Lightner took the envelope and began slowly turning the pages. Standing over him, Hardy waited. Villars was a sphinx. Halfway through, Lightner suddenly looked up. 'But that was just a story. There might not have been a gun. That's just what I thought had happened. It's informed conjecture.'
Hardy again walked to the desk. He reached down into his briefcase and removed a zip-loc plastic evidence bag. Back at the witness box, he opened it and removed Terrell's 'mistake' – the realistic toy gun that had been found in the same dumpster as the murder weapon. 'This is the gun, is it not, doctor? This is the gun Matt was holding, is it not? The gun that you thought was real. The gun that provoked you to shoot him-'
'God!' Hardy heard Jennifer behind him. 'Ken?'
Hardy did not trust himself to move but he could still talk. 'This was the FedEx package – a Christmas present from Nancy, Matt's grandmother. How did you know, in your story, that it was a Christmas present? It didn't get to the house until 9:30, after Jennifer had left to go running. You had removed it with the murder weapon by the time she got back. Jennifer never knew it had been there. Did she?'
Lightner shifted on the seat, eyes on Hardy, then around the courtroom, as though looking for help. Finally turning to Villars. 'I don't have to answer this, do I? I can take the Fifth Amendment,' he told Villars. 'I'm not saying anything else without an attorney.'
It was his only chance, his last chance.
She had called as she increasingly did when they had been fighting. Larry was beating her.
Why wouldn't she leave him? It wouldn't get any better. All the literature, and the facts, agreed on that. He had told her. And still she wouldn't leave him. She believed she had to keep trying.
So he'd listened. And counseled her. And, yes, made love to her.
He lied to Hardy and the court about that, but he'd told the truth to Hardy about his caring for her. Caring? That was putting it mildly. Yes, she loved him, more than transference, he told himself. But she had her family. She just wasn't leaving them. Which meant he could never really have her. The call on Christmas Eve wasn't that she had decided to leave. It was another fight, another beating, another call for help. He had responded, as he always did, and then she went back for more.
And now, again, here Monday morning. Another call, more terrible damage. It had to stop. It was his only chance, her only chance. He could save her and… have her… he would do anything for her. Anything…
Olympia Way. Her beautiful house. The street empty, dead, silent under a cold brittle morning sun. It took him ten minutes, perhaps less. Jennifer was going jogging. There was enough time. She'd be gone…
No one on the street.
He had been here. Three times in the afternoons, Matt and Larry gone, Jennifer meeting him. He knew his way around there. He knew where the gun was. Not that he was really planning on using it. Was he? No. It would never come to that. He would talk to the husband, tell him what he had done, what he was doing, to Jennifer. Now that he was here, it seemed 'What is it?'
'Dr. Witt? We've got to talk. May I come in, please? It's about your wife.'
The guilty eyes narrowing. 'Who the hell are you?'
'Her psychiatrist.' Looking around, scanning the deserted street. 'You know what it is, it confidential.'
No other sounds. They were alone in the house, the two of them.
'All right, just what is this about?'
'She needs me, Dr. Witt. She called. Is she upstairs?'
'She doesn't need you. What do you mean, she called? When? What are you talking about?
'She told me she would be here. You were hitting her again. I'm taking her out-'
'You're not taking anything. She's not here.'
'If I leave I'm calling the police. I'm calling them immediately.'
'What the hell… what do you want?'
'I want to see Jennifer. I want her out of here. She's my patient. You should understand that, Doctor.'
'She's not here. I told you she's not here.'
'I need to see that for myself. I swear to God, I'm calling the police directly. I cannot let here stay here like this-'
'You want some proof? You need the goddamn grand tour.' Less confident now, he thought.
Upstairs, at last, in the bedroom.
'There, satisfied? I told you, she's out. Now you get the hell out of my house!'
The gun right where she said he kept it – in the headboard. 'I don't think so.' He didn't need to think about it. Events were taking over.
'What are you doing with that? Goddamnit…'
Coming toward him, the noise, the other sound… maybe there all along, subliminal… water running into a sink? He hadn't even heard it. No. The noise stopped. That was it. It was the noise stopping. Somebody was in there.
'Don't move.' To Witt, stopping him. The blood rushing now.
'What the hell do you think you're doing?'
'Who's in there?'
Witt yelling over his shoulder. 'Matt, stay in there!' Half-turning, trying to fake him – 'Don't come out!' – just as the other gun appeared… a blur really… in the bathroom doorway. Somebody shooting at him! But no one there. Nothing now but panic. A shadow. Things moving too fast.
Witt begins to lunge. But something else, too, at the same instant, off to the side, in the bathroom door. In his peripheral vision there is another gun. God! Somebody else is here, a witness. More, a threat.
He doesn't have a second. No time for more than a glance at his side. It's a gun – but something's wrong, it's too low to the ground, someone crouching? It pops, the gun pops…
He has no choice, he spins, points, squeezes the trigger just as he sees…
… the boy in a crouch stepping out, holding a gun, pointing it? It pops again. It can't be. It can't be Matt, he's at school. It's a school day and the father is at home alone…
He has to stop! He must! But his hand has already squeezed too far. His gun kicks, exploding in the room with the sound of a bomb, and the bathroom mirror splinters in a haze of sickly bright red.
No stopping now. Only an instant to move while Witt is struck dumb, immobilized by the explosion, by what he's seen, his eyes on the splayed body of his son…
A beat while the horror sinks in, but it is enough. Lightner yanks the gun back on Witt, now coming with a choking scream, hands raised. The face, eyes, a wild man closing in.
Impossible not to fire. Impossible to miss…
The reporters were rushing to telephones and minicams as Hardy turned back away from the witness stand. In a daze, he was aware of Villars using her gavel and of Powell standing at his table, mute. Of Nancy standing in the gallery. Nancy had confirmed in the call last night that she had sent the toy gun to Matt.
Lightner slumped in the witness chair. Hardy sat down next to his client, who turned her face against him, crying out of control.
