Psychosis_When a Dream Turns Deadly

by Roger Bray

  “Happier times.” Alice said, looking at him from her place against the bench.

  Steve almost laughed.

  “You’re serious, happier times?”

  “Well, it was before Hazel left.”

  “But were you happy, Alice?”

  She took the picture from him and looked at it.

  “No,” she admitted, “I wasn’t happy at all. I haven’t looked at that picture for ages, but even so until you said that I hadn’t considered that. But you are right, I wasn’t happy, even then.”

  Steve looked up at her. Her life and that of her brother had gone to hell, but she actually looked better now than she did in the picture, more open, beautiful, there was still a shadow being cast over her, but it was no longer hers, it was her brother’s and she could and was, he suspected, slowly stepping out from under it. The only difference between the picture and the reality was her eyes, as well as sad they now looked weary as well, but he knew that even that could be overcome as she had proved, for a happy few hours at the Granary.

  He smiled softly at her, but Alice couldn’t look him in the eye, as if she sensed what he was thinking, she blushed and nodded toward the piles of paperwork.

  “So, have you decided to help?”

  He smiled, “I’ve decided to have a look, whether I can help is dependent on what I find in these documents. My first task is to read the files and find out what’s relevant and what’s not.”

  “I tried to keep all the documents together as far as the trial is concerned, with their relevance as far as I could see it.”

  “Ah,” he said, “I’m not talking about the trial or the appeals. I mean the evidential relevance of what’s in all of this. At the end of the day, what is evidence and what isn’t; what did the prosecution use and what was rejected, and why was it rejected? What did they miss if anything?”

  “I don’t understand. If there was other information, more evidence, then why wasn’t it used?”

  “There could be many reasons, some that are good and some bad. If the evidence contradicted something that the prosecution was trying to prove then it might have been ignored, if it was seen as neutral, that it didn’t help or hinder their case then it may have been dismissed as irrelevant or that they believed the point was proven without it.”

  “But because the DA didn’t see it as relevant, doesn’t mean that it isn’t?” Alice protested.

  “Exactly right, but you would have thought that Alex’s defense team would have pulled this apart already.”

  She was shaking her head, “Until you mentioned it, I hadn’t realized but no, they didn’t. I mean they made a big thing about countering the DA’s case, but they didn’t seem to be looking for anything new or something that was missing.”

  “This could mean that there isn’t anything new, or the DA didn’t leave anything out, which brings me back to not being able to help.”

  Alice looked crestfallen at this remark and Steve could see that he was her last chance for Alex, if he couldn’t find anything then he doubted anyone else could, if she could be bothered to try to find anyone else, he doubted she would though.

  “Cheer up, Alice, going through this lot is going to take some time, and then, if there’s anything that we can manage to get out of it that warrants a closer look, we could be looking at a few months at least. Please don’t think that going through all of this will get done by the weekend and Alex will be released by next week.”

  He paused while she took this in, chewing on her bottom lip as he had seen her do when, he considered, she was unsure about something.

  “Alice, look. The worst case scenario is that there’s nothing new and Alex stays inside. OK, that’s crap, and it’s definitely not what you want to hear, but at least nothing changes, and it can’t get any worse for him than that can it?”

  She shook her head.

  “But, you never know we might actually find something, something that does change something, and it could be anything. When the cops investigate any sort of offense, they need to prove to a high standard that the person they are charging, the one before the court, is guilty, or at least they have to have enough that the DA is convinced enough to take the charges in front of a jury. That’s the bad news for them, but for us, we don’t need to do that, we don’t need to prove someone else is guilty; we don’t even have to prove that Alex is innocent though that would be nice.

  “What we may be able to do is raise enough doubt in a judge’s mind that they might consider that the conviction could be unsafe. They might be convinced enough to vacate the finding of guilt and release Alex completely or order a new trial.”

  “But how are we going to do that?”

  “Well, my plan is to start from scratch, look at the crime, look at the evidence, look for where there’s no evidence but there should be or if the evidence doesn’t gel with the facts.”

  “So, a completely new investigation?”

  He nodded as she chewed her bottom lip and had started twisting a lock of her long blond hair as well, doubt and concern in overdrive.

  “Why, what’s wrong?” he asked, “don’t you think that your brother’s case warrants a fresh investigation, or don’t you think that his protestations of innocence will stand up to fresh scrutiny?”

  “No, it’s not that, Alex is innocent I know he is, but …” She paused for a moment and the hair twisting increased. “I don’t know how I’m going to pay for it. Since Alex went to jail, the app sales and web work have kept me going OK, but I don’t have a real lot of disposable income. I could sell the house, or ask Alex to sell his, I suppose, but would that be enough?”

  Steve looked aghast for a moment as he understood what she was saying before he recovered and laughed softly.

  “Alice, we met by chance and I offered to have a look at this. At no time did I think of it as any sort of ploy to get you to hire me. I’m more than happy to look at this, it’s exactly the sort of thing I can do and, if something comes out of it then I will be happy to investigate it as best I can. I have no intention of charging you one red cent for this.”

  “Are you sure, no charge?”

  “I told you that I can’t promise anything will actually come out of this, but even so, there’s no way I’m going to charge you, regardless of how much time it might take. There may be some expenses later, but they will be legal fees, court costs, that sort of thing, but nothing for me.”

  She shook her head and looked as though she was about to cry. Steve put down his beer and walked over to her. Taking her in his arms, he hugged her.

  “C’mon, you keep beer in the fridge and maybe go out for the occasional pizza with me and we’ll call it quits. Being with you is payment enough. OK?”

  She nodded as the front door bell rang indicating their meal had arrived. She pushed him away and grabbed her purse off the bench before he could react and made her way to the front door to pay for the food before he could.

  Chapter Six

  Steve chased the last, cold piece of chicken around his plate with his chopsticks before giving up with trying to grab it that way and stabbed the morsel through with one of the sticks.

  He chewed on the chicken and drank the last of the beer that Alice had given him and looked at the three separate piles of paper on the table. The first was quite small and was all the copies of the statements and reports of the evidence that the DA had used against Alex. The second stack, the majority was the bulk of the court proceedings which, contrary to popular depictions, are usually boring affairs. This pile documented the full trial, the charge documents and included a full transcript of the trial. Steve intended to read through it later, but he doubted that it would contain any startling revelations at all.

  The original appeal had concentrated on perceived procedural problems that were, probably correctly, thrown out. He wasn’t interested in some technicality to get Alex out, there was no chance of any sort of appeal on those grounds which had not been explored and considered to the last pe
riod mark in the charges and inference that Judge Prindle had in some way influenced the jury, whereas what Steve read indicated that the judge had been fair in his summing up and in his directions to the jury.

  Steve knew that any appeal on those grounds was as dead as the final piece of chicken he was chewing down.

  Alice had sat in silence, eating her own meal as she watched Steve alternately chewing food, drinking beer, or reading, considering and setting aside numerous documents. The odd one or two he would dwell over and consider more fully before placing it on one of the piles. The third pile wasn’t so much a pile, more a smaller stack that contained areas he considered worthy of further investigation.

  “That’s it,” she asked when he explained his system, “that is all there’s to re-investigate?”

  He nodded and took a sip from the new beer she had given him.

  “There’s not a real lot there.” She sounded disappointed.

  “That’s all there’s from the court documents,” he explained, “I’m hoping that there will be a lot more to look at once I have considered what’s not there.”

  “Not there?”

  “If Alex didn’t kill Hazel and you’re adamant that she is probably dead, and I would tend to agree with that, then something did happen to her.”

  “Homicide?”

  “Maybe? Probably?”

  “But what else could there be?”

  “There are only four ways someone dies: natural causes; homicide; suicide or, accidental death. For natural causes or an accidental death, we would have a body, for sure. For homicide, maybe not if someone had gone out of their way to hide it. Suicide—you may not find a body either if the poor individual had decided that they didn’t want to be found and dependent on the method they chose.”

  “To kill themselves?”

  Steve nodded, “Some people like to hide themselves away or jump into the ocean. But we have no body and given the facts we know of what Hazel was like, of her relationships with Alex and with her mom, there’s no reason that we have to suspect that she committed suicide at all. What was your relationship like with her?”

  Alice considered for a moment before answering confidently.

  “Even after everything that happened between her and Alex it was still good, actually it was still surprisingly good. She was married to my brother and as such was my sister-in-law, but in practice she felt more like a proper sister, that’s how I felt about her, and I think how she felt about me. I could talk to her about anything, and she did with me, and I had full confidence that whatever I said, she would keep to herself. She wasn’t bitchy or nasty in any way, and she even went out of her way to make Brian feel welcome and part of the group whenever we went around to their house or if we invited them to ours. Brian could certainly be difficult at times, but even when he was in one of his moods, she had the knack of including him.”

  “Difficult how?”

  “Oh, I don’t want to put him in a bad light, it wasn’t like that at all. He was a bit older than me, and maybe that’s why, but he could be quite set in his ways, not nasty or anything like that but a bit stubborn and stale maybe, occasionally moody, not angry, but sullen or quiet maybe. Even so, she always had a smile and a kind word, for everyone. She was that sort of person, she could put people at ease and make them feel welcome.”

  “Too welcome, could it have been misunderstood?”

  “Did she flirt; was she a prick tease do you mean?”

  He nodded.

  “As a woman, I would have to say no. She was beautiful, you’ve seen the picture, she dressed well, well cut clothes, low tops, but no, she didn’t flirt. She was natural, open and inviting and acted the same way with men or women, I don’t think that I have ever seen her in a situation where she made a wife uneasy, or a man get the wrong idea. She was a happy, friendly, and confident person.”

  “So, not Brian?”

  “Are you thinking that Brian might have hurt Hazel?”

  Steve shook his head, “I’m not thinking of anyone actually, but I’m working through the people that knew her.”

  “Well, not Brian, that would never have occurred to me. He liked her and was as devastated as the rest of us when she went missing. He always thought well of her and treated her courteously and kindly. He was out of town at a real estate conference in Tampa when she disappeared; that was verified by the police. Brian was about the only one of us who had a solid alibi.”

  Steve nodded before continuing.

  “They split up, Alex and Hazel?”

  Alice nodded.

  “Why, the way you have described them they were the perfect couple. If they were so much in love as you and Alex have said that they were. What happened, was there someone else, was Alex playing away or was she?”

  “She was.”

  “Really?” Steve sounded genuinely surprised. “I can see that she’s an attractive woman and a lot of men might have tried it on but it seems quite out of character for her given what you have told me.”

  “It was, but look.” Alice seemed unsure if she should say any more. “I’m happy to talk about this and give you any information you need and answer any questions that you have, but I think it’s only fair you talk to Alex about it. He needs to be given the chance to put his side to you.”

  He nodded, “Of course, I need to hear Alex’s version of all of this, but that might take a little time as I have to apply to get visitor access to OSP, but, of course, you are correct, and I have every intention of doing that. I’ll apply tomorrow and get up to see him as soon as I can, would you come with me?”

  “Of course, he doesn’t know you and I’m not sure that he would agree to see you if I didn’t go up there with you.”

  When Steve had first seen Alice in the coffee shop, he had been attracted to her straight away. With her looks and figure, he had to admit that she was his type; tall and blond, slim with all the right curves. He could be shallow, he knew that, he had to be attracted to someone on a basic level before he could progress any further and she had certainly fitted the bill.

  There was an attraction but once he had started talking to her, he got a sense of something below the public face that she showed. Something that was dragging her down and at first, he considered that, good-looking though she was, he probably didn’t need any sort of commitment with someone who was an emotional uncertainty. He had had a couple of relationships with women who had possibly been certifiable, and he had no wish to delve into that particular murky pond again.

  After their first meeting, after the fiasco of the fat woman and the legal papers, scattered everywhere, Steve had considered the moment over and never to be repeated but then, he found that he had a problem; he couldn’t get her out of his mind and when he ran into her again near the markets, he was at once pleased and excited but then concerned by those emotions.

  But he liked her and the time that they spent together so far had strengthened that feeling and he didn’t want this to turn into a sort of business relationship, but it was too early yet to try to push it into something else either, so he pushed on, happy to be helping and happy to be in her company.

  “That’s fine. Alex has to be able to speak for himself, of course he must, it’s his story to tell, and I need to get a lot of information from him, anyway. But, you said that you were close to Hazel, so can you give me a perspective from her side of the argument, as her advocate if you like, as she can’t speak for herself.”

  “Speak for her?”

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  “Yes, I suppose. In investigations and trials people forget the victim, especially murders, not that I have been involved in many, but it’s all about the evidence and the defendant’s rights. A lot of people forget that the victim was a person as well. Those crime scene photos that show a battered and bleeding corpse, don’t show the person that once was. Family impact statements help, but I don’t think that they can go the whole way either.”

  “But how can I speak for her
? I don’t know what she was thinking or why she did what she did.”

  Steve could see that Alice was getting agitated, and he put his hand out and rested it gently on her arm, he looked into her eyes and smiled.

  “I know that, of course you can’t, I need to know what sort of person she was, but from a personal point of view, get past the dry words that are on all these documents. I’m trying to figure out her motivations or what she might do in certain circumstances.”

  Alice relaxed a little, but he could see on her face that she was still unsure of exactly what he wanted.

  He watched her chew her bottom lip again and decided that this trait, the vulnerability it showed was starting to grow on him, though he didn’t doubt that he knew what a strong woman Alice was.

  She stopped chewing and looked at him, “Like what sort of circumstances,” she asked, “are we talking about actual events or hypothetically?”

  “A bit of both I suppose but, OK let’s try a specific event. If she was attacked would she crumple and give up or would she fight back?”

  “Fight, definitely, she was a strong, physically fit woman and she would fight, she would scream and bite and scratch, she would do something, she would do anything she could.”

  “So, if she was attacked in the house there would be a struggle?”

  “Do you mean between her and Alex?”

  Steve nodded, “Maybe, or maybe someone else.”

  Alice considered the question for a moment.

  “As far as Alex was concerned, I don’t think that they ever fought, I mean a big argument. Of course, they had the usual little squabbles, who doesn’t? It was never anything major. But even so, I don’t think it would matter even if it had have been Alex, if it had been a physical attack she would have fought him, tooth and nail.”