Stride didn’t want to go outside. Neither did Maggie, but while they were milling in the tumult of the courtroom after Judge Kassel dismissed them for the day, Guppo paged her again, and she fought her way to the door. Stride and Dan stayed behind. He knew that the gauntlet of reporters would be waiting to feast on both of them. Gale was already outside, putting his spin on Sally’s testimony, insisting it opened the door for an acquittal. But the reporters would want to see Dan and Stride, too, and hear their explanation.
Have you lost? Bird would ask.
They both knew. Yes, they had lost. It was as good as over.
Emily Stoner lingered in the courtroom behind them, looking confused and upset. She was alone. Dayton Tenby had been at her side all day, but he had left to pull his car around to the rear of the courthouse. The guards would spirit her out the back, away from the media horde.
She hadn’t said a word yet, and Dan hadn’t acknowledged her. But Stride knew she was the only reason Dan hadn’t flown into an explosive rage.
“You told me she had an alibi,” Dan said. His lips were stretched into a thin, cold line.
“She did.”
“Yet a witness your own men talked to blew the alibi out of the water. And no one ever caught it.”
Stride sighed heavily. “Look, Dan, what’s the point of excuses? We fucked up. Pure and simple. We should have caught it, and we didn’t.”
“Humor me,” Dan hissed. “Tell me why.”
“We interviewed hundreds of witnesses in those first couple days. We were looking for people who had seen Rachel. Someone seeing a teenage girl on the street several blocks away, who didn’t match Rachel’s description, just wasn’t going to be high on our list.”
“Why the hell not?”
Stride shook his head. “Sally was never a suspect. Hell, she’s still not a suspect. I don’t believe for a second she had anything to do with Rachel’s murder. There’s no physical evidence at all to connect her to any of this.”
“Maybe she’s just too smart for you,” Dan said.
“No way. If this was really a crime of passion, she would have left evidence all over the scene. Put me back on the stand tomorrow. I can point out that there were no unidentified fingerprints, no hair or fibers, nothing to put Sally in the van or at the barn. It wasn’t her.”
“You have no new evidence,” Dan said. “I can’t put you back to reiterate what you already told the jury.”
Emily cleared her throat. The two men stopped, looking at her as if for the first time. Her face was white.
“I don’t understand,” Emily said. “You sound like this was a bad thing for the case. Shouldn’t this be a good thing? I mean, she made the connection you needed. She heard Graeme and Rachel arguing that night. It puts them together.”
Dan nodded. The anger drained away, and his eyes softened. “I’m afraid it’s more complicated than that.”
“But why?” Emily asked. “This should guarantee a conviction.”
Dan took one of her hands in his. He met her eyes. “The question is, will the jury believe her? Mr. Gale raised doubts about Sally’s credibility. We know she told one lie, about not going to see Rachel that night. The jury is likely to think she’s telling another lie, to cover up something.”
“Is that what you think?”
Dan sighed. “I really don’t know, Emily. I’d like to believe her. It makes sense, given all the other evidence. If Sally had come forward with this immediately, we’d have a conviction now, no doubt about it. Under these circumstances, I’m afraid it makes it worse, not better.”
“But why?” Her voice was plaintive.
“Well, it may open up reasonable doubt in the jury’s mind. They may be sufficiently concerned about Sally’s testimony that they feel they can no longer be absolutely certain that Graeme is guilty.”
“He is guilty,” Emily said passionately. “He did this. I know it.”
“Many of the jurors may think so, too. The question is, are they sufficiently convinced to convict him?”
The reality seemed to dawn on her. “Are you telling me the son of a bitch could be acquitted? He could walk out of here?”
“I’m afraid that’s possible,” Dan said. His voice was hoarse and angry, as if that reality were only now dawning on him, too.
Stride looked up, hearing the thud of the courtroom door. Maggie was inside again, hurrying down the aisle, beckoning to him. He saw urgency written in her face. Without a word, Stride left Dan and Emily, pushed through the swinging gate, and met Maggie in the middle of the aisle.
“We found a body,” Maggie said breathlessly. “Guppo’s on the scene.”
“Rachel?”
“No way to tell. It’s just skeletal remains. The son of a bitch tried to burn her. Could be Rachel. Could be Kerry. Could be someone else.”
Stride closed his eyes. A month ago, this would have been tremendous news. Three months ago, even better. One of Gale’s best theories, that Rachel was really still alive, might have been stripped away.
“Where was she found?” Stride asked.
“Just a few miles north of the barn. If our search radius had gone another mile, we might have found her.”
“Does Guppo have the scene sealed off?”
“Yeah. The medical examiner is up there, too.”
“What’s he say about it?” Stride asked.
“For now, not much. All he’ll say is that the skeletal structure is consistent with that of a teenage girl. Otherwise, we’ll either have to wait for the DNA or dental records or hope something turns up in a search of the surrounding area.”
“Not a word to the press yet,” Stride said. “Play it cool. I’ll tell Dan, and then you and I can go up there.”
Stride looked back at Dan and Emily and wondered how you break news like this in front of the girl’s mother. He took a deep breath and told Maggie to wait for him. Returning to the front of the courtroom, he saw Dan and Emily watching him. There was no gentle way to say it.
“We’ve located a body in the woods north of the city,” he told them.
Emily’s eyes widened, and her hand flew to her open mouth. “Oh, no!”
Dan said, “Shit.” He repeated it several times.
Emily crumpled into a seat. She sat there silently, like a piece of broken eggshell, then finally looked at Stride with bloodshot eyes. “Is it—is it her? Rachel?”
“We don’t know yet,” Stride said. “I’m very sorry. We only have skeletal remains, so it’s going to take time to identify them.”
“How long?” Dan asked.
“We’ll probably have to wait for DNA tests, unless we can do something with dental records. Either way, it’s likely to be a few weeks.”
Dan shook his head. “We don’t have a few weeks. We don’t even have a few days.”
Stride nodded. “I know.”
“What do you mean?” Emily asked.
“The trial is almost over,” Dan told her. “Without positive identification, we can’t raise the issue in front of the jury. Our suspicions aren’t evidence.”
“But we have her body now,” Emily pleaded. “You can’t let that man continue to pretend to the jury that she may be alive.”
“Unfortunately, we don’t know yet that it is her body,” Stride reminded her gently.
“This is insane,” Emily said, shaking her head. “I can’t believe this. My God, they can’t just let him walk away now. They have to postpone the rest of the trial. They have to give you time to prove it’s Rachel.”
Dan sighed, and Stride knew what he was thinking. It was too little, too late.
“That’s up to the judge,” Dan said.