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“Yeah,” I say. “But every time I do, I lie down until the feeling passes. There’s just something about him. Like he’s too eager to be the hero of our drama.”
“So he gets a good smack again today?” Jimmy says.
I smile. “No plausible doubt on that at all.”
“This may not be the time to ask you,” Jimmy says, “but do you ever think you’re going to lose a case?”
We’re about to get off Sunrise Highway. Just to jam him up a little more, I wait until the last second in the left lane, check the mirror, then accelerate across the right lane and just manage to make Exit 65.
“Hail Mary,” he says, “full of grace.”
“Do I think about losing? All the time.”
I grin.
“Just not today.”
Forty-Six
I AM ABOUT TOget to it with Otis Miller.
Get to what Jimmy Cunniff likes to call the juicy.
I’m not winning my case today. Just trying to put some points on the board. Those scales that Lady Justice holds? They’re supposed to be about fairly weighing evidence presented in court. But I’ve long since come to grips with the fact that I’m no lady, and I sometimes only play fair when I’ve run out of other good options.
“As we’ve discussed before,” I say to Miller, “your issues with post-traumatic stress disorder are a matter of public record, are they not?”
“I thought sharing my story might help people with similar issues,” he says. “Destigmatize PTSD even more than it is already. And encourage people who need help to get it.”
“Very admirable of you.”
“Do I detect sarcasm?” Miller asks.
“No, sir. Not with an issue like that and not with someone who served his country as honorably as you did. If that’s what you heard, Mr. Miller, I apologize.”
“No need.”
I keep my distance from him for now, standing near the court reporter’s station.
“Now, it goes without saying that we’re here because my client has been accused of committing a violent crime,” I say, “even though it would have to be viewed as a completely random act, as there has been no previous evidence of violence in my client’s adult life.”
“But Mr. Hennessy testified that Rob threatened to kill Mitch Gates, didn’t he?”
I want to walk over and kiss him.
“So he did,” I say. “Which leads me to a question, Mr. Miller. I’m wondering if your own struggles with PTSD ever caused you to threaten anybody. Or to engage in a random act of violence.”
“Objection, Your Honor,” Ahearn says. “Mr. Miller isn’t the one on trial for murder here. Ms. Smith’s client is.”
“Sustained,” Judge Prentice says.
“If you’ll allow me just one more question along this line,” I say. “Mr. Miller, didn’t Mitch Gates tell you one night at the Turnpike Tavern to stay away from his wife? And didn’t things escalate enough that the two of you ended up in a fistfight?”
“Objection,” Ahearn says. “Hearsay.”
“Sustained.”
It’s here that Miller surprises me.
