Salem Falls (50 page)

Finally, Amos shifted the cornflakes, so that he could see her unobstructed. Bright color stained her cheeks. “Gilly,” he said softly, offering up a whole story in that one word.

Gillian reached for the Lucky Charms and set it up again, a wall. She took the cornflakes and the Life cereal and made barriers on either side of the first box. Then she lifted her spoon and began to eat in silence, as if her father were not there at all.

“Sydney!” Matt hollered at the top of his lungs, holding his squealing daughter at arm’s length as she fought to hand him the arrowroot biscuit she’d been gumming. “Don’t you do this to me, you little monster. This is my last clean suit.”

His wife rounded the corner, carrying a stack of clean laundry. “Where’s the fire?”

“Here,” Matt said, thrusting the baby into her free arm. “And it’s raging out of control. I can’t have her mess me up, Syd. I’m on my way to court.”

Sydney brushed her lips over the baby’s head. “She just wants to give you her good luck charm, isn’t that right, honey?”

“I’m not taking her cookie, dammit.”

His wife shrugged. “Well, someone’s going to be awfully sorry when the jury comes back with an acquittal.”

Matt gathered up his files and stuffed them into his briefcase. “I’m just not a rabbit’s foot kind of fellow.” He leaned down to kiss Sydney good-bye, then ran a light hand over the soft fuzz of his daughter’s head.

Sydney followed him to the front door, bouncing the baby in her arms. “Wave good-bye,” she told Molly. “Daddy’s going to go lock up the bad guys.”

Charlie took a deep breath and knocked on the bathroom door. A moment later, it opened, steam spilling into the hallway, his daughter’s face hovering in the mist left in the wake of her shower. “What?” she said belligerently. “Did you come to strip-search me?”

She threw open the door and spread her arms, the towel she’d wrapped around her damp body riding low. He didn’t know what to say to her. He didn’t know who this girl was, because she no longer acted like his daughter. So he opted for the practical, the functional, as if pretending that the wall of mistrust between them was invisible would keep it from hurting every time he slammed up against it. “Have you seen my badge?” Charlie asked. He needed it to complete his dress blues, before heading to court.

Meg turned away. “You didn’t leave it in here.”

Still, Charlie looked over her shoulder, at the edge of the sink, checking.

“What’s the matter, Daddy?” she said. “Oh, that’s right. You don’t believe me.”

“Meg . . .” He did believe her, and that was the problem. All he had to do was look at her and he saw her, again, sobbing at the station as she recounted a memory of being sexually assaulted. What Charlie wanted to do, more than anything, was turn back time. He wanted to go through Meg’s closet and never find that thermos. He wanted to keep her under lock and key, so nothing bad would ever happen to her.

He had not broached the subject of the atropine with Meg. He could barely conduct a completely innocuous conversation with her, much less one charged with so much suspicion.

“Then again, maybe I’ve got your badge, Daddy,” Meg said, tears in her eyes. “Maybe I hid it at the bottom of my closet.”

Charlie took a step forward. “Meg, honey, listen to yourself.”

“Why? You don’t.”

The sorrow broke over her, and she stood in her towel before him, crying so hard it made Charlie’s chest ache. He grabbed for her, held her in his arms the way he had when she was small and had believed there were monsters hiding under her bed. There are no monsters, he’d told her back then, when what he really should have said was: There are no monsters there.

Suddenly, Meg went stiff in his arms. “Don’t touch me,” she said, drawing away. “Don’t touch me!” She pushed past him, running for the sanctuary of her bedroom.

As the door flew open in her wake, Charlie saw something glinting on the floor. His badge, which must have fallen behind the door when he was in the bathroom washing his hands. Charlie knelt and picked it up, fastened it, then looked in the mirror. There it was, shiny and silver, pinned to the requisite position on his chest-a shield that covered his heart but had not been able to protect it.

“Shit,” Jordan said. “They beat us here.”

Selena squinted into the sun at the steps of the courthouse, thick with cameras and television reporters. “Is there a back entrance?”

He cut the ignition. “I have to run the gauntlet, you know that.” They got out of the car, Selena straightening her stockings and Jordan shrugging into his jacket. “Ready?”

The reporters reminded Jordan of black flies, those horrible bugs that take over the Northeast for a few weeks every summer and fly heedless up your nose and into your ears and eyes as if they have every right to be there. Jordan pasted a smile on his face and began to hustle up the stone steps of the court, bowed in the middle from years of defendants trudging up in hope and down in victory or defeat. “Mr. McAfee,” a female reporter called, making a beeline to his side. “Do you think your client will be acquitted?”

“I most certainly do,” Jordan said smoothly.

“How will you account for the fact that he’s been in jail for sexual assault before?” another voice shouted.

“Come on inside,” Jordan answered, grinning. “And I’ll show you.”

The press loved him. The press had always loved him. He was cocky and photogenic and had long ago mastered the art of the sound bite. He shouldered aside cameras and microphones, wondering how far behind he’d left Selena.

One step away from the top, a woman blocked his progress. She wore a blood-red turban and a T-shirt that read TAKE BACK THE NIGHT. “Mr. McAfee,” she bellowed, “are you aware that in the United States alone, 132,000 women reported a stranger rape last year-and that if you include the estimated number of women who don’t report violence against them, there may be as many as 750,000 women who were raped?”

“Yes,” Jordan said, meeting her gaze. “But not by my client.”

Jack sat in the rear of the small cell in the sheriff’s office beneath the court, chewing on a thumbnail and staring at the floor between his shoes, completely oblivious to the fact that his attorney had arrived. “Jack,” Jordan said quietly.

He was struck by how well Jack cleaned up. But then again, this was what Jack had been born to: preppy blazers and rep ties and loafers. Jordan offered a confident smile. “You all set?”

“I suppose so.”

“I don’t have to tell you what it’s going to be like in there. You’ve done this drill before. A lot of shit’s going to be said before it’s over, and the most important thing you can do is keep your cool. The minute you blow up is the same minute the prosecutor proves that you’re just one big violent act waiting to happen.”

“I won’t blow up.”

“And remember, we get to go last,” Jordan said. “That’s the best thing about being a defense attorney.”

“And here I thought it was the truly fascinating people you got to fraternize with.”

A surprised laugh bubbled out of Jordan, but when he lifted his gaze, he found Jack staring at him, sober and intense. “Did you know that the average sentence for a felon convicted of a violent offense is one hundred five months?”

Jordan snorted. “Says who?”

“The Bureau of Justice Statistics. Over a million adults were convicted of felonies last year.”

“Maybe this year, the number will be 999,999.”

An uneasy silence settled over the men, punctuated by the cough of a prisoner two cells over. Jordan sighed. “I have to mention something one last time, Jack. You still haven’t given me much to work with here. But there are six men on that jury, and every single one of them has been in the situation where they’re fooling around and then the woman’s changed her mind at the last minute. As a defense against a rape allegation, it’s an easy sell.” He leaned closer. “Are you absolutely sure you don’t want to go with consent?”

Jack’s hands knotted together between his legs. “Jordan, do me a favor?”

The attorney nodded, and Jack turned, his eyes cold. “Don’t ever ask me that again.”

Matt reached into his briefcase for his notes and found them glued together with the dried remains of a mashed arrowroot biscuit. Shaking his head, he began to carefully peel apart the pages of his yellow legal pad.

“Ooh,” winced Jordan McAfee, passing the prosecutor’s table en route to his own. “The last time I saw something like that was in law school, when a guy tossed his cookies in the briefcase of the judge he was clerking for.”

“Friend of yours, no doubt,” Matt said.

“Actually, I think he went on to become a DA.” Jordan hid a smile as one of Matt’s papers ripped. “Careful. You don’t want to ruin your cheat sheet.”

“McAfee, I could try this case in my sleep and still win.”

“Guess that’s your plan, then, since you’re clearly dreaming.” He reached into his own briefcase and took out a pack of Kleenex, which he threw onto the prosecutor’s table. “Here,” Jordan said. “A peace offering.”

Matt took a tissue to wipe the cookie residue off his legal briefs, then tossed the pack back to Jordan. “Save the rest for consoling your client after the conviction.”

A side door opened as a deputy sheriff entered, escorting Jack to the seat beside Jordan’s. He still wore his blazer and tie, but he was handcuffed. As the deputy released the cuffs, Jordan focused on his client, who was such a bundle of nervous energy that heat seemed to emanate from his body. “Relax,” he mouthed silently.

That, Jordan realized, was nearly impossible. The gallery was full-media reps from states as far away as Connecticut were reporting on the trial, and there were a fair number of local townspeople who’d come to make sure that Salem Falls remained as morally pure as it had always been. Amos Duncan stared vehemently at Jack from his spot behind the prosecutor’s table. There had to be close to 200 people in that wide audience, all with their attention riveted on the defendant . . . and not a single one in support of Jack.

“Jordan,” Jack whispered, a thread of panic wrapped around his words. “I can feel it.”

“Feel what?”

“How much they hate me.”

Jordan remembered then that Jack had not ever suffered through an actual trial. His conviction had been a plea bargain-an uncomfortable hearing, but one not nearly as grueling as the one that was about to occur. The legal system sounded good on paper, but the truth was that as long as Jack sat beside a defense attorney, every person watching this trial would consider him guilty until proven innocent.

The six men and eight women who made up the jury and its alternates streamed solemnly in from a door on the side of the courtroom. Just before taking a seat, each one turned, scrutinizing Jack. Beneath the table, Jack’s hands clenched on his knees.

“All rise!”

The Honorable Althea Justice billowed to a seat behind the bench. Her cool gray eyes surveyed the gallery: the cameras, the reporters with their cell phones, the tight rows of residents from Salem Falls. “Ladies and gentlemen,” she said, “I see we have a packed house today. So let’s all start out on the right foot. At the first sign of any inappropriate behavior”-she glanced at a cameraman-“or any outbursts”-she glanced at Amos Duncan-“you will be escorted from my courtroom, and will remain outside it for the duration of the trial. If I hear a beeper or cell phone go off during any testimony, I will personally collect everyone’s electronic devices and burn them in a pyre outside the court building. Finally, I’d like everyone to remember-including counsel-that this is a court of law, not a circus.” She slipped her half glasses down and peered over them. “Mr. Houlihan,” the judge said, “let’s get rolling.”

* * *

“On the evening of April thirtieth, 2000, Amos Duncan kissed his daughter good-bye and went out for a quick run. She was seventeen years old, and although he worried about her every time he left her alone, he had chosen to live in Salem Falls because it was a safe place to raise his child. Amos Duncan certainly didn’t expect that the next time he saw his daughter, she would be sobbing, hysterical. That her clothes would be ripped. That she’d have blood on her shirt, skin beneath her fingernails, semen on her thigh. That she’d be telling the police she had been raped in the woods outside Salem Falls, New Hampshire.”

Matt walked slowly toward the jury. “The evidence that the state will present to you today will show that on April thirtieth, 2000, Gillian Duncan left her home at 8:45 P.M. She met up with her friends and went to a clearing in the woods behind the Salem Falls Cemetery. They made a small bonfire and enjoyed each other’s company, teenagers having fun. And just as they were getting ready to leave shortly after midnight, this man came up to them.”

Matt jabbed his finger at Jack’s face. “This man, Jack St. Bride, approached the girls where they were sitting. He was unsteady on his feet. They could smell alcohol on his breath. He started speaking to them conversationally, even sat down with them to chat. When the girls made it clear they were on their way home, he stood up and left.