Joseph Teller - Depraved Indifference

Amanda was waiting for him in the corridor, but she was hardly alone. A swarm of reporters had her surrounded, snapping pictures of her, shoving microphones into her face, and outshouting each other demanding her comments on the latest development. Jaywalker walked right past her, afraid that if he were seen talking with her, it would smack of collusion.

Sitting behind the wheel of his Mercury, he waited until he saw her reach the parking lot, get into her Lexus and pull out onto the street, before he began following her. He finally managed to catch up to her on the Palisades Parkway, no mean feat for the Merc. As he drew alongside her, he motioned her to follow him. They pulled over at a scenic overlook, where he killed the Mercury's engine, got out and joined Amanda in the Lexus. Unlike the Merc, it had a heater that actually worked.

"What was all that about?" she asked.

"I wanted you to follow me."

"No," she said. "Back in court."

"Oh, that," he said. "Carter told the truth."

"The truth?"

"That you were driving."

People developed tells, Jaywalker had learned long ago, almost imperceptible giveaways that they were lying, or hiding something, or bluffing at the poker table. Some would break off eye contact and look away or down at the floor. Others would raise a hand to the mouth, or the tip of the nose, or one ear or the other. Jaywalker would bite the inside of his cheek. And it was always his left cheek. He had the scar tissue to prove it. But he couldn't help it; for the life of him, he couldn't. Which was why they called it a tell.

Amanda had just bitten her lower lip.

"Why didn't you let me know?" he asked her.

She looked away, out the side window. "Carter," she said. "He insisted. He wouldn't have it any other way. From the day it happened, all that's ever mattered to him is keeping Eric and me out of it. It's his penance, I guess. But I can't believe he changed his mind."

"He didn't, exactly."

He told her what had happened. She nodded grimly several times, but didn't interrupt. When he was finished, she asked, "What's going to happen to me?"

"Not too much," he said. "You certainly weren't drunk, or anything like that. Nobody's going to accuse you of acting with depraved indifference, the way they'd been able to accuse Carter. It was an accident. But it was a bad one, and you did leave the scene."

"What happens tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow," said Jaywalker, "I put you on the witness stand."

"And what am I supposed to do?"

"Tell the truth," he said. "Tell the absolute truth."

Before they began Wednesday morning, Abe Firestone asked to approach the bench. There, he indicated that not only did he want David Kaminsky and Julie Napolitano to flank him at the prosecution table, but he wanted a fourth chair added.

"And who is the guest of honor?" asked Justice Hinkley.

"Investigator Sheetz."

Jaywalker objected, but the judge ruled that since Sheetz had already testified, she saw no reason to exclude him. And appellate courts had long approved of the policy of having "case agents" or other members of law enforcement sit with prosecutors to help out with technical matters. "But this means you won't be permitted to call him as a rebuttal witness," she said.

"Fair enough," Firestone grunted.

They stepped back, and as the jury entered, so did Sheetz. But instead of being dressed in a dark suit and tie, as he had been during his own testimony, now he was wearing his trooper's uniform, and even carrying his Mountie hat.

This time it was Jaywalker who asked to approach, complaining that Sheetz's sudden presence, accompanied by his change in clothing, was nothing but a thinly veiled attempt to intimidate the next witness.

"Who is the next witness?" she asked him.

"The defendant's wife."

"I didn't know that," said Firestone. "I figured you were putting on the allergy doctor."

"So that's who you wanted to intimidate."

"Cut it out, you two," said the judge. "I've got a jury waiting to get started."

"Listen," said Firestone. "If he's putting the wife on the stand, I'm going to ask her if she's been sleeping with her husband's lawyer. Go get that photo," he told Julie Napolitano.

She darted back to the prosecution table and began leafing through a pile of stuff. J esus, thought Jaywalker, they really do have a photo of us in bed. A moment later, Napolitano returned to the bench and held up a photo for the judge to see. But it was the same one that had appeared on Page Six of the P ost, showing Amanda and Jaywalker in the diner, her leaning toward him and looking for all the world as though she was about to kiss him.

"Even if what you say is true," asked the judge, "how is that relevant to anything?"

"Credibility," said Firestone, repeating whatever Kaminsky was whispering in his ear. "Bias. Conflict of interest." It was like watching a ventriloquist at work, with an overstuffed dummy.

"I'm going to reserve judgment on that," said Justice Hinkley. "Step back and call your next witness."

"The defense calls Amanda Drake," Jaywalker announced.

All heads turned to watch Amanda enter. All but Jaywalker's, that is. His eyes were on the jury box. What he saw were nods and a bit of nudging with elbows. Just as he'd planned, the jurors had been seeing Amanda for a week and a half now, passing her in the corridor and wondering just who the tall, pretty blonde was. A few of them, the elbow-nudgers, had evidently figured it out, and were now eager to trot out their I-told-you-so's. Jaywalker had more than a passing interest in identifying them. When deliberations began, those same jurors would take over, talking about things they'd spotted in the evidence, stuff they'd figured out from the testimony. They'd be the leaders, the ones Jaywalker would have to focus on and win over.

He began gently with Amanda, getting her to talk about her career as an interior designer, her marriage to Carter Drake twenty years ago, their teenage son, and her separation from her husband about a year ago. Despite having spent a lot of time with her-a fact that Abe Firestone had already signaled he hoped to explore in detail-Jaywalker had for once underprepared a witness. Part of that had been his indecision over whether to call Amanda at all. Part had been his fear that she'd come off as too rehearsed. But most of it had been because of the impossible position the facts had conspired to put her in. As a result, up to this very moment, he still had no real idea what she'd say. Would she invite being arrested and charged herself in order to save her husband? Or would she protect herself by burying him? He knew this much: if Amanda were to lie and insist that Carter had been at the wheel, Jaywalker would have to go after her and, if need be, destroy her. It wouldn't be pretty and it wouldn't be fun, but he'd have no choice. Yes, she'd hired him, paid him generously, and even slept with him. But she wasn't his client. Carter Drake was, and it was to him that Jaywalker owed his undivided loyalty.

It was a tough rule, but a good one. Just as it was whenever parents retained him to represent their child. The parents often didn't like hearing it, but it was the child who became the client. So no, he wouldn't tell them what the child had confided to him. And no, he wasn't going to help put the kid in rehab when he could beat the case altogether, no matter how much the parents pressured him that it would be best for the child. It was why he'd largely stopped taking juvenile cases, and prostitution cases, too. Well, that and the stairwell episode. No pimp or madam was going to tell him to make sure one of the girls got a few days in jail just to teach her a lesson. And it was the same reason why he'd long ago stopped representing Mafia members and wannabes, because back when he had, he'd found himself answering to all sorts of their friends and associates, guys with bent noses and funny nicknames like Johnnie Knuckles or Vinnie Ice Pick. So Carter Drake was his client, and Amanda was only a witness. And if it came to choosing between them, there was no choice; there couldn't be.