Eric on the night he was being murdered? And why did she have to go back up to his office at the exact moment the killer was stabbing away with his scissors?
Her life had actually been better when she'd been fat. She'd been an outcast, sure, but there were at least no terrible surprises in being an outcast. People smirked at you sometimes but mostly they left you alone. And your friends, unlike some worthless men she could name, never betrayed you or let you down. And inside your fortress of fat you felt safe and protected. Nobody could get to you. Not as long as you kept the walls of the fortress tall and deep.
She hadn't been to class for over a week now, having spent her time in the apartment reading romantic suspense novels in which most of the heroines seemed to be extremely horny TV reporters, and making a daily foray out for thirty, forty dollars' worth of goodies. She chose a different store each day. It was too humiliating to let the same clerk in on her awful secret.
Twice she'd forced herself to vomit, two days in a row she'd taken diuretics. But unlike bulimics, she did these things not so she could maintain her weight, she did them so that her stomach would have more capacity for food.
She lay on her side on the couch and looked out her front window. Even at 9 a.m. it was dark as dusk. She could hear the snowplow in the street below, its motor obstinately pushing against piles of the white stuff. She could even hear its two-way radio inside, crackling loud.
She kept thinking about last night.
She'd almost done it.
In fact, she'd gone as far as getting out of bed, putting on her robe, walking to the kitchen, picking up the wallphone and dialing the number of the nearest police station, which was on a sticker (along with ambulance and fire numbers) on the wall.
A lady cop had answered, asked if she could help.
And Cini almost said it.
Almost said, 'You know that woman you think killed Eric Brooks? Well, she didn't. I saw the real killer. My name is Cini and I'm coming in.'
But then, just when she was about to get the words out, she imagined the press reports of what she'd been doing up in Eric's office.
All those horny women TV reporters in those trashy romance novels. They'd descend on her relentlessly.
'Did you reallywell, you know, have oral sex with Eric?'
'Do you usually have sex with men you don't know? Don't you ever worry about AIDS?'
'Were you always this promiscuous? Even when you were in high school?'
And then the faces of her parents. God, that would be the worst thing of all. Something would die in their eyesrespect, maybe, or the hope of ever seeing their 'problem child' get her life straightened out. They would become old then, old of their humiliation, old of their despair, and they would open their arms to Death in hopes that there really was a better life beyond this one.
She just couldn't do it to them.
She felt sorry for Jill Coffey but she just couldn't to this to her parents.
After awhile, she got up from the couch and went out to the kitchen and took down a fresh package of Oreos.
And who could eat Oreos without a pint of French Vanilla Haagen Daz to go with them?
She sat at the kitchen table and utterly destroyed both Oreos and ice cream and then she went back to the living room and turned on an old Perry Mason show and tried to guess whodunnit.
A couple times more that morning, she thought again of calling the police, telling them the truth.
But whenever the urge came, she'd trot out and grab a quick candy bar. And then the urge went away.
Rick Corday was on the Stairmaster in the den when the call came. He'd been expecting it.
' 'lo.'
'Rick. You looked out the window yet?'
'I looked.'
'No way I can fly in today.'
'Convenient.'
'Oh shit, Rick, I don't need this. I really don't'
'Poor baby.'
'Believe it or not, I'd like to be back there, sitting in our homenotice I said ''our' home, Rickhaving a nice sandwich and a glass of beer and watching one of those old sci-fi flicks you like so much. In fact, babe, why don't you go rent 'This Island Earth' and we'll watch it tomorrow, when I get in?'
'I thought we had an understanding about 'babe.''
'Did I say 'babe'?'
'You said 'babe.''
'When?'
'A little while back.'
'I apologize, Rick. I truly apologize.'
'That what you call all the guys you pick up in bars?'
'Could you have a little fucking compassion, Rick? I've had a tough week.'
'I bet.'
'How're things going with Jill Coffey?'
Rick said nothing. Scare the bastard a little.
'Rick?'
'They're going fine.'
'Man, you had me worried there for a minute.'
'I'll bet you really hate to see Chicago have a blizzard, don't you?'
'Rick, this isn't'
'Have to stay in New York one more day and hit all the bars. Sounds like real tough duty.'
'I'm going now, Rick. I'd hoped we'd have a pleasant conversation.'
'We're going to have a real serious conversation when you get back here.'
'Yes we are, Rick. I want a real serious conversation just as much as you do.'
'Unless you die in an airplane crash or something.'
'Thanks, Rick. That's all I need. Somebody sending out that kind of karma.'
Rick slammed down the phone.
Arthur K. Halliwell came out of the bathroom feeling uncomfortable. Darned prostate gland, anyway. No matter how frequently you urinated, you never quite felt that you'd gotten it allnot when you had a chronic infection, you didn't.
He returned to his office just as his secretary buzzed him that his banker was on line two.
He picked up immediately.
'Hello, Walter, good to hear your voice,' James B. Roehler said after Halliwell had greeted him.
'Good to hear yours,' Halliwell said, unable to keep the note of irritation from his voice. This was no time for pleasantries. This was time for a simple yes or no.
'You met with the loan committee?'
'I did indeed, Walter.'
'And they said what exactly?'
'Walter, I'm afraid that'
'Those bastards!'
