Kate seemed suddenly drained of all color, her jaw again locked tightly in place. “Yes.”
“Did you go to the Quillian home for the purpose of picking Sara up after the skating party, at about five o’clock?”
“Yes.”
“Objection, Your Honor. May we approach?”
Artie Tramm led Kate off the stand as Howell and I walked before the judge and I whispered the reasons for my objection.
“This is beyond the scope of my direct. Way beyond. There’s no reason to bring the Meade children or a spin around the ice into this.”
“I gave you a lot of latitude on direct, didn’t I, Alex?” Gertz asked.
“I’ll get right to it, Your Honor,” Howell said. “It’s not about the little girl. It’s about a conversation this witness had with my client and his wife. Ms. Cooper brought some of those out on her case. I’d say it’s relevant, it’s probative, and it’s admissible.”
“Step back. Let’s see where you’re going with this.”
Artie Tramm walked up behind us and spoke to Gertz over my shoulder. “This gonna be much longer, Judge? The witness isn’t feeling too good. Maybe it’s the heat or something. You don’t want her getting sick in the courtroom.”
“Keep it moving. We’ll break for lunch as soon as Lem is done with her.”
Kate reluctantly climbed the two steps to the stand, and I perched on the edge of my seat, ready to interrupt if the cross went off subject.
“Now, your memory of events of a year and a half ago, would you say that’s as good as your memory of events of five years ago?”
She dropped her head. “Yes.”
“Were you alone when you went to the Quillian home the day of the skating event?”
“No. I was with my two little girls and their nanny.”
“Was Amanda there?”
“No, no. She had gone on a museum trip to Vienna.”
“You knew she was out of the country when you called Brendan to ask your little favor, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but-”
“Did your nanny and the children stay on there with you and Mr. Quillian?”
“No.” I could barely hear the word. “She took them to a movie.”
“But you chose to remain?”
No answer.
“Did you stay at the Quillian home?”
Kate Meade was having a meltdown before my very eyes. I’d asked her about every one of her conversations with Brendan Quillian, and she had not remembered-or not offered to me-the details of this one.
“Yes. To talk about Amanda.”
I glanced across at Lem. He was standing next to his client, one hand resting on his shoulder, the other jabbing through the air at Kate Meade. He had his most serious expression on display as he savored his moment, the witness pinned to the ropes as Howell made it clear to the jury that he was fighting for his client’s life.
“Did you indeed talk about your best friend, Amanda Quillian, that early evening?”
She swallowed hard and coughed to clear her throat. “Yes, we did.”
“By the way, in which room did you have this discussion?”
She coughed again. “Brendan’s den. On the second floor of the house.”
Howell paused, letting go of Quillian and taking a few steps closer to the witness stand. He poured a cup of water from my pitcher-Kate had not touched the one in front of her-and held it out to her. “You seem parched, dry, thirsty, perhaps. May I give you this?”
She pushed his arm away and shook her head from side to side. The internal butterflies seemed to be multiplying at a furious pace in my gut. Kate Meade, Brendan Quillian, and Lem Howell knew facts that I did not.
“Did you ask my client for something to drink that evening?”
Kate looked at Brendan with contempt, almost sneering at him in full view of the jury. “I did.”
“And what did you drink?”
“Wine. Too much red wine.”
“Did there come a time when your conversation stopped?”
“Yes.”
“Is that when you left, Mrs. Meade? Is that when you left Brendan’s home?”
Artie Tramm moved closer to the stand. It looked as if my witness was going to faint.
“Did you leave the Quillians’ house after your chat with my client, to go home to your ill husband and your precious little girls?”
“Not immediately.”
“You remember what you did next?”
“I was drunk, Mr. Howell. I can hardly remember-”
“I’m relying on the fact that you told all of us today what a very good memory you have, Mrs. Meade. Isn’t that when you-”
Kate clamped a hand on the railing in front of her and raised her voice. “He-he took advantage of me-of my condition, Mr. Howell.”
“Would you tell these good people, please.” Lem stood behind me, sweeping his left arm in a wide arc across the front of the jury box. “Isn’t that when you quite voluntarily engaged in an act of sexual intercourse with Brendan Quillian, the husband of your lifelong best friend?”
4
“The sign on the door still says LADIES, doesn’t it?” I asked Mike.
The four stalls behind me were empty in the dingy gray-tiled bathroom around the corner from my eighth- floor office. I had filled a sink with ice-cold water and was splashing it on my face while he watched.
“I just came in to make sure you hadn’t flushed yourself out of the building. What the hell’s taking you so long?”
“I needed a quiet place to think. No Monday-morning quarterbacks, no phone calls from the boss, no excuses from Kate Meade. I’m trying to cool down.”
“It’s like a hot box in here.”
“I’m adjusting my temper, not my body heat. Keep that woman away from me or I’ll kill her.”
Judge Gertz had recessed the proceedings for lunch and I was trying to regroup after the shock of Meade’s testimony. I dried off and picked up my pale yellow suit jacket from the wooden table below the mirror.
“I thought broads don’t sweat.”
“We don’t. I perspired. I sat in front of those jurors while my star witness was eviscerated in silken-smooth form by Lem Howell, turned crimson from the top of my scalp to the soles of my feet, and willed the tears I was holding back not to fall so that they trickled out through every pore of my body instead.”
“I got lunch sitting on your desk. C’mon.”
“I’m too nauseous to eat.”
I had waited in the courtroom until the judge declared a recess and Artie Tramm had cleared it of all spectators. I called my paralegal, Maxine, from my cell phone and asked her to send Mike up with Mercer Wallace, the six-foot-six first-grade detective who was Mike’s closest friend and former partner.
They had flanked me as I walked down the long corridor to the elevator, past the more aggressive members of the press corps who wanted my reaction to the testimony.
I obeyed Mercer’s direction to walk on without turning my head, ignoring the questions reporters tossed at me about Kate Meade and whether the shocking information would affect the rest of my case.
