| |
After a brief team meeting, Dan returned to his boat. He thought he’d had a good day in court, but he also knew this was an uphill battle. Regardless of what the judge told the jurors, he did have a burden of proof—the burden of convincing the jury that everything the prosecution said was wrong. So far, he had batted down most of the evidence, but it was about to get much worse, and at some point, jurors start to think that where there is so much smoke, there must be fire.
Tomorrow he would have to confront the man who put his father in prison. Just the thought made him sick. Made him want to rip the man’s head off. But in the courtroom, he had to stay calm and do his job. Even when it was tearing him apart.
He’d felt bad all afternoon. He was probably working too hard, too soon. He’d felt a sharp tremor rip through his body the second he approached the boat. The sight brought back too many memories. The three men. The little bastard with the tire iron. How they had...damaged him. Violated him. How they took him apart piece by piece.
Maybe that was the real reason he came back here alone. He had to prove to himself that he still could.
Mr. K had security everywhere, of course. Several security officers watching the boat, the courthouse, plus plainclothes officers dogging his footsteps. He didn’t know who they were. Mr. K thought it best they remained undercover, unknown even to the man they were protecting. Camila had offered to come over tonight, but he turned her down, claiming he had too much work to be a good boyfriend.
He didn’t need a babysitter. This was who he was and what he did, right?
But anxiety still clutched at his chest. His fight or flight instinct told him to run—but for some reason he didn’t listen.
He’d like to call that bravery. But he suspected it was just stubbornness. Possibly stupidity.
He knew he wouldn’t sleep much tonight, not that he ever did while a trial was in progress. He’d spend the night rehearsing witness examinations, strategizing, trying to solve the deepening mystery of Ossie Coleman, who he was and why so many people were out to get him.
And trying to convince himself that he was not scared. Even though he knew better.
* * *
When he entered the courtroom the next day, he spotted Bradley Ellison in the gallery, ready to roll. He nodded politely but kept walking, suppressing his thoughts. You’ve already ruined one man’s life. Now you’re gunning for someone else.
A few minutes later, Kilpatrick called his next witness.
Terry Dodgson was the hiker who first stumbled onto the now-famous cabin in the wilderness with the yellow triangle. Lean, wiry. Big bushy beard. Unkempt hair. Red ring on his right hand. Good that Dodgson preferred the great outdoors, because his social skills, not to mention grooming skills, were not highly advanced. He looked hardy and earnest, but no one you’d hire to run your corporation.
Dodgson explained that he loved the Florida outback. He hiked almost every day. He made a living, if that was the word, by contributing articles to an online outdoor-adventures website. He lived in a house his father had left him. He didn’t shop, didn’t have a wife, and didn’t have children—so his needs were relatively small.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Dodgson said. “I’d hiked all over this area. Slow going. Lots of brush, no trails, no roads. Never saw another person. Much less a cabin.”
“What did you do when you found it?”
“At first, nothing. Didn’t want to intrude. Anybody who went to the trouble of building something way out there clearly did not want company. Then I noticed the triangle.”
“The yellow triangle on the gable?”
“Right. I read the news online every morning. Helps me get ideas for things I might write about. So I knew about Ossie Coleman, the kid with no memory of the last fourteen years except a cabin with a yellow triangle.”
“What did you do next?”
“I waited outside for a while. Didn’t see anyone. I slowly walked to the front porch. No windows. I knocked on the door. No one answered. The door was open slightly.”
“And then?”
“I stepped inside. And saw the corpse. The old man on the floor. Smelled him, too. I think he’d been there a long time.”
“And then?”
“I decided it was time to call in the professionals. But it took two hours just to get to a cell signal, and two more hours before I met the police officers.”
“What happened after that?”
“I showed them what I found.”
“Let me ask you an important question. Did you see the defendant at or near that cabin?”
“No, I didn’t see anyone. Alive.”
“Did you see any traces that the defendant had ever been there?”
“No.”
“You found the cabin. Is it possible someone else could have done the same?”
“Sure. It wasn’t really hard to get to—just remote.”
“Thank you. Nothing more.”
Dan didn’t cross. The primary reason Kilpatrick put this witness on the stand was that he didn’t want someone else to suggest that he was trying to hide evidence supporting Ossie’s story. But it had no bearing on whether Ossie was a murderer.
Kilpatrick’s next witness was Sergeant Enriquez, the officer who took control of the crime scene once Dodgson got them there. He made sure the proper crime-scene protocols were implemented. They cordoned off the property—not that they expected anyone to wander by. They called the medical examiner’s office to take charge of the body. And they systematically sent in crime-scene techs to search for evidence.
“Were there any indications that anyone other than the deceased lived in the cabin?”
“None. No clothes or personal belongings other than those attributable to the old man, who still has not been identified.”
“What about outside?”
“There was a shack...with chains. It appears they were used as restraints. Presumably for the victims before they were...mummified.”
“Did you find any fingerprints?”
“Unfortunately, no. The place was in bad shape. The man had been dead a long time, and I think it’s safe to say the cleaning crew had stopped coming in. A dusty, dirty, filth-ridden environment is not an incubator for forensic evidence.”
Slowly, and with great reluctance, Enriquez described the mummies, the corpses of young boys who had apparently been tortured before being killed and preserved and arranged in staged tableaus. And the pharmaceutical cabinet.
“Can you describe what drugs you found in the cabinet?”
“It would be easier to describe what wasn’t found. This guy had everything. It was all legit—assuming he had a prescription. No street drugs.”
“Any ketamine in the cabinet?” That was, as the jury would recall, the poison found in trace amounts on the syringe.
“Yes, that was on the list.”
“Someone could have found the cabin, just as you did, noted the yellow triangle, acquired the poison and a syringe, then left.”
“Objection,” Dan said, rising to his feet. “Who’s speculating now?”
Kilpatrick shrugged. “I’m posing a hypothetical.”
The judge appeared baffled.
“If Pike can do it—” Kilpatrick took a breath, then tried a different approach. “I’m just establishing that a killer could’ve obtained the poison from this cabin.”
“Oh.” The judge extended his lower lip. “Well, that’s okay, I think.”
His clerk nodded subtly.
“Any idea where these drugs came from?” Kilpatrick asked.
“No idea. The man must’ve gone into town periodically for food and supplies. Looks like he had a source that hooked him up with drugs, too. A physician, maybe, or a Canadian pharmacy that didn’t care whether he had a prescription. Hard to know.”
And with that, Dan realized, the prosecution added the last element needed to complete its prima facie case—an explanation of where Ossie got the poison and perhaps the syringe. No signs that he lived in this cabin, much less for fourteen years. But a strong suggestion that he might’ve dropped by and acquired the murder weapon.
And there wasn’t a thing he could do about it. Because he knew every word the witnesses had spoken was true.