John Lescroart - The 13th Juror

Unflappable and friendly, Strout said of course.

"Was there anything about your examination that indicated that the injection had not been self-administered?"

"Such as?"

"I don't know. Maybe a scratch where he might have tried to fight off the injection. Anything at all?"

Strout thought. "After all this time, no, nothing."

Freeman went back to the exhibit table and lifted People's Exhibit 5, the original autopsy report. "Did you notice anything nine years ago, Doctor, that would have argued against Mr. Hollis giving himself the shot?"

Perusing the page, Strout handed it back. "No. But, of course, there were tracks – needle marks."

"There were needle marks? And where were these, Doctor?"

"On his inner arms."

"Consistent with where a drug user might inject himself?"

"Yes."

"Did you notice any needle marks on his thighs?"

Again, Strout glanced down at People's Exhibit 5, his early autopsy diagram. "No, not that I noted here."

Across the room, Hardy saw Powell sitting, his hands folded in front of him, his head down. He was getting killed and he knew it. Freeman, with half a losing point – the needle marks on the thigh – wasn't even ready to concede that. He'd come back nearly to the edge of the witness box during the rapid-fire questions, and now he moved back to the center of the room. "But it's possible, is it not, Doctor, that you might have missed even a recent needle mark?"

Nodding amiably, the doctor, relentlessly honest, went him one better. "Not only could I, Mr. Freeman, it seems likely I did. The injection went in his thigh. It's the only way the atropine could have concentrated itself there. Needle marks are notoriously difficult to locate and catalogue. Autopsies miss them." Strout spread his hands one last time. "It happens," he said.

Dropped off on the seventh floor by the bailiff, then escorted by her two female guards, Jennifer Witt undressed in the open room, hanging her good clothes carefully on the wooden hangers, watching as the guards made space for them in the changing locker. She turned and faced the wall as she removed the feminine underthings that Freeman had bought for her. She slipped a runner's bra over her head, turned back around, took the proferred plastic bag from Milner – a sweet-faced, overweight redhead with a gappy smile and freckles – and dropped the articles, one at a time, into the bag.

The other guard, Montanez, sullenly held out the red jumpsuit. From out in the pods, through the building, they heard the sound of bars clanging, strident voices rising and fading. It was near to dinnertime, getting darker a little earlier, a few weeks before the end of Daylight Savings Time.

"How's it going down there?" Milner asked.

Jennifer shrugged. "Bunch of men talking a lot."

"Ain't it, though?" Montanez started moving them together toward the door to the changing room.

"The judge is a woman, though. Her name is Villars. There are a few on the jury, too."

But these considerations didn't much concern either Milner or Montanez. The two guards flanked her in the dim and ringing hallway, their belts and hardware creaking as they walked. From behind them, the lockup guard called out, "Is that Witt? She's got a visitor."

Dr. Ken Lightner had been in the courtroom for at least some period of time during each of the four days of the trial so far. Not being a lawyer, he had not been allowed into the tiny room next to the guard's station but, like Frannie, had to content himself with the more public arrangement – hard wooden chairs and telephone lines on either side of the Plexiglas.

He was already sitting there, waiting. His head was cradled wearily against the heel of his hand. When Jennifer sat down he stared at her for a long minute. Finally he reached for the telephone. "How are you holding up?"

"Nobody's hitting me anymore. Maybe they think I'm going to win." She allowed her face to crack into a brittle smile. "I'm starting to have a little faith in Mr. Freeman."

Lightner nodded. "What does he say?"

"He won't every commit to anything. He says it's a long haul. But I hear him talking to Mr. Hardy, I see the response he's getting from the jury. He seems confident."

"And how about you?"

"I miss you, Ken. I miss talking to you. Everything. The people here…" There was nothing to say about them. They lived on a different plane. She stopped herself, swallowed. "It's so different. I don't know…"

The phone nearly fell from her hand.

"What, Jen?"

She swallowed again, giving the impression of pulling back, even through the Plexiglas. "About going on."

"What about going on, Jen? You've got to go on."

Shaking her head, she became silent.

Lightner leaned forward, his face an inch from the glass. "Jennifer, listen to me. You've got to go on. You can't give up now. You're winning now, the worst may well be over."

"No, the worst isn't over. Mr. Freeman says the worst hasn't started yet…"

"He's a big help."

"He's trying. He is, Ken. I'm at least sure of that. It's not even the trial, you know, not mostly. It's everything else being so different. All these people here" – she gestured around her – "this whole place. I think sometimes I'll never get back to anything I recognize, anything I want." A tear broke from her eye and rolled down her cheek. This time she didn't wipe it away. It didn't matter if she looked weak, if she broke down in front of Ken, that's what he was for. And she was weak – they'd proved that. She didn't care about the old things anymore. "I'm so confused, Ken, I'm so confused…"

Lightner watched her, waiting for something, he couldn't say exactly what. Jennifer seemed inside herself, suffering, and he wanted to get her past this, but he didn't want to push. You let people find their own way out if they could.

"I'm still here," he said finally.

She allowed that brittle smile again. "I sometimes think you're the only reason I'm alive." A half-sob, half-laugh. "It's funny, you know. Remember when I thought if we could just get away from Larry, everything would work, everything would be better? It'd be a whole new world."

"I remember. It could still be there, Jen. We've talked about this over and over, working through the changes."

She shook herself, almost began rocking. Her head moved back and forth, a heavy weight held by a thread. "But that's just it, that's the problem. I don't believe it anymore. I don't know if I believe it anymore. The thing with Matt…" The flow of words stopped, her eyes suddenly dead, without any energy. "It would be better if it were just all over with. That'd be the end of it."

Maybe it was a test. Jennifer searched through the glass for something in his eyes, some answer. She scratched at the counter in front of her, reached her hand toward the Plexiglas, then withdrew it. "It's not going to get better, no matter what happens. I'm just the kind of person that everything beats up on… men, things, situations. I'm a loser, that's all."

Lightner was sitting forward now, his hand pushing against the glass. "You're not a loser, Jen. You've been victimized. We've talked about this. It's natural to feel the way you do, with what you've been through. But you're not a loser. I wouldn't stick with you if you were a loser, if I thought there wasn't some end to this, some time when things are going to be better."

"Tell me when."

"Come on, Jen. No one knows that, exactly. But-"

"I think you'd stick with me anyway, Ken, even though I am a loser. And you know why. I've figured this out. Because I'm a challenge to you, some classic case study."

"Jesus, Jennifer, how can you say that after all-"

"Because it's true, isn't it? You don't really care, do you? I mean about me. Who could ever love somebody as messed up as I am? As soon as I do get turned around, the minute it happens, if it ever does, the challenge or puzzle or whatever I am would be over. You'd be gone, too, wouldn't you? And then where would I be? I'll tell you where – where I am now, which is nowhere. Nowhere, nothing, never coming back, oh, goddamn it all…"