They were escorted through a small security area, including a metal detector, although Nevvie’s purse was manually searched because there wasn’t an x-ray machine like in the main lobby. Then he led them down several back hallways until they reached a small conference room off the side of a courtroom.
“Do you have any questions about today?” the prosecutor asked Nevvie.
“Any chance she’ll plead guilty?”
Although Nevvie suspected that wouldn’t happen.
“Doubtful. And this is a preliminary arraignment. I suspect her public defender will make a couple of motions regarding her state of mind and asking for psychiatric evaluations.”
“Gee, she tried to kill me, among other things, and she might be crazy. Go figure.”
“It’s the process,” Bob said.
“I know. The process is fucked up. This same ‘process’ let Alex go free early without telling me and he nearly killed me and Tommy, after he killed Tommy’s sister. When I was a kid barely older than Zoey, the ‘process’ failed me because some little bastard’s rich father bought him out of trouble and he wasn’t charged for raping me. So excuse me if I’m not a fan of the justice system and its ‘process’ or its ability to protect me and my family.”
“Mrs. Kinsey-Paulson,” the prosecutor said, “we’re going to vigorously prosecute this. The evidence against her is considerable. I never claim a case is a slam-dunk, but I’ve gotten convictions on cases with a lot less evidence than this one. You can stay in here until we come to get you before the arraignment. That’ll keep you away from the press for now.”
“Thank you,” Tommy said.
Once the prosecutor left, Bob settled at the table with them. “Why did you insist on being here today, Nevvie?”
“Because this bitch used me. I actually liked her. She played me. I considered her a friend, and she poisoned me. She could have gone after our kids and hurt them, or Tommy.”
“This is going to be a media circus,” Bob said. “You realize that, right? Today will be mild compared to how crazy it’ll get once the actual trial is underway in a few months.”
“I do. That’s why we made Tyler and Zoey stay home today. Steven’s at the house with Zoey.”
Mikey and Willow had reported that while as Zoey’s siblings they received more attention than before everything started, for the most part they were left alone in school. Perhaps because Willow and Zoey weren’t identical twins, people didn’t fixate on Willow.
When it came time, they made their way into the courtroom to sit in the first row of the spectator gallery, behind the prosecutor’s desk. Because of the notorious nature of this case, and the high level of press interest, the judge had opted to handle the arraignment separately from the rest of the morning’s docket, before the afternoon session started. Definitely wasn’t as large a jurisdiction as Hillsborough County back in Tampa, what Nevvie remembered going through for the ordeal with Alex.
This judge probably processed the number of arraignments in a day what a judge down in Tampa did in an hour.
With Nevvie sandwiched between Tommy and Andrew, both men reached for her hands as two female bailiffs led Crystal into the courtroom through a side door. She was dressed in a set of orange scrubs, and was shackled, wrists and ankles. Nevvie fought the urge to stand and scream at her.
Except…she knew she didn’t totally hold the moral high ground. More like a draw, in one area, at least.
And she didn’t want to give the media any sound bites or video loops that would explode as memes and gifs online.
Crystal was led over to the defense table, where her attorney talked to her for a moment in hushed tones that were overridden by the sound of camera shutters whirring and the soft murmurs of the other spectators.
Crystal didn’t look around, either, other than an initial glance that Nevvie knew meant she’d seen Ty wasn’t there.
Nevvie wasn’t sure if this was a good thing or not.
Part of her wanted Crystal to look her in the eye so Nevvie could send her the thought, Yeah, I know what you tried, bitch. Checkmate.
Part of her didn’t want Crystal to turn around, because she knew every camera in the room would be focused on her and Crystal and recording it. The last thing Nevvie wanted to give away was the one bit of knowledge she and Andrew shared.
Crystal didn’t seem to be listening to her attorney. She was busy vigorously scribbling something on a legal pad, her attorney looking increasingly frustrated at her not responding to him.
A bailiff called the proceedings to order and everyone stood as the judge entered. Once everyone was seated again, the prosecutor was in the middle of listing the charges against Crystal when she stood and turned.
The sound of the judge’s gavel echoed through the room, cutting through the rising buzz of spectators’ voices. “You need to take your seat.”
Her attorney tried to get Crystal to return to her seat, but then she lunged at the bailiff who’d walked toward her.
Someone screamed, “Gun!” As Tom dove over Nevvie, covering her with his body, a shot rang out, followed by screams and the sounds of people scrambling to escape.
Nevvie ended up on the floor, under Tommy. By the time they got themselves untangled and Nevvie realized they—and Andrew and Colin—were uninjured, Bob was trying to get them out of there.
Except Nevvie wouldn’t be moved. Crystal lay sprawled on the floor, on her back, between the defense and prosecution’s tables. All Nevvie could see of her was her legs.
“Get EMTs in here!”
“What’d she say?”
“She confessed to killing Cole—”
“Code blue!”
“She’s coding!”
“GSW in courtroom three, lock down the building—”
Bob, the prosecutor, and another bailiff ushered them back into the room they’d been in before, with orders to wait there. Numb, Nevvie stared into Andrew’s blue eyes and wondered what the hell they’d engineered.
* * * *
The prosecutor came for them nearly an hour later. He asked the bailiff to step outside and waited until the door was shut behind him to softly speak.
“She’s dead.”
Nevvie didn’t know how to feel. Still seemed to be happening…apart. Not to her. Like she was looking in and watching it as some super-weird virtual reality experience or something.
The prosecutor continued. “At least three people distinctly heard Crystal confess to Cole’s murder and to poisoning Ms. Kinsey-Paulson before she lost consciousness. She’d also written a note that was left on the defense table. In it, she confessed to everything. Playing back the video, looks like she was trying to get herself killed. She probably knew trying to grab a gun would get her shot. She was counting on it.”
“Suicide by cop,” Bob said.
The prosecutor nodded.
Of course she had.
“It was in Tyler’s latest book,” Nevvie quietly said. “The one that just released.” Everyone stared at her. “The guy Augustine wanted to kill got arrested for something else, and he knew Augustine was after him. Augustine was sitting in the courtroom during the trial, watching. The guy rushed a bailiff and got himself shot and killed. He wasn’t trying to get killed, just injured, so he could get transferred to the hospital and hopefully escape from there. He knew he was dead anyway if he went to prison, that Augustine would get to him somehow.”
“Son of a bitch,” Bob muttered. “I hadn’t even had time to read it yet.”
“Oh, sorry. Spoiler alert.”
A harsh laugh escaped Tom and he kissed the top of her head.
“So that’s it, then?” Andrew quietly asked. “We’re done?”
“Yes, Mr. Paulson. We’ll likely hold a coroner’s inquest, but considering she left what amounts to a confession in her suicide note, she made a verbal confession, and all the evidence…it’s pretty open and shut. I hate that phrase, by the way, but I don’t see any reason for a protracted investigation that�
��s going to drag things out any longer than necessary for your family or Cole Johnson’s.”
“Can we get them out of here without the press mobbing them?” Bob asked.
“Give me your car keys, and I’ll have one of my people get your car and bring it around back.”
Tommy fished them out of his pocket. “Grey Lexus sedan, second floor of the garage. If they hit the button on the fob it’ll show them which one.”
“Thanks. I’ll come get you in a couple of minutes.”
Once he left, Tommy and Bob were talking, but Nevvie and Andrew silently stared into each other’s eyes the whole time.
She supposed it didn’t matter why Crystal confessed to something she didn’t do when she’d wrongly accused a guy of something he didn’t do. Maybe guilt had finally eaten her alive. Maybe she’d suddenly developed a magic conscience and knew she’d never be free again after this.
Maybe she was legit batshit crazy in a psychopathic way and wanted to imitate Tyler’s books.
Maybe she was so in love with Tyler she wanted to send him a statement.
It didn’t really matter…did it?
Andrew reached over and squeezed Nevvie’s hand, arching an eyebrow at her. She slowly nodded, turning her hand over so she could squeeze his hand in reply.
He nodded and sat back, leaning against Colin, who’d watched them without comment.
Nevvie sighed and leaned in to whisper to Andrew. “Now what’ll we do with alllll that duct tape?”
He smiled in reply and dropped her a wink.
* * * *
“Do I ever hear the full story, Sir?”
Andrew looked over at where Colin had settled on the edge of the bed, staring at him.
“What?”
“The full story.” His green gaze pierced through Andrew in a way even, god help him, Peggy’s hadn’t. The raw steel, the honest heat, the sweet, sexy love.
All of him.
Andrew finished unbuttoning his shirt and dropped it into the hamper before he walked over to Colin and stared down into his eyes.
“Between us alone?”
“I belong to you, Andrew. I meant that in every way. Your secrets are mine.”
“Then what do you wish to know, pet?” he quietly asked.
Colin wrapped his arms around Andrew and pulled him close, looking up into his face. “You left my house that night,” he quietly said. “Friday night, when Cole was shot. I lied to the police when I said you were there with me all night. You and I both know it, even though you thought I wasn’t lying on purpose. You thought I was asleep when you left and came back. I didn’t ask you about it, because I wasn’t sure I wanted to know why you’d left in the first place. Later, when Cole was found, I knew why. I’m not sure how you did it, but you did it.”
Andrew slowly raked his fingers through Colin’s hair. “I went merely to talk. He attacked me. It was in self-defense.”
“But you confronted him. About what he did to Zoey.”
“Yes. He confessed to that and to the others, and more, and showed zero remorse.”
Colin pressed a kiss against Andrew’s stomach, long and lingering. “I’d wondered why you really wanted to spend the night at my house that night instead of here. I didn’t question. I didn’t want to. Especially not after.”
Andrew didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing.
“Will Zoey be okay now?” Colin asked.
“I certainly hope so. She was far from his first victim, and let’s hope none come forward from after he attacked her. She would not have been his last had he lived and not been sent to prison for life.”
“Steven said he was a creep. That he’d brag about…about he could get any girl he wanted, even if she didn’t really want it. That no one could touch him, because his father, the coach, and the principal protected him. But he told me no one took Cole seriously, not really. Hopefully, his father, the coach, and principal will go to jail for covering up for Cole for so long.”
“Let’s hope so, pet.”
“Why do you think Crystal confessed to his murder if she didn’t do it?”
Andrew stared out the windows. From their bedroom, he could see the exact spot in the yard where Alex had dropped dead after Tyler shot him.
“She was deeply troubled. She drugged Nevvie, had been stalking Tyler from afar for years, had done any number of things to others we don’t fully know and might never know. Maybe she felt it was her past catching up to her. Maybe she believed Tyler had killed Cole and she thought she was protecting him. Maybe she wanted to live out Tyler’s books as an homage to him.
“She admitted in the note she left that she loved Tyler. She was probably going to stop somewhere with Nevvie, once the drugs she’d given her had taken effect, kill her, and then stage it to make it look like a suicide. Like in Tyler’s seventh Augustine book. Or perhaps, like in the third book, she’d hoped to give her enough to make her OD, and then she was going to plant the drugs in Nevvie’s purse to make it look like she’d accidentally OD’d. But Crystal didn’t count on them stopping here first, or for so long, and that gave the drugs time to hit Nevvie’s system. Who knows? All that matters is Crystal got herself killed on purpose and took credit for something that she certainly seemed capable of.”
“Nevvie knows, doesn’t she? I watched you two in the room after. And that line she said was from Tyler’s latest book. I finished it the other day. That’s really why you insisted on coming today.”
“Yes. I confessed to her on Friday, and gave her the choice to turn me in or not. She told me to put the gun back in my gun safe and hold on to it because it was safely hidden. And she asked me to come with her today for support.”
“You planted the gun in Crystal’s car?”
“Yes. While it was parked here Saturday. After Nevvie was taken to hospital and I came back to take my heart medication. That’s when Adam told me what he’d discovered. I knew then for certain Crystal was the reason Nevvie was sick, but I didn’t know exactly why at that point. Bob’s the one who remembered the Ketamine. I moved Crystal’s car because she’d parked me in, and made sure to park it where my security cameras couldn’t take a picture of me opening her trunk.”
Colin’s embrace grew tighter. “Thank you, sugar.”
“For what?”
“For fightin’ so fiercely for your family. And for me. I know Susan won’t be able to win.”
Andrew cupped Colin’s face and made him look into his eyes. “You are family. I love you. I want to be your husband. Why wouldn’t I fight hard for you or any of my loved ones?”
“You have a great disguise. A mild-mannered British grandfather. Something out of a PBS show or something. No one would ever suspect you.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment. But knowing all this, does it lessen your feelings for me? I wouldn’t blame you if it did.”
Without pulling free of Andrew’s hands, Colin felt for Andrew’s belt and started unfastening it. “Let me show you what it makes me feel, Sir.”
“Are you about to manhandle me?”
“Maybe. If you behave yourself.”
Andrew grinned and released him. “Then by all means, please continue, my sweet pet.”
Chapter Fifteen
After they dropped off Andrew and Colin next door, Nevvie sat in the car and made no move to get out when Tommy shut off the engine in their own driveway. He worried about her.
She was miles and years and an entire life away from the terrified woman they’d rescued from the shitty Tampa apartment.
She was the love of their lives, the mother of their children. Their partner.
A fierce woman who’d fought for her family in more than one way.
And now…
He wasn’t sure how to interpret the expression she wore.
He reached across the seat to touch her hand. “Baby girl, you ready to go inside?”
She shook her head.
“They probably already know.”
“I know.
”
Tom took a deep breath. “Want me to go in first and make sure Zoey’s okay?”
“Crystal’s dead, and there’s no justice.”
“Zoey was believed, and gave others enough confidence to report he attacked them, too, and that’s what’s important. She’s validated. She knows she wasn’t the only one he attacked, and she knows we believed her, and so did the cops. It’s not her fault or ours that Crystal offed the little bastard before the courts could bring him to justice.”
Laughter burped from her but she still stared at the front of the house and made no move to unfasten her seat belt.
“I know this is a trigger for you on a lot of levels,” he said, “but what’s important is that Crystal can’t hurt any of us or anyone else ever again. Cole can’t hurt Zoey or any other girls, either. They’re gone. What’s also important is that from this point forward, we move together as a family and keep supporting each other. Plus Zoey knows her grandfather loves her enough he was willing to lie to say he was the one who killed Cole to protect her and the rest of us. And that all of us—including her brothers and sister—were willing to take that risk, too.”
She finally nodded. “I guess,” she whispered.
“We’re a family. Family matters. Momma would have been deep in the middle of this, too, and you know it. Hell, she probably would have pulled the trigger on that fucker herself, if she’d had half a chance, over what he did to Zoey.”
Now full-on laughter rolled out of Nevvie, until she was crying. He understood this was a delayed stress reaction finally setting in and maybe some residual effects of the drug, too. He got out, limped around the car, and opened her door. After getting her seat belt unbuckled he helped her out and held her as she cried in his arms.
The front door opened, Tyler appearing in the entrance. Wearing an inscrutable expression, he walked down to join them in a group hug, pressing a kiss to the top of her head and kissing Tom on the lips.
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