Chapters (148)

I dropped a dollar in quarters into the slot, stabbed a couple of buttons, and watched the orange packet of Reese’s Pieces clunk down the chute.

I was here for the night. I wanted to believe that we were going to unmask a depraved killer and save lives.

But there was an awful possibility that all I was doing was making an ass of myself. Jesus, that poor guy and his wife. What a disaster.

Part Six: THE VERDICT

Part Six

THE VERDICT

Chapter 102

OF ALL THE DAMN DAYS to be late.

Cindy grappled with her oversized handbag, shifted her computer bag to her left shoulder as she walked quickly up McAllister toward the Civic Center Courthouse, thinking how she hadn’t missed a day of court since the trial started four weeks ago.

Now the grueling testimonies and scalding cross-examinations were over.

Today O’Mara and Kramer would make their closing arguments whether or not she was on the courthouse steps when the doors opened.

God.

If she lost her seat to another reporter—it was a possibility too grim to consider.

Cindy sprinted across McAllister against the light, crossing to the courthouse, a pale stone block of a building cut on the diagonal, facing the intersection of McAllister and Polk.

Looking up, she was relieved to see the courthouse doors were still closed.

And she saw Yuki standing at the edge of the crowd at the top of the steps, gripping the handle of her briefcase with both hands. Her eyes were fixed on the middle distance, seeming to see nothing.

Cindy had an anxious thought about Yuki, her weight loss, her fragility. Also, the simple fact that she hadn’t gone to work since her mother died.

The trial was consuming her, and it showed big-time.

Cindy threaded her way through the mob standing on the courthouse steps. She called out to Yuki as she climbed.

Yuki saw her at last, saying, “What happened? I was so worried about you.”

“Breakdown on BART,” Cindy told her. “I was stuck between stations for half an hour. I almost went crazy.”

The security guards opened the heavy steel doors, and Cindy and Yuki were swept along with the buzzing crowd pouring into the courthouse.

A packed elevator took them to the fourth floor, where they got separated on their way to courtroom 4A. Cindy went directly to the last bench in the room, the one against the back wall reserved for the press.

She scanned the courtroom as it filled, then booted up her laptop.

She began to type.

Maureen O’Mara wore a tomato-red Oscar de la Renta suit, Cindy wrote. This is her game suit, her fighting color, how she wants the jury to remember her summation.

Chapter 103

JUDGE CARTER BEVINS shook his wristwatch, then turned his bespectacled eyes on Maureen O’Mara. He asked her if she was ready to proceed.