If you've seen any smutty internet porn -- and I'm not saying I have -- you already know how this scene goes. The hot police captain standing way too close whispers all kinds of dirty talk about what he's going to grind out of you with his big hard nightstick if you don't fold like a good girl and give him what he's after. Cuffing your naked, trembling body to the overhead light fixture, he forces you onto the table, clamping your legs around his hips to finish you off the hard way. Just as you start to like it like that, his delicious little female partner bursts in, demanding to know what you're doing with her man. She may be willing to negotiate a deal, she purrs, lying you back with her face between your legs as he takes her from behind -- until all three of you drop to your knees and beg for the court's mercy.
In real life, the captain's wife didn't come off as quite that open to inserting herself in
my fantasy relationship with her devoted husband. Special Agent Dr. Allison Knowles, one of the top FBI profilers in the country, was pretty and athletic, with big brown eyes and a shiny brunette bob -- the kind of girl you knew in high school who always got elected president of everything without even knowing she'd been nominated. You could definitely see why even the most twisted serial killer would want to tell her everything, convinced she already saw his side. "I can't seem to find my Chapstick," she said, digging through her messy desk drawers. "I lose things. Drives me nuts."
She plugged in a low-tech cassette recorder. "I'm going to record this, if that's okay," she said brightly. "Nothing formal, just for my own notes." Thank God I hadn't gone with
Atti's advice to come in with one of those fancy cameras from his spy shop hidden in the wand of a mascara. I would have only ended up offending this nice lady if the scary security dude had found something like that in my purse. She grabbed a few jelly jeans, sliding me the jar. "Please get these away from me. Do you mind if I call you Cherry?
"Do you mind if I call you Cheery?" I wanted to ask. Her office was crazy inviting, with a rainbow of old-fashioned penny candy set out in glass jars besides bowls of fresh-cut daisies.
She displayed a desk picture of a little boy of about seven with a soccer trophy. "That's my son, Jeremy," she volunteered. "He was murdered, totally random. Wrong place at the wrong time, God bless his little heart."
"Wow, I'm so sorry." She had just offered more information than I managed to wrest out of her infuriating dog of a husband over the last two months combined. Here I'd worked, slept, laughed, cried, committed a felony and fled the country by her husband's side -- only to be ignored for days on end. Was it any wonder I couldn't decide whether to worship him forever or slap him in the face? "I hope they caught the killer," I offered my would be lover's wife.
"He'd already been given immunity in another case," she said, sighing. "Sometimes we get it wrong." She kicked off her sensible pumps, taking a seat on an overstuffed couch. "The system does work, most of the time. It's just an awful lot easier to trust when it's somebody else's child. But let's talk about you."
Sure, why not -- just a couple of girls sitting around talking lipstick and homicide. As strange as that felt, maybe what I really needed wasn't some guy to go losing my head over, but a girlfriend I could actually count on. "Can you tell me the last time you remember physically seeing Rita alive?" she asked.
"
Well, I was blind for a couple of days. Permanent false eyelashes, you ever try them? Don't." She told me that the prosecution's inability to substantiate the exact time and place of Rita's death had somehow bolstered
the defense's theory that Hollister couldn't have murdered Rita. "I've interviewed the suspect extensively, and I have to admit he tells quite a convincing story," she said. "Be that as it may, the defense might be looking at someone like you to corroborate their timeline."
"Me? But I'm one of you."
"Can you see how that makes you their dream witness?"
No, no, this couldn't be happening. Here was my chance to spill it,
to go back and fix what I'd done wrong -- and make all of this just disappear. Catching another glance at that sweet little boy with the missing front teeth in the picture -- I suddenly realized none of this was about me. The killer of this woman's son had walked away free after some internal screw-up. No wonder his father had been so quick to make sure that damn well wouldn't happen again on his watch. "What do you need me to say?"
"I just need you to think. See, if Rita really was murdered at home, it's possible you were there with her -- afterward. It's also possible you were there with the real killer at some point."
If you were acting in a soft core porn film as a fully clothed extra -- and I'm not saying I ever was -- someone would yell cut. Wardrobe would remove the fuzzy cuffs and make-up would fix the mussed pink lipstick around the silly gag in your mouth. Everyone would be home in time to watch "Wheel of Fortune," and nobody would ever die -- not until years after their looks had gone and all of this seemed like an amusing little story to tell at suburban dinner parties.
"I need you to think very hard," said my new friend Allison, insisting I call her that. "Because whatever you saw or didn't see -- at home or anywhere else -- you're very much a witness." She reached into her pocket, finally locating her long lost Chapstick with an exasperated thwack in the forehead. "Want some? It's cherry." She rolled it over her lips, then offered the tube to me. "Now. Let's start where you open the door to the landlord who was coming around for the rent."
She plugged in a low-tech cassette recorder. "I'm going to record this, if that's okay," she said brightly. "Nothing formal, just for my own notes." Thank God I hadn't gone with Atti's advice to come in with one of those fancy cameras from his spy shop hidden in the wand of a mascara. I would have only ended up offending this nice lady if the scary security dude had found something like that in my purse. She grabbed a few jelly jeans, sliding me the jar. "Please get these away from me. Do you mind if I call you Cherry?
"He'd already been given immunity in another case," she said, sighing. "Sometimes we get it wrong." She kicked off her sensible pumps, taking a seat on an overstuffed couch. "The system does work, most of the time. It's just an awful lot easier to trust when it's somebody else's child. But let's talk about you."
Sure, why not -- just a couple of girls sitting around talking lipstick and homicide. As strange as that felt, maybe what I really needed wasn't some guy to go losing my head over, but a girlfriend I could actually count on. "Can you tell me the last time you remember physically seeing Rita alive?" she asked.
"Well, I was blind for a couple of days. Permanent false eyelashes, you ever try them? Don't." She told me that the prosecution's inability to substantiate the exact time and place of Rita's death had somehow bolstered the defense's theory that Hollister couldn't have murdered Rita. "I've interviewed the suspect extensively, and I have to admit he tells quite a convincing story," she said. "Be that as it may, the defense might be looking at someone like you to corroborate their timeline."
"I need you to think very hard," said my new friend Allison, insisting I call her that. "Because whatever you saw or didn't see -- at home or anywhere else -- you're very much a witness." She reached into her pocket, finally locating her long lost Chapstick with an exasperated thwack in the forehead. "Want some? It's cherry." She rolled it over her lips, then offered the tube to me. "Now. Let's start where you open the door to the landlord who was coming around for the rent."
