“Tell us what you know about Lute Pettijohn’s murder, Bobby, and you walk out of here.”
“Sounds good.”
Up to this point Alex hadn’t moved. Now she turned to Perkins. “Is it necessary for us to listen to this?”
The lawyer asked Smilow to stop the tape so he could confer with Alex. Smilow courteously complied. Perkins whispered a question to her. She answered quietly. They consulted in undertones for about sixty seconds.
Then Perkins said, “You can’t seriously validate this man’s statements. He’s bargaining for a dismissal of charges against him. Obviously he told you what you wanted to hear.”
Smilow said, “If he’s lying, then it doesn’t matter to Dr. Ladd what he said, does it?”
“It matters in that it could prove embarrassing for her.”
“I’m sorry for any embarrassment. But I would think Dr. Ladd would want to hear what’s being alleged about her. She’s free to jump in and refute anything he says at any time.”
Perkins turned to her. “It’s up to you.”
She gave the attorney a curt nod.
“All right, Smilow,” he said. “But this is cheap theatrics and you know it.”
The rebuke bounced off Smilow, who restarted the tape at the point where he repeated his question about how Trimble had supported himself and his sister.
“We got by for a time, with me doing this and that,” he replied. “But I was busting my ass trying to keep food on the table and Alex in clothes. She was growing, you know, like teenage girls do. Blossoming.”
Trimble’s tone dropped to a confidential pitch. “It was seeing how she was filling out that first gave me the idea.”
“What idea?”
“I’m getting to it,” he said, nettled by Smilow’s impatience. “I started noticing how my buddies looked at my baby sister. In a whole new light, you might say. I overheard a few remarks. And that’s when the idea first occurred to me.”
Hammond propped his left elbow on the fist of the arm in the sling and covered his mouth with his hand. He wanted to stop up his ears. He wanted to throw the tape recorder against the wall. He wanted to slap the shit out of Steffi, who was smiling smugly at Alex. He was helpless to do anything except to listen, just as she was being forced to do.
The difference in Trimble’s diction and syntax was noticeable. Talking about his past had caused him to lapse into the speech patterns of his youth. He sounded more crass. More uncouth. More lewd.
“The first time it happened by accident. I mean, I didn’t plan it. Alex and I were with this friend of mine. He had stolen a six-pack of beer and we met in this abandoned garage to drink it. He started teasing Alex and…” A squeak of a chair as he shifted his weight. “Eventually he dared her to raise her shirt and give him a look at her top.
“Alex told him no way, José. But she didn’t mean it. She was giggling, playing along, you know. And damned if she didn’t finally do it. I told him that in exchange for seeing my little sister’s tits—sorry, breasts—he had to give me the extra beer. He said no way in hell because all he had really seen was her brassiere. But the next time—”
Hammond’s left hand shot out and stopped the recorder. “We all get the drift, Smilow. Dr. Ladd’s half-brother exploited her. It’s disputable whether or not she went along willingly. But in any case, it’s ancient history.”
“Not that ancient.”
“Twenty, twenty-five years! What in God’s name does this have to do with Lute Pettijohn?”
“We’re coming to that,” Steffi said. “It all ties in together.”
“The rest of you can sit in here and listen to this tripe,” Frank Perkins said, also coming to his feet. “But I will not allow my client to be subjected to listening to it.”
“I’m afraid I can’t allow Dr. Ladd to leave,” Smilow said.
“Do you plan to formally charge her with a crime?” Sarcastically Perkins added, “One allegedly committed this decade?”
Smilow evaded giving him a direct answer. “If you don’t want to hear the remainder of the tape, I must ask you to wait in the other room until Mr. Cross has heard all of it.”
“Fine.”
“No.” Alex spoke quietly but with resolve. All eyes moved to her. “Bobby Trimble is trash. Over the last twenty years, he’s acquired some polish, but he’s still a lowlife. I want to hear everything he says. I have a right to know what he’s saying about me. As horrible as it is for me even to hear his voice, I need to listen to this, Frank.”