46

CHRISTINA TUGGED AT BEN’S shirt sleeve. “Have you lost your mind?”

Ben held her at bay. “I know what I’m doing.”

“Ben, she’s the worst witness against us!”

“Which is why we have to bring her back.”

“Ben—”

“I know what I’m doing.”

Judge Cable wrinkled his brow. “Counsel, have you notified Ms. McNaughton that she would be called as a witness today?”

“No, sir. But she is on the witness list—thanks to the prosecution—and she is in the courtroom.”

LaBelle joined in. “Judge, he’s already had an opportunity to crossexamine.”

“True, your honor. But now I want to introduce new topics, not rebut matters raised on direct. And I want to reexamine her in light of the new information that has arisen.”

Cable ran his fingers through his graying hair. “I suppose he has that right. Mrs. McNaughton, would you please return to the witness box?”

In the third row of the gallery, Andrea McNaughton pushed herself up on uncertain legs. “Sir, I … don’t … want to.”

“I’m sorry,” Judge Cable said. “I can imagine the pain this must cause you. But I’m afraid you have no choice.”

“I’ve already said everything I have to say.”

“And if Mr. Kincaid starts repeating matters that have already been addressed, I can assure you I’ll shut him down. But for now I must insist that you come to the witness box. Bailiff.”

On cue, Brent, the bailiff, walked up the aisle beside Andrea. Taking her elbow, he gently escorted her to the front of the courtroom.

The judge nodded. “Thank you, Mrs. McNaughton. I’ll remind you that you’re still under oath.”

“Of course.” Her voice seemed hollow and hoarse.

Ben approached the podium. He had no notes for this cross. He was winging it, pure and simple, which was unfortunate, because he knew that everything depended on what happened next.

“Mrs. McNaughton, you were in the courtroom while Keri Dalcanton testified, weren’t you?”

“Oh yes. I heard it all.” Her voice left little doubt but that she was not persuaded by what she had heard. At the same time, it had a fragile quality, a vulnerability that had not been there before.

“Then you’re aware that her testimony differs from yours on several key points.”

She twisted her neck awkwardly. “Is that really a surprise?”

“No, it isn’t. You and Keri have been antagonists from the outset. In some respects, this whole case has been a conflict between you and her. But it leaves the jury in a bit of a fix. Because both of you can’t be telling the truth. So they have to determine who is—and who isn’t.”

“She’s lying,” Andrea said. “She’s lying to save her scrawny neck.”

“So you’ve been saying. But something about your story has always bothered me, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Until just a few minutes ago, when I heard Keri testify. When I heard her talk about what a hard life she had after she moved to Tulsa.”

“Is there a question in here somewhere?” LaBelle asked.

“I’m getting there,” Ben replied. He turned his attention to Andrea. “I remembered your account of your visit to Keri’s apartment, just before your husband was found dead. You said she attacked you—”

“She did.”

“—which she denies. In the struggle, you said she threw you down on some kind of exercise equipment and you hurt yourself. The problem is—I’ve been to Keri’s apartment. And there’s no exercise equipment.”

“I don’t know exactly what it was. One of those fancy high-tech things—”

“You heard how poor she’s been. There’s no way she could afford some Nautilus equipment or rowing machine.”

“She probably thought it was worth the cost to keep up her shapely figure. That’s important when you make your living as a whore.”

Ben took a deep breath. “It’s not there, Mrs. McNaughton.”

“She probably got rid of it after she murdered my—”

“This is a copy of the police inventory,” Ben said, waving a sheet of paper in the air, “taken when the police arrived at her apartment, less than one hour after your husband’s body was discovered. It lists everything they found there. Which is not much. And there is certainly no exercise equipment.”

“Maybe they didn’t think—”

“Here is a sheaf of photos I pulled out of the file,” Ben said, passing them to the bailiff. “The police photographed Keri’s apartment in every room from every possible angle. Standard operating procedure—at the time, they thought the murder might’ve occurred there.” He watched as the bailiff passed the photos to Andrea. “Take your time and look through them, ma’am. There’s a lot to see. But I can tell you one thing you won’t see—exercise equipment. Because she didn’t have any.”

Andrea rifled furiously through the pictures. “Well, maybe it was a table or cabinet …”

“Ah, but now you’re changing your story. Before, it was a fancy high-tech exercise machine.”

“It all happened very quickly. I could’ve been confused.”

“Confused? Is that a way of saying you lied?”

“I did not lie!” Her face flushed. “All right, maybe I did make that part up. I made a mistake.”

Ben shook his head. “You didn’t make a mistake. You invented the exercise equipment because it fit the image you were trying to create, the image of this young husband-stealing bimbo living in the lap of sin and luxury. The problem is—none of it is true.”

“Your honor,” LaBelle said angrily. “He’s speechifying again. He’s already made his point.”

“Have I?” Ben asked. “The point is—she’s admitted she lied once. How can we believe anything else she had to say?”

“Your honor—”

“Given the knowledge that you lied once,” Ben continued, “it’s now easier to resolve all the other conflicts between your testimony and Keri’s. For instance, you say that when you came to her apartment and identified yourself, she greeted you with contempt and hostility. But why would she? Remember—she didn’t even know Joe had a wife. Her principal reaction was shock.”

“That’s her story. If you want to believe it.”

“No one has ever given us any reason not to believe it. Not even you. You say that she attacked you.”

“She did.”

“And Keri says you attacked her. Now which is more likely? That the attack would be initiated by a nineteen-year-old girl who’s just found out her boyfriend is married? Or the betrayed married woman with an acknowledged proclivity for violence? The woman who subsequently attacked Keri twice in front of witnesses. The woman we know has already lied once.”

“That’s not true! I didn’t—”

“I’ve seen you attack Keri myself. You admitted you attacked your husband. And I think you did it in Keri’s apartment, too. You obviously have a problem with your temper, ma’am. And although I’m no psychiatrist, I suspect your problems go even deeper than that.”

“How dare you! You don’t know what happened—”

“I think I do. You claim Keri made a lot of hateful threats to you as you were dragged out of the apartment by her brother. But why would she? She may have been shocked to learn that Joe had a wife, but she had no reason to believe he would leave her. He refused when you first asked him, something you’ve already admitted. And something you told Keri when you were at her apartment. He didn’t change his mind until later—after you worked on him some more. So what reason did Keri have to be making threats to you? None. None at all.” Ben leaned in closer. “I think you made it up, Mrs. McNaughton. You made it up because you hate Keri Dalcanton and you want to see her die.”

“That isn’t true!”

“I think it is. In fact, I know it is. The truth is, Keri has no reason to be telling lies about you. But you have every reason to tell lies about her. Because, as you’ve already admitted to the jury—you hate her.”

“That’s not so!” Andrea rose out of her chair. “Make him stop saying that!”

“You did lie, Mrs. McNaughton. You lied about the exercise machine and the threats and everything else. Anything that would make the police arrest Keri and pursue her relentlessly. Which they did. Because they felt they owed it to Joe’s poor widow.”

“Make him stop!” Andrea was screaming; almost out of control with rage. “Make him stop lying!”

“Your honor—”

Ben cut LaBelle off before he had a chance to interrupt. “And you told all those lies, Mrs. McNaughton, you stirred up the whole police department, because you hated that woman, you hated her with every ounce of your body, hated her so much you were willing to do anything—”

She stole my husband!” Andrea’s impassioned screech reverberated across the courtroom. She leaned across the rail, almost flinging herself out of the box. “She stole my husband!

Ben allowed the horrible silence following her outburst to fester. Andrea placed her hand against her temple, brushing the hair from her eyes, and lowered herself back to her chair, sobbing uncontrollably.

“And by that,” Ben said, “you don’t mean that she killed your husband, because she didn’t, and you know it. You mean she stole his love. She alienated his affections.”

Andrea’s head was bowed. Her voice was broken, her face shattered. “Whenever I think about the two of them, being together, doing all those disgusting things, I—I—just can’t stand it.”

Ben spoke quietly but insistently. “And so you decided to get back at her, the best way you knew how. By making sure she was Suspect Number One. By making sure the law-enforcement community hounded her relentlessly, never giving up until she had paid the final price for what she did to you. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it, Andrea?”

Andrea’s face was wet and streaked. She looked broken and pathetic. “Was that so much?” she asked. “She took everything from me. Everything.”

Ben nodded, then looked up at the bench. “That’s all, your honor. I have no more questions for this witness. I think she’s been through enough.” He glanced back at the defendant’s table. “I think we all have.”