Death on the River Read online

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  DeQuarto and Skarkas returned to the room, DeQuarto carrying Angelika’s purse, and DeQuarto asked if he could have the keys to the Jeep. She told him to go ahead and get them out. DeQuarto didn’t want to go into her bag to retrieve them, but Angelika insisted. They left after a couple of minutes, with DeQuarto promising to get the fan turned on to pull the smoke out of the room. Skarkas returned moments later with coffee and excused Angelika to go to the restroom with a female officer.

  When Skarkas and Angelika had settled back in with cups of coffee, Skarkas continued his push for a confession. “This is your window of opportunity,” he said. “This is for you to provide what I call your slice of the pie, your version of the truth from your perspective. There’s only one person in the world that can provide that perspective, and that’s you. You don’t want other people or other things to portray a picture of you that’s going to be unfair. And, obviously, the facts are what the facts are. We obviously talked about some of them at length. And one of the things I want to tell you is that we’re the police, we’re not the morality police, you know what I mean? And I know that you said, ‘Oh, this is fucked up,’ or whatever, but you know what? What’s more, this is real life. This is real life. I know that they say everyone walks around with their proverbial masks on or whatever, but that’s not really what goes on behind closed doors, people’s relationships and lives and there’s explanations for everything. One of the things I wanted to talk about is some of the time frames we talked about just don’t match up.”

  “Okay. Which ones?”

  “From the time you leave Bannerman Island to the time you make the nine-one-one call, all right? That duration of time is about forty minutes, which is right around—is long enough for you to be back at Plum Point, you know, onshore.”

  “Yeah.”

  When he pointed to the delay before she called 911, she elaborated on her story. Originally, she’d told him that all Vince had said was, “Call nine-one-one.” Now she claimed she’d asked, “Right now? Now when I’m trying to save you?” and he’d repeated his request to call 911.

  Skarkas challenged her, encouraging her to be honest. “The fact of the matter is, you didn’t want to save him. We talked about that. You don’t have to sugarcoat it. Listen, you wanted him gone, right? Did you do anything to make that happen more quickly? Did you pull the oar away? Did you pull the kayak away?”

  “No. I didn’t pull the kayak or oar away,” she said, shaking her head.

  Referring to the kayak paddle, Skarkas said, “You said to me before that you took it. In taking that oar, it was a part of you that wanted him to be gone. You knew taking that oar from him—”

  “I didn’t take it from him on purpose,” Angelika insisted, suppressed anger strangling each word. “I didn’t take it from him, like grabbing it from his hand so he couldn’t have it.” She paused, trying to organize her words before speaking out loud.

  She told Skarkas that she could see Vinny’s kayak filling up with water because of the missing plug and the forceful waves. “He handed me the oar.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “And I took it,” she said. Adding more detail to the conversation while Vince was in the water, she now said that she had urged Vince to swim toward her.

  “My question to you, and I’ll be direct, you wanted him to be dead. You took steps for him to die. Did you do anything at that moment that made it easier, faster or better? You know what I mean. You didn’t want to save him. You wanted to be free. You’re trapped. You’re in this relationship that you feel trapped in, that you wanted to escape from.”

  Angelika didn’t deny his assessment but said, “All I did was try to paddle towards him and stay afloat myself and make sure the phone was in my lap, just in case I needed to call.”

  “The thing is when he goes under—and we’ve already talked about this—there was a sense of happiness and relief which, regardless of what anyone else may think, those are your emotions, those are your words, your feelings, not mine. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Like I said, we’ve got to own our words, own our feelings. You wanted him to be dead. He goes under the water. You know he’s going to drown. There’s happiness and some relief. Did you do anything to make sure that was going to happen? Did you do anything to make sure you can feel that relief? Did you take the oar out of his hands? Did you pull the kayak away from him?”

  “No. None of that.”

  “You just didn’t do anything proactively to try to save him.”

  “I did,” Angelika insisted. “I tried to paddle towards him. But my arms were tired.”

  “Why did you do that if you wanted him dead?”

  “I didn’t. I didn’t and I did.”

  Skarkas kept trying to prompt her into a direct answer. “At that moment, did you do anything—besides the fact of obviously taking the plug out—did you do anything beyond that to make sure that was going to happen?”

  “I stayed on the line with nine-one-one. What I should have done was make the call and then paddled, but I didn’t.”

  Then he asked about the witness who’d observed her intentionally capsizing her kayak. “Why did you do that? What’s the real reason why you did that? What did you want them to think?”

  “That I was trying to save him.”

  “Okay.”

  “That I was doing everything I could to save him.”

  Skarkas asked if she’d had her story planned out before she left Plum Point. Angelika denied it, shaking her head vigorously.

  Investigator Skarkas asked her to describe her whole day again, leading up to when she and Vince drove to Plum Point. As she told her story, Don DeQuarto returned to the room and slipped back into his seat against the wall.

  Angelika repeated her claim that she did not think about the possibility of Vince dying in the river that day until his kayak started taking on water, DeQuarto reminded her that she’d told him she wanted Vince to have a good final meal and that when they’d stopped at Wendy’s she’d considered that his “last supper.” That, he said, showed that she was thinking about it before arriving at the riverside.

  “I don’t want to talk about my past,” she said. She rose and walked over to the door, her back to the detectives.

  Skarkas said, “You don’t need to talk about your past.”

  She walked back to the table, wiped tears from her eyes, and returned to her chair. DeQuarto encouraged her to release whatever she was holding back. She said that she couldn’t say it—she could write it in her journal, but she could not speak of it.

  “Tell us what was going through your head that afternoon about what was going to happen on that Hudson River,” Skarkas said.

  She struggled to find words, making senseless hand gestures as she worked up to a full sentence. “It just felt like something good was coming out of it.”

  “Out of his death? Something good?” Skarkas asked.

  “I had to go along with the traffic that day.”

  “That makes sense,” DeQuarto said, “but can you explain it a little more, so I can get a better picture?”

  “I’m very stubborn,” she told them, steepling her hands. “And I’m set in my ways. And go for what I want. And no matter how long it takes, I get what I want, regardless of others. I keep on moving forward. I help people who are necessary for what I want.”

  “What do you want?” DeQuarto asked.

  “I want to travel the world—”

  “No, what did you want that day?”

  “That day? I wanted to be free,” Angelika said.

  “And you wanted him to die.”

  “If you put it that way.”

  “I’m not putting it that way. What’s the answer? You know what the answer is. What’s the answer, Angelika?”

  After a pause, she said, “I wanted him gone.”

  “And that would set you free.”

  “I didn’t want him, like, gone, gone. That�
��s why I wanted to have a kid.”

  “You wanted him gone, but he would live on in the child. His spirit would live on,” DeQuarto said, appealing to her strong sense of spirituality.

  Angelika nodded her head and mumbled an unintelligible response.

  Skarkas moved the discussion to the moment Vince had capsized: “What are your feelings and emotions knowing that this was going to happen?”

  “I’m like, ripping in two halves,” Angelika said. “You know, like angels and demons.”

  “Mmm-hmm. What’s the demon side saying?”

  “The demon side—ah, it’s not a good side. You guys don’t want to see that side of me.”

  “Nobody does,” Skarkas said.

  “That side was telling me: This is what’s going to happen, just let it happen. Just let it—but the good side was saying: Save him. Save him. You can do it. You’re strong.”

  “Why did the demon side win out?” DeQuarto asked.

  “Well, because of the way he was treating me, you know.”

  “We’ve all got that. One little guy has a pitchfork, the other has little wings, right? Sitting on our shoulders. Sometimes one wins, sometimes the other.”

  “I’m reckless, reckless. I have no fear.”

  “Did you realize the devil side was coming out?”

  “Yeah, yeah, like when it gets dark outside.”

  “That’s what I asked you before,” Skarkas said, “and maybe now you’ll open up. The demon side, did you do anything else when he was in the water that would ensure that he would die out there? Did you take that paddle out of his hands? Did you pull that kayak away? Did you do anything?”

  “I did not pull that kayak. I did not pull the paddle.”

  “You just knew that you didn’t need to do anything, that he was going to drown?”

  “Yeah, yeah.” She told them her “two sides” hadn’t argued about what to do.

  Skarkas disagreed. “You know, I think there was some of that. You said you knew he was going to die. You knew it was his last day. There was this happiness and relief when he goes under the water. When you took that plug out, that was the first step. That was the demon side of you knowing that was the first step towards making you free?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t want to think that, but I guess so.”

  “I know you don’t want to quote, unquote, admit it, but it’s the truth. Correct?”

  When Angelika did not respond, DeQuarto said, “So you’re free.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You got what you want.”

  After Angelika let out a heavy sigh, Skarkas said, “When we’re done, you can cover it back up again, that’s fine. But for now, how long before that day were you thinking about a way he could die, and you would be free?”

  “I wasn’t,” she protested, throwing a hand over her mouth.

  “Really?” Skarkas said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

  “The way to be free. We were planning a wedding on August 15, which is exactly fifteen years since I came to the states—that was a day that was meaningful to me.”

  “But that’s not what I’m asking,” Skarkas said. “What I’m asking you is when did you think, ‘He needs to die and I’m going to take some steps to make sure that happens’?”

  “‘And be free,’” DeQuarto added.

  “‘Be free. And be out of this controlling relationship.’”

  “I wasn’t thinking that,” she said.

  Angelika wavered as Skarkas asked the question again and again. She balled her hands into fists in her lap. Once they were on the island, she said, “I had my towel in my hand and I said I’m unhappy and I’m going to end it.”

  “Then you were what? Your emotion?”

  “Happy.”

  DeQuarto asked, “Did you think those thoughts when you guys had an argument the last time?”

  “That was Saturday night.”

  “You wanted to be free?”

  “I always wanted to be free.”

  Skarkas pressured her about when she took the plug out, insisting it was that Sunday, but Angelika stuck to her original story that it had been a while since she had done so. Skarkas wasn’t buying it. “No way, no way,” he said. They argued, Skarkas getting progressively more belligerent. When Angelika had had enough, she asked to speak to “Donnie” alone. Skarkas granted her request and left the room.

  “I did not take the plug out that weekend,” she told DeQuarto. She asked him if he wanted the date she’d removed it.

  “I just want the truth,” he said.

  Angelika pleaded for more time to think. She breathed deeply. Her legs tucked underneath her body, she extended her hands across her thighs and made yoga mudras with her hands as if in meditation practice.

  DeQuarto played the good cop to the max. He talked about being with her from day one, learning about her, and coming to understand her. “You let me in today. Yes, and you know what? That made me understand why this happened—everything, why this incident took place. It made me understand it. And you know what was before that?”

  “What? A great big jumbled mess.”

  “It looked like—it didn’t look good. But now it’s explainable why something like this happened, because I know what happened in your past. And it was okay to tell me that because it made me—it painted a picture for me of what occurred. Like I said. There’s a little piece you’re still holding back from me. I’m not here to hurt you. I’m not. I’m here to help you through this. To help everyone through this. To put this to bed. To close it.” He pushed her to tell him why she took the plug out, but she steadfastly said she did not know why.

  She seemed as if she wanted to answer his questions but couldn’t. No matter how many ways he posed the question, she said that she couldn’t remember when she’d removed the plug and the ring.

  “I know you took that plug out the beginning of April, but I want to know the reason why you took it out. I know why. You know why. We both know why, but I need you to—”

  Angelika finished his sentence. “To set it free.”

  “I need to know the reasoning why you took that plug out. I need you to be straight up with me. Honesty. The truth will set you free.” He then moved to talking about what she did to cause Vinny to submerge in the water. She said she hadn’t done anything and DeQuarto reminded her that was not what she’d said earlier.

  “Well, you keep asking me,” she said in an exasperated tone.

  “That’s because you keep changing your story.”

  “Because I don’t remember the whole thing,” she argued.

  “Put yourself in my shoes—”

  “I know everyone thinks I’m lying and I’m on drugs and I’m not—”

  “I don’t think—listen, I don’t think you’re on drugs—I’m not judging you at all.”

  “I know you are not. I’m saying out there.”

  “We’re trying to complete an investigation here. Do you know how much hours and time we put into this?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  ‘No, you don’t have to be sorry. We’ve spent a lot of time—helicopters, boats—there are a lot of unanswered questions that are going to surface and a lot of them are going to surface with time. We’ve put in so much time and caring for you not to give me one hundred percent.”

  “I’m doing that—I’m trying to.”

  He acknowledged that she was having trouble remembering and that was okay, that it was why he was spending so much time with her. She admitted that she wanted Vince gone and their kayaking trip was an opportunity for that, that she knew the kayak plug was out that Sunday, that there was a possibility that the kayak would fill up with water, and that he drowned as a result. She also admitted again that she felt better now that he was gone and she was free.

  They ran through the timeline again. Then DeQuarto left her in the room by herself.

  She swung her legs restlessly and then tried to sit still and focus on her breathing. Soon she was up doing yo
ga stretches to settle her nerves. She had just started a series of warrior poses when Skarkas returned to the room. She continued her yoga as he asked her questions. First, he wanted to know how she’d met DeQuarto at the island that morning and she said she’d called him. He confirmed that she went there of her own free will. Then he asked about the memorial at Shadows and she said it was for his friends.

  All the while, Angelika continued doing yoga and Skarkas had finally had enough. He asked her to take a seat. She said she didn’t want to.

  “I’d rather you sit, please.”

  For a while she just stared at him, then took a few deep breaths and returned to the chair. Her mannerisms turned drastically different. With DeQuarto, she’d relaxed in a slouch in the chair and kept her eyes focused on him when he spoke. Now with Skarkas, her back was rigid and she looked at the wall, the floor, or the surface of the table.

  Where DeQuarto was beseeching and sympathetic, Skarkas was blunt. He told her she was lying and he told her she’d killed Vince. She countered that she wasn’t lying but also didn’t want to admit to killing him.

  “The truth is, you took that plug out because you wanted to kill him, you wanted him to be dead, you wanted to be free.”

  Angelika argued again that she’d taken the plug out a long time before.

  “Because you wanted him to die,” Skarkas pointed out.

  “Yes,” Angelika said.

  “We’re talking semantics. By taking that plug out, you killed Vinny. Correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “And you wanted that to happen. Correct?”

  Angelika took a breath and arched her back. “Correct.”

  “And you feel happy and relieved that it happened, that he’s dead.”

  “Yes.”

  After a twenty-second pause, Skarkas said, “See, that wasn’t all that hard.”