Sly Fox: A Dani Fox Novel (48 page)

The clerk said: “On count one—murder in the second degree—how do you find the defendant?”

Standing in the jury box, the foreman answered, “Guilty.”

I breathed in, not realizing I had been holding my breath. Gonzales glared at the foreman and each juror. Mr. Invincible simply glanced down at the defense table.

As each juror was individually polled, their answers of “yes” faded in the distance as I thought about how long it had taken to get justice for Benita Gonzales. There would be no escape into federal protection now. I glanced over my shoulder just in time to see Agent Longhorn duck from the courtroom.

While Judge Morano was thanking the jury and dismissing them, I noticed one of them staring at me. It was juror number five, a retired schoolteacher. She was in her midsixties and I had seen her eyeing the Polaroid with intensity when I was giving my closing statement. I wasn’t able to give her any further thought, because as soon as Gonzales was taken away and Judge Morano had exited the courtroom, Carmen raced up to me and gave me a tight hug.

“You did it!” she said, smiling.

“He’s going to prison. He’ll never hurt you again.”

My mother was standing next to Carmen.

“Your father would be so proud of you if he were here,” she said.

“I feel as if he is here, Mom. Smiling down from heaven.”

Paul Pisani left the courtroom without speaking to me. I didn’t expect a compliment, but I thought he might make a snide remark or a sexual innuendo. In the end, he simply tucked his tail between his legs and ran away.

O’Brien was waiting to escort me from the courtroom.

As I stepped outside, Will Harris and other reporters came running up to me. I answered their questions and then, when all of them were leaving, I called Harris to the side.

“You’re one of the reasons why I won this case. You told me about the cop in prison and he told me about the boom microphone and the damning tape recordings. I am willing to explain on the record for your readers the role that you played in this case. That way you can write an exclusive and claim credit for helping solve it.”

Harris beamed. “I can see a headline in my head: ‘Daily Reporter Helps Crack Murder Case.’”

“I like that a lot,” I replied.

“But I think you may be giving me too much credit. I just interviewed juror number five and she said it wasn’t the tape recording that convinced the jurors. It was your summation—you showing them Benita’s photo and pointing out how well-groomed she was. That photo is what did it. As a woman, she understood.”

60

O’Brien invited me to O’Toole’s to celebrate with the boys. But I declined. I also turned down an invitation from my mom. All I wanted to do was go home, take a hot bath, grill a steak, and eat a box of dark chocolates for dessert.

I let Wilbur into the kitchen and gave him a can of corn to tide him over until dinner. I stepped outside and lit some charcoal on my hibachi. It took several minutes for the coals to turn red, so I spent them making myself a salad and adding peanut butter to apples for Wilbur. The steak tasted great and Wilbur loved the apples.

By the time I had cleaned up the kitchen, it had turned dark and started raining. I led a reluctant Wilbur outside to his pen. There was no way that I was going to risk having him wake me up grunting in the morning. I was emotionally and physically exhausted and wanted to sleep late for once on a Saturday morning.

Lightning crackled and the rain felt good and cool on my skin as I dashed back inside. I locked the back door and crossed through the kitchen on my way to the bathroom to start a bath. As I entered the dining room, I noticed my front door was wide open.

I stopped in my tracks.

My purse with the .357 snub nose was on the dining-room table. I was taking a step toward it when I was smacked hard in my right shoulder by a baseball bat with such force that I was knocked to the floor. I heard a crack and knew my collarbone was broken. The pain was immediate and intense.

Looking up from the floor where I was lying on my back, I saw the masked face of a man dressed in black, towering above me with a wooden bat in his hand. There was no way I could get to my purse and pistol now because he was standing between me and the table.

He threw the baseball bat to one side, reached into the front pouch of his black sweatshirt, and withdrew a knife, which he flipped open with a twist of his wrist. Without warning, he kicked me in my abdomen, causing me to gasp for air. Stepping backward, he used his left hand to remove his ski mask.

Juan Lopez looked down at me.

“I told you that Maya was mine but you didn’t listen.”

He kicked me again, causing me to roll from my side completely over onto my stomach. As I was lying helpless and in pain on the floor watching him, Juan put his knife on the dining-room table and pulled his sweatshirt over his head. I could see the “MAYA” carved in his flabby stomach.

Retrieving his blade, he said, “I’m going to slit my own wrists and join Maya in heaven—right after I send you to hell.”

Using my good arm, I pushed myself up and managed to bolt across the dining room. I was trying to get into my bedroom where my second gun, the .38 Wesson revolver, was on the nightstand.

“Run, run,” he taunted me. “But you can’t hide.”

As I entered my bedroom, he caught up with me, grabbed my hair, and jerked me backward, causing my legs to fly out from under me. I landed hard on the floorboards and felt something warm flowing from my head. I was dazed but knew it was blood.

“Juan, hurting me isn’t going to bring back Maya!”

“Oh, I’m going to hurt you. I’m going to hurt you bad. I’m going to carve a name into your chest. You know what name? BITCH. And then I’m going to put you in the oven just like I did Maya. The heat is going to purify your soul and burn away your sins.”

He bent down, reaching for my blouse, but I was able to spin out of the way and roll into the hallway. Juan was now standing between me and my nightstand. I managed to get on my feet as he stepped forward swinging the knife at my face.

I ducked and ran faster than I thought imaginable toward the still-open front door.

He swung at me again as he chased me but missed as I dashed through the doorway out onto the front porch. The surface was wet and I started to slip backward. I immediately compensated by throwing my body forward—a move that caused me to lose my footing and tumble off the porch onto the wet front lawn. I hit so hard that the fall knocked the breath from my lungs. I spun over onto my back and looked up just in time to see Juan looming over me as the rain pelted both of us in the evening darkness. He raised the knife, which he was now holding with both hands, and was about to plunge the blade down into me when I heard a low boom and watched as a huge hole burst open in Juan’s naked chest. His entire body flew backward. He hit the porch hard and didn’t move.

O’Brien came running up to me holding a .12-gauge shotgun.

“You okay?”

I was soaked, my shoulder hurt like hell, and I’d been kicked in the gut and traumatized by a knife-wielding madman who wanted to cut my chest and stick me in an oven. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

“I thought you might need a bit of watching tonight,” he said. “I decided to skip going to O’Toole’s with the boys.”

He helped me to my feet and we walked over to where Juan’s body was lying motionless on my porch. O’Brien kicked Juan’s foot.

“Huh. I thought it would be Rudy Hitchins lying here, not Juan Lopez,” O’Brien said.

I felt a chill. Rudy Hitchins was still out there somewhere in the darkness, still seeking revenge.

O’Brien removed his toothpick and said to the corpse, “Let this be a lesson to you, punk. Never bring a knife to a gunfight.” Inserting the toothpick back between his lips, he grinned and said, “God, I’ve always wanted to say that!”

EPILOGUE

A Week Later

I was late. As usual. It was my first day back after the shooting. As I made my way across the parking lot toward the front door of the Westchester County Courthouse, I saw a man walking several steps in front of me.

Oh crap, I thought. It was miserable Judge Morano. I intentionally slowed down. When he reached the front door, I expected him to hurry inside. But instead, he opened the door, turned, and looked at me.

“Hurry up, Miss Fox. We have serious cases waiting for us.”

I walked with him into the lobby.

He was right.

There are many to thank:

The countless men, women, and children who have crossed my path—those victims who demonstrated great courage and resolve in the face of enormous odds. They are the real heroes who give meaning to those of us who do the work of criminal justice.

Pete Earley, my collaborator, who comes to this effort with a background in reporting and writing as well as an intricate knowledge of the Federal Witness Protection Program. His assistance has been immeasurable. I am most grateful that he, like me, is willing to eat cold pizza during deadlines.

A special thank-you to Gretchen Young from Hyperion for her insight and intuition and her never-ending perseverance in the pursuit of the perfectly edited book. To her assistant, Allyson Rudolph, who works above and beyond to make sure the product is a good one. To Diane Aronson for her thorough work.

David Vigliano, who approached me when I was the sitting District Attorney of Westchester County, New York, to write a book such as this and who was steadfast in his effort to get me to put pen to paper. I thank him for his persistence.