Lisa Scottoline - Mistaken Identity

“Connolly won’t mind giving it, if she’s really what she claims to be. You’ll get an answer in seven to ten days. You’ll know the truth.”

Bennie twisted off the water and reached for a towel. The truth suddenly struck her as a disruption, a distraction from the case. She’d been trying to keep the personal issues separate from the legal, with less and less success. A DNA test would only make it worse, wouldn’t it? She ducked into the clammy towel.

“Bennie?” Grady said. “I think you should do it.”

“Maybe I will, but not now.” She stuffed the towel onto the rack. “I appreciate what you did, but I don’t see the point. I wouldn’t have the answer by the trial anyway.”

Grady pursed his lips. “I’ll leave the application on the table, in case you change your mind.”

“Fine.” Bennie pushed aside the Plexiglas shower door, circa 1960s, which rumbled in its mildewed tracks. She turned on the water and it sputtered into the brown stain of the ancient tub she used to think was charming. “Christ. Sometimes I’m sorry we bought this house.”

“Wait a minute.” The light went on in the bathroom, and Grady gasped. “Bennie?” he said, disbelief in his voice. She turned to slip into the shower, but Grady caught her arm. Bennie felt her nakedness fully as he pulled her close, staring at her hair and face. A ribbon of water dribbled forgotten into the tub. “Your hair, it’s like Connolly’s.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“Yes, it is. I saw her mugshot in the paper. Did you get your hair cut like her? You’re trying to see if she’s your twin?” Grady looked worried, his gray eyes slightly puffy behind his wire rims. Bennie guessed he hadn’t slept well last night and felt a wave of responsibility for that. He deserved a straight answer.

“I’m dressing like Connolly to help her defense. The press has the story that we’re twins, and I’m going to exploit the situation to her advantage. That’s it. Now I have to take a shower. My new investigator’s coming in this morning, I hope.”

“So you’re trying to look like Connolly?” Grady shook his head in wonderment. “When, at trial?”

“Yes, and before.”

“Why before?”

“So it’s not obvious that I started at trial.”

Grady released her arm. “Don’t you think that’s beyond the pale?”

“Not at all.” Bennie wished she could cover herself, even though locker rooms had cured her of any residual modesty. “Any lawyer would do it.”

“No, they wouldn’t. I’m a lawyer and I wouldn’t.”

“She’s my client. I’m trying to save her life.”

Grady set his jaw. “Bennie, this is not about your defense of a client. This is about you, trying to figure out your relationship to Connolly. If that’s what you want to understand, take the goddamn blood test.”

“You have it wrong. I’m doing everything in my power to get her off, and in this case, I happen to have one more weapon than usual.”

“That’s a rationalization. You’re telling yourself you’re going through all of this for professional reasons, but you’re not.” Grady examined her face, determined. “Listen, Connolly walks into your life and you don’t know which end is up. The worst thing you can do is to lie to yourself.”

“I’m not lying to myself. I’m representing my client.”

“Her interests aren’t the only ones at stake.” Grady held her bare shoulders. “Slow down. It’s one thing to walk into a dark room where you’re familiar with the furniture. You can wander your own house with safety, navigate the space without seeing. But this isn’t just the furniture getting rearranged, the whole landscape is changed. You’re in a hotel room, in a new city. And the building’s on fire.”

“Oh, Christ, Grady.” Bennie broke the embrace, more brusquely than she felt. She hated being naked right now and reached for the towel, snapping it from the rack and wrapping it around her body like armor. “Don’t be dramatic.”

“It’s not dramatic, it’s realistic. You’re getting yourself into a position where there are no foundations for your emotional response. You’ve taken on the defense of a woman who might be your identical twin. Imagine that at the end of the trial, Connolly is found guilty of murder. Worse, she gets the death penalty.”

“I thought of that already. I’m doing everything in my power to make sure that doesn’t happen.” Bennie turned away and waved a hand under the shower to test the water. It was ready, and so was she. “I won’t lose.”

“You could. You have to admit, you could. Cutting your hair, dressing like Connolly. You’re destroying the emotional distance you need as her lawyer and at the same time telling yourself it was there all along. You’re not in control, you’re just telling yourself you’re in control.”

“Grady, I have to take a shower, I really do. I don’t have time to discuss this.” She dropped the towel, stepped inside the tub, and rolled the shower door shut. Water coursed over her head and she closed her eyes to Grady’s wavy outline on the other side of the old Plexiglas.

“Ask Connolly about the DNA test,” he called over the sound of the water. “Bet you twenty bucks she won’t take it.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“Ask her today. Prove me wrong. We’ll talk tonight.”

“I won’t be home tonight.” Water sluiced down Bennie’s strong shoulders and down her slim tummy. “I have to work.”

“I’m not letting you off the hook,” Grady said, then left.

It wasn’t until Bennie was toweling off after her shower that she permitted herself to think about whether Grady was right. Something in her resisted the notion and even counseled against considering it for too long, like a jinx. Bennie had to run Connolly’s trial and direct her defense. To win, she’d have to control the courtroom, command the attention of the jury and the respect of the judge. She had to believe in herself absolutely and couldn’t afford to have her confidence shaken. She combed out her hair quickly and hurried to dress, but didn’t once look in the mirror.

Joe Citrone wrapped his plaid bathrobe around his lean frame and opened his front door just before breakfast, satisfied to find his newspaper delivered on time for a change. God knows what kept that kid half the time. When Joe was young he got up in the middle of the night to deliver the paper. The Philadelphia Inquirer was the morning paper then and the Evening Bulletin was what his father read when they sat down to dinner. Now Joe’s father had passed and only the Inquirer was left. Half the time it didn’t get delivered until after Joe’s eggs.

He picked the paper off the stoop and straightened up, stiff again. DOUBLE TROUBLE: TWIN DEFENDS TWIN IN COP MURDER, read the headline. Joe shut the door and skimmed the newspaper story until he got to the only paragraph that interested him.

Early reports that Rosato’s license to practice law had lapsed were unfounded, sources said today. The attorney was only technically in default on her yearly ethics requirements. According to one well-placed source at the Pennsylvania Bar Association, the lapse “should cast no reflection on Ms. Rosato’s ethical standing or prevent her from undertaking any civil or criminal defense.”