Cold Heart by Lynda La Plante Read Free Book Online

asked.
    ‘Oh . . . just conversations. He taped phone calls, and there were cameras in all the rooms in the house. For security, you know, the art.’
    ‘You knew about that, though.’
    ‘Oh, yes, I knew.’
    Again Lorraine felt that Cindy wasn’t telling the full truth, and she wondered whether the presence of a pornographer, an ex-actress and a large number of cameras under the same roof had had the inevitable consequence. ‘He didn’t make any other sort of recordings?’
    ‘No,’ Cindy said, a shade too quickly. ‘He was just paranoid, even about personal things. I mean, he hated anyone to know he’d had a face-lift, and he dyed his hair – plus he took his drugs down here.’ It was a titbit thrown out to shift the conversation away from a subject Cindy clearly didn’t want to discuss.
    Lorraine asked, ‘What drugs did he use?’
    ‘Oh, stuff for body-building mostly. Sometimes he’d have a few lines of cocaine, but mostly it was steroids, or speed – he was a real speed freak. But he was careful. He’d never over-indulge – he always knew exactly what he was taking.’
    ‘Did you take drugs?’
    ‘Me?’ Cindy gave a goofy grin, suddenly the little girl again, as if it were all a game. ‘Oh, yeah, I’d do anything that was going, mostly cocaine. But I haven’t touched anything since I knew about the baby. I’ve got to take care of myself. You have to when you’re pregnant.’
    Cindy gazed at her reflection in the mirrors, and Lorraine considered how to question her. She would like access to the tape recordings Cindy had mentioned. ‘Can I just take you through the events up to your arrest?’ she said.
    ‘Sure. Do you want a drink?’
    The girl’s butterfly mind digressed into trivia – either she didn’t realize the seriousness of her situation, or she was trying to hold on to some kind of normality. She wandered off to a small kitchen area, tucked away at one side of the gym by the showers.
    ‘Just water for me,’ Lorraine said, following her.
    Cindy opened the fridge and selected a can of Diet Coke for herself. She opened a cupboard and took out a glass. Having forgotten, it seemed, Lorraine’s water, she opened the can and poured out the contents.
    ‘Where exactly were you on that morning?’ Lorraine asked, sitting down on a work bench and taking out her notepad.
    ‘I was lying on the balcony, over there.’ Cindy waved her hand. ‘I fell asleep.’
    ‘Would that be at the front of the house?’ Lorraine asked.
    ‘Sort of. There’s balconies all over the house, but I kind of move around with the sun, you know, so I was on that one.’ She pointed to indicate which side of the house she meant.
    ‘And the swimming pool is where exactly?’
    ‘Behind you,’ Cindy said.
    ‘Is there access from here to the pool?’
    ‘Of course. Behind the mirrors, they slide back.’
    ‘Right. So what time were you sunbathing?’
    ‘Oh, the usual time.’ She took a slug of her Coke, draining the glass.
    ‘Yes, but I don’t know your usual routine, so if you would just take me through it.’ Lorraine tried not to sound irritated.
    ‘Okay. I get up usually about nine, sometimes earlier, sometimes a lot later, shower, then work on my tan for a couple of hours – just my body, I don’t do my face.’
    ‘Do the servants all know your routine?’
    ‘Of course, I’ve been doing it since I got married – get up, shower, sunbathe, swim, get dressed for lunch.’
    Cindy started doing half-hearted t’ai chi exercises in front of the mirror.
    ‘So on the day you discovered your husband’s body, you were sunbathing as usual and you fell asleep. A loud noise woke you – about what time would that have been?’
    Cindy wrinkled her nose. ‘Maybe eleven. I was asleep the first time, then I heard it again. At first I thought it was a car backfiring. It was just one loud bang. Then I saw all these birds flying up, from the garden by the shrubbery. You can’t see the pool from the balcony, just