Claim of Innocence Read online

  “But Mayburn is here.”

  “I know.” A sad cast appeared on her face. “And that’s why I can’t get too deeply involved with him right now. I’m not ready and I don’t know when or if I will be.” She blinked, as if batting away tears. She cleared her throat, then her eyes focused on mine. “Can I ask you a legal question? How long will it take until Michael’s case goes to trial?”

  “A federal indictment having to do with organized crime? That’s a biggie. It could take a year or two, easy.”

  The sad cast returned.

  “Hey,” I said, “did you ever learn what evidence sent Michael back to prison?”

  She shook her head. “Since I’ve told him I want a divorce, he doesn’t tell me anything. All I know is that the feds received some kind of anonymous information that linked him to that group from Italy who were trying to establish themselves in the U.S.”

  “The Camorra.”

  “Yeah.” She ran her fingers across her forehead, as if trying to rub away some thought. “I still can’t believe that the man I married got involved with any of that. It’s so hard to wrap my head around, and I don’t know what to say to the kids….”

  I didn’t know what to say, either. The Camorra was the group my father had spent much of his life trying to shut down. It was what had taken him away from us. But Lucy didn’t know all that.

  Lucy looked at me. “Don’t you see why I want to go out with Theo’s friends? I want to be with people who are younger. I want to go backward.”

  Was that what I was doing with Theo? A better question—was that what I’d be doing with Sam? Going backward?

  “Theo and I are supposed to go out tomorrow night with his friends,” I said. “But I have to warn you—a couple of them aren’t the brightest tools in the shed. Once I saw one of them wearing a T-shirt that said, Things are smaller than they appear.” I threw my hands up. “What does that mean? That his penis is smaller than it seems?”

  Lucy laughed. “Was he cute?”

  I nodded grudgingly.

  “Great! This is exactly what I want. Cute, young and not-so-smart.”

  I shrugged. “Tomorrow night at nine.”

  16

  When I got to the courtroom, Maggie was raring to go. I could see that even through the Plexiglas wall. Her cheeks were tinged pink, the way they got when she was excited.

  I pushed open the door with the lock and walked to our table. “You’re ready?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She grinned.

  “You look a little revved up.”

  “I found out Bernard is coming into town next week to sub with the orchestra.” Maggie actually clapped her hands.

  Maggie and I met Bernard in Italy in June. He was a French horn player with the Seattle Symphony. And he was also a huge, huge Filipino guy, which was sort of funny when you paired him with little, golden-haired Maggie. But they had become a couple, despite their odd appearance together. The minute we’d returned to the U.S., she was on the phone with him a few times a day, emailing about ten times a day and texting even more.

  “That’s fantastic!” I said.

  “I know. My grandfather is going to flip. He loves the CSO.”

  She went quiet. We both thought of Martin.

  “Where is he?” I asked.

  The grin fled her face. “I went to his house this morning, and he’s not doing well. He’s just kind of…fading. I don’t know how else to put it.”

  “Your grandmother must be worried.”

  “She is. I am, too, but I told him we could handle the openings and the first witnesses.”

  “We can.” I wanted to keep up her spirits, so I changed the topic and told her I’d seen Sam after court yesterday and how I’d stormed from the restaurant.

  “Interesting,” Maggie said. “But that doesn’t really help you figure anything out, does it?”

  I gave her an irritated look. “No.” I changed the topic again. “Who’s handling our exhibits and graphics?”

  Now Maggie gave me an annoyed glance. “What do you mean? I’m handling the exhibits. Or we are now. And we don’t have any graphics. I’ve got some blowups of a couple photos, but nothing else.”

  “Holy mother of Elvis.”

  Maggie looked even more annoyed. “You know, that stop-swearing thing of yours has got to go. Those curse word replacements are ludicrous, and you always end up swearing anyway to explain it. Just say it.”

  “Fine. Holy shit, are you serious?” When I was at Baltimore & Brown, if I was on trial, I not only had my assistant, Q, to handle the exhibits and the graphics, I usually had command of one or two paralegals, as well.

  “Yeah, I’m serious,” Maggie said.

  “Do you have records from this case scanned into your computer?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Any exhibits in your laptop?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then you should be putting them on a screen or on the wall. Everyone is used to looking at a TV or a computer. They can’t just listen anymore. You’ve got to show the jurors something.”

  Maggie chewed her lip. “I know one of the attorneys in my office has the equipment for all that, but he’s a personal injury lawyer. We never use that kind of stuff.”

  I shook my head. “You criminal lawyers are so weird.” I took my cell phone out of my bag. “I’ll call Q to do it.”

  She shook her head. “No, no. I just brought you in on this case. I can’t add anyone else. It will throw me off. Plus, we’re in a small courtroom, and there aren’t many exhibits needed right now.”

  I sighed. “Keep it in mind.”

  “Done.”

  I looked around the courtroom again and saw more people filing into the gallery. “Where are Amanda’s family members?”

  Maggie jutted her chin toward the right side of the spectator benches. “That’s the husband, Zavy.”

  I followed her gaze. I saw a handsome man, midfortyish, I guessed, but he looked younger. He wore a navy blazer over a white shirt. His hair was blond-brown and thick. His face bore slight creases around the eyes and mouth, but he was a type of man on whom facial lines looked handsome. From what I could see, he was in shape, probably a weekend athlete. If Valerie had wanted him for her own, I supposed I could understand why.

  As I looked at him, Zavy raised his head and gazed through the glass to the front of the courtroom. He stared at the state attorneys’ table, at the lawyers there. It seemed to me as if he was waiting for them to glance at him, to give him some direction or ask him questions. He looked sad, helpless.

  “Shouldn’t he sit at the counsel’s table?” I asked Maggie.

  She shook her head.

  “But he’s the victim of the crime.” I saw the look Maggie shot me. “Alleged crime.”

  “He’s the victim’s spouse, not the victim,” Maggie said. “And even if he were the victim, he’s not a party to the lawsuit. The state is. Technically, the case has nothing to do with him.”

  In a civil trial, Zavy would be sitting with the attorneys. He would be an integral part of the case. I felt a wave of pity for the guy. His wife had died and yet the case didn’t have anything to do with him? “I’m going to say hello and introduce myself.”

  Maggie looked startled. “Why?”

  “Because I think it would be polite. It seems the right thing to do.”

  “I don’t think Zavy Miller wants to hang out with us.”

  “I’m not going to hang out with him. I just think civility demands an introduction.”

  “The state’s attorneys won’t like it. He’s their witness.”

  “But he’s not their client. Like you said, he’s not a party. And anyone can talk to lay witnesses.”

  Maggie’s face scrunched in concentration.

  “What?” I said in response to her expression.

  “I’m trying to think of what my grandfather would say.” She looked around the courtroom, her eyes stopping on the state’s attorneys and then Zavy Miller. When she looked
back at me, she was grinning. “I think he’d say go ahead. You’re an adult and a lawyer, and you should do what you think is ethically right.” She laughed quietly. “I also think he’d say go ahead and piss off the state’s attorneys. It’ll throw them off their game.”

  “Great.” I turned, pushed open the Plexiglas door and stepped into the gallery.

  More people had gathered now for the opening arguments and all eyes went to me. Zavy Miller looked at me expectantly, too.

  I stepped into the pew where he sat and took a seat, making sure to be a respectful distance away from him. “Mr. Miller,” I said, my voice low, “I want to introduce myself. I’m Izzy McNeil. I’ll be representing Valerie Solara, along with the Bristols.”

  I held out my hand to him. He looked at it, then back up at me.

  I waited for a look of hatred or maybe revulsion. But he only nodded, as if he respected the gesture. He stuck out his hand. Our shake was firm, friendly even.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the state’s attorneys staring at us. Ellie was giving Tania a shove on the arm, pointing to me. Tania headed for the Plexiglas door.

  “Mr. Miller,” I said, “I don’t know if this will make sense, but I just wanted to tell you I hope that whatever is supposed to happen here, whatever is right…well, I hope that happens.”

  He nodded. Sadness crossed his face and he swallowed, as if gulping something down. “Thank you. That’s very kind.”

  I stood and almost ran into Tania, who had a stern look on her face. “Excuse me,” I said, trying to move around her.

  But Tania didn’t move. “Everything okay?” she said to Zavy.

  He gave a simple nod.

  “Mr. Miller,” she said, “I’m sorry but you’re going to have to step out of the courtroom until we call you as a witness. After that you can stay. I know that’s difficult, but those are the court rules.”

  “That’s fine.” Zavy Miller stood. “Nice to meet you,” he said to me with a kind smile.

  “Likewise.”

  When he was gone, Tania leaned in and whispered to me, “Ellie wants you to know that we looked into your background last night.”

  “Excuse me?” I pulled away.

  “Your background.” As if that explained everything.

  “Okay.”

  “You’re not a criminal defense lawyer.”

  “Just a lawyer,” I said with an easy tone. I shifted toward her, sure she would move now, but again she didn’t budge.

  “Things are different here than they are at the Daley Center.” She said Daley Center with a mocking air, as if she were saying, Things are different here than they are at that day care center.

  Normally, I took the high road. But not when I was on trial. “Yeah,” I said, “the difference is that attorneys there intimidate with talent.”

  Zing. Tania actually took a step back, and I moved around her. As I pushed through the Plexiglas wall, Ellie Whelan was glaring at me.

  I smiled in return and went to the defense table. “See,” I said to Maggie, “that wasn’t so bad.”

  17

  “For most of us, best friends are safe havens. Best friends provide a place where we can let ourselves be who we really are, where we are supported, where we are loved.” Ellie Whelan paused, as if having a hard time with her words. “But this woman…” She turned and pointed at Valerie. “This woman is pure poison. For her friendship was merely a disposable relationship where she could shop for a new husband. And kill any obstacles. Any at all.”

  Valerie sat on the other side of Maggie, but even from that distance I heard her whimper. Maggie put her hand on Valerie’s forearm for a brief second. I saw a couple of jurors notice the movement.

  Ellie Whelan patrolled the courtroom, moving back and forth in front of the jury, often pointing at Valerie and combining the gesture with damning words. She told the jury that Valerie and Amanda were best friends, or at least Valerie let Amanda think that. She told them that they would hear all about the friendship from another best friend, Bridget. They would hear how Bridget and Amanda and Amanda’s husband, Zavy, had supported Valerie after her own husband, Brian, died years ago. They’d become her second family.

  “Because for Bridget and Xavier, and especially for Amanda, friendship meant something,” Ellie said.

  She gestured toward Tania, who strode forward with a few poster-size exhibits. Tania placed them on an easel and went back to their table.

  “Friendship and family,” Ellie said. “That’s what was important to Amanda Miller.”

  She turned the first exhibit to face the jury. “This was Amanda Miller.”

  I stood and walked to a side wall, where I could see a photo of a lovely brunette with green eyes and a big smile.

  “You will hear from Amanda’s husband about the importance of friendship to Amanda Miller. He will tell you how much she loved her two girls, Tessa and Britney.” Ellie put the first exhibit on the floor, revealing a blown-up photo of Amanda and two toothy, gorgeous girls. “Xavier will tell you how the girls are now motherless. He will tell you they are having a very, very hard time of it. And all because of…” She didn’t have to say her name this time; she just turned and pointed toward Valerie.

  From my vantage point at the wall, I could see the jury from the side. I was standing not just to see the photos, but also to try and determine the jury’s reaction to the state’s opening. For now, they were calm and attentive. But if I was looking for a reaction, I was about to get it.

  “Here,” Ellie said, beginning to slowly remove the photo of Amanda’s kids, “is Amanda Miller on the day she died.”

  As the next blown-up photo was revealed, the jury gasped.

  I couldn’t help it—I winced. Maggie shot me a dirty look from across the courtroom, and I composed my face.

  The photo was a “death shot.” Amanda, naked on a stainless-steel counter, a sheet draped across her lower half, her skin white as pearl, her mouth open, rigor mortis making her neck look stretched and rigid, like she was screaming into eternity.

  I couldn’t take my eyes away from the photo. Out of my peripheral vision, I could tell that the jurors couldn’t, either. That poor woman, I heard one say. Horrible, murmured another.

  “Quiet, please,” the judge said.

  I glanced at Valerie. Had she killed Amanda? Had she done that to her friend? And if she had, constitutional rights or no, what was I doing representing her?

  The courtroom felt chilly suddenly, as if sinister air had entered through a back door and wound its way through the place.

  “You will hear from the coroner who examined Amanda’s body after her death, and you will hear how he came to the diagnosis of death by poisoning.” Ellie took a step away from the photo, letting the image of the dead woman speak volumes to the jury. “From Bridget, you will hear that just weeks before Amanda’s death, Valerie asked her about poisons, which Bridget had researched as part of a novel she was writing. And you will hear Xavier Miller tell you about the day…” A heavy pause. “About the day he came home from work and saw Valerie put something crushed, something blue, into the food she was cooking. She said it was an herb. It was not. It was a drug that, given at high doses, acted as a poison, and that poison would kill Amanda Miller before the day was done.”

  Another pause to let all the information settle.

  “Why would Valerie want to kill her ‘best friend’?” Ellie asked the jury. “I’ll tell you why. Because she was husband hunting.”

  There seemed to be no more exhibits forthcoming, so I went and took my seat again next to Maggie.

  Ellie continued. Brian, she told the jury, was Valerie’s husband, although not the father of her daughter. He had died of Lou Gehrig’s disease. He was only forty-eight at the time, Ellie said, which was strange because the disease didn’t usually exhibit itself until people were over fifty.

  I looked at Maggie. “Objection,” I whispered. I saw Valerie’s pained face on the other side of her. I dropped my
voice even further. “Are they trying to imply she killed her husband?”

  Maggie frowned at Ellie. “We already dealt with this in motions before the case started,” she said under her breath. “If she says one more word…”

  But sure enough, Ellie moved on, just short of drawing an objection. She told the jury how Amanda and Xavier had helped Valerie care for Brian. She told them that Valerie had fallen for Xavier during that time and shortly after had tried to seduce him.

  A number of the jurors furrowed their brows and openly appraised Valerie.

  I glanced at her. She seemed to nearly tremble in her black dress, but she didn’t blink, didn’t flinch.

  Ellie Whelan was nearing the close of her argument. “At the end of this trial,” Ellie said, “I will have an opportunity to get in front of you again, and at that time, I will ask you to do the only thing that justice will allow. Find Valerie Solara—” again she pointed at our client “—guilty of first-degree murder.”

  Maggie popped up from her seat even before Ellie had found hers. She waited for a minute, then when Ellie was in her chair, looked at the judge. “Your Honor, I’d request that the state remove their exhibits.”

  “Granted.” The judge nodded at Ellie Whelan. “Counsel?”

  I saw Maggie cover a small smile. Ellie had tried to leave the autopsy photo in front of the jury, a good move, but Maggie had countered it, not just taking it down, which she could have done, but getting the judge to make the state do it after Ellie had taken a seat.

  Ellie shot an annoyed look at Tania Castle, who jumped to her feet and removed the photos.

  Maggie introduced herself quickly to the jurors, then said, “Boy, that was a good story, wasn’t it?” She nodded. “Kind of like watching a soap opera, am I right? All that stuff about coveting someone else’s husband, about poisoning someone? That’s really interesting, huh?” She nodded as if to concede the point. “But that’s all that was—a really interesting story. A story concocted by the state in order to lay blame for the tragic death of Amanda Miller. But this woman—” she moved behind Valerie and placed a hand on her shoulder “—is not to blame.”