creed,” she said. “Truly remarkable.”
“Why thank you, Ms. Crouch.”
She said, “You took all the evidence on display and managed to get every single fact wrong. Every fact but one.”
I smiled and said, “Bullshit.”
N. Crouch stood. “I’m in my early sixties, not fifties. I don’t think I’m smarter than my friends, though none have surpassed me professionally. The pictures on the desk are my sister’s adopted children. I’m not divorced because I’ve never been married. I’m not from the Midwest, I’m from Miami. My contemporaries didn’t graduate from prestigious colleges because psychiatrists graduate from medical schools, not colleges. Speaking of which, Pittsburgh Medical happens to be the number one medical school in the country. In 2005 alone they received one hundred and eighty NIHA’s—that’s National Institute of Health Awards—totaling more than seventy-six million dollars.
“And by the way,” she added, reaching into her lower desk drawer, “I don’t hide my first name and I
She stopped for a minute and said, “What are you grinning at? You look like the village idiot.”
Then it hit her.
“Shit,” she said. “You just got me to tell you all about myself.”
“Don’t take it too hard,” I said.
“You probably already knew about the book.”
“I Googled you before setting the appointment.”
“I’m going to have to keep an eye on you, Mr. Creed,” she said. “You’re quite the manipulator.”
“Thank you.”
“You take that as a compliment?”
“What’s the one thing?” I said.
She looked puzzled.
“You said I was wrong about everything but one.”
She smiled.
“Wait,” I said, sharing the smile. “I know what it is. I was right that you’ve been beautiful your whole life.”
She grinned, and I cocked my head at her.
“Ms. N. Crouch,” I said. “Did you just wink at me?”
And thus began my professional relationship with Nadine.
Chapter 8
The word on Teddy Boy Turner was that the gambling bug bit him long before he scored the bartending gig at the Grantline Bar & Grill in Darnell, West Virginia. As a teenager, he mowed lawns and washed cars until he amassed enough money to start betting the sports book.
In gambling, winning early in life usually leads to financial ruin down the road, and Teddy Boy’s experience was no different. His current losing streak had put his life in serious jeopardy. He was deeper in debt than his Grantline salary could ever pull him out—to Salvatore Bonadello, no less, one of the biggest and most notorious crime bosses in the country.
