Nancy Grace - Murder in the Courthouse

Other photos showed Regard getting sworn in, his wife, a petite brunette with her hair in a short bob dressed startlingly similar to Jackie Onassis, and their three children. Two boys and a girl stood beside their mother. All three resembled Bill Regard.

Hailey clicked back to Eleanor’s Facebook page to make sure not a single picture of Bill Regard appeared. Hailey wondered if Deputy Marks was right. Had she secretly been in love with Regard? And what must that be like? For Regard to mourn in complete secrecy?

The memory of the years of mourning Will’s death flooded over her… the weeks of no appetite whatsoever… the very smell of food would make her nauseated. Crying in the shower, the pain of hearing songs on the radio or even the low buzz of voices on TV. Not being able to even speak Will’s name-that would have been unbearable. If Marks was in fact right, that’s what Judge Regard was going through at this very moment.

Eleanor Odom had lots and lots of “friends.” Hailey started scrolling down more than 400 so-called Facebook friends, recognizing several court personnel. And there, of course, was Alton Turner, decked out in full Chatham County Sheriff regalia.

She had lots and lots of friends… but were they really friends? Did any of them ever tell her, as a friend, to stop the courthouse romance with a married man? A judge at that? In the public eye? Hailey thought back to the thin, pale wife, the Jackie O look-alike. Did Mrs. Bill Regard know her husband was cheating? Was that what she was thinking about as she held the Bible for her husband to take his oath as judge?

Hailey minimized Eleanor’s Facebook screen and went to Google. Dozens of articles popped up before she’d even finished typing the words “Judge Bill Regard Chatham County.” Regard had been a crackerjack trial lawyer before he took the bench, a former death-penalty prosecutor for the state’s attorney general’s office.

That, in itself, was a rare achievement. Only the best and the brightest were typically entrusted to handle death-penalty cases and the AG was very selective when it came to their trial lawyers. He appeared to be a Democratic Party darling and was rumored to be up for the next available spot on the Georgia Supreme Court… or more. Some articles suggested that Regard was considering a run at the Georgia governor’s mansion.

Wow. The governor’s mansion. It was absolutely gorgeous-a 24,000-square-foot red brick Greek revival palace rising at the crest of a gently sloping hill. The entire eighteen acres of lawn was absolute perfection, adorned by abundantly blooming pink, purple, and white azalea bushes, dogwoods, cherry trees, and plenty of tall pine trees that never seemed to drop a single pinecone on the green carpet below.

The interior was gorgeous but comfortable looking. Ostentatious would never do, but the mansion was the ultimate in classical, muted design, not over the top, but clearly steeped in good taste and expert interior design. It was just a few miles northwest of downtown Atlanta. Hailey had been there several times for law enforcement galas.

Hailey sat on her hotel bed, staring at her iPad. If Bill Regard ever hoped to move himself and his family into that mansion someday, it could never come to light that he had an affair with a calendar clerk behind his wife’s back.

That sort of story might play in other parts of the country where the cheater would make a carefully guarded statement, with his wife standing beside him in prescription-drug stoicism as her husband claimed a “sex addiction.” He’d then go somewhere posh like Horizons Malibu Rehab and be back cheating again in four to six weeks. But in the Bible Belt, not just cheating-but cheating and humiliating your wife-was the kiss of death.

If this came out about Elle, Regard’s goose was cooked.

Hailey started to navigate out of the online maze of Eleanor Odom’s life, but she paused briefly to look at an absolutely perfect-looking roast turkey. Just barely showing over the top of the evenly browned bird was Elle’s smiling face, proud of the big bird she’d basted and cooked to perfection. In the background, Hailey could just make out a Thanksgiving pilgrim decoration in the center of a table set for eight.

Hailey clicked through. Eleanor Odom was quite the cook, sharing dozens and dozens of food postings, maybe close to a hundred or so. Many of them showed her cooking in what appeared to be a small apartment kitchen. Several of the dishes were photographed at various stages of preparation with a gorgeous shot at the end. One was a steamed lobster, completely done and perfectly pink, garnished and sitting staged on the same table as the turkey, but this time set for two.

But for who?

Hailey rummaged through a myriad of recipes, amazed Eleanor had taken the time to post so many. What sort of a woman spends hours and hours not just preparing food, but posing the dishes and taking pictures of them to post online?

There was a beautiful shot of ruby red rhubarb and deep purplish-green kale in two colanders beside the sink. Hailey clicked on a gorgeous peach salad with prosciutto, plum, and amaretto tarts, a blue and white dish of bourbon-poached peaches posed on an antique linen tablecloth. Eleanor had each recipe detailed beside each photo. Hailey paused to read “Eleanor’s Delicious Banana Nut Bread Without the Nuts!” The next was a photo of Eleanor in a Christmas sweater with “My Favorite Fruitcake, Fruity Not Nutty!” A different set of postings covered cooking organically, avoiding foods treated with pesticides, and intricate recipes for pastries like napoleons and éclairs.

The time and planning it must have taken to prepare, pose, photograph, then post the photogenic dishes. They were, each and every one, absolutely perfect. Had it become sort of an obsession for Eleanor Odom? Something to fill her time? But then there were softball games, charity functions, work. She didn’t need time-fillers.

Or maybe it was Eleanor’s desire to create something perfect, something beautiful, something that she alone could control… including its outcome. Was she obsessed not just with the preparation of food, but with creating the perfect family home… minus the family? The family she’d never be able to have with a married judge?

Exhausted and feeing like she knew way too much about Eleanor Odom now, Hailey turned off the iPad and pulled back the covers on her bed. Settling in, she pulled the blankets over her. Lying on the bed looking out and up through the window, she had an entirely different view. Instead of the black water of the Savannah River, she saw an even deeper black, velvety sky with stars twinkling down through her hotel room window.

Unbidden, photos of Eleanor Odom drifted through her mind. So happy, so vibrant, so alive. The last glimpse Hailey had of her, her face was purple and sweaty as she died on the cafeteria floor. Hailey felt a deep swell of sadness for the woman she hadn’t even known. The woman smiling over a roasted turkey, holding a team softball trophy, in love, sadly, with a married man. The woman who probably never even knew Alton Turner adored her.

It was 10:30 AM and the courtroom was packed. Hailey sat with her notebook and pen in hand, she and Fincher touching shoulders, three rows back behind prosecutors. The courtroom never failed to remind Hailey of a wedding: No matter how large or small the ceremony was, lavish or simple, guests invariably sat on either the bride’s or the groom’s “side.” Guests would only be seated otherwise if there were no seats on the “right” side.

Julie Love’s blood family, relatives, and friends sat, like Hailey and Finch, behind the prosecution. Todd Adams’s family, supporters, and the press sat on the defense’s side of the huge, old courtroom.