Malice (8 page)

“And you don't believe them? Why not?” After working two cases with her, he had learned to trust her instincts.

“Because she won't tell me anything, and I know she's lying. She's terrified. And she's still defending him, as though he's going to come back from the dead and get her.”

“She won't say
anything?”

“Not really. She is frozen in pain, it's written all over her. Something terrible has happened to that girl, and she won't give it up.”

“Not yet,” he smiled at her, “but she will. I know you better than that. It's early days yet.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, but we don't have much time. The arraignment is today, and they're going to assign a P.D. to her case this morning.”

“No family attorney, or associate of her old man to take care of it for her? I would think someone would turn up.” He looked surprised as the young doctor shook her head.

“His law partner claims that he was just too close to her father to want to defend her, since she's the killer. He also says there's no money left, because of the mother's illness. Just the house, and the law practice. And he might just inherit all of it, now that she can't, and he claims her father owed him quite a bit of money. He's not offering ten cents to help in her defense, which is why I came to see you. I don't like the guy, and I don't trust him. He portrays the deceased as a saint, and claims he will never forgive the daughter for what she did. He thinks she ought to get the death penalty for it.”

“At seventeen? Nice guy.” He looked seriously intrigued now.

“And what does our girl say to all this? Does she know this guy won't help her, and may even take everything her father had, against his supposed debts?”

“Not really. But she seems ready to go down in flames for the cause, as long as she keeps her mouth shut. I think she is deluding herself that she owes that to her parents.”

“Sounds like she needs a shrink as much as an attorney.” He smiled at Molly. He liked the idea of working on another case with her. She was great to work with, and now and then he cherished a small hope that a romance would spring up between them, but it never had, and a part of him knew it never would. But it was fun to imagine sometimes. And his hopes never got in the way of their work together.

“What do you think?” Molly asked him with a worried look.

“I think she's in big trouble. What are they actually charging her with?”

“I'm not sure yet. They were talking about murder one, but I think they're having a hard time proving it. There's no real ‘inheritance’ there to provide her with a motive for premeditation, just a house and a pretty good-sized mortgage on it, and the law practice which the partner claims was promised to him anyway.”

“Yeah, but she didn't necessarily know that. And she didn't necessarily know that she couldn't inherit from her father if she killed him. They could try for murder one, if they really want to.”

“If she denies any intent to kill him, they might give her a break, and charge her with second-degree,” Molly said hopefully. “It would carry a sentence of fifteen years to life in prison. She could be forty or more by the time she was free again, if she was convicted. But at least it's not the death penalty. They've already said they're going to prosecute her as an adult, and there was some talk about the death penalty. If she'd just tell us what happened, you might even be able to reduce it to manslaughter.”

“Shit. You really did bring me a peach, didn't you?”

“Can you get assigned to it?”

“Maybe. They probably figure it's a loser anyway, with her father so prominent in the community she'll never get a fair trial here. You'd almost have to ask for a change of venue. Actually, I'd like to try it.”

“Do you want to meet her first?”

“Are you kidding?” He laughed. “Have you seen what I defend here? I don't need an introduction. I'd just like to know I have a chance. It would be nice if she'd talk to us, and tell us what really happened. If she doesn't, she could be facing a life sentence, or worse. She's got to tell us what happened,” he said earnestly, and Molly nodded.

“Maybe she will, if she trusts you,” Molly said hopefully. “I was going to go back and see her this afternoon. I still have to finish my evaluation for the department, as to whether or not she's competent to stand trial. But there's really no question of it. I was just dragging my feet a little bit because I wanted to keep seeing her. I think she needs some real live human contact.” Molly looked genuinely worried about her.

“I'll go over there with you today, if they give me the case. Let me see what I can do first. Call me at lunchtime.” He jotted down Grace's name and the case number, and Molly thanked him before she left. She was immensely relieved to think that he might be Grace's attorney. It was the best thing that could possibly happen to her. If there was any chance of saving her at all, David Glass would find a way to do it.

Molly didn't have time to call him back until after two o'clock and when she did, he was out of the office. And it was four before she had time to try again, but she was worried about what had happened. She had had a hellish day doing rounds, making evaluations for the courts, and working with a fifteen-year-old who had tried to commit suicide and failed, but left himself a quadriplegic. He had jumped off a bridge into concrete, and in this case the stamina of youth had betrayed him. Even she had to wonder if he wouldn't have been better off dead than spending the next sixty years able only to wiggle his nose and his ears. Even his speech had been affected. She called David again at the end of the day, and apologized for the delay.

“I just got back myself,” David explained.

“What did they say?”

“Good luck. They claim it's open-and-shut. She wanted his money, what little he had, according to them, but she didn't know how badly her mother's illness had eaten up their savings or that she'd never inherit if she killed him. They're holding to the theory that it was premeditated, or at the very least that they had a fight, she got mad, had a tantrum and killed him. According to them, it's all very simple. Murder one, at worst. Murder two, at best. Anywhere from twenty to life, or the death penalty if they get really crazy.”

“She's just a kid … she's a girl …” Molly had tears in her eyes as she thought of it, and then reproached herself for getting too involved, but she just couldn't help it. There was something so wrong here. “What about the defense?”

“I just don't know. There's no evidence that he attacked her or endangered her life, unless your rape theories turn out to be correct. Give me a chance, kid. They only assigned me the case two hours ago, and I haven't even met her yet. They postponed the arraignment till I could see her at least. It's at nine o'clock tomorrow morning. I thought I'd go over there at five if I can get out of here by then. Want to come? It might speed things up and break the ice, since she knows you.”

“I'm not sure she likes me though. I keep pushing her about her father and she doesn't like it.”

“She's going to like the death penalty even less. I suggest you meet me there at five-thirty. Can you make it?”

“I'll be there. And David?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks for taking it.”

“We'll do our best. See you at five-thirty at Central.”

And Molly knew as they hung up that they were not only going to have to do their best, but pray for a miracle, if they were going to help her.

Chapter 3

M
olly York and David Glass met outside the jail promptly at five-thirty, and went upstairs to see Grace. David had gotten all the reports from the police by then, and Molly had brought her notes and the ones from the hospital to show him. He glanced at them as they rode upstairs, and raised an eyebrow when he saw the pictures.

“It looks like someone hit her with a baseball bat,” he said as he looked at them, and glanced at Molly.

“She says nothing happened.” Molly shook her head, and hoped that Grace was willing to open up to David. Her life literally depended on it, and she still wasn't sure that Grace understood that.

They were led into the attorneys’ room, with the two separate doors, and the table and four chairs. It was where Molly had met Grace before and at least it would be familiar to her.

They sat down for a few minutes and waited for her. David lit a cigarette and offered one to Molly but she declined it. It was a full five minutes before the guard appeared at the window in the door to the jail, as the heavy door was unlocked, and Grace stood looking at them hesitantly. She was wearing the same jeans and T-shirt. There was no one to bring her clothes, and she had nothing else with her. All she had was what she had worn the night she had killed her father and been arrested.

He watched her carefully as she entered the room, she was tall and thin and graceful, and in some ways she looked young and shy, but when she turned to look at him, he saw that her eyes were a dozen years older. There was something so sad and defeated there, and she moved like a doe about to dash away into the forest. She stood staring at them, not sure what to make of their visit. She had spent four hours with the police that day, answering questions, and she was exhausted. They had advised her that she had the right to have an attorney present at the questioning but she had already admitted to shooting her father, and didn't think there was any harm in answering their questions.

She had gotten the message that David Glass was going to be her attorney, and he would be over to see her later. She had heard nothing from Frank Wills, and she still hadn't called him. There was no one to call, no one she could have turned to. She had read the papers that day, the front page and several articles were devoted to stories about the murder, about her father's admirable life, his law practice, and what he had meant to so many. It said relatively little about her, except that she was seventeen, went to Jefferson High, and had killed him. Several theories had been offered as to what must have occurred, but no one ever came close to what had really happened.

“Grace, this is David Glass.” Molly broke the silence by introducing them. “He's from the public defenders’ office, and he's going to represent you.”

“Hello, Grace,” he said quietly. He was watching her face, he hadn't taken his eyes off hers since she'd entered the room, and it was easy to see that she was desperately frightened. But in spite of it, she was polite and gracious when she shook his hand. He could feel her hand shaking in his own as soon as he touched her fingers. And when she spoke, he could see that she was a little breathless, and he remembered Molly's comment about her asthma. “We've got some work to do here.” She only nodded in answer. “I read your files this afternoon. It's not looking so good for the moment. And mostly what I'm going to need from you is information. What happened and why, whatever you can remember. Afterwards, we'll get an investigator to check things out. We'll do whatever we have to.” He tried to sound encouraging, and hoped she wasn't too frightened to listen.

“There's nothing to check out,” she said quietly, sitting very straight in one of the four chairs. “I killed my father.” She looked him right in the eye as she said it.

“I know you did,” he said, seeming unimpressed by the admission, and watching her intently. He knew what Molly had seen in her. She looked like a nice girl, and she looked as though someone had beaten the life out of her. She was so remote, one almost wondered if one could touch her. She was more like an apparition than a real person. There was nothing ordinary about her. Nothing to suggest that she was a seventeen-year-old girl, a teenager, none of the life or ebullience one would have expected. “Do you remember what happened?” he asked her quietly.

“Most of it,” she admitted. There were parts of it that were still vague, like exactly when she had taken the gun out of her mother's night table. But she remembered feeling it in her hand, and then squeezing the trigger. “I shot him.”

“Where did you get the gun?” His questions seemed very matter-of-fact, and oddly unthreatening as they sat there. He had an easy style, and Molly thanked her lucky stars again that he had gotten the case assigned to him. She just hoped he could help her.

“It was in my mother's nightstand.”

“How did you get it? Did you just reach over and take it?”

“Sort of. I just kind of took it out.”

“Was your father surprised when you did that?” He made it sound like the most mundane question, and she nodded.

“He didn't see it at first, but he was surprised when he did … and then he tried to grab it and it went off.” Her eyes glazed as she remembered, and then she closed them.

“You must have been standing pretty close to him, huh? About like this?” He indicated the three feet between them. He knew she had been closer than that, but he wanted to hear her answer.

“No … uh … kind of … closer. …” He nodded, as though her answer were ordinary too, and Molly tried to feign disinterest, but she was fascinated by how quickly Grace had started talking to him, and how much she seemed to trust him. It was as though she knew that she could. She was much less defensive than she had been with Molly.

“How close do you think? Like a foot maybe? Maybe closer?”

“Pretty close … closer …” she said softly, and then looked away from him, knowing what he must be thinking. Molly must have told him her suspicions. “Very close.”

“How come? What were you doing?”

“We were talking,” she said hoarsely, sounding breathless again, and he knew she was lying.

“What were you talking about?”

His question and the ease of it caught her off guard and she stammered as she answered. “I … uh … I guess, my mother.” He nodded as though that were the most natural thing, and then leaned back in his chair pensively and looked at the ceiling. He spoke to her then, without looking at her, and he could feel his heart pound in his ears as he addressed her.

“Did your mom know what he'd been doing to you, Grace?” He said it so gently, it brought tears to Molly's eyes, and then slowly he looked at Grace, and there were tears in her eyes too. “It's okay to tell me, Grace. No one's ever going to know, except us, but I have to know the truth if I'm going to help you. Did she know?”