Steven James - The Knight

This was her chance.

Jayson stepped into the room, eating a handful of Cheerios.

“C’mere,” she called to her son. “You can play spelling games until Daddy gets out of the shower. Mommy has to take care of a few things.”

“Wha’ dings, Mommy?”

“I’ll just be in the other room,” she lied. “Don’t worry.”

She positioned her son in front of the computer and pulled up one of the preschool spelling games. The boy would be fine playing on the computer until his father was done showering.

After Jayson was sufficiently preoccupied, she shoved her Blackberry and digital voice recorder into her purse, grabbed her car keys, and then slipped out the back door.

Ridgeland High School lay just ahead.

Tessa hated battling rush hour traffic so she’d been thankful earlier in the morning when Martha offered to drop her off at school on her way to bridge club.

Martha still hadn’t brought up the diary or the whole deal with Paul’s letter the day before. But now as they approached the school, Tessa felt like she should probably say something about it.

“Hey, listen, about what happened yesterday. You know in the living room when I…”

“We don’t need to talk about all that now.”

“OK.”

They pulled to a stop in front of the school.

“It’ll be all right.” Martha patted Tessa’s leg.

“Yeah. Thanks.” But she didn’t get out of the car. “OK, so here’s the thing: I know you’re probably thinking I shouldn’t hold it against my mom, that I should forgive her, or whatever, but I’m not going to. I just can’t.”

Martha was quiet for a long moment. At last she said, “Then you’ll hurt whenever you think of her.”

It wasn’t what Tessa had thought she would say. “I guess I will.”

“That’s a rather harsh punishment to sentence yourself to, don’t you think? For something you had no control over?”

That wasn’t what she’d expected her to say either.

Someone behind them honked, and Tessa finally stepped out of the car.

“Good luck on your exams,” Martha said. “And take care of that arm.”

“How did you-”

“I found the bandage you threw away last night. It was in your trash can. Right on top of the diary.”

“Oh, right-wait, how’d you know it was my arm?”

“I’ve seen your scars, dear.”

Then Martha gave her a smile, and Tessa closed the door and crossed the sidewalk.

After a few steps, she glanced back to see if Martha was still there, but she’d already driven away.

Then the five-minute bell rang and Tessa swung her knapsack over her shoulder and walked up the steps, but her mind wasn’t on her upcoming exams; instead she was thinking about the diary and the bloody bandage she’d dropped on top of it.

And the harsh sentence she’d handed to herself.

There are a lot of different kinds of scars.

And she had a feeling Martha had seen more than just the ones on her arm.

The Cook County Criminal Courthouse Chicago, Illinois8:27 a.m. Central Time

I knew the media frenzy today would be even more intense than it’d been on Friday, and I really didn’t want to face any reporters, so I’d made arrangements for Ralph to meet me at the back door of the courthouse. And now as he opened the door and gestured for me to come in, I saw that his face was swollen. “What happened to you?”

“Turns out I’m allergic to raisins,” he grumbled.

“You’re almost forty years old. How could you only find that out now?”

“Don’t ask me. I guess I never ate quite so many at once before. Now, get in here.”

I joined him inside. “Maybe you’re allergic to being bald.”

“That’s not funny.”

“It’s sort of funny.”

“Keep it up, Mr. Profiler, see what happens.” I started toward the main lobby, but he directed me down the east hallway. “I convinced ’em to set up a secondary security screening area, so people involved in the trial don’t have to walk past the protestors. It’s this way.”

“Good call.”

“There’s a lot going on,” he said. “I need to fill you in on a few things.”

“Do you mean Calvin?”

“Calvin?”

“Yes,” I said. “I talked to him this morning. Did you know he’s in Denver?”

Ralph stopped walking. “You talked to Calvin?”

“Just before I left the hotel.”

“What did he say?”

Ralph seemed curious, but something deeper as well, and as I summarized my conversation with Calvin he listened intently, then began walking again. “He didn’t mention anything else? Calvin, I mean?”

“No.” We arrived at the security checkpoint. “Why? What’s going on?”

After the shooting last week, security was even tighter than it had been on Friday, and most of the people passing through were being patted down. Thankfully, Ralph and I didn’t have to deal with that, although we did have to hand over our weapons.

“When I couldn’t find him yesterday,” Ralph said, “I did some checking. Ran a complete background, the whole nine.” Ralph wasn’t looking at me, and I got the feeling he was avoiding eye contact on purpose. “Medical records included.”

I didn’t like the direction this conversation was going. “You found something.” He was quiet as we gathered our things from the far side of the X-ray conveyor belt. “What is it?”

Ralph eyed the hallway in both directions, then motioned for me to join him in an out-of-the-way alcove at the end of the hall.

“Tell me, Ralph. What’s going on?”

After we were alone, he said, “I think there’s a reason Calvin has become so interested in seeing justice carried out promptly.”

My thoughts leapt ahead to the most obvious conclusion, one that I didn’t want to be true. One that couldn’t possibly be true. “You’re not saying…?”

Ralph didn’t answer. I waited. He looked conflicted. Torn. At last he put a heavy hand on my shoulder. “Yeah. That’s what I’m saying.”

“No.” I shook my head. “It can’t be. He would have told me.”

“I talked to a couple of his family members. As far as I can tell, he hasn’t even told them.”

A crushing sadness overwhelmed me. “I need to get back to Denver, Ralph. I need to find him.”

“You need to testify first.”

“No, Ralph. I have to-”

“You just told me Kurt was looking for him,” Ralph said firmly. “He’ll find Calvin. You’ll see him when you get back tonight, it’ll all work out. Right now you need to be here at this trial.” He tapped my head. “All of you needs to be here.”

He was right, of course, but I needed to take a couple seconds to think things through.

“You all right?”

Grant Sikora’s dying request flashed through my mind.

“Promise me you won’t let him do it again.”

“I promise.”

“All right,” I told Ralph. “I’m good. Let’s go.”

“So, you know what you’re going to say up there?” It was Emilio Vandez, and the beginning of the trial was only minutes away.

I thought of the story about the midwives, about how they’d lied to protect innocent lives and God had honored them for it. And, despite Calvin’s misgivings about his guilt, I was still convinced that Basque was responsible for the murders-and that he would kill again if he were set free.

“Yes,” I told Emilio. “I think I know what I’m going to say.”

“All right.” He chugged my shoulder good-naturedly. “Then let’s do this thing.”

I slipped out Tessa’s cell phone and found no messages from Kurt about whether or not they’d found Calvin, or if Adrian Bryant and Benjamin Rhodes were still alive. Then the bailiff rose, I shut off the phone, and the trial began.