Key Witness (46 page)

If he could put the pieces together. The big
if.

F
RIDAY-NIGHT TRAFFIC APPROACHING
the city, normal heavy load, plus a major fender bender fifteen miles from his exit that slowed everything to a crawl. By the time he got home it was past midnight. Moira had gone to sleep, leaving him a note:

Please don’t wake me, I’m getting up early to meet the construction foreman at the store. Michaela went to a dance workshop with her troupe and will be out of town until Sunday
P.M
. Don’t forget to lock up. M.

Undressing and performing his nighttime ablutions in the guest-room bathroom, he silently maneuvered into their bedroom and slipped under the sheets. Moira lay on her side, her back to him, breathing in deep-sleep rhythm. Lying awake, staring at the ceiling, he began a mental inventory of his forthcoming agenda, in loose sequential order.

He needed to know more about Thompson—he’d been desultory in that regard. Everything he could know about the man. Did he have any family, did they maintain contact with him? There might be good leads in that direction. Get into the specifics of this computer stuff. How good a hacker was Thompson? And how could he have gotten access to a computer in the county jail, and then plugged into … what? Did his jailers know about his computer expertise, and had they taken steps to keep his hands off their equipment?

Monday morning he would put Josephine to bird-dogging that trail. Blake he would handle himself. He debated whether he should confront her without warning, a sneak attack to catch her unawares and hopefully rattle her into giving up information she would instinctively want to protect, or go the more official route, formally request an interview as part of the discovery process.

Both methods of confronting her had positives and negatives. If he confronted her and she didn’t crack it would be harder to squeeze anything out of her down the line. Conversely, if he went through official channels she would be forewarned, and would have time to dig in her heels and prepare a defense.

He had the weekend to decide. Maybe he’d get together tomorrow with Darryl, brainstorm it with him. Bring Walcott in, too. He didn’t want to cut his titular boss out of the loop unless he had to.

He awakened with a jolt. He had been dead to the world. Deep, deep sleep, sleep below the subconsciousness of dreams. It took him a moment to realize where he was—in his own bed. He rolled over and looked at his bedside clock: 3:15. Everything was black, the moon obscured by clouds.

Moira was out of bed, in her robe, fumbling around for something in the drawer of her night table.

“What is it?” he managed to mumble, his voice thick with sleep.

“There’s someone in the house,” she whispered. Even as a whisper her voice came across angry, hostile, full of recrimination.

“What?” He was disoriented; his body felt heavy, like it was filled with cement.

“There’s someone in our house,” she hissed again, pointing to the wall near their bedroom door, on which was mounted a keypad similar to the one downstairs. The lights on the keypad blinked green.

“You forgot to turn the alarm on, didn’t you?” she said accusingly.

“I …” He thought he had. He was sure he had. He had let himself in the front door with his key, locked it behind him, checked the alarm (she had left it off, thinking he would be home sooner than he was), gone into the kitchen to pour himself a small cognac, drunk it standing in the middle of the kitchen, come back out, activated the alarm, gone upstairs.

“You forgot, didn’t you?” she asked again in her angry, frightened whisper.

“I … I thought I did. Set it,” he stammered.

“There’s someone in the house. Listen. Downstairs.”

He rubbed his head to try to clear the cobwebs. She was right. He could hear noises downstairs. Footsteps, a door opening and closing.

“Someone’s broken into our house,” Moira said. “We’re being robbed.”

“Why do you …”

“Think that?” she finished for him. “Cloris went to her sister’s for the weekend; I gave her tomorrow off. And Michaela is with her dance troupe in East Holbrook, a hundred miles from here. No one else has a key. No one else should be in here. We’re being robbed, Wyatt. Just like the Spragues.” She started for the bedroom door, her right hand tucked into the pocket of her thick terry robe.

Now he was awake. She was right—what other explanation could there be? He kicked himself mentally for having forgotten to set the alarm, for having taken her fears too lightly. “I’ll call the police,” he said quietly, reaching for the phone.

“No!” A firm whispering command.

“But we have to,” he urgently whispered back.

“By the time the police get here we could be dead.”

He listened again. There was definitely someone down there. His heart was pounding.

“Those kids,” she muttered.

“What kids?”

“Those kids you brought here. Your killer’s friends. They were here, they could look around and see how vulnerable we are.”

“They wouldn’t break into our house,” he protested.

“They’re criminals, aren’t they? One of them is a big-time drug dealer, you told me that.”

“They’re working with me,” he said, his voice hard with suppressed anger. “They aren’t going to rob me.”

“Well, someone down there is,” she said. “And I’m not going to let them.”

She walked out the door, heading for the stairs.

“Moira!” he whisper-called after her.

She didn’t respond. He got out of bed, put on his robe, and went after her.

By the time he reached the top of the stairs she was at the bottom. She glanced behind her, hearing him, then pressed forward. He tiptoed down the stairs after her, as fast as he could without making noise.

He had to stop her. She could be in danger.

The noises were coming from the family room at the far side of the downstairs. All of their stereo and video equipment was there, their cameras. Thousands of dollars’ worth of top-of-the-line stuff. Silently, resolutely, she moved toward the room until she had reached the door.

He crept across the floor. “Don’t go in there,” he whispered, but not loud enough for her to hear.

Her hand came out of the pocket of her robe. There was a gun in it.

He was blown away. Where had she gotten that? And when?

Turning her body away and pressing the weapon against her abdomen to muffle the sound, she thumbed the safety off and slid the barrel back, locking and loading.

He lunged forward to try to snatch the gun out of her hand, but she was too fast—she swiveled away from him, pushing him off her with her free hand, the left hand, the hand with the ring finger that had the wedding band and engagement ring on it he’d given her so many years ago.

And then her hand was on the doorknob, turning it, the door was swinging open, and there was a shadowy figure in the family room, standing in the middle of the floor. The curtains were drawn, blackout curtains for television watching, so it was even darker in here than their bedroom had been, all he could see in the dim light coming from the French doors was the outline of someone standing there, someone turning to them in surprise.

The figure lifted a hand. The hand was holding something. It looked like a weapon.

Moira fired.

They heard their daughter scream.

M
ICHAELA WOULD LIVE
. The bullet had exploded in her right thigh, shattering the femur. But she would live. “There’s going to be major reconstruction,” the orthopedic surgeon told them. The doctor’s name was Lew Levi; he was the best man in the city. He had gotten out of bed in the middle of the night to work on Wyatt Matthews’s daughter. They’d sat in the hospital corridor, outside the operating room. Levi was in his scrubs. “We’ll know in a few days, once the trauma’s subsided and we actually repair the leg. What we did now was to take the bullet out and clear fragments, set things up. We may have to insert a rod—it’s called an intramedullary rod—down her femur canal, and there will be pins and screws above and below the fracture, for stabilization. It’s going to be a substantial rehabilitation, six months or more,” he continued, anticipating their questions. “We have to guard against infection, rejection of the foreign matter, shriveling of the leg. The leg could wind up shorter than the other, a fraction of an inch or so. It’s fairly common. But she should be able to walk again, and in general have full range of motion.”

“How long will this rod be in her leg, Lew?” Wyatt asked. The shooting had happened hours earlier and he was still shaking inside.

“Forever,” the doctor replied. “It will be taking the place of her thighbone, which is the longest bone in the human body.” He explained what they were doing presently. “A pin has been drilled through her tibia, and clamps with bows were hooked to weights, so that she’s in what’s called balanced-skeletal traction. It’s to keep the leg to length, so the muscles won’t go into spasm and the leg won’t shrivel up before the operation.”

Moira, who had been in hysterics for hours and then had shut down almost going comatose, stood beside her husband. They had wanted to give her a sedative, but the police still had to question her, and she had to be straight for that.

“I’ll go to the station with you,” Wyatt said to her after Levi had left.

She shook her head. “Stay with her.”

“We’ll drive her down and bring her back here, Mr. Matthews,” the detective in charge of the investigation told Wyatt. “It won’t take long.”

Wyatt looked at his wife. She had shrunken into herself, looking like a wraith, her face completely drained of color. “Are you sure?” he asked gently.

She nodded. “She needs one of us here,” she said flatly, “and it can’t be me.” She got to her feet, standing unsteadily. One of the officers put his arm around her waist to make sure she didn’t collapse.

He was allowed into the recovery room an hour later. Michaela was propped up on pillows with an IV in her arm. Still groggy from the anesthetic, she mouthed the word “Why?”

Moira was at the police station for three hours. Darryl met her there, stayed with her through the process, held her hand. Charges weren’t going to be filed, for now at least—the police and DA’s office accepted her explanation. But they would have to go to the house and access the situation before making a final, formal finding.

The press got wind of it. Reporters converged on the hospital, waiting for a statement from Wyatt Matthews, one of the country’s most prominent lawyers, who was currently defending the most notorious killer in the state.

He knew they’d be there. He couldn’t duck them even if he wanted to, which he didn’t. They had their job to do, but they’d have to wait until he was ready. He sat by Michaela’s bed, holding her hand until she drifted into sleep from the morphine and sleep-inducing drugs dripping into her system.

Darryl brought Moira back to the hospital from the police station. He took her in through a side entrance to avoid the press. Wyatt was waiting for them outside the recovery room. He and Darryl embraced.

“If you need anything,” Darryl told him.

“I’ll call you. Thanks for everything.”

Darryl shook his head in sorrow. “It’s a tragedy for everyone.”

Wyatt nodded.

“I’ll check on you later,” Darryl said. He gave Moira a strong hug and left.

Moira stood near the door to the recovery area. “Can I see her?” she asked in a little, grief-stricken voice.

“Yes,” he answered. “She might be sleeping now; we’ll see.”

“Will she see me?” Moira asked.

“What kind of question is that? You’re her mother.”

“I was almost her executioner.”

“You’re going through hell,” he told her. “We all are. Don’t make things any harder on yourself than they already are.”

They sat by Michaela’s bed until she came awake again. Michaela looked at her mother. “I should have called and told you I was coming home early,” she whispered, her mouth dry from the painkillers.

“Oh, baby!” Moira broke down crying, her head on the covers.

Michaela reached out and stroked Moira’s head. “It’s not your fault, Mom.”

Wyatt stood at the foot of the bed, watching. She’s right, he thought. It’s no one’s fault. Don’t ascribe blame. Although it was hard not to.

Earlier, he had talked to the leader of Michaela’s dance company, who had called when she heard of the shooting on the radio. One of the girls had taken sick en route, the woman explained, and since they were working as an ensemble they wouldn’t be able to perform, so they had turned back and come home, to save the cost of the motel room.

My daughter was shot to save fifteen dollars, Wyatt had thought. Her share of the motel. But he knew that was a lie, a self-deceit. Michaela had been shot because her mother had bought the gun lobby’s line.

Don’t ascribe blame. He didn’t know if he’d be able not to.

Michaela was going to have to stay in the hospital for two weeks, at least. The operation to reconstruct the leg and set the rod and screws was tentatively scheduled for the following week, but Dr. Levi cautioned it could be delayed until they were sure infection hadn’t set in. Moira would stay with her during that time; sleeping in her room. Wyatt would commute, coming every day before and after work.

“Dad?”

He looked at his daughter. She was groggy from the painkillers. “What, darling?”

“Am I going to be able to dance again?”

Dancing was the most important thing in Michaela’s life. For her not to be able to dance would be an enormous emotional and psychological tragedy.

He glanced over at Moira. She looked away, unable to face either him or Michaela. “I’m sure you will,” he told her. “The doctor said he expected you to have a full recovery. But it will take time,” he added.

“As long as I can dance when I’m healed.”

He made a mental note to make sure Levi didn’t say anything to the contrary about that when he saw Michaela. For now he wanted to help her keep her spirits up as much as he could. She had already suffered enough; anything more could wait.

He left mother and daughter and went to the main reception area of the hospital, where the press had been waiting for hours. A small contingent: one crew each from the local TV stations, some radio reporters, a reporter and photographer from the newspaper.