All for Hope (27 page)

His first witness was Justine Taggert, who was led into the room with her arms and legs chained. Hope smiled to her, trying to show her friend how much she still cared for her. Justine smiled back, swiped a lock of blond hair back from her eyes and turned her attention to Van.

“Could you please state your name for the court?” he asked first.

“Justine Taggert.”

“Justine, do you have any family in the court today?”

She nodded. “Yes, my mother and father are here.”

“Do you have any loved ones here?”

“Yes.” She nodded again, not going any further in her answer.

Hope could see that she was clearly nervous. She was playing absently with the chains on her wrists as she rocked back and forth in the chair.

“Who are the loved ones?”

“Only one,” she answered. “The only person I can really say I love is Hope.”

“Hope Sheffield Rawley?”

“Yes.”

“And why is she the only one?”

“She's always—accepted me for me. She never demanded more than I was ready to give.”

“Your father made demands on you, didn't he?”

“Objection.” The prosecutor stood. “Leading the witness.”

“I'll rephrase, Your Honor,” Van amended. “Justine, who has made demands on you?”

“Just about everyone. My father, my mother, the men I—the men that hired me.”

“What men?”

“I—was a hooker.” she told him, avoiding his eyes in obvious embarrassment.

“Let's get back to your father. How did he put demands on you?”

“Everything? You want to know—it all?”

“Please, Justine.”

“I can remember when I was eight, he made me clean the house, from top to bottom. I was standing on a stool, cleaning the spider webs from the corners and I fell. I bruised my arm, but he wouldn't let me stop. He— hit me, yelled at me— until I climbed back up to finish.”

“What did he hit you with?”

“A strap, across my legs and back. I had those bruises for a long time.”

“Did this happen often?”

“Often enough.”

“Did he treat your brothers and sister in the same manner?”

“Sometimes, but—mostly me. I wasn't—I didn't look like him, like they did. He thought I was ugly because I looked like my real mother.”

“Your real mother?”

“My real mother left us when I was just a baby. I call Carol my mother.”

“Carol is the mother to your brothers and sisters?”

“Yes.”

“What else did your father do?”

“When I was about thirteen—fourteen. He came into my bedroom—one night—” Justine turned to Hope, and Hope smiled to her, nodding.

“He--he touched me—and—did things to me.”

Justine had turned into a frightened child again, her eyes wild and fearful.

“Did he rape you, Justine?”

“No—not that night—but later. He raped me a couple of weeks later.”

“And did this continue?”

“Yes.”

“How long?” Van asked, pouring her a glass of water and bringing it to her.

“Until—I was seventeen and I left.”

Van went on to ask her about her relationship with Hope. She told of how they had met and how Hope had helped to get her on her feet when she was pregnant and on through to Justine's murder trial.

“Were you upset when you heard Hope had taken your daughter?”

Justine smiled, shaking her head. “She promised me would save Michelle. I knew she would. That was why she took her, to get her away from my father.”

“Is Hope the person you want to raise your daughter?”

“Yes. Hope loves Michelle. She always has. I've been thinking a lot in prison and—I think God knew I couldn't do my baby justice, so he found some way to get her to someone who could raise her right. What kind of role model could a prostitute be?”

“Thank you, Justine. No further questions.”

The DA attempted to get Justine to change her testimony about her father, asking her if Hope had coerced her into lying. Justine remained strong, though, never relenting. After going through some of Justine's past, the District Attorney gave up.

Next, Van called Justine's sister, Geneva, to the stand. Harold Taggert was clearly worried about her appearance. He even stood, as if to stop her from going to the stand, then sat down with eyes wide.

“State your name for the court, please.”

“Geneva Taggert Simpson.”

“And you are Justine's sister?”

“Yes.”

“Were you listening to your sister's testimony?”

“Yes.”

“Do you believe your sister?”

Geneva turned to look at her father, her eyes glossy with tears, and then she nodded as she peered down at her hands. “Yes, Justine is telling the truth.”

“How do you know this?”

“Well, Daddy was always hardest on Justine. He made her work until she could barely walk and he hit her sometimes—with the strap like she said.”

“Did he hit you?”

“No—well, sometimes, but not like he did Justine. Usually he just spanked me and the others with his hand.”

“What else do you remember?”

“Justine kept telling me she was leaving. I was only ten and she was sixteen, but we were kinda close. She said Daddy did ugly things to her. I didn't understand until—” She sighed heavily and shook her head as if denying the memory.

“Are you all right, Mrs. Simpson?”

She nodded. “There was a storm one night. I hated lightning. Justine used to let me sleep in her room, but I didn't want to wake her so I just climbed into the closet and made a pallet in there. Just as I was laying down—Daddy came in—” The young woman was crying now, shaking with her sobs.

Hope turned to look at Harold Taggert, whose face had turned pale. His eyes were crazed as he looked at his wife who had snatched her hand from his. It was clear Mrs. Taggert was finally realizing what her husband was. She was breathing heavily, frowning with disgust as her daughter described what he had done to Justine.

“Thank you, Mrs. Simpson. Your witness,” Van said to the DA. The other attorney just shook his head. It appeared that he too now understood what Harold Taggert was.

The judge called a recess until after lunch. Hope sighed, glad things were moving so swiftly. Brennan came behind her and put his arms around her neck, kissing her cheek, and then stood as the District Attorney came to Van Buren.

“I need to speak to you.”

Van nodded, and he, Kay, and Hope all followed the man to a large conference room. It seemed Justine and Geneva's testimonies had had an enormous impact on him. After nearly an hour of diplomacy, it was finally decided that Hope could do community service to pay for the crime, along with paying a huge sum as restitution.

Hope seemed to be in shock when court resumed, and the judge declared the trial over. She stood, turned to Brennan with eyes wide.

“You're free,” he laughed, pulling her across the railing and into his arms.

“Thank God!” she screamed as he spun her around and around.

“You'll never get my granddaughter,” a sinister voice said from behind her, and they all put their eyes on Harold Taggert.

“Do you know what we do to disgusting perverts like you in New Durma—” Lord James began, but Hope put her hand over his shoulder to stop him.

“Michelle is our daughter, Mr. Taggert. And maybe very soon you'll realize that.”

“Never! She will be ours—”

“Harold,” Mrs. Taggert called, her eyes still full of loathing. “Leave them alone, Harold. Leave them alone.”

The man stared at Hope a long moment, his eyes clearly showing his hatred for her, and then he turned and followed his wife from the court.

Guillory shuffled his cards around, organizing them while assessing his hand. After a few moments he ran his tongue along his top left molars and tossed some chips into the pile. Johnny Pollard didn’t look up; he watched his friend roll his head in one direction then another in a painfully slow fashion. With an exaggerated sigh, Guillory laid his cards down in front of him and folded his arms across his chest.

“All right,” Pollard nodded, stacking his cards and then tossing his chips. “I’m in.”

This was Guillory’s “real” retirement celebration. Earlier in the day, the department had thrown him the standard cake foofaraw. Now it was time for the real deal. Liquor, gambling and inflated stories of heroism amongst men.

Guillory glanced at Eva Lipton to his left and cracked a side-ways grin.
Women too
, he thought. Lipton was a relative newbie and just barely past the rookie status. But she was tough as nails and had good instincts. The few cases he’d worked on with her proved to him she was worthy of joining the monthly–and formerly all-male–poker game.

More chips hit the table, cards were exchanged, and the game proceeded amidst mostly silence for a few minutes.

“So she got off, eh, Guillory? Was that your swan song or what?” Lipton finally spoke. Hernandez to the right grunted. The recent talk around the department had been the entire Hope Sheffield debacle. Just a few days earlier, Harold Taggart had managed to raise his $250,000 bail on the child molestation charges stemming from the Sheffield trial.

Guillory only licked his lips and raised a brow.

“The hell it was Guillory’s doing. I’m the one who found the sister, and yet this prick’s the one who gets the interviews and accolades.”

“Well, hell,” Lipton cursed after taking a card and watching Hernandez up the ante. “I’m out.”

“Hehehe,” Guillory chuckled.

“So why’d you do it, man?” Hernandez asked, glancing at him with intense black eyes. “I know you were leavin’ anyway, but you’ve had a good career with the force and if this thing had gone bad, you could’a lost. Big time.”

“He was hot for the defendant.” Those were Pollard’s words, his eyes crinkling at the edges with carefully restraining mirth. Guillory stared him down, still saying nothing.

“Hey, man, don’t try that evil-eye shit with me. It won’t work.”

So, apparently some people were impervious to the cold, dead look. Rolling his eyes and flicking a few more chips onto the pile, Guillory finally laughed. “You guys are as nosy as a bunch of old women. What the hell do want to know?”

Lipton laughed. “Avoiding the question? We asked why. It’s a pretty simple question, officer.”

He shrugged, tapping his cards against the felt-covered table. “It was time for me to get out of this… this crap. I see perps around every corner. I can honestly say that nine out of every ten people I run across give me that gut reaction that says ‘you’re guilty as hell of something.’ I mean, there’s got to be more than that out there. From the moment Sheffield’s case dropped into my lap, I was missing that gut reaction where it was supposed to be.”

“So you followed your gut. You did the right thing.” Lipton nodded, a lovely smile softening her normally hard expression.