Chapter Thirty-Five

Many hurdles had to be leapt between Valentine’s Day and the last Saturday in July. Dean soon learned planning a big wedding was more complicated than his playbook. They went through the rigmarole of getting permission from the Episcopal priest in Chapelle to allow them to marry in the gothic cathedral on St. Charles, a building every bit as grand as old St. Louis on Jackson Square. He went through the pre-wedding interview, no sweat, figuring the Catholic version would have been worse. They tasted a dozen samples of cake, all white with different fillings, sweet! He thanked Jesus, Mary, and Joseph that he’d been banned from wedding dress shopping.

In the midst of the preparations, Kent Gonsoulin came to trial. Dean sat in the courtroom while Kent’s high-priced lawyer grilled Stacy on the stand, implying that she’d lured the man to her office with the intention of having sex. Wisely, she’d dressed for court in one of her gray Anchi Services suits, the exact sort of ensemble she’d worn the day Prince got shot and told this to the jury. While she looked great in it, the outfit did not ooze sexual appeal. Coolly, she said Mr. Gonsoulin had asked to use the bathroom and returned exposing himself to her. She’d fled.

The defense asked if maybe his client had simply forgotten to zip up. “No, he let it all hang out.” Stacy drew laughter from the audience. “He said he’d gotten it ready for me. I needed to pay for jilting him for the prom and letting my dog pee on his feet. He was ready to pop.” Dean watched the back of Kent’s neck go red, well, redder than usual. His lawyer made Stacy admit that Mr. Gonsoulin never actually touched her.

“I kicked his hand away from my ankle after he fell on the spilled pencils.”

“Perhaps, he sought your assistance in getting up.”

“He’d already gotten it up by himself before he slipped,” Stacy replied. “I had no intention of joining him on the floor.” More laughter. Way to go, Princess.

She told of running into Prince Dobbs and what ensued. No, she could not swear Mr. Gonsoulin intended to shoot her and had to confess he might have been trying to save her from a mugger. Stacy recounted Dean’s arrival, summoned by a signal of putting a red scarf in the window, because she’d feared trouble with Kent. To hear her tell it, he’d been the unstained hero of the night. Remembering how he’d treated Stacy and what came after, Dean slumped down in his seat. At last, the judge dismissed her, saying she should remain available in case they needed to call her again.

The police officer testified next referring to photos of the Anchi office in disarray, the loan forms used to get an appointment with Miss Polasky, the red scarf in a bag, and the gun they had found at the scene. The paparazzo told his version. At last, Prince Dobbs was called into the courtroom, pausing to take Stacy’s hand where she sat by Dean and say, “God bless you,” as he passed. Prince walked like a man completely healed, but with most of his swagger drained away. He wore his hair in small, light brown fuzzy dreads all over his head that created an almost halo effect. With his honey-colored face clean-shaven and still bearing the light scars of Stacy’s nails, he’d dressed in a conservative suit and tie, no tats showing, when he took the stand.

The defense made sure to display to the jurors pictures of the bearded Prince wearing his knit cap taken as he sat on the sidelines of a Sinners game. Yes, he’d been dressed entirely in black. “But that’s not my color no more, man.” He had to testify to his height and weight and condition at the time. “Recovering from a previous injury. I’m a little lighter now from all the PT, but I’ll be rock hard and ready to run by September.”

“So you sustained no serious injury due to my client’s actions.”

“I wouldn’t say that, oh no. I died and saw Jesus. I forgive your client for my suffering like the Lord said to do.” Prince thumped his chest a few times with a sizeable fist.

“Still grandstanding,” Stacy whispered to Dean.

“He was an arrogant asshole, now he’s a jerk for Jesus, but I can stand the new version a whole lot better,” Dean said.

Then, Kent’s lawyer asked why Prince had come to Stacy’s house that evening.

“To make amends, man, to make amends.”

“For what?”

“For thinking she wanted to have sex wit’ me when she didn’t. She stomped my foot good and, uh, while leaving I fell down her stairs.” Prince’s eyes rolled in Dean’s direction and cut away again. He’d saved his own dignity and spared his quarterback. “Dr. Funk, the team shrink, said I got to apologize. My apology was not honest. That’s why I got shot, Jesus said.”

Stacy was recalled to explain her relationship with Prince. “We’ve known each other from childhood. Our families are friends. I called off a date with him, and he took it badly, wanted to have sex. I didn’t. I did defend myself and yes, Mr. Dobbs fell down my stairs. I reported his actions to the team.”

“Have you always been a sexual tease, Miss Polasky, even in high school when you reneged on a promise to go to the prom with my client?”

Out of orders sounded. The gavel banged. The question brought the red to Stacy’s cheeks. She blinked hard a few times. Dean knew the signs, but they would not make her cry. He’d tried to make her weep often enough as an obnoxious teen to realize that. Now, she’d shielded him from the whole Prince mess simply by leaving him out of it. She didn’t have to answer the question, but damage had been done to her character. The lawyer asked about her relationship with Dean Billodeaux at the time. “We were seeing each other.”

“After you dated Mr. Dobbs but before you tried to seduce my client.”

Another out of order, but she answered anyway. “I did not date Mr. Dobbs, nor did I try to seduce your client.” Stacy had regained her cool.

The defense attorney attempted to bring in the recent revelation that during a break in their relationship Dean had fathered a child with another woman—or had they been engaged in a ménage a trois? The judge ruled that irrelevant to the case.

The trial continued for several days with medical experts on Prince’s condition, both mental and physical, and chance for full recovery. A parade of character witnesses testified that Kent Gonsoulin was a pillar of the community, a member of the Chamber of Commerce, a regular attendee at Ste. Jeanne d’Arc, and a good family man. He’d sold many a trailer to black people and had nothing against them, Kent said when called to the stand. As for Stacy, he’d misread her signals since she’d haggled over the fees and services to keep him in her office—which had a bedroom upstairs. Being such a beautiful woman, he simply couldn’t turn her down. No, no, he’d never considered cheating on his wife before, but this opportunity was just too tempting. He sent Stacy an oleaginous smile that must have creeped out the two young women on the jury.

The prosecution countered with some of the same for Stacy, bringing in a few of her clients, not very good for business, but they all spoke of her professionalism and when working at the hospital, her compassion. They found two women in Chapelle who’d had sex with Kent, one a pro, the other a woman who’d gotten a big discount on her mobile home. Both said he could be a little rough but paid up later.

Lots of back and forth went on about Louisiana’s stand-your-ground and concealed carry laws, until at last the jurors filed out to deliberate. Nine white men, two young Caucasian women, and one elderly black person, who believed in Jesus and forgiveness, returned a verdict of not guilty. Stacy did cry in Dean’s arms on her purple sofa in the privacy of her apartment now staked out again by the press. “He went unpunished, and my reputation has been smeared all over the newspapers. I wish I were in Germany.”

“You would have had to come home for the trial anyhow. It’s over. Don’t do this. Kent has lost his reputation and his black clientele. That wife of his might go for a divorce, Catholic or not. Think of poufy wedding dresses and tiaras and cake with raspberry filling,” he said. “Aren’t we supposed to pick out our china and silver patterns at Schifferman’s this week?”

“Like you really want to do that.” She blotted her eyes on a corner of the red scarf Mati dragged onto her lap when he came to lick her face.

“No, but I will—for you. Trust Leslie. He has good taste.”

Stacy gave him a watery smile. “You were there for me every day, Dean. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me either. I’m going to ask you to stand by me come the Fourth of July. That’s when Ilsa says the baby is coming. She disagrees with the doctor by a good two weeks, and she has a pretty strong will.”

The birthday of the nation and possibly of his child, Stacy would be there, she promised, and not in Germany.