Killer Ambition - [77]

Declan nodded. “I agree. I thought he protested a lot too much.” He paused. “Can we tell when that blood drop was left on the trunk?” Declan asked.

“Blood smear, and no. So the defense could argue that Hayley’s blood got on the trunk at a different time than Ian’s. But it’s a loser. What are the odds they’d both swipe the same exact spot on the trunk of someone else’s car-on two different occasions?”

Declan nodded. “But you can’t say for sure which guy killed them.”

“Not yet.”

I sure hoped that would change…soon.

“I think Russell’s in denial,” Declan said. “He doesn’t want to believe someone he thought was, like, his closest friend would do something this heinous.”

“I’m sure. It’s horrible enough to suffer through the death of a child. But it’s a whole new form of hell to know that the murder was committed by someone close to you. He’s probably dealing with a fair amount of guilt right now.”

But an awful suspicion had leaped into my mind during the fight with Russell. One I didn’t want to be right about. One I couldn’t share with Declan. So we rode on in silence until he pulled off the freeway at Broadway.

We talked about what we’d need to do to get ready for trial as we walked back to the courthouse, and when we got up to the office, I told him that if he had any work left on his other cases, now was the time to wrap it up.

“I’m going to finish up my ‘to do’ list. When it’s done, I’ll call you and we can divvy up the work.”

“Got it.” Declan turned to go, then stopped and held out his hand. “I just want to thank you for letting me be your second chair. I know it’s an honor I probably don’t deserve, but that doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate it. So…uh, thank you.”

We shook, and I found my attitude toward him softening. He really wasn’t what I’d expected. “No, thank you, Declan. I was glad to have you there. That got a lot uglier than I thought it would.”

I started to work on my list, but our discussion about Russell and his feelings of guilt had struck a familiar chord. It brought back memories of my father. He’d felt guilty too. At the time, I was so young, and so consumed with my own shame and feelings of responsibility for my sister’s abduction, I hadn’t been able to see that his anger, his emotional distance, and his drinking were all ways of coping with his own guilt.

But now, with the benefit of hindsight, a few more pieces of my childhood puzzle fell into place. After Romy was abducted, my father started taking me with him to go target shooting. At the time, I’d thought that was just something he’d always liked to do, and that he’d started bringing me along to make me feel better, to distract me from my loneliness.

But that wasn’t quite right. My father hadn’t done any target shooting before Romy’s disappearance. It was only after her abduction that he bought a gun and taught me how to shoot. I was only seven years old, but day after day, when I came home from school, he’d take me out to the fields near the woods and drill me on how to aim, shoot, and take apart a gun. And that wasn’t all. He’d “play games” that I only now realized were survival training. “I’m the bad guy and you’re the cop, Rachel.” He’d reach out as if to grab my arm. “Now what do you do?” I had to show him how I’d move out of range and pull my gun. “Now let’s pretend you’re walking along and I sneak up behind you. What do you do, Rachel?” I learned all the moves.

Though he insisted on perfection, and the “games” quickly got to be repetitive, I’d loved every minute. It was the only time I got to see him smile. Whenever I hit the can during target practice, or gave the right answer, or made the right move, I’d look to see his reaction. Was he smiling? Rarely. But when he was, my heart would soar. More often, his face had a sad, faraway look, or an expression that was fierce, intense…and scary. Still, I turned back to him time after time, because those rare smiles were the only source of joy in my dark, gray world. They showed me the father I used to know, the one who’d swing me by my arms as I screamed with sheer joy, who’d put me on his shoulders and gallop to play horsy, who could make me laugh with just a word or a funny face. Dad was always there for me. Until he wasn’t.

In my limited child’s-eye view, I couldn’t see that those “games” were really my father’s effort to keep me safe. Romy’s abduction had taught him that the only way to fight back against a world that bred the kind of predators who would snatch a little girl off the road was to teach me to fight for myself. No one else could be relied on. Not even himself. And ultimately, I think his broken vision of himself as caretaker and protector was too much for him to bear. Which was why, over time, our “playdates” dwindled-and so did his sober moments. For the last full month before he skidded off that icy bridge, there were no more games.

47

The following morning I was up early and pushing through my closet. I had to find a suit that would look good enough for the arraignment but not make me sweat through it on my way to the courthouse. I pulled out a few possibilities and turned on the television to catch what they were saying about the case. News of Ian Powers’s arrest had gone nationwide, and from the looks of things, the tsunami had hit. A spray-tanned, hair-gelled anchor announced with unrestrained zeal: