Heartstopper

by Joy Fielding

  “Well, here’s poor Mrs. Allen in 1412 who drops dead from a stroke, and before her body even hits the floor, women everywhere are running to their stoves to make Mr. Allen dinner.”

  “You’re saying he shouldn’t eat?”

  Sandy smiled. “I’m saying that sort of thing wouldn’t happen if it had been Mr. Allen who’d had the stroke. Mrs. Allen would be fixing her own dinner.”

  “Real men don’t make quiche,” Will quipped as the elevator doors opened onto the sixth floor. He stepped back to let Sandy exit.

  “But I hear they make a mean chicken,” Sandy said, walking beside him down the narrow, gold-carpeted hallway.

  “They make excellent chicken.” Will unlocked the apartment door and Sandy entered the tiny tan-and-green-striped foyer. “This way.” He led her past a small galley kitchen into a sparsely furnished living-dining area that contained a green leather sofa and matching chair, a half-filled bookcase, and a small, glass-topped dining-room table with two high-back, black leather chairs. Large squares of beige ceramic tile covered the floor. There were no area rugs, no paintings on the off-white walls, no photographs or knickknacks of any kind. “Make yourself comfortable. I’ll be right back.”

  Sandy walked to the bank of windows that made up the apartment’s east wall and stared across the street at another tall building. Welcome to the big city, she thought, feeling an unexpected rush of exhilaration. She’d forgotten how much she missed cramped spaces in tall buildings, she realized with a laugh, hearing Will moving around in the kitchen. “Can I do anything to help?”

  “Not a thing.”

  “How long have you lived here?”

  “About a year.”

  “It’s very nice,” she said, mentally redecorating, replacing the green leather furniture with something softer, painting the walls a warmer, more inviting shade. Actually the apartment wasn’t unlike the one she and Ian had lived in just before she’d gotten pregnant with Megan. It was about the same size and shape, although it had fewer windows and the floors were cheap wood, not expensive tile. They’d been happy enough there, she thought. Of course she’d thought they were happy enough right up until the moment he’d announced he was leaving her for another woman.

  Kerri Franklin winked at her from the reflection in the glass. Sandy closed her eyes, opening them only when she felt something stir behind her. She turned around just as Will reentered the room, a drink in each hand.

  “Green-apple martini, right?”

  “Oh, God, no. I couldn’t.”

  “Sure you can. Chicken’s gonna take a few minutes to heat up.”

  “We don’t need to heat it up. I’m sure it’s delicious cold.”

  “Who’s the chef here?” he reminded her.

  Sandy was about to remind him that he said they’d only be a few minutes, but she decided against it. She didn’t want to sound ungrateful, since it was obvious he was going to all this trouble to impress her. Hadn’t Ian once complained she didn’t know how to have fun, that she was always the first to leave a party, the one who put a damper on everyone else’s good time?

  “Come on,” Will was saying. “Have a few sips and try to relax. I’ll check my e-mails and then we can eat.”

  Sandy nodded, taking a few tentative sips of her martini to prove she wasn’t a spoilsport, then watched him walk from the room. She took another sip of her drink, thinking that if his chicken was half as good as his martini, she was in for a real treat. She sat down on the sofa, feeling the silk of her dress immediately stick to the leather of the seat, and she crossed and uncrossed her legs several times, trying to get comfortable. She took another sip of her martini, which tasted far more of green apples than it did vodka, so there was probably little danger of her getting drunk, she decided, taking another. She looked around for a table on which to deposit her glass, but there wasn’t one, so she took another sip instead, and then another and another, each sip longer than the one before, until she realized she’d finished half the glass. What the hell? she thought, downing the rest. Nobody was going to accuse her of not knowing how to have fun.

  “Hey, Sandy,” Will called from the other room. “Come here. You’ve got to see this.”

  Sandy lowered her now empty glass to the floor, then stood up, feeling the room spin around her. “Whoa,” she said, grabbing the back of the sofa and pausing until the spinning stopped.

  “Sandy,” he called again.

  “Where are you?”

  “The bedroom. Turn right at the hall.”

  The bedroom, Sandy repeated, turning left instead and finding herself in the kitchen. I’ll just check on the chicken, she thought, leaning over and sniffing at the air as she pulled open the oven door.

  The oven was empty.

  Sandy pulled back, the sudden motion creating ripples in the still air. Maybe she’d misunderstood, she thought, fighting to clear her head. Hadn’t he said the chicken was heating up?

  “Sandy,” he called again. “What’s going on?”

  “Coming.” She proceeded down the hall toward the bedroom, even as a nagging voice was telling her to hotfoot it out the door. “I thought you said the chicken was heating up,” she told him from the doorway.

  “I said it would take a few minutes to heat up,” he corrected her. “I’m preheating the oven now.”

  “Oh.” Had the oven felt warm?

  “Anybody ever tell you you have a very suspicious nature?”

  “Sorry.” She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, fighting the almost overwhelming urge to sink to the floor.

  “You okay?”

  “I think that drink went right to my head.”

  “You drank the whole thing?”

  “Probably a mistake.”

  “You want to sit down?” He looked toward the king-size bed that took up most of the room.

  Sandy noted the navy satin sheets and shook her head. Bad idea, she thought, as the room spun around her. “You said you wanted to show me something?”

  Will pointed at the computer on the narrow desk across from the bed. “Take a look at this.”

  Sandy approached the large, flat-screen monitor, her eyes widening as she absorbed the image on the screen. “Oh, my God.”

  “Can you believe the kind of stuff people send you?”

  Sandy stared openmouthed at the image of a man and a woman, both naked, the woman bending forward from the waist as the man cupped her breasts from behind, his huge erection positioned strategically at her rear end.

  “Great ass, huh?” Will said.

  Sandy wasn’t sure if it was the feel of Will’s hands suddenly cupping her own breasts or his easy use of the word ass that did it, but suddenly, she was pushing him away and propelling herself toward the bedroom door.

  “What are you doing? Where are you going?” he asked, grabbing her hand and pulling her back, pressing her open palm against the front of his pants.

  Sandy yanked her hand away as if he’d just placed it on a hot stove. “I’m out of here.”

  “Don’t be silly. What’d you come here for?”

  “I thought we were having chicken,” Sandy sputtered, knowing how ridiculous she sounded.

  “Oh, come on,” he said, dekeing around in front of her and blocking her exit. “Nobody’s that naive.”

  “Apparently somebody is. Look. I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong impression.” Was he going to let her out of here?

  “The wrong impression? You’ve been coming on to me all night.”

  “What? How can you say that?”

  “You got into my car, didn’t you?”

  “Yes,” Sandy admitted, feeling her stomach start to swirl along with her head. “That wasn’t too smart. I admit that. But now I’d like to go home.”

  “To Torrance?”

  “Yes. To Torrance.”

  “Where that girl was murdered.” A statement this time, not a question.

  Sandy found herself holding her breath.

  “Think she was s
tupid enough to climb into a stranger’s car?”

  “Oh, God.” Sandy’s stomach started doing flip-flops against her heart.

  “Think all she was expecting was a nice chicken dinner?”

  What was he saying? That he’d murdered Liana Martin and was about to kill her as well? Would the police find her rotting corpse in some distant swamp with half her head blown away? The thought propelled her into action. She pushed him out of the way and raced for the apartment door.

  He was right behind her. “You want out?” he demanded, once again blocking her exit. “Fine. You want out? Get out.” He reached behind him and opened the door. Immediately, Sandy bolted toward the elevators, his voice in hot pursuit. “You’re pathetic. You know that? You want to know why I picked you tonight? I picked you because I thought you were a sure thing. An old bag like you—I thought you’d be grateful.”

  How could she have been so stupid? Sandy wondered as she stepped inside the waiting elevator. How had she gotten herself into this mess? She was at least an hour’s drive from Torrance; she didn’t have a cell phone to call for a taxi, which would likely cost her a week’s salary; she couldn’t very well call Rita and ask her to drive all the way back to pick her up, especially after deserting her earlier; she was drunk and feeling sick to her stomach, and her kids would be horrified when they saw her. Please let them be asleep when I get home, she prayed. Please don’t let them see me.

  She checked her watch, but the dial was spinning and the numbers refused to settle. “He’s right,” she said as the elevator doors opened into the lobby. “You are pathetic.”

  “You say something?” asked old Mr. Samuels from behind the reception desk.

  “I was wondering if you could call me a cab,” Sandy said. Then she threw up all over the gold-flecked marble floor.

  EIGHTEEN

  KILLER’S JOURNAL

  I didn’t feel so hot this morning so I stayed home and rested. Not sure what it was. Fatigue maybe. Or some bug I picked up. I hear there’s something going around, which doesn’t surprise me. There’s always something going around. It’s kind of scary when you think about everything that’s out there, all these microbes and bacteria, exotic viruses, weird and deadly strains of flu, all of them just hiding, biding their time, waiting for just the right moment to make their presence known.

  Sort of like me.

  I don’t get sick often so I knew something was wrong the minute I got out of bed. My legs felt wobbly and unsteady, as if the floor were on a tilt. I was nauseous and dizzy and had no appetite. My muscles felt as if they’d been transformed into flaccid rubber bands, incapable of sustaining my weight. “I just don’t feel like me,” my aunt used to say whenever she got sick, and for the first time I understood what she meant. So since it’s Sunday, and there was no urgent reason for me to push myself, I chose to give myself the morning off. I deserved a rest after all. I needed time to recharge my batteries, regain my strength. There’s still so much to be done.

  Maybe it was last night. All that celebrating in the park. A celebration of death, as it were. I followed the proceedings carefully. I confess it gave me a thrill. Maybe that’s what made me so light-headed this morning. Maybe I was suffering a celebratory “death hangover.” If so, hopefully it’s the first of many.

  So what was I doing all morning as I lay in my bed? Was I thinking, plotting, selecting, anticipating, remembering, letting my imagination run wild? Well, yes. All these things. I’m a very creative person, even if this is something that is rarely acknowledged and certainly never encouraged. People tend to pigeonhole you. They think they know you. They grow complacent with their perception of who they think you are. They don’t want that perception challenged or altered. They don’t want to know more.

  The truth is they don’t know anything.

  Take my aunt for example.

  She thought she knew me.

  She was wrong.

  Have I mentioned I killed her?

  Shame on me, although truthfully, I feel no shame. Not anymore. I did for many years. Too many years, I realize now. Oh, not for killing her. No way. She deserved what happened to her. No, the shame I’m talking about was the shame I carried with me while she was alive. God, how she used to terrorize me! How she loved to make me feel guilty! How ugly and worthless she made me feel! She was one of those people who truly deserves to die. And she was my first. My virgin kill, as it were.

  I’ve already alluded to some of my experiences with my aunt: the time she took me to a neighbor’s birthday party and almost let me drown, the way she subsequently transferred the blame to me, the vacations she ruined, the swimming lessons she insisted I take, the waterskiing disaster, her taunts, that grating hyena-like laugh. You big baby. Where are you, scaredy-cat? Come on, chicken liver.

  You might have thought things would get better as I got older, but that would be underestimating my aunt’s eagerness to interfere, her ability to infiltrate and infect the minds of others. Even my own mother’s.

  Nothing I did was ever good enough. My failures were magnified, my successes ignored. Every disappointment I suffered was good for a laugh. Who’s laughing now? I wonder.

  I’ve replayed that afternoon so many times in my mind, I sometimes worry that I’ll tire of it, that one day the memory might grow stale, or that it might start skipping, like a defective CD, and I’ll inadvertently omit an important part, a small tidbit perhaps, but one meant to be savored. I don’t want to leave anything out. I don’t want to forget even the smallest detail of that day. That’s why I’ve chosen to create a permanent record. I’m carving these memories in stone, so to speak.

  Tombstones.

  Even though my aunt was my first kill, it remains my most satisfying. What is it they say about sex and love? That sex is always more fulfilling when love is involved? Does the same hold true of murder? And is hate as powerful as love? I think it is. In fact, I think it’s more powerful.

  Certainly, killing Liana Martin was infinitely more rewarding than killing Candy Abbot.

  Just as my next kill will be even more satisfying than doing away with Liana Martin.

  There’s one kill in particular I’m looking forward to.

  Her time is drawing near. Each day brings me one day closer.

  But I’m getting ahead of myself, and if I’m going to get the most out of these recollections, I have to be accurate, I have to make sure I’m in the moment. There can be no outside distractions. I have to return to that hot and humid July day, almost three years ago. Almost three years? God, it doesn’t seem possible. What is it they say? Time flies when you’re having fun?

  So, okay. Here goes. I was alone in the house. Reading, enjoying the air-conditioning and the solitude. And suddenly there she was. Banging at the door, demanding to be let in. I ignored her, focusing all my attention on the book in my hands, and after a minute it got quiet, and I thought she’d gone away. I remember allowing myself a sly smile, but the smile quickly disappeared with the sound of a key turning in the lock. I heard the front door open and close, the sound of footsteps approaching.

  “Oh. You’re home,” she said, clearly startled to see me. Her short, dark hair was frizzy with the humidity, and the underarms of her blue sundress were stained with little half-moons of perspiration.

  “Yes,” I acknowledged with a nod.

  “Why didn’t you answer the door when I knocked?”

  “I didn’t hear you.”

  “How could you not hear me?”

  “How did you get in?”

  She waved her key in front of my face. “Your mother thought I should have one. In case of an emergency.”

  “Is there one?”

  “Is there one what?”

  “An emergency.”

  “Don’t be smart,” she said, an expression I’ve always found faintly ridiculous. Why would you tell somebody not to be smart? Unless of course their smarts made you look stupid.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

&nb
sp; “Your mother borrowed my good black heels, and I need them for tonight.”

  “Do you have a date?”

  “Actually, yes, I do.”

  I laughed. “Poor guy.”

  “You’re certainly one to talk,” she said, and although I wasn’t sure exactly what she meant by that—truth be told, I’m still not—I knew it was meant to be insulting. “What are you reading?” She grabbed the book out of my hands, roughly flipped through several pages. “Aren’t you a little old for comic books?”

  “It’s a graphic novel.”

  “It’s a glorified comic book. Honestly! At your age. Don’t you have anything better to do with your time?”

  “Don’t you have to get ready for your date?”

  She checked her watch. It was one of those Rolex knockoffs that don’t fool anybody. I mean, all you have to do is feel them to know they aren’t real. They don’t even look real, if you ask me. Kind of like fake boobs. She had those too. “I have lots of time.”

  “Good. Because I think my mother might have been wearing those shoes when she went out.”

  “What?”

  “I’m pretty sure she was wearing those shoes.” Actually I was sure of no such thing. I rarely paid any attention to what shoes my mother might or might not have been wearing. I only said that to upset my aunt, and was gratified to see it had.

  “Where did she go? When will she be back?”

  “I have no idea. She didn’t say.”

  “Those are expensive shoes. She better not be wearing them to go grocery shopping,” she railed.

  I shrugged, returned to my book. Seconds later, my aunt was rushing up the stairs to my mother’s bedroom. I heard a closet door opening above my head, items being tossed carelessly to the floor.

  “Found them,” my aunt announced angrily, appearing at my side seconds later, waving the shoes menacingly close to my head.

  “Then you should be happy,” I said.

  “Why did you tell me she was wearing them?”

  “I said she might have been wearing them.”

  “Now I’m all hot and flustered.” She said this as if it were my fault.