'I want to know why you killed your father and what that slimy half brother of yours had to do with it. I want to know everything about Schein.'
'Guy's not involved in this. Neither is Larry.'
I squeezed her upper arms and pulled her close.
'Jake, you're hurting me.'
'I've never hit a woman. I hate the cowardly cretins that do. But if you were a man, right now I'd knock you through that wall and kick your ass across Ocean Drive.'
'Jake, you're acting crazy!'
I let her go and she pulled away.
'You thought you were being so smart,' I said. 'Well, your pal Schein taped you when you thought he wasn't. He's got proof you planned to kill your father. No blackouts, no irresistible impulses. No nothing but a life behind bars.'
She blinked but she didn't cry.
'And here's another little surprise. Two characters named Faviola and Kent are getting expenses-paid vacations to Miami.'
'Luciano doesn't need the money,' she said quietly. 'Martin would do anything for a dollar.'
My look asked the question, which she quickly answered. 'Luciano Faviola is an Italian playboy. He tried to rape me at a party when I was stoned.' She shook her head and said bitterly, 'I wish I'd killed him.'
'Perfect trial demeanor,' I said sarcastically, 'showing your tender, remorseful side. I'm sure the jury will have a lot of sympathy for a coke-snorting, spoiled bitch princess who carries a gun and cries rape at every opportunity.'
'Is that what you think I am?'
'It doesn't matter what I think.'
'It does to me,' she said, her eyes tearing. She walked to the window and stared out at Ocean Drive. 'Martin Kent was a playboy without a bankroll. He stole from me. He was just another one of my incredibly poor choices where men are concerned.'
She was talking about Kent, but was she thinking about me?
'Can they really testify?' she asked.
'It's up to the judge. I'm more concerned about the tape. It's clearly admissible, and it's damning.'
For a moment she was silent. Then, speaking softly, she said, 'If I tell you the truth, will you still help me?'
I didn't answer. I couldn't. I didn't know.
'My father did rape me, Jake. You must believe that.' We sat at her kitchen table. Chrissy reached for a cigarette and lit it. 'I had blocked it out and couldn't remember it. I always had these vague feelings of uneasiness around my father. I knew he'd done something, but I didn't know what. Larry Schein brought it out under hypnosis. It's all true. All I lied about-left out, really-was that I planned to kill him. I planned it, and I told Larry.'
'Who has it on tape,' I said. 'He's the one who can send you away. If you'd told me, maybe there's something I could have done.'
'What would you have done?' She exhaled, and a plume of cigarette smoke drifted toward the ceiling.
'I don't know. Something!'
Chrissy poured a second cup of coffee for each of us. Outside the kitchen window, the sun was blinking through thin streaks of clouds where the horizon touched the ocean. 'I wanted to kill my father. I wanted to be cleansed, but I didn't want to go to prison. I'd done some reading. I knew about posttraumatic stress disorder. Damn it, Jake, I had it! I was just able to rationally decide what to do.'
'Rationally?'
'Yeah. What difference should it make if a woman blows away her abusive husband while he's beating her, or if she does it after sitting down and thinking about it? That's the only difference here. I thought about it for a while, then did it.'
'The difference,' I said, 'is between manslaughter and first-degree murder.'
'Then they should change the law.'
'Great, write your legislator.' Chrissy's coffee was burning a hole in my gut and my mood wasn't improving. 'Did Schein ever encourage you in this rational plan to kill your father?'
'Not in so many words. He did say something like my father's death could be therapeutic, but phrased real vaguely. He never used the word 'kill' or 'murder.' '
'What about Guy? Did he know?'
'I certainly didn't tell him.'
'But Schein did! Don't you see? They wanted you to kill your father. They set you up with a phony defense, then trashed it the night before trial. They want you convicted.'
'Why?'
'Money! Guy gets the entire estate and you spend the rest of your life in prison.'
She wasn't rattled, and she still didn't cry. 'That doesn't make any sense. Guy's rich enough.'
'Some people never are. And there are other reasons, too. Guy never got over the fact that you were the pampered child. He probably hated your father for it.'
'No. The first few years were tough on Guy-he was treated like hired help-but Daddy made it up to him. He brought Guy into the business, turned it over. It can't be that.'
'Then what is it, Chrissy? If it's not money, if it's not anger, what's his motive?'
'I don't know.'
'You have to know!' Losing my patience.
She angrily tossed the cigarette stub into her coffee cup. 'You don't believe me. You never have. That's why you tricked me into taking the lie detector test.'
'On a relative scale, that should rank somewhat lower than tricking you into committing a first-degree murder.' She glared at me and I added, 'If they really did trick you.'
'Bastard! How can you defend me if you don't believe me?'
'I do it every day. It's my job.'
'That's not the way I want it to be,' she said, her tone more sad than angry.
'Fine, I'll ask the judge for permission to withdraw. If he grants it, you'll get a continuance. Maybe another lawyer can figure out-'
'No! I want you. I trust you, even if it's not reciprocal.'
'I don't know how to try the case. I don't know how to win.'
'Don't change anything. Play the tapes. I'll tell the jury I damn well planned it, and I'd do it again. Let Schein testify I planned to kill Daddy. Let's tell the truth.'
'The truth?' The idea was so preposterous I just laughed.
'Isn't that what you wanted? Isn't that what you demanded in your holier-than-thou tone? Okay, Mr. Self- righteous. Let's take the truth and go with it.'
'There are times,' I said sadly, shaking my head, 'when the truth will not set you free.'
21
I sat in the cushioned chair in front of Judge Myron Stanger's desk. Freshly shaved, my hair still wet from the shower, packaged in my sincere blue suit and burgundy power tie, I almost looked like a lawyer, even with my neck bulging out of my collar. Abe Socolow sat in the leather chair next to me, his sallow complexion set off nicely by his funereal black suit. A young woman sat next to the judge, perched over her stenograph, awaiting the words of jurisprudential wisdom, or at least semigrammatical English, that are occasionally spoken in chambers.
On the sofa behind us all, beneath dozens of plaques proclaiming His Honor's civic high-mindedness, sat Chrissy, her legs demurely crossed. She was dressed in a charcoal-gray suit over a white silk blouse that she had
