She studied me briefly. “What’s up?”
The question was brave. I didn’t think she really wanted to know, but she’d always struck me as the type to plunge right in. She probably whipped off big pieces of adhesive tape, too, with the same decisive thrust, just to get it over with.
“I talked to Colin,” I said. “He remembered you.”
The modification in her manner was slight and a look, not of apprehension, but of wariness flickered in her eyes.
“Well that’s nice,” she said. “I haven’t seen him for years, of course. I told you that. ” She reached into her purse and took out a compact, checking her reflection quickly in the mirror running a hand through her hair. Rosie came back with her Scotch and a glass of water. I paid the tab. Rosie tucked the money in the pocket of her muumuu and wandered back to the bar while Gwen took a sip of water. She seemed to be holding herself in check, not trusting herself to pick up the conversation where we’d left off. I bumped her along for the sake of surprise.
“You never mentioned that you had an affair with Laurence,” I said.
A laugh burbled out. “Who, me? With him? You can’t be serious.”
I had to interrupt her merriment. “Colin saw you out at the beach house that weekend when Nikki was out of town. I don’t know all the details, but I can make a guess.”
I watched her compute that and shift gears. She was a very good little actress herself, but the slick cover she’d constructed was getting shabby from disuse. It had been a long time since she’d had to play this game and her timing was slightly off. She knew all the right lines, but the pretense was hard to sustain after an eight-year gap. She didn’t seem to recognize the bluff and I kept my mouth shut. I could almost see what was happening inside her head. The terrible need to confess and be done with it, the pressure to spill it all out was too tempting to resist. She’d gone a few rounds with me and she’d pulled it off beautifully but only because I hadn’t known which buttons to push.
“All right,” she blurted out rebelliously, “I went to bed with him once. So what? I ran into him at the Palm Garden as a matter of fact. I nearly told you the other day. He was the one who told me Nikki was out of town. I was shocked that he’d even speak to me.” She switched to the Scotch, taking a big drink.
She was fabricating as fast as she could and it sounded nice but it was like listening to a record album. I decided to skip the cuts I didn’t want to hear. I bumped her again.
“It was more than once, Gwen,” I said. “You had a fullblown affair with him. Charlotte Mercer was screwing his headoff back then but he broke it off with her. She says he was into something very hush-hush. ‘Very hot,’ to quote her. I think it was you.”
“What difference does it make if we had an affair. He’d been doing that for years.”
I let a little time elapse and when I spoke I kept my voice low, leaning forward slightly just to give her the full effect.
“I think you killed him.”
The animation drained out of her face as though a plug had been pulled. She started to say something but she couldn’t get it out. I could see her mind working, but she couldn’t put anything together quickly enough. She was struggling and I pressed.
“You want to tell me about it?” I said. My own heart was pounding and I could feel damp rings of sweat forming under my arms
She shook her head but that was all she could manage. She seemed transfixed. Her face had changed, taking on that look people get in their sleep when all the guards are down. Her eyes were luminous and dark and two bright patches of pink appeared now in the pale of her cheeks, a clownish effect, as though she’d applied too much blusher in an artificial light. She blinked back tears then, propping her chin on her fist, looking off beyond me, fighting for self-control, but the last defense was breached and the guilt was pushing against that gorgeous facade. I’d seen it happen before. People can hold out just so long and then they fold. She was really an amateur at heart.
“You got pushed too hard and you broke,” I said, hoping I wasn’t overplaying my hand. “You waited until he and Nikki left town and then you used Diane’s keys to get into the house. You put the oleander capsules in his little plastic vial, being careful to leave no prints, and then you left.”
“I hated him,” she said, mouth trembling. She blinked and a tear splashed on her shirt like a drop of rain. She took a deep breath, words coming out in a rush. “He ruined my life, took my kids, robbed me blind, insulted, abused — oh my God, you have no idea. The venom in that man …”
She snatched up a napkin and pressed it to her eyes. Amazingly, Rosie didn’t seem to notice her distress. She sat at the bar, probably reading Ann Landers, thinking At Wit’s End should have turned hubby in for the obscene calls he made, while a customer confessed to murder right under her nose. To her right, the little television set flickered a Muppets rerun.
Gwen sighed, staring down at the tabletop. She reached over and picked up her glass, taking in a big slug of Scotch, which made her shudder as it went down. “I didn’t even feel bad about it, except for the kids. They took it hard and that surprised me. They were far better off with him gone.”
“Why the affair?” I probed.
“I don’t know,” she said, folding and refolding the paper napkin. “I guess it was my revenge. He was such an egotist. I knew he couldn’t resist. After all, I’d insulted the hell out of him by having an affair with someone else. He couldn’t tolerate that. I knew he wanted his own act. It wasn’t even that hard to engineer. He wanted to prove something to himself. He wanted to show me what I’d passed up. There was even a certain amount of jazz to the sex for once. The hostility was so close to the surface that it gave us both a sick charge. God, I loathed him. I really did. And I’ll tell you something else,” she said harshly. “Killing him once just wasn’t enough. I wish I could kill him again.”
She looked at me fully then and the enormity of what she was saying began to sink in.
“What about Nikki? What did she ever do to you?”
“I thought they’d acquit her,” she said. “I never thought she’d go to jail, and when the sentence was handed down I wasn’t going to stand up and take her place. By then it was too late.”
“So what else?” I said and I noticed that my tone was getting sullen. “Did you kill the dog too?”
“I had nothing to do with that. He got hit Sunday morning. I drove Diane over there because she’d remembered that she’d left him out and she was upset. He was already lying in the street. My God, I wouldn’t run over a dog,” she said emphatically, as though I should appreciate the delicacy of her sentiments.
“And the rest just fell into place? The oleander in the yard? The capsules upstairs?”
“One capsule. I doctored one.”
“Bullshit, Gwen. That’s bullshit.”
“It’s not. I’m telling the truth. I swear to it. I’d thought about it for a long time but I couldn’t see a way to make it work. I wasn’t even sure it would kill him. Diane was a wreck about the dog anyway so I drove her to my place and put her to bed. As soon as she was asleep, I took her keys and went back and that’s all it was.” She spoke with an edge of defiance, as though having opened up this far there was no point in mincing words.
“What about the other two?” I snapped. “What about Sharon and Libby Glass?”
She blinked at me, pulling back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh the hell you don’t,” I said, getting up. “You’ve lied to me since the first minute we met. I can’t believe a goddamn word you say and you know it.
She seemed startled by my energy. “What are you going to do?”
“Give the information to Nikki,” I said. “She paid for it. We’ll let her decide.”
I moved away from the table, heading toward the door. Gwen grabbed her jacket and purse, keeping pace with me.