The Pact (32 page)

Dr. Feinstein rallied once more. “Whatever Chris says is protected by patient confidentiality,” he said. “You really don't have to be present.”

“Number one,” Jordan said, “patient confidentiality has been violated before in extreme circumstances, and Murder One certainly qualifies as one of those. Number two, the dynamics of your relationship with my client come second to my relationship with him. And if he's going to be putting his trust in anyone these days, it's me, Doctor. Because you might be able to save his mind, but I'm the only one who can save his life.”

Before the psychiatrist could answer, Chris appeared at the doorway. A smile broke over his face at the sight of Dr. Feinstein. “Hi,” he said. “I've, uh, had a change of address.”

“I can see that,” Dr. Feinstein chuckled, settling back in his chair with such ease that Jordan found it difficult to believe this same man had been shaking at the control booth only minutes before. “Your attorney graciously arranged for me to have a private meeting with you. Provided he's allowed to chaperone.”

Chris cut a glance toward his lawyer and shrugged. Jordan took that as

a very good sign. He sat down at the last empty chair and flattened his palms on the table.

“Why don't we start with how you're feeling?” Dr. Feinstein began. Chris turned toward Jordan. “Well... I feel weird with him here,” he said.

“Pretend I'm not,” Jordan suggested, closing his eyes. “Pretend I'm taking a nap.” Chris scraped his chair along the floor, turning it sideways so that he wouldn't see Jordan's face. “At first I was pretty scared,” he told the psychiatrist. “But then I figured out that if you keep to yourself it's okay. I just try to ignore most everybody.” He picked at the cuticle on his thumb.

“You must have a lot you want to say.”

Chris shrugged. “Maybe. I talk a little to one of my cellmates, Steve. He's all right. But there are things I don't tell anyone at all.”

Atta boy, Jordan thought silently.

“Do you want to talk about these things?”

“No. I don't,” Chris said. “But I think I need to.” He looked up at the psychiatrist. “Sometimes it feels like my head's going to crack apart.” Dr. Feinstein nodded. “I found out that Emily was... we were going to have a baby.”

He paused, as if waiting for Jordan to swoop in, avenging legal angel, to say that this was too closely related to the case to discuss. In the silence, Chris knotted his hands together, squeezing the knuckles tight against each other so that the pain would keep him focused. “When did you find out?” Dr. Feinstein asked, his face carefully blank.

“Two days ago,” Chris said softly. “When it was too late.” He looked up. “Do you want to hear the dream I had? Don't psychiatrists like dreams?”

Dr. Feinstein laughed. “Freudians do. I'm not a psychoanalyst, but go right ahead.”

“Well, I don't dream much in this place. You've got to understand, the doors are slamming shut all night, and every few minutes one of the more ob' noxious officers comes around on the catwalk and shines his flashlight in your face. So the fact that I slept deep enough to dream anything is pretty amazing. Anyway, I dreamed she was sitting next to me-Emily, I mean-and she was crying. I put my arms around her, and I could feel her shrinking away, into only skin and bones, so I hugged her a little tighter. But that just made her cry more, and curl up closer, and all of a sudden she hardly weighed anything at all and I looked down and saw that I was holding this baby.” Jordan shifted uncomfortably. When he'd included himself in this private session, he had not thought beyond the point of protecting Chris legally. Now, he was beginning to realize that the relationship between a psychiatrist and client was very different from the relationship between a lawyer and client. An attorney only had to draw out the facts. A psychiatrist was obligated to extract the feelings.

Jordan didn't want to hear Chris's feelings. He didn't want to hear Chris's dreams. That would mean getting involved personally, never a good idea when practicing law.

He had a fleeting vision of Chris, sucked dry on both accounts by Dr. Feinstein and himself, blowing away like a husk.

“Why do you think you had this dream?” Dr. Feinstein was saying.

“Oh-I'm not done yet. Something happened after.” Chris took a deep breath. “I was holding this baby, see, and it was screaming. Like it was hungry, but 1 couldn't figure out what to feed it. It kicked harder and harder, and I talked to it, but that didn't make a difference. So 1 kissed it on the forehead, and then I stood up and slammed its head onto the ground.”

Jordan buried his face in his hands. Oh, Christ, he prayed silently. Don't let Feinstein get subpoenaed.

“Well. A psychoanalyst would say something about you trying to return to the so-called childhood of your original relationship,” Dr. Feinstein said, smiling. “But I'd probably say it sounds like you were frustrated when you went to bed.”

“I took this psych course at school,” Chris continued, as if Feinstein had not spoken. "I think 1 can figure out why Emily turned into the baby in the dream-somehow I've got them connected in my mind. I even understand why I was trying to kill it-that guy Steve I was talking about, my cellmate?

He's in here because he shook his baby to death. So that was already going around my head, too, when I went to sleep."

Dr. Feinstein cleared his throat. “How did you feel when you woke up from the dream?”

“That's the thing,” Chris said. “I wasn't sad. I was totally pissed off.”

“Why do you think you were angry?”

Chris shrugged. “You're the one who said that emotions all jumble together.” Feinstein smiled. “So you were listening,” he said. “In this dream, you hurt the baby. Might you be angry about the fact that Emily was pregnant?”

“Wait a second,” Jordan objected, aware that critical information was about to be revealed. But Chris wasn't listening. “How could I be?” he said. “By the time I found out about it, it didn't make much difference.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” Chris said sullenly.

“Because isn't an answer,” Dr. Feinstein said.

“Because she's dead,” Chris exploded. He slumped down in his chair and ran his hand through his hair. “God,” he said softly. “I am mad at her.”

Jordan leaned forward, his hands clasped between his knees. He remembered how, the day Deborah had left him, he'd gone to work at the DA's office and had picked Thomas up at day care and acted as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. And then a week later Thomas had knocked pver a cup of milk and Jordan had all but skinned him alive-he, who had never struck his son-before he realized who he was really trying to punish.

“Why are you angry at her, Chris?” Dr. Feinstein asked softly.

“Because she kept it a secret,” Chris said hotly. “She said she loved me. When you love someone you let them take care of you.”

Dr. Feinstein was silent for a moment, watching his patient gather control. “If she'd told you about the baby, how would you have taken care of her?”

“I would have married her,” he said immediately. “A couple of years wouldn't have made a difference.”

“Hmm. Do you think Emily knew you would have married her?”

“Yes,” Chris said firmly.

“And what is it about this that scares the hell out of you?”

For a moment, Chris was speechless, his eyes set on Dr. Feinstein as if he was wondering whether the man was a seer. Then he looked away and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “My whole life was about her,” Chris said, his voice thick. “What if her whole life wasn't all about me?” He bowed his head at the same instant that Jordan lurched to his feet and walked out of the conference room, breaking his own rules so he would not have to listen anymore.

The Hartes' HOUSE was decorated, for the most part, in the serviceable New England WASP style that included spindly Chippendale furniture, threadbare antique carpets, and paintings of stiff-lipped subjects who were not related to the family. By contrast, the kitchen-where Jordan was currently sitting-looked as if several ethnic festivals had recently collided within it. Delft tiles decorated the splashboard of the sink; Colonial lad-derback chairs offset a marble-topped ice cream parlor table; a shoji screen blocked off the doorway to the dining room. Rainbow-hued Zapotec Indian place mats surrounded a German Hofbrauhaus beer stein, which held a mismatched assortment of silverware and plastic utensils. The eclectic surroundings set off Gus Harte beautifully, Jordan thought, as he watched her pour him a glass of cold water. As for James-he turned his attention to the man, hands shoved in his pockets as he stared out the window at a bird feeder-well, he probably spent his time in the rest of the house.

“There you go,” Gus said, drawing up the second chair to the tiny round table. She frowned at its surface. “Do we need to move?” she asked. “There isn't much room here.” They should have moved; Jordan had brought a crate full of papers. But there was something about being in one of the more staid, conservative rooms that didn't appeal to Jordan, not when it came to discussing a case that required nearly gymnastic flexibility. “This is fine,” he said, steepling his hands. He looked from Gus to James. “I came today to talk about your testimonies.”

“Testimonies?”

It had been Gus's question; Jordan let his eyes touch on her face. “Yes,” he said. “We're going to need you as a character witness for Chris. Who knows him better than his own mother?” Gus nodded, her face pale. “What do I have to talk about?”

Jordan smiled sympathetically. It was quite common for people to be afraid of going up on the stand; after all, every eye in the courtroom was focused on you. “Nothing you won't have heard before, Gus,” he assured her. “We'll talk about the questions I'm going to put to you before the actual testimony. Basically we'll cover Chris's character, his interests, his relationship with Emily. Whether, in your esteemed opinion, your son could ever have committed murder.”

“But the attorney general-doesn't she get to ask questions too?”

“She does,” Jordan said smoothly, “but we can probably figure out what they're going to be.”

“What if she asks me if Chris was suicidal?” Gus blurted out. “I'd have to lie.”

“If she does, I'll object. On the grounds that you're not an expert in teen suicide. So then Barrie Delaney will rephrase, and ask whether Chris ever mentioned anything to you about killing himself, to which you'll simply say no.”

Jordan pivoted in his seat to address James, who was still looking out the window. “As for you, James, we're not going to use you as a character witness. What I'd like to get out of you is the possibility that Emily might have taken the gun herself. Did Emily know where the guns were kept in your household?”

“Yes,” James said softly.

“And did she ever see you take one from the gun cabinet? Or Chris, for that matter?”

“I'm sure she did,” James said.

“So is it possible, since you weren't there to actually see it happen, that it was Emily and not Chris who removed the Colt from the safe?”

“It's possible,” James said, and Jordan broke into a smile.

“There,” he said. “That's all you'll have to say.”

James lifted a finger and set a stained-glass angel sun catcher swinging in the window.

“Unfortunately,” he said, “I won't be taking the stand.”

“Excuse me?” Jordan sputtered. He'd believed, until this moment, that the Hartes would condone anything short of and possibly including bribery to get their son free. “You won't take the stand?” James shook his head. “I can't.”

“I see,” Jordan said, although he didn't. “Could you tell me why?” The cuckoo clock on the wall came obscenely to life, its small dweller slipping out like a tongue seven consecutive times. “Actually,” James said, “no.”

Jordan was the first to recover his voice. “You do understand that all the defense has to do to vindicate Chris is present a reasonable doubt. And that your testimony, as the owner of that gun, would almost singlehandedly do that.”

“I understand,” James said. “And I refuse.”

“You bastard.” Gus stood in front of the shoji screen, her arms crossed. “You selfish, rotten bastard.” She walked up to her husband, so close her anger stirred the strands of his hair. “Tell him why you won't do it.” James turned away. “Tell him!” She whipped around to face Jordan. “It has nothing to do with stage fright,” she said tightly. “It's because if James gets up at the trial, he can't pretend that this was all a nasty nightmare. If he gets up at the trial, he's actively involved in defending his son . . . which would mean there was a problem in the first place.” She snorted in disgust, and James pushed past her and left the room.

For a moment both Jordan and Gus were quiet. Then she sat down in the chair across from him once again, her hands toying with the collection of silverware in the beer mug, making it clink against the ceramic lip. “I can put him on the witness list,” Jordan said, “in case he changes his mind.”

“He won't,” Gus said. “But you can ask me the questions you were going to ask him.” Surprised, Jordan lifted his brows. “You've seen Emily with Chris when he was getting into the gun cabinet?”

“No,” Gus said. “Actually, I don't even know where James keeps the key.” She scrubbed her thumbnail over the engraved design of the mug. “But I'll say anything you need me to, for Chris.”

“Yes,” Jordan murmured. “I imagine you would.”

THE UNWRITTEN RULE in the jail was that baby killers got no peace. If they were showering, you threw things into the stall. If they were shitting, you walked in on them. If they were sleeping, you woke them up.

As the medium security ward population dwindled-supposedly, the huge influx occurred after the Christmas holiday-the two prisoners who'd shared a cell with Chris and Steve were moved out. One was transferred to maximum security for spitting at an officer. The other finished his sentence and was released. With these cellmates out of the picture, Hector began anew his campaign to make Steve pay for his crime.

Unfortunately, Chris still shared the cell with Steve.

One Monday when Chris was sleeping, Hector began to bang on the bars of the cell. Privacy was an illusion in jail, especially during times when they weren't locked down. But even if the door to a cell was open, you did not walk in uninvited. And if the inhabitants were asleep, you left them alone.