The Mentor’s Daughter

CHAPTER 1

SOMETIMES IN LIFE you just have to absorb the blow. Take it, then pick yourself up off the floor and fight. When Eli Scott spot ted her entering the Tulsa restaurant, he knew this was one of those moments. Something was terribly wrong. After three unanswered calls, his mentor of sixteen years was a no-show. Now, in his stead, his mentor’s daughter, a notorious lawyer and image consultant, had appeared unannounced. They’d never met, yet her history and public reputation built a wave of worry that surged through him. For the second time in his life, he knew he’d have to rely on a sociopath.

With every step she took, his mentor’s uncharacteristic absence took on a more sinister meaning. Eli’s body instinctively braced for fight or flight, but trapped by his obligations to her father, he could do neither. Whatever lies she carried, Eli had to hear them. His adrenalin spiked, then he realized his past was the source of the anxious pressure building inside. He filled his lungs, reminded himself who he was today, and readied to face the woman marching toward him. Despite his hatred of liars, Eli decided to accept Hope Munro for who she was and where she was today: a woman who made her fortune by lying.

She smiled at the hostess, passing her with a dismissive wave. The brilliant noontime sunlight streamed through the plate-glass windows. Eli’s trepidation grew as she made her way along the white quartz floor between the onyx tables and past the glistening brass rails. Without a word, she stopped across from him, grabbed the back of the opposing chair, sat, and faced him.

“Mr. Scott, thanks for waiting for my father,” she said, her expression bright and optimistic, her tone confident and engag ing. She seemed charming. Eli wanted to relax, expecting a simple explanation, but he knew not to be fooled. Still, he played along.

“Not a problem. I wouldn’t be where I am today if not for your father. I was getting concerned.”

Her million-dollar smile spread across her thin face. “Well, we have that in common.” But the smile dissolved into a stare that felt like a predator locking on its prey. Her deep brown eyes bored into his as she reached across the table and covered his hand. “My father is the problem.”

Eli’s heart rate doubled, pounding in his ears. He embraced the warning that clawed in his gut, trying to dig its way out. His body quaked. His jaw felt locked in place. He narrowed is eyes on her.

“Is he okay?” he said, not wanting to hear her next words.

Hope’s eyes drew tight, and a tear drifted down her cheek. “He’s been kidnapped.”

He lunged toward her. “What!” A few heads from surrounding tables snapped in his direction. He didn’t want to believe what she’d said. Jim was much more than his mentor. He’d filled the void Eli’s father could never fill. Now, Eli envisioned life without him, the loss slicing him in half. He imagined Jim and his captors, and he forced himself back into his seat and gripped the arms on the chair until his knuckles whitened. He forced himself to take a breath.

Eli assumed she loved her father considering how Jim had stood by her. Yet a warning that she lied for a living—a particularly good living—rang out again somewhere deep inside. Eli wasn’t an investi gator; he was an oilman who had donned his armor and had fought his way from the oilfields into the executive ranks until he refused to follow in his father’s deceptive footsteps.
Eli gritted his teeth and resisted the urge to throttle her. “How long has he been missing?”

“Since yesterday evening,” she said, calmly.

“What about the police?” Eli asked, trying not to yell. She’d taken far too long to ask for help.

Hope pulled out a tissue and wiped her cheek. “I can’t. They wouldn’t believe me.”

“Can’t what?” This time Eli was loud enough to draw the atten tion of the two women seated next to them.

Hope eyed them, forcing them to look away, then she turned back to Eli. “There’s a video,” she whispered.

“What?” he asked, swallowing his frustration.

“It said not to go to the authorities, or he’s done,” she explained. Eli checked the proximity of the ladies on either side and leaned forward on his forearms. “Show me.”

Hope thrusted her hands out to the side. “It’s gone. The video disappeared as soon as I looked at it.”

Eli’s microscopic speck of trust in anything she said evaporated. “How was it sent?”

“To my Signal account,” she said as if Eli should have known that.

He knew the app was an encrypted messaging service that had the capability to automatically delete messages and videos. He wasn’t surprised she used it with her high-profile clients. But considering her history of twisting the truth, the fact that the video disappeared and couldn’t be verified was a problem. A big one.

“Describe the video,” he said, doing his best to deliver a more pleasant smile.

“My father was in a nondescript gray room anchored to a metal chair. A garbled voice said that unless I gave them what they wanted, they’d kill him. His head was wagging no the entire time. They said they’d be in touch with further instructions.”

It sounded like every TV ransom setup. Too rote. She let the description hang in the air between them, like bait on a hook. She kept her eyes glued to his.

“And they didn’t say what it was they wanted?” he said. He watched her for any signs of deception. She showed none, but still, he didn’t trust her.

“No. I’m assuming that comes next,” she said.

Eli leaned forward on his elbows again and whispered. “Did you notice any other sounds in the background?”

Hope matched his lean. “No. It was silent other than the garbled voice.”

Still leaning closer, he asked, “Could you tell if the camera was stationary or handheld?”

She leaned back again. “What difference would that make?” Despite challenging his question, she remained oddly calm. “It says something about the alleged kidnappers,” Eli said, firmly. She shrugged. “It was moving around. Like a video someone was posting.”

“Did it look like a home or an industrial setting?”

Hope folded her arms and smiled. “Don’t you think I would have mentioned that?”

Still unsure about her answers, Eli had a choice. Believe her, freely giving her his trust, and help her save the man who’d helped him navigate the worst times of his life, or Eli could assume she’d lied, taking the risk that she hadn’t. But deep down, he wanted to believe some of her lies because they were Jim’s only hope.

Jim Munro was also the father who’d said he’d recognized Hope’s condition after he’d witnessed a soccer game where she was more interested in kicking the other girls than the ball. In retaliation, two opposing team members had beaten and kicked her as her team mates stood and watched until the coaches ended the melee, the faded scar on her neck a result of those injuries. A few years later, when she’d confessed to stealing her mother’s friends’ jewelry from their unoccupied homes and keeping her loot hidden in the garage, her mother gave up, leaving her father with the carnage.

Jim had said he’d guided Hope through a gauntlet of run-ins with the local police in high school until he’d helped her discover where she could best survive. She had the grades, and her father’s connections led to the University of Tulsa law school. Passing the bar on the first try, she had become a defense attorney. Then, based on her ability to rehabilitate her clients’ images in the courtroom, she’d added image consultancy to her services. A parade of disgraced tech giants, politicians, and oilmen had followed, and her reputation and bank account had swelled.
Eli shifted in his chair. He didn’t want to trust a liar. It was a recipe for disaster. But he didn’t have a choice. As much as he hated lies, he’d have to find a way to sort through Hope’s.
Hope’s expression said she’d recognized his doubt. “My father said to come to you if anything happened to him. You’d know what to do. He said you’d help me because you were the best friend he ever had.”

Eli imagined he was playing a deadly game of truth or con sequences, where the wrong answer could destroy everything he’d painstakingly rebuilt. But while Hope hadn’t earned the benefit of the doubt, James Munro had. And then some.

“I’ll look into it and get back to you,” Eli said, knowing he had little choice.

“I need an answer now. He’s in trouble. I know you know that feeling.” Another tear ran down her cheek.

Eli wanted to jump in with both feet. But he felt triggered. He felt himself shifting into crisis mode, something he was very good at. He reminded himself of her very public reputation. Better to think about it. “Give me a few hours. I’ll call the number tied to your text.”

She skidded her chair back and stood. “I’ll be waiting.” As he watched her confidently stride from the restaurant and slip on her dark Bottega Veneta sunglasses, his suspicions still begged for his attention. There was something about their conversation. It seemed to go just the way she wanted. And there was something about her behavior. Not that it had felt scripted. That was the wrong word. Every word, every expression had been driven, confident, and measured. It had been as if she were on autopilot. It was compulsive. Then it hit him. It had been pathological.
Eli got the attention of his server and asked for the bill. The last time he’d delt with a sociopath, he was seven years old. He knew he needed professional help to better manage this one. He pulled out his phone and selected a number from the most recent calls. He called Lizzy Beauregard’s number.

She answered on the first ring. “Eli?”

“I need to see you this afternoon.”

CHAPTER 2

ELI KNEW THE trip to Lizzy Beauregard’s practice would take only a few minutes. It felt like a lifetime. He gripped the steering wheel and wrestled the dilemma tearing at his heart. The weighty certainty of his obligation to Jim Munro was clear, but so were the warning flares ignited by his mistrust of Jim’s sociopathic daughter. He needed Lizzy’s help to untangle this mess. He took in a slow deep breath and eased it out just as she had taught him. He regained his focus on the present moment.

As he drove past Utica Square, the upscale outdoor shopping mall, the cold winter day limited the number of well-dressed shop pers. Still, he sensed the old money power of the area. Those powerful oil families had built stately homes with long winding drives among the one-hundred-year-old trees guarding stone-and-brick mansions that peered over the area from their hilltop perches. Throughout the last century, they’d built Tulsa into the more cosmopolitan of the two major cities in Oklahoma. While Oklahoma City was the capital, scratched from the red flat plains of the western part of the state, Tulsa had been cultivated on the rolling green hills of northeastern Oklahoma by the oil barons who’d made Tulsa the oil capital of the world in the first half of the twentieth century. They’d continually enhanced the city’s cultural pedigree. While it had taken too long for some, they’d also come to recognize the contributions to its culture from Native Americans and Black men and women—far too many of whom had paid with their lives in the city’s worst moments.

Eli turned into the small, shaded parking lot facing the con verted home just after 1 p.m. Built in 1910, the Craftsman-style home featured red brick accented by natural stone topped by a dark-gray slate roof. A low brick wall bordered the front porch that welcomed visitors to the rounded wooden entry door of NorthStar Counseling. Eli remembered how the comfort of the place scrubbed the tension from his body. This place had saved his life. But it was all he could do to contain the energy ricochetting through his head.

Inside, Eli was greeted by the gentle sound of trickling water from the pebbled fountain in the corner. Soft natural light fed the deep green plants placed atop the natural wood furnishings, giving him the sense of the magic of life. The familiar scent of sandalwood filled the air. Two sofas, upholstered in gentle gray-and-blue woven fabric, provided a brief respite for those who waited for their sessions. The four parlors had entrances off the foyer. The waiting area was empty, a function of the late lunch break for the practice. Lizzy’s door was open.

“Eli?” Lizzy said.

Eli walked to the open double doors and took a calming breath. “Hey, Lizzy.”

“I didn’t know you were here already. You practicing your cat burglar skills? Your session won’t go any better if you sneak up on it.” Eli smiled as he always did when she greeted him with her quips. “It took me a while to clear your security.”

She grinned. “You know what I say. More security builds suspi cion, and suspicion is the mother of insecurity.”

He had known Lizzy for over a year, but Eli felt she knew him as if she’d been a lifelong companion. Together they’d plumbed the depths of his deepest fears and sorrows and continued to rebuild his thinking about his life. That had grown into what Lizzy called a professional relationship neither had expected.

He stepped into the parlor and took the familiar king chair facing her. She placed her pad of paper on the small table next to her. She’d told him she’d never believed in desks. She said they were too much like a barrier or a throne. Her bright green eyes found Eli’s and she smiled.

At fifty-eight, she’d reached the point where she could manage the practice and take on a limited number of clients. She’d come to Oklahoma from Charleston, South Carolina, thirty years ago with her now ex-husband and toddler son so her husband could take the chief counsel position in a small but growing pipeline company. After his multiple affairs, she’d left him and returned to school, graduating with a master’s in psychology from Oklahoma State. After working as a school counselor until her son, Brady, was out of grade school, she’d begun her private practice.
Lizzy sighed and a look of concern swept across her face. She looked down at his foot, and Eli realized he was tapping it. He stopped. “What’s the emergency? You sounded out of sorts on the phone, and you seem unsettled now. What gives?” Lizzy asked.

Eli wanted to be careful. He didn’t want to pull Lizzy into some thing and didn’t know what her legal obligations might be. “I need to run something by you. Just to check my thinking. But start the consulting clock.” He wanted to make a distinction between Lizzy’s consulting and his counseling sessions, always respecting the red lines of their professional relationship. “I also have a question to start. Theoretically, if someone tells you about a crime, do you have to report it?”

Her eyebrows shot up, one higher than the other. Her face twist ing with concern. “Are you in trouble?”

Eli shook his head. “No. Let’s say it’s not me.”

Lizzy tilted her head. “Is it a credible threat to someone else?”

Eli didn’t want to answer. He thought for a moment, then it hit him. “No. Not credible.” Yet, he thought.

“Then no.” She grabbed the notepad from the table. “Tell me what’s going on.”

Eli leaned forward. “I had a visit from Jim Munro’s daughter at lunch.”

Lizzy seemed surprised. “Wow. That’s a blast from the past. How is he?”

“That’s what she wanted to talk about.”

Lizzy furrowed her brow again. “Oh no. Is he okay? I know you two were close.”

Eli swallowed hard. “That’s just it. I don’t know. Jim had told me years ago his daughter was a sociopath.”

As she looked down and wrote a note, she said, “Must have been a while back. We don’t use that term anymore. We use antisocial personality disorder.”

Lizzy’s definition made him feel worse. “Okay then. He said she lies all the time. And that’s the problem.”

“How so?” Lizzy asked.

“She said she received a Signal video that showed him kidnapped.” Lizzy looked up from her notes. “Did she call the cops?” “No. She said they wouldn’t believe her, and they threatened to kill him if she did.”

Lizzy shrugged. “Just show them the video.”

Eli shook his head, showing his disappointment. “It was one of those that immediately delete themselves once viewed.” Eli could see her connecting the dots. She jotted something down. The more she wrote, the drier his mouth became. “I see.” She looked up from the pad. “You don’t believe her?”

Eli carefully thought about his reply. Eli and Lizzy had uncov ered a few trust issues he had. Mistrust came much easier to him, and Lizzy knew it. In this case, he felt justified, but the irony wasn’t lost on him. He needed to find a way to trust a liar. “I called and texted him before she showed up and after she left and didn’t hear back. So, it fits… but you know what she does for a living?” Lizzy nodded. “I do. She’s quite famous.”

“Notorious,” Eli said. “Jim had told me she also had juvenile problems with the cops involving violence, missing neighborhood pets, and stealing when she was growing up.”
A look of concern returned to her face. “I remember you talked about Jim being upset about her.”

Eli locked his eyes on hers. “Here’s the question. How can I trust her? Jim told me she’d been diagnosed as a sociopath on her eighteenth birthday. When I met her, I got the sense I was being manipulated and everything she did was rehearsed.”

Lizzy tapped the top of the pen against her lower lip. “Did Jim ever talk about her problems in detail?”

Eli wasn’t sure where Lizzy was going. He felt like this was going backward. He needed an answer to his question, now. He took a breath. He trusted Lizzy. “Only about his need to stay close to her and his frustration with her behavior. And the fact that Hope’s stash of stolen items from his wife’s friends’ houses was the thing that broke their marriage.”

Lizzy paused and looked at her notes. “Did he talk about her remorse? Did she apologize either to him or to them?” Eli still wondered where Lizzy was going with this. He was get ting impatient. “He just said she apologized but didn’t seem to mean it. She didn’t seem as guilty or ashamed as he would have liked.” “Is she single?”

“What?”

“Is she alone?”

Eli gave her an exaggerated nod. “Yes. I think so.”

Lizzy ignored his frustration. “Did she seem nervous?” “No. Not nervous. But here’s the thing. She did seem genuinely worried. Like she needed to get him back.

Lizzy wrote a few more things down. She stared at the page for a few seconds.

“What is it?” Eli asked a bit more loudly than he’d planned. Lizzy drew in a breath and let it out. “Look. I can’t diagnose anyone without meeting with them—getting to know them. But if I’m”—she made air quotes— “‘consulting,’ I can give you some advice.”

Eli glanced at his watch.

“Are you pressed for time?” Lizzy asked.

Eli realized he’d been keeping her in the dark about his urgency. “I forgot to tell you, Hope said the kidnappers gave her a deadline to come up with what they want. I only have seventy-two hours, and the clock started yesterday.”

“Good God,” she said, staring.

Eli stared right back. “I know, right?”

“What do they want?”

“That’s yet to come.”

Lizzy slowly shook her head and looked down at the pad in her lap. “Now I know why you were asking those questions.” “I can’t get the authorities involved. Please. They’ll kill him if it’s true.”

Lizzy held her gaze on him for a few seconds. Finally, she sighed, wagged her head, and turned her attention back to her notepad. “Look,” she said, tersely. “Here’s my professional take. She checks the boxes on some of the traits and behaviors that are used to assess psychopathy or antisocial personality disorder.”

Eli’s heart jumped into his throat. “I’m dealing with a psycho path, not a sociopath?”

Lizzy looked up from her notes. “Wait a second. Don’t jump into the pool until I fill it with water.”

Eli chuckled to himself, then settled and patiently waited for Lizzy to finish.

She looked back down at her pad. “From what you’ve told me, she has a history of being capable of violence. She lacks empathy and remorse. She’s deceitful, manipulative, and superficially charm ing. She’s repeatedly broken the law. And she seems to be a loner, perhaps pointing to a limited ability to demonstrate and connect with emotions.”

“That captures what I know. She also gets paid to lie.” “That brings up one of the mitigating factors. She apparently can manage money.”

“Or she makes so much, it doesn’t matter.”

“A valid point. But what I’m trying to say is she may be some where on the scale. I doubt she’s a full-blown psychopath. I’d agree with the diagnosis of ASPD. If she’s sociopathic, it’s more common than you’d think, as many as one in twenty-five people.”

Eli turned his head, curiously. “I feel like you’re trying to tell me something that I’m missing.”

“I am. I’m trying to tell you to be careful. She may be a highly functioning sociopath. That would mean she doesn’t experience emo tions like we do. It’s their absence that’s the problem. She appears to be very intelligent. She hides her condition very well in social situations. It’s a dangerous combination.”

Eli still looked for the bottom line. “I shouldn’t trust anything she says?”

“You’ll have to make that assessment yourself. Sociopaths can experience strong, painful urges to act out. And acting out can be some type of antisocial behavior, like lying, hurting others, or break ing social norms by stealing. But here is the thing. If they can’t do those things to alleviate the painful pressure building inside, a few of them can give in to their violent impulses.”

“They snap?”

“I wouldn’t use that term professionally, but yes, they can snap.” “That’s why you want me to be careful.”

“That and I value our relationship.” Lizzy crossed her legs, rested her pad on her knee, and leaned back. “Look. You need to know a couple of things.” She started a count on her fingers. “First, you have to understand the person she is.”

“What do you mean?”

Lizzy closed her pad. “I mean she has no conscience. None what soever. She won’t feel shame, guilt, or remorse for anything she does. She is a predator. She only wants to win. And that winning is defined by dominance through control or manipulation of those of us with a conscience. That’s why she’s so good at what she does for a living.”

It wasn’t the answer Eli had hoped for. His pulse slowed and he sighed. As usual, Lizzy could read him well.

“What are you thinking?” she asked.

“I’m thinking, what about Jim? I have to do something. I owe Jim a lot. He sent me home to sit with my mother while she was in hospice. Four weeks. He went against the rules—made sure I was paid, didn’t dock my vacation. He showed me the ropes in the oilfields. He gave me opportunities, and those opportunities and his advice got me through the worst times in my life.”

Lizzy put her pad on her table and settled. “I’m going to switch hats for a moment and do some of that therapist stuff. You ready?” Eli relaxed. “I’m ready.”

“Do you remember our work on self-worth? How you were very confident in your abilities, but you had that voice driving you to always improve. To be better.”

Eli remembered the sessions. “Yes. Those were tough sessions.” “Yes, they were. My point is, a sociopath can spot that need a mile away and exploit it.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Number two is to always approach all matters with her intellectually. Keep your emotions out of it.”

“Okay.”

“It is your superpower. She’ll feed off your emotions if you let her. They will fuel her. Luckily, hiding your emotions is one of your strengths.”

Eli wanted to laugh. “You mean the thing we’ve been working to fix all this time is an asset?”

Lizzy grinned. “Don’t get carried away. I said hide your emo tions, not suppress them.” She held up three fingers. “Third. Change the game but don’t tell her.”

“What?”

“Her game is to win. Dominate through manipulation and con trol. Pick your objective and stick to it. Intellectually. Don’t get swept up in her game.”

“My goal is simple. Find and rescue Jim.”

“Fine. Stick to it.” Lizzy made sure of her eye contact with him. “Now. Be patient. You’ll feel the fight-or-flight response when she targets you. It will cloud your judgment. You need to let it go.” Eli opened his eyes wide. “Uh oh.”

“What is it?”

“Already felt it. When I was talking to her.”

“Let it go. It will wear you out. Play the intellectual game instead.”

“Got it.”

“Four. Don’t confront her head-on. It will escalate her impulsive ness. She’s already shown a tendency for violence, like we discussed. Be patient. Remember that she’s better at her game than you’ll ever be. Think before you do anything.”

Eli nodded.

“Last but not least, try to enlist someone else to help.” Eli knew that was a nonstarter. “Help. I can’t. I can’t tell anyone.” “You’ll find someone. I have confidence that you’ll find a way.
There is safety in numbers. Two heads and all that stuff.” Eli was always surprised by her confidence in him. “I’m not sure I understand that therapist lingo.”

“Very funny,” Lizzy said, folding her hands in her lap. “Let me ask you: Are you trying to save Hope?”

The question cut straight through to the dark dungeon he hid from everyone. Lizzy had found it—again. His recent work with Lizzy had uncovered a pattern. He’d subconsciously find women who were flawed in some way, who even treated him poorly. He then spent his time trying to change himself to cause them to fix them selves and fix their relationship with him. It was a product of the buried sense of not being enough that he’d adopted as a kid. It had been a strength in his run up the corporate ladder, as he constantly sought to improve himself. It was also self-destructive behavior that had made him a sucker for someone in distress. Someone like Hope.

“Eli? What are you feeling?”

He ran through the list of emotions they’d been working on. He struggled a bit identifying the emotion tied to experiencing Hope. “I felt as if I wasn’t good enough to deal with her. I also felt like I had to help her. I had to believe her. I wanted to say that I would. But I felt triggered.”

“Good,” she said. She gently smiled. “Now. Think back to our EMDR session a few months ago. Did it feel like that?” Eli remem bered the session where they’d worked on a feeling that he’d been experiencing since the day he’d been fired from his executive job because he refused to go along with a lie. “I think that’s it. Not quite as intense, but it’s there.”

“Do you remember the root of that feeling?”

Eli recalled the EMDR light sliding side to side. It was hypnotic. As he’d held the sensation inside him, a string of events from his past arose and Lizzy captured them all. Their follow-up work took them to the oldest memory. It was the night he had watched his mother, strapped to a gurney, being loaded into a waiting ambulance. Her body and mind failing under the weight of his father’s trail of soul crushing lies. Eli was alone and seven years old.

“I remember.” The sinking, raw shame of not being enough for her—to save her, reached up from the darkness inside. Then, it hit him. “I do want to save her. I also want to save Jim.” When he’d remembered what they’d just talked about regarding changing the game, he sat up in the chair and pulled his shoulders back. His determination intensified. He was ready to save the man who had saved him.

“Find Jim and save him,” he said again.

“Good,” Lizzy said. “Be careful about that first one. If she is a sociopath, she’s a predator. Like I said before, they can find a weak ness in anyone with a conscience and manipulate it.”
Eli’s confidence grew. “I’ll focus on Jim. Banish the shame gremlins.”

She reached over and touched his forearm.

“You and I have been through that hell together. And you’ve battled through it. You’ve worked harder than most. I think you know what to do. I’m here if you need me.” She leaned back in her chair. “Back to consulting. With Hope, I’m telling you to move with caution.”

Lizzy was right. He knew what he needed to do. Whether he could do it was another thing.

“Back to my question. How can I tell for sure if she’s lying or telling the truth?”

Lizzy picked up her notebook and stood. “You can’t.”