turning down the job at the DA's office because of it. But I had no
interest in the alternatives I'd been given at the city's big firms,
and Roger knew it. There's no good way to tell your husband that
you're making employment decisions based on an old boyfriend, even if
it is to avoid him. So, instead, I'd played the odds that I could
avoid one of the county's two thousand cops, at least for a while.
When I saw his name on the police reports for my first trial, I tried
to ready myself. I prepared the speech in my head and went over it
again and again in the shower that morning, the way I should have been
rehearsing my opening statement. I was going to apologize for all the
venom that came out of me that day. Then I would laugh as I said it
all worked out for the best in the end, since he'd accomplished what he
wanted, and I was so happy with Roger.
None of it was ever said. He walked into my office with his patrol
partner, handed me a cup of coffee, and said, "Jason Hillard, meet
Samantha Kincaid. Kincaid and I went to Grant High together. So
what's the game plan?"
I'd prepped them for the trial, but the case turned into a bench
warrant when the defendant no-showed. Two years later, looking at
Chuck with my father, I realized I'd still never apologized to him for
how I behaved that summer, nor had I thanked him for saving me from
having to do it when I wasn't ready that day in my office two years
ago.
They came back into the kitchen with the steaks, and Dad started
heaping mass quantities of food onto three plates. I set the table,
blinking away tears before any could roll down.
"I was just telling Chuck about the damage you did last weekend at the
target range," Dad said.
My entire life, my father has enjoyed gun collecting and target
shooting. Cursed with having a daughter as his only child, he had
tried repeatedly to spark some interest from me, but to no avail.
To his initial chagrin, I eventually learned to use a gun only when my
ex-husband insisted on keeping one in our New York apartment. If he
was going to keep a loaded handgun in an unlocked nightstand, I figured
I sure as hell better know how to use it. So some of the agents took
me to the aTF. firing range and taught me how to load, aim, fire, and
reload just about every weapon available, legally and otherwise, in the
United States. As irrational as gun ownership is as practiced by the
most hard-core of American gun lovers, I'm a good enough shot and get
sufficient shooting practice that I find a sense of security in the .25
caliber automatic that I keep taped to the underside of my nightstand
drawer.
Chuck took his attention away from his steak long enough to say, "I
never would've believed it if someone had told me back in high school
that Sam would grow up to be a beef-eating gun toter who likes to put
bad guys in prison."
"Remember when she decided to be a vegetarian her junior year?" Dad
was laughing so hard I thought he was going to choke. "God, she tried.
Decided eating meat was so barbaric."
Chuck was nodding his head in agreement. "Right. But, in the end, she
hated the idea of being hypocritical even more, and, try as she could,
she couldn't live a one-hundred-percent animal-friendly lifestyle."
That's why I've always felt so at home with Chuck. He got me. He
could take the traits that other people see as so inconsistent and
understand that they make me who I am. I eat like a pig, but I run
thirty miles a week. I despise criminals, but I call myself a liberal.
I'm smart as hell, but I love TV. And I hate the beauty myth, but I
also want good hair.
To Chuck, it somehow all made sense, so I never felt like I was faking
anything. Dad has never quite figured me out, but he sure enjoys
making fun of me. "Poor girl drove me and her mother crazy trying to
avoid leather, animal fat, anything that might make her seem like a
hypocrite for telling everyone else how mean we were for eating
meat."
I had to laugh too, remembering my mother's face when she opened her
Christmas gift one year to find the hideous macrame purse I'd
triumphantly presented as an alternative to her tried-and-true tasteful
brown leather handbag.
"Does rubbing my face in my youthful attempts to be a good person make
you guys feel good?" I said. "OK, you win. I love the smell of
leather. I like being at the top of the food chain. I eat thick slabs
of beef, still pink in the middle. Vegetables are what my food eats.
Are you happy now? Maybe we should talk about the time Chuck joined
the feminist center in college so he could scam on women. Or how
about, Dad, when you got a CB radio and grew a mustache after you saw
Smokey and the Bandit? What was your handle again, the Rocking
Ranger?"
We continued like that, recalling our most embarrassing moments at
least the ones clean enough to tell in front of my dad until the
high-pitched beeping of a pager broke through our laughter. By
instinct, Chuck and I both immediately hit the "stop making that
wretched noise" button on the right side of our waists and looked down
at the digital display. "It's me," I said. "Grace. I better get
it."
Grace was calling to let me know that she'd dropped off Kendra and to
wish me luck with trial the next day. She also told me that when she
went inside with Kendra, Kendra had played the answering machine in
front of her. Apparently, her old friend Haley was looking to get back
in touch with her, had heard that she was living at home again, was
wondering what she was up to, that sort of thing. It was hard not to
be furious as I remembered my only encounter with the girl.
I tried to keep cool as I dialed Kendra's number.
"Hey there. How you holding up?"
"Alright, I guess. I just want the trial to be over with."
I said what I could to relieve the anxiety. In the end, there's
nothing you can say to comfort a victim who senses the system's
potential to fail.
I raised the phone message from Haley with caution. "Grace mentioned
that Haley is trying to get in touch with you. I didn't realize you
had stayed in contact with her."
"I haven't. She called, that's all."
"She give you any idea what she wanted?" I said.
The distinctively teenage sulk came through loud and clear over the
phone. "Will you please, like, not freak out? She was just wondering
how I was doing."
I didn't like the idea that Haley might be working her way back into
Kendra's life, so I said what I could to discourage her from returning
the call. I knew in the end she'd do what she wanted.
I'd been looking forward to curling up with a book and going to bed
early when I got home. That's not what happened.
I should've known something was wrong as soon as I put my key in the
lock. Vinnie usually runs to the front door to welcome me home. OK,
so it's more of a waddle. The point is that he comes to the door when
he hears my keys. This time, I could h
ear Vinnie barking, but he
wasn't at the door.
I remember the noise behind me in the dark as I bolted the front door.
And I think I remember feeling the crack against my head that quickly
followed, but maybe I fabricated that memory later with the help of
blinding head pain and a lump the size of a golf ball.
When I came to, the clock told me I'd been out for an hour. My house
was a wreck. Cupboards were open, cushions were thrown, drawers were
emptied. And I could still hear Vinnie's muffled barks from somewhere
in the back of the house.
As much as I wanted to run to him, I'd watched enough scary movies to
know what to do if someone might be in your house. What you don't do
is creep around in the dark silence. That's how you wind up skewered
by some guy in a bad mask.
Instead, I went to my car, started the engine, and used my cell phone
to call 911. And my dad. And then Chuck. And then I realized I could
call everyone I knew, and it wouldn't get the first of them here any
faster.
So I waited and watched. Even when I could hear the sirens, still no
sign of life. Whoever tore the place apart must have left after
knocking me out.
Two patrol officers swept through the house while the EMTs finished
checking me out in the ambulance. No concussion, just assurances that
I'd have a brutal headache for the next forty-eight hours.
The police cleared me to enter after I showed them my ID and assured
them I knew how to handle a crime scene. A pane in the back door had
been smashed to gain entry.
Chuck and Dad showed up around the time I was freeing Vinnie from the
kitchen pantry. Knowing Vinnie, he'd made a valiant effort, but it
doesn't take much to kick a French bulldog into the nearest closet. He
put up a brave front when I picked him up, but I could feel him
shaking.
Dad kept on eye on me, while Chuck pulled rank to make the patrol
officers page out a technician to search for prints. PPB doesn't dust
every home burg, so I was getting special treatment. Must have been
the nasty knock to the head.
When he was done with immediate business, Chuck came into the kitchen
where my dad was fixing me a drink and monitoring the ice pack on my
head. "You doing OK?"
"Yeah, I guess."
"How's the mutt?" he said, smiling as he flipped one of Vinnie's ears
over.
"Seems to be getting over it. Dad's going to take him to the vet for
me tomorrow just to make sure he's alright."
One of the young patrol officers walked in and gave the kitchen a
cursory look over "Man, they really did a number, didn't they?"
I looked around and took in just how bad the place looked. And then I
took it out on the patrol officer. "Better call off the crime scene
team. McGruff the Crime Dog here has got the whole thing figured out.
Yep, they really did a number on the place. I hadn't picked up on
that, Mr. Sensitivity. Jesus Christ, get yourself a copy of Policing
for Idiots before you go out on any more calls." I put my hands
against the kitchen table, pushed my chair back, and stormed over to
the sink to look out the window.
Dad came to my side and patted my shoulder while I fought back tears
and tried to regain my composure. When I'd gotten myself under control
again, Chuck suggested that I look around when I was ready to see if
anything was missing. As I started to leave the kitchen, the patrol
officer said, "Just make sure you don't touch anything, ma'am."
I didn't turn around, but I heard Chuck say, "You got a death wish or
something, Williams? Use your fucking head."
The only valuables I own are some jewelry I inherited from my mother,
and I'd be surprised if anyone ever found those. If every old house
has some irregularity that invites fantastic stories, mine is an old
wall safe that someone had built into the baseboard of my bedroom. The
day I was entrusted with my mother's jewelry, I locked it inside that
safe and moved my solid maple headboard directly in front of it.
The bed was right where I'd left it. In fact, nothing seemed to be
missing, making me wonder why someone had bothered.
We were throwing around theories in the kitchen, with me desperately
searching for one that didn't involve any further mortal danger. First
I floated the typical teenage thrill burg. Wannabes get a high off
being in another person's house, going through their stuff, and
trashing the place. But they probably wouldn't have slugged me in the
noggin.
My next front-runner was a small-time junkie thief who broke in and
then went nuts and trashed the place when he realized I didn't own the
kinds of things that smalltime junkie thieves steal, like CDs, DVDs,
and other small items that are easily resalable to those who live in
the modern world.
That theory just might have stuck, at least for the night, if I hadn't
decided I needed a beer.
I opened the fridge to find my twelve-inch chopping knife prominently
displayed on the top shelf. It secured a note that said, Next time we
slice up you and your dog. It's that easy.
So much for a theory that didn't scare the shit out of me.
Seven.
Like any other crime victim, I could do nothing about the intrusion
into my home and assault upon my person except wake up in a messy house
with a pounding headache.
PPB had assured me that they'd do what they could to find prints, but I
knew there wouldn't be any. And I assured PPB that I'd go over my
files to identify anyone who might want to scare me, but I felt in my
gut that it had something to do with Derringer. Unfortunately,
Derringer currently enjoyed the greatest protections a defendant can
enjoy. Lopez had served me and the police department with written
notice that he was invoking his rights to counsel and to silence, which
meant that, while his trial was pending, the police couldn't question
him about anything, even suspected new crimes.
The truth is that prosecutors are rarely threatened. Some speculate
that it's because they are feared, but the real reason prosecutors are
generally safe from the scum they prosecute
U1
is that they're replaceable. You take out your prosecutor and nothing
changes. The same witnesses bring the same evidence to the same
jurors, only with a different mouthpiece coordinating the show.
Unfortunately, an occasional defendant is too stupid to see that
reality, and I suspected Derringer was one of them. Now I had to go
into trial with yet another reason to feel sick whenever I looked at
him.
The first day of trial was mercifully quick. Judge Lesh had reviewed
all the written motions in advance and was ready to rule on them
without holding an evidentiary hearing. Even though the appearance
took only a few hours, I still found Derringer's presence
disconcerting. I'd almost hoped he'd throw me a look to confirm my
suspicion that he was behind the ransacking. His seeming indifference
only served to foster the combination of
rage and fear that I'd been
nursing since the previous night. I tried to use it to fuel my
concentration on the pending motions.
I was nervous about Lopez's motion to exclude the false alibi Derrick
Derringer had volunteered for his brother the last time around. It was
my position that this was relevant in determining whether Derrick was
telling the truth now.
Lisa argued that the evidence was too prejudicial to provide to the
jury. Or, as she put it, "Your honor, Ms. Kincaid knows full well
that, under the Rules of Evidence, my client's prior conviction is
inadmissible. By framing this evidence as impeachment of Derrick
Derringer, she's trying to find a way to get my client's prior
conviction through the back door."
Lesh went off the record. "Ms. Lopez, you're doing a good job for
your client, but if I were you I would avoid using the term 'back door'
when referring to his prior conviction, which I see is for attempted
sodomy."
David Lesh was one of those people who could say the most inappropriate
things and yet somehow never offend anyone. A legendary story holds
that when Lesh was still a prosecutor, one of the female judges and her
law clerks saw him leaving the building wearing shorts. The judge
jokingly commented that the DAs were letting their dress standards
lapse a bit. Lesh's response? "I don't mind telling you, judge, that
these legs are under a court order from the National Organization for
Women. I cover these beauties, and those fanatical broads at NOW will
Judgement Calls Page 15
