Twenty-Nine and a Half Reasons
Page 18

“Yes, sir. An anonymous tip was called in informing the police that Mr. Decker had the murder weapon on his premises. The informant said they saw Mr. Decker place an object under his house after the murder. We procured a search warrant and found a bloody crowbar in Mr. Decker’s crawl space.”
I was all too familiar with anonymous tips and planted evidence. When Sloan, a bartender I’d met at Jasper’s restaurant, had been killed, Joe planted a gun in my shed and called in a tip that the murder weapon was on my property, trying to protect me from Daniel Crocker. Luckily, I’d seen him do it and was able to avoid arrest, which was good, since I’d had nothing to do with Sloan’s murder.
But even though I wasn’t swayed by Detective Taylor’s testimony, the jurors around me were. Mrs. Baker gasped at the news, and the man to my right pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes while turning to examine Mr. Decker.
Mr. Deveraux presented the crowbar in a plastic bag, still bloodstained, as evidence. “And did you conduct DNA analysis of the blood on the crowbar, Detective Taylor?”
“Yes, the blood was determined to be a ninety-nine percent match for Frank Mitchell’s. Mr. Decker’s fingerprints were found on the murder weapon as well.”
Mrs. Baker shook her head. The woman behind me mumbled again.
I had to admit, Mr. Deveraux made a good case. The jury seemed to believe it. If I hadn’t had my vision, I might have bought his reasoning, and maybe even got past the point of wondering how Bruce Wayne could pick up a crowbar, let alone whack someone with it.
Bruce Wayne Decker sat in the same chair as yesterday. He’d been doodling on the legal pad, gripping his pen in his right hand, but when Mr. Deveraux started asking about the crowbar, Bruce Wayne put down his pen and began to fidget. It was funny how the day before, I’d thought of him as Mr. Decker, but I felt a kinship to him now. I couldn’t help wondering if his dad had an obsession with Batman. Bruce Wayne wore a short-sleeved shirt and a tie and kept sticking his fingers between his collar and neck, trying to widen the gap. He looked like a man who was slowly strangling.
Then again, I guessed he was.
Mr. Yates began his cross-examination, displaying the image of the victim again. He glared in my direction, probably checking to see if I was going to pass out a second time. The heat intensified my irritation. I hadn’t passed out because of the picture.
I studied the image just to prove it didn’t bother me, even though my stomach churned enough to make a batch of butter. Staring at the dead man’s head, I wondered how the murderer swung the crowbar hard enough to bash in the victim’s right temple.
Watching Bruce Wayne, who’d resumed his doodling, I realized he was right-handed. I imagined him picking up the murder weapon and striking. It would have hit the victim on the left side, not the right. A left-handed person would have hit him on the right side.
The man in my vision was left-handed.
A clue. I squirmed in my seat with excitement, only to get frustrated when Mr. Yates didn’t bring it up in his questions.
Mr. Deveraux called the coroner as the next witness to declare that the victim had died from blunt-force trauma to the head. Mr. Yates had little to ask.
Judge McClary adjourned for lunch, growling about the heat. “If they don’t get this goddamned air conditioning fixed soon, I’m gonna start arresting people for contempt of court.”
As soon as Marjorie Grace dismissed us from the juror room, I went outside to call Joe while I waited for Neely Kate. I still hadn’t heard from him and I was starting to worry. His phone rang twice before a woman answered, breathless. “Joe’s phone.”
I froze, recognizing the voice.
“Hello?” she asked.
Why was Hilary answering Joe’s phone? My throat closed off and I had to push out the words. “I need to speak to Joe.”
She laughed, low and sexy. “He’s taking a shower right now. Can I take a message?”
Fear and anger mingled into one unnamed entity. Finally, I choked out. “Tell him Rose called.”
“Oh! Rose!” she exclaimed in mock surprise. “I didn’t know Joe still kept you around.”
I bit back several ugly things hanging on the tip of my tongue. “Just tell him I called, please.”
Neely Kate found me sitting on the courthouse steps in the shade of a Corinthian column, blowing my nose into a tissue while tears streamed down my face. “Hey, what’s going on? Did you pass out in court again?”
I shook my head, amazed at her casual all-knowing attitude. Then I realized that finding out about my faint yesterday wouldn’t have been that difficult. Turns out, the Fenton County Courthouse would have aced the telephone game.
“No,” I wiped the tears from my cheeks. “Nothing like that.”
She sat next to me, touching my arm. “Hey, what happened? Was it Deveraux? Did he do something? That man—”
I wished. “No, it’s Joe.” Just saying his name brought a fresh batch of tears. “He didn’t call me last night, and when I called him a few minutes ago, Hilary answered and said he was in the shower.”
Neely Kate stiffened momentarily then relaxed, rubbing my arm. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly logical explanation. Was everything okay that last time you talked to him?”
“Yeah,” I sniffed. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“But Hilary still has a thing for him?”
“I think so.”
She threw out her arms and stood. “Well, there you go! She’s jealous and she’s trying to break you up. I’m tellin’ ya, Rose, if Joe wanted to be with her, he would have been with her before he started going out with you. Now let’s go to lunch.”