Merry Christmas, Alex Cross (Alex Cross 19)
Trey began to snivel. “I can’t help it, Dad.”
“Of course you can’t,” Fowler said soothingly. “Most of your mother’s defective DNA strands just happened to spool out to you. And those that didn’t found their way into your older brother and sister.”
He smiled at me. “I’m a lucky, lucky man, Cross.”
“That so?” I asked, hoping he’d continue to vent, expend his emotional energy, and then see the hopelessness of his situation before the meth could turn him full rhino.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Fowler asked acidly. “Doesn’t luck just seem to shimmer all around me?”
“It used to,” I said.
He looked off into the distance, said, “Yes, it did, before my surroundings and close companions conspired to warp me.”
Here was paranoia, crystal meth’s staple emotion. I could already hear the angry persecution story coming.
Fowler didn’t let me down.
CHAPTER
20
FOWLER CROSSED TO HIS SON JEREMY AND USED HIS BOOT TO PUSH THE BOY over onto his back, where he cringed like a dog.
“Here he is,” Fowler said. “My scion. The apple of my eye. Make that the apple strudel, cake, pie, and Pop-Tart of my eye. Not to mention my favorite bed wetter. By the looks of it, he’s regressing, pissing his pants now, instead of his mattress.”
The boy was humiliated. Jeremy began to make hiccupping noises that broke into chokes and sobs.
“Sto
p, Daddy!” Chloe screamed. “You’re making it worse. You’re ruining everything! You always ruin everything!”
“Ahh, Chloe,” Fowler said. “My Little Miss Perfect.” He looked to me. “Chloe is exceptionally smart, a trait that no doubt came from my end of things. But that intelligence crossed with my ex-wife’s narcissism produced a young lady who tries to control the world as if it orbited around her head.”
“I get it, Henry,” I said. “Your kids didn’t turn out the way you planned. Welcome to the club. It’s what makes them human. And the disappointment? That’s your issue. Deal with it.”
He looked surprised, then his eyes narrowed and he snarled, “Who the fuck do you think you are, Dr. Phil?”
“Isn’t that why you asked me in here?” I said.
“I asked you in to serve as jury foreman,” he snapped. “I’m running the show here, or haven’t you noticed?”
“Look,” I said. “It’s Christmas Eve. You obviously aren’t happy with your life or your family. But I am happy. I have a family I love. I’d like to get back to them, so I’d appreciate it if you’d tell me what it was that broke you.”
Fowler didn’t know what to make of that. He clearly hadn’t expected it.
“What are you talking about?” he demanded.
“You were at the top of the game on K Street, making millions, making headlines, and then it all unravels,” I said. “I get the overspending, the consumerist wife, the messed-up kids. But lots of guys in this town have those problems, and they aren’t holding their families hostage on Christmas Eve. So what was it? What caused you to unravel?”
CHAPTER
21
FOR A SECOND THERE I WONDERED IF I’D GONE TOO FAR, BEEN TOO DIRECT, TOO confrontational. But then Fowler smiled icily at me.
“You want to know the straw that broke the camel’s back, Cross?” he asked, reaching into his jacket and coming up with a glass vial.
“Wouldn’t hurt to understand your side of things,” I said.