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  “What was the insult?”

  “The bitch told her boyfriend, Ryan, I came on to her. I called her a slut.”

  “Did you come on to her?”

  Hastings looked appalled. “No! Jesus. She’s cleaned up a lot, but back then, she was into this Goth thing. Rings in her nose, a stud in her tongue. She looked disgusting.”

  “If nothing happened, why did she accuse you?”

  Hastings’s temper flared. “Why are you cross-examining me?”

  “If we go to trial, the district attorney is going to come at you a lot harder than I am, so you’ve got to be prepared. Getting defensive on the stand could sink you.”

  Hastings calmed down. “Okay, I get it. Sorry I went off on you.”

  “So, why do you think she accused you that time?”

  “I have no idea.” Hastings shrugged. “I was pretty popular in high school, and she was anything but. Maybe she wanted everyone to think I was into her.” He shrugged again. “Maybe she wanted to make Ryan jealous. But it was all bullshit.”

  “You said there was another reason for Miss Stark’s false accusation. What is it?”

  “Money. I just turned twenty-one. I have a trust fund that’s worth a lot, and it vested on my birthday. You can bet your ass that little bitch is planning to sue me.”

  “This is very good to know, Blaine. We can use this to cast doubt on Stark’s accusation. If you get any other ideas, don’t keep them to yourself.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Okay. Now, you did know Miss Stark in high school. What kind of relationship did you have?”

  “None. I hardly saw her. We didn’t run in the same circles. My family is pretty well off. We’re members of the Westmont Country Club, we have a really big house in the best part of town. When Randi was in high school, she lived in this housing project that is just barely in my high school’s district. Not that I look down on someone because they’re poor. Several guys on my teams were from the same project. But I didn’t bump into Randi outside of school, and not even in school much.

  “Part of that was because I was in the AP classes, and she isn’t that swift. Also, I hung with the athletes and she hung out with the class losers. You know, tattoos, piercings, and pride in their D’s and F’s.”

  “If you weren’t attracted to her, why did you make out with her at the party?”

  “Like I said, she cleaned up since high school. No piercings or Goth shit. She’s still no knockout, but I was drunk. A lot of women look great when you’re drunk.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what happened.”

  “Okay, well, we—Oregon—came up to Portland and played Portland State that afternoon. I knew some of the guys on the PSU team from high school, and they invited me and some of the other guys from the team to this frat party.

  “We’re a top twenty-five team and PSU isn’t in our class, so we pretty much ran over them, and I had three sacks. I was feeling good and I had too much to drink.”

  “Were there any drugs involved?”

  Hastings gave a vigorous shake of his head. “There’s a good chance that I’m going to get drafted by an NFL team, so I’m very careful about what I put in my body.”

  “Okay, go on.”

  “Anyway, sometime after I’d started feeling a buzz, Randi and I got to talking. She’d been drinking, too, and one thing led to another and we ended up in one of the bedrooms.”

  “Who initiated the move to the bedroom?”

  Hastings thought for a moment. He looked concerned when he answered. “Now that I think about it, I’d say that she was the one who took the initiative.”

  “But you went along with her.”

  “Like I said, I was a little wasted.”

  “Okay, so you’re in the bedroom. Can I assume it’s just the two of you?”

  Hastings nodded.

  “What happened?”

  “We closed the door and we started making out on the bed.”

  “How far did that go?”

  “When we got on the bed, we started kissing. Then she unzipped my fly.”

  “This is very important, Blaine. Did you put your penis inside Miss Stark’s vagina? The State has to prove penetration in a rape case.”

  “Look, Mr. Armstrong, I’m not some dumb jock. I’m premed, and I know all about the way babies are made. I didn’t have a condom with me, so there’s no way I was going to risk getting Randi pregnant. But it didn’t matter, because the minute she got my penis out of my pants, she gave me a very fast hand job and I came right away. Then, as soon as I came, Randi yelled at me to get off her.”

  “Did you honor her request?”

  “Definitely. My folks brought me up to respect women, and I know that ‘no means no.’”

  “So that was the end of it?”

  “Most definitely. She sat up and yelled something like ‘Get off me.’”

  “Did that surprise you?”

  “Yeah, it did, because I got up as soon as she asked me.”

  “Okay, what happened then?”

  “The door opened and her friend, Annie Roche, came in and I left.”

  “Did you talk to anyone on the way out?”

  “When Annie came in, I might have said something to her, but, like I said, I was a little drunk, so my memory is hazy.”

  “What did you do after you left the bedroom?”

  “It was getting late and I’d gotten banged up in the game, so I went home.”

  Armstrong made some notes. Then he looked up. “So, you’re saying that you never forced yourself on Miss Stark in any way?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Your father hinted that you may have been in some trouble before this. He was vague and I didn’t want to push him. Can you tell me what he might have been talking about?”

  Hastings looked chagrined. “I have a temper, Mr. Armstrong. I’m not proud of it. It comes out when I play, and I try to keep it under wraps when I’m not on the playing field, but I had a few fights in high school, like the one I told you about. I can take care of myself, and I sent one boy to the hospital.”

  “Were you prosecuted?”

  “No. I was the victim. I had witnesses. It was a kid from the housing project, and he had it in for me because I’m rich and a jock and I do well in school. Once the school and the police learned the truth about what happened, I wasn’t in any trouble.”

  “Let me ask you something else,” Doug said. “Have you ever had problems with women before this? And remember, the prosecutors have investigators. If there’s anything out there, they’ll find it. And there is nothing that leads to a conviction quicker than a surprise at trial.”

  “What do you mean by problems?”

  “Let me be blunt, Blaine. Are any women going to go to the DA and say you sexually assaulted them?”

  Blaine hesitated.

  “This is very important,” Armstrong emphasized. “If the DA puts on witnesses who swear you sexually assaulted them, it will have a huge impact on the jury.”

  “Okay. There was this one time in eighth grade when this girl—Julie Angstrom—said I forced her to have sex, but it wasn’t true and there were never any charges.”

  “Was the situation similar to what allegedly happened at the party: drinking, a bedroom, et cetera?”

  “No. She said I followed her into Forest Park and pulled her into the woods.”

  Forest Park was the largest urban forest in the United States and had many isolated areas.

  “Were you in the park when she was?”

  “Yeah, but I had three witnesses who told the police that I was with them all the time we were in the park. Plus, there was no forensic evidence like hair, DNA. I mean the whole accusation was complete bullshit.”

  Armstrong made a note to find out more about the Angstrom girl’s complaint.

  “We may have a serious problem that we need to discuss,” Doug said. “The DA told me that Miss Stark went to the hospital after the party and they did the tests they a
lways do when a woman says she’s been raped. They found semen in Miss Stark’s vagina and tested it for DNA. I assume you know what that is if you’re premed.”

  Hastings nodded.

  “Okay. Well, the lab says the DNA is a match for your DNA.”

  “What!”

  “Do you have an explanation for that?”

  “No, I … It’s impossible.”

  “It’s definitely a problem if you insist that you never penetrated Miss Stark and never ejaculated inside her.”

  “Well, I didn’t.”

  Hastings was lost in thought for a moment, and Armstrong gave him time to think. “I do have a possible explanation for the sperm. Randi had a reputation in high school, if you know what I mean.”

  Armstrong nodded.

  “She could have had sex with someone else that evening. She was pretty drunk.”

  “That wouldn’t explain the match.”

  Hastings looked genuinely puzzled. “I don’t know what to say. That can’t be mine.”

  “Okay. Let’s leave this for the time being,” Doug said. “I’ll hire an expert on DNA, and we’ll see if we can get to the bottom of this. So, do you have any questions?”

  “Not right now.”

  Doug stood. “I’m going to check on how much progress we’ve made with the bail as soon as I get back to my office. Meanwhile, do not—under any circumstances—discuss your case with anyone, no matter how sympathetic they may seem. I am the only person—and that includes your parents—that you can talk to. A fellow prisoner will run to the DA with anything you tell them. Remember, I am your only friend until the jury says not guilty.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  If ever a man looked like a criminal, that man was Everett Henderson. His massive head was shaved, his bulging biceps and thick neck were evidence of hours spent pumping iron in a prison yard, a knife scar crawled down his pockmarked cheek, teardrop tattoos under his right eye announced to the world that he was an ex-con and more tattoos attested to his membership in a racist prison gang.

  As soon as she’d been court-appointed to represent Henderson, Robin looked up her new client’s rap sheet. It read like a list of all the possible ways one man could violate the criminal statutes of the State of Oregon.

  “Mr. Henderson, the Court has asked me to represent you,” Robin said when her client was seated across from her in the contact visiting room at the jail.

  Henderson studied Robin and he didn’t look pleased. “You’re awfully young to handle a case like mine.”

  “I am young, but I’m very good. Have you heard of Regina Barrister?” Robin asked.

  “Sure, who hasn’t?”

  “I’m Regina’s partner, and this is not the first death penalty case I’ve defended.”

  Henderson relaxed a little, but Robin could see that he was still skeptical.

  “Look, Mr. Henderson, I can see why you might not trust me. You didn’t choose me to be your lawyer and you don’t know a thing about me. So, let me give you a little background: I graduated from Yale Law School, which is one of America’s best, and I clerked for the chief justice of the Oregon Supreme Court before Regina hired me.”

  Robin was about to continue, when Henderson suddenly leaned forward and stared at her.

  “Are you Rockin’ Robin Lockwood?”

  Robin smiled. “I am.”

  Henderson broke into a grin. “I seen you fight. You were pretty good.”

  “I was okay.”

  Henderson nodded. “That Kerrigan broad did put a hurt on you.”

  Robin nodded in agreement. “That she did, which is why I decided it was safer to duke it out with DAs and judges.”

  Henderson laughed.

  “So, Everett … Can I call you Everett?”

  “Sure thing.”

  “I read the police reports before I came over. The DA is saying you killed Greg Schaefer, an off-duty cop, in a bar fight.”

  Henderson stopped smiling. “I did kill that motherfucker, but he started it.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what happened.”

  “My lady and I was in the Shamrock and we were dancing. The asshole I killed was in civilian clothes, and there’s no way I could tell he was a cop. He’d been drinking with his buddies, and he’d had way more than one too many—or he would have known better than to come on to Felicia.”

  “Felicia is your girlfriend?”

  Henderson nodded. “And she’ll tell you she told him real polite that she did not want to dance with him. She’ll also tell you that he wouldn’t take no for an answer. That’s when I suggested that he fuck off or get hurt. Which is when he took a swing at me.”

  Henderson shook his head. “Dumb move. I done a little fighting of my own. Tough-guy competitions and plenty of street stuff. Plus, I was sober and he wasn’t. I decked him pretty quick and Felicia pulled me off of him. We was walking back to our table when he grabbed a bottle and smashed me on the head.”

  Henderson bent his head down to show Robin his stitches.

  “Fucker hit me from behind and was jabbing at me with the jagged end after the bottle broke. That’s when I knifed him. But he started the whole thing. I was just defending myself.”

  “His friends tell a different story.”

  “Yeah, well, they’re lying motherfuckers. Hell, I doubt they saw what happened. Their table was way on the other side of the bar.”

  “Other than Felicia, were there any other witnesses who can back up your story?”

  “Anyone in the bar who saw what happened.”

  “My firm has an excellent investigator named Jeff Hodges. Give me the names, addresses, and phone numbers of your witnesses, and I’ll have Jeff talk to them. Then he’ll talk to the State’s witnesses. I’m also going to get a doctor to look at your head wound, and I may have Jeff take some pictures.”

  “What about getting me out of here?”

  “I’ll try, but I’m not optimistic. There’s no automatic bail in a murder case, and you are charged with killing a cop. Proving that the charge is bullshit may take a while. I may change my mind about the chances for bail when I’ve read all of the reports.”

  “Take your time. I’m okay in here.”

  “I figured that this wasn’t your first rodeo,” Robin said.

  Henderson grinned.

  “I’m still going to warn you about discussing this case with anyone except me and Jeff.”

  “I know all about jailhouse snitches. I’ve had to explain why that activity is unhealthy to a few of them.”

  Robin held up her hands. “Too much information, Everett.”

  Henderson laughed and Robin stood up.

  “Get me that witness list as fast as you can. Call when it’s ready, and I’ll send Jeff over to talk to you.”

  “Thanks for coming over so quickly.”

  Robin rang for the guard. It was a little after four when she left the jail, and she decided to go home instead of returning to the office. During her walk, Robin thought about Henderson’s case. She didn’t like to predict how she would do, because she knew that clients weren’t always truthful, but she felt pretty good about Henderson’s chances. If he was telling the truth.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The phone was ringing. Robin sat up and stared at the clock. It was two in the morning.

  “Miss Lockwood,” a frightened voice whispered.

  “Yes.”

  “This is Randi Stark. They’re after me.”

  Robin was still groggy. “Who’s after you?”

  “Blaine.”

  “The boy who raped you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is he there?”

  “Not him. One of his friends. He followed me from the club.”

  “Why do you think he’s a friend of Hastings’s?”

  “Because he’s a giant. He’s gotta play football.”

  Robin suddenly realized that Randi was slurring her words. “Have you been drinking?”

  “Yeah, at the Blue Unicorn. Tha
t’s where he was.”

  “Where are you now?”

  “I didn’t think I could make it home, so I hid around back of this gas station between two Dumpsters.”

  “Okay. Give me the address, and I’ll come over right away.”

  * * *

  Last year, Robin had purchased a .38 Special after someone involved in one of her cases had tried to kill her. After pulling on jeans, a T-shirt, and a sweatshirt, Robin put the gun in its holster and headed out.

  The gas station was fifteen minutes from Robin’s apartment by car. It was deserted, and the lights on its two islands and those that had been left on in the office provided the only illumination. Robin switched off her headlights and parked in the shadows at the far edge of the lot. She closed her car door quietly, then headed for the back of the station. Halfway there, she heard voices.

  Robin pulled out her .38, jogged along the side of the building, and looked around the corner. There were no lights in the back of the station, and the Dumpsters were at the end of the building farthest from her. Robin squinted into the shadow and saw Randi Stark cowering in front of a man who was the size of two normal humans. The neck of Randi’s T-shirt was clamped in a hand the size of a catcher’s mitt.

  Robin walked toward the Dumpsters and raised her gun. “Stop right there,” Robin commanded.

  The man spun around and released Randi, who fell hard onto the asphalt. The man’s face was in shadow, but she heard the disdain in his voice when he said, “You’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, bitch. Get smart and leave fast.”

  “I’m going to make this very simple,” Robin answered, “since anyone who is unarmed and insults someone with a gun has to be very stupid. This .38 Special is loaded with hollow-point bullets. Anywhere I shoot you will fuck you up big-time, and I’d have to be a horrible shot to miss someone the size of a rhinoceros. Leave now and live, or stay here and die. Your choice.”

  The man hesitated, and Robin could see he was fighting the urge to charge. Then he backed away, his eyes never leaving Robin’s, until he disappeared into the shadows.

  Randi began to sob. Robin waited a few seconds to make sure that the behemoth didn’t decide to sneak back. Then she placed the gun on the asphalt, where she could get to it quickly, and knelt next to Randi.