“I don’t know that they know. I can’t get away with saying he’s a suspect again because he hasn’t been arraigned. The jury might have even thought I was baiting the kid, trying to get his pathetic little goat. Which, apparently, I did.”
We crossed Opera Plaza, a mixed-use development with restaurants, a bookstore, and movie theaters on the ground floor. Avoiding the stares of the crowd, we took the elevator down to the garage, and after going back and forth several times between the rows of parked cars, we found Yuki’s Acura at last.
We strapped in, and when Yuki turned the key, the engine jumped to life. I was already thinking ahead to tomorrow.
“You’re sure it’s a good idea for me to testify?” I asked my attorney.
“Absolutely. Mickey and I totally agree on this. We’ve got to get the jury’s sympathy going toward you. And to do that, those people are going to have to see and hear what you’re made of.
“And that’s why you’ve got to testify.”
Womans Murder Club 4 - 4th of July
Chapter 94
THE NEXT MORNING THE view from Yuki’s kitchenette was gray, as rain gathered for a fall from the huge thunderheads over the city. Strangely, this was the San Francisco that I loved, stormy and tempestuous.
I drank my coffee and fed Martha. Then we went for a quick walk on Jones Street.
“Gotta hurry, Boo,” I said, already feeling the mist in the air. “Big doings today. Mama’s going to be lynched.”
Twenty minutes later, Mickey picked us up in his car. We got to the courthouse at quarter to eight, cleverly missing most of the mob scene.
Inside courtroom B, Mickey and Yuki sat next to each other and argued in whispers, Yuki’s hands fluttering like frantic little birds. As for me, I stared out the courthouse window at the sheets of falling rain as tense minutes ticked off on the electric clock against the side wall.
I felt a touch on my arm.
“I’ll be honest, that alarm was one of the worst things that ever happened to me in a courtroom,” Mickey said, leaning across Yuki to talk to me. “I’d hate to think that Broyles staged that event, but I wouldn’t put it past him to have rigged the electric cord.”
“You can’t be serious?”
“I don’t know, but we’ve got to do damage control. It’s our turn to put on our case, and we have two messages to convey. The kid’s a horror even on wheels, and you’re a great cop.”
“Look, do not worry about your testimony, Lindsay,” Yuki added. “If you were any more prepared, you wouldn’t sound natural. When it’s time to do it, just tell the story. Take your time and stop to think if you aren’t sure of something. And don’t look guilty. Just be the great cop that you are.”
“Right,” I said. And for good measure, I said it again.
Too soon, the spectators filled the room in their damp raincoats, some of them still shaking out umbrellas. Then the opposition filed in and banged their briefcases down on the table. Broyles gave us a civil nod, barely masking his joy. The man was in his element, all right. Court TV. Network TV. Everyone wanted to speak with Mason Broyles.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Broyles shake Andrew Cabot’s hand, kiss Eva Cabot on the cheek. He even helped the medical attendant position Sam Cabot’s wheelchair just so. He orchestrated everything, so why not that alarm yesterday?
“Sleep okay, Sam? That’s great,” Broyles said to the boy.
For me, the nightmare resumed.
The sound of Sam sucking air through his ventilator tube every few seconds was such a painful and constant reminder of what I’d done that I found it hard to breathe myself.
Suddenly, the side door to the courtroom opened, and the twelve good men and women and three alternates walked to the box and took their places. The judge, carrying a cardboard cup of coffee, took hers as the court was called into session.
Womans Murder Club 4 - 4th of July
Chapter 95
YUKI, LOOKING CALM, COLLECTED, and sensational in a gray suit and pearls, kicked off our case by putting veteran dispatcher Carla Reyes on the stand. Yuki asked Carla some general questions about her duties and what her shift on May 10 had been like.
Then she played the tape of my radio transmissions that awful night: four and a half long minutes of my voice calling in our locations as well as radio calls from the patrol cars.
The clipped and broken transmissions surrounded by sparking static pumped adrenaline into my bloodstream and sent my mind careening around the corners of that dark night in the past, chasing the unknown suspects in a black Mercedes.
Jacobi’s voice requesting paramedical help for the passengers of the wrecked car was interrupted by the hard pops of gunfire that cut him off midsentence.
I actually started in my seat at the sounds of the gunshots. My hands began to sweat, and I felt myself tremble.
A moment later, I heard my own fading voice request ambulances. “Two officers down. Two civilians down.”
And the worried voice of Carla Reyes. “Lieutenant, are you okay? Lindsay. Answer me.”
“I really thought I’d lost her,” Carla told Yuki from the witness stand. “Lindsay’s one of our best.”
After Mason’s tepid cross, Yuki put on our next witness, Mike Hart from Ballistics, who confirmed that the slugs removed from my body were a match to Sara’s gun and that the slugs taken from Jacobi had been fired by the gun found beside Sam Cabot.
Broyles had no questions for Mike, so Yuki called Jacobi to the stand.
Tears brimmed in my eyes as my old friend and partner walked to the front of the room. Jacobi’s walk was heavy even though he’d lost a lot of weight. He struggled as he heaved himself up to the witness stand.
Yuki gave him time to pour himself a full glass of water. Then she asked him some routine questions about how long he’d been with the force, how long with Homicide.
Then, “Inspector Jacobi, how long have you known Lieutenant Boxer?”
“About seven years.”
“Have you had an occasion to work with her before the night in question?”
“Yep. We were partners for three years.”
“Have you been in other situations with her where she had to use her gun?”
“Yes. A coupla times.”
“And how would you say she reacts under pressure?”
“She’s great under pressure. And you know, every time you go out on the street you’re under pressure, because nothing suddenly turns into something without any warning at all.”
“Inspector, when you hooked up with Lieutenant Boxer on the night of May tenth, did you smell alcohol on her breath?”
“No.”
“Did you know that she had been drinking?”
“Yes. Because she mentioned it to me.”
“Well, why did she mention it to you?”
“Because she wanted me to know, so that I could kick her out of the car if I wanted to.”
“In your opinion, having worked with her for so many years, did she have all her faculties?”
“Of course. She was sharp, just like she always is.”
“If she was in any way impaired would you have gone on this assignment with her?”
“Absolutely not.”
Yuki took Warren through the night of the tenth, from the moment he picked me up at Susie’s to the last thing he remembered.
“I was glad we got those kids out of that car. I was worried that the gas tank was leaking and the whole thing could’ve gone kaboom. I was on with our dispatcher, Carla Reyes over there, telling her that Sam Cabot had a broken nose from the air bag blowing up in his face and that those kids coulda had internal injuries. Little did I know.”