I sit behind my desk—my father’s antique desk from his law office—and stare at the blank legal pad before me. Much of the closing is already written out, but I like to do a fresh rewrite at the end to make my words more organic and well-tuned to the twists and turns every trial takes. Neat stacks of evidence sit expectantly on the wood top—the ingredients to the great recipe I hope to cook up. Trial transcripts, photographs, the autopsy report, a printout of the 911 call, the picture of Sara Barton’s blackened back, and the like—all of it awaits to be used for the greater good.
I’m worn out. I need to sprawl myself on a beach somewhere and let the sunshine carry my soul back to good health. Too much of my adult years have been spent under artificial light. I need the real thing. I have the money. I can disappear for a good long time.
Sara Barton should’ve left—look what staying got her. I put the autopsy photos side-by-side with the photo of her back after Barton beat her. So much pain. Why did she stay? Lara has money. She could’ve moved in with her. Instead, Sara stayed. The choices we make condemn us to death, and we don’t even know it. We swim with the tide, thinking the current will take us wherever it wants anyway. Sara was so beautiful, but nobody looks good in an autopsy photo, the blood all drained from the face. One morning a beautiful woman woke up never to see another day. Happens to ugly people all the time. Everyone should leave when they have the chance.
I access the secret compartment in my father’s desk and remove the two naked pictures of Sara Barton I removed from Sam’s shed in the Georgia mountains. Visions of an inviting Lara cloud my eyes. She would meet me tonight if I said we needed to talk about the trial. This weekend figures to be the only time I will ever be able to hold her again. Once the verdict is read, she’ll slip away from me forever. I stare at her dead sister’s nude body some more, wrestling with the decision, wanting one more taste of the poisoned fruit.
I pass. I’m too tired to handle Lara tonight. Tomorrow maybe.
I think of Sam. Millwood could never effectively work him into the trial. Putting Liesa on the stand was a disaster for the defense, killing any chance to parlay Sam into a not guilty verdict. Sam remains an enigma, much like his death. A healthy helping of conscience reminds me that the failure to turn over that box in Sam’s shed had everything to do with what happened at trial. I refuse to accept the blame. The box was never mine to turn over. Those photographs belong to someone else.
“Then why are there naked pictures of me on your desk?”
I ignore Sara Barton’s question. You can’t argue with a ghost.
Not much work is getting done. I consider throwing in the towel for the night and starting anew in the morning. I have the weekend. But I resist the impulse to get up. Sam still tugs at my mind. I’m missing something. An inkling chews at me but scurries away when I try to catch it. I’m missing something, and the signs point to Sam. The harder I think about the problem, the less I see.
I prod myself to focus on something else for a few minutes. Reshuffling the cards in my mind usually works wonders when I’m stuck on a mental puzzle. When I return to the problem with fresh eyes, new insights invariably emerge. Seeking a distraction, I again consume the naked pictures of Sara Barton and think of Lara’s sculpted body—the marvelous mystery she first revealed to me a few paces from the spot where I now sit. Bad idea. To dampen my incipient lust, I pivot to studying the autopsy photos again. I’m running on fumes at this point. I need this trial to be over.
Back to Sam.
I go back to the night of the murder and see Sam’s sad face as he tried to extricate himself from the fine mess he’d got himself into. I see him at Sara Barton’s funeral, staring at Lara with a cringeworthy intensity. I wince at the memory of him storming into my office with a fake John Wayne tough guy act. I remember the uneasy peace the two of us reached at The Varsity—the last time I ever saw him alive. He gave me his research to throw my scent Barton’s way. It worked. The call from Scott informing me of Sam’s death punches me in the gut one more time. Lara’s hysterical reaction in the aftermath started the tailspin that eventually crashed our relationship. Lastly, I return to the mountains and work over the implications of Sam’s porn stash of Sara Barton and her various lovers. I even replay all my dealings with Liesa.
All these things I think about and still come up blank. What is Sam trying to tell me?
I stand up to stretch. Standing on my toes, straining my Achilles to the max, the flash of a memory breaks through the fog. I refuse to believe it and doubt the accuracy of my recollection. It would be an easy thing for me to mishear in the moment. I pace around the room wrestling mightily with my brain to squeeze out as many details as possible. What I now remember can’t be, which means that I’m misremembering. I’ve been around enough eyewitnesses to know the vagaries of how humans process their memories. All of us carry around things we remember that never actually happened, and most of us refuse to be moved off our certainty of the invented past. I pace some more.
But once I fixate on it, the memory possesses the clarity of crystal. Yet it makes no sense. I try to work out a scenario where what I think I remember would fit some logical possibility. I fail. You’re wrong, I tell myself. Either the wording wasn’t exactly as you now remember, or she didn’t say what you think she said—simple as that. Don’t tie yourself into knots over this imagined complication. Focus on your closing. Doubt is the enemy of faith.
I walk back to the desk, now ready to work. Then I see it. The scales fall from my eyes, and everything fits into place. The evidence before me cannot be written off as a false memory. I can now see nothing else. With one exception, I work out everything in roughly a minute. The one open question requires careful thought and massaging. I can’t do this alone. I need Scott.
I pick up the phone to call him, eager to get started on the weekend of work ahead of us. I then set the phone aside to mourn a little for myself. The thrill of the chase is no tonic for the pain of knowing that my lover is a murderer. All I have to do is prove it.
49
Monday morning arrives sooner than I would like. The task before me portends nothing but despair—bad medicine that no amount of drink will ever wash down. Scott and I did what needed doing over the weekend. What happens next rests in my hands alone.
Just before we enter the courtroom, I tell Ella, “I’m going to put Lara on the stand to rebut Barton, then we’ll go into closing.” She remains in the dark about what I know and doesn’t understand my reasoning. The pushback is fierce.
“We don’t need to put her on the stand. You destroyed Barton on cross.”
“I’m going to put her on.”
“She’s my witness. If we need her to deny it, I should be the one to ask it of her.”
“I’m doing it.”
“You’re dictating things all of a sudden? We had an agreement that I would handle her.”
“I’m doing it. That’s final. I have my reasons. Please trust me.”
“Well it damn sure doesn’t appear that you trust me.”
I avoided telling Ella over the weekend to sidestep this type of conversation. I lack the emotional capacity. After today, I intend to disappear for quite a long time. Ella enters the courtroom ahead of me in a huff. I follow her as if entering a torture chamber.
***
Before the judge enters, I take Lara to the side and explain, “I’m going to call you back up to the stand first thing this morning to refute Barton’s alibi. Just follow my lead and answer the questions. You’ll do fine.”
“I wish I had more notice.”
“You’ll do fine. Just follow my lead.”
Lara remains uncertain but takes her seat. The judge enters and calls the room to order. Woodcomb turns the floor over to me, and I recall our star witness to the stand. As she makes her way up front, I scribble a quick note to Ella. The note says, “I’m sorry.” She reads it and looks at me with austere neutrality. I stand up, knowing that my life will never be the same.
“Ms. Landrum, you were in court Friday afternoon when the defendant, Bernard Barton, testified that he was with you on the night of your sister’s murder. How would you respond to that?”
“It’s a lie.”
“Have you ever had a sexual relationship with the defendant?”
“Absolutely not.”
The answer is delivered with the perfect note of indignation—not too much, not too little. She’s very good. The room eats it up.
“Is it possible that the defendant mistook your sister for you?”
The snark oozes. Millwood objects, the witness looks confused, and the courtroom snickers. I withdraw the question and begin again.
“Let me rephrase that last question. To your knowledge, has the defendant ever mistaken you for your sister?”
I give her a slight nod for assurance. The tightrope I’m walking will give way at any moment. I need her to think we’re on the same team for as long as the pretense can last.
“No, he can tell us apart.”
“Was your sister ever arrested?”
“Yes. For DUI. A long time ago.”
The abrupt change of pace unsettles the air. I grab a sheaf of documents and show them to Millwood. He looks at them and looks at me, frowning before handing me back the papers. Barton whispers something to him, but Millwood waves him away with his hand, instead eyeing me intently. I approach the witness.
“Ms. Landrum, I’m handing you the arrest file for your sister’s DUI. Have you ever seen it before?”
“No.”
“And is that your sister in this mugshot?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
I collect the documents and walk back to lay them on counsel’s table. Ella pens a note on a legal pad and pushes it toward me: “What are you doing????” The composure in her face masks the uncertainty in her heart. I nod. The gesture is meaningless in the context of her question. Her eyes narrow. Silence fills the courtroom. I stumble along, content to portray an aura of incompetence. The jury is irrelevant. My performance is for a more limited audience.
“The defendant also denied ever hitting your sister. How do you respond to that?”
“He hit her. I saw the bruises on her back with my own two eyes.”
The answer is comfortable, confident—the product of her being on surer ground. She glares at Barton for emphasis. I study the both of them, trying to decipher the one piece of the puzzle that still escapes me. The analysis doesn’t bear any fresh insight. I shuffle along and laboriously set up two easels adjacent to each other. I leave the easels empty and redirect my attention to the witness.
“Have you ever seen the defendant hit your sister?”
She hesitates. I walk toward the wall where I retrieve two enlarged photographs. The witness follows my movements with great interest. My eyes look expectantly toward her for an answer. I then start the cumbersome task of carrying my jumbo-sized photographs back across the courtroom.
“He wouldn’t have dared to hit her in front of me.”
“Objection!”
“Sustained.”
Millwood has been itching to get more involved. I welcome the diversion. Better the witness thinks about him than me. I place one of my giant photographs on an easel—a blow-up of an autopsy photo earlier admitted into evidence. I straighten the picture on its perch and assess the naked torso with the bullet hole adjacent to the heart, checking once more just to be sure.
“Ms. Landrum, this is an enlarged copy of an autopsy photo of your sister admitted earlier into evidence. Have you ever seen this photo before?”
“No.”
“Does it upset you?”
“Objection, relevance.”
“Sustained.”
The other photo is a blow-up from the Sara Barton and Brice Tanner sex tape. Sara rides Brice cowgirl-style right there on the museum floor, her bare breasts flowing proudly in the figurative wind. Even though the video played earlier in the trial, the high definition quality of the photo, freezing this particular revealing moment in time, shocks in a way the video did not. The ludicrous thought that I probably just caught the television censors unaware seizes me with unseemly glee. Life is absurd, and the mind is an untamed animal.
Millwood wants to say something but realizes that I’m offending half the room while perplexing the other half. He once taught me that no duty exists to rescue in the courtroom. You’re not a lifeguard. If opposing counsel is drowning, don’t throw him a life preserver. Let him sink. I hope he follows his own advice now to give me the time to do what I need to do. Ella’s countenance of neutrality wobbles on the brink of panic. Her stare informs me that I’m throwing away the case. She’s not necessarily wrong. Judge Woodcomb looks at me askance but holds her tongue. I’ve built up a great deal of credit with her over the years, and she’s a pro. The photos on display aren’t any more offensive than the bloody crime scene pictures regularly admitted into evidence. Murder is an ugly business.
“Ms. Landrum, this is a photograph captured from the video of your sister and Brice Tanner admitted earlier into evidence. Do you recognize your sister?”
“Yes, of course.”
I take a deep breath. Millwood studies me with the focus of a world-class poker player trying to get a read on his opponent. I feign impassivity, but a torrent of colliding nerves wreaks havoc on my internal equilibrium. I focus my attention on Bernard Barton and ask my question.
“Why is there a tiny scar on your sister’s left breast in the autopsy photo but no scar in the picture taken at the party?”
The room is slow to react. The question floats unanswered. Millwood breaks character, his wrinkled expression betraying deep indecision as to the meaning of my words. He releases me from his sight to look at the pictures for himself. Barton squints to do the same, his reaction revealing little, except poor eyesight. I turn to the witness. Concern and confusion contort her beautiful face. My manner cajoles, imploring her to give what should be an obvious answer if only she would see it. The encouragement is a lie, designed to keep her off balance. The witness isn’t the only one who can act.
She offers, “I don’t understand. Can you repeat the question?”
I remove a laser pointer from my pocket. I send the thin red beam across the courtroom to the autopsy photo and land on a tiny, weathered scar adjacent to the dead body’s left breast. I then move my laser to the same spot on the photo of Sara and Brice, except there’s no similar mark.
“Why is there a scar on your sister’s left breast in the autopsy photo but no scar in the picture taken at the party?”
“I … I don’t know.”
Disappointment shows in my face. Her eyes plead for help. She’s trying hard to connect the dots, thinking we’re still on the same team. That illusion is about to shatter. Everyone’s trying to figure everyone else out. The witness looks at me. I look at Barton. Barton looks at the witness. Millwood’s back to looking at me. Ella looks confused.
“Do you have a scar on your left breast?”
I know she doesn’t.
Barton slowly awakes to what’s happening. His emotions are an open book, and he looks punch drunk with surprise. I return my attention to the stand. The witness and I glare at each other, both of our masks now dropped to the wayside, each of us knowing that the other one knows. No one in the courtroom dares take a breath for fear of missing the witness’ answer.
“I resent that question.”
I grab Sara Barton’s arrest report and besiege her, “Why don’t the fingerprints from Sara Barton’s arrest match the fingerprints of the person in this autopsy photo?”
“I have no idea.”
“You’re Sara Barton, aren’t you?”
“No!”
Murmurs—sounds, not words—start percolating around the courtroom. The secret is out, and the implications start to accumulate. I bear down on the witness before all hell breaks loose.
“Do you have a scar on your left breast?”
&
nbsp; “Stop it!”
I take one last measure of Barton. I have to be sure. We could’ve arrested the witness any time over the weekend. But double jeopardy prevents Barton from being tried for the same crime twice. The whole purpose of today’s charade is to flesh out whether Barton had a role in this mess or not.
Scott and I spent hours working it every way we could and settled on two possibilities. Scenario One: Barton and his wife conspired to kill Lara Landrum, only for Sara to leave him holding the bag at the end of the day. Barton couldn’t very well tell the truth under this version, forcing him to dig out of his predicament in some other way. Scenario Two: Sara killed her sister by herself, intending to frame Barton from the start. She posed as Lara and seduced Barton, knowing that he couldn’t admit sleeping with his sister-in-law at the time his wife was murdered, especially if “Lara” refused to corroborate his alibi.
I demand, “Did you conspire with your husband to murder your sister?”
“No!”
A stupefied Barton jerks toward me and shakes his massive head in a helpless spasm of denial. I believe the bastard. Millwood smiles like a kid at Christmas. War stories are the stock in trade of seasoned trial lawyers, and Millwood will be telling this one for years.
“But you did kill your sister?”
“No!”
I yell, “The fingerprints don’t lie, Sara. The photographs don’t lie. Look at them! Insanity is your only defense. You better start telling the truth.”
Mike Tyson once said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Keeping up the attack while she’s dazed and confused may be the only path to get at the truth. She’s too cunning for me to give her a chance to regroup and invent some escape hatch. I can prove she is Sara Barton but not that she actually squeezed the trigger on the gun that killed Lara Landrum. I need her to admit that. Throwing out the possibility of an insanity defense might be the hook that yields the catch.
“Are you bipolar? I have your medical records if you want to see them. Are you bipolar?”
The Murder of Sara Barton (Atlanta Murder Squad Book 1) Page 31
