I SEE YOU an unputdownable psychological thriller with a breathtaking twist by PATRICIA MACDONALD (bookstand for reading txt) 📗

‘Oh yes,’ said Hannah. Marjorie had instructed her to only answer the questions. Not to volunteer any information.

‘Did your daughter talk to you about this relationship?’

Hannah hesitated. ‘When they first met, she told me that he worked at the hospital.’

‘She never said that she was madly in love with him, or anything to that effect?’

‘No,’ said Hannah. ‘Nothing like that. She seemed to enjoy going out with Troy. But, with her daughter and her studies, she doesn’t have a lot of free time.’

‘Did he come to your home? Did you meet Troy Petty?’

‘Yes,’ said Hannah. ‘He came to pick her up once in a while. He seemed . . .’

‘What, Mrs Wickes?’

Hannah took a deep breath. ‘He seemed like a nice young man.’

‘But Lisa never spoke of him as a potential husband, or father for Sydney?’

Hannah shook her head emphatically. ‘No. Never.’

‘Did you know she was lending him money?’

Hannah hesitated. ‘No,’ she said truthfully. ‘I wasn’t aware of that.’

‘Would you have approved, if she had mentioned it?’

‘No,’ said Hannah firmly. ‘Lisa must have known I wouldn’t approve. It was a financial struggle as it was, with expenses for medical school, and caring for Sydney. That’s probably why she never mentioned it.’

‘Are you surprised to learn that she lent him money?’

‘No,’ Hannah admitted. ‘Lisa always had a soft spot for anybody in need. Or in trouble.’ She grimaced inwardly. That wasn’t precisely true. Lisa often chose to associate with people whom Hannah and Adam thought were questionable, and she would get angry if they criticized her choices. It wasn’t the same thing exactly. But it stemmed from the same impulse, she thought loyally.

‘Thank you, Mrs Wickes.’ Marjorie turned Hannah over to D.A. Castor.

The D.A. peered at her, and approached the witness box. ‘So, it’s your testimony that if your daughter had been madly in love with Troy Petty, she would have told you so.’

Hannah hesitated. ‘Probably. Yes. Ever since she was little, when she was enthusiastic about something, she would kind of bubble over with it. At least initially.’

‘What about when she was angry?’ he asked. ‘Would she tell you that?’

Hannah took a deep breath. Marjorie had prepared her for this line of questioning. The D.A. was trying to trap her. She was ready.

‘No. She pretty much kept her anger and her disappointments to herself.’

Hannah could see the irritation in Castor’s eyes. He thought he had cornered her, but she had evaded him. ‘Did Lisa ever mention to you that she caught Mr Petty preparing to assault your granddaughter?’

‘No. Of course not.’

‘Isn’t that the sort of thing you might blurt out to the people you lived with? Your parents? Your child’s grandparents?’

‘I’m sure she was terribly ashamed for having brought him into her daughter’s life. She just went ahead and broke up with him. That’s what I would have expected her to do.’

‘You wouldn’t have recommended that she call the police? Report Mr Petty as a predator?’

‘I might have,’ Hannah admitted. ‘But I didn’t know about it.’

‘Your granddaughter is not the only child out there, Mrs Wickes. If this man was the predator that Lisa made him out to be, he needed to be stopped.’

‘I agree. But I’m sure that Lisa’s first thought was to get her own child away from him. And she did.’

‘So she just let it go. Never reported him.’

‘She may have intended to. We’ll never know. He died before she could.’

‘Maybe that was your daughter’s way of stopping him. Making sure he could never hurt any other child.’

Hannah remained calm. ‘No matter how many reasons you come up with, Mr Castor, the fact remains that my daughter would never have killed Troy Petty. She’s studying to be a doctor. She intends to be a healer. Not a killer.’

Castor pursed his lips. ‘No further questions for this witness.’

‘I think we’ll break for lunch right here,’ said the judge.

Hannah was excused, and she left the courtroom.

‘How did I do?’ she asked when Adam met her outside.

‘You did great,’ he said sincerely.

‘Marjorie warned me he would ask about that.’

‘You were ready for him. Marjorie knows her stuff,’ said Adam, shaking his head admiringly.

After lunch, Marjorie called the parole officer for Troy’s brother, who claimed that Troy was paying off one drug dealer after another because of his brother’s habit. With that, the defense rested.

After another break, D.A. Castor was invited to give his summation to the jury. He stood up wearily, dark circles under his eyes. Then, the young D.A. squared his shoulders and went to work, trying to salvage his decimated case. As Castor outlined it, Lisa had multiple motives to kill Troy Petty. There was the check for $450 which Lisa cashed. D.A. Castor pounded on this fact, saying that the convenience-store tape was positive proof of Lisa’s guilt. But then, as if trying to shore up his argument against the lack of hard evidence in the explosion, and unable to discount the testimony given by Carl Halloran, he insisted vaguely that this was also a crime of passion. According to Castor’s summation, Lisa had arranged for the fishing camp to explode because she believed Troy was trying to assault her daughter. And then, on top of that, Troy Petty had the temerity to try to break up with her. Perhaps she was even jealous, Castor said. She sits before you coolly now but who knows what was really in her heart. He did his best to dismiss the lack of forensic evidence as unimportant. He insisted that it could not have been an accident, and that there was no one else, according to Castor, who would have any reason to want Troy dead. Even to a layman like Hannah, his summation seemed to be without substance and all over