Lying With Strangers (29 page)

PEYTON WENT HOME FROM TONY’S OFFICE, TO HER REAL HOME,
where Kevin slept alone these days. If she was going to testify, Tony wanted it to be first thing tomorrow morning, giving the prosecutor as little time as possible to prepare his cross-examination. That gave her even less time to clear the air with Kevin.

It was a weird feeling, walking tentatively up the front steps and knocking on her own front door. One moment it felt as though she’d never lived there, the next, as if she still did. She almost chickened out, but the door swung open.

“Peyton,” Kevin said, standing in the open doorway. It seemed like a reflex, the way he’d uttered her name.

“Tony thinks we should talk.”

“So do I.” He stepped aside, inviting her to pass.

She hesitated, then entered. Kevin helped her with her coat, almost too eagerly. “Can I get you something?”

She didn’t really want anything, but he had such a hopeful look on his face. It would have seemed cruel to say no. “Is there any of that carrot-tangerine juice left?”

“Of course. Nobody drinks it but you and Florida rabbits.”

They shared a weak smile as she followed him to the kitchen. He poured the juice and offered her a chair. She stood at the kitchen counter.

“No, thanks. This shouldn’t take too long.”

“You sure? You hungry? I’ve got some…” He flipped open the refrigerator. “Olives.”

“I’m not hungry.

“How about—”

“Kevin, I’m planning to testify tomorrow.”

He closed the refrigerator door and walked to the side of the kitchen counter opposite her. “I can’t say that surprises me.”

“Do you disagree with my decision?”

“It’s not my decision to make.”

“You know what I’m saying. I’m sure Jennifer gave you the same speech that Tony gave me.”

“I have a feeling mine was a little different.”

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing. Whatever you decide, I’m completely behind it. In truth, I was undecided as to what I would do. But if you’re going to testify, I imagine I will too.”

“I just want us to be clear on this. My decision to testify isn’t going to create a problem for you that you can’t solve, is it?”

He hemmed and hawed, but gave no verbal answer.

“Is that a yes or no?” she asked, concerned.

He looked away, then back. “The night Gary Varne was killed, you and I had a fight. I walked out, remember?”

“Yes, I remember.”

“I don’t have an alibi.”

“Neither do I.”

“But you can tell the jury that you stayed home all night. It’s going to be a bit more difficult for me to explain where I ended up.”

For a moment, she couldn’t speak. Her eyes were like lasers. “You told me you were with her only once.”

“Who?”

“You swore that you and Sandra were together only that one night last winter.”

“We were.”

“Don’t try to backpedal now.”

“You got it all wrong. That’s not what I was trying to say.”

“You must take me for a fool.” She turned and headed for the foyer.

“Peyton, wait.”

Angrily, she pulled on her coat. “You know, last night I was thinking that maybe you made a mistake. Maybe you really did regret it. Maybe I could forgive you for just one indiscretion. But the lies just keep coming, don’t they? I don’t even know why I bothered coming here.”

“But I wasn’t with Sandra. Not that night.”

She wheeled and said, “Then where were you?”

“Jennifer says…” He hesitated, seeming to struggle. “It’s best that you just not know.”

Her anger swelled as she flung open the door. “Damn you!” she shouted, slamming the door on her way out.

At ten-thirty Charles Ohn was relaxing in his La-Z-Boy in front of the television, just himself, a beer, a big bag of pretzels, and ESPN. Tonight was his favorite, the
World Series of Poker.
Ohn was probably the hardest-working prosecutor in Boston, and coming home after ten to unwind in front of the television was pretty much his nightly routine since the divorce six months ago. In fact, it had also been his nightly routine before the divorce, which his wife had pointed out quite loudly before closing the book for good on their twelve years of marriage.

The phone rang. Ohn dug out the portable from between the seat cushions. It was Jennifer Dunwoody. “Congratulations on surviving the motions for acquittal this afternoon,” she said.

Ohn lowered the volume on the TV with the remote. “Oh, thanks. But it’s hardly something to be congratulated on. If a prosecutor can’t build a strong enough case to keep the judge from throwing the case out before the defendants even put on a defense, he’s not much of a prosecutor.”

He thought he heard a little chuckle in her voice, but perhaps it was just his own insecurity. After all, it was Jennifer’s husband who had coined his nickname, the “Ohn-anator.” Ohn had actually embraced it at first, thinking it a play on Schwarzenegger’s
The Terminator.
Finally, someone told him about Onan, a biblical figure whose name had become synonymous with masturbation.

“To be honest,” said Jennifer, “I thought the motion should have been granted as to my client.”

“If that’s what this call is about, there’s a little game of Texas Hold ’Em that I’d like to get back to watching.”

“Actually, I’m trying to decide whether to put Stokes on the stand.”

She suddenly had his undivided attention.

“Talk to me.”

“Well, there are a couple of possibilities.”

“There always are,” said Ohn. “Either he testifies or he doesn’t.”

“This one has a little wrinkle to it. If he takes the stand, he could testify as part of his defense. Or he could testify as part of your rebuttal.”

“Are you saying that he’s willing to testify against his wife?”

“He says he’ll never do that. But I say you never know. I just want to be able to advise my client of all his options. So I’m just checking to see if that deal you offered earlier could perhaps be back on the table.”

Ohn glanced at the television set. His favorite player had just bet everything on a pair of aces. “Sorry, Jennifer. The offer no longer stands.”

“What?”

“No deals. I’m taking them both down.”

“All right,” said Jennifer. “We’ll see about that.”

“Yes, we will,” said Ohn. “Soon enough.”

At 11:00
P.M.
, Rudy was online, back in the usual chat room, trolling for Ladydoc.

He hated himself for doing it. She didn’t deserve another chance, not the way she’d stood him up last night for the second time. It wasn’t his nature to be so forgiving, and it made him wonder about the balance of power in their relationship. Not that it was anything to beat himself up about. He had the upper hand: He knew where she lived. She might have thought she could get rid of him just by exiting a chat room, or by changing her screen name, or by being a no-show at their real-life rendezvous. Others had made that same mistake before. The last little bitch who’d tried to blow him off had revealed so much about herself online that Rudy even knew she kept a pitcher of banana smoothies in the refrigerator at work for lunch. Dressed as a deliveryman, he dropped by her office, sneaked his way to the kitchen, locked the door, jerked his load into her smoothie, and put it back in the fridge. Who had the power there?
Drink that banana, baby
.

Disgusting, yes, but it wasn’t the smoothie that had killed her.

The computer screen glowed in the darkness, a blank white page with only a blinking cursor to keep him company. He typed nothing, just watched and waited. Two minutes past eleven o’clock, the message he’d hoped for flashed on the screen.

Ladydoc has entered the room.

The anger turned to excitement. It was just the two of them in their private chat room.

“u came,” he typed.

“of course.”

“don’t say of course. u stood me up last night.”

“sorry.”

He waited for more, but he knew it wouldn’t come. She hadn’t offered any explanations last winter either. Just a no-show at their agreed-upon meeting, then one final chat where she dumped him, supposedly for good. And then the swim in Jamaica Pond.

Don’t even think of dumping me this time.

“is that all you can say, sorry?”

“Let’s see. How can i possibly make it up 2 u?”

“u know how.”

“u want me to sing u love songs?

“no.”

“u want me to recite poetry?”

“wrong again.”

“u want me to suck your big cock?”

“ahhhhhhhh.”

“is it out now?”

“yes.”

“i want it all the way out.”

“it’s all there for u.”

His hands were off the keys. It had been so long since the last time that in just thirty seconds he was on the verge of climax. He touched himself with the left hand and fumbled through the desk drawer with the right, sifting through scores of photos he’d secretly taken of Peyton over the last eighteen months, searching for just the right one to spray with excitement.

A sentence was building on the screen, catching his eye.

“something’s come up. gotta go now.”

He dropped everything. “wait!”

“must go right now. catch me tomorrow nite in the movie chats.”

“NO!”

“i promise. tomorrow nite for sure.”

“u bitch!”

“tomorrow. i promise, i promise.”

“Don’t do this to me again!”

He stared at the empty screen. She was gone.

“Damn you!” he shouted, nearly rattling the windows. He yanked out the drawer full of Peyton photographs and hurled it across the room. Hundreds of snapshots scattered across the floor—Peyton jogging, Peyton walking to work, Peyton eating lunch at a sidewalk café.

Peyton on her way to Gary Varne’s apartment.

With each hand he grabbed a fistful of hair and pulled till it
hurt, grimacing to the point where he could no longer stand it, then screaming at the top of his lungs. He released his grip, ending the self-flagellation. A series of deep, noisy breaths followed as he calmed himself.

“That’s it,” he said softly, staring at the computer screen. “It’s time.”

PEYTON FELT CHILLS AS HER LAWYER ROSE TO SPEAK IN A PACKED BUT
hushed courtroom.

“The defense calls the defendant, Dr. Peyton Shields.”

After weeks of being portrayed as an adulteress in the newspapers, after being doubted by her lawyer and even her own husband, Peyton wanted nothing more than to tell her side of the story. That someday she’d vindicate herself had been her driving force through the lowest points. As she approached the stand, however, she was gripped by the dark reality that the world might never believe her.

“Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth…”

The oath had seemed so mechanical when she’d watched other witnesses swear it, but it was something else altogether to hear the bailiff put those words to her in front of the judge, the jury, her lawyer, her husband, her parents, a hungry press, and scores of spectators. With all those eyes upon her, she wondered how anyone ever lied on a witness stand. That nervous moment, on the verge of her personal plea to a jury of her peers, confirmed an unshakable truth about herself: She wasn’t made of the stuff that liars were made of.

Her lawyer approached, cordial but professional. First he covered her background, particularly her decision to devote herself to children and pediatrics. It was a way of endearing the jurors to
her while making her feel comfortable. Soon, however, the warm fuzzies were over.

“Dr. Shields, the last thing we heard from the government before the close of their case yesterday is that you owned a thirty-eight caliber handgun. When did you buy that weapon?”

“Last winter.” Her voice cracked. The first substantive question, and already she had a lump in her throat.

“Why did you buy it?”

“One night, when my husband was out of town on business, I thought I heard someone picking at the lock on our front door.”

“So you bought it for your own personal safety?”

“That’s correct.”

“Did you ever discharge it?”

“I took a safety course that included target practice. My last class was, I believe, February. That was the last time I ever fired it.”

“What did you do with it?”

“I kept it stored in a metal box that was on the shelf in my closet. I put it in there and, I swear, never touched it again.”

“Why wasn’t it there when the police came looking for it after Gary Varne’s death?”

“I can’t explain it. All I can say is that it must have been stolen.”

Tony paused, as if to let the jurors absorb the testimony. Judge Gilhorn grumbled like a bear waking from hibernation, waving the lawyers forward. Both Tony and the prosecutor stepped toward the bench for a sidebar, outside the earshot of the jury. From the witness stand Peyton was close enough to overhear the judge’s scolding.

“Mr. Falcone, I granted your pretrial motion to prevent the government from offering into evidence those so-called love letters that were found in the box when the police went searching for the gun. With this suggestion that someone tampered with the box and stole the gun, you’re about one question away from making me change my mind. Understood?”

“Understood.”

The lawyers retreated, Ohn to his table and Tony to his place before his client. He steered Peyton directly into her “other life” with Gary Varne, how they’d dated in high school and then crossed paths again at Children’s Hospital—friendly, but just coworkers. Then it was time to explain how she’d ended up in Gary’s apartment, starting with her surprise visit to Kevin in New York and the horrible mistake she’d made in thinking that her husband had been sharing a hotel room with another woman.

“What did you do when you got back to Boston?”

“The last thing I felt like doing was going home to our apartment. So I went to the hospital, a way of losing myself in my work.”

“And you saw Mr. Varne there?”

“Yes. He happened to be on duty, and we started talking. He could see that I was upset. Like I said, we were friends, so we decided to leave work and cheer me up a little bit.”

Peyton glanced at the jurors. One or two seemed to have their own damning opinion as to where this “cheering up” would lead.

“So you went to a bar?”

“First we went for coffee. That was my idea. Then we met up with some friends of his at a bar. That was Gary’s idea.”

“Do you recall how many drinks you had?”

“Not exactly. It didn’t seem like that many, but in hindsight I can say that it was definitely one too many. I was tired and feeling pretty low. I had just flown back from New York thinking my husband had cheated on me.”

“About what time did you leave the last bar?”

“All I remember is that I started to feel really bad around two
A.M.
, so we left. From then on, I don’t remember anything.”

“What is the next thing you do remember?”

“Waking up in Gary’s apartment. The next afternoon.”

The crowd murmured. Steve Beasley’s testimony had given some insights, but these were new details, juicy ones at that.

Peyton’s pulse quickened. She dreaded the next couple of questions, but at last night’s rehearsal Tony had assured her that if she was going to tell the whole truth, it was better to bring the sordid details out on direct rather than to let Ohn extract it on cross.

“Exactly where were you in his apartment?”

“I was in his bed, alone. Gary had slept on the couch.”

“Were you dressed?”

“Yes. Partly.”

“What were you wearing?”

“My panties. And one of Gary’s T-shirts.”

The crowd’s rumbling grew louder. The judge gaveled them down. “Order.”

Tony continued. “I have to say, this is starting to sound like an embarrassing situation.”

“It’s not what it sounds like. Gary explained everything the next morning. He told me—”

“Objection,” shouted Ohn. “The witness has testified that she has no recollection of what happened after she reached Gary Varne’s apartment. Her understanding of how she ended up half-naked in the victim’s bed is based solely on what Gary Varne told her. That’s hearsay.”

“Sustained.”

Peyton looked at Tony, distressed that the jury might not hear Gary’s own admission that they hadn’t had sex, that she’d gotten sick, and that he’d simply cleaned her clothes for her.

“But, Your Honor,” said Tony, almost pleading.

“The objection was sustained. Next question, please.”

Peyton caught the judge’s eye, and at that moment she realized Tony had been right. He’d predicted that the jury wouldn’t believe that she hadn’t slept with Gary. Evidently, the judge was of the same opinion.

Reluctantly, Tony moved on to Gary’s hostility toward her after their night together, the argument over the rose she’d found taped to her locker, the theft of her computer from the library. Then it was on to the heart of her defense.

“Dr. Shields, we heard Sandra Blair testify about the argument she overheard between you and your husband at the Harvard cocktail party. What was that all about?”

“Kevin had heard false rumors about me and Gary, and he confronted me in the hallway. I denied that anything had happened between us, but I didn’t think a hallway was the place to discuss it. When I wouldn’t get into it, he got angry and left without me.”

“So you went home alone?”

“Yes. I waited up late for him to come home, but he didn’t. Around eleven o’clock I got a couple of hang-up phone calls. It scared me, so I stayed up watching television till pretty late.”

“Then what?”

“The phone rang, and I woke up in front of the television. It was after four
A.M.
”

“Who was it?”

“I don’t know. A man’s voice that I didn’t recognize.”

“What did he say?”

Peyton braced herself for another hearsay objection from Ohn, but he seemed just as rapt as everyone else in the courtroom, too curious to interrupt.

“He told me to check my mail, then hung up.”

“Did you check it?”

“Yes. I found an envelope in the foyer that someone had dropped through the slot. I opened it right away.”

“What was in it?”

She swallowed the lump in her throat and said, “A lock of human hair.”

That drew a loud crowd reaction. “Order,” the judge said, banging the gavel.

“What happened next?”

Her voice shook as she recounted the lights going out and the call on her cell phone. “I found my way to the bedroom and answered it. It was the same voice as before.”

“What did he tell you this time?”

“He said he’d kidnapped Gary Varne and demanded a ten-thousand-dollar ransom.”

Ohn looked shocked, too stunned even to object. Peyton tried to ignore the crowd noises and stay focused.

Tony asked, “Pay him ten thousand dollars or he’d do what?”

She stole a quick glance at Kevin. Only she knew him well enough to see how much this pained him. “He said he’d kill Gary and tell my husband that we were lovers.”

“What was your reaction?”

“A combination of fear for Gary’s life and anger that I was being accused of being his lover, when I wasn’t. Beyond that, pure shock. He gave me a couple of days to come up with the money, and then he hung up.”

“Did you call the police?”

“No. He said that if I called the police, he’d kill Gary.”

“So what did you do?”

“Kevin came home around dawn, and we talked it out. He was convinced from the get-go that Gary had staged the whole supposed kidnapping and had simply made the phone call himself, essentially trying to blackmail us. So we agreed not to pay.”

Peyton saw her lawyer wince at her mention of blackmail. It was the added motive that he’d tried desperately not to serve up to the prosecution on the proverbial silver platter.

“Did you discuss the part about you and Gary supposedly being lovers?”

“I told Kevin it wasn’t true. He said even if it was true, he’d forgiven me.”

“Did you hear again from this supposed kidnapper?”

“Two days later he called me at work. Said I’d better have the money by midnight or he’d kill Gary.”

“Did you get the money?”

“No. Kevin and I were still convinced that it was just Gary harassing us. But we agreed that if I got one more threatening phone call, we’d go to the police.”

“Did you get another phone call?”

“No. Kevin and I waited till after the midnight deadline, but we never heard a thing.”

“So then what? Did you and Kevin go to bed?”

“I think the stress was finally getting to us. We had an argument. Kevin went out.”

“For how long?”

“The rest of the night.”

She glanced at her husband, then at the prosecutor. Ohn seemed to be making a note of Kevin’s second disappearance.

“What did you do?”

“I went to bed and didn’t sleep very well. I had to be at work early, so around five-something I walked to my car as usual, got inside.”

Her voice was fading. For eight weeks, Tony had downplayed the kidnapping as something he didn’t want to talk about, and Peyton had suppressed it. Now, it was flooding back with her in-court description of the man’s hand over her mouth, the image in the rearview mirror, the man in the backseat behind the ski mask.

“He asked if I’d gotten the money. I tried to tell him that I
could
get it, but he just wanted a yes or no answer to his question: Did I get the money? I told him no.”

“Then what?”

“He told me, ‘Good for you, Peyton. You made the right call.’” She paused, her voice shaking, eyes clouded. Last night’s rehearsal had ended right there, but almost involuntarily she added, “It was as if he was saying that it was the right decision to let Gary die.”

Tony paused for effect. “Tell us what happened next.”

“He put a rag over my mouth. I could smell the chloroform. And then I was out.”

“What’s the next thing you remember?”

“Waking up in the hospital. Kevin was there. He told me the police had found me in my car with a spilled bottle of sleeping pills. And then the police came,” she said, displaying a touch of emotion. “They said Gary was dead. His body was in the trunk of my car.”

Tony took a step back, and Peyton prepared herself for the strong finish they’d rehearsed.

“Dr. Shields, did you have an affair with Gary Varne?”

“No.”

“Did you kill Gary Varne?”

“No, I did not.”

“Did you assist in any way in the disposal of Mr. Varne’s body?”

“No, I did not.”

“Do you have any idea who this man was who abducted you?”

She did a double take. At their rehearsal, he hadn’t asked about the possible identity of her abductor, and the change unsettled her. “No,” she said, feeling shivers across her body. “But he seemed strangely familiar.”

“How so?”

Perhaps it was the courtroom setting, perhaps it was the fact that she was under oath and searching every ounce of her inner self for the truth. But she was suddenly convinced that the man in the ski mask was the “Good Samaritan” who’d pulled her from Jamaica Pond. She looked at no one in particular and said, “It was as if I’d looked into his eyes before.”

Slowly, with all of the jurors watching, Tony turned his entire body away from Peyton and toward her husband, seated at the table, letting his judgmental gaze rest on Kevin.

Peyton replayed in her mind those final words—
It was as if I’d looked into his eyes before
—and nearly choked on Tony’s implied accusation. She wanted to retract her testimony or explain what she’d meant, but it had taken a second too long for her to fully appreciate the stunt her own lawyer was pulling.

“Thank you, Dr. Shields,” said Tony. “Nothing further.”

Peyton looked at Kevin, saw the mortified look of betrayal on his face. She glanced at the judge, her eyes emitting a silent but desperate scream,
Wait! There’s something I need to say.

“Mr. Ohn,” said the judge, “cross-examination please.”

Her heart sank further as the prosecutor stepped forward. She took one look into his burning eyes and knew that it was too late to explain herself now, too late for backpedaling.

The easy part hadn’t been so easy. The hard part had just begun.