Dark Justice

Zak was pacing back and forth across the tiny cell. “Hey, so I don’t want to be fried. Sue me!”

“You let me put a liar on the stand! That’s inexcusable!”

“Aw, clam up already.”

“I have never in my life put on a witness I thought was lying-”

“And you still haven’t.”

“But everyone in that courtroom thinks I did! They don’t know my idiot client doesn’t have the sense to tell his lawyer the truth!”

Zak pressed himself into Ben’s face. “Look, this isn’t about you, okay? I’m the one who’s on trial. It’s about me!”

“That’s the whole point, you blithering idiot. It is about you! And my defense of you has been systematically undermined because you don’t have the sense to tell me the truth!”

Zak threw himself down on the cot. “It wouldn’t have made any difference.”

“It would! If I’d known Molly was lying, I would’ve told you we couldn’t use her. In case you haven’t noticed, the prosecutor isn’t an idiot. She knows how to smoke out a liar. Putting perjured testimony on the stand could only hurt you. Which it did.”

“Man!” Zak flung his head back on the pillow “I still can’t believe she cracked like that. Just because of a little picture. Stupid cow.”

Ben’s face burnt red, smoldering. “How dare you-” In frustration, he ripped the pillow out from under Zak’s head and tossed it down in his face. “You should be calling that woman a saint! Do you know how hard it was for her to do that? To sit up there and perjure herself for you?”

“Uh, Ben.” Christina was out of the firing line, at the side of the cell, next to the window. “About that.”

“What?”

She motioned him over to the window. “Get a load of this.”

Ben walked beside her, anxious to get away from his client. He craned his neck and peered through the paned and barred window.

The view wasn’t very scenic-just an alley behind the jailhouse. But in this instance, that provided an eyeful.

There were two people in the alley leaning against a Jeep, and Ben knew both of them. One of them was Rick Collier, the turncoat Green Rager who had helped drive one of the biggest nails in Zak’s coffin.

The other was Molly Griswold, who minutes before had stepped off the witness stand after Granny destroyed her.

And they were kissing.

Key words and phrases raced through Ben’s brain. He was a pig to women, Rick had said. Never treated them well. And then Molly: He was the one who broke up with me.

She knew that store, Ben remembered. She’d been in there. She knew they had a video camera.

And then Ben recalled another phrase, one from last night’s witness prep.

Zak has done so much, she said. I just want to pay him back.

The couple in the alley were still kissing. It was obvious that this was not a new relationship.

They had each managed to get back at Zak, Ben realized. Rick by exposing his true feelings. And Molly by hiding them.

Zak was alone in his cell lying on his cot when Granny appeared out of nowhere.

“Lawyer take a powder?” she asked.

Zak didn’t even look up. He didn’t know why she was here and he didn’t care. “Hadn’t he been here long enough? Man, if I go over that testimony one more time I’m gonna hurl.”

Granny smiled. “I’m surprised he bothers.”

“Well, he’s an optimist. He still thinks there’s hope.”

“And you?”

“I don’t pretend to know. What do you think, Madame Prosecutor?”

“I think you’ve got a date with the Big Needle,” she said, approaching the bars. “But sometimes juries fool me. Not often, but sometimes. And I look at you and I think-well, he’s handsome. Big baby-blue eyes. Used to handling himself in public. If he’s really good on the stand, he might possibly sway one of the jurors. And unfortunately, one is all it takes.”

“Is that why you’re here?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. I’ve decided to take out a little insurance.”

Zak sat upright. “What are you talking about?”

“When Kincaid puts you on the stand,” she explained, “I want you to cave.”

“What?”

“Refuse to testify. Take the fifth. Get mad. I don’t care what you do. Just don’t testify.”

“You’re out of your mind.”

“I don’t care if you answer the easy stuff, like your name and address. But when he takes you to the night of the murder, you freeze. You don’t say a word.”

Zak pushed himself off the cot. “Lady, I think trial stress has deadened your brain cells. You must be crazy if you think I’m going to take a dive on the witness stand.”

“You know, I thought that would be your reaction. That’s why I haven’t been here before.” She leaned forward, exposing a generous amount of prosecutorial cleavage. “I kept thinking-how can I get to him? He’s basically self-centered, selfish, cares only about himself. I can’t threaten him with anything worse than what I want-death. How do I get to him?”

Zak strolled slowly toward the bars. “And what did you come up with?”

“Well, I remembered how nice everyone says you are to one of those Green Rage clowns. Deirdre, to be specific. Rick Collier mentioned it. Even Kincaid mentioned it. At first, I figured she was one of your many female conquests, but my informants told me that wasn’t so. So what the hell was she to you? I couldn’t figure it out.”

Zak’s eyes grew dark and narrow. “And?”

“And so I sicced a team of investigators on it. And early this morning they finally brought me the answer I wanted.” Granny smiled from ear to ear, like a crocodile with way too many teeth. “She’s your sister.”

“You bastard,” Zak growled.

“Deirdre isn’t even her real name. Her real name is Dana Zakin, but she changed it because-get this-she’s hiding from the law. Seems there’s a warrant out on her for possession of over ten kilos of cocaine, with intent to distribute.”

“She didn’t have anything to do with it!” Zak said. “She didn’t even know about it. It was this asshole she was living with. But the apartment where the cops found the junk was in her name. And she was on the premises.”

“You know, I figured there was probably some explanation like that. But it doesn’t really matter, does it? Ten kilos-my goodness. That’s worth at least eight years in the slammer. Even for a first offender. And you know, as I was telling someone else just the other day-life in prison is not fun. She’ll be sent to the Collingsgate women’s facility. It’s a hellhole. Violence, cruelty, rape-it happens every day at Collingsgate. They’ll love a pretty little thing like your sister.” She shook her head. “Dana won’t last a year.”

Zak’s teeth were clenched tightly together. “What is it you want?”

“I already told you. You go on the stand and zip your lips. If you do, I’ll tear up my information and the cops back in Tulsa will probably never find her. But if you don’t, I’m afraid your sister has a very bleak future. And a short one.

“But if I don’t testify, they’ll kill me!”

“Don’t you get it yet, Zak? You’re dead already. The only question is whether your sister goes down with you.”

Zak’s face twisted up in a bitter snarl. “You’re a real bitch, you know it?”

“As a matter of fact, I do.” She pushed forward on her tiptoes and kissed him on the lips. “And now you do,