If I'm Dead

If I'm Dead

Damp, salty ocean air is hell on everything. Especially evidence. If we hadn’t lucked out and found the car so fast, we’d never have had a shot at getting DNA results out of that little drop of blood on the passenger seat of the SUV. But a young surfer looking for a new break near Point Mugu had spotted the vehicle and decided to call the police; the sight of the abandoned car had given him a “bad feeling.” I found out what he meant when I went out to the scene. And I got that same bad feeling every time I looked at the photograph that’d been taken that night—something I’d done often and was in fact doing right now.

The white SUV glowed in the moonlight, a ghostly beacon on an outcropping above a rocky stretch of beach north of Point Mugu. The “soccer mom” vehicle wouldn’t have merited a second look had it been in the parking lot of any shopping mall in the San Fernando Valley. But there, in the limitless darkness of a remote overlook on the Pacific Coast Highway, it was an ominous misfit. A car like that did not wind up in a place like this. Not overnight. And not in the dead of winter.

I couldn’t help being transfixed by the sight of that Ford Explorer, iridescent and isolated, in the endless black maw of ocean and night sky. Chilling, eerie, the photo emanated a sense of menace, a prelude to a violent demise.

At least I hoped it did. I planned to use that photograph—now enlarged to poster size—in my opening statement. I figured it would help me hit the ground running with the jury. Get their minds in the right place. I’m Rachel Knight, and I’m a deputy district attorney assigned to the Special Trials Unit—a small group of prosecutors that handles the most high-profile, complex cases in Los Angeles. Unlike most deputies, we get our cases the day the body is found and work alongside the detectives throughout the investigation. And the detective I’ve been working with almost exclusively for the past few years, who also happens to be my best friend, is Bailey Keller, one of the few women to gain entrée into the elite Robbery-Homicide Division of the LAPD.

The white SUV had belonged to Melissa Gibbons-Hildegarde, the only daughter born to Bennie and Nancy Gibbons, who combined old family money (hers) and a real estate empire (his) to wind up one of the most wealthy, influential couples in Los Angeles. Which, of course, meant that Melissa stood to inherit a very sizable fortune upon their demise. They may as well have painted a bull’s-eye on her back. The arrow that found that target came in the form of Saul Hildegarde, a charismatic community activist whose passion for welfare reform inspired Melissa to abandon her jet-set lifestyle and devote herself to higher pursuits. Unfortunately, it was only after they’d married that Melissa realized the welfare Saul was most passionate about was his own. But while Saul discovered a taste for the easy life of tennis, clubs, and parties, Melissa discovered a burning desire to help the impoverished, and so she dedicated herself to the support and founding of charities around the world. Especially those devoted to the welfare of children. And it wasn’t enough for her to just send money. Melissa took the hands-on approach and accompanied her checkbook around the world, helping to build huts in Somalia and set up clinics in Nigeria. She’d even spoken of adopting some of the children she’d helped during her travels. Her friends were uniformly stunned at Melissa’s transformation. It seemed as though she’d gone from party girl to Mother Teresa virtually overnight. But Melissa didn’t see much of her friends anymore; her charity work kept her plenty busy—likely too busy to ask for a divorce. Right up until the day she’d come home early from a trip to Botswana to find Saul in flagrante with a young coed who’d apparently volunteered to work on a more personal style of welfare reform. Melissa had announced her intention to get a divorce that same night.

Three weeks later, Saul reported her missing. And when her SUV had been found abandoned on a lonely stretch of the Pacific Coast Highway, the contents of her purse strewn across the passenger seat and the glove compartment rifled, it was initially believed that Melissa had been the victim of a robbery-murder, and that her body had been dumped in the ocean.

But that made very little sense to Bailey and me. Why would a robber accost a woman in an SUV out on the Pacific Coast Highway? And even if he did, why bother to dump the body? Why not just kill her and take her money? We’d been skeptical, and so when Dorian Struck, our favorite criminalist, finished with the SUV, we made fast tracks to the house where Saul and Melissa lived. Sure enough, we found evidence of a struggle in the garage. And then Dorian went back over the car with a fine-tooth comb. Not only did she find a wad of money zipped into a pocket in Melissa’s purse (What robber would’ve left that money behind? Or the purse, for that matter?) but she also found blood on the passenger side of the car. Though we didn’t yet have DNA confirmation, preliminary tests indicated it was likely Melissa’s. And then we’d learned that Melissa had a prenup stipulating that in the event of divorce, Saul would only get a share of the money Melissa had earned on her own after the marriage—which was basically zilch. And finally we’d found out that Saul owned a boat that was docked in the marina close to their home but far from the place where Melissa’s car had been found. Which meant it would’ve been easy for Saul to dump her body in the ocean and then leave her car many miles away, north of Point Mugu. So even if a witness happened to see him in the marina that night, it would play like an alibi—putting him far from the scene of Melissa’s murder.

In short, we had a pretty decent case: evidence of a violent confrontation, a blood trace to show how the body had been moved, access to the means of body disposal, and motive up the wazoo. If it hadn’t been for the fact that we didn’t have a body, it would’ve been a no-brainer. But that fact was a real headache in this case, given Melissa’s globe-trotting lifestyle. And there was one additional wrinkle to the “she’s not dead” defense that was problematic: Melissa, having found Saul in bed with another woman, had a reason to disappear and let him take the fall for her murder. Besides, she didn’t have to be vindictive enough to send him away for life. She could always show up after a few months and tell everyone she hadn’t known what was going on over here; that she’d decided to cool off and spend time working for some new charity no one knew about in… Malaysia. It was a reasonable-doubt case that was tailor-made for a “not guilty” if the defense found the right jury. So Bailey had spent months contacting every friend, relative, and acquaintance who’d ever known Melissa, then scoured every database for hospitals, jails, and charities of all stripes around the world to prove that Melissa wasn’t just out feeding the starving children in Angola. But would it be enough to convince the jury? That was the big question.

“Damn it, have you heard a word I said, Knight?” Bailey asked, hands on hips.

“Almost all of ’em,” I lied. “Got any particular one in mind?”

Bailey gave me an exasperated look and pushed the photograph of the SUV facedown on the table next to my desk. “Quit staring at that thing and listen. I’ve got good news.”

I sat up straighter. “Why didn’t you say so?”

“I swear to God, Knight, I’ll hurt you.”

I crossed my arms, unimpressed. Bailey might be taller than me—and, okay, maybe she’s got a little more lean muscle—but I’ve got firearms, a great leveler. Even as we spoke, a .38 Special was resting peacefully in its holster in my bottom desk drawer.

This had never worried Bailey in the past, so I don’t know why I thought it would now. And it didn’t. Unperturbed, Bailey continued, “We got DNA on the spot of blood on the back of the passenger seat. It’s Melissa. So now it’s nailed down. They can’t claim ‘it could just be anybody, including the robber.’ ” She dropped the lab report on my desk.

“Not as good as finding her body, but better than nothing, I guess. How big’s the spot?”

Bailey held up her right thumb.

I sighed. “That’s it?”

It was good, don’t get me wrong. Especially because it was in a car that only Melissa drove, and it was on the passenger side. But a spot that small could be explained away as a random accident: So she cut herself, big deal. It happens. I wanted a piece of evidence that was a slam-dunk. This wasn’t it.

Bailey added, “And we haven’t had any of those BS ‘sightings’ for the last four months.”

That was true. The raft of phone calls we’d initially gotten from people who’d claimed to have seen Melissa in the weeks after her car had been found abandoned had largely dried up. The defense always loved to point to these folks to show the jury that there was reason to believe the victim was still alive. Most of them were either looking for their fifteen minutes or channeling their victim “sightings” through tinfoil hats. But in this case all things worried me.

“That doesn’t mean they couldn’t still come crawling out of the woodwork at trial.” I picked up the lab report. “And, of course, our DNA expert Albert Kwan can’t say when the blood on the seat was deposited.”

“Look, I’m a detective, not a magician. What do you want me to do? Go to the morgue and get you a body?”

“Gee, I didn’t think you’d want to. But if you’re up for it, I’m in.”

Bailey glared at me, then continued, “And I talked to Kwan. You’re right, he can’t say exactly when the blood got there, but he will say it had to have been left there fairly recently for it to yield so much DNA, given the conditions.”

“Yeah, that’s cool, but—”

“But what? What innocent explanation is there for her blood to be on the back of the passenger seat?” Bailey demanded. “It’s not like she would accidentally cut herself and then drip blood near the bottom like that.”

I held up my hand. “You’re preaching to the choir, Keller. I’ll be preaching to the twelve-headed monster. And that monster will be looking at Mr. Wonderful, never-had-a-parking-ticket, former Eagle Scout, now welfare-reform activist, and thinking, This guy killed his wife?”

“His rich wife, whose prenup cut him out if they divorced—”

“And whose family, even if we lose this case, will have lawyers who’ll know how to tie up all that money in litigation until the guy’s in assisted living.” I had no doubt the defense would find a way to get that little nugget in front of the jury so they could argue that the defendant had no motive to kill Melissa. Of course, I planned to take every opportunity I could to point out that he didn’t have the legal sophistication to anticipate any of that. But all the defense had to do was raise a reasonable doubt; they didn’t have to prove what Saul knew. It was yet another stumbling block in this obstacle course of a case. Dwelling on it wasn’t making me feel any better, so I did a quick mental review of my to-do list, searching for a reason to get optimistic. I remembered we hadn’t heard back from our criminalist. “Did Dorian turn in her report yet?”

Bailey pulled out her cell and tapped the screen, then scrolled for a moment. “She said it’d be done today. Why don’t we head over there? We’ve got to get out and see the family anyway.”

Melissa had a large and loving family who wanted minute-by-minute updates on the case. We’d been checking in whenever we could, but Saul had hired Ronnie O’Bryan, a street fighter of an attorney who believed in jamming the prosecution into trial as fast as possible. I’d told him we wouldn’t have all the evidence reports in until the first day of trial, and that some might even come in after that. He didn’t care. If I didn’t have the reports, that meant I couldn’t prepare either. I had to admit, it was a pretty effective strategy. If I’d had the stomach to be a defense attorney, I’d sure as hell have used it. And just as he’d intended, I was running at double speed, flogging my experts in an effort to get the most critical work done in time. But with the trial just two days away, the Gibbons family’s anxiety was mounting by the second. They needed some TLC.

I looked out the window of my office on the eighteenth floor of the Criminal Courts Building, trying to gauge whether I’d need to bring my sweater. It was a beautiful day: the sky was piercingly blue and the downtown air had been whipped clean by the hot, gusty Santa Ana winds that’d blown through last night. My walk from my room in the Biltmore Hotel to the courthouse this morning was pleasant enough, but that’d been hours ago. By now, the July sun had been radiating for more than five hours. I figured it was easily ninety degrees out there. Still, Bailey liked to crank the AC in the car, and I knew Dorian kept her office at meat-locker temperature. I grabbed the sweater.

The sprawling brick-colored building that houses the Scientific Investigation Division of the LAPD is just south and east of downtown Los Angeles, about a ten-minute ride from the courthouse. Bailey made the trip in less than five minutes. L.A. is a lot easier to navigate when you don’t have to worry about speeding tickets.

As we rode the elevator up to Dorian’s office, I braced myself for the encounter. Dorian Struck was one of the few veteran female criminalists, and she’d processed more crime scenes in her twenty-three years on the job than even the most seasoned detectives had ever seen. No one was better at the gig, and I was always glad to have her on a case. But she was a prickly pear who didn’t like to be rushed, and I’d rushed her. More accurately, I’d pestered Bailey into rushing her. The moment we stepped out of the elevator, I spotted Dorian’s short, square frame standing next to a young male criminalist whose head was bent over a microscope.

When we got to within five feet of her, she looked up. “Didn’t I tell you I’d call when the report was done?” She glared at Bailey.

Happy to be out of the line of fire, and to see Bailey in the center of it, I stepped back to watch the show. Bailey shot me a narrow-eyed glance before responding. “Yeah, but you also said the report would be done today. So I thought I’d save you the trouble.”

Dorian turned on her heel and headed toward her office, grumbling. “You want to save me some trouble, stay in your cop shop and wait for the report like everyone else.”

Her small, Spartan office was the picture of anal-retentive obsession. No paper out of place, no pens or paper clips lying around, no open books. Most of us have family photos or fun prints on our office walls. Dorian’s were covered—neatly, to a T-squared perfection—with crime scene photos that centered on a gloved hand (Dorian’s, of course) pointing to evidence: bloodstains, spent bullets, spent casings, paint chips, you name it. There was even one of a disembodied head. Dorian’s only nod to sentimentality was a photograph of Indiana Bones—a cadaver dog shown in the act of alerting to a mound of loose dirt. Dorian tapped her computer into life and hit some keys, and the printer whirred, then spit out two pages. Bailey took them and I leaned over her shoulder to see, ignoring her irritated glance.

I read aloud from the report: “ ‘… found evidence of wipe marks throughout the interior of the car… a cleanser was used.’ ” This was good stuff, but as always I wanted more. “If the wipe marks were still detectable, then that must mean he’d cleaned the car shortly before we found it, right?”

“First of all, I’m not saying it’s a ‘he’ or a ‘she’ or an ‘it’ who did the wiping. That’s your problem. Second of all, I’m not saying anyone ‘cleaned’ the car. I’m saying exactly what you read in my report: there were wipe marks that appeared to be associated with a cleanser.”

It was the heaven and the hell of Dorian. She never stretched her findings. She reported literally what she saw and not one thing more. It was a great credibility booster but a minefield for the unwary prosecutor. So far, I’d managed to avoid that pitfall by making it a point to feel around for the parameters of Dorian’s opinion before we walked into court.

“Can you say anything about what kind of cleanser was used?” I asked.

“I can say there was bleach in it, but that’s about it.”

“Can you say that bleach is a particularly effective way to get rid of blood?”

“As opposed to what? Armor All? Your spit? No.”

“Okay, thanks, Dorian.” I’d been warned. But then I remembered the blood drop. I looked at Bailey, who picked up on my thought.

“If the car was wiped down, then how come there was still a visible drop of blood on the back of the passenger seat?” Bailey asked.

Dorian’s expression told me it was good that Bailey’d been the one to ask. “What do you do with my reports? Line the cat box?” I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing. “The blood drop wasn’t on the back of the seat. It was on the undercarriage of the passenger seat.”

Would anyone else have found that little drop of blood in such a hidden location? I doubted it. And what a find it was. A blood drop in an accessible area is one thing. But a blood drop underneath the seat? That one was hard to explain. Especially with the evidence of cleanup. This new evidence would decimate any lingering hope the defense might’ve had at selling the BS story that Melissa had been killed in a robbery. It’d be a pretty rare thief who’d kill someone, dump the body, then take the time to wipe down the car out on the highway. Feeling cheered—maybe more than was justified—we thanked Dorian and headed out to see the Gibbons family one last time before the trial began.

Bailey steered us onto the freeway, and I braced myself for an inch-by-inch, hour-long crawl. It was almost four p.m., a time when the freeways routinely turned into parking lots. But for some reason the goddess of travel smiled upon us, and today the road was stunningly wide open. We flew up the 101 Freeway north and made it to Hancock Park in just fifteen minutes. It’s an older neighborhood, with homes that date back to the ’30s—ancient, by Los Angeles standards—and its pricey midtown location makes it particularly desirable to high-end professionals in the entertainment and law business. The nearby Wilshire Country Club provides a picturesque stream that runs through the area, and even the smallest homes are worth at least a million; the larger estates will set you back more than ten times that much. So the lawyers who live there? Yeah, none of ’em work in the L.A. County District Attorney’s Office.

The Gibbons manse was on South Las Palmas Avenue and occupied a double lot that sported an elegant French Tudor home on one side and a pool pavilion with a ski lodge–type fireplace on the other. The newly retiled pool and tennis court robbed the family of any excuse not to stay fit, and the guesthouse and home theater ensured company would be entertained and well cared for. This was where Melissa had grown up.

Her mother, Nancy, was a warmer version of the kind of woman who always seemed to be the “lady of the house” in a place like this: perfect, understated makeup, expertly styled pageboy hair, neatly manicured nails, and tasteful, conservative threads that genteelly whispered money—lots of it. That same muted luxury was a theme repeated throughout the rolling grounds and spacious rooms of the house.

The maid, an older woman with Slavic features, ushered us into the living room. My heels sank into the plush beige carpet and the sunlight that streamed through the expansive picture window filled the room with a warm glow. I felt as though I’d walked into a painting. Nancy, her handsome features sagging with fatigue and sorrow, moved toward us and gripped my hand in both of hers.

“Thank you for coming. Bennie couldn’t get out of his meeting in time, but of course he’ll be in court… the day after tomorrow, isn’t it? I find it hard to believe it’s finally happening.”

I gave her what I hoped was a supportive smile. But to me, it felt more like “already” than “finally.” We all sat down and I asked how she was doing. As well as could be expected, she told us, then asked, “More importantly, how are you feeling? How does the case look?”

I told her about the latest findings by Dorian and Kwan. I tried to soft-pedal the subject of blood, to give her the importance of the results without invoking the images it conjured. But how the hell do you do that? Anyway, I tried. Nancy blanched and closed her eyes briefly.

“I know, it’s a terrible thing to have to hear,” I replied. “I’m so sorry.”

“No, no. I meant it when I said I wanted to know everything. And I appreciate how you’ve accommodated my wishes.” She took a deep breath, then continued, “So with this… evidence, and the diary, do you think the case is strong enough?”

“With all that plus the evidence in the garage, yes, I do.”

But, of course, I wouldn’t be on the jury. The truth was, given all the circumstances, I was less confident than I let on. Fortunately, Bailey took over.

“Did Melissa keep a diary when she was younger? Or was this something she started when she got older?”

“If she kept a diary as a child, I didn’t know about it. You’d have to ask her college roommates to be sure, but I believe the diary-keeping was something she started after she and… Saul”—Nancy nearly choked on the name—“began having trouble. I think her diary gave her a way to vent because she wasn’t ready to admit out loud that she’d made a mistake.”

I waited for her to continue, but she stopped suddenly and looked down at her hands. Only when the sun sparkled on the teardrops falling into her lap did I realize Nancy was crying. I squeezed her shoulder, and she patted my hand as though she were trying to console us both. Once again, I found myself admiring her strength and unstudied dignity. After taking a few deep breaths, she blinked and looked out the window. Though her body was unbowed, it seemed cloaked in an aura of despair.

“It’s just hard to accept,” she said. “We were always so close. Yet Melissa didn’t feel she could confide in me about what she was going through. I keep asking myself, why? Why didn’t she tell me? Where did I go wrong?”

Nancy pressed her lips together and again closed her eyes and bent her head. I gave her space to recover, and the room filled with a heavy silence.

“Nancy, I don’t think you went wrong anywhere,” I said. “From what I’ve seen, Melissa was strong and independent… like you. I think she wanted to handle this herself. And who knows? Maybe at first she hoped things would improve. Then, by the time she realized there was no hope, it was too late. I’d bet she’d planned to tell you after she’d handled the situation but just didn’t get the chance.”

Nancy swallowed and patted my hand again. “Maybe so. I hope so. Thank you, Rachel.”

But I knew she wasn’t convinced. It would be a long time before she would stop blaming herself for Melissa’s death. If ever. I was struck again by the way the murder of one person poisoned the lives of so many. The proverbial rock in the pond that sends ripples in concentric circles all the way to shore.

The first day of the trial dawned bright and fiery hot. The sun bounced off the sidewalks with blinding force as I walked up Broadway on my way to the courthouse. I could’ve driven, but the walk always gives me a chance to think and charge my mental batteries. Today, especially, I needed that interruption-free time to review my opening statement. But as I walked I could feel the heat penetrate my suit and blouse, and sweat began to run down my neck and into my bra. I’d just pushed through the security door on the eighteenth floor and headed down the hallway for my office when a familiar voice called out, “Now I know what they mean by ‘something the cat dragged in.’ Girl, you look like hell.”

That unflattering assessment was provided by Toni LaCollier, who, like me, was a prosecutor in the Special Trials Unit. If she weren’t my “bestie,” I’d have nailed her in the head with the heel of my Stuart Weitzman.

“So it’s a good thing I’ve got opening statements in one hour, isn’t it?” I groused. “Damn it. Please tell me this isn’t a bad sign.” Trial lawyers are notoriously superstitious. Which is why I was wearing my standard navy “believe me” suit, the one I always wore when I was going to talk to the jury.

“This isn’t a bad sign,” Toni parroted obediently.

“Okay, now say it like you mean it.”

“I do mean it. But remind me to give you my juju just in case. Better safe than sorry.”

“Your what?” I asked. “Toni, since when do you—”

She held up a warning hand. “Stop, do not go there, hear me? Just trust me, it works. Now, come on, I’ll fix you up.”

An hour later, makeup restored and hair expertly blown dry thanks to Toni and her ever-present beauty kit of wonder, I was standing before the jury, the poster-size photograph of Melissa’s white SUV propped up on an easel to my left.

As I’d hoped, the photograph was a siren song the jury could not resist. Time and again, as I described the evidence I’d present, I saw their eyes stray and linger on the image. Taking heart, I hit my final points slowly but firmly.

“So, ladies and gentlemen, we will show you the signs of a struggle in the garage, Melissa’s bloody scarf near the stairs, and the drop of blood on the undercarriage of the car seat, but that’s only the forensic evidence…”

I paused, partially for effect, partially to let the jury catch up. I’d deliberately not mentioned the wipe marks that were evidence of cleanup in the car because I always like to promise less than I deliver. That way, when I present the “new” evidence, it has an extra punch.

I turned back to counsel table, and Bailey handed me the enlarged photograph of Melissa’s diary. I held the photo up for the jury to see.

“Because, ladies and gentlemen, we will bring you the voice of Melissa herself.”

I held the photograph in front of them as I spoke. “Through this diary, Melissa will speak to you from the grave. With her very last entry, on the day that was likely her last day on this earth, she will tell you that this defendant, Saul Hildegarde, took her life. This is what she said:

“ ‘Every time I mentioned divorce, he’d say the only way I’d get out of this marriage was in a pine box. I didn’t believe he really meant it. But then I found him with that volunteer, and I finally knew I’d had enough. So that night, I told him it was over and I didn’t care what he wanted anymore. I was getting a divorce. He grabbed me by the throat and started to shake me. “I’ll kill you!” At that moment, his voice, his face…I’d never seen him look like that before. I was so scared. It was real. He really meant it. I know if I don’t get out of here, he’s going to kill me. If I’m dead when you read this, it’ll be because he killed me.’ ”

I paused again, letting her words sink in. “Sadly, though the evidence will show she tried to get away, Melissa never made it. What we will prove to you, ladies and gentlemen, is that this defendant”—I turned and pointed at him for emphasis—“took her life even as she desperately, valiantly, tried to escape. Then he dumped her body into the ocean and purposely tried to make it look as though she’d been killed during a robbery.”

I saw Juror Number Four nod slightly, then toss a skeptical look in the defendant’s direction. Excellent. I’d already pegged Juror Number Four as the likely foreman.

“But that scenario won’t fly. So my guess is that he’ll say Melissa deliberately left her blood in the car to set him up, and that she’s not dead at all. She’s just getting even. But, ladies and gentlemen, when it’s all said and done, you’ll see that’s just another defense ploy, and that Melissa is truly, tragically, dead. We will prove to you beyond a reasonable doubt that Melissa was murdered and that this defendant was the killer. And at the conclusion of this case, I will be asking you to return a verdict of guilty for murder in the first degree.”

On that note, I strode back to counsel table with a bravado I definitely wasn’t feeling. The truth was, though I’d trumpeted Melissa’s last diary entry, it posed a big problem for me. It started off great, but it ended with Melissa saying she had to get out of there. I knew Ronnie O’Bryan would make it the cornerstone of his defense. But there was no point in trying to avoid it. The defense would trot out that line every chance they got—probably a thousand times before this trial was through. Better to front it myself and show the jury it didn’t bother me. Anyone who tells you a trial isn’t a performance is a damn liar.

As I sat down, I glanced at the defense table and saw Saul whispering animatedly to O’Bryan. Saul was handsome, but his thick arms and torso gave him a hulking look that could appear menacing, especially hunched over at counsel table. His dark eyes and heavy, sensual features added to the effect. And I’d noticed during pretrial motions that he had a hard time controlling his reactions. Every time I said something to the judge, he’d nudge his lawyer and write furiously, and occasionally I’d catch him glaring at me. This was great stuff for the jury to see, and I hoped O’Bryan wouldn’t be able to break him of the habit. Now, I saw O’Bryan pat him on the arm, then stand to address the judge. My guess was that Saul had been pushing him to make an opening statement—something the defense rarely does, and rarely should do.

“Your Honor, the defense will reserve opening statement at this time.”

“Very well,” the judge said. He turned to me. “People, call your first witness.”

My only hope was that the physical evidence would tip the jury in my favor. So I intended to lean heavily on my experts. Because Dorian was in charge of evidence collection, she was the most logical witness to start with. And of course the strongest.

“Please tell the jury what you found in the garage.”

“I noticed a large suitcase, navy blue and yellow in color, which was under the tool bench,” Dorian answered.

“What drew your attention to that suitcase?” I asked.

“A corner of it stuck out from under the bench.”

“As though someone had shoved it underneath in a hurry?”

Dorian shot me a warning look. “The way it was situated would have put it in the way of anyone moving around the garage. So it seemed logical to conclude that it wasn’t intentionally placed in that position.”

I declared victory with that answer and moved on.

“Did you notice anything that indicated a more likely place where the suitcase was normally stored?” I asked.

“Yes. I noticed other suitcases of similar appearance, blue and yellow, on a shelf above the tool bench.”

I paused to let the information—and hopefully the implications—sink in with the jury. It was one of those “sleeper” pieces of evidence, the significance of which can take a moment to appreciate. The fact that the suitcase had been dragged down off that shelf indicated that Melissa had been trying to get away. And the fact that the suitcase was still there in the garage, out of place, indicated not only that she hadn’t made it but that there had possibly been some kind of struggle. So this single piece of evidence helped paint an entire scenario for the last moments of Melissa’s life. After stalling for as long as I dared to give the jury time to catch on, I asked Dorian what else she’d found noteworthy in the garage.

“I found a scarf, pale blue plaid in color, near the door to the kitchen. I noted it because it was on the ground next to the stairs and I thought it fair to assume it wasn’t normally kept there.”

I glanced at the jury and saw that most were taking notes—a good sign—and that a few were smiling at Dorian. A great sign, because it showed that they spotted and appreciated Dorian’s minimalist approach, which meant she was scoring big points for credibility.

“Was it immediately visible to you when you entered the garage?”

“No. The scarf was in a dark corner next to the wall, partially hidden by the shelving unit that was bolted to the wall.”

Point being, Saul Hildegarde wouldn’t have noticed that it had fallen there in the heat of the moment and so never knew to get rid of it.

“Did you process that scarf for hair, blood, or foreign fibers?”

“I did. I found traces of human blood that I submitted for DNA testing, and I found a mixture of hairs, which I compared to hairs from Melissa’s brush, and to her family’s hair, and to the defendant’s hair.”

“And what did you find?”

“I found a number of hairs consistent with Melissa’s that appeared to have been forcibly removed—”

“By that, you mean yanked out of her head?”

Dorian gave me a stern look. “By that, I mean pulled out, as opposed to falling out naturally. And I found some forcibly removed hairs consistent with the hair of this defendant as well.” Dorian nodded in Saul Hildegarde’s direction.

She hadn’t approved of my editorialized yanked, but she hadn’t refuted it. I’d taken the risk of getting smacked by Dorian into account and decided it was worth it. Yanked painted a clearer picture of a violent struggle.

“Did you find any other evidence of note in the garage?”

“Yes. I found what appeared to be damp spots on the floor, which I tested for the presence of blood.”

“And what was the result of that test?”

“It was positive. But I must add that certain other substances may also give a positive result to that test, such as rust and certain vegetable materials.”

“Did you see any spots of rust or vegetable materials on the floor of the garage?”

“I did see some rust spots near an old bicycle.”

“And were those spots damp?”

“No.”

In other words, Saul wasn’t a neat freak who liked to scrub his garage floor. He’d only scrubbed certain spots, i.e., those that were bloodstains. So far so good, on to the finale: Dorian’s findings in the car—the spot of blood on the undercarriage of the seat, which gave me the chance to show the photograph of the car again and the “new” evidence of cleanup.

“Did you find the wipe marks throughout the car?” I asked.

“No. A search of the entire cabin of the car revealed wipe marks only in the backseat area, including the back of the passenger’s and driver’s seats.”

It couldn’t have gone any better. I leaned down and asked Bailey if there was anything I’d missed. She shook her head. I sat down. Time for cross.

Ronnie O’Bryan wisely refrained from getting into Dorian’s credentials—a losing gambit for him since it would only add to her credibility—and went after the damning inferences of the evidence she’d found.

“Now, you’re not trying to say that Melissa got attacked as she pulled that suitcase down off the shelf, are you?”

“Counsel, I’m not trying to say anything. I said what I saw: a suitcase that appeared to be out of place. How it got there, why it got there, is not my business.”

“Exactly so. I agree. And so you don’t know whether Melissa pulled down that suitcase and kicked it under the bench and left it that way herself, do you?”

“Of course not—”

“And you don’t know whether Melissa deliberately cut herself and wiped the blood on that scarf you found either, do you?”

With any other witness, I would’ve objected. The questions called for speculation and were argumentative, intended only to broadcast the defense. But when it comes to objections, less is more. Juries hate objections; it makes them wonder what you’ve got to hide. Besides, this was Dorian. I knew from hard experience that she hated this kind of conjecturing.

Dorian glared at O’Bryan. “Counsel, we can sit here all day talking about the things I don’t know. String theory, the God particle, I don’t know about ’em. I describe what I see at crime scenes. That’s what I know. You want to speculate how the suitcase got where it did, how the scarf landed on the floor by the stairs, how the blood got on it, fine. Have at it. But that’s not what I’m here for.”

A quick glance at the jury told me they were in love with Dorian. Now most of the jurors were smiling, and a few were even chuckling. Score one for the good guys. O’Bryan thanked Dorian and tried to sound as though he meant it. Ronnie had on his poker face, but I was gratified to see that Saul looked worried. That is, until Ronnie sat down and whispered to him. I knew he was telling Saul to chill out. Sure enough, Hildegarde nodded thoughtfully and put on a neutral expression.

I looked back at Nancy and Bennie to see how they were holding up. It hadn’t been gruesome testimony by any means—at least, not compared to what I’m used to. But Dorian’s testimony had left a clear, if inferential, picture of a violent confrontation in that garage, and somehow her understated delivery had made it even more compelling. Nancy stared straight ahead, covering her mouth with one hand and clutching Bennie’s arm with the other as though it were a life preserver. But Bennie was staring hard at Saul and with such searing intensity it wouldn’t have surprised me to see Saul’s head burst into flame.

We moved on. I called Kwan to talk about the blood on the scarf and in the car: it matched Melissa’s. I called a representative of the luggage manufacturer. He testified that the suitcase under the tool bench and the suitcases on the shelf above belonged to the same set.

It was time to put on the “soft” witnesses: the ones who’d describe the demise of Saul and Melissa’s marriage. The friends told of the fights, the lawyer told of how Melissa had consulted him about a divorce, and two of Saul’s girlfriends, who were surprisingly forthcoming, told of how he’d cheated on Melissa with them. I’d wanted to call the volunteer Melissa had caught him with, but she’d decamped to France. Supposedly for a job. Maybe this one would let her perform her duties in a vertical position. Which, come to think of it, wouldn’t necessarily change the nature of her “work.”

“Did you know Saul was married?” I asked the girlfriend named Wendy. Or, as Bailey called her, Winsome Wendy.

“Well… yeah. And I know I was wrong to do that, you know? And I’m sorry. I guess—”

“Objection!” O’Bryan said, half rising from his chair.

But Winsome Wendy, either because she was tougher than she appeared or because she didn’t understand, plowed ahead.

“I guess that’s why I was willing to come here today. To make it right, you know?”

“The objection is sustained,” the judge ruled. “For what it’s worth. You want the answer stricken, Counsel?”

The jury looked at O’Bryan, and I could swear Juror Number Four had raised an eyebrow. O’Bryan did the wise thing and used the moment to endear himself.

“Nah, who’m I to stand in the way of redemption?”

It got him a laugh and earned him some juror love. Score one for the bad guys.

I looked at Saul to see if he was laughing—a mistake because he should be looking remorseful; even if he hadn’t killed his wife, he was a shitheel for cheating on her. The corners of his mouth twitched, but he’d managed to rein himself in. Damn.

I’d planned to call a few more friends to paint the picture of marital discord, but since no one had seen the defendant get physically violent with Melissa, and the jury’s eyes were starting to glaze over, I decided it was probably overkill. I leaned over to Bailey.

“Time for the trump card, such as it is?” I whispered.

Bailey nodded and went to fetch our witness: Officer Susan Abrams. Still in uniform because she was in the middle of her shift, Officer Abrams raised her right hand, swore to tell the truth, and adjusted the microphone as she sat down. I quickly established that she was one of the police officers who participated in the search of the house in which Melissa and the defendant lived. Then I pulled out the photograph of the room where she found our key piece of evidence.

“Officer, did you personally search this room?”

“Yes, it’s a small study at the back of the house.”

“And what, if anything, did you find of significance there?”

We always say “if anything” to avoid the objection that the question assumes there was something significant to be found. It’s a silly formality. Why would I be asking her about the search if she didn’t find anything of significance? Lawyers have to say a lot of useless things like that.

“I found a diary.”

I turned to Bailey, who produced the actual diary in a plastic evidence envelope. Pulling on a set of rubber gloves, I took the envelope and the box of gloves up to the witness stand. Officer Abrams gloved up and removed the diary from the envelope.

“This is the diary I found.”

“Please look at the last entry.”

She turned to the page.

“Is that what you saw when you found this diary?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Please read the entire page for us.”

The officer did so, and concluded with the final line: “ ‘I know if I don’t get out of here, he’s going to kill me. If I’m dead when you read this, it’ll be because he killed me.’ ”

Officer Abrams did a nice job of it. A few peeks at the jury while she was reading from the diary showed that they were riveted. Juror Number Four was nodding to himself and taking notes. Excellent.

“No further questions,” I said, and sat down.

Bailey leaned in and whispered, “I think I saw Juror Number Nine wiping away a tear.”

More excellent still. Score another one for the good guys.

Ronnie’s cross started out to be an uninspired do-over of all my questions on direct—the typical move defense attorneys make when they really have nothing to ask. And then he dropped the bomb. It started innocuously enough.

“Now, Officer—and I trust the prosecution will not object to an obvious point that may be a little outside your field of expertise—there’s no way to know exactly when that last entry was written, is there? At least, there’s no forensic science that can tell us when ink or pencil was put to paper, correct?”

I wanted to object, because I had a bad feeling about where this was going. But I knew this to be true, and any expert—mine or his—would agree to the unremarkable proposition. I sat tight and held on to my poker face. Officer Abrams shot a quick, puzzled glance my way but answered without further hesitation.

“No, not that I’m aware of.”

“And so that writing could have been there for days, even weeks or months, before Melissa left, correct?”

“I suppose.”

“Or, conversely, that writing could have been done days, weeks, or even months after Melissa left, isn’t that right?”

Officer Abrams’s expression had grown even more perplexed. A fast look at the jury told me they were equally confused, but many were leaning forward in their seats. I would’ve done the same if I hadn’t been busy acting like I didn’t give a damn.

“Well, no. How could that be? I mean, the handwriting matches. It’s Melissa’s.” Officer Abrams shook her head and shot O’Bryan a look of contempt. “She couldn’t have written it after your client killed her.”

Much as I loved the snarky dig, I knew it could be trouble. Juries don’t trust cops who come out swinging. They generally like their officers neutral and unbiased—“Just the facts, ma’am.” Saying that Melissa couldn’t have written the entry after Hildegarde had killed her was about as biased, and obviously improper, as it got. Juries have been known to turn on us for less. I tried not to cringe when O’Bryan made his objection.

“Objection!” Ronnie said. “Motion to strike! That is obviously improper!”

“It was,” the judge said. “Ladies and gentlemen, you’re ordered to disregard that last remark.”

The jury nodded solemnly. I kept my poker face on, but I was in a quandary. Was Ronnie actually claiming someone dummied up this diary? Forged Melissa’s handwriting to frame the defendant? Who? According to everyone I’d asked, no one in Melissa’s life had even known she kept a diary. And I couldn’t think of anyone with a plausible motive—friends or family—who had access to the evidence after we’d seized it. Flashing back on all the people I’d spoken to, I couldn’t come up with a single one who’d given me a suspicious vibe. Had I missed it? I glanced at Hildegarde, who had a smug little smile on his face.

“Now I want to ask you some personal questions, Officer Abrams.”

I prepared to object—how could anything personal about the officer be relevant?—but his next question brought me to a dead stop.

“How long have you known Melissa Gibbons?”

I could’ve objected. The question assumed she’d ever known our victim, but I knew that’s exactly what O’Bryan wanted. If I objected it’d only help O’Bryan to underline the point; worse, it would look like I’d known all along and was trying to hide it—whatever it was. I surreptitiously inhaled and pressed my lips together as I wrote on my legal pad to Bailey: WTF???

Bailey, her expression stony, wrote back: NO FRIGGIN’ CLUE.

Officer Abrams opened and closed her mouth silently as though she had gills. When she finally found her voice, it came out rough. “What? What are you talking about? I never met the victim.”

“Really? Aren’t you married to Angus Warren?”

Officer Abrams’s brow furrowed as she answered slowly, “Yes.”

“And you’re aware that your husband, Angus Warren, was previously married to a woman named Jeanine Stryker?”

“I, ah… yes. I think that’s her name.”

“Oh, come now, Officer Abrams. You’re all remarkably friendly, aren’t you? Amicable divorce and all that, you all see each other socially, attend the same parties. Isn’t that true?”

“Yes. I just… didn’t remember what her maiden name was. We don’t see each other all that often, honestly.”

“But you do see each other, don’t you? You’re not trying to tell this jury otherwise, are you?”

“I… no, of course not. I just don’t get—”

“Of course you do. Jeanine Stryker is Nancy Gibbons’s sister. Melissa is Jeanine’s niece.”

Officer Abrams’s face froze. I struggled to look nonchalant. The defense had just thrown a veritable grenade into the heart of the case. By proving that Officer Abrams had a connection to Melissa’s family, he’d shown there was someone with both motive and access who could’ve altered the evidence.

Officer Abrams was red-faced and steaming. “You’re saying I forged Melissa’s handwriting and made that last entry? That’s crazy! Why on earth would I do such a thing?”

“I ask the questions, Officer Abrams,” O’Bryan boomed. “You give the answers. So please explain to us why you never told the prosecution about your relationship to Melissa’s family.”

The only hope we had was for the officer to keep her cool and show the attack wasn’t worth taking seriously. One look at her told me that hope was about to be obliterated. Officer Abrams had pulled herself up in her seat, and now she leaned forward, her face an angry fist.

“You’re out of your mind! How dare you.”

O’Bryan, loving every devastating second of it, turned to the judge with an air of indignation. “Your Honor, I object!” With a sweeping gesture toward the jury, he pronounced, “We’re entitled to an answer! Please order the witness!”

“Sustained,” the judge said quietly. “Answer the question, Officer.”

O’Bryan turned back and faced Abrams with a stern expression. “I’ll repeat it in case you don’t remember: you didn’t tell anyone, did you?”

The officer glared at O’Bryan, nostrils flaring. “No, Counsel. That’s right. I didn’t.”

A fast glance at the jury showed many of them had stricken looks. Juror Number Nine, who’d teared up when Officer Abrams read the diary, was looking from O’Bryan to the officer as if she weren’t sure who to believe. Worse still, Juror Number Four was studying Officer Abrams skeptically, one eyebrow raised. A lump formed in the pit of my stomach.

Meanwhile, Saul Hildegarde was nodding sanctimoniously—an “I told you so” expression on his face. I wanted to put my fist into it so badly I could feel my knuckles turn white.

We were screwed, and it was only going to get worse. I’d intended to close the case with the handwriting expert who’d say that the handwriting in the diary was consistent with Melissa’s. Since the last line of the diary helped the defense, I’d figured that was the one area O’Bryan wouldn’t want to mess with. But now I knew Ronnie O’Bryan would pull out all the stops to go after the handwriting expert to prove the diary entry could be a forgery. And that meant I’d be forced to end on the weakest note of all, because Morris Ivins wouldn’t be able to rule out the possibility that someone else had deliberately forged the last entry. I tried to salvage what I could from the wreckage of my case.

“Mr. Ivins, did Melissa Gibbons make this last entry in the diary?” I asked.

“Most likely, yes. Not only does the handwriting in this entry match the handwriting in the rest of the diary, but it also matches other known exemplars written by Melissa Gibbons.”

I sat down and slid another glance at the jury. Some looked disturbed, others confused, but there were at least two, one of them Juror Number Four, whose expressions were closed. A very bad sign. I sighed privately. There was nothing more I could do.

O’Bryan swaggered up to the podium. He took Ivins through all the weaknesses in handwriting identification for what felt like hours and then ended on a note that was predictable yet powerful:

“The truth is, Mr. Ivins, you can’t rule out the possibility that someone deliberately imitated Melissa’s handwriting, can you?”

“No, sir. I can’t.”

“And so you really can’t say for sure that the writing was done by Melissa, can you?”

“No, I cannot.”

“Nothing further, Your Honor.” O’Bryan obnoxiously turned to me with a flourish. “Your witness, Madame Prosecutor.”

I nodded and smiled serenely as I silently wished for him to perform an anatomically impossible act. Saul Hildegarde tilted his chin up and faced the jury with a self-righteous look. Before standing, I quickly leaned over to Bailey. “We could ask Officer Abrams to try and imitate the handwriting and then let Ivins show how hers is different from Melissa’s. But—”

“The defense will just say Abrams wasn’t really trying,” Bailey whispered back. “No, cut the cord. If the jury’s buying the defense bullshit, there’s nothing more we can do.”

It rankled to let go, and I badly wanted to wipe the supercilious smile off O’Bryan’s face, but I knew Bailey was right. If we started scrambling and making desperate moves now, it would only taint all the good evidence we’d presented.

“Ms. Knight, any redirect for Mr. Ivins?” the judge asked. I thought I heard a note of sympathy in his voice, but I could have been wrong.

“No, thank you, Your Honor. No redirect.” I stood, put on my game face, and said in as strong a voice as possible, “The prosecution rests.”

“Defense?” the judge said to O’Bryan.

“Your Honor, the defense chooses to rest on the state of the evidence. We believe the People have failed to make their case—”

“You can tell the jury what you believe in closing argument, Counsel,” the judge said, deliberately cutting off the grandstanding. “For now, I take it you don’t intend to present any additional evidence?”

“That is correct, Your Honor.”

“Then, seeing as it’s the noon hour, we’ll take our lunch break and commence with closing arguments at one thirty.”

After the jury filed out, the defendant gave O’Bryan a victory clap on the back. Feeling my eyes on him, Hildegarde shot me a sneering, triumphant grin. I wanted to yank Bailey’s gun out of her shoulder holster and blast the grin off his face.

Bailey saw my expression. “The only thing that’d make his getting off worse is for you to wind up in custody. Let it go, Rachel.”

Having no other choice, I did. Bailey and I picked up what was left of the sandwiches at the snack bar. She scored a ham and cheese; I wound up with some rolled-and-pressed mystery meat. We took our “lunch” up to my office and ate in silence. Neither of us was in the mood to chat. As I stuffed the remainder of my sandwich into its wrapper and pitched it into the wastebasket, I heard the ki-koo of Toni’s heels clicking down the hall toward my office.

She stopped in my doorway. “Hey, where’s the funeral?”

“Right here, soon as I finish closing arguments and get a five-minute ‘not guilty.’ ”

“That bad?”

Bailey gave her a dark look. “Yeah.”

“Man, that’s a bitch. You guys put together a hell of a case. What happened?”

We told her. Then I noticed the clock on the Times Building. “We’ve gotta jump. Meet us for sympathy drinks?”

Toni nodded. “Your place?”

My place being the Biltmore Hotel, where I got to live full-time thanks to a case I’d won involving the murder of the CEO’s wife. I stood up and started to gather my legal pads and exhibit sheets.

“Hold on,” Toni said. “I’ll be right back.” She hurried out.

Twenty seconds later, Toni was back. She pressed a small plastic object into my hand. I looked down at it, puzzled.

“It’s my juju,” Toni said.

“It’s a friggin’ troll doll, Tone.”

“Just keep it close—”

I started to argue, but she grabbed my chin and got nose-to-nose.

“Do not argue with me about this, Knight. What can it hurt?”

I sighed and dropped the little thing into the pocket of my blazer. What the heck—who was I to argue at a time like this? I needed all the help I could get.

I tried to put a spring in my step as I entered the courtroom. Never let ’em see you sweat.

“Ready, Counsel?” the judge asked.

We both said yes.

“Let’s have the jury.”

The jury took their seats, and I stood up. For the next hour, I did my best to sound persuasive, convincing, and confident. But when O’Bryan stood up, the jury leaned forward, all ears. Short of their handing in the “not guilty” verdict right then and there, it couldn’t get much worse. He made the predictable argument that we’d utterly failed to prove Melissa was dead, that she had every reason to want to frame Saul Hildegarde for murder, that the jury had no choice but to return a verdict of “not guilty.” And then he made his grandstand move.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I say that you must have a reasonable doubt, because I listened to the evidence here in this courtroom just like you did. And I cannot say that I believe beyond a reasonable doubt that Melissa is even dead, let alone that my client killed her. And neither can you. Because for all you know, Melissa could be walking into this courtroom at this very moment!”

With that, O’Bryan turned, thrust out his arm, and pointed to the door. And at that very moment a woman just “happened” to be entering the courtroom. Of course, the woman wasn’t Melissa, and there was not a doubt in my mind that O’Bryan had orchestrated it, but I knew that didn’t matter. He had made his point, and now he capitalized on it.

“Ladies and gentlemen, when I turned and pointed to that door, I saw all of you look. In fact, everyone in this courtroom looked—including Madame Prosecutor.”

Ronnie turned to face me for a moment, enjoying his moment of triumph.

“And that proves you are not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that Melissa is dead. Therefore you must return a verdict of ‘not guilty.’ ”

The judge looked at me. “Ms. Knight. Rebuttal?”

I sat still for a moment and let the silence linger. My heart was pounding. I knew that what I was about to do was dicey on many levels. But given the circumstances, I had nothing to lose. I moved to the edge of counsel table and faced the jury with a little smile.

“That was quite a dramatic moment, wasn’t it?”

A few hesitant nods.

“But Mr. O’Bryan didn’t get it quite right. He said that when he pointed to that door, everyone in this courtroom turned to look, including me. But he was mistaken. You see, I did turn, but I wasn’t looking at the door.” I came to a full stop and looked each of the jurors in the eye before continuing. “I was looking at the defendant.”

I turned toward the defense table. Saul Hildegarde was frowning and shifting nervously in his seat. O’Bryan, his forehead wrinkled in confusion, was trying to figure out where I was going. I knew I had only seconds to make my move. Because whether he’d figured it out or not, in two more seconds, O’Bryan would object and take me to sidebar, if only to derail me. And if that happened, it would likely ruin my one last shot. I quickly turned back to the jury.

“And so when Mr. O’Bryan pointed to the door, and you all turned to look, I saw that there was one person in this courtroom who didn’t look.” I swung my arm out and pointed at the defense table. “Him. Saul Hildegarde, the defendant. Do you know why? Because Saul Hildegarde didn’t have to look. He knew Melissa would never walk through that door. He knew that beyond all possible doubt because he killed her.”

One hour later, the jury returned with the verdict: guilty. Murder in the first degree.

The judge ordered the defendant remanded into custody forthwith. And Bailey and I had the unmitigated pleasure of watching the bailiff ratchet the handcuffs tightly around the wrists of a stricken, white-faced Saul Hildegarde and lead him out of the courtroom.