Trial and Terror (24 page)

Without pause, she pointed to SK.

Summer smiled as she approached the witness stand. She could easily impeach Spellman’s credibility—in her interview with Tai, she had said she wore glasses but couldn’t recall whether she’d been wearing them when she encountered SK. But rattling Spellman would only upset the jury. Besides, Summer needed to explain SK’s fingerprints on the crime photos and on the door.

“Did Ms. Killington seem angry when you saw her?” Summer asked.

“No, ma’am,” she said. “Seemed real nice. I said ‘Nice weather’ and she smiled and said, ‘Yes, it is.’ Then, ‘Have yourself a real nice day.’ These days not too many people are that friendly.”

“That does sound friendly. Did she try to hide from you?”

“Oh, no, ma’am.”

“Didn’t try to skulk around the back way, right?”

“No, ma’am.”

“You didn’t see her any other time did you?”

“No, I didn’t. Just the once.”

“Not that evening.”

“No.”

“Did you see where she went after you talked with her?”

“No, ma’am, I didn’t,” Spellman said. “I had a lot of work to do.”

“Was she carrying anything?”

Spellman offered Summer an exaggerated shrug. “Couldn’t say one way or the other. I remember what she looked like, but after that, I really wasn’t paying much attention.”

“No further questions, Your Honor,” Summer said. “And Mrs. Spellman, you have yourself a real nice day.”

Spellman nodded. “You too, dearie.”

After Summer sat down at the defense table, SK tapped her knee.

“Good job,” she said.

But Summer knew she had blundered. She had committed a cardinal sin for defense attorneys: asking a question she didn’t already know the answer to. Spellman hadn’t seen SK leave the photos at Gundy’s door. Although it was possible the jury would conclude there was a good chance that SK had left them to remind of Gundy of an egregious error in judgment, it was far more likely they would believe that SK had been casing his condo with plans to return later.

Summer may have inadvertently characterized SK as the merry murderer.

She glanced at Raines, who was smirking at her.

Next in line was Malcolm Byers, a 25-year old local with a life going nowhere fast. He testified that he had been delivering two stuffed-crust pizzas with mushrooms to one of Gundy’s neighbors at the time of the murder.

Byers was pimply and awkward, his hair scraggly, his clothes ill-fitting. Raines led him through his testimony. He claimed he’d seen a “skinny redheaded woman” in black leather tights and a snug halter top run from Gundy’s at 10:10 p.m. “That woman,” he said, pointing at SK.

“You saw her open the door of Mr. Gundy’s condo?” Raines asked.

“Hell, yeah,” Byers said.

“What did you see?”

“The defendant all sweaty, like she’d been working out real hard. She poked her head out to make sure no one was around, but since I was coming out of the house across the way, and I was in the dark, she couldn’t see me.”

“What else, Mr. Byers?”

“I saw her do this weird kung fu action, like, move her hands like this.” Byers curled his elbows in and waved his hands threateningly, accompanying it with a squawk. “Something like that,” he said.

Summer had to shush SK.

“And then?” Raines asked.

Byers’s face lit up. “Oh, yeah, man, it was so cool. She ran off and just before she got to this fence she did this awesome handspring and fuckin’—sorry—leaped over the fence. I was scared, ’cause a woman like that could kill you.”

“You said she was moving quickly; but did you, perchance, notice what she was wearing on her feet?” Raines asked.

“Boots,” Byers said. “She was pretty still when she first left the condo, so I got a real good look.”

Raines held up Exhibit 27B, the boots that Tyler had testified were the ones he’d found at SK’s. “Do you recognize these as the boots she was wearing?”

Byers nodded yes.

“Let the record indicate that Mr. Byers is nodding his head in agreement,” Raines said.

“Got me a pair just like them at home,” Byers added. “St. Croix brand. Good for stomping people, if, that’s, like, what you’re into.”

Summer was so eager to begin her cross-examination that on her way to greet Byers she stumbled. She took Byers through past run-ins with teachers and principals in high school and the jobs he was fired from for stealing or flunking lie detector tests.

When Summer asked about his taste in movies, Raines objected. “What does that have to do with anything?” he asked.

“If the court will bear with me for a moment,” Summer said.

The judge looked down imperiously. “A very brief moment, Counselor.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” she responded. “Now, Mr. Byers, what films do you like to watch?”

Byers shifted in the chair. “All kinds.”

“Do you ever rent movies from a store?”

“Yeah. From Smitties Video on Allen Street.”

“Do you ever rent pornographic DVDs?”

Byers looked like he had been shot. “Maybe.”

To make him sweat, Summer took her time walking over to the defense table. She picked up a pile of printouts: a record of every title Byers had rented over the last three years. She handed a set to Raines.

“Maybe?” Summer repeated.

“Sometimes,” Byers said.

Raines, after skimming the list, jumped up. “Objection. I fail to see what relevance any of this has to this case.”

“Judge,” Summer said, “May I have a word with you and Mr. Raines in chambers?”

Hightower leaned back in his chair and consulted the clock. “All right. Let’s take a 20-minute break. Ms. Neuwirth, Mr. Raines, give me a couple of minutes, then join me in chambers.”

Raines was already inside when Summer arrived. Hightower was on a step stool, tossing books into a box. Judging by the tension in the air, it was apparent that the two of them were not speaking. The election was only ten days away. Although he clearly held Raines in disdain, as far as Summer could tell, thus far Hightower hadn’t let this influence him.

“Have a seat, Summer,” Hightower said. “You don’t mind if I continue to clean up a bit while we discuss this, do you?”

Do I have a choice?
she thought. “Of course not, Your Honor.”

Hightower dropped more books into the box. “Legal thrillers my wife gave me. She’s quite a fan.”

Summer reached into the box and pulled out a bestseller called
Primal Evidence
. She read the back:
The improbable story of a schizophrenic alcoholic who solves the murder of a child actress and inadvertently stumbles onto an international conspiracy involving the Catholic church.

“Actually,” Hightower said, taking the book from Summer and flipping through it, “this one was kind of good. I heard it’s going to be the big movie at Christmas this year.”

Raines said, “Can we get down to business?”

With a meaty sigh, Hightower stepped down and took his place behind his desk. “Now, why did you request this meeting, Summer?”

“I have here a list of every DVD Mr. Byers rented from Smitties over the past year,” she said. “Out of more than 200 of them, 129 of them were porno movies, many of them rented repeatedly.”

“So?” Raines asked.

“Did you corner the market in moral impropriety?” Summer asked. “You dredged up a 20-year old prostitution conviction.”

“That’s different. One is a conviction and the other is—” Raines shut up when Hightower held up his hand.

“Surely you have more to offer me than Mr. Byers’s lust for pornography,” Hightower said.

“Yes, sir,” Summer said. “I have here a DVD that Mr. Byers rented nine times, a porno flick called, excuse my French,
Kinky Ninja Sex Girls
. May I play a section of it for you?”

Raines snorted, “Judge, you can’t be entertaining the notion that I, or the jury for the matter, has to be subjected to this filth.”

“The scene in question has no nudity,” Summer said, “and it’s brief. Your Honor, I believe you have an obligation to at least view the segment I have marked.”

“This better not be a waste of my time.” Hightower took the disc from Summer and slid it into his DVD player.

Afterward, he said, “I have no choice but to allow this to be entered into evidence.”

*
 
*
 
*

Summer cued up the scene and Sprague hit “play” on the judge’s command. While Byers and the jury watched on a monitor, a man and woman engaged in combat, complete with fists of fury and hokey sound effects. The woman, a ninja assassin dressed in black leather tights and a halter top, kicked the man in the face. He was knocked to the ground. She straddled him as he begged for mercy and snapped his neck cleanly.

Cat-like, she made her way to the door. She peeked once left, then right. After quietly shutting the door behind her, she darted into the night. Just before coming upon a tall chain link fence, she performed a handspring and vaulted over it, disappearing into the night.

Part V

INFOMANIA

Chapter 28

“I’ve worked for the
public defenders office for more than 20 years and I’ve never had anything like that happen to me,” Levi said. “How did you ever find that DVD?”

Summer was in Levi’s office, reclining on his couch while Levi had his shoes off and his feet up on his desk. His air conditioner hissed, leaked water, and groaned. Levi said he thought of it as a house pet. A vinyl record spun on a turntable playing 60s rock, complete with pops and hiss, which Levi claimed added to the ambience.

“It’s all Tai’s handiwork,” Summer said.

“And you didn’t want him.”

“I was dead wrong.” Summer massaged her bare heel. “I know this is a little immoral, but I’m hoping the jury relives this moment over and over again via the media. Maybe it’ll have a cumulative effect, encourage them to vote ‘not guilty.’ Sure, they all promise when they’re selected that they won’t read newspaper, magazine, or television accounts of the trial, but how can they not overhear something on TV or glimpse a headline?”

“That’s a perfectly normal desire, as long as you don’t foster it. But don’t rely on it. The D.A.’s won cases with a lot less evidence than this, so keep up the pressure. I assume you’re going to rest without mounting a defense.”

“You betcha,” she said, “although SK is making noise like she wants to testify; she wants to use the witness stand as a pulpit. I’ve avoided committing to this in the hopes she’ll see that we’re way up on points, and that the best strategy would be to shut up until after the trial. Then, let her write a book for all I care.”

“Sound judgment.” Levi itched one foot with the toes of his other, which poked through a hole. “You know, this is your lucky day for another reason. I just got a call from Jimi Cruz.”

Summer heard sounds of shock come out of her mouth, finally managing, “I thought he was dead”; then immediately regretted saying it.

But it was too oblique a reference for Levi to catch. “Dead? Well, the way he was going, I can see why you’d think that. He called to say he got a slot in a local drug rehab program and wanted me to thank you. Let’s face it: If it wasn’t for you, he’d be in the slammer for 25 to life calling some 300-pound goon named Bubba ‘Honey.’ ”

If Cruz wasn’t dead, then what other pieces of information had Marsalis toyed with? She had to fight the urge to deconstruct every moment she had suffered through with him, but she had ten minutes to get back to court.

It would have to wait.

Summer ran into Rosie on her way out. Together they walked down the concrete steps in front of the building and out to the boulevard, where they waited at the stoplight.

“
Kinky Ninja Sex Girls
?” Rosie’s tongue was pushed against her cheek. “It’s all over the court building.”

Summer tossed her head back. “If Raines had a streak of decency, he’d move to dismiss, but with the election coming up, and the fact that he’s a sanctimonious pain in the ass, he’ll take his chances with a jury.”

The light changed and they crossed through the car exhaust.

“Did you tell Jon about, you know, the gang thing?” Rosie asked.

“If he ever finds out, it’ll have to come from you.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me. Everybody has nasty little secrets. Maybe if I had a stronger character or a better sense of what was right or wrong, I’d dissolve our friendship. But given the fact that 98 percent of the clients we represent are guilty, I’d be a hypocrite if I did. Besides, The Latin Brothers play rough. If I were in your shoes, I don’t know what I’d do either. And I wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.”

Before Summer entered the court building, Rosie chucked her in the arm. “With a little luck, SK will be out in time for the weekend,” she said.