Divine Evil

office in town, of course, tidy and organized. But he'd always preferred to work here, up in the top of the house, where he could be accessible to his family. And smell his flowers from the garden below.
    There had been stacks of books, she remembered. Along the wall the shelves had been piled with them. Stepping into the room, Clare began to open other boxes, togo through all the things her mother had packed away but hadn't been able to toss out.
    Real estate books, studies in architecture, her father's ratty old address book, novels of Steinbeck and Fitzgerald. There were heavy volumes on theology and religion. Jack Kimball had been both fascinated and repelled by religion. She pushed through them, wondering what had driven him to turn so fiercely back to his childhood faith near the end of his life.
    Frowning, she dusted off a dog-eared paperback and tried to remember where she had seen the symbol drawn on its cover before. A pentagram, its center filled with the head of a goat. Its two top points held the horns, the sides the ears, and the bottom tip, the mouth and beard.
    “
The Left-Hand Path,”
she read aloud. She shuddered and started to open the book when a shadow fell over her.
    “Clare?”
    She jolted, dropping the book so that it fell facedown among the others. Without thinking, she moved her hand, shifting another book on top of it as she turned.
    “I'm sorry.” Cam stood in the doorway, searching for the right words. He knew being in this room had to cause her pain. “Your car was here-and the radio's on. I figured you were somewhere in the house.”
    “Yeah, I was just…” She rose and dusted off her knees. “Going through things.”
    “You okay?”
    “Sure.” She looked down at the books she'd scattered over the floor. “See, one person can make a mess.”
    He laid a hand on her cheek. “Hey, Slim. Do you want to talk about it?”
    “Be careful.” She closed her fingers over his wrist. “I'll start leaning on you.”
    “Go ahead.” Gently, he drew her to him and rubbed a hand up and down her back.
    “I loved him so much, Cam.” She let out a long breath and watched the dust motes dance in the sunlight. “I've never been able to love anyone else like that. When I was little, I used to come up here after I was supposed to be in bed. He'd let me sit in the chair while he worked, then he'd carry me down. We could talk about anything, even when I got older.”
    She tightened her grip. “I hated it when he started drinking. I couldn't understand why he would make himself so unhappy, make all of us so unhappy. I would hear him crying some nights. And praying. So lonely, so miserable. But somehow, the next day, he'd pull it all together and get through. And you'd start to believe that it was all going to be okay again. But it wasn't.” Sighing, she pulled away, and her eyes were dry.
    “He was a good father, Clare. I spent a lot of years envying you and Blair your father. The drinking was something he couldn't control.”
    “I know.” She smiled a little and did what she hadn't been able to do alone. She moved to the window and looked down. The terrace was empty, swept clean. Edging it were the early roses her father had loved.
    “I've been through all the groups, all the therapy. But there's one thing none of them could tell me. There's one thing I've asked myself again and again and never found an answer. Did he fall, Cam? Did he drink himself senseless and lose his balance? Or did he stand here, right here, and decide to stop fighting whatever demon was eating at him?”
    “It was an accident.” Cam put his hands on her shoulders and turned her to face him.
    “I want to believe that. I've always tried to, because theother is too painful. The father I knew couldn't have killed himself, couldn't have hurt my mother or Blair or me that way. But you see, the father I knew couldn't have cheated, couldn't have bribed inspectors and falsified reports the way he did on the shopping center. He couldn't have lied and taken money and broken the law so arrogantly. But he did. And so I don't know what to believe.”
    “He loved you, and he made mistakes. There's nothing else you have to believe.”
    “You'd understand, better than anyone, what it's like to lose a father when you need one so badly.”
    “Yes, I understand.”
    She tightened her fingers on his. “I know it might sound odd, but if I could be sure-even if I could be sure he had killed himself-it would be easier than