The Mystery of Revenge (14 page)

“Mind, are you kidding?” Shao Mei burst into tears, and she couldn’t help it. “I don’t mind to go to the homeless shelter if only they would take me.” Without Yi-yun, she would be homeless in a foreign country for
sure!

She moved in with Yi-yun who never even asked her for rent. Soon she started teaching private students on campus for $20 an hour. She was told that even a young American college graduate would have a hard time finding a professional job with degrees in pure physics, let alone a middle-aged foreigner who spoke very poor
English.

Shao Mei was snapped out of her memories when the prosecutor raised his voice. “Ms. Shao? Can you describe the relationship between the deceased and the
defendant?”

She was thinking hard. “It wasn’t a relationship of love, even though Ms. Lin fell in love with the defendant,” she said in a dull voice. “I’m pretty sure he was just using
her.”

“Did you know she was pregnant before she was
killed?”

“No.” The first time she learned about Yi-yun’s pregnancy was on TV, a day after they found her dead at home. She blamed herself that she didn’t pay enough attention to her young friend after her teenage son came to stay with her. With her full-time job and the attentions paid to his study, she was too busy to talk to
anyone.

“In your opinion, why did she keep it as a secret? Was she afraid of the
defendant?”

“Objection, Your Honor, irrelevant!” the defense lawyer
protested.

“Objection sustained,” the judge
said.

The prosecutor turned and faced the jury. “Now, Ms. Shao, how would you describe the
deceased?”

“She was the most generous, warm-hearted woman I’ve ever met,” she said. The dear girl even taught her how to save money while job-hunting.

She knew from the beginning that she needed a full-time job—a job that could provide her and her son health insurance. She could go on without it, but she didn’t want to take chances with her young son. Since she couldn’t speak English properly, she had very limited choices. She could never be a receptionist who had to talk on the phones. She could never be a word processor because she could only type with her two index fingers, and she could never be a science teacher because she wouldn’t be able to obtain a teaching
certificate.

After more than a few months’ rigorous and continuous job searching, as soon as she was able to obtain a work permit, she finally landed an interview for a clerk position in a big insurance
company.

Desperately wanting the job, Shao Mei bought a how-to-interview book and read it from cover to cover. She even went to Filene’s Basement, the most famous discount store in Boston, to buy a proper outfit. The jacket was perfectly cut, and the skirt was nicely fit. She was so gorgeous in the suit that she had to buy a pair of shoes to match it. She had never, ever spent so much money on one outfit. Shao Mei was nearly suffocated when she tried to swallow the price at the cashier
counter.

“Can you believe it?” she complained to Yi-yun. “I spent almost two hundred dollars on my interview outfit! What if I don’t get the job? I’ll never have the chance to wear them again. What a waste! Two hundred bucks! That’s more than one month of our grocery
money.”

“Keep the receipt,” Yi-yun said. “Maybe you can return them later. I heard about a guy who went to an interview in a suit that had a price tag on it. During the interview, however, the tag loosened
and—”

“Did he get the job?” Shao Mei asked eagerly, interrupting Yi-yun in the middle of her
sentence.

“I don’t know,” she said. “It’s a
joke.”

“But it’s definitely a good idea,” Shao Mei said with a nod to herself. “Maybe I should give the tag a few stitches so nobody would see it. After the interview, I can return the
suit.”

“Are you serious?” Yi-yun looked at her
incredulously.

“Yes, I’m deadly serious,” Shao Mei said determinedly. “I just can’t waste that amount of money on clothes and
shoes!”

“What if you have to go for another interview? What if the process is longer than the return period?” she
asked.

“I’ll return it first, then get another suit at a different store when I need it. As long as I keep the price tag, it’s returnable, right?”

“Right,” Yi-yun said, couldn’t stop chuckling, “but this is crazy, Shao
Mei.”

“I thought you told me the story on purpose,” Shao Mei said with a straight face and then a flashy
grin.

“Yes, I did, but I didn’t expect you would do it,” Yi-yun said
sheepishly.

“What kind of job are you holding right now?” the defense lawyer came up to her and asked. It was the cross-exam that the prosecutor had warned her
about.

“Mailroom clerk at John Hancock,” Shao Mei said
calmly.

“So a professor at a famous university becomes a mailroom clerk,” the lawyer
smirked.

“I consider living on my own, without taking a handout, is the honest and right way to live. It is better than sitting at home and eating off government and tax payers,” she replied defiantly, glaring at the defense lawyer, a young man who was not much older than her students in
China.

The smirk disappeared. “Is it true that the deceased married her ex-husband for the green card?” he asked now with a straight
face.

“It’s not true!” she said angrily. “That marriage was based on
love.”

“But she walked out of this loving marriage only a few months after she got her green card,” he said sarcastically. “Is this
correct?”

“That’s because the
defendant—”

“Yes or no,” he cut her off curtly in the middle of the
sentence.

She lowered her head and murmured
yes.

“Do you know their divorce cited irreconcilable
differences?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t think so,” she said
rebelliously.

“We have the court papers here. In fact, the deceased was a woman who liked to attach herself to whoever was useful to her at the
time.”

“Objection!” The prosecutor was quick on his
feet.

But Shao Mei already shouted at the lawyer. “It’s totally false!” She was so mad she forgot she was on the witness stand in a courtroom. “You don’t even know
her!”

The young lawyer stepped away and faced the jury. “You do know the defendant has won one of the most prestigious music awards in the world, is that correct?” he asked and then turned and looked at
her.

“Yes,” she said
reluctantly.

“You also know that he signed a contract with the Boston Symphony, which pays him a six-figure annual
salary?”

The defense lawyer led Shao Mei to confirm all the accounts that showed Tom Meyers a fine gentleman and Yi-yun a greedy bitch who had huge character flaws. Shao Mei was seething when she was finally allowed to leave the witness stand. Poor Yi-yun, who got murdered not only once but twice—first by her boyfriend, then by his defense lawyer who twisted the facts in the way that the nicest girl on earth now became a selfish, self-centered
monster.

The defense lawyer had a field day with Fang Chen as
well.

“You have to look at the evidences presented in this courtroom carefully,” the defense lawyer addressed the jury in his closing argument. “Yes, Yi-yun Lin was killed in her own apartment. But there was no eyewitness. It could be one of those men she had taken advantage of in the past, or it could be her ex-husband who has admitted he threatened to kill the defendant and wanted to kill the deceased when he found out they committed adultery. There is no murder weapon. The police told us the deceased was killed by a bullet from a .22 caliber handgun, but how many of those handguns are out there, maybe a thousand? Anyone can get hold of a gun these days. As for motive, what motive does this defendant have? He is a talented musician, has a great job, and he loved his girlfriend. As their upstairs neighbor testified, before he left for his tour, he made love to her. Do you think a man in this state of mind and in his position would kill? There is not a thread of real evidence in this case other than a circumstantial one. Now this innocent young man’s life is in your hands. If you can’t prove him guilty beyond any reasonable doubt for a second-degree murder, you have to set him
free.”

This was absolutely madness! Shao Mei was beside herself. Tom Meyers having sex with Yi-yun the night before was not because he loved her; it was because he was a pervert who treated her like a sex slave. Everyone could get the picture if they only listened to what Ms. White had to say. Who were the men out there Yi-yun had taken advantage of? There was nobody! The ex-husband indeed! Fang Chen was the most honorable and trustworthy person she had ever met. How would the defense lawyer explain Tom Meyers’ missing handgun? Where was it, and who took it other than the owner himself? And what motive did they need? It’s all there. Because he was getting rich and famous, he didn’t need Yi-yun anymore, and he didn’t want the baby, so he killed them
both.

She wanted to shake those men and women sitting in the jury box to make them see her points. Unfortunately, she could do nothing but glare at them, hoping they could see through the game the defense lawyer had been playing and return with a guilty
verdict.

In his office, Paul Winderman was looking at the records he got from the payphone company in town. The two payphones within walking distance from Yi-yun Lin’s apartment had generated a dozen or so outgoing calls the days before and after her death. Using a pen, he carefully struck through the numbers of recipients that were out of state, eventually there were only three to four local phone numbers left on the call-lists.

He checked each of them and came up with a hospital, a couple of private homes and a school in the city as the recipients of the outgoing calls. Like a cat spotting a mouse, his eyes lit up when he noticed the name of the school. He grabbed his jacket and headed to the door. He wanted to get a comprehensive list of extensions and the phone records from the school. It could be the breakthrough he had been looking
for.

Chapter 16

Yi-yun was dumbfounded when Tom turned her down brutally. “No,” he said, eyeing her expanded waistline with disgust. “Do you think I will give up my career simply because you’re pregnant?” He had just made love to her, and they were lying naked next to each
other.