The detective met her eyes, sizing her up. Then she smiled. “Did you know he had a daughter?”
“Yes.”
“And did you get to know his daughter?”
It was the intonation of the question that revealed the detective’s hand. Correa knew everything. The police had talked to Violet and Celeste. They knew Nat had visited the Sagaponack home, knew she had befriended Violet. They had found Gabe’s phone and read the angry missives Nat had sent him, listened to the voice messages where she’d threatened to kill him. They weren’t questioning her as a witness; she was a suspect. She was in big trouble.
“I think I need a lawyer.”
“Sure,” the detective said casually. “One of my colleagues will call a public defender for you.” She nodded toward the one-way glass. “I’d like to keep chatting, if you’re up for it.”
A lawyer would advise Nat to shut up. She knew this from all the Shonda Rhimes shows she’d watched with her mother. But she had to know.
“What happened to Gabe?”
“He was found dead at the bottom of a stairwell on East Eighty-Eighth, early in the morning of May twentieth.” The detective’s voice was calm, her eyes appraising Nat’s every reaction. “He’d been shot once, in the face.”
A horrified sob found its way through Nat’s clenched lips.
“There was a necklace found on the stairs near the victim’s body,” Correa said, opening a manila file folder. She slid a photograph toward Nat. “Do you recognize it.”
Nat’s hand threatened to fly to her throat, but she held it in her lap. She remembered taking the pendant off, putting it in the pocket of her dress before she met Gabe at the High Line. But there it was, in the image before her.
“Your social media accounts show you wearing this necklace.”
“I had one like it,” Nat said. “There was a break-in at my apartment. Last Saturday. They took the necklace.” She was lying to the police now. This wasn’t going to end well.
“Did you report it?”
“No. Gabe told me not to.”
“Why would he tell you not to?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“A gun was found wrapped in a woman’s T-shirt, in a nearby dumpster. Do you own a gun, Ms. Murphy?”
She couldn’t deny it. They were going to get a warrant to search her apartment. If the gun was still there, she’d be caught in a lie. “I got it for protection. I was being harassed by an old boyfriend. Cole Doberinsky. You should find him and talk to him.”
Correa jotted down Cole’s name.
“Gabe paid to have Cole beaten up,” Nat offered. “Cole hates him. He could have killed him.”
“We’ll talk to Mr. Doberinsky.”
“I think it was Cole who broke into my apartment. He probably took the necklace and the gun.”
“So you think ballistics will show that your gun killed Gabe Turnmill?”
“No. I—I don’t know.” She was getting confused; she should stop talking. “But if it does, then Cole probably took it.”
“Do you have a permit for the weapon? Did you register it with the state?”
“I got it secondhand. At a pawn shop.” The lies were piling up, threatening an avalanche that would bury her, but she wouldn’t bring Oleg into this. He had been kind to her, protective of her . . . she owed him.
“Where were you on Monday morning, around one thirty A.M.?”
“At home. I’d been at a club, but someone put something in my drink. I felt sick, so I went home. I’m not sure what time it was. Maybe around midnight.”
“Where was the club?”
“Hell’s Kitchen.”
“Can anyone corroborate that you were at home between one and five A.M.?”
“No. I didn’t see anyone.”
“A witness saw a woman matching your description on the Upper East Side, not far from the crime scene.”
It was impossible. Nat had gone home after the club. Unless she hadn’t.
There was a knock at the door, and Correa got up to answer it. Nat could see the fat detective but couldn’t hear his muttered words. Her interrogator nodded and returned to Natalie.
“Natalie Murphy. I’m arresting you for the murder of Gabriel Turnmill.”
“No.” It came out a sob.
“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. . . .”
The detective was Mirandizing her, just like on TV. But Nat was not on a detective procedural. This was real. This was happening. But those TV shows had taught her a few things.
“Can I make a phone call?” she said tearfully. “Isn’t that my right?”
The detective’s eyes softened slightly. “Who do you want to contact?”
Gabe. He was the only person who would know how to get her out of this mess. He was a lawyer; he had money. But Gabe was dead. And the police thought Nat had killed him.
She would have to call her mom, though the news would devastate her. Allana would not be able to help her daughter financially, would not be able to fly across the country to come to her aid. Her mother had Nat’s young siblings to care for. But there was someone else she could try.
“I’d like to call my dad,” she said.
48
* * *
Holding
After Nat spoke to her father, she was “processed.” A fresh-faced male officer recorded her biographical details, swabbed her cheek for DNA, and took her photograph. With her hair dried into a crazy helmet, her puffy face, a scrape on her chin, she looked like a lunatic. Criminally insane. She had to hand over her phone, her apartment keys, even a receipt she’d found in the pocket of her rumpled sweatpants. Her fingernails were cut and collected, her hands tested for gunshot residue before she was digitally fingerprinted. Not once did the young officer look at her like she was a person. She was simply a project.
After what could have been two, three, or four hours—Nat had lost all sense of time—she was cuffed and taken out to a van. It was dark as she and two other females were led to the vehicle that would shuttle them to central booking. The late hour did not bode well for a short stay. They would have to spend the night, would be arraigned the next day, if they were lucky.
Her dad had said he’d come. Despite their distant and strained relationship, he would help her through this, would not let her go down for a murder she didn’t commit.
“Did you do it?” he’d asked her, point-blank.
“No.” But her voice had wobbled, relaying her doubt. Because Gabe was dead. And she couldn’t remember what she had done that night. But still . . . “I could never kill anyone,” she said, as adamantly as she could.
At central booking, Nat and her cohorts were led through a maze of dimly lit, concrete corridors to a windowless holding cell. Outside, it was night, but in there, it was broad daylight. Brighter than broad daylight. Eleven women sat on hard metal benches pressed up against the light green walls. A short partition hid a toilet and a sink that Nat resolved not to use. (The smell emanating from the general area was not inviting.) She and the other recent arrivals were given a sandwich and a carton of milk, and then the heavy bars to their enclosure were slammed shut. A large woman with a tattoo snaking out of her shirt got up from the bench. “Are you going to drink that?”
Nat glanced at her carton of milk. Without hesitation she handed it over.
It was not just the light that kept Nat awake and alert. It was fear of the present and the future; confusion about the past. She sat on the cold floor, nibbling the bland cheese sandwich, willing herself to remember. What had she done after she left that nightclub? She remembered stumbling toward a cab. And then . . . nothing. Blank. Somehow, she had gotten home, had passed out on her apartment floor. But what had she done in between?
Eventually, her cellmates succumbed to exhaustion, lying on the bench, curling up on the floor—no pillows or blankets were offered. But Nat had been in a heavy, drugged sleep for days. She would not join them, could n
ot relax. The words she had told her father rang in her head: I could never kill anyone. It was true. She had never been violent before. But she’d never experienced the intense feelings she had for Gabe. Love and hate were two sides of the same coin. She had been willing to use Gabe’s daughter to destroy his family. Was shooting him that much worse?
Without the sun, a watch, or her phone, the only indication she had that it was morning was when the guards arrived with small boxes of cornflakes, more cartons of milk, and bananas. The inmates were not given spoons, so Nat filled her mouth with the crunchy flakes and took a drink of milk. She forced down the banana, though it was bruised and overripe. She didn’t know when the next meal would come, undoubtedly another dry sandwich. Still, she had not used the toilet or sink.
Her companions were being taken out, one by one. Nat waited. Hours passed, though she didn’t know how many. A sandwich arrived, and she surmised it must be around noon (she had no way of knowing that her breakfast had been served at 4:00 A.M.). Two women came in to mop the cell, but they ignored the filthy bathroom area. Sometime later, a second sandwich, a dinner sandwich arrived, and Nat began to panic. How long could they keep her here? If this were a TV program, some ridiculously attractive lawyer would be advocating for her release right now. But this was not TV. Nat had no one to fight for her.
She had just finished her peanut butter and jelly when a guard came to the bars. “Natalie Murphy!” She jumped up, put her hands behind her back as she’d seen her cellmates do, let the stocky guard cuff her. Nat was led back through the concrete maze and deposited in yet another cell. But this one had a small window and no bathroom. That meant a short-term stay. It had only two other women in it. One of them was crying softly; the other sat stoic, hard, jaded. She had been there before.
Nat took a bench. Turning her head, she could see out the window, a glimpse of darkening sky. In the previous dank, windowless cell, she’d felt fear, panic, confusion. But seeing that slash of night brought a painful realization. Outside that window, life was going on as normal. People were living their lives: working, buying groceries, meeting friends for dinner. Nat might never do any of those things again. She might never be free. For the first time since she’d been booked, tears rolled down her cheeks.
A man, small and bird-boned, dwarfed by his gray suit, approached the cell. He had unruly curly hair that he’d attempted to control with heavy product. If not for the silver threads running through his coif, he would have looked about twenty-five. Nat judged him to be in his early forties.
“Natalie Murphy?”
Nat swiped at her tears, hurried toward him. “That’s me.”
“My name is Matthew Hawley. Your father hired me to represent you.”
Her heart swelled. Her dad, who’d abandoned her as a little girl, had come through for her now. A lump of gratitude, perhaps even love, clogged her throat.
“Your father arrived this morning. He’s waiting in the courtroom. Your mother is on her way. Your parents believe in you and support you.”
Nat had thought she was completely alone. She wasn’t. She swiped at a fresh batch of tears.
“You’re about to be arraigned for the second-degree murder of Gabriel Turnmill,” Matthew Hawley said, unfazed by her emotions. “The DA’s case is circumstantial, but from what I can see, the evidence is damaging.”
A pain twisted Nat’s intestines, and she felt she might throw up. This couldn’t be happening. It all felt so surreal. But her whole life, since she’d started seeing Gabe, since he’d abruptly ended it, had felt surreal. This was part of her new, fucked-up reality.
Her lawyer kept talking. “When we go before the judge today, we’ll plead not guilty. When I’ve had time to examine the evidence and do some investigation, we can discuss a defense. If the DA offers a plea, it would be wise to consider it.”
“I didn’t do it,” Nat said, hands gripping the bars of her cell. “I can’t remember the night, but I couldn’t kill someone. Especially not Gabe.”
But if she could have killed anyone, it would have been Gabe. She’d hated him that much.
A vein twitched in her lawyer’s temple. “Let’s focus on getting you bail. You’ll be called up soon.”
Through the bars, Nat watched the diminutive man hurry away.
49
* * *
The Arraignment
Perhaps an hour after Matthew Hawley left her, a bailiff led Nat into court. The room had high ceilings and dark wood wainscoting; an intimidating space filled with intimidating people. Not all of them were there for her. The press occupied several seats, alert for a sensational case worthy of their attention. There were numerous lawyers in suits, waiting for clients. The seating area was filled with wives and mothers, husbands and fathers—of the victims and the accused. All were waiting for the defendants to be brought before the judge. Many of the women, and a few of the men, were crying.
Scanning the crowd, Nat found her dad. He had not changed much during their years of estrangement; a little heavier, the lines around his mouth more pronounced. Their eyes met, and her own fear and pain reflected back at her. She’d been angry with him for so long, had blamed him for so many of her issues. But now she saw him for what he was: a troubled man, fighting his own demons, trying to do right by his child.
A court officer called her docket number. “The people against Natalie Doris Murphy.” The bailiff led her to the center of the room, where Matthew Hawley and his large gray suit joined her. A Korean-American woman, petite and feminine despite her power suit, stood to their right. She didn’t look much older than Nat, but she emanated an air of formidable capability. On the bench, looming above them, was the judge, an imposing figure with dark skin juxtaposed against thick white eyebrows. He was completely bald, his pate shiny like it had been buffed and polished. His name plate read: JUDGE GORDON BELL.
Judge Bell briefly scanned the file in front of him before he spoke. His voice was commanding but perfunctory. (Nat knew from television shows that judges like him might process as many as a hundred arraignments per day.)
“The prosecution will bring forward notices.”
The tiny woman, evidently the assistant district attorney, moved forward, submitting various papers to the judge, while announcing their corresponding numbers. Matthew Hawley was invited to do the same, and he approached the bench with more forms. Nat stood by, forlorn and confused. She heard her lawyer plead not guilty on her behalf, but the rest of the process was a confounding blur of paperwork and legal jargon. When the judge brought up bail, Nat’s focus became intense.
“Natalie Murphy is charged with felony murder,” the petite prosecutor began. “She has no ties to the community. No job, no property, no family in New York. The people request remand.”
The judge allowed Hawley to counter.
“The defendant’s father has flown across the country to be in court today, and he’s able to post bail. Her mother is on a plane as we speak. The defendant has no criminal history and no warrants against her.” He paused, then, his voice softening. “The defendant is a young, naive woman from a small town. This experience has already caused her extreme emotional distress. Sending her to Riker’s could cause severe damage to her mental health.”
“May I remind the court,” the prosecutor sniped, “that this young, naive woman from a small town is accused of shooting her sugar daddy in the face.”
The spectators burst into scandalized whispers. Matthew Hawley erupted, defending his client against the prejudicial remarks. But Nat couldn’t take in any of it. Her ears were ringing, her cheeks burning, the room swimming before her eyes. The charges against her, articulated in such a crude fashion, were so salacious, so degrading, so mortifying. She knew how they would sound to her father, to the judge, to the onlookers. Nat had sold herself to a rich man, and when he no longer wanted her, she had killed him. Her knees shook as shame and self-hatred threatened to overwhelm her.
She felt the judge’s heavy gaze on her then. For
the first time, he was looking at her, not as another arraignment to process, but as a person. The mess of a girl trembling before him must have stirred his sympathy. Or perhaps, he just saw how weak, how pathetic, how harmless she was.
“Bail is set at five hundred thousand dollars.”
It was an astronomical sum, a faint hope, but it was hope. Nat looked toward her father. He was standing, his expression tense and troubled. Did Andrew Murphy have half a million dollars to secure his daughter’s release? Could he afford to get her out of jail and still pay for her defense lawyer? She knew little about her dad’s career in Las Vegas, knew nothing of his net worth or finances. But his slight nod, his hint of a smile informed her that he would get her out. For now, at least. Her chin trembled with gratitude and emotion.
The bailiff took her arm and led her back toward the door from whence she’d entered. She would return to the cells until the paperwork was filed, her bail posted. As she approached the door, she turned back to the courtroom, longing to connect with her father’s eyes, to ensure he was still there, that he wouldn’t walk out on her again. And that’s when she spotted them.
Behind the prosecution, three rows back, sat Gabe’s wife. She wore a casual dress and no makeup, her face ashen with grief. Her dark eyes on Nat were soft and wet. Celeste was flanked by an older couple, their hands on her, protective and supportive. The resemblance was undeniable: they were Celeste’s parents. Violet was not with her mother and grandparents, of course she wasn’t. Celeste would not subject her daughter to this ugliness and trauma.
Nat felt a tug at her elbow. With some relief, she let the bailiff escort her back to her cell.
50
* * *
Freedom
By the time Natalie’s bail was processed (her father had contracted a bail bondsman who would charge him 15 percent on the half million), her mother had arrived from Blaine. As Nat walked away from the holding cells (“the pens” she heard them called), she spotted her parents waiting anxiously in the bustling corridor. They were talking intently, her father’s hand rubbing her mother’s arm in a comforting way. It had been years since Nat had seen her parents together. It had been even longer since she had seen them act civilly, even kindly toward each other. When her mom spotted her bedraggled eldest child emerging from captivity, she burst into tears.
The Arrangement Page 21