Cinderella Read Free

behind her, singing along with a boy playing a mandolin, her legs widespread, skirt tucked between them, long brown hair blowing in the wind off the lake, dark eyes flashing as Matthew approached.
        The pool lights were on outside. He could see her naked body in the reflected light.
        A tangle of memories.
        Susan as virgin queen, radiant in white, billowy white skirt and white sandals, white carnation in her hair, gleaming white teeth, face flushed as she rushed to him, hand outstretched, reaching for him, reaching…
        She whispered that she liked his house.
        He whispered that he was renting it.
        Memories.
        Susan as wanton hooker standing in their bedroom door, black garter belt and panties, seamed black nylons and high-heeled black shoes, dark hair hanging over one eye, Come fuck me, Matthew…
        She asked him if he enjoyed living alone.
        He told her he didn't.
        So many years together, you learned the hollows and curves, you learned the spaces, you molded yourselves to remembered nooks…
        "In Calusa tonight-"
        The news.
        He looked at the bedside clock: 11:03 p.m.
        He kissed her.
        "-killing the driver. The car swerved off the highway and into the front window of a television repair-"
        Her mouth the way he remembered it when she was young.
        Breasts still firm.
        Legs…
        "-identified as Otto Samalson, a private investigator with offices on Highgate and-"
        " What?" Matthew said.
        Susan gasped, startled.
        "Did you hear that?"
        "No. What? Hear what? What?" she asked, frightened, and sat up, clutching the sheet to her naked breasts.
        "Shhh," he said.
        "In Sarasota, the county commissioners have outlined a plan to open-"
        "Did he say Otto Samalson? Did you hear…?"
        "No," Susan said. "Who?"
        "Jesus," he said, and got out of bed.
        "Matthew, what…?"
        "I have to… I'd better call… Susan, if it was Otto… look, you'd better… listen, I have to make a call, excuse me."
        He went into the room he'd set up as an at-home office, and called the Public Safety Building, and asked for Detective Morris Bloom. A detective named Kenyon told Matthew that Bloom was on vacation, but yes, the man who'd been shot and killed on U.S. 41 was indeed a private investigator named Otto Samalson.
        Matthew thanked him and hung up.
        When he came back into the bedroom, Susan was already dressed.
        "I just remembered why we got divorced," she said, and walked out.
        
***
        
        It was nightmare time.
        A nightmare of flashbacks.
        Invading Matthew's bed, invading his sleep.
         I just remembered why we got divorced.
        Susan's words. Opening a floodgate of memories that triggered the first of the nightmare flashbacks: Matthew coming home at a quarter to one, the lights on in the study, Susan sitting naked behind the desk in the house they used to share. "I just had a phone call," she says, "from a man named Gerald Hemmings," and Matthew's throat goes suddenly dry.
        He and Aggie have rehearsed this scene a thousand times. They are lovers, Aggie and he, and therefore liars of necessity. They are lovers, he and Aggie, and therefore killers by trade, strangling their separate marriages. They are lovers, Aggie and he, he and Aggie, and therefore conspirators in that they are sworn to secrecy and know exactly what to say in the event of a trap.
        This is a trap, he knows it is a trap.
        But he knows in his darkest heart that it is nothing of the sort.
        She has spoken to Gerald Hemmings, she has talked to Aggie's husband, it is one o'clock in the morning, and Susan knows everything, Susan knows all.
        In the horror chamber of his mind, as he tries to sleep, the scene replays itself.
        Denial, denial, denial, for