Expert Witness

by Rebecca Forster

  EXPERT WITNESS

  by

  Rebecca Forster

  For Bruce & Carole Raterink

  Many thanks to Jenny Jensen for keeping this story on track, and to friends with good eyes: Nancy McClain, Julie Mandarino, and Jay Freed. Your help, cheerleading and friendship is so greatly appreciated.

  Expert Witness

  Copyright © Rebecca Forster, 2011

  All rights reserved

  Edition Copyright © by Rebecca Forster 2011

  Witness Series Cover Art: truebluemedia.com

  CHAPTER ONE:

  DAY 1:

  An Outbuilding in the California Mountains

  He touched her breast.

  He hadn’t meant to. Not that way. Not gently, as if there was affection between them. Not as if there was suddenly sympathy for her, or second thoughts about the situation. To touch her so tenderly – a fluttering of the fingers, a sweep of his palm - was not in the plan and that, quite simply, was why he was surprised. But he really couldn’t find fault with himself. There must have been something about the fall of the light or the turn of her body that made him do such a thing.

  Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes not wanting to be distracted by her breasts or her face or her long, long legs. For someone like him, it would not be unheard of to be moved by the frail, failing light filtering through the cracks in the mortar, pushing through the hole high in the wall. This was a desperately beautiful light, heroically shining as the dark crept up to capture it, overcome it, extinguish it.

  There were smells, too. They were assaultive, musty smells that reminded him of a woman after sex. Then there were the scents of moist dirt and decaying leaves mixed with those of fresh pine and clean air. There was the smell of her: indefinable, erotic, unique.

  Breathing deep, turning his blind eyes upward, fighting the urge to open them, he acknowledged the absence of sound. The sounds of civilization were white noise to him, but in this remote place his heart raced at the thump of a falling pinecone, the shifting of the air, the breathing and twitching of unseen animals, the flight of bugs and birds.

  God, this was intimate: sights, smells, silence. His head fell back against the rough concrete. He understood now what had happened, why he had crossed the line. Oh, but wasn’t his brilliant objectivity both a blessing and a curse? He saw life for what it was and people for who they truly were. He was so far superior in intellect and insight – and hadn’t that just messed him up at a critical juncture in his friggin’ life because of her-

  He stopped right there.

  No wandering thoughts. No anger. He was better than that. It had taken years to master his hatred, and he would not throw his success away on this pitiful excuse for a woman. He closed his eyes tighter, banishing the bad and empty words that were simply the excrement of exhaustion. He breathed through his nose, lowered his heart rate, and returned to his natural, thoughtful state before realizing that he had neglected to acknowledge her blouse. It was important to be thorough and sure of his conclusions, so he opened his eyes, pushed off the wall, and balanced on his haunches. He pressed his fingers onto the cool, hard-packed earth.

  Ah, yes. He saw it now. The dart. The tailor’s trick of construction intended to draw attention to a woman’s breast. The widest part hugged the graceful mound, the tip pointed right at the nipple. There wasn’t more than one man in a thousand who would notice such a thing, much less understand its true purpose. That dart, so absurdly basic, was a subliminal invitation to familiarity. Confident and in control again, he touched her purposefully. He didn’t grasp or grope yet she moved like she didn’t like it.

  That pissed him off just a little so he squeezed her hard and hoped it hurt. He would never know if it did and that was more the pity. He liked the symmetry of cause and effect. Certainly that’s what had brought them to this place. She was the cause of his torture, and she would have to deal with the effect of her actions.

  Disgusted that he had wasted precious time, he pushed himself up and kicked at her foot. She didn’t move. She was no better than a piece of meat. He worked fast, pushing her on her side. He cradled her finely shaped skull. When it was properly positioned, he dropped it on the hard ground.

  Leaning over, he grabbed the stake above her head with both hands and pulled as hard as he could. It didn’t move. No surprise. The hole was deep, the concrete was set, and the wood was too thick to break, too wide at the top for the rope to slip off. His hard work had paid off: the bag of concrete dragged half a mile uphill, the water carted from the creek a mile in the other direction, the patient whittling of the wood itself. He had battled the thin air and the crushing September heat that rested atop the mountains and smothered the city below. Now that it was done, though, he realized how much he hated this place. There was a spiritual residue here that fanned his spark of uncertainty. He shivered. He hoped God wasn’t watching.

  Gone. Banished. Think on it no more.

  Sin, immorality, cruelty were not words he would consider. He had chosen this place precisely because it was ugly and horrid. No one had a better purpose for it than him. Pulling his lips together, he put his knee into her stomach, crossed her wrists, and yanked her arms upward. They slipped through his grasp.

  “Good grief,” he muttered.

  Practice had gone smoothly, but the reality was that limp arms and smooth, slender wrists slipped away before he could get the rope tight enough to hold her. She groaned and that made him afraid. Beads of sweat became rivulets. His shirt was soaked. He would throw that shirt away. He would cut it up and throw it away. That’s what he would have to do. Maybe he would burn it.

  Working faster, he leaned his whole body against her and pushed her arms up, not caring if the rope cut her or anything. Task completed, he collapsed against the wall and mentally checked off the list that had been so long in the making.

  Engage.

  Subdue.

  Transport.

  Immobilize.

  Punish.

  Only one remained unchecked. It would come soon enough, and with it would come satisfaction, retribution and redemption. He didn’t know which would be sweeter.

  A water bottle was placed near enough for her to drink from if she didn’t panic. Food – such as it was - was within biting distance. Bodily functions? Well, wouldn’t she just have to deal with that as best she could? Humiliation was something she needed to understand. Humiliation and degradation.

  He was starting to smile, when suddenly she threw herself on her back and her arms twisted horribly. He pulled himself into a ball, covering his head with his hands. When no blows fell, when she didn’t rise up like some terrifying Hydra, he lowered his hands and chuckled nervously. He hated surprises. Surprises made him act like a coward, and he was no coward. And he was no liar, as God was his witness.

  He looked again and saw it was only the drugs working, not her waking. Catching his breath, he stood up. It was time to go. He paused at the door and entertained the idea of letting her go but knew that was impossible. What was done was done. Justice would finally be served.

  With all his might, he pushed open the metal door, stepped out, and put his shoulder into it as he engaged the makeshift lock. He wiped his brow with a handkerchief and composed himself. Next time all this would be easier. Next time he would bring water for himself. Next time he would bring the woman in the cement hut something, too.

  He would bring her a friend.

  Josie Bates’ House, Hermosa Beach

  Max slept on the tiled entry near the front door while Hannah Sheraton marked off the hours by the sound of his dog dreams; timing his snuffling and whining like labor pains.

  Eight o’clock.

  Nine.

  Ten.

  Eleven o’c
lock.

  At midnight Hannah went for her meds, but it was the razor in the medicine chest that caught her attention. She touched it, cocking her head, narrowing her eye. It would be so easy to break it open, take the blade and slice away her fear and anxiety. Another scar would be a small price to pay for relief. Her fingers hovered over it just before she snatched the pills and slammed the door. She wouldn’t disappoint Josie.

  At one a.m. Hannah stepped over the old dog, eased outside, counted off twenty paces, and stopped exactly one step from the gate. She stood arrow-straight with her feet together and her knees locked. Whippet thin, lush chested, graceful and gorgeous as only a sixteen-year-old girl could be, Hannah paused. A breeze came off the ocean and fussed with her long black curls but did nothing to cut the heat. She scanned one side of the tiny walk-street where Josie’s house anchored the corner, and then scanned back the other direction to the beach. The neighbors’ houses were dark.

  Suddenly her ears pricked and her heart beat faster. Someone was coming, walking on the Strand that paralleled the beach. That person wore hard shoes. Their steps sounded forlorn. That person stumbled once. Alert in the silence, Hannah waited. The steps started again. Hannah saw it was a man walking and an unhappy one at that. The moon was bright enough to see that his hands were stuffed into the pockets of his pants. He was hunched over like Sisyphus eternally, wearily, fruitlessly pushing that rock of his. Hannah’s shoulders fell as he went by, disappearing into the early morning dark without ever looking her way. Her nerves prickled under her skin and her gut roiled with disappointment. She wanted that to be Josie walking home to her. Her head nearly split in two with wanting that.

  At two a.m. Hannah turned on her heel, went back up the walk, took the key from inside, locked the front door, jiggled the knob four times, and moved away. Then she went back and did it all again. Dissatisfied still, she forced herself to leave.

  Quickly, silently, Hannah went down her walk-street, turned north on the Strand and hurried toward the big pink apartment building half a mile away. The breeze kicked up to a hot wind as if the beach itself was suddenly as unsettled as she. Narrowing her eyes against the sudden dusting of sand, she caught her hair in her fist. It was sticky with the salty mist.

  Hannah hurried past Scotty’s Restaurant. The wall facing the beach was made of glass. Inside, a neon beer sign glowed yellow. If a thing could look lonely it did. On her left she passed the statue of the surfer perpetually crouched under the curl of a bronze wave, forever beached at the foot of the pier. If the artist had a soul, he would have at least faced the surfer so he could see the ocean. Hannah shivered as she glanced past the statue to the pier itself. It looked like the road to hell, reaching into the sea, swallowed by the black water.

  To her right was Pier Plaza. The walking man had tired and now sat outside Hennessey’s at a table bolted to the concrete. Whatever pain kept him up so late it was his alone. He wouldn’t let it loose on her the way men liked to do. This was Hermosa Beach, after all. This was the safest place on the face of the earth. That’s what Josie said. But Josie wasn’t here, so the truth of that was suspect.

  Breathing hard, unaware that she had been running, Hannah reached her destination and slid into the shadow of the awning over the front door. She pressed her fist against her chest as if this would keep her thumping heart inside. If anyone saw her they would think she was still sick instead of just afraid. Everyone was afraid of something, even if they didn’t admit it.

  Letting a long breath curl through her lips, her numbers tumbled out with it. She touched her fist to her chest five times, ten, fifteen and twenty, whispering the number that went with each one. Ritual complete, Hannah opened the outside door of Archer’s apartment building and ducked in.

  Quickly, lightly, she went up the first flight.

  Heart pounding, numbers rattling inside her head, she made the second landing.

  She caught her breath. There was one more flight to go.

  She made it to the third floor with barely a sound.

  A shudder ran down her spine before branching out to wind around her waist and clutch at her stomach. Her chin jerked up and then down again. Slowly Hannah opened her palm and looked at the key. She never thought she would touch this key much less use it. Not that she’d been forbidden to be here, it had just worked out that way. The man and the girl had not easily taken to one another, but they had staked out acceptable territory in Josie’s life. Tonight, there was no choice. Hannah had to cross the boundary.

  Putting the key in the lock, she turned it slowly, sure that the tumblers sounded like the crack of a gunshot. It was only her imagination. Inside, Archer slept on. That was a good thing. Hannah didn’t want to wake him; she only wanted to see if Josie slept beside him.

  The door swung silently. She stepped inside. A full moon illuminated the deck and half the living room. Hannah closed her hand around the key, her fist went behind her back and then her back went against the door.

  Her courage was small, so she moved fast when she found the kernel of it. She went past the couch, past the chair, past the bookshelf with the rosary hanging from the neck of a beer bottle. She stopped just to the side of the bedroom door, peered around the corner and looked at the bed.

  Her heart fell.

  The covers were piled too high for her to see who was underneath them. Biting her bottom lip, knowing she couldn’t turn back now, Hannah inched into the room. No harm done if she was quiet. A quick look and she would be satisfied.

  Three. . .

  Four. . .

  Five steps…

  Suddenly, an arm was at her throat, a gun was at her head, and Hannah was pulled back against a man’s half-naked body.

  CHAPTER TWO:

  Archer’s Apartment, Hermosa Beach

  “Jesus Christ, Hannah. You’re damn lucky I didn’t shoot you.”

  Archer paced, he lectured, and Hannah sat on the couch with her knees together, feet out, hands clasped, and head down. He probably thought she was ashamed, but she wasn’t; she was embarrassed by the sight of a shirtless, shoeless Archer wearing only his raggedy robe and sweat pants. His hair was mussed and he needed a shave. The only reason she was upset was because he had been sleeping alone.

  “Hey, are you listening to me? I could have hurt you. I could have. . .” He pulled his hands through his hair and stopped right in front of her, splaying his legs, bending from the waist, barking at her like a drill sergeant. “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”

  Hannah’s head snapped up, she raised her sharp green eyes to his keen dark ones. He couldn’t intimidate her. Sixteen years of her life was like sixty for a normal person, but he’d forgotten that. All he saw was a kid sneaking around his place.

  “Stop yelling. I can hear you.”

  “And I’ve got a telephone,” he barked. “You could have called.”

  “And I didn’t because you’d be pissed at me. You think I don’t know when Josie is here she’s off limits?” Hannah came back strong, but her bravado was a beat off. “She might have forgotten to tell me she was staying here, you know. It’s not like either of you is used to having a kid around.”

  Her stunning, dark face tightened with indignation. She picked at the upholstery, looking more like a child than Archer had ever seen her look. Finally, she pushed her chin up and shook her hair back.

  “When my mother didn’t come home all I had to do was look in some dude’s bed to find her. I’m sorry if I’m just doing what comes natural.”

  Archer opened his mouth only to close it again. What could he say to that? The girl had a point. Sixteen-years-old, she had been framed by her own mother for murder, a mother who slept with anything that moved, who abandoned Hannah for days on end when she was little, and kept doing it until the day they put her in jail and threw away the key. Yeah, Hannah had cause to worry when the adults who were supposed to take care of her went missing.

  “Point taken,” he mumbled.

  “Okay.” Hannah gav
e an inch because he had. She raised her eyes again and the fingers of her right hand methodically tapped her left. “I don’t expect Josie to babysit me, but if I saw that she was here I could at least go home and sleep. But she’s not here, she’s not anywhere, and now I’m really scared.”

  Archer sat down opposite her and put his elbows on the chair arms. He covered his face with his hands then drew them down slowly as much to wake himself up as to give him time to check out this girl who had changed the way he and his woman went about their business.

  Josie Bates had almost given her life for this kid – literally - then turned their world upside down for her. She made sure Hannah saw a therapist twice a week, got her into school and encouraged her art. He understood. This was Josie’s way of healing her own broken heart, crushed when her own mother abandoned her. She’d been close to Hannah’s age when that happened. Even Archer had to admit that Hannah and Josie were a good fit: just different enough and just alike enough to make theirs an interesting, dedicated and complex relationship.

  Given all that, it made no sense that Josie would not check in with Hannah. Besides, Hannah’s obsessive-compulsiveness led her to check every nook and cranny of her surroundings a hundred times a day, so logic dictated that she had searched meticulously for Josie. If she hadn’t been found, something was definitely wrong.

  “Okay. Okay.” His hands fell to the side. “When did she leave?”

  “I saw her yesterday morning.”

  Hannah hugged herself and shook her head. Those startling green eyes of hers never left Archer’s face. For the hundredth time he admired the genetic recipe used to create this girl: not black or white, East Indian or Irish. She simply was exquisite and that, as far as Archer was concerned, added to the trouble she brought with her.

  “When did you get back from school?”

  “Three-thirty,” Hannah answered. “Then I went to an appointment with Doctor Fox.”