by K. J. Dahlen
Chapter Seventeen
On the plane the next morning, Cade stared at India. After she had gone to bed the night before he cornered Briar and asked about the trouble between her and her grandparents. At first Briar refused to tell him. He said if India wanted him to know she would tell him. When Cade told him why he needed to know Briar relented and explained his brother what India had told him about their relationship.
Now on the way to Boston, he just stared at her. After Briar told him about John Carsten, Cade had looked him up. As a Judge, he was on the harsh side of the law but he tried very hard to be impartial. He didn’t have many friends in the judicial system, in fact most of the attorney’s hated having him reside over their cases. His personal life left a great deal to be desired. He was married to Peggy Holt and they had one child, India’s mother Tessi.
Briar had told him when Tessi got pregnant with India, John kicked her out of their home. When he looked up India’s birth certificate he found Jared Kent listed as the father. Checking into Kent’s financial records, he found Kent paid child support directly to John Carsten. There was no sign that Tessi or India ever got a cent of the support money and that didn’t sit well with Cade.
He had made a few phone calls last night and now armed with the new information he felt prepared to deal with John and Peggy Carsten today. First, they had the business of the depositions to take care of.
When they arrived at the courthouse, they met with District Attorney Doug McCall. When he led them into a conference room there was already someone waiting for them. The young woman looked professional. She was dressed in a dark two piece suit. Her raven hair was brushed back away from her face. When they entered, she stood and Doug introduced her.
“Cade, Elliot, meet Mandy Wiess, attorney for Gretchen Hawks. She will be allowed to ask questions during the deposition but please remember Ms. Wiess, this is not a courtroom. You are here to represent your client not hold a trial.”
As they sat down Mandy opened a notebook. When they were asked about the last time they visited Gretchen Hawks, Cade and Elliot told the D.A. for the record what happened to the best of their ability. They were interrupted several times and reminded by Mandy to tell only what they saw and not to state their own speculation into the record.
After a grueling hour, the deposition was over.
Cade got up from his chair and left the room without speaking to anyone.
~* * * *~
When he met Briar and India in the hallway, Briar knew his brother well enough to know he was pissed. He looked at Elliot as Cade pushed past him to walk down the hall. “What the hell happened in there?”
Elliot frowned as he watched Cade disappear around the corner. “When we began telling what we saw and heard that day, Gretchen’s attorney questioned everything we had to say. “
“That’s her job,” Briar reminded him.
“I know that, but Cade wanted to get his point across and she wouldn’t let him.” Elliot shook his head. “This is going to be the hardest part for him.” He paused as he looked at India and T.K. “I heard that Flynn and Cooper’s attorneys are coming in for their deposition. Hopefully, they will have better luck.”
“I know but I’ll be in there with them,” Briar said.
“How can you be in there with them?” Elliot asked.
“They have the right to have someone representing them and I’m that person. I still have a license to practice law,” Briar told him.
“Well good luck with that, especially if she finds out you two are sleeping together. That might be a reason for her to call for a new attorney in this process.” Elliot shook his head. “I’ve heard that Flynn’s lawyer is Lydia Garvin. I’ve also heard that she is one mean attorney.”
Briar nodded. “I’ve had the displeasure of meeting her and seeing her in action. This is going to be a nightmare for the girls.” He frowned. “I hope they can get through it all right.”
“All they have to do is tell the truth,” Elliot said.
“If you thought Mandy Wiess was brutal, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Lydia is ten times worse. She’s going to chew them up and spit them out.”
“That’s why you’re going to be there.” Elliot slapped his brother on the back.
Briar rubbed his hands together. “You’re right about that.”
Cade popped his head around the corner and yelled at Elliot, “Hey are you coming or what?”
Elliot slapped Briar on the back again and said, “Good luck in there. Give her hell.” Then he walked to join Cade.
India joined Briar and watched as his brothers disappeared. She glanced back at Briar and asked, “What’s going on?”
“The Hudson’s attorneys are going to be present at the deposition. Cade wasn’t happy about it.”
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“Elliot was telling me that Flynn has a mean attorney and she’s going to try and disprove your story.”
India looked troubled. “Yes, I have seen this before. Whole cases thrown out by that type. How can they represent people who are murderers?”
Briar turned to her. “I have seen her in action. She will twist everything you say. She’s going to do her best to confuse what you say. I’ve seen her take a simple straight forward story and twist it so bad the witness didn’t know which end was up.” He paused and asked, “Are you going to be able to handle that?”
“I can but I’m not so sure about T.K. She hates all this anyway.”
“You have to talk to her, tell her what’s going to happen. She has to be ready for what’s coming.”
“She will be. We have come too far to allow these fiends to go free,” India said.
~* * * *~
An hour later, Cade and Elliot walked up to the door of the modern one story home of John and Peggy Carsten. Cade was going to get to the truth in order to strengthen the case for the state against Flynn and Cooper Hudson and Gretchen Hawks. He had to find out what happened fifteen years ago.
Knocking on the door, he waited for someone to answer. When he heard footsteps coming toward the portal Cade looked at Elliot and nodded.
The door opened and they found themselves looking at John Carsten. He was an older man with pure white hair brushed away from his face. He carried himself with an imposing stature and he appeared the stern judge even dressed in blue jeans and a polo shirt, as he was today.
“My name is Cade Rivers and this is my brother Elliot. We’re here to ask you a few questions. I don’t know if you’ve been informed yet, but we found the man that murdered your daughter.”
John’s face became stone. “My daughter died fifteen years ago. Let the past stay in the past. I don’t want to talk to you or anyone about my daughter’s death, not now not ever.” He moved to close the door but Cade stopped him.
“I don’t care what you want. The reason we’re here is to gather information about what happened fifteen years ago so we can put a serial killer and his cohorts in jail for the rest of their miserable lives.”
“What are you talking about?” John asked.
He was joined by an older woman. “What’s going on John?” she asked.
“They want information on Tessi,” John told her.
Peggy looked at Cade and Elliot then at her husband. “Please let them in.”
John sighed deeply then stood aside to allow Cade and Elliot to come into his home.
Peggy led the way into the living room and motioned for them to sit down. “Now what is this all about?” she asked as John joined them.
He sat off to the side, almost as if to separate himself from the rest of the group.
“I understand that when your daughter told you she was going to have a baby you asked her to leave your home.” Cade held up his hand when he saw John sit forward in his chair. “Believe me I don’t say that lightly and what you did back then was your choice. It’s what happened after that we need to discuss with you.”
“What does what we did so long ago have to d
o with the reason you came here?” Peggy looked confused.
“Fifteen years ago your granddaughter witnessed a gruesome murder. She and a friend T.K. Jonas witnessed the murder of Jenna Kramer.”
“How on earth did that happen?” Peggy was horrified by what he was saying.
“Your daughter was at work and India was supposed to be home but instead, she and T.K. were at an abandoned warehouse near the old piers. It was their usual hangout and they figured they were safe as no one knew where they were,” Cade explained. “But that night a man carried a woman’s body into the warehouse and began dissecting it.”
“I knew Tessi wasn’t ready to be a mother yet. How could she leave her daughter alone at night in Boston?” John began ranting.
“She had to do what she did in order to make a living,” Cade told him, his tone was cold.
This seemed to set John on edge. “My daughter’s life could have been different if she hadn’t gotten pregnant and decided to keep her baby.” John justified his actions by blaming his daughter’s choices.
“I’m not here to judge your actions, but to bring you the facts,” Cade told him. He turned back to Peggy. “When India left the warehouse that night, she took a jar with evidence with her. She hid the jar and tried to forget what she saw. Then your daughter was murdered and she went into foster care. She didn’t remember what happened as her life suddenly turned upside down. Just recently, she remembered what happened and she told my brother Briar. Briar brought her to us and we investigated her claim. When we found out it was true, we dug a little deeper and we uncovered a serial killer. This man murdered twenty three women up and down the East coast over the course of at least fifteen years. We also connected his father and his mother in this conspiracy and working with the police, DEA and FBI we were able to arrest this monster. While we were going through his trophies, India found her mother’s remains among the displays. Needless to say she was quite distraught.”
“My lord…” Peggy raised her hands to cover her mouth. She shook her head as tears rolled down her cheeks. “That poor child.” She glanced at her husband and found him staring at the carpet. His face could have been carved from stone. She looked back at Cade. “Please go on. We need to hear the whole story.”
“Flynn and Cooper Hudson and Cooper’s mother, Gretchen Hawks were arrested that night.” Cade paused as John sat up in his chair and stared at him. His face had paled.
“Did you say Hudson?” John growled.
Cade nodded. “Flynn and Cooper Hudson. Why? What do you know about them?”
John shook his head. “Nothing about them but I’m wondering if they are relation to a Sam Hudson, from Sunbury, PA?”
Cade looked at Elliot then glanced back at John. “As a matter of fact, Sam is Flynn’s uncle. How do you know Sam Hudson?”
“Sam Hudson came before me in court fifteen years ago on a charge of aggravated assault with the intent to murder someone,” John told them. “The case should have been straight forward but something happened that threw it way out of balance. His attorney Lydia Garvin kept twisting the evidence to suit her case. I knew he was guilty the moment I laid my eyes on the man. We were lucky to get a conviction. Lydia was not a happy person when the foreman said Sam was found guilty.”
“So Lydia Garvin was Sam’s attorney fifteen years ago huh? That’s very interesting,” Cade noted. “She happens to be representing Flynn in this trial. What happened fifteen years ago?”
“One night I was working late and someone slipped something under my door. When I got up to see what it was I found a large manila envelope. I opened my door to see who had delivered it but the halls were empty. When I opened the envelope, I found a picture of my daughter and granddaughter. The second page was a threat against their lives if I didn’t throw the case and find Sam not guilty.”
Peggy gasped. “O-oh my god,” she whispered. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“I couldn’t say anything to anyone. If I did, I would have had to call a mistrial and I wasn’t going to do that. The law is my life and I won’t put anything above it. I had to follow the letter of the law. I didn’t really think the threat was real. The jury found Sam guilty and I thought long and hard about what the sentence would be. I convicted Sam to twelve to fifteen years.” John shook his head. “It should have been a straightforward case. Sam went to jail and was due to get out in twelve years. His time had been shortened up because once inside he straightened his act up and he was due to get out within days when he was found murdered in his cell, three years ago.”
“What happened fifteen years ago, after you sentenced Sam?” Elliot asked.
“The next day we were informed that Tessi was murdered. The police told us her body had been found beheaded and wrapped in orange linen. There was nothing to tie her murder together with anything the police had seen before.” John stopped to take a breath. “The next day, I got a phone call from someone claiming to be responsible for Tessi’s death. It was a woman’s voice and she said that if I didn’t want my granddaughter to have the same fate as her mother I should let the system take care of her. It galled me to allow someone to tell me what to do but to save her life I let the foster system take my granddaughter.” He shrugged, then said, “I didn’t know if I wanted to take her in anyway and it was easier this way.”
“You can be so heartless sometimes,” Peggy told him. “She should have come to us. I would have welcomed her with open arms. I never did understand your decision at the time.”
“Your granddaughter is under the impression you don’t want anything to do with her. When you turned your back on her all those years ago, India felt abandoned,” Cade told them.
“That’s not true at all!” Peggy cried out. “When she was a baby I used to visit them. It broke my heart to see the cramped apartment they were living in but Tessi said it was all she could afford. I tried to offer her money but…” Peggy hesitated and glanced at her husband before she told them, “My daughter takes after her father in being stubborn at times. She was bound and determined to be independent. She told me she had to prove she could do it, not only to herself but to her father as well.”
Cade turned to John and asked, “Why, if you were collecting child support from India’s father did you never turn the money over to your daughter?”
John frowned at Cade and asked, “How did you know about that?”
“Never mind how we knew about it, what you did was against the law. The money Jared Kent paid you should have gone to his daughter’s care.”
“Don’t you lecture me young man.” He thundered at Cade. “I had my reasons for what I did and they are none of your business.”
“Did you know,” Cade turned to Peggy. “That Jared Kent was never told Tessi was dead? That because of your husband, he was never allowed to see or be present in his daughter’s life?”
“The bastard didn’t want anything to do with the child he created with my daughter.” John growled at them. “He wanted nothing to do with Tessi or the baby when he found out she was pregnant. He wanted her to abort the baby and when she wouldn’t he walked out of their lives. One of the reasons I nailed him for support was to teach the bastard responsibility.” John shook his head. “Every month when he handed me the check I could tell he hated me but I didn’t care about that. I put the money away for India and figured someday it would pay for her college. We contacted her when she was seventeen but she didn’t want the money and she wanted nothing to do with us either.”
“You said earlier that a couple of days before the end of Sam’s trial, you got a note that threatened your daughter’s life.” Elliot asked. “You didn’t by chance keep the note did you?”
John glared at him for a moment then got up and walked to another room. A few minutes later, he returned with a folder. Inside the folder was the picture and the note. “I don’t know why I kept it all these years.”
“I’m glad you did,” Cade said as he previewed the material. He held the paper up to the li
ght and saw a faint watermark in the linen. He looked at John. “Can I take this with me? We may be able to track it back and see who bought it.”
“Take it. If this will help your case you are welcome to it.”
“One more thing before we go.” Cade stared at them. “When India found her mother’s remains, she was hurt and furious with you and the social services. She felt she had been lied to about how her mother died. Can you tell me who decided to tell her, her mother died as a result of a robbery gone wrong?”
“How do you tell a ten year old child her mother was murdered so brutality?” Peggy asked. “The police wouldn’t even tell us the details. They wanted to have something held back in case the murderer was found. We asked that she just be told her mother was dead. We didn’t know she was a witness to a murder just days before.”
“It’s all in the past anyway, why do we have to relive it now?” John asked.
“Because you have one very pissed granddaughter out there and she’s going to start asking questions. To her, the worst day of her life is going to come out in the courtroom and she isn’t going to let it destroy her. She wants the truth to come out after all these years to set the record straight. It’s going to be painful for her and she’s going to uncover every bit of the truth. She deserves at least that much don’t you think?”
John didn’t answer him, instead he got up and went to the window. He stared out the window for a moment before he said, “There’s something else you need to know.”
“What would that be?” Cade asked.
“Once a month since Sam Hudson died, I’ve received another envelope shoved under my door, usually late at night. Inside the envelope is a current picture of India and a note. All the notes have been threats against her life. The latest one came five days ago. She was sitting in what looked like a courthouse.”
Cade looked at Elliot and then back to John. “Do you still have those notes and pictures?”