Sense of Deception (37 page)

With that I got up and left the room.

“W
hat do you want me to do?” Dioli asked me when he finally joined me out in the hallway. I noticed he was carrying all the papers and photos from the table. He handed them carefully to me, and it was like he didn't trust them in the same room with Miller and wanted me to keep them safe.

I took a deep breath. He wasn't going to like what I had to say. “In a little over an hour there's a hearing at the Board of Pardons. I want you to go there, but first, I want you to call the DA and confess that you royally screwed up.”

Dioli looked taken aback, so I added, “The DA called you to tell you about Gallagher, didn't she? She called to say that we were asking a man named Dennis Gallagher, a man known by APD to have a record of B and Es, about Noah Miller's murder.”

Dioli stared at me, and I could see the guilt in his eyes. “And in turn,” I said next, “you called Miller and told him we were fishing around, trying to get Skylar off on the appeal by claiming we had a witness to the murder. And when Miller asked you who that was, I'm guessing you told him what you knew about Dennis. That's how Chris discovered that the screen and the window had
been put back, and why the baseball he'd stolen from Noah's room had never been discovered in Skylar's backyard. He must've wondered about that for ten years, and when you called to tell him about Dennis, he finally had an answer, but he also knew in that exact same moment that he also had a really
big
problem.”

The detective wiped a bead of sweat from his brow, but he didn't say anything. It didn't matter. I knew he'd done it. “You got Dennis Gallagher killed, Detective,” I said to him with more than a little venom in my tone.

“Jesus,” Dioli whispered, dropping his gaze to the floor. More sweat beaded up on his forehead.

I pressed on. “After you call the DA and
convince
her to support you at the Board of Pardons, I want you to go there and tell them that there's been a horrible miscarriage of justice, and that
you
were personally at fault. I want you to beg them to spare Skylar Miller's life, because you are now convinced, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she's an innocent woman, and the killer is currently in custody. And then I want you and the DA to file a motion with the courts to have Skylar Miller completely exonerated for the crime of murder. I want her off death row, and out of that jail, Dioli.”

The bastard had the balls to look as if he was about to protest, so I brought the big guns out. “And if you don't do everything that I've just said, Ray, I will make your life an utter living hell. The state's attorney is already asking questions about your initial investigation, and all the evidence you not only ignored but failed to provide to Skylar's attorney. I'll go to the press and I'll tell them about how you hacked the investigation together without ever considering Chris Miller's involvement. I'll point out the two identical knives found at the scene, and show how you blatantly ignored that. The missing baseball, the loose screen, the
pushed-down bedcovers, the void in the curtain, the phone call made to Chris's cell at the exact time of the murder that couldn't possibly have been made by Noah, and Miller's fingerprints on the windowsill.

“And then I will also point them to a second investigation where you arrested and accused the wrong person for the crime. I'm pretty sure Len Chen is still carrying a significant grudge against you. Think he'd be happy to talk to the press?”

Dioli held up his hand. “Okay!” he barked. “Enough, okay? Enough.”

There was an anxious pregnant pause where I wondered what he'd do next, but he surprised me a little when he withdrew his cell phone and made a call. “Lisa? It's Ray Dioli. I need to speak to your boss lady. It's an emergency. I don't care what she's doing—interrupt her and tell her to take this call.”

Taking a step back, I leaned my weary head against the wall and fully exhaled for the first time in ten days.

*   *   *

O
scar, Candice, and I exited the car and stared up at the brightly lit condo complex, all three of us wearing identical expressions of happy satisfaction. From a balcony on the third floor, Skylar got up from her chair, set aside her book, and waved down at us. Then she motioned us to the front door.

We headed up the walkway lined with Christmas lights without comment. I'm not sure any of us could speak, actually. I stopped at the locked door and waited for Skylar to buzz us in, and while I did, Candice hooked her arm through mine and squeezed. I laid my head on her shoulder, sharing the glorious moment we'd had a hand in creating.

Behind us another car pulled into the drive. As the door buzzed
and Oscar reached for the handle, I looked back to see Cal behind the wheel. While Candice and Oscar headed inside, I held the door open until Cal came up the walkway. “Hey, there,” he said warmly, greeting me with an impromptu hug and a light kiss on the cheek. “Happy holidays, Abby.”

“And to you, counselor,” I said, unable to keep the giant grin off my face.

Cal took the weight of the door from me and I stepped across the threshold over to the stairs and headed up three flights. Belatedly I realized there was an elevator. “I'm getting too old to climb stairs,” Cal said, wheezing a little behind me.

“It's good for you,” I chided. Looking right, then left, I finally spotted Skylar waving at us from down the hall.

“In here,” she called.

Cal and I moved down the narrow corridor side by side, and greeted Skylar with hugs and nervous laughter. None of us said much at first. There was too much emotion and it overtook the words.

At last we were settled into Skylar's beautiful little kitchen, and evidence of her recent move was nowhere in sight. As I looked about the kitchen, and then into the living room, which was nicely decorated in soft steel blues and yellows, with a hint of white tucked in here and there, it appeared like she'd been there far longer. “I love your place!” I told her.

She blushed and swept a hand through her curly hair, which had been cut a bit shorter and which flattered her features quite nicely. “Thank you,” she said. “I still can't believe I own it.”

Skylar had been completely exonerated by the courts just ninety days before. It'd been an anxious few months for me while Cal and the DA worked together to file all the legal motions and paperwork to get her out of jail. The DA had also been working on a
deal with Chris Miller, whose attorney suggested that if the DA was willing to take the death penalty off the table, his client might be inclined to make a full confession to both Dennis Gallagher's murder and Noah's.

That'd taken a whole three weeks of back-and-forth just on its own. I found little satisfaction, however, in reading the confession from Chris about the night of the murder. It'd actually gone down almost exactly as I'd suggested in the conference room to my fellow investigators. Chris had indeed planned to murder his son, frame his ex-wife, and stage her murder like a suicide.

His confession sickened me to the core.

Still, the week was made better by the news that Skylar was going to be set free at the end of September. Next to my actual wedding day (the second wedding day, not the first), it'd been the happiest day of my life.

Immediately following her release, Skylar and Cal had then worked out a deal with the city, in which Skylar agreed not to sue their pants off, and the city agreed to pay Skylar 4.5 million dollars. If you ask me, they got off easy. I'd have asked for double that.

We spent the evening with Skylar toasting her release and exoneration, and we all pestered her for details about how she was getting on and what she was doing, but she was more interested in us. So we laughed at Oscar, who was so smitten with his house, his dog, and his very cute house-sitting girlfriend, and we toasted my recent anniversary to the love of my life, and Candice's impending vacation in Switzerland with her gorgeous hubby over the Christmas holidays, and Cal's new sports car. A present to himself after the settlement with the city. We enjoyed the wonderful things happening in our lives and Skylar seemed to soak it all in like a thirsty sponge.

Toward the end of the evening, we each helped her clear the
table and gathered in the kitchen, where our host had laid out a delicious-looking buffet of tasty confections. While fresh coffee percolated, I noted a group of pictures tacked up onto the fridge. Noah's birthday photo was in the center, and spiraling out from that were the faces of about a dozen other children. “Who're these cutie-pies?” I asked.

Skylar moved over to the fridge and laid her hand gently on a few of the photos. “Those are my kids,” she said, with pride in her voice.

Cal leaned over—a pink-icing-covered confection in his hand—and said, “I helped Skylar set up a scholarship fund for underprivileged kids. It's called Noah's Nation, and Skylar is personally sponsoring these twelve little guys from charter school all the way through college, while also helping their moms out with extra food, clothing, counseling—whatever they need.”

“All the moms are single parents who left abusive relationships,” she told me. “One or two had substance abuse issues and are currently working the program.”

I noticed that on the counter there was a shiny new AA medallion. Skylar was still working it too. “Wow!” I said, so impressed with this woman. “Look at you, Skylar. Not out of jail even three months and you're already performing miracles.”

She blushed. “Noah would've loved it,” she said. “Do you know that Detective Dioli reached out to me in a letter to express how sorry he was for everything that happened? He even offered to volunteer for the Nation. He said he's good with a paintbrush, or for tutoring the kids, or whatever we need.” Dioli had retired from the police force shortly after his appearance at the Board of Pardons. There was a rumor that his superiors recommended that he take the early retirement, but I think he probably would've gotten there on his own. His reputation was pretty much ruined.

“And how does his apology sit with you?” Candice asked. I was wondering the same thing. I probably wouldn't have been able to forgive him, and, knowing me (as I do), I'd have told him where to stuff it.

“Well,” she said with a sigh, “it's hard. But I know Noah would've wanted me to forgive him, and the cause is so worthy, and I desperately need a little help, so how
can
I turn away his offer?”

“Easy,” I said. “You just say no to the person who almost had you killed.”

Skylar smiled at me. “Yes, but, Abby, when did you ever learn anything
worthy
by taking the easy route?”

That made me laugh, because Skylar was so right, and I realized I could definitely learn a thing or two about forgiveness from her. Wrapping my arm around her, I pulled her in for a sideways hug. “Good for you, girl,” I said. “Good for you.”

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