'I hope so, and please feel free to call me if you do want me to investigate the death of your husband.'

Joan returned, crooked her finger at Lorraine then jerked her thumb, indicating for her to leave, sharpish.

Cindy didn't even look at Joan. 'Right now I'm more worried about what's going to happen to me, because I didn't do it. I never shot Harry, but a lot of his friends won't believe it.'

'Why?'

Cindy Nathan gave that little shrug of her shoulders again. "Cos I was always threatening him. I never got around to doing anything, though.'

'Well, somebody did. You're sure it was your husband in the swimming pool?'

Joan became slightly aggressive. 'Come on, don't get me in trouble. Out now.'

Cindy Nathan's wide, cornflower-blue eyes stared at the wall. 'Yes, yes, it was him, face down. It was Harry, all right.' And two big tears rolled down her cheeks.

Lorraine went out of the building, down the curving walkway that looked more like the approach to a smart office complex than a police department. As she bleeped open the Cherokee with her alarm key, she saw Cindy Nathan's lawyer standing by a black Rolls-Royce, parked on Rexford, arguing with two uniformed police officers. So heated was their exchange that they paid Lorraine no attention as she drove past.

The following morning, Decker was already brewing coffee and collecting the leaves the ficus trees seemed to shed every night when Tiger bounded in, almost knocking him off his feet.

'I've got all the newspapers. Mrs Nathan was released without charge last night. She's front page in most of the tabloids.'

Lorraine glanced over them. 'Well, until I hear back from her, there's not a lot I can do. She was very . . .' She frowned. She'd been thinking about her meeting with Cindy Nathan since the early hours. 'She wasn't exactly flaky, just, I don't know, not reacting the way she should have. I mean, she didn't seem to understand . . .'

'The trouble she's in?' Decker enquired, carrying Lorraine's coffee into her office.

'Yeah, I suppose so. Maybe she was in shock. They give any more details about her?'

'They certainly do. It was her automatic, by the way, slug taken from Nathan's head.'

'What?'

'She also inherits the house and about half of Maximedia, as his widow,' Decker said.

Well, she won't if they can make a murder rap stick to her.'

'Mmm, well, according to the LA Times, it looks like that's a sort of foregone conclusion.' He rummaged through the paper to find the rest of the leading article from page one. 'Apparently Cindy Nathan threatened to shoot her husband last month at Morton's restaurant. They had a big slanging match in front of a packed dining room, and they had to drag her out.'

Lorraine sipped her coffee. She was now leafing through all the various papers, in which Decker had marked the relevant stories in green felt-tipped pen. 'She said she never called us,' she remarked, lighting a cigarette.

'Well, that's ridiculous. Of course she did. And we've got it taped.'

'You taped the call?'

'All calls. I protect you at all times, ma'am.' He slipped his headphones on.

'Play it for me, would you?' Lorraine continued reading, glancing at the pictures of Cindy Nathan being assisted into the lawyer's Rolls with her hands covering her face. The press had worked fast: they also had numerous glamour shots of her she had been in a TV soap for a few weeks, but most of the photographs were sexy poses in swimsuits and lingerie. 'Shit, she's only twenty years old,' Lorraine said, not that Cindy had looked older it just surprised her that she was so young. At the bleep-bleep of the answerphone she looked up.

Decker was searching for Cindy's call. He eased off his headphones. 'I fucked up, I can't find that call.'

'Jesus Christ, Decker, this is important. We need that recording. Cindy Nathan said she never made the call to the office. If Cindy didn't make that call, somebody did, someone who knew Harry Nathan was dead maybe because they had shot him, understand, sweetheart? That call is very important.'

Decker was flushing bright red. 'You spoke to Cindy on the phone and met her. Did you think it was the same voice? I mean, do you think she made the call?'

Lorraine lifted her hands in the air. 'I dunno . . . and I'm not wasting time thinking about it. Like I just said, let's move on. I'm down seven hundred dollars on this fiasco.'

Decker was dispatched to get any back issues of articles on Cindy Nathan, and Lorraine read every newspaper. Harry Nathan had been married three times and there were photographs of Kendall Nathan, his second wife, a thin, dark woman who looked to be in her late thirties, and Sonja Sorenson, the sculptress, a tall, formidably elegant woman with prematurely white hair. Lorraine clipped out the pictures and the accompanying coverage, then tossed the rest into the trash can.

The phone rang and made her jump but she waited a moment before she picked it up. 'Page Investigations,' she said brightly.

It was Decker, speaking from the car phone. 'Hi, it's me. Turn the TV on. It just came over the radio. Cindy Nathan's been arrested for the murder of her husband.'

Lorraine hurried into Reception and switched on the TV. There was Cindy Nathan, almost hidden by a battery of cameras, being hurried into the police department. Feinstein, her lawyer, his arms wide, was trying to protect his client. She looked tiny and frightened, in a simple white linen button-through dress and carrying her jacket.

Lorraine sat on the edge of the sofa with Tiger at her feet. Then she shot up, tripping over Tiger as she snatched up a tape and rammed it into the video machine. At that moment Decker returned. 'Quick! Video this, will you?' She passed him the remote control. They recorded the coverage of Cindy Nathan's arrest every time it was screened a lot was repetitive but they learned that she came from Milwaukee and had left at fifteen after winning a beauty competition. A few modelling jobs followed, and then her short stint in the soap drama Paradise Motel in which she played a chambermaid, not very well.

Harry Nathan was more handsome than Lorraine had expected, a tall, lean, muscular man with dark hair, worn quite long, and a dazzling, though somehow charmless smile. The still photographs of him were glamorous, mostly taken at society functions, premieres, Oscar nights, with celebrities on his arm. His associates from the studio said in interviews that Nathan would be greatly missed by all who had ever had the pleasure of working with him, and his secretary, in floods of tears, was so distraught she could hardly speak.

Lorraine continued to watch the news coverage at home. It said nothing new. There was no mention of where she was being held pending arraignment.

Nathan was a self-made millionaire and renowned art collector, who had moved from making commercials to directing zany comedy movies, which had been a big hit back in the eighties. He had then turned his attention to producing rather than directing, and had moved gradually towards cheap, adult-oriented movies on the verge of porn.

Lorraine was about to call it a night when, channel-surfing, she caught an exclusive interview with Harry Nathan's second wife, Kendall. It struck her that there had been neither comment nor reaction from the woman who had been married longest to Harry Nathan, Ms Sorenson.

Kendall Nathan whispered that she was deeply shocked by events, and also felt compassion for Cindy. She had been married to Harry Nathan for four years and knew better than anyone that he had been difficult to live with, but their divorce had been amicable, and she had continued to enjoy a deep friendship with her ex-husband. They had also remained business partners.

Then she gave a tremulous smile, her voice breaking. 'Harry was always an honourable man whose many friends will be devastated, as I am, by his tragic and untimely death.'

Most people would have focused on Kendall's performance as a grieving woman, but Lorraine was trying to ascertain whether it could have been Kendall who had called her agency.

The morning newspapers were full of the update on the shooting, and as there were no other job prospects Lorraine and Decker cut out all the articles and pinned them together with the previous day's.

At twelve they had a call from a Mrs Walgraf asking for an appointment with regard to her divorce.

At two o'clock another appointment was booked and, to Lorraine's astonishment, a third call came in at four. The next two days were busy.

After being held at the Cybil Brand Institute for Women in the female facility of the Los Angeles County jail, Cindy Nathan was duly arraigned on charges of murder, pleaded not guilty, and was released on bail, security set at three million dollars. No one saw her leave the courthouse, as she was taken out through a small back entrance because of the number of press waiting outside. Her lawyer read a statement on her behalf: she was innocent and begged to be left alone to mourn the loss of the husband she adored. She would give no further press statements or interviews in the lead-up to the trial as she was pregnant. Feinstein assured the press that he was confident that all charges against his client would be dismissed, and that Mrs Nathan needed rest and care. Her pregnancy was in the early stages and the stress of her arrest had made her ill. She was now fearful, Feinstein ended, that she might lose the child for which she and her husband had prayed.

Three weeks after Cindy Nathan's release, Lorraine had traced one missing daughter, and had discovered that Mrs Walgraf's husband had obviously been preparing for his divorce for many months before his wife had become aware of his intentions.

Mrs Walgraf did not have the money to pay Lorraine, who would not press her she felt sorry for the woman.

'Well, let's hope we get something a bit more financially rewarding next,' Decker said.

Lorraine yawned. It was almost time to leave. Tiger was stretched out on his back on the pretty cherry-coloured sofa in Reception, his legs in the air. 'He's not supposed to get up on that,' she said, irritated.

'I know, my dear, but you try and shift him!'

The phone rang and Decker snatched it up. It was the main reception downstairs. He listened, then covered the receiver. 'It's Mrs Nathan. She's downstairs. She wants to see you.'

Lorraine smiled. 'You know, I thought I'd hear from her again. Ask her to come up.'

Lorraine put on some fresh lipstick and ran a comb quickly through her hair. She was just checking her reflection when Decker tapped and opened her door. Tiger was barking and tried to get into the office between Decker's legs. 'Mrs Nathan to see you, Mrs Page. Sit!' Tiger slunk off to the sofa and lay flat on it with his head on his paws.

Decker closed the office door and returned to his desk, wishing he could be privy to the conversation. He was beginning to like the job. He'd been worried during the past week as there had been little to do, but now he couldn't wait to make a quiet call to Adam Elliot to tell him who had arrived.

Cindy Nathan wore dark glasses, a short powder blue princess-line dress, low, peep-toe shoes in white patent leather, and a silver chain and padlock, fastened tightly, like a dog collar, round her neck: a gift from her loving spouse, Lorraine had no doubt. She didn't have a purse, just a small white-leather billfold.

'Please sit down. Sorry about my dog. He's supposed to be trained, but he hasn't got it quite right yet. Can I offer you tea or coffee?'

'No, nothing, thank you.' She was perched on the edge of the chair.

'How are you?'

'Oh, I'm fine, get sick in the mornings, but they say the first few months are the worst,' Cindy said. 'Do you have children?'

Lorraine nodded. 'Two daughters. They live with their father.' She said it quickly, wanting to avoid a long conversation about births and pregnancies.

'Harry's other kid didn't live this would have been his only child. It would be terrible if it was born in prison.'

Lorraine looked at her fingers. 'Do you think that's a possibility?'

'That's why I'm here. I need someone on my side.'

'What about your lawyer?'

'Oh, I have a whole team of lawyers, LA's best.'

'And what do they say?'

'Oh, they seem pretty sure I did it. They don't say it, it's just how they ask me all these questions, over and over.'

'Do you know what the evidence is against you, Mrs Nathan?'

Cindy looked down at her toenails, painted electric blue. 'Well, the gun was mine.'

'Are your fingerprints on it?'

'Yes.'

'And they have the gun?'

'The police found it in the shrubbery by the pool.'

'Did you fire it, Mrs Nathan?'

'Yes.'

'But you've said you did not kill your husband.'

'Yes, but you asked if I fired it and I did,' Cindy said, with a childish sort of exactness. 'A few times, just practising. Once I fired it at Harry, but I missed and there were blanks in it anyway.'

Lorraine picked up a pen and twisted it in her fingers. 'Did you fire your gun on the day your husband was found dead?'

'No.'

'Where did you leave it the last time you used it?'

'In our bedroom, on my side of the bed, in a silver box. Harry had guns all over the house he was paranoid about security. He had a licence, and he even had a gun in his car.'

'Could I come out to the house, Mrs Nathan?'

Cindy nodded. 'Will you say that you're going to give me a massage? I don't want them to know. I don't think they would like it, you know, me hiring you, without telling them.'

'Who are you referring to, Mrs Nathan?'

'Oh, the lawyers and the staff.'

Lorraine leaned back in her chair. 'Did you love your husband, Mrs Nathan?'

'Yes.'

'As his widow, are you his main beneficiary?'

'I get the house and the stock he had in the company, and his second wife, Kendall, gets his share in the gallery on Beverly Drive, though the will says that if there should be issue of our marriage, then the kid would be the main beneficiary and I get a lot less. The most valuable stuff is the art in the house Harry was a collector. Feinstein says it's mine as part of the contents of the house, but Kendall's got some attorney to write claiming she and Harry agreed to split it so her half wasn't his to leave. There's something about Sonja too, but Feinstein says it won't add up to more than a few mementoes. It's all very complicated . . .' Her voice trailed off.

'I'll come and see you tomorrow, all right?'

Cindy nodded, then opened her wallet. 'You gave me your card, so I got the cheque all ready. All you got to do is fill in the amount. I don't know how much you charge, but I want you to look after me, exclusive, so that will be extra, and I'll pay extra because I don't want you to tell anybody that you're working for me. If it gets out, I'll deny it, and I'll get one of my fancy lawyers to sue you. Do you have client confidentiality?'

'Of course.'

Decker ushered Cindy Nathan out of the office and into the elevator, while Lorraine remained at her desk, staring at the looped, childish writing. She had suggested Cindy engage her on a weekly basis, and said it would be three hundred dollars a day plus expenses.

Cindy had counted on her fingers, then leaned over to use Lorraine's felt-tipped pen. 'I'm going to pay you five thousand dollars a week, and I want you for a month to start with. Then, if everything works out all right for me, I won't need you any more.'

When Decker returned, Lorraine held up the cheque between her fingers. He took it and looked stunned.

'Shit! Twenty grand! What in God's name do you have to do for that?'

Lorraine perched on the side of the desk. 'Long time ago, one of the boys arrested this old guy for passing dud cheques. When he was questioned he shrugged his shoulders and . . . he was crazy. He'd found the cheque book in a supermarket.'

'I don't follow. What's that got to do with Cindy Nathan?'

'I think she's crazy the elevator's certainly not quite going to the top floor. I wouldn't be surprised if that cheque bounced. On the other hand, she's a wealthy widow.'

Decker chuckled. 'Well, hell, let's bank it first thing in the morning, and if she's out to lunch we're laughing.'