32. Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Two
I hurry in the direction of the lobby signs pointing toward the Mission Bay room. I don’t know how I’ll talk my way in if the room has bouncers, but I’ll think of something.
Except there’s no one at the door checking for conference badges. They must not expect a rush on “Critical Thinking in Forensic Psychological Evaluation.”
I take a deep breath and slip into the back. It’s an ordinary conference space, with long narrow tables and plastic chairs set up to accommodate about a hundred people. It’s three-quarters full. At the front, a screen shows the title card for the presentation, and next to it, a man peers down at the clicker in his hand. He’s tall and bony, like me. Straight dark hair like mine.
David Lombard. I recognize him from the university website photo, and I know I should feel something. After all these miles, after all these days, I should feel something. This should be a moment.
But I feel nothing.
He stares at the clicker in consternation before he sets it down and waggles his index finger in the air.
“Clicker’s busted. Guess I’m doing this the old-fashioned way,” he says with a chuckle before he taps a key and the PowerPoint advances. He gets a courtesy laugh.
David Lombard. My sperm donor tells dad jokes.
He launches into the presentation. Within a minute, he does the same scratch-between-the-eyebrows gesture that Leila and I do. It’s strange to see him do it. When Leila did it, it felt like watching a puzzle piece snap into place. When David Lombard does it, it’s like watching someone do a bad impersonation of me.
He talks for forty minutes. His information is clear, concise, and I find myself interested even though I came here to learn about him, not criminal minds. As he digs into the ins and outs of profiling, I realize that he takes people apart the same way I do. I’m absorbed in his analysis of a murderer he helped the FBI catch early in a serial killer spree, but a distinct part of my brain refuses to dive into it, distracted by a feeling that something is off, but I can’t quite pin it down. I watch him, cataloging the similarities between us.
But with every word he speaks, the unease grows: he’s describing being deep inside another person’s mind while sounding completely disconnected from the whole process.
He launches into his next section, an analysis of how the killer’s daily patterns provided the FBI with enough clues to nab an X-ray technician who spent his off hours deep in the bowels of 4Chan and porn sites.
I’m as riveted as I am disgusted, and that’s when I realize why this all feels off: David Lombard and I share the same fascination in people, the same desire to understand how they work and why they do what they do, but it’s like a version of me in the Upside Down.
His interest in people is clinical. Mine is human.
I can’t unsee it now. As he moves into the final part of his presentation, I realize that he’s doing the darkest version of the job I want for myself: understanding the worst parts of humanity. But it’s not darkness I find interesting. I like reflecting light into the corners no one has ever seen before. David Lombard works in black and gray. I work in full color.
He’s kind of like a shadow of me. It’s not just the different versions of what we do. It’s the way he moves. He’s a solid presenter, but not the most dynamic. He may use the same gestures, but he doesn’t do it with the same energy as Leila does. Or me.
He concludes with a dark quote about human nature from some dead philosopher and thanks the audience, who claps. From the enthusiasm it sounds like he did a good job with the information.
People begin to file out, but half a dozen attendees stay to talk to him, and I watch those conversations, wishing I could hear, but the mic is off now.
He leans forward and listens intently to each of them before answering. I wonder if that’s how I look when I’m in the information-gathering stage with each new peer-to-peer referral.
He’s down to two people, a man and a woman, and my stomach knots. My turn is coming. I take a step forward but stall. I don’t know what the right words are for this situation, but I need to find them, fast.
Hello. I’m Kendall. Were you a sperm donor in the early 2000s? It gives him a little time to prepare for the follow-up question he’ll sense coming.
Hello. I’m definitely not a stalker like that Harrowgate Hacker, but I did come all the way from Colorado to find you.
No. Definitely not that one.
The woman hugs him, and it contains more warmth, lingers longer than I would expect to see between colleagues. She’s dressed casually in a tropical-print sundress, and she gives his cheek a soft pat before heading for the door.
It’s definitely more than a coworker. I study her as she passes me on her way out, but I see nothing but clear, uncomplicated pride on her face as she exits.
I recognize her from my internet sleuthing. Erin, his wife. Makes sense.
I don’t have any more time to think about it, because the remaining man must have only needed a simple answer. He nods, David murmurs something to him as he packs up his laptop, then pauses when the man offers his hand for a shake and heads for the exit.
Which now means that David and I are the only people left in the room. He spots me for the first time, but his gaze doesn’t linger. No curiosity. No spidey-sense telling him he’s seeing his daughter. He goes back to zipping his laptop bag.
Say something .
I take a deep breath and step forward again as he heads up the aisle toward the exit. Toward me.
But then the door opens beside me and Mom slips in.
She swims in and out of focus for a minute as I try to make sense of what I’m seeing.
“Kendall.” She looks exhausted, her eye makeup slightly smudged, her hair limp, her clothes wrinkled. She pulls me into a hug. I let her, but I’m too confused to hug her back.
“Mom. What are you doing here?” I wiggle out and hold her at arm’s length, trying to figure out what’s happening.
“I came straight from the airport.” She keeps her voice low, like she doesn’t want to be overheard. “We need to talk.”
But David Lombard is walking up the aisle, fussing with the strap on his bag. I’ll either need to say something or let him pass. “I need to talk to him first, Mom. That’s the sperm donor.”
She shoots me an anguished look. By now, David is only a few feet away. He stops short when he spots her. Up close, I can see his eyes. Dark green eyes.
“Maggie?”
Maggie? How does he know her name?
“Hi, David.” Her voice is tense and guarded.
“What are you doing here?” He says it like she’s one of the criminals he’s put away.
“This is Kendall. My daughter.”
His mouth tightens as his gaze falls on me. He lingers on my straight, dark hair. My eyes.
“So this is an ambush,” he says to Mom.
A bad, ugly feeling twists in my gut.
She shakes her head. “No. I had nothing to do with this.”
“How can that be true when you’re standing in my presentation in California? Are you going to tell me you didn’t come here looking for me?”
“She didn’t,” I say. “I did.” I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but maybe this will go better if he knows it was me. “I wanted to find my sperm donor.”
“Your sper—” He breaks off, pinning Mom with an angry glare. He takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” he tells me, his voice clipped, “but you got bad information. I’m not your sperm donor.”
Whatever I expected, it wasn’t a denial. “I watched your whole presentation. We have the same gestures. Same hair. And I didn’t get these eyes from her.”
He shoots Mom a look full of accusation. “You told me you took care of this. This wasn’t my problem then, and it’s not my problem now. Come near me again, and I’ll take legal action.”
He shoves the door open, the clank of the safety bar like a gunshot in the silence. I spin to race after him, but Mom catches my arm.
“Let him go,” she says, as I strain toward the door. Outside, Erin waits for him, her smile turning to concern when she spots his expression. She’s holding the hand of a young boy, maybe eight years old. Max.
“What’s wrong?” Erin asks. But David shakes his head and says, “Nothing. Just a work call. Let’s go to the pool.” And without looking back, he leads them toward the resort pool as the conference door closes.
“Mom?” I turn toward her and my voice wobbles.
She sighs, the wrinkles around her eyes deepening. “I got a room. Two, actually. Why don’t you text Mia that there’s a key waiting under her name at the front desk. Then you and I can go to our room and talk. There are things I need to tell you.”