Perfect Match (35 page)

Unlike some of the other witnesses the prosecutor's put on the stand, Frank ie meets my eye. I don't read sympathy there, but I don't read disgust eith er. Then again, this is a woman who is faced daily with the forensic proof of what people are capable of doing to others in the name of love. “I deter mined that the chance of randomly selecting an unrelated individual from th e population other than the suspect, whose DNA matched the semen DNA at all the locations we tested, was one in six billion.”

Quentin looks at the jury. “Six billion? Isn't that the approximate population of the whole earth?”

“I believe so.”

“Well, what does all this have to do with bone marrow?” Frankie shifts on her seat. “After I'd issued these results, the attorney g eneral's office asked me to research the findings in light of Father Szyszy nski's medical records. Seven years ago, he'd had a bone marrow transplant, which means, basically, that his blood was on long-term loan . . . borrowe d from a donor. It also means that the DNA we got from that blood-the DNA t hat was typed to match the semen in the underwear-was not Father Szyszynski 's DNA, but rather his donor's.“ She looks at the jury, making sure they ar e nodding before she continues. ”If we'd taken saliva from Father Szyszynsk i, or semen, or even skin-anything but his blood-it would have excluded him as a donor to the semen stain in the child's underwear.“ Quentin lets this sink in. ”Wait a second. You're telling me that if someone has a bone marrow transplant, they've got two different types of DNA in the ir body?”

“Exactly. It's extremely rare, which is why it's the exception and not the r ule, and why DNA testing is still the most accurate kind of evidentiary proo f.” Frankie takes out another lab report, an updated one. “As you can see he re, it's possible to test someone who's had a bone marrow transplant to prov e that they've got two different profiles of DNA. We extract tooth pulp, whi ch contains both tissue and blood cells. If someone's had a bone marrow tran splant, those tissue cells should show one profile of DNA, and the blood cel ls should show another.”

“Is that what you found when you extracted tooth pulp from Father Szyszyn ski?”

“Yes.”

Quentin shakes his head, feigning amazement. “So I guess Father Szyszynsk i was the one person in six billion whose DNA might match the DNA found i n the underwear . . . but who wouldn't have been the one to leave it ther e?”

Frankie folds the report and slips it into her case file. “That's right,” she says .

“You've worked with Nina Frost on a few cases, haven't you?” Fisher asks m oments later.

“Yes,” Frankie replies. “I have.”

“She's pretty thorough, isn't she?”

“Yes. She's one of the DAs who calls all the time, checking up on the result s we fax in. She's even come to the lab. A lot of the prosecutors don't both er, but Nina really wanted to make sure she understood. She likes to follow through from beginning to end.”

Fisher slants a look my way. Tell me about it. But he says, “It's very importan t for her to make sure that she has the facts straight, isn't it?”

“Yes.”

“She isn't someone who'd jump to a conclusion, or rely on something she wa s told without double-checking it?”

“Not that I've seen,” Frankie admits.

“When you issue your lab reports, Ms. Martine, you expect them to be accur ate, don't you?”

“Of course.”

“You issued a report, in fact, that said the chances of somebody other than Father Szyszynski contributing this semen to Nathaniel Frost's underwear wer e less than one in the population of the whole earth?”

“Yes.”

"You never put anything in that report qualifying your results in the case th at the suspect was a bone marrow transplant recipient, did you? Because that'

s such a rare event that even you, as a scientist, would never assume it?"

“Statistics are statistics ... an estimation.”

“But when you handed that initial report to the DA's office, you were prepare d to ask the prosecutor to rely on it?”

“Yes.”

“You were prepared to ask a jury of twelve people to rely on it as evidence to convict Father Szyszynski?”

“Yes,” Frankie says.

“You were prepared to ask the judge to rely on it when he sentenced Father Szyszynski?”

“Yes.”

“And you were prepared to ask Nina Frost, the child's mother, to rely on it for closure and peace of mind?”

“Yes.”

Fisher turns to the witness. “Then is it any wonder in your mind, Ms. Martin e, that she did?”

“Of course Quentin objected,” Fisher says, his mouth full of pepperoni pizza.

“That's not the point. The point is that I didn't withdraw the question befo re I dismissed the witness. The jury's going to notice that nuance.”

“You are giving far too much credit to a jury,” I argue. “I'm not saying the cro ss wasn't fantastic, Fisher, it was. But . . . watch it, you're going to get sau ce on your tie.”

He looks down, then flips the tie over his shoulder and laughs. “You're a riot , Nina. At what point during this trial do you think you might actually start to root for the defense?”

Never, I think. Maybe it is easier for Fisher, a defense attorney, to come u p with rationalizations for why people do the things they do. After all, whe n you have to stand up next to felons on a daily basis and fight for their f reedom, you either convince yourself they had some excuse for committing a c rime ... or you tell yourself this is nothing but a job, and if you lie on t heir behalf it's all in the name of billable hours. After seven years as a p rosecutor, the world looks very black and white. Granted, it was easy enough to persuade myself that I was morally righteous when I believed I'd killed a child molester. But to be absolved of murdering a man who was blameless-we ll, even Johnnie Cochran must have nightmares every now and then.

“Fisher?” I ask quietly. “Do you think I ought to be punished?” He wipes his hands on a napkin. “Would I be here if I did?”

“For what you're making, you'd probably stand in the middle of a gladiator's ring.”

Smiling, he meets my eye. “Nina, relax. I will get you acquitted.” But I shouldn't be. The truth lies at the base of my stomach, even though I can't say it aloud. What good is the legal process if people can decide th eir motives are bigger than the law? If you remove one brick from the found ation, how long before the whole system tumbles down?

Maybe I can be pardoned for wanting to protect my child, but there are plenty of parents who shelter their children without committing felonies. I can tel l myself that I was only thinking of my son that day; that I was only acting like a good mother . . . but the truth is, I wasn't. I was acting like a pros ecutor, one who didn't trust the court process when it became personally rele vant. One who knew better than to do what I did. Which is exactly why I deser ve to be convicted.

“If I can't even forgive myself,” I say finally, “how are twelve other people g oing to do it?”

The door opens and Caleb enters. Suddenly the atmosphere is plucked tight as a bowstring. Fisher glances at me-he knows that Caleb and I have been estra nged, lately-and then balls his napkin up and tosses it into the box. "Caleb ! There's a couple slices left.“ He stands up. ”I'm going to go take care ..

. of that thing we were talking about," Fisher says vacuously, and he gets o ut of the room while he can.

Caleb sits across from me. The clock on the wall, fast by five minutes, ticks as loud as my heart. “Hungry?” I ask.

He traces the sharp corner of the pizza box. “I'm starving,” Caleb answers. But he makes no move to take one of the slices. Instead, we both watch as hi s fingers creep forward, as he clasps my hand between both of his. He scoots his chair closer and bows his head until it touches our joined fists. "Let'

s start over," he murmurs.

If I have gained anything over these months, it is the knowledge there is n o starting over-only living with the mistakes you've made. But then, Caleb taught me long ago you can't build anything without some sort of foundation . Maybe we learn to live our lives by understanding, firsthand, how not to live them.

“Let's just pick up where we left off,” I reply, and I rest my cheek on the cr own of Caleb's head.

How far can a person go ... and still live with himself?

It's something that's been haunting Patrick. There are certain acts for whi ch you easily make excuses-killing during wartime; stealing food if you're starving; lying to save your own life. But narrow the circumstances, bring them closer to home-and suddenly, the faith of a man who's dedicated his li fe to morality gets seriously shaken. Patrick doesn't blame Nina for shooti ng Glen Szyszynski, because at that moment she truly believed it was her on ly option. Likewise, he doesn't consider making love with her on Christmas Eve to be wrong. He'd waited for Nina for years; when she finally was his-e ven for a night-the fact of her marriage to another man was inconsequential . Who was to say that the bond between Patrick and Nina was any less strong because there was no piece of paper sanctifying it?

Justification is a remarkable thing-takes all those solid lines and blurs the m, so that honor becomes as supple as a willow, and ethics burst like soap bu bbles.

If Nina chose to leave Caleb, Patrick would be at her side in an instant, and he could come up with a multitude of reasons to defend his behavior. Truth b e told, it's something he's let himself consider in the soft gray moments bef ore sleep comes. Hope is his balm for reality; if Patrick spreads it thick en ough, sometimes he can even envision a life with her.

But then, there's Nathaniel.

And that's the point Patrick cannot get past. He can rationalize falling in l ove with Nina; he can even rationalize her falling in love with him. There's nothing he would like more than to see Caleb gone from her life. But Caleb is not just Nina's husband ... he is also the father of her son. And Patrick co uld not bear knowing that he was responsible for ruining Nathaniel's childhoo d. If Patrick did that after all that has happened, well . . . how could she ever love him?

Compared to a transgression of that size, what he is about to do seems insign ificant.

He watches Quentin Brown from the witness box. The prosecutor is expecting t his to go easily-just as easily as it did during the practice session. After all, Patrick is a law enforcement official, used to testifying. As far as B rown knows, despite his friendship with Nina, he's on the side of the prosec ution. “Were you assigned to work the Nathaniel Frost case?” Quentin asks.

“Yes.”

“How did the defendant react to your investigation of the case?” Patrick can't look at Nina, not yet. He doesn't want to give himself away. “ She was an incredibly concerned parent.”

This is not the answer they have rehearsed. Patrick watches Quentin do a do uble-take, then feed him the response he was supposed to give. “Did you eve r see her lose her temper during the case?”

“At times she'd become distraught. Her child wasn't speaking. She didn't kno w what to do.” Patrick shrugs. “Who wouldn't get frustrated in a situation l ike that?”

Quentin sends him a quelling glance. Commentary on the stand is not necessa ry, or desired. “Who was your first suspect in the molestation case?”

“We didn't have a suspect until Glen Szyszynski.”

By now, Quentin looks ready to throttle him. “Did you bring in another man for questioning?”

“Yes. Caleb Frost.”

“Why did you bring him in?”

Patrick shakes his head. “The child was using sign language to communicate, and he ID'd his abuser with the sign for father. At the time, we didn't understand he meant priest, rather than daddy.” He looks directly at Caleb, in the front row behind Nina. “That was my mistake,” Patrick says.

“What was the defendant's reaction to her son signing father?” Fisher rises from his seat, poised to object, but Patrick speaks quickly. “S he took it very seriously. Her primary concern was always, always, protectin g her child.” Confused, the attorney sits back down beside Nina.

“Detective Ducharme-” the prosecutor interrupts.

“I'm not quite done yet, Mr. Brown. I was going to say that I'm sure it tore her up inside, but she got a restraining order against her husband, because s he thought it was the best way to keep Nathaniel safe.”

Quentin walks closer to Patrick, hisses through his teeth so that only his w itness will hear. “What the hell are you doing?” Then he faces the jury. “De tective, at what point did you make the decision to arrest Father Szyszynski ?”

“After Nathaniel gave a verbal disclosure, I went down to talk to him.”

“Did you arrest him at that moment?”

“No. I was hoping he'd confess first. We always hope for that in molestation cases.”

“Did Father Szyszynski ever admit to sexually abusing Nathaniel Frost?” Patrick has been a witness at enough trials to know that the question is blata ntly unacceptable, because it calls for hearsay. The judge and the prosecutor both stare at Fisher Carrington, waiting for him to object. But by now, Nina's lawyer has caught on. He sits at the defense table with his hands steepled, w atching this unfold. "Child molesters almost never admit they've hurt a child,

“ Patrick says, filling the silence. ”They know jail's not going to be a pleas ant place for them. And frankly, without a confession, a molestation trial is a roll of the dice. Nearly half the time, these guys get off because of insuff icient evidence or because the child is too terrified to testify, or because t hey do testify and the jury doesn't believe the word of a kid ...“ Quentin breaks in before Patrick can do any further damage. ”Your Honor, may we have a recess?"

The judge looks over his bifocals at him. “We are in the middle of the direct .”

“Yes, Judge, I'm aware of that.”

Shrugging, Neal turns to Fisher. “Does the defense object to stopping at this point?”

“I don't believe so, Your Honor. But I would ask the Court to remind all co unsel that the witnesses have been sequestered and can't be approached duri ng the break.”

“Fine,” Quentin grits out. He storms from the courtroom so quickly he doesn'

t see Patrick finally make eye contact with Nina, smile gently at her, and w ink.