Night Fall (45 page)

Jill asked me, “How would that look as evidence?”

I cleared my throat and replied, “I think we could cut this part-”

“They would want the whole tape. See the time and date in the lower-right-hand corner? Isn’t that important to show when this was happening?”

“I suppose… but I think we could scramble your bodies and faces-”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep. I’ve had enough of that.”

On the screen, Jill rocked back on her haunches and looked at the camera. She waved and said, “That’s a wrap. Scene Two. Wine, please.”

As a detective, I know you can learn a lot about people from their dens and offices, by the books on the shelves, the photos on the wall, their film library, and all of that. This, however, was more than I needed to know.

I looked back at the screen, and saw that Jill was lying on her back as Bud reached behind him and retrieved the wine bottle. Jill thrust her legs in the air and said, “A wife-tasting party.” She spread her legs and said, “Pour.”

Bud poured, then went down on her. I could hear her loud breathing over the sound of the wind, and she said, “I hope you have that camera pointed right.”

He lifted his head, looked into the camera, and said, “Yeah.”

She took the bottle from him and poured the rest of the wine over her body and commanded, “Lick.”

Bud began licking her body.

Mrs. Jill Winslow seemed to me a classic passive-aggressive in the sex department; bossing Bud around on the one hand, then performing sex acts that were submissive, perhaps even demeaning if you considered the context.

Another way to look at this was that she was exerting power over a man, while simultaneously fulfilling all his desires, and hers-hers being a desire for both sexual degradation and sexual control. Meanwhile, Bud is both servicer and servant. It was all a little complicated, and I doubted if Bud understood much beyond the length of his erection, which I really didn’t want to see.

Using her first name, I said, “Jill. Seriously. Let’s move on.”

She didn’t reply, but kicked off her slippers and put her feet on the coffee table.

I sat back in the chair, pointedly not looking at the screen.

She asked, “Is this making you uncomfortable?”

“I think I said that.”

“Well, it’s making me uncomfortable, too. And if I give you this tape, how many people will see this?”

“As few as possible.” I added, “They will all be professional, trained law enforcement officers and Justice Department investigators-male and female-and they’ve seen everything.”

“They haven’t seen
me
having sex on videotape.”

“I don’t think they’re interested in the sex. They’re interested in the scene of the aircraft exploding, and that’s what I’m interested in, so if you can fast-forward to that, I’d very much like to see it. Now.”

“You’re not interested in seeing me having sex?”

“Look, Jill-”

“Mrs. Winslow to you.”

“Uh… sorry. Mrs. Winslow-”

“Jill is okay.”

I really
was
becoming uncomfortable, and I thought maybe I had a loony on my hands, but then she said, “You understand why I’m doing this?”

“I do. I completely understand why you didn’t want to come forward with this tape. Quite frankly, I’d have second thoughts myself if it was me. But we can and will edit this tape, scramble the faces, and do our best to protect your privacy. We’ll focus on the events surrounding the aircraft-”

“We’re getting to that. Pay attention.”

I heard Jill, on-screen, say, “I’m sticky. Let’s skinny-dip.”

I glanced back at the screen, and she was sitting up. Bud’s face had emerged from between Mrs. Winslow’s thighs, and he said, “I think we should go. We’ll shower at the hotel.”

Jill said to me, “I wish I’d listened to him.”

On the screen, she was standing on the blanket and looking up at the dune rising from the valley. She froze the frame, took her feet off the coffee table, and leaned toward the big screen. She said, “I look younger. Maybe a little thinner. Don’t you think?”

I looked at her perfect naked body in the last of the sunlight, which made her look golden.

“Well, what do you think?” she asked again.

I was a little tired of her ignoring my gentlemanly suggestions to skip the little bangs and get to the big bang, so I took another approach and said, “I don’t think your face has aged at all, and you’re a beautiful woman. As for your body, it looks great on videotape, and I’m sure it’s still great.”

She didn’t reply and kept staring at the screen. Finally, she said, “This was the first and last time we’d ever videotaped ourselves. I’ve never seen myself naked in a photo or on film. I certainly never saw myself having sex on film. Have you ever done that?”

“Not outdoors.”

She laughed. “Did you look foolish?”

“Yes.”

“How did
I
look?”

“No comment.”

“Do you want this tape?”

“I do.”

“Then answer my question. Did I look stupid having sex on videotape?”

“I think everyone looks a little silly having sex on film, except the pros.” I added, “This wasn’t bad for a first time. Bud, however, looked very uncomfortable. Now, may I have the remote?”

She handed it to me and said, “We were supposed to take this back to the hotel and play it to make us hot again. But I think this would have turned me off.”

This may have been the first time in my twenty years of law enforcement that I felt I needed a chaperone to look at evidence. I hit Play, and Jill Winslow’s perfect, naked body came to life. She started climbing the dune, then disappeared off-camera, but I could hear her voice say, “Come on. Set the camera up here and get us skinny-dipping.”

Bud didn’t reply, but walked toward the camera, then disappeared. The screen went black for a moment, then the scene on the screen was of a beautiful red and purple sky at dusk, the white sands of the beach, and the golden red ocean sparkling in the setting sun. I heard Jill’s voice say off-screen, “This is so beautiful.”

Bud, also off-camera, replied, “Maybe we shouldn’t go down to the beach naked. There could be people around.”

“So what?” Jill said, “As long as we don’t know them, who cares?”

Bud’s reply: “Yeah, but let’s take some clothes-” and she interrupted, “Live dangerously, Bud.”

Without realizing it, I said, “Bud’s a wimp.”

Jill laughed and agreed, “Wimp.”

There was no sound for a few seconds, and no one on the screen, then I saw her enter the picture to the far left of the screen, running across the beach toward the shore. Still no Bud. Then she turned her head back as she ran and shouted, “Come on!” But I could barely hear her at that distance from the camera, with the background noise of the wind and surf.

A few seconds later, he appeared on the screen running after her. His butt was a little flabby and bounced.

He caught up to her near the shore, and she stopped, turned around, then turned Bud around to face the camera on the dune. Jill shouted something, but I couldn’t make it out.

I asked, “What did you say?”

“Oh… something about swimming with the sharks. Pretty stupid.”

She took his hand and they waded into the water.

Bud, in my opinion, was being led around by his dick. He really never initiated anything, and didn’t seem to be enjoying himself as much as, say, I would in that situation. I asked Jill, “How long did this affair last?”

“Too long. About two years.” She added, “I’m not as embarrassed about the sex on tape as I am about who I did it with.”

“He’s very good-looking.”

“So am I.”

Good point.

They were cavorting in the calm sea, washing each other front and back, then looking out at the sea and sky. She seemed to be saying something, but it was totally inaudible. I asked her, “What did you say there?”

“I don’t remember. Nothing important.”

I looked at the running clock in the lower right of the screen. It was 8:19P.M. TWA Flight 800 from Kennedy Airport was just lifting off the runway and was about to begin its climb over the ocean.

Jill and Bud were talking as they stood waist deep in the water, and I could see by the expression on Bud’s face that something she said had annoyed him. Before I could ask, she said to me, “I think I was finally telling him that he was overly cautious about everything, and he got annoyed with me. In a few seconds, I grab his rear end… there… he was still annoyed, and he wanted to leave, but I wanted to do it on the beach, like in From Here to Eternity, so…”

She grabbed his thing-a-ma-jig and said something. He didn’t look as happy as he should have been at that moment, and began looking around as if to see if they were alone. She didn’t literally lead him by his dick, but figuratively she led him by his dick, although she was now holding his hand as she led him back to the shore.

The running clock said 8:23P.M. TWA Flight 800 was about three or four minutes into its flight and was banking left, toward the east, toward Europe.

Jill and Bud were standing on the shore, full frontal nude, but they seemed to have forgotten about the camera because neither of them looked up at where it was positioned on the dune about fifty yards away. The sun had set, but there was a little light left on the horizon and in the sky, and I could still see their naked bodies silhouetted against the sea and sky.

Jill said something to Bud, and he obediently lay down on his back in the sand. She got on top of him, and I could see her hand going between their bodies to put him into her.

Jill asked me, “Would my husband ever see this?”

I froze the frame at 8:27 and 15 seconds. I looked in the sky to the right, to see if I could make out any aircraft lights, but I couldn’t. I scanned the horizon, to see if I saw boat lights, but there weren’t any.

“Mr. Corey? Would my husband ever see this?”

I looked at her and replied, “Only if you want him to.”

She didn’t reply.

I hit the Play button and glanced at the bottom of the screen where the lovers were doing it on the beach with the surf rolling over them. I looked at the sky, but still no aircraft lights. For the record, it was 8:29 and 11 seconds when Mrs. Winslow climaxed. I could see it, but I couldn’t hear it.

Jill Winslow lay on top of Bud Mitchell, and I could tell they were both breathing hard, then she sat up and straddled him with her legs, facing southwest. I could now see the distant lights of an aircraft, far out over the ocean-eight miles, actually, and about twelve thousand feet above the water.

She said to me, “Stop it! Stop!”

I hit the Pause button and looked at her. She stood and said, “I can’t watch this again. I’ll be in the kitchen.” She walked barefoot out of the family room.

I sat there for a full minute, looking at the frozen screen-Jill Winslow sitting on top of Bud Mitchell, the surf caught in mid-motion, the stars no longer twinkling, a thin, wispy cloud frozen like a splotch of paint on a black ceiling. And almost opposite Smith Point County Park, two lights-one red and one white-were captured on the film. You wouldn’t think they were anything other than stars in a still photograph, but in a motion picture, you would see them blinking and moving from west to east.

I got up from my chair, sat on the coffee table, and leaned toward the big plasma screen. I hit the Slow Motion button and watched closely.

At 8:29 and 19 seconds, I saw a glow on the horizon to the right, and I froze the frame. The video camera at the top of the dune was about twenty feet high, including the tripod, and from this vantage point you could see a little more than most of the eyewitnesses who’d seen this from a boat, or from ground level, which on the south shore of Long Island was barely ten feet above sea level, if that. I looked at the glow awhile and decided it could be-could be-a missile launch.

From where I’d seen the glow, I could now see a tongue of bright, red-orange light rising into the sky. It rose quickly, even in slow motion, and I could now make out a white plume of what looked like smoke, trailing behind it. I glanced at Jill and Bud, but they hadn’t seen it yet. It was 8:30 and 5 seconds, and I hit the Pause, slid off the coffee table, and knelt in front of the TV screen, staring at the point of light until my eyes got blurry. I rocked back on my haunches and continued the tape in slow motion.

There was no mistaking what I was seeing now, and what over two hundred other people had seen, including Captain Spruck, who, to be honest, I had doubted. I could see why he was so obsessed with this now that I saw it myself, and I owed him an apology. More important, the American people were owed an apology, but I didn’t know from whom.

I thought of my meeting in Jack Koenig’s office and him looking me in the eye and saying, “There is no fucking videotape of a couple screwing on the beach with the plane exploding behind them,” then, “No fucking rocket either.”

Well, fuck
you
, Jack. And fuck Liam Griffith, and fuck Ted Nash for starters. Lying bastards.

The streak of light, trailing its white plume of smoke, rose higher until it was about mid-frame on the TV screen. At this point, I saw Jill’s head turn toward the light, and she stared up at the sky, then Bud sat up quickly so they were face-to-face, then he turned and looked over his shoulder to where she was staring. The light was almost incandescent on the TV screen, and I could see it was gathering speed. I glanced at the lights of the aircraft, then back to the rising streak of light. I was too close to the TV to see the whole screen, so I stood quickly, backed up to the coffee table, and sat.

There was no audio in slow motion, but there was nothing to hear anyway, and I stared, mesmerized by what I was seeing, because I knew exactly what was going to happen.

The burning light seemed to make a sudden turn as it converged on the blinking lights, and I saw the evidence of the turn more clearly in the smoke plume, as it twisted.

A few seconds later, there was a flash of bright light in the sky, which looked strange in slow motion, like a Roman candle burst, then a few seconds after that, a huge fireball began to grow in the black sky-like a bright red flower, blossoming in a time delay film. I froze the frame at 8:31 and 14 seconds and stared at it.