Chapter 102
“WHAT DO YOU SAY we go out the front door today?” Mickey said, taking my arm. “It’s Friday. The case will be on hold throughout the weekend and that makes me think this is a good time to ‘meet the press.’”
I walked between my attorneys into the hallway and from there down the marble stairs and out onto McAllister. The corner of the Civic Center Courthouse is cut on an angle so that the building faces kitty-corner onto the wide intersection and the manicured park across from Civic Center Plaza.
By contrast to the dark of the courthouse, the sunshine was blinding. And, as it had been since the beginning of my trial, McAllister was so jammed, I couldn’t see over the press and the satellite vans that were lining the curb.
It was like the scene outside the O. J. Simpson courtroom. The same kind of adrenaline-fueled madness that masked the truth, whatever that might be. This trial wasn’t worthy of the world stage. The media exposure was all about viewership, ratings, advertising dollars. Be that as it may, today I was “it.”
Like hounds on a rabbit, the press saw me and closed in for the kill. Mickey was ready with his statement, but he never got to deliver it.
“How long do you think the jury will be out, Mr. Sherman?”
“I don’t know, but I’m sure, however long it takes, the jury will find Lieutenant Boxer innocent of all charges.”
“Lieutenant Boxer, if the jury finds against you —”
“That’s unlikely to happen,” Yuki answered for me.
“Ms. Castellano, this is your first high-profile case. How do you think you did?”
Fifteen feet away, a crowd was also forming around Mason Broyles, his clients, and his deputies. Film rolled as the medical attendant moved Sam Cabot down a wooden ramp and loaded him into a van. Reporters followed, firing questions at Sam as his father did his best to shield the boy.
I picked Cindy out of the crowd. She was shouldering through the sardine can-packed bodies, trying to get closer to me. And that’s why I wasn’t paying much attention to Mickey when he answered his cell phone.
Then his hand was on my shoulder. His face was totally gray.
“I just got a heads-up from the clerk’s office,” he shouted into my ear. “The jury has a couple of questions.”
We pressed through the crowd, making our way to the street and Mickey’s waiting car. Yuki and I got into the backseat, and Mickey got in front beside his driver.
“What did they want to know?” Yuki asked as soon as the doors closed. The car moved slowly through the crowd, heading toward Redwood.
“They want to see the evidence of Lindsay’s alcohol intake,” Mickey said, turning to face us.
“Christ,” Yuki said. “How could they still be stuck on that?”
“What else?” I asked urgently. “You said there were two things.”
I saw Mickey hesitate. He didn’t want to tell me, but he had to do it.
“They wanted to know if there was a limit on how much money they could award the plaintiffs,” he said.
Chapter 103
IT WAS A GUT shot, and the shock resonated from my solar plexus throughout my body. I felt my stomach drop and bile rise into my throat. I had envisioned losing this case in terms of a fanciful, theoretical aftermath: working at street fairs, reading books on the deck of some beach house, la-de-da. But I hadn’t taken into account the full emotional impact of the reality of losing.
Beside me, Yuki squealed, “Oh, my God, it’s all my fault. I shouldn’t have said ‘find her guilty of being a good cop, blah blah.’ It was a flourish! I thought it was good, but I was wrong.”
“You did a great job,” I said, my voice as heavy as stone. “This has nothing to do with what you said.”
I wrapped my arms around myself and lowered my head. Mickey and Yuki were talking together. I heard Mickey assure her that the fat lady hadn’t yet sung, but the voice in my mind was a needle stuck in an old-fashioned record groove.
One question kept repeating.
How could this be?
How could this be?