Gallagher Justice. Amanda Stevens
That secret again. “They can both be major-league assholes,” he muttered, but Fiona didn’t think that was what he’d meant to say at all.
More and more, she was starting to think that there was something on Milo’s mind, something he wanted to confide in her, but for some reason, felt he couldn’t. The vague warnings were starting to make her uneasy around him.
But at least his appearance was somewhat reassuring. He was dressed today like the Milo she was accustomed to—gray suit, neatly combed hair, dark-rimmed glasses that made him look boyish and earnest. A persona that might or might not be an asset if the jurors compared it to the dark, smoldering sex appeal of Vince DeMarco.
“Only one person missing from this circus,” he said, turning to scan the courtroom. “Where in the hell is Kimbra? Have you heard from her this morning?”
“I haven’t talked to her since court yesterday, but she promised me she’d be here.”
Milo’s lips thinned. “And if she doesn’t show?”
“Then we could be in some deep you-know-what here. But she still has a few more minutes. I’m not giving up on her just yet.”
But it wouldn’t be that much of a surprise if Kimbra didn’t show, even though Fiona had stressed over and over how important it was for the jury to see her in the courtroom today. But that was Kimbra’s MO. When the going got tough, she ran.
Not that Fiona could blame her. It couldn’t be easy sitting in court day in and day out with her attacker only a few feet away, his smoldering gaze mocking her at every turn. The jury saw only one side of Vincent DeMarco, the good-looking, sexy cop who wouldn’t need to resort to rape when he could have any woman he wanted, even one as young and exotically attractive as Kimbra.
But rape wasn’t about sex. It was about power. It was about domination and humiliation.
And humiliation was something Fiona could relate to.
You didn’t fall in love with a man who’d killed three women and not want to curl up and die at your own gullibility—at your own blind stupidity for not having seen through such evil, for not having been able to stop it.
Which was why Fiona had to stop it now.
Almost against her will, she glanced at the table across the aisle. Vincent DeMarco met her gaze and smiled, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking.
Then a commotion at the back of the courtroom drew his attention, and Fiona saw anger flash across his face. He turned and said something to Quinlan, and the older cop nodded in grim agreement.
Fiona shifted her gaze to see what had caused their agitation, and relief swept through her. Kimbra and Rachel Torres, the woman who ran the runaway shelter where Kimbra sometimes stayed, had just come into the courtroom. They paused at the back, and then Kimbra started forward with a little stumble, as if Rachel had had to nudge her to get her to move. The girl’s expression was frozen. She glanced neither to the right nor to the left as she stepped up to the prosecution table and took her seat.
Fiona turned and put her hand over Kimbra’s. “Thanks for coming.”
Kimbra shrugged. “I said I would, didn’t I?”
Fiona squeezed her fingers. “I know this isn’t easy for you, but you’ve done great so far. Just hang in there a little longer, okay? It’ll all be over soon.”
“Then he’s goin’ to prison, right?” Kimbra turned eyes that looked as old as time on Fiona. “Cuz if he don’t do no time for this, I’m a dead woman.”
A shiver crawled up Fiona’s spine at the certainty in the girl’s voice. “If he threatens you in any way—”
“What y’all gonna do ’bout it, Miss Lawyer? Huh? That man’s Five-O. They do what they want,” she said bitterly. “Who’s gonna stop ’em?”
“I’ll stop him. If he comes near you, we’ll get a restraining order—”
Kimbra all but laughed in her face. “You still don’t get it, do you? If he wants me dead, I’ll just disappear one day. Won’t nobody ever know what happened to me. That’s how he’ll do it.”
She paused for a moment, her gaze sliding past Fiona as a look of pure terror crept into her eyes. Then she blinked it away and the defiant mask slipped back into place. “Y’all keep messin’ with the wrong people, Miss Lawyer, they might just disappear you, too.”
* * *
FIONA WALKED OVER TO THE jury box and planted her hands on the railing. Milo had done a fantastic job sum-marizing the evidence and recounting witness testimony in his closing remarks, but the defense attorney, Dylan O’Roarke, had been masterful.
He’d wasted no time in getting to the heart of the case. “In spite of the prosecution’s attempts to muddy the waters at every turn, the case is a simple one, ladies and gentlemen. It boils down to one single question. Who do you believe? A troubled runaway with a long history of drug abuse and a willful disobedience of the law? One who openly bragged about her hatred of the police? One who, as you heard more than one witness testify, swore to get her revenge on Detective DeMarco for an old arrest?
“Or do you believe Vincent DeMarco, a decorated police officer, an ex-Army Ranger who distinguished himself on a desert battlefield as well as on the mean streets of Chicago?”
Dylan had gone on and on, hammering home the same point until Fiona had seen at least one juror nod very slightly in agreement.
And now it was her turn to offer a rebuttal. She surveyed the twelve members of the panel, noting their expressions as they stared up at her expectantly, and then she said, very quietly, “One out of every three women in this country will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. One out of every three.”
She emphasized the last five words as her gaze slid to a well-dressed, middle-aged woman in the second row who had sat rigidly throughout the whole trial. Her expression rarely showed anything more than an intense concentration, as if she were determined to perform her civic duty to the best of her ability, but beyond that the trial couldn’t touch her. Rape couldn’t touch her.
Fiona stared at her for a long moment until the woman was forced to meet her gaze. “It could happen to any woman in this courtroom. It could happen to me. It could happen to you.”
Something flashed briefly in the woman’s eyes. Denial, Fiona thought. She often found the toughest jurors to sway in a rape case were upper-middle-class white women who had a hard time identifying with a victim like Kimbra.
“Think of three women in your own life. Your mother. Your sister.” Fiona paused, letting her gaze move to a male juror seated directly in front of her in the first row. “Your daughter.”
He flinched.
“One out of every three women in this country will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime.”
Fiona straightened and paced slowly back and forth in front of the jury box. “The defense would have you believe that a man like Vincent DeMarco, a decorated police officer, a war hero from Desert Storm, a man of impeachable honor and character, could not have perpetrated such a terrible crime. A man like Vincent DeMarco could not be guilty of rape. And yet...”
Fiona turned to Kimbra. “Someone did rape Kimbra Williams on the night of April 17. Someone forced her into that alley and beat her until she could barely move. And when she still fought back, her attacker held a gun to her head and threatened to blow her brains out if she screamed.”
Fiona paused again, letting the mental picture seep in. “You heard testimony from the doctor who examined Kimbra on that same night. You saw photographs of the severe bruises and swelling left by the beating. Kimbra Williams was brutally attacked and raped. Of that, there is no doubt.
“But the defense has also implied that Kimbra’s fear may have impaired her ability to correctly identify her assailant. After all, it was a dark, moonless