If You Really Loved Me (38 page)

"Jay?"

"Yeah. What's up?"

"You said to call. What are you doing?"

"Getting ready to go to my kids' parade. What are you doing?"

"I have something to tell you."

". . . Yeah?"

"I was ashamed before—to tell you the whole truth. I just couldn't say it," she said softly.

"What?"

"Jay ... I did it. I was the one who actually pulled the trigger. ... I lied to you. I'm sorry."

Newell hung up the phone. How did he feel? He wasn't sure at first, and then he felt a surge of relief. Deep within his bones, he knew he had just heard the final truth, the terrible secret Cinnamon had kept submerged for years. They would no longer have to worry about the tiny tears in the fabric of Cinnamon's story. Jay Newell had been fairly certain that David himself hadn't pulled the trigger; the man was a coward.

Patti's part of it all was still a question mark.

He remembered Cinnamon saying plaintively, "Daddy, does it
really
matter who pulled the trigger?" Under the law, it really didn't.

When Jeoff Robinson heard that Cinnamon had admitted the shooting, he remembered being "totally relieved." Both Robinson and Newell were still convinced that David had set the whole murder scheme in motion, orchestrated it, pulled all the strings, and let someone else do the unpleasant part.

That still made him guilty as hell in the eyes of the law. It is a tenet in California law (and in almost every other state): "vicarious liability." Principals who aid and abet a crime are equally guilty. Anyone who aids, abets, instigates, promotes, or encourages murder is guilty of that murder, just as guilty—if not more so in some cases—as the actual killer.

32

I
t was Halloween when Newell headed north to see Cinnamon once again, this time to hear it all. The air grew crisp. It smelled like Halloween, and he thought of how excited his own kids were. His oldest daughter was now the same age Cinnamon had been on the night Linda died. Fourteen. He remembered now the Ocean Breeze neighbor girl's scorn as she laughed at Patti and Cinnamon for dressing up on Halloween. They had had such precious little time to be children; that night in 1984 had to have been one of their last attempts.

Patti, at least, must already have been playing David's "killing" game.

Even though, as a detective, Newell was eager to hear what Cinnamon had to say, this day would be rough. She looked pale and frightened when she came over from her "cottage." Newell took his time. They had lunch and talked about easy things, until he could sense that Cinnamon was relaxing.

Cinnamon nodded as he said, "You have told me that it was not true what you told me about being outside. Okay, everything else that we talked about that day—when Detective McLean and I came up here and talked to you on August 10—was
that
true?"

"Up until the time of her death—yes."

There was a symmetry in the way all of them— Cinnamon, Patti, David, Art Brown—had reconstructed the day of the murder, right down to the menu and the games they had played. That was the easy part. But now Cinnamon had to continue on with a chillingly true version of what happened next.

"Linda was already in the room taking a shower. . . . Me and Patti were left in the living room. My father was in there for a little bit, talking to us. He had left the living room and went in there with Linda. Me and Patti were in the game room; we were watching TV."

It was quite late—she wasn't sure of the time, but they had been watching music videos. "Patti fell asleep on the floor; I told her to get up, go sit on the couch . . . and we ended up going in Patti's room to go to sleep. . . . Later on that night—I'm not sure how long it was, but I know I was asleep—he came in and woke us up."

"Okay. Who came in?"

"My father. ... He came in, and he woke us up, and he said, 'It has to be done tonight.' And he was to the effect saying that, if I loved him, then I would do it for him."

Newell had to help Cinnamon so much more in this interview. Her words and thoughts did not emerge easily, but caught themselves up and held on tight. It was too ugly to think about. Too ugly to say out loud.

"The same thing that he had talked about before then? Right?"

"Right. He was saying basically the same thing . . . and he said it had to be done tonight. And I was asking him
why?
And he just said, you know, 'Otherwise, I won't be here anymore. Linda's going to kill me.' "

"Did you guys stay in the room, all three of you, or what?"

No, Cinnamon remembered that David and Patti had talked softly between themselves, and then her father had instructed her to go with him. He led her to the door of his bedroom and told her to be quiet. "He went in and got some bottles and brought them out."

She didn't know what they were, just some prescription bottles. Then her father had led her to the kitchen and told her to get a glass of water.

"I took them. . . ."

"Took what?"

"The pills he told me to."

She had no idea how many pills there were. "He told me to take them. I took them. I was having a hard time swallowing them. He just said, 'Do what you can do.' I told him I felt like it was going to come back up again."

But she had kept swallowing pills, handfuls of orangey pills, and some other kinds of pills from a new vial her father opened. When she was done, he led her back to Patti's room. David was inflexible. "My father was talking about 'it has to be done tonight. It
has
to be done
tonight.
. . . And one of you is going to have to shoot her. That's the only way I can think of. That's the only way it's going to work.'

"He was telling me I had to shoot myself to look like I tried—like I was sorry."

Newell's surprise showed in his voice. "Shoot
yourself?
What do you mean, shoot yourself?"

"He told me that after Linda was shot—to shoot myself in the head with the gun."

"Well . . . Okay. How were you supposed to do that? -What did you say to that?"

"I told him I was too scared."

"How were you supposed to shoot yourself in the head, Cinnamon, and not get hurt? I don't understand."

"He said that if I shot myself—just to where it would nick my head and make it look like I tried to kill myself. But I told him no, I was too afraid. And he said, 'Well, then, if you don't want to do that, then we'll just go with the medication.'"

There had been no gun in sight at this point, and Cinnamon didn't even know if there was one—beyond the big guns in the locked gun case. David explained to her that he was going to leave the house, "and when he came back, you know, if it wasn't
done,
then he was going to leave . . . leave me. Or he was going to kill himself. Or do
something.
Or Linda was going to kill him. He kept on saying that. And he said, 'You girls—' He was telling us in a way, 'You girls take care of business while I'm gone.'"

And then David had handed Cinnamon a brown-upholstered pillow from the back of his recliner. "And he told me to hold it over the gun. And I was going to ask him,
'What gun?'
'Cause I didn't have the gun."

Cinnamon had no idea what the pillow was for. "I assume it was either to stop the noise or to stop powder or something from flying."

David had gone back once more to confer with Patti about something, and then he had left the house. "Patti went back to her room, though I was, like, blown away. ... I went in the room and Patti was already sitting down, and she was moving the towel and started wiping off the gun."

David had given
Patti
the gun. And the towel. Newell asked where the towel had come from. Cinnamon didn't know; it was just a folded bath towel, with a gun between the folds. "I know she was wiping off the gun, but I'm not sure if she wiped off the bullets or not."

And then Patti had handed the gun to Cinnamon and asked, "Daddy told you what to do with the pillow?"

"She handed me the gun," Cinnamon said almost whispering. "I'm not sure if I pulled it—the thing—back or if she did it. . . . She was—she was telling me all I had to do was pull the trigger. . . . She told me to go in, go in. Daddy told me to. And fire the gun."

This was obviously so exquisitely painful for Cinnamon. Until this moment, as her words fell into the October air and became solid, living entities, none of it had been real. She could take that night and turn it around in her mind and cover it with veils so that the terrible part was deep inside.

Tears ran down her face.

"Okay," Newell said quietly. "So tell me what you did."

"Otherwise, Daddy would, you know, be hurt. So I ... I went. I was holding the pillow the whole time—with the gun. I went in Linda's room. I don't know where I was standing in the room, 'cause I was too scared. I just fired the gun."

She could not remember if she was close to Linda or close to the bed. Yes, she knew where Linda was supposed to be in the dark room. She knew which side of the bed Linda slept on.

"I was just walking in the door. And I fired the gun. ... I just fired it in that direction. And the pillow got stuck in the gun when I fired it. And I didn't know if I had broken it... so I ran back to Patti's room."

Patti had Krystal in her arms, as David had told her to do, so that she would be safe. The two teenagers, with the baby between them, had struggled with the pillow to pull it from where it was caught against the hammer. The trigger wouldn't work, and Cinnamon was sure she had broken the gun.

And then there was a roar that deafened both of them for moments. "And somehow I pulled the trigger. ... I was afraid that I hit Krystal 'cause Krystal was right there near the end of the gun. ... I was panicking."

Newell shuddered to think of how close it must have been. With Patti and Cinnamon hysterically tugging at the pillow and the gun, and the baby between them. It was a miracle they hadn't shot the baby.

"The baby looked like she was scared from the noise too. . . . Patti mumbled something about 'that's an accident.'. . . The gun wasn't supposed to go off in her room. She was pretty upset about that."

When their ears stopped ringing, they heard another sound, a whining, animal-like sound.

It was Linda. Linda wasn't dead. It was an eventuality that no one had thought of.

She wasn't really saying words, but she was half-crying, half-moaning. It didn't sound like Linda, but there was no one else in the house except the three of them and the baby.

Cinnamon was holding Krystal, trying to calm her after the loud boom in her ear, and Patti held the gun. Cinnamon watched Patti pull the hammer back. "She handed it back to me, and I handed her Krystal. And she told me to go—go in there. And it—when I entered the room, I didn't hear Linda. I didn't hear anything."

"She wasn't saying anything, moaning or anything?" Newell asked.

"No, I didn't hear anything. And I just did what I was told to. And I fired it again. And I was ... the noise again . . . my ears were ringing. And I couldn't concentrate. And I was scared and I dropped the gun."

It was quiet in the master bedroom now. Cinnamon couldn't see anything. She had seen nothing this night in the dark room. She had just fired the cocked gun Patti gave her.

Twice.

Like an automaton, Cinnamon followed the rest of the plan. She took the "suicide note" from her trailer and went out to the doghouse.

Sitting with Jay Newell, Cinnamon sobbed as she let herself, finally, go all the way back to March 19, 1985.

"Did your father or anyone ever come out to that doghouse while you were out there?"

"No."

"Okay. Cinnamon, now I need to ask you . . . when you told me and McLean that you were outside when you heard the shots, after hearing your dad drive away in a car—why did you tell me that lie?"

"Because I'm ashamed that I loved my father enough to shoot Linda. I'm
ashamed
of it
.
And I didn't want to admit it. Or accept it."

Cinnamon had called her mom and told Brenda the truth before she had called Jay Newell. And Brenda had told her it was all right—that it was time for her to tell the complete truth.

Cinnamon was drained now, shivering from the shock of it.

"You know how many of those pills you got down?" Newell asked.

"No ... He was just telling me to take as much as I could swallow."

"Did your dad ever show you how to hold the gun to your head . . . and shoot yourself?"

"Not that night, but he did before. When he was talking about me writing the note. He was talking about how I'd have to make it look like I tried to kill myself."

". . . You knew that it would be pretty damaging to put a gun to your head and shoot, didn't you? I mean, your own head?"

"Yeah . . . and I was wondering why he wanted me to do it."

Newell knew it would be well nigh impossible to "just nick yourself" when pointing a gun to your own head, short of shooting an ear off. Her father had told her to take what might have been a lethal dose of pills
and
shoot herself. She still believed he had wanted it to "look like" she had tried to commit suicide. Clearly, her death was an integral part of his plan. And yet, while Cinnamon could now shoulder the blame for what she had done, she seemed unable to face the possibility that her father had intended for her to die. It would be a long time before she could face that.

She did not remember talking to anyone at the hospital. She did not remember talking to Fred McLean. She only remembered being sicker than she had ever been in her life, and waking up, a long time later, in the hospital. From that moment on, Cinnamon Brown had been locked up, both physically and in a blurry cage of her own making.

In a sense, she was free now.