“Ya’ll ever hear of this guy, Paul?” asked one of the retired lawyers.
Paul shook his head no.
“He’s at Flak’s office, the train station.”
“Robbie’s up to his old tricks.”
Not a smile, not a grin, not a forced chuckle. When Boyette produced her ring, and freely displayed it for the cameras, fear swept through the cabin, and Paul Koffee found his way to a chair.
———
The breaking news was not heard by everyone. At the prison, Reeva and her gang were gathered in a small office where they waited for the van ride to the death chamber. Not far away, the family of Donté waited too. For the next hour, the two groups of witnesses would be in close proximity to each other, but carefully separated. At 5:40, the family of the victim was loaded in a white unmarked prison van and driven to the death house, a ride that lasted less than ten minutes. Once there, they were led through an unmarked door into a small square room twelve feet long and twelve feet wide. There were no chairs, no benches. The walls were blank, unmarked. Before them was a closed curtain, and they had been told that on the other side of the curtain was the actual death chamber. At 5:45, the Drumm family made the same trip and entered their witness room through another door. The witness rooms were side by side. A loud cough in one could be heard in the other.
They waited.
CHAPTER 26
At 5:40, the U.S. Supreme Court, by a vote of 5–4, refused to hear Donté’s insanity petition. Ten minutes later, the Court, again 5–4, denied cert on the Boyette petition. Robbie took the calls outside the holding cell. He closed his phone, walked inside to Warden Jeter, and whispered, “It’s over. No more appeals.”
Jeter nodded grimly and said, “You got two minutes.”
“Thanks.” Robbie reentered the holding cell and broke the news to Donté. There was nothing else to do, the fight was over. Donté closed his eyes and breathed deeply as the reality set in. Until that moment there had always been hope, however distant, however remote and unlikely.
Then he swallowed hard, managed a smile, and inched closer to Robbie. Their knees were touching, their heads just inches apart. “Say, Robbie, you think they’ll ever catch the dude who killed Nicole?”
Again, Robbie wanted to tell him about Boyette, but that story was far from over. The truth was anything but certain. “I don’t know, Donté, I can’t predict. Why?”
“Here’s what you gotta do, Robbie. If they never find the guy, then folks will always believe it was me. But if they find him, then you gotta promise me you’ll clear my name. Will you promise me, Robbie? I don’t care how long it takes, but you gotta clear my name.”
“I’ll do that, Donté.”
“I got this vision that one day my momma and my brothers and sister will stand beside my grave and celebrate because I’m an innocent man. Won’t that be great, Robbie?”
“I’ll be there too, Donté.”
“Throw a big party, right there in the cemetery. Invite all my friends, raise all sorts of hell, let the world know that Donté is innocent. Will you do that, Robbie?”
“You have my word.”
“That’ll be great.”
Robbie slowly took both of Donté’s hands and squeezed them in his. “I gotta go, big man. I don’t know what to say, except that it’s been an honor being your lawyer. I have believed you from the very beginning, and I believe you even more today. I’ve always known you are innocent, and I hate the sons of bitches who are making this happen. I’ll keep fighting, Donté. I promise.”
Their foreheads touched. Donté said, “Thank you, Robbie, for everything. I’ll be all right.”
“I’ll never forget you.”
“Take care of my momma, okay, Robbie?”
“You know I will.”
They stood and embraced, a long painful hug that neither wanted to end. Ben Jeter was by the door, waiting. Robbie finally left the holding cell and walked to the end of the short hallway where Keith sat in a folding chair, praying fervently. Robbie sat down beside him and began weeping.
Ben Jeter asked Donté for the last time if he wanted to see the chaplain. He did not. The hallway began to fill with uniformed guards, large healthy boys with stern faces and thick arms. The beef had arrived, just in case the inmate had second thoughts about going peacefully to the death chamber. There was a flurry of activity, and the place was filled with people.
Jeter approached Robbie and said, “Let’s go.” Robbie slowly got to his feet and took a step before he stopped and looked down at Keith. “Come on, Keith,” he said.
Keith looked up blankly, not sure where he was, certain that his little nightmare would end soon and he’d wake up in bed with Dana. “What?”
Robbie grabbed an arm and yanked hard. “Come on. It’s time to witness the execution.”
“But—”
“The warden gave his approval.” Another hard pull. “You’re the spiritual adviser to the condemned man, thus, you qualify as a witness.”
“I don’t think so, Robbie. No, look, I’ll just wait—”
Several of the guards were amused by the altercation. Keith was aware of their smirks, but didn’t care.
“Come on,” Robbie said, now dragging the minister. “Do it for Donté. Hell, do it for me. You live in Kansas, a death-penalty state. Come watch a little democracy in action.”
Keith was moving, and everything was a blur. They walked by the columns of guards, past the holding cell where Donté, eyes down, was being handcuffed again, to a narrow unmarked door Keith had not noticed before. It opened and closed behind them. They were in a small boxlike room with dim lights. Robbie finally turned loose of him, then walked over and hugged the Drumm family. “No more appeals,” he said softly. “There’s nothing left to do.”
———
It would be the longest ten minutes in Gill Newton’s lengthy career in public service. From 5:50 until 6:00 p.m., he vacillated as never before. On one side, literally on one side of his office, Wayne pushed harder and harder for a thirty-day reprieve. He argued that the execution could be delayed for thirty days, and thirty days only, while the dust settled and the claims of this Boyette clown could be investigated. If he was telling the truth, and the body could be found, then the governor would be a hero. If he turned out to be a flake, as they strongly suspected, then Drumm would live another thirty days and then get the needle. There was no long-term harm, politically. The only permanent damage would occur if they ignored Boyette, executed Drumm, then found the body exactly where Boyette took them. That would be fatal, and not just for Drumm.
The mood was so tense that they were ignoring the bourbon.
On the other side, Barry argued that any form of retreat would be nothing but a show of weakness, especially in light of the governor’s performance before the mob less than three hours earlier. Executions, especially high-profile ones, attract all sorts of attention seekers, and this guy Boyette was a perfect example. He was obviously looking for the spotlight, his fifteen minutes onstage, and to allow him to derail a proper execution was wrong from a judicial point of view, and even more so from a political one. Drumm confessed to the murder, Barry said over and over. Don’t let some serial pervert cloud the truth. It was a fair trial! The appeals courts, all of them, had affirmed the conviction!
Play it safe, Wayne countered. Just thirty days, maybe we’ll learn something new about the case.
But it’s been nine years, Barry retorted. Enough is enough.