The Craigslist Murders - Brenda Cullerton [41]
“So did you bring cash?” she’d asked greedily, while pulling out a gold compact.
Charlotte had nodded, mute with distaste.
Then there was the photograph of the woman’s young daughter in the living room. No older than twelve or thirteen, the kid was dressed in the same $400 sprayed-on jeans and wifebeater as her mother. But her eyes, rimmed in thick black kohl, already had the spirit sucked right out of them. Her feeble attempt to match her mother’s smile seemed almost grotesque. Charlotte recognized herself in that smile. She felt as if she should look away, as if it was indecent, seeing the girl’s pain.
She had imagined the insane rush of adolescent hormones, the pole-vaulting leaps between euphoria, doubt, and despair. How she’d loathed those inconsolably lonely years as a teenager. “Do me a favor, dear. Don’t even look at her!” the woman spat out, dumping a silver tray on the driftwood coffee table and pouring herself a tumbler of champagne. “The two of us were tighter than my jeans,” she said, slapping her own butt. “But she chose to live with her father, if you can believe it. Just up and deserted me. Not even a note. I found out from the lawyers.”
Charlotte’s head had buzzed. She could still almost feel the heat of adrenaline. When the woman belched and rose unsteadily to her feet, Charlotte had reached around behind her, searching, blindly, for the poker next to the fireplace. It was the third fire tool in. She’d counted.
Keep her talking, keep her talking, a voice inside had prompted her. “It must be hard, being here alone,” she said to the woman. “I mean, without your daughter or your husband.”
“Him! I’d like to kill him,” the woman whispered. “Like that woman in Hong Kong who served her husband a nice, cyanide-laced, chocolate milkshake.” As Charlotte’s fingers found a grip on the poker, the tumbler of champagne slid out of the woman’s hand.
“Shit!” she’d said, leaning over to pick it up from the carpet. Which is when Charlotte swung the poker up from behind her and clubbed her on the head.
The woman slumped down and gurgled. Blood had spattered across the carpet and the driftwood table. Her skinny martini-legs were doing this weird butterfly kick. And her head was all wobbly. Bending her knees and driving the poker straight down into the crown of the woman’s skull, Charlotte suddenly thought of her nanny pointing out the soft spot on her sister’s head when she first came home from the hospital. And just like that, it was over.
There had only been a tiny splotch of blood on Charlotte’s jeans. After rolling up the poker in her yoga mat, she’d grabbed a bottle of Dom from the vestibule, buttoned up her slicker, and walked down the fire stairs to the garage in the basement. From then on, the poker had become a talisman, the instrument of Charlotte’s transformation. Like the banners beneath which medieval knights would rally their forces before galloping into battle, it was an extension of herself: straight, strong and true to its purpose.
Climbing reluctantly out of her bed, she pulled back the heavy damask curtains, put on a pair of red wooly socks, and walked towards the kitchen. Pavel was probably somewhere over Newfoundland by now, she thought. He’d left a message on her cell, promising to be there at six. She was as nervous as a teenager. What would she wear? Something casual but sexy. Maybe the black silk harem pants and a plain white t-shirt. Perfect, she thought. And a pair of old red sequined Converse. She’d devote the rest of the day to pulling together her vision of the dacha. Laying out swipes from magazines, the color palette, her swatches and sketches … This was probably the only step left in the process of decorating that she still looked forward to. Like dreaming out loud, she whispered, picking up the tarnished silver framed photo of her Aunt Dottie before heading off to polish it.
25
When Charlotte saw Pavel stabbing at the fire with the poker, she almost dropped the toast points.
“Russians are good with fire, Charlotte,” he said with a