Accused (42 page)

A thought occurred to Scott.

"Rebecca, you said Renée did a profile of Trey … When?"

"A couple weeks before he …"

"Did you go with him to the studio?"

"No. I was shopping in Houston that day. But they didn't do the interview at the studio. They did it here."

"Here where?"

"At the house."

Scott stared down at his ex-wife.

"Renée Ramirez was in your house?"

THIRTY-SIX

With Renée Ramirez sipping a Mimosa in the foreground and the whitecaps of the waves washing ashore in the background, it was a chamber of commerce portrait of Galveston Island.

She was a stunningly beautiful Latina in a stunningly short skirt. She had shiny brown hair and smooth tan skin but her eyes were as blue as the summer sky. Her voluptuous body strained against her snug low-cut white top. She wore a turquoise-and-silver necklace and silver coyote earrings and no wedding band. She was young, beautiful, and perched on a high stool with her long bare legs crossed as if daring Scott—or any man within eyeball range of her—not to stare.

He stared.

Scott had called her station and set up a meeting at the open-air pool bar at the Hotel Galvez on the seawall for that Monday morning. Renée had arrived first and ordered the Mimosa. Scott had arrived with his blood pressure pumping, ready to give her a piece of his mind for putting his daughters on television. She attempted to preempt his fatherly anger by appealing to his manly vanity, as if that would work.

"Those football tapes, you were quite the stud in college, Scott. You look like you could still play."

"Oh, thanks, I—" He caught himself. Damn, it almost worked. "Don't put my girls on TV again."

"Freedom of the press. You and Rebecca are news, you were in a public place, and they happened to be there with you. So how about an on-air interview?"

"No."

She pushed her lips out. "Odd. Most lawyers are begging to be on TV." She sipped her Mimosa. "Anyway, I was completely within the law."

"Just because you can doesn't mean you should."

"Should you and Rebecca have been groping each other like horny teenagers on a public beach that night?" She grinned. "That was you, wasn't it? What was that about, for old time's sake?" She shrugged. "I guess she is your ex. Screwing her is one thing, but why are you defending her?"

Scott got suspicious. He glanced around the bar for a hidden camera. He saw nothing, but he accused her anyway.

"Are you secretly taping our conversation?"

"You mean, like with a wire?"

"Or a tape recorder."

Renée slid off the stool and stepped so close to Scott he could breathe in her perfume.

"You want to pat me down?"

Yes. Desperately.

"Doesn't look like you're hiding anything. Your clothes are so tight I doubt you could get a finger in between."

"You could try."

She winked at him then climbed aboard—her stool—and assumed her legs-crossed-I-dare-you-not-to-stare position.

"So why are you defending her?"

"She's the mother of my child."

"But she cheated on you with the guy she killed!"

"She cheated with him, but she didn't kill him."

"You just can't let her go." She shook her beautiful head. "Men. You know the best way to get over her? Cheat back."

"But we're not married."

"Doesn't matter. You need to get over her—it's a psychological thing. And it'll make you feel better." She uncrossed her legs and swiveled toward him then licked her glossy lips and leaned in. "And I happen to be free today."

Leaning toward him like that, she exposed a significant portion of her full, soft breasts—which attracted Scott's male eyes. Gabe Petrocelli was right: she was as alluring and dangerous as a rattlesnake. Rattlers are pit vipers—they hunt warm-blooded prey; they swallow their victims whole; and they are conniving slithering beasts. They coil up and shake their rattles to attract your eye, to distract you, to disarm you, then—ZAP!—they strike at you with jaws wide and sink their fangs into your flesh and inject their venom. Scott tried not to stare at Renée's rattles.

"I'd be afraid of seeing a tape on the evening news."

"I doubt you're that good." She gave him another sexy wink. "But I'll guarantee confidentiality."

The man who had not been with a woman in almost two years wanted to say, "Let's get a room!" But the lawyer representing his ex-wife on a murder charge said, "I doubt anything is confidential with you."

She frowned and sat up, taking her rattles with her. The lawyer had spoiled a perfect human encounter, as lawyers are wont to do. But the man was comforted by the knowledge that he was years away from requiring a Viagra prescription.

"Why'd you air that tape just two weeks before the trial?"

"Sweeps week. Ratings. Sex sells, Scott. I'm hoping the networks will pick it up when the trial starts."

"You're hoping Trey's murder advances your career?"

She rolled her blue eyes. "Save the righteous indignation, Scott. I know lawyers. And I know a lawyer's only measure of success is money and the things money can buy. Why do you want to be a federal judge, to save the world? Or because it's a taxpayer-guaranteed lifetime salary? You're willing to have your career advanced by an asshole like Armstrong, but you're judging me?" She almost laughed. "Lawyers are always so goddamned self-righteous, always ready to criticize everyone else's ambitions and denounce everyone else's desires—at eight hundred dollars an hour." She shrugged. "Besides, I didn't kill him."

He shook his head.

"Look, Scott, I graduated with straight As in journalism, but the only job offer I got was as a weather girl—and only because of my looks. I put myself through UT modeling for local stores in Austin, could've signed with a New York agency but I wanted a serious profession, like journalism. Turns out I was still modeling. Five years standing in front of a green screen pointing out cold fronts and high-pressure systems. Now I'm thirty years old. My time to jump to the networks is running out fast. This body won't last forever. I've got to spend two hours a day in the gym to compete."

"For men?"

"For jobs. In TV, you get fat, you get fired. Women, anyway. Men can be old and fat and on-air, but women—once you put on a few pounds and the face sags, you're history. And that goddamn HDTV highlights every flaw. This is my shot, Scott. Minorities are in right now. You watch the network morning shows? Looks like the goddamned General Assembly at the UN. The Hispanic population is exploding, so every morning show has a pretty Latina. I want to be the next one. I'm an educated, articulate, hot-looking Hispanic—I'm perfect for today's demographics. Wall Street's vying for our business and Washington for our votes—why do you think we finally got a Supreme Court justice? It's our time. It's my time."

She drank her Mimosa.

"Scott, I'm sorry you're upset about your kids, but this is my moment, and I'm not going to let it pass me by. I just need something big to catch a network's eye."

"Like a murder case?"

"I don't make the news. I just report it."

"Who's your source at the courthouse?"

"That's confidential."

"You're tainting potential jurors."

"A lifetime on this island tainted them."

"You're denying my client her right to a fair trial."

"Take it up with Shelby."

Renée sipped her drink. Scott eyed her manicured fingers wrapped around the damp glass.

"I'm filing for a change of venue this morning."

"Good luck with that."

"You don't think I can get the trial moved?"

"Not in our lifetime."

"Why not?"

"Scott, the typical murder case on the Island, it's drug violence—black on black, brown on brown. Go to the trial, won't be anyone there except the victim's family, if them. Case gets two sentences in the Metro section, not even a mention on my station's evening news. Why? Because Anglos could care less if blacks and Latinos are killing each other. More the merrier, they think."

She drank her Mimosa and shook her head.

"Hurricane Ike white-washed the Island, destroyed the public housing, sent the blacks and Latinos fleeing to the mainland, which made a lot of Anglos giddy—like your buddy Armstrong. They think Ike did the Island a favor, that an all-white Island will attract more tourists and rich folks to buy beach houses—and maybe get a casino here. So they don't want to rebuild the public housing—the minorities are gone and they want them to stay gone. That's the way it is here, Scott. That's why I want to get the hell out of here. This case—a star pro golfer stabbed by the Guilty Groupie—this is front-page news, lead story on every Houston newscast, updates on the network morning shows. This murder case is my ticket off this fucking island."

Renée finished her Mimosa then slid off her stool and slithered over to the exit. She had a nice slither. At the door she stopped and turned back to Scott—he thought to see if he were looking at her—but she said, "And it's Shelby's ticket, too."

THIRTY-SEVEN

"I'm not losing this case because you can't keep your dick in your pants!"

It was a week later—one week before the trial—and Judge Shelby Morgan was pointing a long manicured finger at Scott. The prosecution and defense teams had crowded into the judge's chamber for the pretrial conference.

"It's not your case to win or lose, Judge. It's ours. Issue a gag order."

"I can't do that. There's a little thing called the First Amendment."

"Then move the trial to Austin or San Antonio, out of the range of the Houston TV stations—everyone down here has seen Renée's reports. My client can't get a fair trial in Galveston County."

"He's right, Shelby," the D.A. said. "Between Renée and whoever the hell is leaking the evidence to her, we'll have a heck of a time seating a jury of twelve folks who haven't made up their minds about the case. Hell, a week in Austin won't be that bad. You can look up old friends from your UT days."

The judge shook her head. "Moving the case now, seven days before trial, that'd screw up the cable deal for sure. Motion for change of venue is denied."

"What cable deal?" Scott said.

"Renée made a deal with cable TV, they're going to air the entire trial, start to finish."

"You're going to let her televise the trial? Judge, didn't you watch O.J.'s trial? It was a farce, everyone playing to the cameras."

The D.A. nodded. "Shelby, that was a train wreck of a trial. TV cameras bring out the worst in everyone—jurors, witnesses, cops"—he glanced at the Assistant D.A.—"lawyers. You don't want to go there."

The judge leaned back in her chair, obviously weighing the pros and cons of TV cameras in her courtroom. Right now, she stood first in line for the federal bench; a bad TV experience and she could fall from first to last. On the other hand, a masterful performance could send her straight to the federal appeals court, a short step away from the Supreme Court. She sat forward in her chair.

"Yes—I do want to go there."

"But, Judge—"

"I've made my decision, Mr. Fenney."

She shuffled papers on her desk.

"Motion to suppress the fingerprint evidence is denied. Motion to suppress the toxicology report, denied. Motion to suppress all evidence found at the house due to lack of a search warrant, denied. Motion to limit the crime scene photos shown to the jury, denied."

"Scott," the D.A. said, "I won't go overboard with those. But the jury has a right to see the victim I'm representing and the crime they're sitting in judgment of."

"Any other motions?" the judge said.

"Yes, Your Honor," Karen said. "Motion to exclude the expert testimony of Dr. Holbrooke, the prosecution's psychiatrist. Our client is charged with murder, not manslaughter, which requires that she 'intentionally or knowingly' caused Trey Rawlins' death. If the doctor is going to testify that she didn't know what she was doing because of the cocaine and alcohol, then he's testifying that she had no intent."

"Then you should want him to testify."

"Your Honor," the Assistant D.A. said, "the doctor is not going to testify that she didn't know what she was doing, but that the cocaine may be why she can't remember doing it."

"Your Honor," Scott said, "this is junk science. You can't allow that testimony in."

"I can and I am. The Rules of Evidence say admission of expert testimony is at the sole discretion of the trial judge. You want to appeal my ruling, you've got to prove I abused my discretion. Which means unless I'm screwing the expert, you've got no chance on appeal."

"I don't care if you're screwing the expert, Judge, just that you're screwing my client."

She didn't appreciate that comment.

"Jury selection on Friday, nine
A.M.
We're done."

"A TV trial," Scott said to the D.A. on their way out of the courtroom, "that's going to be a circus."