“Have you decided yet?” Paul pulled back and peered into her face. “Can we go out to eat?”
“I told you we’d have to ask Daddy. When he gets home, we’ll ask him if we can go for pizza, okay? He should be here any minute.”
“Oh, boy,” Paul yelled, jumping up and down. “I’m gonna go watch for him out the window.”
“No, you go wash your hands and face and put on a clean shirt. Give that Kool-Aid one to Juliet to wash. I’ll go watch out the window.” She picked up Melissa. Paul ran down the hall to the children’s bathroom. “You’re getting heavy, my girl. Pretty soon Mommy won’t be able to pick you up any more.”
“Pretty soon I’ll be all grown up,” Melissa said.
A car pulled into the driveway, and its engine cut off. She carried Melissa into the den where they peeked through the mini-blinds. They watched as Zack’s lean frame unfolded from the white Lexus SUV he’d insisted he had to have. His light brown hair glistened in the evening sun. He glanced around the neighborhood and waved to some neighbors. He gave the impression of being in a good mood, though Dena could tell by the way he held his head and the bend of his shoulders that all was not as it appeared.
She sighed and released Melissa to run greet her father. This would be their last night together for more than a week. She couldn’t wait for him to be gone, for the tension in the house to leave with him. Dropping the mini-blinds, she walked to the kitchen door leading to the garage. When he came inside, the garage door groaned in the background as it closed.
“Hello.”
“Daddy,” Melissa called out.
“Why is the garage door open?” He ran his fingers through one of Melissa’s ringlets and patted her cheek.
Dena flexed her jaw and reigned in her anger. “I guess I didn’t close it when I got home. Paul met me in the garage.”
Zack’s dark eyes glared down at her. “I’ve told you a hundred times, Dena. One of these days someone is going to waltz inside and rape you or Juliet and kill all of you, and it will be because you were too damn trusting to close the garage door. What do I have to do to convince you?”
“Don’t talk like that in front of the children.”
Melissa looked from one to the other of them.
“I apologize. I figured you’d be home pretty soon anyway.” Seemed like the men in her life were always fussing at her. She couldn’t wait to put some distance between herself and them, to be her own boss in every sense of the word. “I’ll try harder to remember.”
“You’ve got to start taking things more seriously. How many times do I have to tell you that everyone out there in the world is not like you and I?”
“Me,” she said. “You and me.”
Zack shot her a dark look. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you.” He brushed past her, dropping his briefcase on the table. At the wet bar in the far corner of the den, he started mixing himself a drink. Melissa had followed him and stood next to him staring up. “Where’s Paul now, anyway?”
The air filled with the smell of bourbon. “Getting cleaned up.” She crossed the room and picked up Melissa. “The kids want to go out to eat.”
He held a bourbon and water in his hand. “So you’re not going to cook again?” He sipped his drink.
Dena bit her lip. He seemed to be deliberately goading her. He knew she hated the smell of bourbon. It reminded her of vomiting up bourbon and Coke at college. Backing away, she dropped into her rocking chair, Melissa on her lap. Juliet hadn’t left yet, and Melissa wasn’t so young that she didn’t at least pick up on harsh tones of voice even if she wasn’t old enough to understand what was going on. An argument wasn’t what she wanted, anyhow. What she wanted was to have something to eat, play with the kids, put them to bed, and work on the files she’d brought home, before going to bed herself. “I can cook if you want. Paul just asked me before I ever got out of the car. I think he wants to go for pizza at Mario’s.”
Zack set his glass down on the counter and bent down, putting his face very close to hers, spewing bourbon breath. “I don’t give a damn what Paul wants to do, but if it will keep this family happy the last night before I leave, I’m in agreement.”
Melissa reached out to him. “Pick me up, Daddy.”
“Daddy. Daddy.” Paul came around the corner and jumped into Zack’s arms before Zack had a chance to take Melissa from Dena. “Can we go eat pizza?” Paul grabbed Zack’s cheeks one in each fist, pulling Zack’s face toward his.
Melissa said, “Yea, pizza.”
Zack’s laugh was strained, but the kids took no notice. “Are you paying for it?”
“I don’t got no money, Daddy,” Paul said, still holding onto his father’s cheeks and staring into his eyes, nose-to-nose.
“I don’t have any money,” Dena said.
Zack shot Dena another grim look.
“Daddy’s got money,” Melissa said, clapping her hands. “Daddy. Mama. Let’s go get pizza.”
Dena chewed on her lower lip. In spite of the way she felt about Zack, the kids loved their father, and he clearly loved them as well. It would be hard on the kids to take them away from their father, but they're growing up around the increasing hostility between their parents wouldn’t be any better. “Guess majority rules.”
Zack looked from one of the children to the other. “Anything to make my children happy, huh, kids?” He glanced at Juliet who stood in the background. “You can come too, if you want.”
Paul hugged his father’s neck. “Thank you, Daddy.”
“No thank you, Mr. Armstrong,” Juliet said, clutching her purse to her chest. “I have a class tonight. Have a pleasant evening together.”
Dena walked Juliet to the front door. When she returned, she caught a glimpse of the children in her husband’s arms. For just the barest moment she felt like an outsider peering through a window, a taste of what it would be like when she and Zack divorced. More than likely, there would be split custody. The children’s time would be divided between the parents. Grimacing, Dena resolved to make a fair deal for both of them when the time came. The children shouldn’t be deprived of either parent, and the parents should put the best interests of the children first.
CHAPTER FIVE
ALAN SELLERS
Searching for a parking space, Sellers drove around the lots close to the Justice Center several times before breaking down and leaving his car across the street. He wore tan slacks and a flowered shirt, not tucked in, and his running shoes. The summer heat and humidity caused him to break a sweat before he ever got to the door. He clutched the papers he’d been served by some red-headed girl two weeks earlier. He hadn’t heard from Ginny, and the redhead surprised him outside his apartment. He hadn’t expected court papers, especially ones that said what those did.
Now, when he pushed through the glass doors, he found people waiting to go through metal detectors. He raked his damp, thinning hair with his fingers when he stopped at the end of the line. July in Texas always made him feel like a sausage link frying on a grill.
His watch indicated he only had about two minutes before he’d be late. He didn’t even know what courtroom the case was in. He felt for the handle of the fillet knife in his back pocket under his shirttail. He’d have to stash it somewhere, and he didn’t have time to go back to his car. He hurried back outside where he ditched the knife in the ground under a clump of pink-flowered bushes. He hoped no one would notice the handle sticking out of the dirt.
Moments later, he elbowed his way in front of other people, mumbling about being late for court. He emptied his pockets into a plastic container on the counter and stepped through the archway. “Which way to domestic relations court?”
“Lemme see your papers.” A deputy looked at the documents and then said, “Up the elevator to six then down the hall to the right.”
“Thanks, Buddy.” Sellers stuck his hand between the elevator’s closing doors, forcing them to open back up. He dumpe
d his keys and change into his pockets as he rode.
There were two courtrooms on six. He opened the door to one. A bunch of men in jail clothes sat in the front. He recognized their jumpsuits from when he was in the county jail.
Jogging to the other end of the hall, he flung open the door just as Ginny stepped down from the witness stand. She walked toward a table where another, somewhat older woman stood. He stepped into the courtroom.
Ginny’s straight blond hair hung to her waist, shining in the fluorescent lights. She looked like a teenybopper. He walked to the front of the courtroom, past the bench seats where Mary, Ginny’s bitch of a sister, sat. When Ginny turned toward him, and her eyes flared wide, Sellers felt like he’d already won the first round. He started to wave but remembered what she had filed on him and the things the papers said. Bad enough she had filed for divorce when they weren’t even married, but that protective order thing made him sound like a wife-beater. The other woman faced the bench, and Ginny tugged on the woman’s sleeve.
“He was finally served this time, Your Honor, but he hasn’t shown up.” She turned in response to Ginny, her face registering his arrival with a flicker of a frown. She wasn’t much bigger than Ginny, but he could tell she was a lot older, about the same age as him. She wore large black-framed glasses, which made her eyes look really big. “Never mind, Your Honor, he’s here now.”
Sellers looked past the woman lawyer at the thin-faced, gray-haired judge. The judge scowled behind his own glasses, his lips pressed together, tight as a vise.
A black man the size of a bear stepped toward Sellers. He had a badge on his jacket pocket. Sellers’ stomach turned over. He should have hired a lawyer.
“Very well, Mrs. Armstrong,” the judge said. “Call your next witness.”
“Alan Sellers,” the attorney said. Ginny gave him a lot of space and walked to one of the tables.
“Mr. Sellers, step up here to the witness stand,” the judge said. “Raise your right hand. Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”
Sellers almost laughed aloud at how much the judge looked like the grim reaper in that black robe. His gray hair faded into a face as pale as bleached bones. His eyes were dark and sunken in their sockets. “Yes, Sir, Your Honor.” He heard a tremble in his voice and hoped no one noticed. No way did he want them to think he was scared of what they might do to him.
The judge’s eyes followed him as he sat down. The big bear-like man stood next to the witness box and said in a low, rumbling voice, “Roll your chair up to that microphone so you can speak right into it.”
Sellers obeyed and glanced at the deputy for approval.
The officer’s forehead furrowed, and he grunted at Sellers. He stepped back and sat in a chair near the door to the hallway. His jacket fell open, exposing a side arm in a shoulder holster.
Sellers shivered.
The judge turned his attention to the lawyer. “Proceed, Mrs. Armstrong.”
Under the cover of the witness box, Sellers rubbed his sweaty palms on his pants. Everything was dim and dreamlike. The clock on the wall ticked as the second hand circled around. The time between seconds seemed like minutes. When his eyes met those of the lawyer’s, he had the distinct feeling he knew her or had seen her before. He glanced away, then back.
“Isn’t it true you first beat your wife about two weeks after you moved in together?” The lawyer had sat down at one of the long tables. Ginny rolled her chair up next to her.
Alan hadn’t dreamed much since he was a kid. He knew everyone dreamed, but he rarely remembered he even had a dream, much less what it had been about. Sitting there in the witness box, he recalled dreaming of his mother. He’d been a little boy and had wet the bed. He tiptoed as quietly as he could to the hall closet for dry sheets, but his father came out of his room and backhanded Alan into the wall. The occurrence had been a frequent one. Eventually, he quit dreaming of her. Later, he quit wetting the bed. Sometime, he didn’t really remember when, he had quit dreaming altogether. His father hadn’t quit backhanding him, though.
Shaking off the rush of memories, he focused on being in court. His eyes met those of the lawyer again. Behind those thick glasses, the color of her eyes was difficult to make out. They looked light brown or green, maybe even hazel, like his. Her face came into focus. A scowl drew her eyebrows together.
What were they going to do to him? His discipline of Ginny hadn’t been that bad. Not like when his father had hit him. He tried to catch Ginny’s eye, but she had slid her chair behind the lawyer where he couldn’t see her. Would they give him jail time?
“Mr. Sellers?” He heard the judge’s deep voice again. “Mr. Sellers. You don’t have to testify. But if you don’t wish to testify, you must step down. You have the right not to incriminate yourself, Sir.”
Sellers came to his senses, staring into the lawyer’s eyes. He cleared his throat. Ginny peeked around the lawyer’s shoulder. “What was the question?”
CHAPTER SIX
DENA
“Isn’t it true you first beat your wife about two weeks after you moved in together?” Dena repeated and stared at Alan Sellers, waiting for an answer. Something was familiar about him, something disconcerting she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Although sure she’d never met him before, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she knew him. She’d figure it out eventually. It would probably be one of those things she’d wake up in the middle of the night remembering.
“Mr. Sellers,” the judge said again. “Mr. Sellers, if you don’t wish to testify you must step down. You don’t have to incriminate yourself, Sir.”
“I’ll answer,” Sellers said. His eyes pierced Dena to the core.
“Isn’t it true?” Dena had written her cross-examination questions on a legal pad since she hadn’t performed a cross-examination in a family violence case. Although she wanted to be a great litigator someday, she knew she had a long way to go. This early in her career, she hoped she looked self-confident, even if she didn’t always feel that way.
Alan Sellers’ eyes darted around the courtroom as if searching for an escape route. Finally, he said, “No, Ma’am.”
Dena inhaled and continued, “Isn’t it true, Mr. Sellers, that on the night you and Ginny moved into your own apartment from her sister’s, you got drunk, accosted your wife in the kitchen where she was cooking your dinner, yanked her head back by the hair, tried to pour beer down her throat, and when she wouldn’t swallow, you dumped it all over her and threw her to the floor?”
“No, Ma’am. That’s not true.” The muscles flexed in his jaw.
“And after you threw her to the floor, you tore off her shorts and tried to rape her.” Dena’s heart pounded. Her hands shook, so she put them in her lap. After a moment, she smoothed the hem of her brown skirt and pulled it down over her knees. She glanced from Sellers to Ginny. As slight as Sellers was for a man, Ginny was even smaller, not more than five feet tall. She looked hardly old enough to date, much less marry a man in his early thirties.
“No, Mrs. Armstrong, that didn’t happen, and if Ginny told you that, she’s a liar. I never touched her that she didn’t want me to.” His face softened. He turned in his chair toward the judge. “Judge Johnson, I never did that. Make her stop saying I did those things.”
“Young man,” the judge said, “you said you wished to testify. Mrs. Armstrong has the right to question you in the manner in which she has been proceeding.” He nodded at Dena. “Go ahead, Counsel.”
“Thank you, Your Honor,” Dena said, hiding a smile. “Now, Mr. Sellers, to give credit where credit is due, you didn’t rape your wife the night y’all moved into your apartment, did you?”
“No, Ma’am,” he said, sitting a bit straighter in his chair and folding his hands on the counter in front of him.
Dena adjusted her glasses and looked down at the legal pad
resting on the table beside her. She made a check on the paper. “You didn’t rape your wife the next night either, did you?”
“No, Ma’am. I didn’t.” He visibly relaxed.
“Or the next?”
“No, Ma’am.” A confident smile grew on his face.
Dena’s voice grew louder as she spoke. “In fact, isn’t it true you didn’t succeed in raping your wife until approximately four weeks ago? And wasn’t that after you had beaten her so severely—”
“No.”
“—so brutally, that she could scarcely see out of either eye? And isn’t it true you forced her to have sex with you at the point of a fillet knife with which you have threatened her on several occasions?”
“No, Ma’am. I never did.”
“May I approach the witness, Your Honor?” Dena rose, holding two glossy eight-by-ten, black and white photos.
The judge nodded. “Certainly.”
“How do you explain your wife’s appearance in these pictures, Mr. Sellers?” Dena spun the pictures down on the counter in front of him like she was dealing from a deck of cards. “If you never hit your wife, how could she possibly have turned up at the hospital looking like this?” She pointed with her fountain pen at Ginny’s face in the photographs.
Sellers’ tan face paled when he glanced at the prints. His eyes swept past Dena and stopped on Ginny. “Oh, Honey,” he said in a sorrowful voice, “who did this to you?”
Heat flared in Dena’s cheeks. Surprised at her own anger, she said, “Come on, Mr. Sellers. Are you going to sit there and tell Judge Johnson that you never touched your wife?” Her face was so close to his that she could smell his body odor. He stank like rotten meat. “Do you understand the nature of the oath you took before you got on the witness stand?” She snatched the pictures from in front of him and took them to the bench where she handed them up to the judge. Ginny had already testified to them before Sellers’ arrival. Taking several long strides back to the table, she threw her pen down.
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