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“Yes.”
The prosecutor flipped to the next page of his notes. “Mr. Betters, let me ask you now about Mr. Nichols’s personal stake in EML Records. Did he own any stock?”
“He held stock options.”
“Did he stand to profit from the sale of EML Records?”
“Not at this price,” he said, scoffing.
“What do you mean?” the prosecutor asked.
“An option is the right to buy stock at a stated price. Mr. Nichols’soption price was set before piracy wiped out almost fifty percent of the company’s value. His option price was higher than the market price.”
“In other words, his stock options were worthless?”
“That’s correct,” said the witness.
“But let’s say piracy suddenly stopped, and the company regained that forty-eight percent loss in value. How much would Mr. Nichols stand to make in that situation?”
Jack rose. “Objection, Your Honor. Mr. Betters is a fact witness, not an expert. The prosecution cannot put hypothetical questions to a fact witness.”
Owens fired back. “Judge, I’m not asking the witness for an expertopinion. This is simple math. What would the value of Mr. Nichols’s stock options have been if the value of the company had not declined by forty-eight percent due to piracy?”
“The objection is overruled,” said the judge. “The witness can answer.”
“About a hundred million dollars,” said Betters.
Owens stepped away from the lectern and placed his notepad on the table, but he wasn’t finished. He returned to the gooseneck microphone, formulating one last question in his head.
“Mr. Betters, would it be fair to say that in this time frame—right before the sale of EML Records and right before the death of Tyler McCormick—Mr. Nichols had every motivation to dosomethingto stop piracy? Maybe even something drastic?”
“Objection,” the defense lawyers said in unison.
Jack thought the judge might allow the witness to answer, given his prior rulings. But he drew the line here.
“Sustained,” the judge said.
The ruling didn’t seem to faze the prosecutor in the least. “No further questions, Your Honor.”
Owens glanced in Jack’s direction as he returned to his seat. Their gaze met and held for a moment, and it was as if they were thinking the same thing: for a second time, the prosecutor had rung the proverbial bell—the one that could not be unrung.
“Mr. Swyteck, cross-examination?” the judge asked.
The prosecutor’s entire theory of the case had pivoted from kinky sex to good, old-fashioned greed, and Jack needed to recalibrate.
“Judge, I’d like fifteen minutes to confer with my client, if I may.”
Shaky’s lawyer was also on her feet. “Same, Judge.”
“I think our jurors could use twenty,” he said with a smile, and all six nodded in agreement. The judge excused them, and they filed out the side door.
“This court is in recess,” he said, and with a final bang of his gavel the twenty-minute clock was ticking.
The bailiff’s command brought all to their feet. Judge Cookson exited to his chambers, and the courtroom silence was broken. The media was at the rail, and the clogged center aisle made the rear exit unreachable. Jack and Imani took the side door and hurried toward a small, windowless conference room across the hall from Judge Cookson’s chambers. It was slightly larger than a closet, furnished only with a small table and two chairs, which was fine, until Shaky’s lawyer knocked on the door and insisted on a joint defense meeting. She was boiling mad, and Jack feared that if he turned her away, she’d vent to the press. There was room for four with the lawyers standing.
“What kind of shit are you and your client feeding the prosecution, Swyteck?”
Calling her paranoid would have been counterproductive. “This is not the time to turn against each other,” said Jack.
