A Good Mother by Lara Bazelon (different ereaders txt) 📗

pointed at Shauna. She is so angry that Will can feel it; for a moment he can feel the blade entering his own body.

“He never said he was going to kill you, did he?”

“No.” Luz’s tone has gone sarcastic. “He just slapped me, yanked back my hair so my head almost came off from my neck. He just called me a cunt and told me to start praying. That’s all.” Luz turns to the jury with a frosty smile. Can you believe this bullshit? Will, watching the twelve faces, wills her to stop, wills it all to stop.

“But all those things had happened before in your relationship, to one degree or another, right?”

“This time it was different.”

“It was different because you decided it was going to be different.”

“It was different because I had Cristina to think about.”

Shauna nods. “You didn’t want her growing up in that environment.”

Luz stares at her, shaking her head in disbelief.

Shauna appeals to Dars, who says, “Answer the question.”

Luz rounds on him, half rising in her chair, and screams, “I had to protect my baby.” The sound of her voice seems shocking even to her, and she sinks back down with her hand over her mouth.

Dars says evenly, “Raise your voice like again and I will strike your testimony. All of it.” He nods at Shauna. “Ask your next question.”

Shauna’s voice is quiet but firm. “Are you telling us that if it hadn’t been for Cristina, you would not have resorted to violence?”

Luz is back to rolling her eyes. “I am not a violent person. I don’t go around stabbing people, if that’s what you mean.”

Will is on his feet but Shauna’s question is already out.

“Isn’t it true that when you were in high school you stabbed a girl in the bathroom?”

Will is shouting, “Sidebar, Your Honor.”

Abby has already started for the bench. When they are gathered around the court reporter, she speaks first, her face the color of ash. “Your Honor, we move for a mistrial—”

“Not you.” Dars turns pointedly to Will. “She’s your witness.”

Will has made the mistake of looking at Luz, who is staring straight ahead, eyes vacant. There is too much saliva in his mouth and he has to stop to swallow. “We move for a mistrial,” he repeats. “You ruled weeks ago that her juvenile prior could not be brought up and there’s case law stacked to the ceiling that says so. Those are sealed records.” He hears his voice shake. “They are never admissible. Never.”

Shauna says, quietly, “She just lied. When a witness lies, I have the right to expose the lie.”

“She didn’t lie,” Will explodes. “Jesus Christ.”

“That is enough.” Dars is looking past them at the jury box and Will follows his gaze to meet twelve wide-eyed stares. Dars turns back and says in a low voice, “The motion for a mistrial is denied.” Will starts to say something and Dars puts out his hand, five fingers spread, inches from Will’s face. “Shut up. Shut. Up.” The court reporter lifts her hands from the stenographer’s machine and for a moment they are all silent, waiting.

Dars says, “The defendant did lie. She’s been lying. She’s a liar. But—” and now Dars is looking at Abby “—I’m going to do you a favor here. I’m gonna split the baby. So to speak.” He smiles at his own humor. “The question will be withdrawn and stricken from the record. The jury will be instructed that the defendant was in a physical altercation in high school with another student where she used a knife to inflict injury.”

Beside him, Will hears Abby’s sharp intake of breath. He says, “That’s worse than letting her answer the question. At least then she could explain—”

Dars leans in, his face inches from Will’s. “She doesn’t get to explain. Now step back.”

“Your Honor—”

“I said step back.”

Shauna nods once, turns, and briskly walks to her place at the podium, Will and Abby trailing in her wake.

“Alright then.” Dars leans forward, his eyes on the jurors. “The question is stricken. But I am taking judicial notice that the defendant was involved in an incident where she wielded a knife against another student while at school at the age of sixteen and inflicted injury. Judicial notice means you are to accept what I have told you as a proven fact.” He looks at Shauna. “Move on.”

Shauna turns a page in her notebook. “When we left off, you were telling us about your responsibilities as a mother. One of those responsibilities is to provide for your child. At the time you were living on the military base with your husband, did you have a job?”

“I would have found something back in California.”

“Did you have any savings?”

“No.” Luz, scowling, isn’t even looking at Shauna now.

“What you did have, though, was Sergeant Hollis’s $400,000 life insurance policy?”

“Not while he was alive I didn’t.”

“Not while he was alive,” Shauna repeats and Will feels the dread curdle in his stomach. “But if he was dead, no one stood to benefit financially except for you.”

“The money was for Cristina.”

“Your lawyer, Mr. Estrada, arranged that?”

“Yes.”

“Before you killed your husband?”

“You’re acting like I planned it. I didn’t.”

Shauna looks at the jury. “You picked up a steak knife and stabbed him through the heart.”

Luz leans forward, her voice rising again. “I was defending myself. I was defending my baby.”

“You had no injuries. He was nowhere near the baby.”

“So what? I’m supposed to wait until he broke one of my bones? Until he grabbed Cristina out of her crib and threw her against a wall?”

Will cringes.

“You took a parenting class before you had your daughter, right?”

Will looks at Abby. Where is she going with this? But Abby’s eyes are trained on Luz, her face a studied blank.

“Yes.”

“In the class, you learned to perform CPR, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“As your husband lay bleeding to death on the floor of your house, did you at any point attempt to perform CPR on him?”

“I was in a panicked state, I couldn’t think—”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

“I