“Sure. Let me get that. Mr. Chesterfield, would you like a cup. We can get more if we need it,” Nathan said as he stood up. When he’d retrieved the creamer, he sat back down and waited for Charles and his attorney to fix their coffees and take a few sips. “Look at that. It’s the same creamer that’s on the counter in your kitchen.”
“It’s a popular brand.”
“I’m sure it is. But, let me tell you what the forensics lab in Columbia found in that creamer unless you want to tell me. Or should I ask Linda?”
Charles’s eyes grew as big as saucers as he and Wayne slowly moved the cups from their lips. “What do you mean?”
“Hang on, we’ll come back to that. Tell me, Charles, did you and Vanessa sign a prenup?”
“Of course, both families came from large estates, so our fathers insisted on it.”
“I see. Do you remember what the document said?”
“Parts of it.”
“Tell me what you remember.”
“What does this have to do with anything?”
“Motive.”
“Motive? For what?”
Wayne looked from Nathan to Evan and back. “Where are you going with this? I think I need a minute with my client.”
“That’s fine.” Nathan started to put everything back in his folder. “I’ll just go across the hall and speak with Linda while you do that. If she tells me what I want to know, then she’ll get my only recommendation to the Prosecutor. I guess we’ll find out how much longer she’s willing to wait for you. Your divorce is final in a couple of weeks, but will she wait for another twenty years on you?”
“Twenty years? What the hell are you talking about? Evan, what’s he talking about?”
“Charles, shut up.” Wayne looked at Nathan. “He’s already facing attempted murder charges that he’ll probably get a reduced sentence for. What the hell else do you have?”
Evan held a neutral expression. “He needs to answer the questions, Wayne. It’ll go a lot smoother if he does.”
Wayne turned to speak directly into Charles’s ear where Evan, Nathan, or the camera couldn’t read his lips. Nathan waited for any indication that Charles was ready to speak. Charles shrugged and shook his head. “I’ll allow this to continue for now. Are you looking to charge him with something else?”
“I don’t know yet. We’re just talking for now.”
Wayne nodded for Nathan to continue and that Charles would cooperate.
“Tell me about the prenup.” Nathan pulled out a thick envelope of papers. “Here, maybe this will help you.”
“You’ve got a copy of our prenup? Did Vanessa give you this?”
“Read what it says, right here.”
Charles glared at Nathan before he took a deep breath. “In the case of Vanessa’s death without having an heir, Charles will become her heir and inherit the family’s beach property on Edisto Island as well as the financial trust.”
Evan looked from Nathan to Charles then Wayne and back to Nathan. “Are you shitting me? Is that why you shot her? Were you trying to kill her for the land and money?”
“Tread carefully here,” Wayne mumbled to his client.
“No, I swear, I was pissed off with my father. He’d called that day and…and told me to, um,” he narrowed his eyes and looked straight at Nathan, “and told me to fuck her.”
Nathan swore his back teeth cracked as he clenched his jaw. “So what, you got drunk?”
“Yes. Linda knew I had to do it from time to time because of my father, but I felt like I was cheating every time I did.”
“What the hell? You were cheating on your mistress with your wife? Don’t you think that’s a little backward?”
“I didn’t love her when our fathers came up with this stupid plan, and I don’t love her now.”
“So you decided to kill her.”
“The gunshot was an accident, in the heat of the moment! I told you that in court.”
“Because she found lipstick on your collar.”
“She brought up Linda, and she knew not to do that.”
Nathan brought out another piece of paper. “This is the forensic report on the creamer in your kitchen. Do you know what Nerium Oleander is?”
“Oleander is a bush that grows around here. So?”
“So, it’s also poisonous.”
“Everybody knows that. If you’ve grown up around here, you know to stay away from it. What does that have to do with the creamer?”
“It was found in the creamer.”
“What? No! There was an appetite suppressant put in it, but that’s it.”
“Who put the appetite suppressant in it and why?”
A pained look came over Charles’s face. His eyes widened as if he couldn’t believe he let that piece of information slip. “I don’t want to answer that. Can’t I invoke my fifth amendment rights?”
Wayne held up his hands. “Where are you going with this?”
“Mr. Chesterfield, he can answer my questions about the creamer or I’ll be more than happy to walk across the hall. Like you said, he’s already facing attempted murder charges, Linda Gregory isn’t facing anything. Do you think she’s going to implicate herself?”
“Can I see her?”
“Not right now. Maybe in a bit. Otherwise, I do believe visitation days are Sundays. Maybe she’ll come to see you then.” Nathan stared at Charles and Wayne, waiting on his decision. When they remained silent, Nathan started putting everything back into his folder and stood up.
“No, wait. You still haven’t told me exactly what this is about.”
“What this is about, Charles, is you poisoning your wife with oleander laced coffee creamer. What this is about is premeditated attempted murder. What this is about is me finding out just how much you knew.”
Charles’s head swiveled so fast looking at the men. “What? Stop fucking with me. Wayne?”
Nathan didn’t stop, but planted both hands on the table and leaned across it to get directly into Charles’s face. “You have been trying to kill her for years. What, you hoped she’d just starve to death or hit her head when she fell? Why didn’t you just divorce her?”
Charles shoved his chair back and stood so fast the chair toppled over. “Because of my father!”
Evan pushed off the wall. “Charles, you need to sit back down. You don’t want this to go any harder on you than it already is. You’re facing attempting murder charges, then you broke the agreement of your release and went after Vanessa out of town, and now we’re looking at premeditation. You need to think about your next step very carefully.”
Charles plowed his fingers through his hair and grabbed hold. He leaned against the far wall of the room and slid down it. “What have I done?”
Nathan took a calming breath. “Let’s find out.” He walked to the door with the creamer in hand and gave it to the officer outside. “Offer Ms. Gregory some coffee and let her know I’ll be over to speak with her when I’m done here.”
“Yes, sir.”
Nathan turned and found Charles sitting back in the chair in a much calmer state, but his attorney looking worse. “I’ll remove the cuffs if you think you can stay in that chair.”
Charles moved his hands to the middle of the table. “Thanks.”
Nathan asked questions as he removed the cuffs. “Did Vanessa ever complain about stomach cramps? Did she fall without any assistance from you?”
Charles rubbed his wrists. “Yeah, I know that most people at the ER think we were there so much because I was hurting her.” He massaged his forehead. “Look, I know you have feelings for my wife, and yes, I was the cause of some of her trips to the ER, but sometimes she’d just fall. She’d say she was dizzy, or her eyes went blurry, or she’d just faint. I thought she had some kind of health problem.”
Nathan gripped the side of the table. “So why the appetite suppressant? Why the daily weigh-ins? Were you hoping she’d get so weak she’d fall and hit her head?”
“Yes, damm
it! My father was pushing that it was time for her to get pregnant. Linda told me if she lost enough weight her periods would stop and she wouldn’t get pregnant. I used a condom most every time just to make sure but didn’t tell my father that part. It got to a point where he didn’t believe me, so he made appointments where they’d check for semen. We figured if she didn’t have a period or enough body fat, she wouldn’t get pregnant.”
“So why did you tell Dr. Gregory that you were actively trying to get pregnant?”
“In case my father asked him.”
Nathan pushed away from the table and paced the floor. “Son of a bitch,” he mumbled.
“Nathan, do we need to take a break?” Evan stood beside Nathan, facing away from Charles and Wayne. “You’ve got him, don’t do something stupid.”
“Yeah, I need a minute.” Nathan walked out of the room and straight to the restroom to splash cold water on his face. What the fuck? Was it a conspiracy? Shit.
Nathan was staring at himself in the mirror trying to figure out what to do next when a knock came on the door. He turned to see an officer looking at him. “The prisoner needs to take a piss. I thought you might want to leave before I bring him in here.”
“He can wait a minute, but yeah, I don’t want to be in here with him.”
“Yes, sir.”
A few moments later, Nathan walked out and went to speak with Evan. “What do you think?”
“You need to push that the appetite suppressant was actually poison and find out if he knew or when he knew. So far, he’s given us a lot, but nothing that says he knew he was poisoning her.”
“Let him sit here for a few minutes. I’m going to talk to Linda.”
Nathan grabbed the picture of the kitchen and the forensic reports before walking across the hall. He opened the door with a concerned look on his face. “Ms. Gregory, I’m sorry for keeping you so long, but I was having a nice conversation with Charles. Did the officer get you some coffee?”
“Yes, but why am I here? I’ve been waiting for over an hour.”
“Again, I apologize. Charles just had a lot to say. While he’s taking a break, I thought I’d talk to you.” Nathan picked up a piece of paper from the table in the corner before he sat down in the chair across from Linda. “Thank you for coming down tonight.”
“Am I in some kind of trouble?”
“I don’t know yet. Do you think you are?”
“You took part of a bush from my house.”
“Ahh, yes. Ms. Gregory, I need to ask you some questions, and you have the right to leave if you want, but then I’ll just get a warrant to bring you back in. I want to give you the same rights that are given to everyone, or you can sign this waiver and be able to speak freely. Which would you prefer?”
“If signing the waiver will move this along quicker, just give it here. I’d like to get home. I do have to work tomorrow.”
Nathan slid her the paper that waived her Maranda warnings. “What do you want to know, Officer Cox?”
Nathan placed the photo of the Harpers’ kitchen in front of Linda as she raised the coffee cup to her lips. “Do you recognize that?” he asked as he pointed to the jar of creamer.
Linda swallowed, looked at the creamer on the table beside her, and then back at Nathan with eyes that were about to pop out of her head. “Is that, this?” she asked pointing from the picture to the creamer.
“It looks the same. Would it be a problem if it were?”
She immediately put the cup on the table and pushed it away. “Um, why do you ask that?”
Nathan then placed the report in front of her. “This is the lab results from the food that was in the Harpers’ kitchen at the time of the shooting. As the report shows, the creamer was laced with oleander, and this report shows the samples I took from your yard are the same variety of oleander found in the creamer. Now, how do you suppose the oleander got into the creamer?”
“Um, those trees are all over town. It could have come from anywhere.”
“I’m sure, but I haven’t seen any other trees with bark missing.”
“W-What does Charles say?”
“Oh, we haven’t gotten quite that far yet. We’re still working on why the two of you thought it was a good idea to starve Vanessa so she wouldn’t have a period.” Nathan looked at his watch. “Sit tight, Charles should be back from the restroom. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“You’re making me stay here?”
“Yes, for a little longer. If you need anything, just ask the officer right outside your door.”
Evan walked out of the room behind the two-way mirror at the same time Nathan closed the door to the interrogation room. “All you have left to find out is if she acted alone with the poison or was he a conspirator.”
“I know.”
Evan clamped his hand on Nathan’s shoulder. “Keep your shit together when you go back in there.”
Nathan bent at the waist before taking a deep breath then turned the knob on the door handle. He looked at the officer. “Thank you. I’ve got it from here.”
Evan moved back to the spot where he was leaning as Nathan sat back at the table. “Linda no longer wanted to drink her coffee when she saw the picture of your kitchen. Why would she be concerned if the creamer in that picture was the same as in her coffee if all that was put it in was an appetite suppressant?”
“I don’t know,” Charles said in a weary voice.
“Because the appetite suppressant was poison. When did the two of you decide to step up the heat on Vanessa? When did you decide she wasn’t dying fast enough?”
“I didn’t know she put oleander in the creamer. She just told me it would help her not want to eat. That it’d slowly shut down her body. That’s all I know. She was steadily losing weight until…”
“Until when?”
“Until you worked with her on that surveillance shit. I knew you had something to do with it, I just didn’t know what.”
“So you knowingly gave her something that you knew would hurt her.”
“Yeah, but…but…”
“But what, Charles? You weren’t going to stop until she either starved to death or died from blunt force trauma during a fall. If you don’t understand what you just admitted to, let me help you with that. You just admitted to premeditated attempted murder. While the gunshot may have been in the heat of the moment, poisoning someone isn’t. Where did Linda get the oleander?”
“I don’t know. She’d just give me the creamer when I told her Vanessa was getting low.”
“Was this your idea?”
“What? No! I resigned myself to the fact that my life was shit after my father and Mr. Calhoun concocted this plan. Once Vanessa and I moved into our house, Linda came to me with the idea because my father insisted Vanessa go off birth control.” Charles blew out a heavy breath. “I suggested Linda get pregnant, then I thought my father would let me out of this marriage with Vanessa so I could marry Linda and give him a grandchild. He was so caught up in that damn property that he couldn’t see anything but a way to keep it so he could develop it in a few years. He wasn’t prepared for his health to go downhill. I haven’t seen him in months and don’t even know if he’d recognize me.”
“Linda came to you with the creamer. You didn’t ask for it or make a conscious decision to look for a way together to kill Vanessa?”
“I’m not putting this on Linda.”
“It doesn’t matter, Charles. I’ve got the oleander tree in her yard, and you’ve already said that she’s the one who gave it to you. I just want to know if you’re a conspirator or an accomplice after the fact.”
Charles buried his face in his hands. “Dammit, it wasn’t supposed to be like this. I wasn’t going to contest the divorce so we could be together. Why did you have to go snooping? It was supposed to be over.”
“Well, I guess you should have thought about that before you poisoned an innocent person.”
Charles lifted his head with tears in his eye
s. “I didn’t know. I swear, I didn’t.”
“Excuse me, I need to finish my conversation with Linda. Sit tight.”
Nathan walked out of the room and gathered himself. His stomach was tight because he couldn’t breathe yet. He needed to arrest Linda, but he also wanted a confession even though he didn’t think he’d get it. A few moments later, Evan emerged from the room.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, they’re going away for a long time. Am I stupid for feeling a little sorry for the asshole?”
Evan looked him in the eyes. “You know what they say about a woman scorned.”
“But she wasn’t scorned.”
“Wasn’t she? They had a life planned, but his father changed their course.”
“Then why didn’t she go after Mr. Harper?”
“She did. She just used Vanessa to do it.”
“There were other things in the prenup. If she didn’t get pregnant by their tenth wedding anniversary, she’d have to go through invitro.”
“Nathan, I don’t think they were ever going to kill her. They were going to make her suffer and not get pregnant to make his father suffer. He was never going to get possession of that property. Hell, I’d even bet that once his father died, he’d divorce Vanessa. She just beat him to the punch.”
“That’s some messed up shit.”
“Yeah, it is, but that’s just my hunch. Now you’ve got to go in that room and get a confession from her.”
Evan went to the room behind the two-way mirror again while Nathan walked into the room where Linda was sitting.
“It’s about time. I’m ready to go, Officer Cox.”
“Yeah, I don’t think you’ll be going home tonight.”
“What? Why?”
“You see, Charles and I finished our conversation. We finally got around to talking about that creamer. He told me you gave it to him with an appetite suppressant in it for Vanessa.”
“He said he wanted to make sure she maintained the agreed upon weight, so I gave him something to help that along.”
“You gave him creamer laced with poison that you collected from the leaves, flowers, sap, and bark of the bush in your yard. We have him on video saying he told you when Vanessa was low on creamer and you’d bring him more. He also confessed to not knowing what was in the creamer.”
Unbridled Passion: A Riverton Crossing Novel Page 17
