The One Who Got Away

by Caroline Overington

I went over some of the more obvious points: an adulterer was not necessarily a murderer. David was missing from the surveillance tapes for only a matter of minutes. David had nothing to gain from making Loren’s death look like a suicide, because the policy would not pay out.

  The foreman and his fellow jurors nodded, and retreated.

  I retired to my chambers to wait. Bored, I went for a wander in the courtyard, outside the main court building. I saw Loren’s family sitting at a picnic table, each wearing a splash of yellow: a ribbon, a blouse, a set of earrings.

  I hurried past, not wanting them to see me.

  The press had gathered in an opposite corner of the same courtyard. They were starting to get twitchy. I have developed a good relationship with some of the older, regular court reporters over the years. They feel free to speak frankly when I pass by.

  ‘What’s happening, Judge Pettit?’

  ‘I have no more information than you do.’

  ‘I wish they’d hurry up. We need a verdict by four pm to make the evening news.’

  ‘I’m sure that’s at the forefront of their minds,’ I said.

  ‘They’ll definitely find him guilty. Definitely. There’s no other verdict they can reach.’

  He had no idea. Hardly anyone ever does. What the jury can or will or might or should do – it’s all a mystery, until they come back. I returned to chambers. Some of the shelves were empty from when I’d packed up the books in anticipation of Rebecca Buckley’s arrival. Her replacement had been announced. Brett Wagner. He’s from Bienveneda. He’ll do a good job.

  I stood and stretched my back. I reached into my top drawer for my wallet, thinking that a bagel or Starbucks might be in order, and then the phone on my desk rang, and it was Cecile, saying: ‘Are they back yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Which way do you think it will go?’

  ‘I wouldn’t want to speculate.’

  ‘Do not think I’m crazy,’ she said evenly. ‘Do not think I’m old. Do not think I have dementia. Do not judge me, but I think he’s innocent!’

  ‘I’m not sure I can direct the jury to acquit on the grounds that my wife has changed her mind.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid, Samuel! I’m being serious.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Cecile,’ I said, ‘but I don’t see what you want me to do?’

  ‘You can’t do anything. It’s up to the jury now, isn’t it?’

  ‘Of course it is,’ I said, ‘it’s been their decision all along.’

  * * *

  There is a special telephone in my chambers that rings only to tell me when the jury has returned its verdict.

  ‘They’re back, Your Honour,’ said Ben. ‘Thank you,’ I said, putting down the phone.

  I adjusted my robes over my collar and tie and made my way down to Court Five.

  David Wynne-Estes came into the court flanked by two security guards. I asked him to remain standing in the Perspex box and he did. He was nervous and pale, and although doing his best to keep his hands lightly clasped in front of him, I could see that his hands were shaking.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, have you reached your verdict?’

  ‘We have, Your Honour.’

  The foreman passed a small piece of paper to the court manager, who passed it up to me. It’s no small matter, the business of keeping one’s expression – be it surprise, or resignation – to oneself at such moments, but I like to think that I have, over the years, done my level best to betray nothing of the outcome to the accused.

  Did the verdict surprise me? No. Two women were dead in horrible circumstances. David was a liar and a cheat. That was probably enough for the jury. The trial itself may even have been beside the point.

  ‘And what is your verdict?’ I said, handing back the note.

  The foreman did not look at David, and that alone should have told David all he needed to know.

  I did look at David, just long enough to see his knees collapse a little against the base of his chair. ‘No,’ he said, ‘you don’t understand.’

  Tucker stepped in. ‘It’s fine, David,’ he said. ‘We’ll be appealing.’

  ‘Appealing?’ exclaimed David. ‘You said …’

  Yes, Tucker, you said this was a lay-down misère. You said they have no body, no weapon, no cause of death and no chance in hell.

  The sentence?

  I got through that quickly. It was life without parole. It had to be; for all their theatrics in the courtroom, Tucker and Sandy had agreed before the trial to take the death penalty off the table, leaving only life in prison.

  I returned to my chambers and I was in the process of placing the last of my law books – the ones I’d needed for the trial – into a cardboard box when Ben knocked.

  ‘Come in,’ I said.

  ‘May I assist?’ he said, taking the robes from my shoulders.

  ‘Don’t hang them,’ I said, ‘send them out. Get them cleaned. There’s a place on Main that will box them up like a wedding dress. You never know, some descendant of mine might want them one day.’

  Ben bowed his head. Breaking with protocol, I stepped forward and shook his hand.

  I left the courthouse as I’d arrived, behind the wheel of my own car, and as I eased the wheels from the underground garage onto the gravel drive, I was surprised to find Molly waiting for me.

  ‘Miss Franklin,’ I said, having brought down the tinted window. ‘How may I help?’

  Molly gripped the windowsill. Loren’s girls – Peyton and Hannah – were standing behind Molly, with yellow ribbons in their hair.

  ‘We wanted to thank you,’ Molly said. She had ducked down and her face was so close to mine, I could smell her toothpaste.

  ‘No, no, the verdict had nothing to do with me,’ I said. ‘I am the judge. Judges preside. The jury decides.’

  Molly didn’t seem to hear. ‘Can you wait?’ she said. ‘Dad’s coming. He wants to thank you, too.’

  ‘It’s not necessary …’ I said.

  ‘Please? I’ll just run and get him.’

  Molly released her grip on the car and ran to assist her father, who was lumbering slowly across the driveway in my direction.

  I waited, trying hard not to stare at the two blonde girls with their stoic faces and their cascading curls.

  ‘Here he is,’ said Molly, returning to my window breathless, holding her red-faced father by the hand.

  ‘Yes, we just wanted to thank you,’ he puffed.

  ‘We do,’ said Molly.

  Like a bumbling fool, I repeated my mantra: ‘This has nothing to do with me. Judges preside. The jury decides. If you’ve got anyone to thank, Ms Franklin, it’s the jury.’

  ‘Well, we still wanted to say thank you,’ she said, ‘so, thank you. Okay. Girls, come on.’ She took Peyton and Hannah by their hands, and the girls went with her.

  I watched as they became specks on the landscape, and I thought to myself: has justice been served? I had no way of knowing. Was the outcome a good one? Again, that’s not a question for me.

  Judges preside. Juries – you, the people – must decide. I pressed the button to bring my driver’s side window up, and drove towards home.

  Molly Franklin

  ‘You get justice in the next world.

  In this world, we have the law … that

  is now my favourite saying!’

  Observation by Molly Franklin in her personal journal

  I would hate for anyone to take this the wrong way but it turns out Loren was right, it isn’t at all difficult to adapt to the High Side life.

  This morning was typical.

  I was lying out by the pool. I had on a blue-and-white striped bikini and big sunglasses. Loren’s old housekeeper – now my housekeeper – came out with juice on a tray.

  Peyton came running with her foam noodle. ‘Come and play, Molly,’ she cried. Water dripped in a circle around her feet.

  ‘No, no, you finish your juice, then you play with Hannah,’ I said, gently.
>
  Hannah’s nanny – and you do need two – knows a cue when she hears one. She took the glass from Peyton, placed it on a side table and said, ‘Come on, let’s get those kickboards out!’

  With that, they were off.

  I leaned back on the sun-lounger, and observed them through my sunglasses. The girls are doing well. Everyone who sees them says so. They look great. They hardly cry.

  The business of asking why Mom and Dad can’t come home has basically stopped.

  The period immediately after the trial was difficult, with Long Tall Janet wanting to push for a greater role for her family in the girls’ upbringing but, as I’m their legal guardian, that is now well and truly behind us. Also, Loren’s insurance has paid out and the way I’ve set up Loren’s estate … well, it’s at my discretion.

  I decided that the girls should stay at Grammar. They do look sweet in those boaters.

  I decided that we should all move back into their home on Mountain View Road.

  Has the odd person raised an eyebrow about that? I can’t see why they would. Where are we supposed to live? In my old apartment? I don’t think so.

  Aaron from the Bugle gets on my case from time to time. His latest report was all about how I used some of the money from Loren’s estate to make my gran more comfortable, which was something Loren didn’t do.

  My gran wasn’t her gran, I guess was the excuse.

  Yes, it’s true that I moved her out of the state-funded Low Side place that smelled like death and moved her to The Manor, which people over here describe as ‘the last stop on the High Side road to Heaven’.

  Gran deserves no less, and it’s not true that she’s not family.

  Aaron’s report also had Janet complaining that my mom and dad had taken up residence in one of the guest houses here on Loren’s property. Where is Mom supposed to live? She’s married to Dad, who is still grieving for Loren. It’s good for him to be here with the girls. It’s good for the girls to have him here. He’s a different influence. He can do things like keep a fire pit going.

  All our lives were changed by what happened to Loren, mine included.

  I had to give up the business. Yes I have the nannies for the girls but apparently heading down to Cabo four times a year so Low Side penny-pinchers can get fake boobs isn’t the kind of thing a Grammar mom is supposed to do.

  Also, with the staff and the house and the Grammar Booster Club board position, it’s not like I don’t have plenty to keep me occupied, and I won’t deny that a lot of my new life is fun.

  I have to remind myself not to feel guilty.

  To that end, there are things that I allow myself to think about and there are things that I don’t allow myself to think about.

  I do allow myself to think about the desperate, garbled call I got from Loren, the day after Lyric died.

  It was nine am, or thereabouts. She was calling from a number I didn’t recognise. Later I found out that she still had David’s secret cell phone, and just as well because imagine if the police had found that at the scene of her crime?

  ‘Come over,’ she said, ‘please, Molly, come now.’

  My instinct was to say: ‘Oh, okay, so when you need me, that’s when I get a call?’ But I was always a sucker for Loren, so over I went, wondering what little job she’d have for me this time.

  Holy moly, it was a doozy.

  The story that Loren told me that morning was very different from the story David told the jury. He said it was an accident. I think David and I both know that’s not true.

  In Loren’s version of the story, there was no love-making.

  Loren told me that she went to bed early that night, suffering a migraine, wondering at the wisdom of trying to save her marriage.

  She woke to find David gone and knew exactly where he’d be.

  David’s midnight trips out the back door and down through the Lemon Grove to Lyric’s house were a well-established pattern, and one that he’d revealed in those stupid sessions with Bette Busonne.

  Loren found him in Lyric’s kitchen: David had his pants around his ankles and Lyric was bent over the kitchen bench.

  Loren said she picked up the nearest implement – a kinfe – and lunged towards them. Who did she want to kill? Maybe both of them, but David sprang away and it was Lyric who ended up in a pool of blood.

  ‘Holy hell,’ I said. ‘Is she dead?’

  ‘She’s dead.’

  ‘Oh my God. And what did you do? Don’t tell me you left her there?’

  ‘We had to, Molly.’

  ‘But why? Why didn’t you call someone? Maybe you could have saved her.’

  ‘I wanted to call the police,’ said Loren. ‘I wanted to explain. But David refused. He kept saying nobody would believe it was an accident. He’d get the blame. He’d go to prison. Or we both would, because Lyric had so much dirt on David. He talked me out of it. He wanted to get out of there. He wants us to just get on the plane and deny we were ever at Lyric’s last night.’

  ‘And what if you were seen? What if there’s a camera? What if the neighbours heard something?’

  ‘David says he’ll think of something.’

  ‘Something like what?’

  ‘I don’t know. He wants to help me.’ Loren was distraught.

  ‘Oh, come on, Loren. If David wanted to help you, he’d have a lawyer here by now. Can’t you see what he’s doing?’

  ‘What is he doing?’

  ‘He’s making sure you can’t say it was an accident. He’s making you look like somebody who is running away!’

  ‘David wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘How do you know? Do you really trust him to protect you when the police come calling? Because what if the police think it was him? He’s definitely going to say it was you!’

  She didn’t answer.

  I told Loren: ‘Believe me, you cannot go along with David’s plan. I don’t trust David not to tell the police what you’ve done. This is a death-penalty state. You have to save yourself.’

  ‘But how?’

  I had no idea how. All I knew was that I had to step in. ‘I booked you onto that ship, and I can get you off.’

  ‘I don’t get it,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t either,’ I said. ‘But I’ll figure something out. Just do as I say: get on the ship and let me think about how to get you off.’

  ‘But what about the girls?’ she asked, anguished.

  ‘I’ll figure that out. I know people in Mexico who can help us. I will get the girls to you. The main thing is to get off that ship before police come to arrest you.’

  We did not formalise the details. For one thing, there was no time. For another, I hadn’t worked them out myself yet. Loren would have to get off the ship. It would have to look like David had pushed her. He would have to go to prison because if not him, then her.

  It was the only way.

  I told Loren to make sure she kept her cell phone with her at all times. I had some Mexican SIM cards I could give her, so that we could communicate without anyone knowing.

  ‘You don’t think he’s gone to the police, do you?’ she said.

  ‘What now? I don’t know,’ I said, ‘but that’s not a bad point. If you accept his help now, you will have to live the rest of your life wondering when he’s going to turn you in.’

  ‘But he loves me,’ cried Loren.

  I’d never believed that.

  The hours and days that followed were frantic. Loren and David left for Cabo. I went back to my apartment and began making calls. I’m lucky I have contacts. The guy I hired … let’s call him Vincent. He lives in Mexico and he’s good in a crisis. That’s all I’ll say.

  I’d previously used him to help a client who went to Mexico to get new teeth and ended up in a car accident that killed the son of one of Mexico’s most prominent politicians.

  Sorting that out had cost a pretty penny. Not me, her. But still, Vincent had gotten it done.

  Another time, he helped a client get ou
t of prison, after the guy got caught smoking pot on the beach, two days after having penis-fattening surgery.

  ‘What crisis do you have for me now?’ he said.

  I refused to say more than I needed to. Vincent didn’t need to know the details. I simply told him: ‘You need to get on this ship, and you need to get one of my clients off.’

  ‘The first bit will be no problem,’ he said, ‘the second might take some doing.’

  He wasn’t wrong. Vincent was easily able to board the ship as a porter, taking a job from someone who was happy not to have to work for five days. We had this idea that he should take onto the ship an extra suitcase, not unlike the one Loren had taken for her shopping, and maybe wheel Loren off in it.

  We had been watching too many movies, obviously.

  ‘I just can’t see how,’ he told me, in one of his calls from the ship. ‘They have cameras on this boat. I’ve found a few places on the deck where it’s dark’ – meaning, where there was no coverage – ‘but how am I supposed to get her into a suitcase on the deck? People are going to see me wheeling it onto the deck, and they’re going to question me. And how long is she going to be in the case before I can get it off the ship?’

  Also, where would he hide the case – with panicky Loren inside – while police searched the ship?

  ‘Your plan is full of holes,’ he said.

  I didn’t disagree. The plan was full of holes. We thought up a few alternatives. Could Loren duck out of camera range, scurry down into the bowels of the ship, and hide among the laundry, for example?

  I could practically see Vincent shaking his head, no, no, no, it was impossible.

  ‘The biggest blind spot is on the deck. That’s where she has to go missing. But your plan – to carry her off – is impossible,’ he said, ‘because what if this woman’s husband doesn’t wake early and doesn’t go looking for her? She could be in that case for hours.’

  ‘I don’t have all the answers,’ I said, exasperated. ‘All I know is, we have to fix this.’

  ‘Then let me fix it,’ he said. Then, after a pause: ‘Tell me, Miss Molly, who is this person to you?’

  Who was Loren to me? That was a good question.