Stone Cold (24 page)

“How many shots, Detective?”

“Three. Two quick shots and then a third one.”

“Did you notice anything else about the shots?”

“The first two made a popping sound, like they came from a small-caliber gun, and the third one was a lot louder, like from a bigger-caliber weapon.”

“What did you do when you heard the shots?”

“I drew my weapon and ran for the house. I kicked the door open and saw Dwayne lying on the floor. The defendant was standing nearby holding a gun. There was a gun next to Dwayne’s body. I told the defendant to put her gun down and she complied.”

“Did you determine what kinds of guns were involved in the shooting of Mr. Reed?”

“Yes. The defendant’s gun was a Ruger LCP .380. It’s a small gun, which makes it easy to conceal. Reed had a Glock .22, which is a .40-caliber weapon.”

“To whom was the Ruger registered?”

“The defendant. The registration records showed she bought the gun the day after Reed was acquitted in the Wilfred Donaire case.”

“And the Glock?”

“It wasn’t registered. The serial number was filed off.”

“Are you familiar with the sound that these guns make when fired?”

“I am. I’ve fired guns of the same caliber, probably hundreds of times, on the practice range. The .380 is a small-caliber gun and it makes the popping sound I mentioned before. The .40-caliber is bigger and has a much louder report. It’s easy for me to tell them apart.”

“Based on that, were you able to establish the sequence for the three shots you heard before you entered the house?”

“I was. The first two shots I heard came from the .380. The third came from the .40-caliber. The defendant fired first.”

“Did you observe anything else at the scene that supported your conclusion that the defendant shot Mr. Reed twice before he fired his gun?”

“Yes. We found the bullet from Reed’s gun in the ceiling. That told me that he was probably falling to the floor or already on the floor when he fired his gun.”

“Is there any other explanation for how the bullet from Mr. Reed’s weapon ended up in the ceiling?”

Rossi shifted in the witness chair, cocked his head to one side, and nodded. “There was a gap between the defendant’s second shot and when Reed’s gun was fired. The defendant could have raised Reed’s hand and fired the gun while he was still holding it or she could have fired it herself.”

Alex grabbed her Post-it pad, writing
bullshit!
and scooting the note toward Claire, who glanced at it without responding.

“Did you examine the defendant’s clothing while you were at the crime scene?”

“Just the jacket she was wearing.”

“Did you observe anything significant about the defendant’s jacket?”

“Yes. There was a bullet hole in the right-side pocket, indicating that she had fired the gun while it was still in her pocket.”

“What was the significance of that?”

“Given the sequence of shots fired—the first two by the defendant and the third by Reed—and given that Reed was probably falling to the floor or on the floor when he fired his gun and that the defendant kept her weapon hidden from Reed, he never had a chance to defend himself.”

“Was anyone else present in the living room besides Mr. Reed and the defendant when you entered the room?”

“Reed’s mother, Odyessy Shelburne. She was kneeling on the floor next to Reed.”

“Did Ms. Shelburne say anything to you?”

“She was crying, and she pointed to the defendant and she said, ‘She killed my baby.’ She kept saying it over and over.”

“No further questions.”

Chapter Forty-One

CLAIRE WAITED A MOMENT before beginning her cross-examination, watching the jury’s reaction to Rossi. They’d listened, straight backed and wide-eyed, his nothing-but-the-facts testimony resonating with them. She had to walk a fine line between trying to undermine his credibility and using it to her advantage.

She had learned early in her adult life how to convert her height and build into an image of power and authority at a time when men rarely saw either in a woman. What had once been practiced was now ingrained, her silver hair adding the wisdom of years to her arsenal.

Rising slowly to draw the jury’s attention away from Rossi and toward her, Claire walked toward the witness stand, stopping in front of the podium, creating a triangle composed of Rossi, the jury and her, knowing she was its apex.

“When you entered Odyessy Shelburne’s house, one of the first things you did was to tell Alex Stone to put her gun down on the floor, isn’t that true?”

“I did.”

“And I assume you immediately secured her gun.”

Rossi took a deep breath, letting it out, knowing what was coming and that he couldn’t avoid it. “No, I didn’t.”

“Odyessy Shelburne was distraught when you saw her on the floor next to her son, correct?”

“Yes. Very much so.”

“The last time you were at her house she threatened to shoot you, isn’t that correct?”

“It is.”

“So you knew she had a history of threatening to shoot people, including you, and you knew she was very upset about her son’s death, and yet you left Alex Stone’s gun unsecured and lying on the floor. True?”

“Yes.”

“And what was the next thing that happened with that gun?”

“Odyessy Shelburne grabbed it and shot the defendant.”

Claire paused, starring at Rossi, giving the jury time to absorb his testimony, hoping it made the jury question his competence and that it made Alex more sympathetic.

“You told Mr. Ortiz that it was possible that Alex Stone had fired Dwayne Reed’s gun.”

“I did.”

“You’re not telling this jury that’s what happened, are you?”

“No. It’s just a possibility.”

“You’re aware that gunpowder residue was found on Mr. Reed’s hand, indicating that he had recently fired his gun?”

“I am.”

“And you said that it appeared to you that Mr. Reed didn’t have a chance to defend himself because Alex fired her gun while it was in her coat pocket.”

“That’s correct.”

“Now, Mr. Reed also had a gun, didn’t he?”

“He did.”

“And you don’t know whether Mr. Reed had threatened Alex with his gun before she fired, do you?”

“According to the eyewitness—”

“I’m not asking about the eyewitness, Detective. Your testimony is based on what you observed at the scene, and you didn’t observe anything that proves that Mr. Reed hadn’t threatened Alex with his gun before she fired. Is that the truth?”

Rossi clenched his jaw, answering reluctantly. “Yes.”

“Thank you, Detective. Now, Dwayne Reed was a dangerous man, wasn’t he?”

“You could say that.”

“You did say that, didn’t you, Detective?”

“I imagine I did, in so many words.”

“Because you believed it to be true, yes?”

“Yes.”

“What exactly was he accused of doing to Wilfred Donaire?”

“He was accused of killing him, if that’s what you mean.”

“Well, that’s certainly bad enough, but you were much more graphic at Dwayne Reed’s trial. Tell this jury what you told that jury about what Mr. Reed was accused of saying and doing. I’ve got a copy of the transcript of your testimony if you’d like to review it.”

Rossi clenched his jaw for an instant and then let it go, deciding it was better to play along than start a fight he couldn’t win.

“He threatened to cut off Wilfred Donaire’s dick and shove it down his throat. And that’s what he did. And then he stabbed him to death.”

Claire let that sink in as several jurors covered their mouths while others grimaced.

“That would make him a dangerous man in anyone’s book, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, ma’am. It would.”

“In fact, you warned Alex Stone to stay away from the Hendersons because if Dwayne found out she was keeping an eye on them, he might—and I believe these were your words—terminate their attorney-client relationship permanently. Were those your words?”

Rossi leaned back in his chair, nodding and crossing his arms over his middle. “I told her that.”

“And that was your way of telling Alex that if Dwayne became upset with her, he might kill her, isn’t that so?”

“Yes.”

“And you also thought that Dwayne would rape Bonnie Long if he got the chance. Isn’t that so?”

Rossi sighed. “It is.”

“That’s why you went to Truman Medical Center, to warn Dr. Long and to tell her not to leave the hospital without you as her guardian and escort. Isn’t that so?”

“I told her to wait for me, yes.”

“And you asked Dr. Long if she knew where Alex was.”

“Yes.”

“Because you were worried that Alex was going to talk to Dwayne about him threatening Bonnie.”

“In part.”

“And the other part was that you were worried about what Dwayne would do if he found out about the relationship between Bonnie and Alex.”

“I guess so, yes.”

“And you were worried about that because if Dwayne couldn’t get to Bonnie, he might settle for taking his anger out on Alex. Isn’t that so?”

“That was a consideration.”

“Well, it was more than a consideration, wasn’t it, Detective?”

“I don’t know what you mean, Counselor.”

“I mean that when you saw Alex’s car in the driveway and heard those shots fired, you were more concerned about her safety than Mr. Reed’s. Isn’t that so?”

Rossi licked his lips and nodded. “Yes.”

“And that’s because you didn’t think Alex Stone could defend herself against Dwayne Reed. Isn’t that so?”

He shook his head. “No, I didn’t think she could.”

“Well, you were wrong about that, weren’t you, Detective Rossi?”

“Objection!” Ortiz said. “Assumes facts not in evidence.”

“Withdrawn,” Claire said. “No further questions.”

Ortiz stood at his counsel table. “Just a couple of follow-up questions, Detective. Was the defendant treated for her gunshot wound at the scene?”

“Yes. A paramedic patched her up.”

“Did you overhear any conversation between the paramedic and the defendant?”

“Yeah. The paramedic said—”

“Objection,” Claire said. “Hearsay.”

“Sustained.”

“Detective,” Ortiz said, “what was the subject matter of their conversation?”

“How the amount of blood made the defendant’s wound look a lot worse than it was.”

“And what did the defendant say on that subject?”

“She pointed to Reed’s body and said, ‘Try telling that to him,’ like it was all a big joke.”

“That’s all I have,” Ortiz said.

Chapter Forty-Two

ROSSI LEFT THE COURTROOM, joining a crowd waiting for an elevator, which, given the temperamental nature of the equipment, could take long enough for a person to grow old. There were six elevators, three each on opposite sides of the hall, though at any one time, two were usually out of order, two were stuck, and the other two were jammed full of impatient people.

When at last an elevator stopped and the door opened, a crowd piled out like clowns from a circus car. Rossi peered over the heads of the people waiting in front of him and saw a familiar face at the back of the car. It was the woman he’d seen Blues with coming out of the Chouteau Courts apartments. And then he remembered who she was and how he knew her.

She was Grace Canfield, the investigator in the public defender’s office who had worked with Alex Stone on the Wilfred Donaire trial. She was holding a file, studying it, and didn’t notice him. The car filled and the doors closed before he had a chance to get onboard.

He sorted this information for possible explanations as he bolted down five flights of stairs, hoping that she was headed to the ground floor and that he could catch up to her and ask her a few questions. Grace could have been at Choteau Courts on another case and just happened to run into Blues. Or she could have been working with the defense team, helping Blues find Gloria Temple.

That made more sense to Rossi, knowing how difficult it was to get people living on the east side to talk to anybody about anything. But he knew they’d talk to Grace because she was one of them, having lived her whole life on the east side. And she worked for the public defender’s office, the only lawyers dedicated to helping them when the cops jammed them up. And Rossi hated coincidences, though he loved the definition he’d run across by an author named Emma Bull whose sci-fi books had a permanent spot on his nightstand.
A coincidence is the word we use when we can’t see the levers and pulleys.

If he was right, her involvement meant more trouble for the defense team, because the public defender’s office had put as much distance between itself and Alex Stone as possible, suspending her and issuing a statement that it would not be involved in her defense. Given that, Rossi assumed Grace Canfield’s participation was off the books, something he could use to persuade her to tell him what she knew about Gloria Temple.

Rossi made it to the ground floor in time to see Grace spinning through the revolving door that led to the street. He followed her, slowing once he got outside and saw her standing on the sidewalk talking to Blues. She took a small notepad from her pocket, wrote something, tore the page from the pad, and handed it to Blues, who handed her an overnight bag before each went in a different direction.

Rossi was willing to bet that Grace Canfield had just given Blues the address where he could find Gloria Temple and that Blues had given her something in return. Maybe it was money, though Rossi knew enough about Grace’s reputation to dismiss that possibility. More likely, it was something for Gloria, meaning that Blues expected Grace to see her before he did.

He followed Grace back to the building at Eleventh and Oak where the public defender’s office was located, stopping across the street, waiting until she was inside and out of sight before he called Gardiner Harris.

“I think I’ve got a line on Gloria Temple,” he said, explaining what had happened.

“How do you want to play it?”

“Get eyes on Blues and stay with him. I’ll stick with Grace. One of them is bound to lead us to Gloria.”

“Works for me. Where’s Blues?”