Still Life

by Joy Fielding

  “I’m overreacting? What if Drew comes back? What if someone walks in?”

  “Then I’m just a friend from the gym, paying my respects.”

  What’s wrong? Why is Warren so upset? Who is this man?

  “You need to leave right now.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” the man said calmly, walking toward the bed as the door swung shut behind him. “It’s been more than two months, Warren. You don’t phone. You don’t return my calls. You haven’t stopped by the gym.”

  “I’ve been a little busy these days.”

  “The dutiful, loving husband.” The man’s voice dripped sarcasm, like ice water from the fridge. Casey suddenly felt chilled to her very core, although she wasn’t sure why.

  “You didn’t leave me a whole lot of choice,” Warren said.

  What does that mean? What kind of choice?

  “So how’s Sleeping Beauty doing?” the man asked.

  “I would think that’s pretty self-evident.”

  “She actually looks better than I expected. Are the police any closer to finding out what happened?”

  Warren scoffed. “No. They’re clueless. Look, can we talk about this later? This is neither the time nor the place….”

  “What is?”

  The time and place for what?

  “You know this isn’t my fault,” the man continued after a pause.

  “It isn’t?” Warren asked.

  “No.”

  “My wife is in a coma, connected to a feeding tube. She might be this way for the rest of her life. And you don’t think it’s your fault?”

  I don’t understand. What are you talking about? Are you saying this man is somehow connected to what happened to me?

  “Hey,” the man protested. “I’m really sorry for the way things turned out. But I plowed into her at almost fifty miles an hour. A normal person would be dead after a hit like that.”

  What? What! WHAT?!

  “For Christ’s sake, would you shut up!”

  What’s happening? Is this real or did I drift off to sleep again? Is it a dream, or maybe another TV movie?

  “Look,” Warren whispered hoarsely. “You have to keep your voice down. They’ve done tests. The tests indicate Casey can hear….”

  “She can?” Casey felt the man’s weight as he leaned across her bed, his arm brushing against the side of her own, his minty breath warm against her face. “Can you hear me, Sleeping Beauty?” She felt him retreat. “You’re saying she understands what we’re saying?”

  “Probably not. But it’s possible.”

  A cluck of reluctant admiration. “Hats off to you, Beauty,” the man said. “You’re a tough one.”

  No, this can’t be happening. I’m dreaming. Either that or I’m delusional.

  How many times had she wondered the same thing in the last several months?

  “Look,” Warren implored. “You’ve got to get out of here.”

  “Not until we come to an understanding.”

  “An understanding about what?”

  “Don’t play dumb, Warren. It doesn’t suit you.”

  “If this is about money …”

  “Of course it’s about money. I’m no different than you are. It’s always about money. Fifty thousand dollars, to be precise.”

  Fifty thousand dollars? For what?

  “I don’t give fifty thousand dollars to people who screw up.”

  “I didn’t screw up.”

  “Then what are we doing here?”

  What are we doing here? Casey repeated, her thoughts spinning wildly around in her head, like clothes in a dryer. What were they saying?

  “I guess we’re waiting,” the man answered, his voice a shrug. “It’s obviously just a matter of time.”

  “A matter of time,” Warren repeated wearily. “According to the doctors, she could outlive us all.”

  A long pause.

  “Then I guess we’ll just have to speed things up a bit.”

  What things? What are you talking about?

  “How do you propose we do that?”

  “Hey, man, I’m just a personal trainer. You’re the one with the expensive degrees.”

  “Yeah, well, when we talked at the gym, you gave me the distinct impression you’d done this kind of thing before. I thought I was dealing with an expert.”

  The man laughed. “Ever think of unplugging a couple of these tubes, maybe injecting an air bubble into her IV? I saw that on TV once. It was pretty effective.”

  Oh, God. Somebody help me! Drew! Patsy! Somebody!

  “Yeah, right. Nobody would suspect anything untoward there.”

  “Untoward? Pretty impressive word there, Counselor.”

  “Only for a moron.”

  “Hey, man, go easy. I know you’re upset, but there’s no need to get testy.”

  “I tend to get testy, as you say, when the people I hire don’t do their jobs.”

  Warren hired this man to kill me? He offered him fifty thousand dollars to run me down? No, it can’t be. It can’t be.

  “It’ll get done.”

  “Which is when you’ll get your money.”

  A sigh of resignation. “So, what’s the story? She in here for good?”

  “No. I should be able to take her home pretty soon.”

  “And anything could happen after that.”

  No. This is not happening. They’ve given me some new drug. It’s causing me to hallucinate.

  “It won’t be easy,” Warren said. “The police already suspect it wasn’t an accident. I have to be very careful.”

  “Don’t worry, man. There’s nothing that ties you to any of this.”

  “Except Casey. If she does understand. If she does regain consciousness.”

  Casey felt two sets of eyes burn into her flesh like acid.

  “Then we’ll just have to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  Dear God.

  “And how exactly do we do that?”

  “You’re a smart guy,” the man said. “I’m sure you’ll think of something.” Once again, Casey felt the man’s mouth stop mere inches from her own, his breath brushing teasingly against her lips, as if he was about to kiss her. “Bye, bye, Beauty. You take care of yourself.” He chuckled, the sound gurgling deep in his throat, like oil beneath the earth’s surface.

  “Would you get the hell out of here!”

  “You’ll call me when you come up with something?”

  “Count on it.”

  “Try not to wait too long.” Footsteps receding, followed by the sound of a door opening and closing.

  This can’t be happening, Casey thought again. It isn’t happening. She hadn’t really overheard her husband and another man discussing their failed attempt to murder her, and their plan to try again. It was ridiculous. It hadn’t happened.

  There was no way Warren would do anything to hurt her, let alone hire someone to kill her. It was ridiculous. Totally, absolutely, absurdly ridiculous. What was the matter with her? First she’d been suspicious of Janine. Then it was Drew’s turn. And now … Warren? How could she even be thinking such insane thoughts?

  What’s the matter with me? Warren is a good man, a man whose job it is to uphold the law, not break it. Not shatter it, for God’s sake.

  It was that damn TV. How could she be expected to think straight with that constant jabbering going on?

  Warren loves me.

  She felt motion, a body moving toward her. Who? Was Warren still here? Was anybody?

  “That was Nick,” Warren said casually. “I’m sure you’ve heard me mention him. Great trainer. Lousy human being. Mean streak a mile wide. The kind of guy who likes pulling the wings off butterflies. I was joking around with him one day, told him he was wasting his time torturing jerks like me, said he should consider a career as a contract killer. He told me to name the time and place.” Warren scoffed. “I probably shouldn’t be talking about this, but what the hell? The cat’s out of the bag now.” He moved eve
n closer to whisper in her ear. “Why couldn’t you just have died when you were supposed to?”

  And then everything was still. It was as if the air in the room had suddenly ceased to circulate, and she was poised to stop breathing altogether. A wave of panic surged through Casey’s veins, like a shot of adrenaline. Was it possible he’d injected an air bubble into her IV, as his accomplice had suggested?

  Why couldn’t you just have died when you were supposed to?

  “I’m gonna get a cup of coffee,” Warren said, his voice fading as he walked toward the door. “Don’t suppose you want anything,” he called back.

  So the mystery was solved.

  How could it be? They’d been so happy. They never fought, rarely even argued. The only time they’d even disagreed was when she’d wanted to leave the mansion she’d inherited from her parents and move to a condo in the city, and Warren had been reluctant to abandon their quiet, affluent neighborhood. Ultimately they’d compromised and agreed to start looking for a smaller home, but to stay on the Main Line. It was soon after that they’d talked about starting a family.

  And all the while, he was planning her death.

  Had these murderous impulses only lately popped into his head, or had he been plotting since the very beginning to kill her? Could the man in a hurry have been patient enough to wait two full years before translating his plan into action?

  But why? Why would he want her dead?

  Why do you think? she asked herself.

  Money.

  “It’s always about money,” Nick had said.

  But Warren’s never been interested in my fortune, Casey argued. He was the one who’d insisted on a prenup. And there are no insurance policies on my life….

  He doesn’t need any of that, she realized. As her husband, he stood to inherit a good portion of her estate, even without a will. At the very least, he’d probably walk away with more than a hundred million dollars. As a lawyer, he surely knew that.

  “Nobody becomes a lawyer to get rich,” she heard him say. “Factor in expenses and taxes and overhead, you’re certainly not retiring at forty.”

  Was that what he wanted after all? To retire at forty? No. No way. Warren had a thriving career that he loved. He had everything he needed. They had a terrific life together. There was no way he would do this.

  He loves me.

  A hundred million dollars could buy an awful lot of love.

  “So how’s our patient doing today?” someone asked.

  What? Who said that?

  “I see you’re watching Gaslight. Great old movie.”

  “I don’t think I ever saw that one,” a second voice said. “What’s it about?”

  “The usual—unscrupulous husband tries to convince his wife she’s losing her mind. That Ingrid Bergman was some beauty, wasn’t she?”

  Bye, bye, Beauty.

  “Her blood pressure’s a little higher than normal. What’s going on, Mrs. Marshall? Are you in pain?”

  You have to help me. I’m having these wild, horrible thoughts.

  “Let’s increase her meds.”

  No. Please don’t increase anything. I’m dopey enough, believe me. You should only know the weird things that have been going on in my rocked brain. If I weren’t in a coma, I’d recommend I be committed.

  “I have a favor to ask you,” one doctor said to the other as they walked toward the door.

  “What’s that?”

  “If I ever get wheeled in here in that condition, you’ll just put a pillow over my face and end it right then and there, okay?”

  “Only if you promise to do the same for me.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  They left the room.

  No. Don’t go. Don’t go. Somebody please help me before I lose my mind.

  What was she talking about? Her mind was already lost. As if she wasn’t in dire enough straits, now she was imagining that the person who loved her more than anything else in the world, the person she loved more than she’d ever thought it possible to love anyone, was a cold-blooded sociopath who’d hired a man to run her down, and who was, even now, enjoying a cup of coffee and trying to think of ways to finish the job.

  Was it possible she wasn’t hallucinating?

  I trusted you, Warren, she thought, unable to ignore what was “quite plain” any longer.

  I trusted you with my life.

  SIXTEEN

  “‘He had been left an orphan when he was fresh from a public school,’” Janine read. “ ‘His father, a military man, had made but little provision for three children, and when the boy Tertius asked to have a medical education, it seemed easier to his guardians to grant his request by apprenticing him to a country practitioner than to make any objections on the score of family dignity. He was one of the rarer lads who early get a decided bent and make up their minds that there is something particular in life which they would like to do for its own sake, and not because their fathers did it.’”

  “What’s that you’re reading her?” Patsy asked, adjusting Casey’s head on the pillow. The scent of lavender buzzed around Casey’s face, like a stubborn fly.

  “Middlemarch.”

  Go away, Patsy. I was actually starting to enjoy the stupid book.

  “Middlemarch? What’s that mean?”

  “It’s the name of the town where the story is set.”

  “What’s it about?”

  “Life.”

  It helps me take my mind off my sorry excuse for one.

  Patsy made a sound halfway between a snort and a laugh. “Any good?”

  “It’s considered a masterpiece.”

  “It looks long,” Patsy said.

  The sound of pages flipping. “Six hundred and thirteen pages.”

  “Six hundred and thirteen! Oh, no, that’s way too long for me. And look at the size of that print. I’d go blind.”

  “You like big print, do you?”

  Casey pictured a generous smile filling Janine’s slender cheeks.

  “I don’t read all that much,” Patsy confessed.

  “Well, there’s only so much time. I’m sure you’re very busy.”

  Casey imagined Janine’s smile spreading into her eyes, causing her shapely brows to arch.

  “I do like murder mysteries,” Patsy said. “They’re always good for a laugh.”

  “You find murder funny?”

  “Well, not funny, no,” she backtracked quickly. “But at least it’s entertaining.”

  “Entertaining?”

  “Well, interesting then. Like what’s going on with Mrs. Marshall.” Patsy drew an audible breath. “Do you think somebody really tried to kill her?”

  There was a pause of several seconds before Janine spoke. “Well, the police have pretty much eliminated all their major suspects. Apparently, none of their leads panned out. So it’s looking like it might have been a hit-and-run accident after all.”

  What do you mean, the police have eliminated all their major suspects? Are you saying they’ve closed their investigation?

  “Anyway, sorry to interrupt. Go on. Read some more.”

  Casey pictured Janine’s back stiffening as she straightened her shoulders and lifted the book from her lap. She’d always hated anyone telling her what to do.

  “ ‘Most of us who turn to any subject with love,’ ” Janine continued, after a prolonged pause in which Casey thought she was probably weighing the consequences of throwing the heavy tome at Patsy’s head, “ ‘remember some morning or evening hour when we got on a high stool to reach down an untried volume, or sat with parted lips listening to a new talker, or for very lack of books began to listen to the voices within, as the first traceable beginning of our love.’ ”

  “What’s that mean?” Patsy asked.

  “I guess it’s about remembering the first time we realized we loved something. Or someone.”

  “Why doesn’t he just say that, then?”

  “She,” Janine corrected.

  “Huh?�
�

  “Never mind.”

  I knew I was in love with Warren the minute I laid eyes on him, Casey thought. Although the experts would no doubt insist that was just physical attraction. The love, they would argue, came later, after she got to know him.

  Except she hadn’t gotten to know him. Not really.

  Who was this man she’d married? Was Warren Marshall even his real name? How much, if anything, of what he’d told her about himself was real? Had his mother really been married five times? Had his father died when he was a boy? Had his mother’s last two marriages existed for the prime purpose of keeping her in the manner in which she’d longed to be accustomed? Was it from her that Warren had inherited his taste for the finer things in life?

  And now he was seeking an inheritance of his own.

  There was no doubt he was a lawyer, and a good one. “Smarter than God” had been William Billy’s admiring assessment. Certainly smart enough to know how to play her. Smart enough not to overplay his hand. Smart enough to outwit the police.

  The police have pretty much eliminated all their major suspects.

  “You know how all these poor bastards get caught?” she remembered him saying one morning not so very long ago, as they read the morning paper in their spacious kitchen. He was referring to an article about a man who’d murdered his wife the day after taking out a million-dollar insurance policy on her life. “Not because they’re greedy. That’s a given. It’s that they’re so bloody stupid. Who takes out a million-dollar life insurance policy on his wife the day before he kills her? They don’t think that might raise a few alarm bells? Christ, they might as well take an ad out in the paper saying ‘I did it!’ Use your brains, fellas,” he’d said, and she’d laughed her agreement.

  She’d laughed a lot during their time together.

  “I love to hear you laugh,” he’d told her on more than one occasion.

  Of course you did, Casey thought now. It meant she was a sucker for his charm.

  “I love you,” he’d told her every day of their married life.

  “I love you,” she’d answered without fail or prompting.

  “God, Casey, I miss you so much,” he’d said not so very long ago, sitting at her bedside.

  “You have to get out,” his friends had purportedly told him. “You have to live your life.”