Cates clicked Play, and the picture came up on the big screen.
Evelyn Parker-Steele was seated in a metal folding chair. Her white Tyvek suit was a stark contrast to the black background.
Her hair was bedraggled, she had on no makeup, and the harsh lighting made her look more like a member of the Manson family than a woman at the top of New York society’s pecking order. “My name is Evelyn Parker-Steele, and two years ago I killed Cynthia Pritchard,” she said, lisping the name through broken teeth. “Cynthia was my co-worker, my friend, and my lover. She was open about her sexuality. I was not.”
Her eyes were empty, her voice a monotone. It reminded me of al-Qaeda hostage videos I’d seen, and I wondered if she was reading from a script.
“I grew up in a household that considered homosexuality as Satanic. They would never have accepted me as I am, so I pretended to be something else. When I married my husband, it was a marriage of convenience that suited both our needs.”
“Translation: Jason Steele is gay,” the mayor said. “As if you couldn’t tell.”
“Stanley!” Diamond yelled, pointing at me, Kylie, and Cates to remind the mayor that he was being very un-PC. Then he ran two fingers across his mouth—the universal sign for zip your lips.
“Sorry,” the mayor grumbled, clearly not sorry.
“Most of my sexual encounters were discreet, even anonymous,” Evelyn went on, “but when Cynthia joined the campaign team for Elliott Winchell, I fell in love with her, and we were together day and night. I was happy to continue on in secret, but Cynthia refused to live a lie.
“The night she died, we were on my terrace. She was drinking heavily and begged me to leave my husband. Same-sex marriage had been legalized in New York. Everyone was talking about it, and she wanted me to tell the world that we were in love. I told her I couldn’t even tell my father, how could I tell the world? She said, ‘If you won’t, I will.’ And then she walked to the edge of the terrace, stood up on a planter, and started screaming.
“We were fourteen stories over Park Avenue. It was dark. Probably nobody would hear her. Even if they did, I thought she’d just yell something like ‘Evelyn Parker-Steele is gay’ and that would be it, and we’d laugh about it in the morning. But that’s not what she did.
“She screamed, ‘Leonard Parker cordially invites you to the wedding of his gay daughter, Evelyn, to Cynthia Pritchard, a beautiful and talented young lesbian. Mr. Parker deeply regrets his narrow-minded, homophobic behavior that fucked up his daughter’s life and—’”
There were several seconds of silence as Evelyn just stared into the camera. “And that’s when I pushed her. It all happened in an instant. I didn’t want to kill her. I just wanted to stop her.
“I panicked. I picked up the phone to dial 911, but I knew if I called just a few seconds after she hit the ground, they’d know I was right there with her. I had to be not with her if they were ever going to believe that she fell. I couldn’t leave the apartment. People knew I was home. And then I had an idea. I went to the bar and grabbed a bottle of vodka. I took a big gulp, then another, and another. I was gagging with every swallow, but I just kept drinking.
“The cops found me passed out on the floor in a pool of vomit, drunk, incoherent. It wasn’t an act. My blood alcohol level was three times the legal limit. They took me to the hospital. When I finally could focus, they told me Cynthia was dead, and I cried. I was so sick they couldn’t interview me till the next day. By that time, my father had a wall of lawyers around me. I told the police that I had passed out early in the night, and the last thing I remember was Cynthia sitting on the terrace, drinking. The DA bought my story. It didn’t hurt that my father plays golf with him and supports his reelection campaigns.
“I want to apologize to Cynthia’s parents and her two brothers. I killed her because I didn’t want the world to know how I felt about her. But now I do. She was the free-spirited young woman I always wished I could be, and I loved her more than I ever loved anyone in my life. I didn’t mean to kill her, but I did. I’m sorry. I know what’s going to happen to me next. No trial, no judge, no jury. By the time you see this—”
The counter on the video read 4:17, and the screen went dark.
Nobody said a word. Even the mayor was silent. The Xanax had kicked in.
Chapter 8
Nice turnout, Gideon thought as a steady stream of voyeurs blew off their Monday morning plans and made a beeline for the carousel.
That’s the thing about New Yorkers. They have five hundred homicides a year to choose from. Shoot an old lady getting out of a taxi on Madison Avenue, and people will step over the body to grab the cab. But put a dead rich bitch in a Hazmat suit on a painted horse in the middle of Central Park, and they’ll call in late to work and crane their necks to get a better view.