Cold Heart (6 page)

Cindy started doing half-hearted t’ai chi exercises in front of the mirror.

‘So on the day you discovered your husband’s body, you were sunbathing as usual and you fell asleep. A loud noise woke you – about what time would that have been?’

Cindy wrinkled her nose. ‘Maybe eleven. I was asleep the first time, then I heard it again. At first I thought it was a car backfiring. It was just one loud bang. Then I saw all these birds flying up, from the garden by the shrubbery. You can’t see the pool from the balcony, just the edge of the garden, so I called Harry, wondering if he was messing about.’

‘Messing about?’

‘Yeah. Sometimes he’d take pot-shots at the birds. It used to make me mad as hell, because once he killed one.’

Lorraine doodled on her pad as Cindy went into a long monologue on how she loved all of nature’s creatures. Finally she interrupted, ‘You know, Cindy, if you’re found guilty of murdering your husband, you’ll be locked up in a prison and you’ll be hard pushed to hear a single tweet. Now I know it may be tedious, but I have to ask all these questions so I know exactly what I should—’

‘I never killed him,’ the girl said, red-faced with anger.

‘I know you didn’t, but you’re to stand trial for it, unless—’

‘I never killed him. I found him, that’s all.’

‘So, will you close your eyes and tell me exactly what you did, from the time the noise woke you to the moment you discovered your husband’s body?’

Cindy covered her eyes with her hands. ‘You mean, like creatively visualize?’ Clearly this was something she was familiar with.

‘Just tell me what happened.’

‘After the bang, I called out his name,’ Cindy began. ‘When I got no reply, I picked up my towel, and my sun creams and my straw hat. I went into the bedroom and decided I’d have a swim. I didn’t have anything on – I sunbathe naked – so I put my swimsuit on and got a big outdoor towel. Then I heard another bang – I was pretty sure it was a gun this time, so I put on my mules and went downstairs . . .’ She withdrew her hands from her face, and her big blue eyes stared ahead. ‘I went to the pool and put my towel on the chair by the table. I saw Harry’s towel, his sandals, and his cigarette packet. I looked around because one cigarette was smoked down – there was a long line of ash on it.’

Cindy blinked, and Lorraine noticed that she was looking at herself in the mirrors again as she spoke.

‘I was about to dive in so I went to the deep end. First thing I noticed was the water was kind of pink, and then I saw him. I called out his name – he was lying face down, arms outstretched – but I knew something bad had happened, and I started to scream. I screamed and screamed.’

‘How long was it before someone came out to you?’

Cindy stared at herself and Lorraine had to repeat the question.

‘I don’t know, it seemed a very long time. Then Juana came out, with Jose just behind her, and she said to me, she said . . .’

For the first time since they had come into the gym Lorraine saw some emotion. ‘She said to me, “Holy Mother, Mrs Nathan, what have you done?”’

Lorraine waited, watching Cindy closely. The girl’s breathing had become irregular, and she was swallowing rapidly. ‘Go on, Cindy. Then what happened?’

‘Jose jumped into the pool, and he said, “She’s shot him! She’s shot him!’” She gulped air into her lungs, her chest heaving. ‘They dragged him to the shallow end. I could see white bone . . . and they couldn’t lift him out.’ She shuddered.

Lorraine tapped her notebook. ‘Go on.’

‘They called the police, I guess.’

Lorraine looked up. ‘But Cindy, you told me you called the police.’

Cindy blinked. ‘Oh, yes, that’s right. I did.’

Lorraine made a note that the call to her office had come in at just after eleven o’clock. If Cindy couldn’t recall contacting the police, maybe she couldn’t remember calling Lorraine either.

Cindy continued, ‘I called Mr Feinstein, because the next thing the garden was full of people and someone brought me some brandy. I was still by the pool, but sitting on one of the wooden chairs, and all I could think of was that he’d been sitting where I was sitting, smoking that cigarette. Then Mr Feinstein said to me, “Cindy, they want to take you into the station to ask you some questions,” and that it would be best if I got dressed.’ Cindy began to twist a strand of her blonde hair through her fingers. ‘I got dressed, I got my purse and my sunglasses, just like I was going out shopping or something, but I didn’t put any make-up on, and then they took me to the station.’

‘Do you recall the name of the officer who questioned you?’

‘No.’

‘Did Mr Feinstein come with you?’

‘No, he came on later.’

‘So you had no lawyer with you?’

‘No, I was on my own.’

Lorraine jotted some notes, then looked up sharply as Cindy began to cry. ‘They said they found my gun, they said I did it, but I kept on saying over and over that I couldn’t have done it, that I wouldn’t have done something that bad even if I said I would.’

Lorraine repeated, ‘“Said I would”?’

‘Well, I told you, I was always threatening him.’ Cindy’s voice steadied a little, and her chin lifted. ‘I was always saying I’d kill him, because he used to get me so mad. He could be so mean to me, I’d get mad as hell. I’d scream and shout and try to hit him, but he would just laugh, and that got me even madder, but I never meant what I said. It was just I was upset.’ She dissolved into real tears again – more at the memory of her anger and humiliation, Lorraine thought, than out of grief at her husband’s death.

‘I need a tissue,’ Cindy said, sniffing, her dark blue mascara beginning to run.

Lorraine crossed to the shower area and headed for one of the toilets to get some tissue. She dragged off a length of paper and hurried back to the gym.

‘I didn’t do it. I wouldn’t kill him, even though he got me madder than hell!’ Cindy mopped her face, then blew her nose. ‘I didn’t kill him, did I? Please tell me I didn’t do it.’

Lorraine bent down to her, in an almost motherly fashion. ‘But you didn’t do it, did you?’

Cindy wiped her face and blew her nose again, her voice a hoarse whisper. ‘I don’t know. You see, it’s all blurred. I mean, I’d know, wouldn’t I? I’d know if I
hud
done it. That’s what you got to help me with, because I’m all confused.’

Lorraine straightened up. One moment Cindy had given her a detailed description of what she had done leading up to the discovery of the body, the next she was asking if she could have been the one to pull the trigger. It didn’t make sense.

‘You’ve just told me how you found the body, Cindy, so why are you thinking now you might have killed him? ‘

Cindy rocked forward, head in her hands. “Cos I can only remember going to the pool and seeing him in the water. Nothing before that. I do the same thing every day – I mean, I could be just filling in the gaps.’

‘But you said you heard the gunshot?’

‘Yes, I know.
I know I said that
.’

‘Are you telling me now that you didn’t hear it?’

‘
Yes.
No, I heard it, I’m not lying to you. I heard that one, but . . .’

‘But what?’

Cindy twisted the damp tissue in her fingers. ‘Maybe it didn’t happen when I think it happened.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘What if I’d done it before?’

‘You’ll have to help me, Cindy, I can’t follow what you’re saying. How do you mean before?’

‘Earlier.’

Lorraine sighed. ‘You mean before you went to the balcony to sunbathe?’

‘No. I mean the first shot. When I was sleeping. I mean, I could have done it half asleep. Like in an altered state of consciousness – you know, the way people remember past lives, and sometimes they just act them out? I mean, I could have been a murderess or anything. Maybe I just couldn’t help myself.’

Lorraine rolled her eyes as Cindy sprang to her feet, thinking that her client had been watching too many of her husband’s killer-bimbo fantasies. She watched the girl dive at the punch-bag and hit it, her face a mask of anger. Lorraine let her go until she tired herself out and eventually put her arms around the punch-bag, hugging it tightly.

‘Sometimes he didn’t come home,’ she said softly. Lorraine kept silent. ‘Often he stayed out all night, and I knew about the other women. I knew he was never faithful, he always said that to me, said he could never be faithful to one woman and that I’d just have to accept that. The day before I found him, he’d been really mean to me. We argued at breakfast, and then he came down here. I came after him and he was furious, but I wouldn’t go. I said to him that if he carried on this way I’d leave him, and he said he didn’t care what I did and he laughed at me, kept on punching this thing, laughing and ignoring me. So I went and got the gun, and when I came back he was on that weight machine, and I went right up to him and I pointed it at his head, and I said that was the last time he was ever going to laugh at me.’

Lorraine still said nothing, but was interested to note that Cindy was calm now, her mind focused on what she was saying.

‘He looked at me, then he reached out and pulled the gun over so it was almost in his mouth and he told me to fire it.’

‘And?’

Cindy sighed. ‘I did. I pulled the trigger, but it wasn’t loaded.’ She pushed away the punch-bag, which began to swing slowly. ‘He got up from the bench and hit me in the stomach. I fell backwards onto the floor and he kept on coming towards me, but he stepped right over me and walked into the showers. I screamed at him that I would get him the next time. Next time the gun would be loaded.’ She rubbed her belly. ‘Punched me right in the baby, and it hurt so bad I was sick, but he made me get dressed and go out for dinner at Morton’s, and he told everyone what I’d done, and they all laughed. He kept on fooling around at dinner with this baby zucchini as the gun, shoving it into his mouth, and everyone laughed, and I got so upset I was crying, but I wasn’t going to stay and be made a fool of. So I got up and I shouted it out. I said the next time he wouldn’t live to tell anybody anything because the next time I’d make sure I killed him.’

Cindy went to fetch another Diet Coke. This time she drank it from the can. ‘He didn’t come home. I waited and waited, and it was six o’clock in the morning when he came back. He was in his dressing room, taking his clothes off, when I went in to see him. He just told me to get out, but I wouldn’t. I said he shouldn’t make a fool of me in front of people like he had done, but he just kept on choosing which shirt he was going to wear, ignoring me again.’

Lorraine waited while Cindy sipped the Coke.

‘I went into the bedroom to get the gun. I meant it, I was going to kill him, and I’d just figured out how to load it, but I couldn’t remember where it was, or if I’d taken it from the gym. I was looking all over the room for it when he strolled in all dressed up and Jose knocked on the door.’ Cindy frowned as she tried to recall the details.

‘Jose said that the car needed to be serviced, and did Harry need it after his breakfast meeting at seven. Harry said he didn’t. He’d had a long, hard night and he’d just sit by the pool reading scripts after his meeting. Then . . . he started laughing and he told Jose that I’d threatened to kill him again and that Jose was his witness that I was a real flake, a psychiatric case. He knows how upset I get about him saying things like that because I’ve had, you know, some problems.’

Lorraine shifted her weight. ‘Problems?’ she said gently.

‘Mmmm, I have these . . . kind of bad days, you know. I get depressed, uptight about things, angry.’

‘Can you go back to what you were saying about when your husband and Jose were talking in the bedroom? What happened then?’

‘Oh, yeah. Well, Harry left. And I went back to bed. I’d had such a bad night I told Juana not to disturb me. I couldn’t sleep, so I got up and went out on the balcony to lie in the sun, and I guess I must have gone to sleep there. I had a nightmare, me shooting Harry, like I’d threatened to do, and something woke me up – well, I think it was me woke myself up because I pulled the trigger. I fired the gun. But I’m sure it was in my dream and then I’m not sure. That’s what terrifies me. Did I do it or was I dreaming?’

‘How long do you think there was between the two shots, or the one shot and what might have been a car backfiring?’

‘Er . . . maybe ten minutes.’

‘About how long does it take to get from the balcony to the pool, Cindy?’

Cindy drew open the sliding door. ‘Oh, four, maybe five minutes, but it would depend on how fast you were moving.’

Lorraine picked up her purse and followed Cindy out. ‘Do you think you’re going to be all right here alone?’

‘If I’m not there’s Jose and Juana, but they don’t like me.’

‘When you said I had to pretend to be a masseuse you seemed worried someone would find out that I was investigating the case.’

‘I am. I don’t want Jose or that bitch Juana to know. I don’t want anyone knowing my business because they all believe I killed Harry, and so they won’t say nice things about me in the court. But if they saw this, maybe they would change their minds.’ Cindy pulled up her top. There was a nightmare bruise across her belly, a virtual imprint of a fist. ‘This is nothin’. He was always knocking me around, just not my face.’

‘Does anyone know he did this to you?’

‘Maybe his ex-wives or his girlfriends – my mother always used to say once a wife-beater always one – but they won’t lift a finger for me, will they? Nor will my mother come to think of it.’ Lorraine lit a cigarette. She asked Cindy for the names of the people who had been at the dinner the night before Nathan was killed, the addresses and names of girlfriends and ex-wives, business associates, anyone who would benefit from his death, anyone who had a grudge against him. Eventually she said, ‘Let’s leave it there for the present, Cindy,’ and got up to go. ‘I’ll start checking some of this stuff out.’

‘Sure.’ Cindy shrugged. ‘But I’ll see you tomorrow anyway, won’t I?’

‘What?’ Lorraine was surprised.

‘Harry’s funeral. The coroner’s office released the body last night. I just called Forest Lawn and told them to take care of everything – they said they’d put a notice in the papers and all that stuff. I’d kind of like it if you came. I mean, my folks aren’t going to be there, and I never liked his that much.’