Murder One

15

CHRISTINA FOUND ANDREA MCNAUGHTON at the John 3:16 soup kitchen, scooping red beans and rice onto tin trays. The priest at St. Dunstan’s, Father Danney, after being assured that her intentions were honorable, had told Christina this is where Andrea would be. Even with forewarning, however, Christina found it hard to adjust reality to fit the preconceived mental image. Andrea McNaughton had been all over the newspapers for months, and she had been portrayed in a variety of roles. Grieving. Long-suffering. Betrayed. Most of the coverage in the World had suggested that she was the true victim of this sordid affair. Most of its readers, particularly the female ones, empathized with her and had elevated her to the status of tragic heroine, like Marilyn Monroe or Princess Diana.

Had they run pictures of the woman feeding the homeless, she might have attained sainthood.

Christina waited until Andrea finished serving lunch, which was a considerable wait. John 3:16 was the oldest and largest of the Tulsa shelters that undertook the monumental job of feeding the hungry; there were more than a hundred people, mostly elderly men, in line for a fundamental but life-preserving meal. Some had found a place to live in permanent shelters, but Christina knew far too many of them would return to the streets, a cardboard box under a bridge, a downtown gutter, or some other hellish place they called home. She strengthened her resolve to continue contributing to her retirement fund and to work the daily crossword to keep her mind sharp. Homelessness was not for sissies.

As soon as lunch was served, Christina tapped the shoulder of the woman behind the serving counter. “Mrs. McNaughton?”

Andrea looked at her warily. No doubt the past few months had taught her to be cautious about strangers who already knew her name. For that matter, even if she couldn’t quite place the face, she probably recognized Christina from the courtroom. “Yes?”

Christina extended her hand. “My name’s Christina McCall. I work with Ben Kincaid.”

Not surprisingly, Andrea turned away. “We have nothing to talk about.”

“I just have a few questions I’d like to ask you.”

Andrea moved away, untying her apron. “Please. I don’t want to talk.”

Christina followed her into the kitchen. “I’m sure you don’t. But it’s very important.”

Andrea continued walking away from her. “I’ve already said everything. Over and over again.”

“Not to me.”

Andrea whirled around, and in her eyes, Christina saw a sudden flash of anger. “Why can’t you people just leave me alone!”

Instinctively, Christina reached out and took the woman’s hand. “Please. Just give me a moment of your time. I know this must have been hideous for you—losing the man you loved. But now I’m about to lose my—someone I care about. Deeply. And I can’t just stand by and let that happen.”

“You’re talking about Keri Dalcanton.”

“No. I’m not. She’s our client, but we don’t have a personal relationship.”

“Just as well. Let me give you a news flash, honey. Your client did it!”

“I realize that’s your opinion. Frankly, that’s not why I’m here.”

Andrea’s face seemed to soften slightly. “You must be talking about the lawyer. Kincaid.”

A slight tincture of pink appeared on Christina’s cheeks. “I am.”

Andrea drew in her breath, then released it, slow and full, as if purging demons from her soul. “It wasn’t my idea to go after the lawyer. The D.A. came up with that one on his own. I thought it was a little extreme, even under these circumstances.”

“It was a grandstand play. A desperate gambit to get the case reopened.”

“But it worked.”

Christina nodded. “Which is why I need to talk to you. Now more than ever.”

Andrea’s eyelids fluttered heavily. She seemed to relent, not so much from a sense of obligation as from weariness, from an inability to muster the strength to maintain the fight.

“Excuse me. Is everything all right in here?”

Christina turned and saw a white-bearded older man poking his head through the swinging kitchen doors.

“I’m fine,” Andrea said. The man disappeared. “That was Father Danney, from St. Dunstan’s.”

“I know. He’s a friend, right?”

“And then some. He likes to check on me. I get a lot of people wanting to talk to me, even this long after the murder. Spectators, the idle curious. Investigators. Actually, what I get most of all is other women who’ve been betrayed and think of me as some kind of soul sister. They want to tell me their stories. ‘I was abused, too,’ they say. ‘My man done me wrong.’ Which of course are the last things on earth I want to hear. So Father Danney keeps an eye out for me. He’s a very kind, gentle man.”

Andrea gestured toward the nearest table. “But that’s not what you want to talk about. What is it I can tell you? “

Christina glanced down at the notes she’d made on her legal pad. “Did you know Keri Dalcanton? I mean, before the … incident.” She mentally chastised herself for her awkwardness. Ben had warned her that talking to a woman about her dead murdered husband, not to mention the affair he’d had before his death, was not going to be easy. But the full truth of that statement didn’t hit home until she was confronted with Andrea’s large brown, doelike eyes. “Had you met?”

“Let me think,” Andrea said, with a remarkably even temper. “Had I met a sleazy teenage big-boobed topless dancer from the bad part of town? I think that would be a no.”

“But you did … find out about her. Right?”

“Oh, yes. Some concerned friend decided that I needed to know. Why, I can’t imagine. People just can’t resist the urge to butt into other people’s business, can they? And they love to be the one who drops the big bombshell. It’s like we’re all still out on the playground. ‘I know something you don’t know,’ ” she said in a singsong voice.

“So who was it?”

“Marge Matthews. Another cop’s wife. I guess everyone on the force knew about the affair for some time. I was the only one in the dark.”

“What did you do when you found out?”

“First? I cried. Then I cried some more. Cried a whole Friday away. I was a basket case. We’d been married for almost fifteen years, you know? I mean, I’ve heard people use the word betrayed, but I never really knew what it meant, never felt it, until that day.” Her hand, sculpted nails with bright red polish, rose to her forehead. “I’d probably still be crying, except that around eleven that night, he came home. That snapped me out of it.”

“Did you confront him?”

“That would be one way of putting it, yes. I attacked him. I’m not exaggerating, either. Knocked him flat on his ass. Started pounding on his chest. He didn’t know what hit him.” She shook her head. “It was as if all that sadness, all that despair, suddenly converted into anger. Rage. I even bit him.”

“Did he resist?”

“Not by much. ’Course, he was drunk. He’d been out with the boys. Might’ve been with … her … for all I know.” Her eyelashes, dark with mascara, fluttered. “Poor snockered schmuck. He didn’t know what was going on. At least not till he sobered up.”

“Did he confess?”

“Eventually. Marge had been kind enough to give me many specific details. He couldn’t possibly squirm out of it. He was busted.”

“So what happened then?”

“I asked him to give her up. Stop cheating on me.”

“And?”

“He refused. At that time. I’m sure it was a tough decision for him.”

“How so?”

Andrea paused. It was evident that this was a difficult part of the story to tell, not because it was embarrassing but because she couldn’t find the words to express it properly.

Andrea looked at Christina levelly. “You’re a woman.”

“Thanks.”

“Are you married? “

Christina shook her head. “But I have been.”

“Then you’ll understand. Joe and I were very young when we married. Very, very young. Babies, really. I’d like to say we had a deep and profound spiritual linkage or something like that but, the truth is, I think it was mostly hormones.”

Christina allowed herself a small smile. “I’ve been there.”

“Yeah. Not that I didn’t love him with all my heart and soul. But in the early days, he was a force to be reckoned with. Between the sheets. And I’m not exaggerating.”

“Did that change?”

“Alas, yes. You know how it is. The nasty part of growing old together is that you also grow up. Our … interests changed. His changed a lot. And so did mine, for that matter. We were still cordial and affectionate, but … sexually …” Her hands spread in a helpless manner. “We became distant. So it really shouldn’t have been that much of a surprise that he was screwing around.” She paused. “Shouldn’t have been. But it was.”

Christina nodded. Andrea appeared to be relaxing, settling into the story. She was relieved, and a bit flattered, that the woman felt comfortable enough to discuss these intimate and unpleasant matters with her. “So what did you do when he refused to break it off with Keri Dalcanton?”

Again the level look. “You’re a woman. What would you do?”

“I’d have a few words with Keri Dalcanton.”

Andrea brought her finger around to touch the tip of her nose. “Ding-ding-ding.”

“That must’ve been hairy.”

“It was. Caught her in that crummy apartment where she lived, where she and Joe used to go. She was watching some exercise program on the tube, working out. Wearing one of those sport bras with a matching headband. There she was, silvery hair, big boobs, the works. The child my husband chose to be unfaithful with. I just about died.”

“Did you talk?”

“I thought she’d be reasonable. I thought once she knew there was another woman in the picture, one who wasn’t going away, she’d back off.”

“No such luck?”

“No. Instead I had to hear a lot of crap about what a pistol my man was, about how he and she were heartmates, whatever the hell that is. I think they must’ve carved their initials in a tree or something. I mean, she was talking like a teenager. Hell, she was a teenager. Except the man she was talking about was my husband.”

“That must’ve stung.”

“It got worse. ‘You can’t satisfy Joe.’ That’s what she said to me. ‘You can’t give him what he wants. He wants me.’ ” Her jaw stiffened. “It was—it was just more than I could take.”

Christina reached across the table and squeezed Andrea’s hand. “You hit her, didn’t you?”

“How’d you know?”

“ ’Cause I would’ve.”

Andrea almost smiled. “It was more than just a slap on the chops, I’m afraid. I really went after her, just as I had gone after Joe. We had a regular catfight. We were rolling around on the floor, bumping into her exercise equipment. Tramp got her smelly sport bra all over me.”

“How did it end?”

“The cavalry arrived, in the form of her brother, Kirk. He shares the apartment with her, or used to, anyway. He broke it up. Though not before I got a few good strokes in, I’m happy to say.”

“So you left?”

“Not immediately. I had to put up with a tongue-lashing from Kirk first. Have you met him?”

“Not really,” Christina answered. “I’ve seen him in the courtroom.”

“We’re talking about a man with major issues.”

“Like what?”

“You name it. Sexual ambiguity. Inability to hold a job. Religious guilt. And he’s absolutely irrational on the subject of his sister. He lives and breathes for that girl. There’s nothing he won’t do to protect her.”

“So what did he say to you?”

“I don’t remember the exact words, but the gist of it was, Get out and stay out. He thought I posed some kind of threat to Keri. And he wasn’t far wrong, either.”

“You had cause.”

“Yeah, I thought so, but he didn’t see it that way. So I scrammed. If this mess was going to get solved, I realized, it would be without the help of the teenage tramp and her psycho sibling.”

“May I ask what you did?”

Andrea leaned back in her chair. “Hey, we’ve come this far together. I can’t leave you hanging.” She flashed a quick, if bitter, smile, and Christina got a brief taste of the luminescent beauty on which the papers had often remarked. “When Joe got home, I laid down the law. Told him I was going to talk to the lawyers and he was about to be divorced. He would be publicly branded an adulterer. Given the tender age of his chosen consort, he might even be kicked off the force. That was what did it, I think. That was when he caved.”

“He agreed not to see her anymore?”

“He did. And he went straight over to her place to give her the bad news. And—well, you know what she did next.”

“I’m not sure I do,” Christina said. She didn’t want to risk the relationship she was developing with this woman, but she had to be honest. “I’ve never been convinced by the so-called evidence the police had on Keri. I think she was just the obvious subject. The cops suspected her from the first and they trumped up some evidence to make it stick.”

“You’re wrong.” Andrea glanced over her shoulder, as if making sure no one was listening. “Absolutely wrong.”

“I know you think Ken is guilty, but—”

“I’m not talking about that. I mean about thinking Keri was the cops’ first suspect. She wasn’t. The obvious suspect was—me.”

Christina’s lips parted. This was the first she’d heard of this.

“I tried not to take it to heart. Any time a married person is killed, the cops’ initial suspect is the spouse. And for a good reason—most of the time the spouse is the one who did it. And of course adultery is one of the most common reasons these crimes happen. And the other most common motive is money—which I stood to get a lot of when Joe died. So in many respects, I was the perfect suspect. Perfectly easy, anyway.” She paused a moment. “But it still hurt, you know? To have this whole horrific event twisted around. To realize people who knew me thought I was capable of murder. That was painful.”

“They must’ve realized relatively quickly that you weren’t the killer.”

“They got a better suspect, if that’s what you mean. I think I might still be under investigation, if not in jail, if they hadn’t found all that incriminating evidence in your client’s apartment. Then she became Suspect Number One.”

“Keri thinks you sent the cops out to her place. She thinks you encouraged the police to go after her, to get revenge for the affair.”

“The girl is only nineteen. She thinks the whole world is one big soap opera.”

“I gather … you don’t care much for Keri?”

“Does it show?”

“Well, I saw you try to break her nose in the courtroom.”

“I guess that was telling, wasn’t it?” Andrea’s lips pressed together pensively. “I suppose I should be grateful she didn’t press charges.”

“Ben convinced her it was not in her best interests. You should be grateful to them both.”

“You’re right, of course. But I’m not. I’m not grateful at all. I hate her.” Her delicate neck stiffened. “Honestly, who wouldn’t? I mean, I know hate is a bad thing. I’ve talked to my priest about it, more than once. I’ve worried and I’ve prayed for help. But my God, if you can’t hate the woman who slept with your husband, then killed him, who the hell can you hate?”

A point Christina was not prepared to argue. “I understand your late husband was investigating the Catrona crime family. Did you know anything about that?”

“Not much. No details. I do know Joe got a phone call at home, a few days before he was killed, that disturbed him very much. He was agitated enough to slam the phone down. But he didn’t look angry. It was really more like he was—worried. Or scared.”

“Didn’t you ask what it was all about?”

“I did. But he didn’t tell me. He grunted out, ‘Catrona.’ And that was the end of it. I probably would’ve brought it up again, later. Except your client killed him before I got the chance.”

Christina folded up her legal pad. “I think that about covers it. Thank you very much for talking to me.”

Andrea waved her hand in the air. “Sure. It wasn’t that bad, actually. Not like some of them. You’re a good ear.”

Christina had been told this before, but it was still nice. “If I think of something else, may I call you?”

“Of course.” She fell silent for a moment, and the light in her eyes faded. “I did love Joe, you understand that, don’t you? We had our problems. We disagreed. We fought. Maybe I wasn’t the perfect wife, maybe I didn’t give him everything he wanted. Or even needed. Marriage is not a game of perfect. But even after I knew what Joe’d done, even after I knew I’d been betrayed—I still loved him. With all my heart. And I never wanted to see him come to any harm. Never. And certainly not”—she averted her eyes—“not, like it was. So gross and horrible and—public. No wife should have to endure that. No one should.”

Christina laid her hand on the bereaved woman’s shoulder and simply nodded. There was no arguing with that.