Free The Professional by Robert B. Parker

said.
    “And your marriage is stable?” Susan said.
    “Eric and I spent two years in psychotherapy. Each with our own therapist. You remember Mr. Hemingway’s remark?” she said.
    “It heals stronger at the break,” I said.
    “You’re a reader, Mr. Spenser?” she said.
    “Susan helps me with the big words,” I said.
    Clarice smiled, with even more warmth in it.
    “In retrospect, the entire incident was salvation for Eric and me. Each of us has come to terms with our demons. And we both had demons.”
    “A troubled marriage,” Susan said, “nearly always has at least two.”
    “Has any of this been useful, Mr. Spenser?”
    “It’s been worth hearing,” I said.
    “But useful?”
    “Gotta think about it,” I said. “If any of my victims were willing, would you talk with them?”
    She smiled again. This time with not only warmth but humor.
    “The sisterhood is strong,” she said.
    “I’ll take that,” I said, “for a yes.”
    She nodded.
    “You may,” she said.

Chapter23

    IT WAS MORNING, and we were in the car, drinking coffee, driving south on Route 91 heading for the Mass Pike. I was enjoying a donut.
    “Sure you don’t want one?” I said. “Cinnamon, my fave.”
    “Ick,” Susan said.
    “The naked frolic in a motel outside of Springfield seemed to go better than you thought it would,” I said.
    “A moment of weakness,” Susan said.
    “You think there’s anything in the fact that what Clarice remembers best about her and Gary’s sex life is how strong and forceful he was?”
    “You think he might be a little vengeful?” Susan said.
    “Something like that,” I said. “I mean, even Hawk agrees that there’s a limit to the number of women you can have sex with.”
    “And Hawk has tested the limits,” Susan said.
    “He has,” I said. “You said once that there might be something more than sex and money in this deal.”
    “What could be more than sex and money?” Susan said.
    “Pathology?” I said.
    “Hey, I do the shrink stuff here,” Susan said.
    “And?”
    “Might be,” Susan said. “Worth looking into, I suppose.”
    “And how would I look into that?” I said.
    “Talk to some of his other partners.”
    “Oh,” I said.
    I finished my donut and got another one out of the bag. Susan ate some grapes she’d brought with her from home.
    “You think things really do heal stronger at the break?” I said.
    “It’s a nice metaphor,” Susan said. “When a broken bone heals, there is often additional bone mass.”
    “So bones may in fact heal stronger at the break,” I said.
    “Maybe,” Susan said.
    “Think that holds in other things?” I said.
    “Some things,” she said. “Sometimes.”
    “There are very few absolutes in the therapist’s canon,” I said.
    “Very few,” Susan said. “Although, I guess, understanding the truth about yourself is important.”
    “You think they got there?”
    “Clarice and her husband? Probably,” Susan said. “No one gets there all the way. But they seem close. If she’s accurate. I assume they addressed the causes of the break, understood them, and were tough enough to change.”
    “She was tough enough,” I said, “not to knuckle under to Gary Eisenhower.”
    Susan smiled.
    “You like that name, don’t you?” Susan said.
    “I do. If I adopt an alias, I may use it.”
    “Gee,” Susan said. “You look just like a Gary Eisenhower, too.”
    “And from there it’s an easy leap to Cary Grant,” I said.
    “Easy,” Susan said. “Of course, guilt helped.”
    “Clarice?”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “As in she was tough enough to confess publicly because she felt she deserved the public humiliation?” I said.
    “As in exactly that,” Susan said. “You’re smarter than you look.”
    “Lucky thing,” I said. “If I weren’t, I probably wouldn’t be able to feed myself.”
    “I’d feed you,” Susan said.
    “I know you would,” I said. “But, guilt or whatever, it all worked for her. She kept her