Jonathan Kellerman: Rage

He didn’t bother with small talk. “You’re finished with my client, so can we finally talk?”

“Feel free to state any relevant facts, Mr. Montez.”

“Only one fact, Doctor, but it’s the crucial one. Randy’s obviously impaired. No way you couldn’t have found that. What’s the extent of it?”

No one called the kid Randy.

I said, “It’ll all be in my report.”

“Spare me,” said Montez. “This isn’t the stuff of forensic debate.”

I said, “You know how it goes. Judge Laskin sees everything first.”

“Yeah, yeah… so, what’d you think of that grandmother? You bought her lunch. See that as conflict of interest?”

“I’m pretty busy, Mr. Montez- ”

“Easy, just kidding. So what do you think of her? Seriously.”

“At the risk of repeating myself- ”

“Come on, Doctor. You can’t be harboring any serious doubt about competence. You might want to know that I’m having my own expert conduct a full psychometric battery. Herbert Davidson, endowed professor from Stanford, acknowledged authority in the field.”

“Read his textbook in grad school,” I said.

“Be a shame if your results run far afield from his.”

“Be a damn shame,” I said.

“So when do I get your report?”

“When Judge Laskin sends it to you.”

“Sure,” he said. “Following orders. God forbid anyone should think independently.”

Troy Turner was housed as far from Rand as possible, in a corner cell past a dark twist of corridor. The deputy who walked me over said, “You’re gonna love this one.”

He was an iron-pumper named Sherrill with a shaved head and a massive, straw-colored mustache. Usually, he projected the confidence of a strong man. Today he looked distracted.

“Tough kid?” I said.

He slowed his pace. “I got kids. Four of my own plus a stepkid. On top of that, I spent three years working juvey crime, so I understand kids. Unlike some of the other guys, I know punks can start off as victims. But this one…” he shook his head.

“He do something in here?” I said.

“Naw, it’s just the way he is. ” He stopped. Behind us were empty cells. “Doc, if anything I’m telling you gets out, we’re never going to have any trust between us.”

“This is off the record.”

“I mean it,” he said. “I’m talking to you because word is you’re straight and you’re doing your best for Judge Laskin and we all respect Judge Laskin, ’cause he knows the way the real world is.”

I waited.

He looked over his shoulder, stopped again. Silence all around; only on High Power could a jail be this quiet. Up a few feet was an occupied cell and I could see the inmate checking us out. Well-groomed, gray-haired, middle-aged. Copy of Time magazine in one hand.

Sherrill drew me farther up the hall, muttering, “That one’s Russian Mafia, cut your throat as easy as smile at you.” When we were alone, he said, “I don’t talk much to prisoners, life’s too short, why fill your life with garbage. But this one, being a kid, I tried to be friendly. Turner reacts by shining me on. Completely. Making like I’m invisible. One time, I’d been off-shift, and when I got back he looked like he’d lost some weight. I brought him some breakfast, threw in some extra toast because he seemed pitiful. He snatched up a piece, gobbled like a hyena. I asked him if he understood why he was in here. This time, he doesn’t shine me on, he comes right out and says, ’ ‘Causa what I did.’ But not with any feeling. He could’ve been ordering fries and a Coke. Then he takes another piece of toast from the breakfast tray and looks me in the eye and starts chewing. Real slowly, real sloppy. Pieces are falling out of his mouth, and then he starts dribbling and drooling, rolling his eyes. Acting like an idiot, like it’s a big joke. I stand there and he keeps it up and then he spits it all out on the floor and says, ‘What?’ Like I’m annoying him. And I say you didn’t answer my question, dude. Why’re you in here? And he says, ‘I fucked that baby up is why.’ Then he grinds the toast into the floor with his foot and says, ‘This shit sucks, dude. Gimme some real food.’ ”

“Remorseful,” I said.

“Doc, God help me for saying it- if you repeat this I’ll totally deny it- but some sperm deserve to be drowned before they get a chance to swim.”

Small boy, stick arms, heart-shaped face. Expectant brown eyes widened as I entered his cell. The pinched, wounded features of a Dickensian orphan.

I introduced myself.

He said, “Pleased to meet you.” It rolled out easy, like a rehearsed line, but if there was sarcasm I wasn’t catching it.

I sat down and he said, “That chair’s not real comfortable.”

“Not much choice around here,” I said.

“You kin sit on the bed and I kin sit there.”

“Thanks, Troy, but I’m fine.”

“Okay.” He straightened his posture, rested a hand on each knee.

I took out my notepad. Looked at his hands. Narrow, white, long-fingered hands, grimy around the cuticles but the nails had been clipped neatly. Delicate hands. It wouldn’t take much strength to strangle a baby, but still…

“Troy, I’m a psychologist.”

“To talk to me about my feelings.”

“Someone told you that.”

“Miz Weider.”

Sydney Weider was his primary P.D. She’d been more persistent than Lauritz Montez about meeting me before I began my evaluation, had gotten aggressive when I refused. Laskin had termed her “a pit bull. Mark my word, she’s already making notes for the appellate attorneys.”

“What did Ms. Weider tell you about me?”

“You’re gonna ask questions and I should cooperate.” He smiled, as if demonstrating.

I said, “Is there anything you want to talk about?”

“I guess,” he said.

“What’s that?”

“I should talk about her.”

“Her?”

“The baby.”

“Everyone calls her a baby,” I said, “but she was more like a toddler, right?”

The term was new to him. “I guess.”

“Kristal was two years old, Troy. She walked and talked a little.”

“I didn’t hear her talk.”

“Ever see her before?”

“No way.”

I said, “Why’d you decide to take her?”

“She followed us.”

“Where?”

“Out.”

“Out of the mall.”

“Yeah.” The camera had caught Kristal dangling, kicking her legs. The police had assumed it was a struggle, but both defense briefs suggested that all three kids had been horsing around.

As if that mattered.

I said, “Why’d Kristal follow you?”

Shrug.

“Can you think of any reason at all, Troy?”

“Probably she thought we were cool.”

“Why would she think that?”

“ ’Cause she was little and we’re big.”

“Big is cool.”

“Yup.”

“Okay,” I said. “Kristal followed you and then what happened?”

“We went to the park and smoked and had some beer.”

“All of you.”

“Yup.”

“Where’d you get the beer?”

His eyes half closed. Suddenly wary. “We had it.”

“You had it with you at the mall?”

“From before.”

“Where’d you keep it?”

“At the park.”

“Where at the park?”

Hesitation. “Behind a tree.”

“Hidden.”

“Yup.”

“So you drank and smoked. All three of you.”

“Yup.”

“Kristal drank and smoked.”

“She tried to. She wasn’t no good at it.”

“Kristal had trouble drinking and smoking,” I said.

“It made her cough.”