Walker dropped his gaze to the photo again. He was stalling—was he smart enough to know he was trapped with any answer? An admission that he knew Nick was further evidence that Nick had correctly identified him; a denial was evidence that he was a liar, since they had the photo at the bar to prove that the two had met. Anything feigning uncertainty and Rice would ask him if he always forgot the people he slept with. Then Rice would throw him the lifeline of consent—yeah they’d slept together, but it was consensual, right? And then they had him, because someone knocked out cold wasn’t consenting to anything.
Rice started in. “Let me tell you what I think. I think you two had a sexual encounter.”
“That what you’re calling ‘rape’ these days?” O’Malley said.
Walker looked sideways at her, then back to Rice.
“And you know what my colleague thinks,” Rice said, gesturing to O’Malley. “She believes him.” Rice tapped the photo with a finger. “Maybe I should, too. But I don’t like to leap to conclusions, especially not about what goes on behind closed doors between two adults.”
O’Malley thudded her fist against the doorframe behind her. “Would you cut the boys’-club-consent bullshit?”
“Why don’t you take a walk,” Rice said.
O’Malley looked long at Walker, then slipped from the room. Rice got up and made a show of gently shutting the door. He sat back down in his seat and leaned toward Walker confidentially.
“O’Malley can get a little emotional about these cases. I think it’s hard for her, as a woman. Don’t get me wrong,” he said with a wave, “she’s an excellent detective. But there’s a reason they give me the lead on cases like this.”
“It’s not right to just blindly believe whatever someone tells you because you have some chip on your shoulder.”
“I know; I’m sorry about her.”
“I’ve never hurt anyone in my life, Detective. Believe me.”
“I do, to be honest. Not like this was some pretty little girl you could throw around.” Rice chuckled as he spoke, and Walker smiled with relief. “He’s a grown man,” Rice said.
Walker nodded.
“Just help me understand what’s going on here,” Rice said. “Give me something to run up the chain.”
“We never—” Walker stopped, like his tongue had snagged on a word.
“You two never what?”
Walker’s gaze sharpened with defiance. He smiled with half his mouth. “That was good,” he said quietly. “That was really something. Huh. I’m all done.”
Rice wasn’t ready to concede. “So we agree you knew him.”
But it was too late. Walker’s chair was already scraping back on the linoleum. “Goodbye, Detective.”
Walker pulled open the door to the hallway. There was O’Malley, a thin stack of paper in her hands.
“Warrants,” she said.
Rice had talked it over with the Assistant District Attorney and decided to secure the warrants for Walker’s arrest and a DNA sample before the interview. He’d bombed over to the courthouse late that afternoon, gotten back just in time to interview Walker himself.
O’Malley circled a finger in the air. “Turn around, Mr. Walker. I’m placing you under arrest. We’ll do your saliva at the jail.”
16
Tony Hall, 2015
As Nick talked to the detective, Tony studied his face. Tony knew Nick had gone to the police station earlier that day and had identified a picture of Josh. It was him—Nick was sure of it. Julia had told Tony all of this; when Tony got home, Nick didn’t feel like talking about it. Now, standing in the hallway with the phone against his ear, Nick’s face looked like he was getting bad news. He murmured “Okay” every now and then but said nothing more.
Nick hung up.
Finally, Tony said, “Well?”
“They found him,” Nick said. “They arrested him.”
Tony’s first thought was a selfish one: Thank God; I might actually sleep tonight. Tony’s attention had been divided since that first call from the hospital. It didn’t matter if he was at work, eating breakfast with the kids, or trying to sleep: his worry for Nick was ever present. But now, it was over. They had him.
Julia moved to Tony’s side and asked what the detective had said.
“Something about bail,” Nick said. “He needs $100,000 to get out.”
Julia looked at Tony with wide eyes. “Wow. That’s great.”
“But there’ll be a hearing on Monday, and it could get lowered. If he gets out, he won’t be allowed to talk to me.”
Bail. Right. It wasn’t over. Now there would be court. Tony turned to Julia. She would know what came next.
“Are they gonna indict him?” she asked.
“I think he said something about that.”
“Okay,” Julia said. “Do you want me to call him back and ask?”
Nick shook his head. “He said someone would call me and I’d get to have a meeting or something.”
“Oh, with the ADA?”
“What?”
“The prosecutor,” she said.
“I think so.” Nick’s eyelids were drooping like he was exhausted.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’m sure he just hit you with a lot of information.”
“It’s okay. I think they’ll tell me more at the meeting.”
“I’ll go with you,” Tony said.
“Okay,” Nick said. He sounded annoyed.
“If you want.”
Nick shrugged. “I’m gonna go to bed.”
“Wait,” Tony said. “Did he tell you the guy’s name?”
Nick looked upward. “Yeah . . . I can’t remember now. It’s not Josh. Something with an R.”
* * *
Raymond Walker. That was the man’s name. It was on the paper’s website the next day. Nick’s name was absent.
Now, the man in the dim photo from the bar with the pale skin and dark hair had a name. Tony hadn’t realized it before, but until that moment, the man in the photo had been a monster. He hadn’t been a real person to Tony—he’d been nothing but the evil act. A name transformed him: Raymond Walker had an identity. He had a life. Tony had to know what it was.
He started by searching Walker’s name.
Raymond Walker was a salesman at a company in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where he sold waterworks products around New England. Under his photo on the company website, his brief bio read that he lived in southern Maine.
Raymond Walker lived in Salisbury, like Nick, according to a Whitepages website.
Raymond Walker had graduated from the College of New England in 1998, making him thirty-eight, give or take. Thirty-fucking-eight, to Nick’s twenty.
Raymond Walker had a private Facebook page. That was worse than him having none. All Tony could see was a profile picture: it was Walker flexing in a sleeveless shirt in front of a gym, grinning like a snake.
What Tony did not find was evidence of who he knew this man to be. There was no entry on a sex-offender registry, no other court cases, no news articles about prior victims.
Deep in the pages of a Google search, Tony found the 1997 obituary of one George R. Walker, who was survived by his wife, Darlene, and his son, Raymond. To say he found the obituary was a slight exaggeration—he found a link that was described as containing this obituary, but the link did not work. All he could do was read the description. It taunted him. An obituary might have divulged more personal information about Raymond’s history, if it was even the same Raymond.
Now he searched the name Darlene Walker, and her Facebook page appeared. That morning, she had posted a long block of text on her page. In it, she wrote that her son had been arrested on “nothing more than a story, of which his side is completely different.” She called Nick’s accusation “the made-up story of a boy who went willingl
y.”
Something surged in Tony as he read the words, and his chest boiled. “You fucking bitch,” he hissed at his phone. People had shared the post and written comments—people who were friends with the Walkers, clearly. Lots of shocked and angry emojis on behalf of Walker and his mother.
“Unbelievable,” one man had written.
A woman wrote: “Ray is such a good guy, have faith Darlene.”
“I know,” someone added. “Did the cops ask literally anyone who knows Ray? Because they either have the wrong guy or the other guy’s lying.”
One comment nearly stopped Tony’s heart: “Does anyone know the accuser’s name?” There was no response to that one.
To the rest of the world, Ray Walker was a good person until proven otherwise. He had a job, a house, a gym, a mother who loved him. Tony, Nick, Julia, the detectives—they could see what he really was. They had seen the sickness inside of him. When would everyone else see it, too?
Julia was working in her study that weekend. She often worked a bit on the weekends—she always felt she was behind. On the weekends, the kids were largely Tony’s responsibility. Now, he stuck them in front of the television and knocked on her office door.
“What comes next?”
“Hmm?” She was standing at her desk, typing something.
“What comes next in Nick’s court case?”
“Oh. It sounds like they’ll get an indictment.” The question must have been apparent on his face, because she explained herself. “The prosecutor will present evidence to the grand jury. Nick will have to testify.”
“What will it be like?”
“I’ve never been to one. The defendant and the defense attorney don’t go. Nick will have to tell me what it’s like,” she said with a laugh. Then she grew serious again. “He’ll have to tell his story under oath. There will be people in there—the people sitting on the grand jury, the prosecutor, some kind of court reporter. The point is for the prosecutor to prove she has enough evidence to bring the charges against him. The real point, I think any prosecutor will admit, is to test the case. See how the evidence looks so far. She might even want to see how Nick does testifying.”
Tony thought for a moment. “I’m glad he doesn’t remember.”
Julia cocked her head like she was considering this.
“Don’t you think?” he asked.
“I think it’s bad he doesn’t remember.”
“Why?”
“It gives the defendant free rein to make up whatever he wants.”
“I thought his lawyer would have to stop him.”
Julia looked confused. “Where did you get that?”
“You,” he said. “You told me once you couldn’t let clients lie.”
“If I knew they were lying.”
“Anyone would know he’s lying.”
She shook her head. “Not just if you think your client’s lying. You have to know—like if he tells his lawyer ‘I raped him,’ the lawyer can’t let him testify and say ‘he consented.’ But I doubt he’ll tell his lawyer the truth.”
“Did you have clients lie to you?”
“Yeah,” she said apologetically. “I’m sure I did.”
Julia had only been a defense attorney for four years, but in that time she represented all kinds of people. Most of them normal people, maybe even good people who’d made bad choices. But she’d represented some bad people, too. A wife-beating professor. A teenage drug dealer. A long line of parents who abused and neglected their kids.
And apparently there had been rapists. Tony just didn’t know anything about them.
The thought of her defending someone like Raymond Walker made him sick to his stomach.
“I’ll let you get back to work,” he said quietly, and he closed the door on her.
17
Nick Hall, 2015
A week after Josh—or Raymond—was arrested, Tony drove Nick to a meeting at the District Attorney’s office. It was around the back of a courthouse where the case would happen. That was all Nick really understood: the case would happen. But what that meant—what would actually happen—he didn’t know. He felt clueless about what he had started.
The District Attorney’s office reminded Nick of the police station; it actually seemed more secure than the station had. The woman at the front desk sat behind a thick layer of glass to their right and she had to buzz them into the building through a locked door.
She brought them down a hallway to a room where two women were waiting.
“Can I get either of you a drink: coffee, a soda?”
“You have Coke?” Nick asked.
“You got it.”
Meanwhile, the women in the room stood up, and the older one reached out her hand to Nick.
“Nick, it’s nice to meet you.” Her handshake was firm, and Nick tightened his grasp. “I’m Linda Davis, your prosecutor.” She was striking, with red lipstick and jet-black hair. Nick wondered immediately if it was dyed.
The younger woman had a softer handshake. “Sherie,” she said. “I’m your advocate.” She smiled, revealing a gap between her front teeth.
“And you must be Tony,” Linda said, turning to him.
They all sat down around the table as the woman from the front desk returned with Nick’s drink.
“How are you doing?” Linda asked.
Nick popped the tab. “I’m okay.”
“You in therapy?”
Nick nodded as Tony said, “He is.”
Sherie was staring at Nick. She was probably looking at the yellow bruises on his cheek and neck. They were fading but still noticeable, at least if you knew to look.
“Really,” Nick said. “I’m doing fine.”
“Well, that’s great,” Linda said. “We wanted to go over the court process with you, answer any questions you might have so far.”
“And I’m your girl when you have questions later,” Sherie said, “because you will.” She pushed two business cards across the table. Nick and Tony each took one. Beneath her name were the words VICTIM WITNESS ADVOCATE. “My job is to help you understand what’s going on and to be there for court. And I can help you advocate for yourself.”
“Are you a lawyer?” Tony asked.
“No,” she said. “I’m just there to support Nick. But I work with Linda—we’re always in touch—so when Nick has questions he can call me.” She turned to Nick.
Sherie’s voice went apologetic. “It’s going to be a lot of information all at once, but then it’s gonna be slow. It normally takes a long time for a case to end.”
At the same time, Nick and Tony asked, “How long?”
“It can take a year,” Linda said.
A year. The word was small, but it held a lifetime: Christmas. His twenty-first birthday. The summer. Next school year, his senior year. This might still be the center of his life?
“That’s ridiculous,” Tony said.
“I know,” Linda said. “But this is a high-priority case,” Linda continued, “so I’ll do everything I can to make sure it goes before the grand jury in November. But the court gives the defendant time to hire a lawyer, do an investigation, get an expert. There’s a lot that goes into a case like this.”
An investigation? What was there for Josh—Raymond—to investigate?
Linda went on. “A month or two after we get an indictment, we’ll have a court date where the defense attorney and I talk about the case and try to come up with a deal.”
Right. Plea deals.
“So it could be over then,” Tony said.
“It could be over then,” Sherie said, “but you should know it usually isn’t.”
“I thought most cases ended in plea deals,” Tony said. “My wife’s a lawyer.”
“Many do,” Linda said. “But cases involving sexual assault go to
trial more often than others. Plea deals are still common, just not as common. But if we can get a conviction and a sentence we like, we absolutely want to avoid you having to testify.”
Nick had felt Sherie’s eyes on his face again when Linda said the words sexual assault. She was looking for a reaction from Nick.
“Is that something you’re willing to do, Nick?”
He turned to Linda. “What?”
“Are you willing to testify?”
“Oh, yeah,” he said.
“It’s important for me to know if you don’t want to.”
Nick was confused. Obviously he didn’t want to. “Don’t I have to?”
“Well, if you want a trial, yes. I can’t have a trial without you. But it’s your choice. If you don’t want to testify, I’ll do what I can to get him to plead to something. I just need to know where you’re at.”
This was confusing. Nick didn’t know what to say.
“Your name will stay private,” Sherie said.
“Is it private now?” Tony asked.
“Yes,” Linda said. “I filed a motion. That’s why the criminal complaint calls him ‘John Doe.’”
Nick didn’t know anything about that.
“I didn’t know you could do that,” Tony said.
“We have to have a reason,” Linda said. “It depends on the case. I wanted to maintain some privacy for Nick.” She turned and began addressing him. “Your case is open to the public, which means reporters or anyone else can come watch the court dates. They just don’t learn your name, so it shouldn’t get published anywhere.”
“I know it’s still a huge invasion to have to testify about this,” Sherie said. “There’s no judgment if you don’t want to. You’ve been so brave to even report this.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Nick said. They were acting like testifying would kill him. He didn’t want to, obviously, but he could do it.
Linda was studying him. “It’s your choice, Nick. Just tell me if there comes a time when I need to settle the case. I won’t go to trial if you aren’t testifying.”
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