She was lying on the cot in her cell, under a heavy woolen blanket. Her eyes were closed but she was awake. Whatever color she once had was drained now. She looked small and drab as she lay there.
“Hello, Julia,” I said.
Julia Peterson’s eyes flickered open and she looked in my direction. “Mr. Steel.”
“May I have a few moments?”
“Moments are all I have. You’re welcome to as many of them as you want.”
She stood and stepped slowly to the chair adjacent to the bars of her cell. She sat down heavily.
“How can I help you?”
“I want some more information.”
“Regarding?”
“Henry Carson.”
She flashed me a crooked grin. “Well, for one thing, he’s dead.”
A little gallows humor appeared to lift her spirits. But if she knew, she wouldn’t much care for where I was headed.
“Was there anything else?” she asked.
“How did you convince them to do it?”
She stared at me. “Do what?”
I had been sitting on a bent-cane chair, but I now stood and started to pace. “I couldn’t figure it out. But there was one thing that stuck in my craw. It was the one thing you all said, as if by rote.”
She continued to stare at me and remained silent.
“‘I wish I had done it.’ Which unto itself is an odd pronouncement. Especially coming from three young girls. I wish I had done it. Then you said the exact same thing.”
She stared sightlessly at me, a deer caught in the headlights.
“If I were to get a warrant and search your home, would I find a complete set of steak knives?”
“Do as you like.”
“Would I?”
She looked up at me and with resignation, said, “My life is already ruined. You might as well add murder to the charges.”
I moved closer to the cell. “Why?”
The last of her reserve dropped away. “The humiliation. The shame.”
She gripped the cell bars with both hands. “You have to understand. I lived alone for years and years. My cats were my only company. Men were anathema to me. I had two unsuccessful experiences. One in college, with a man who forcefully stole my virginity. And my pride.”
She stared at me. “After college, when I was teaching at a private high school in my hometown of Columbus, Ohio, I met a man and we began a relationship.
“Ultimately, I moved in with him and we set out to create a life together. Then one night, he hit me. More than once. The next day I moved out. I looked at a map and was intrigued by the idea of living in a place called Freedom. So I came here and started over. But I never took up with another man. Twenty years a spinster.
“Then he showed up. I noticed during our interview that he stared at me more intensely than he needed to. Every time I looked up, he was staring at me. I didn’t think anything of it until the second interview. When he showed up unexpectedly.
“He asked me to dinner and told me he couldn’t get me out of his mind. He said I was the most intelligent woman he’d ever met. He fawned over me and made me feel the way I always thought a woman should feel.
“Then he stayed for a second night and after dinner, he brought me to his hotel, and made love to me. I had never been made love to in such a tender and loving manner. When he left the next day, I realized he had cracked my resolve. I needed him. Shamelessly. I thought I loved him.
“He came back a third time and we never left the bed. It was then that I offered him the job, and by so doing, ruined my life.”
“When did you decide to kill him?”
“I don’t exactly know. Maybe when I accidentally stumbled onto the party. Or when Becky Nyman came to see me. I was riddled with hate. Not just for him. Mostly for myself.
“I arranged a meeting with the three girls, all of whom had been seriously damaged by him. I told them how I wanted to do it. They agreed. We killed him that very day.”
“How did you do it?”
I sensed in her an emotional release, the sudden loss of fear and uncertainty. A measure of confidence reflected itself in her gaze. Her perfidy revealed, she seemed strengthened. The bastard got what he deserved. She’d face the consequences without remorse, whatever they might be.
A slight grin lit her face. “We knew how much he liked Steffi. So she called him and asked if she could meet with him at his office after swim team practice. She slyly hinted at the possibility of some kind of sexual activity.
“I went home and got the steak knife. He was surprised when I showed up at his office at the same time Steffi was supposed to arrive. He was startled when Steffi came in accompanied by Connie and Becky.
“As we had arranged, I stood behind him and grabbed him in a bear hug. At the same time the three girls approached and with each of their hands on the handle, thrust the knife into his neck and left it there.
“He couldn’t remove it because I had him in the bear hug. The girls moved away from him and we all watched as he bled out, got weaker and weaker, pleaded for his life, and then died.”
She looked at me, then hurried to the toilet and violently threw up.
After a while, she went to the sink and rinsed out her mouth. Then she looked back at me.
“That’s how.”