Fugue State (3 page)

Exiting the garage, Alexa passed by Norma Pate once more. Nastiness still lurked in the old woman’s eyes when she grasped Alexa’s hand along with the parking pass she held. “Hand is looking bare without that rock on it.” Norma smiled to herself.

Alexa winced at the cutting words and tugged her fingers away. She glanced at her bare left hand, and her heart yearned for Britt. She would never be Mrs. Britt Anderson. She had given back the engagement ring of her estranged fiancée a few months into the trial.

Alexa flashed a wicked smirk at Norma and forced a quick lie. “I’ll be back by next week, Norma. See. You. Next. Tuesday.” She formed the last four words individually, hoping her listener would spell out their clandestine meaning. With a sly wave, Alexa drove away. The gawking face in the rearview mirror didn’t appear to catch the dig.
Damn.

Pulling out of the garage, she received a text message from her attorney updating her on tomorrow’s court time. She would meet with her lawyer, Jacob Appleby, at seven-forty a.m. with an eight-fifteen a.m. court time. A second text immediately followed.

“
Get some sleep. Don’t look so tired.
”

Alexa frowned
. Sounds like a vodka martini with a double dose of Unisom kind of night.
She drove past a sign on an unfamiliar building that read “Otter Creek Shooting Range.” Without even realizing she was changing her plans, Alexa turned off the street and pulled into the barren gravel parking lot.

She didn’t know why she stopped. She’d been living in a daze for the past few months — a side effect of chronic sleep deprivation. The decision seemed hidden within her subconscious. Then Jimmy Thornton’s words flooded her head.
A gun buys peace of mind.
She looked again at the sign on the building, reading the words slowly and out loud this time. “Otter Creek Shooting Range.”
I’m at a shooting range. Yes. I’m going to buy a gun.

The dimly lit building took Alexa by surprise.
Shooting firearms in here can’t be safe.
The gray-haired man who sat behind the counter bore a
Semper Fi
tattoo on his left forearm that peeked from beneath the rolled sleeves of his plaid button-up. A half-snuffed cigar bobbed in his mouth.

Alexa eyed the gruff salesman with a moment of hesitation. He pulled the unlit cigar from his mouth and stood up straight.

“Can I help you, Miss? This here’s my place. Joe Reynolds at your service. Most folks just call me Smokey Joe, suits me fine.”

Alexa approached the counter. An array of handguns filled the glass case under the man’s resting elbow. Her gaze scanned the case slowly, and then moved to the rifles on the wall behind Smokey Joe. Her eyes finally met his. “I want a gun.”

“A gun to shoot, or a gun to buy?” asked Joe, his bright eyes beaming now. He motioned to the double doors with plexiglass inserts behind him, and she peered at the indoor shooting range in the adjacent room.

“Both,” she replied.

Joe took her small hands in his and examined them. His gentle touch relieved the lasting sting of Norma’s grasp. Within moments, he had a selection of half a dozen handguns for her to try.

Joe gave her a forty-five-minute lecture about the six guns he had selected for her before he escorted her into the shooting range in the back. He briefed her on his extensive military training. She took comfort in his expertise. The more he explained, the more she wanted to know
. Who’d have thought there was so much to learn about a handgun?

Alexa’s shooting lesson took another hour and a half, and most of that time, Joe left the front counter unmanned.

He picked out a simple target for her — the silhouette of a human figure. There was a bull’s-eye on the chest over the heart, and another in the center of the head. She aimed for the target on the head. She concentrated on her aim and the stillness of her hands, and strove for both accuracy and precision with each squeeze of the trigger. Precision came first, which Joe applauded. She managed to hit the target just a few inches to the left of center every time. He said precision was much more difficult to learn, and a careful adjustment in her technique would easily improve her accuracy. Joe was right. She had made several perfect shots by the time she finished her first lesson.

“You’ve got a knack for weaponry, pretty lady,” he complimented and stretched out his hand.

“Thank you.” Alexa blushed. “Truly, thank you.” She reached out to shake his hand, taking his hand in both of hers. “Call me Alexa, Please.”

She took an instant liking to Joe, and she happily accepted his invite to meet again for another lesson at the end of the week. Texas didn’t require a waiting period, and Alexa left with a .38 caliber snub-nosed revolver with a two-inch barrel. A common choice of handgun for a female; it wasn’t too bulky to fit in her Fendi handbag.

The door chimed as Alexa walked out, leaving Smokey Joe alone behind the counter to straighten up and lock the door. He licked his lips. He liked the look of his young female client — long lean legs and perfectly manicured hands; it was a nice change of scenery. He wished he’d bothered to wash the tobacco spit from his shirt collar before they’d met. Her determination was striking; her face memorable. He had recognized that pretty face from the television at first glance, but there was something more. The thought rolled around in his head the way an empty beer can would in the back of his truck. The trepidation in her voice. The way she hesitated.
She’s afraid.
Somebody hurt that girl. She let her guard down when she thought I wasn’t looking, and I saw her fear.

She had the same wide-eyed stare Laura Beth had the night I hit her.
The face that haunted him flashed in his mind, and he recalled the slap that caused her head to spin all the way around before her body hit the ground. A chill ran over him that left his hand shaky, so he reached for the flask he kept under the counter. The doctor called it post-traumatic stress disorder due to the war that led him to hit his wife. Joe called the monster inside his soul Hyde.
Good thing she left me. I’m afraid I’d have killed her.
Joe reached for the remote to turn off the muted television monitor that hung high on the wall in the corner of the shop. Channel five news mentioned updates on Alexa’s case, and her picture appeared on the screen. Joe nodded to himself.
Yep that’s the one
. He muttered aloud to the reporter covering the story. “Somebody hurt that girl.” He flicked the television off and spit tobacco into the trashcan, with another stray drop landing on his shirt collar.

CHAPTER 4

A
fter leaving Smokey Joe, Alexa still managed an hour of kickboxing before night fell. Physical exhaustion helped her sleep. She followed the workout with a combination of sleeping aids, which included Benadryl, propanolol, and an Ambien. After a couple of restless hours, she slept.

That night, the yellow-eyed man crept into her dreams. He entered through her bedroom window, breaking the glass with an axe. Alexa instinctively rolled underneath the bed and lay there, paralyzed. Her heart beat rhythmically, fast and hard, while the axe hacked away at the bed sheets and the bed frame overhead until she could see the glow of his yellow eyes through the gaping hole above. Then he reached underneath and yanked her from her hiding place by her ankles. With the axe, he hacked at her extremities, beginning distally with her fingers and toes, and moving proximally toward her shoulders and thighs.

She awoke with tightness in her throat, and her hand reached for the source of the pain.
My screams woke me.

The clock read 4:09 a.m.
Too close to court time for any more meds.
She rolled out of the covers, laced up her running shoes, and ran in the cold night air until the sun rose. The coolness of the air felt good on her tight throat, but she worked to breathe. Her chest moved in spasms as she gasped for breath. She returned to her apartment in a cold sweat, trembling from her lack of sleep. After a hot shower, she prepared for her trial. She stepped into a navy skirt and cream-colored silk button-up blouse. Both colors conveyed innocence, according to Appleby. She wrapped herself in that small bit of hope, while her insides felt numb. Concealer and a brightening serum under her eyes helped relieve the discoloration of chronic fatigue. Eyeliner and mascara wakened her tired eyes, and a pink-hued blush returned life to her hollow cheeks. The makeup helped, but it couldn’t stop her constant eye twitching. Alexa sighed as she walked to Appleby’s private car outside.

Jacob Appleby’s initial words were uplifting. “The prosecution’s attempt to brand you a serial killer won’t pan out.”

Pictures of a dead nineteen-year-old male, gagged with wrists bound, naked in a ditch by the railroad tracks flooded her mind. His throat had also been slit with a knife ten months earlier, and the prosecution tried to link Alexa to the murder. The allegation seemed fueled by Marcum’s insight on Alexa’s knife skills. He had an astounding influence on the prosecution. Using various tactics to describe Alexa as a doctor by day, streetwalker by night, the prosecution accused her of living a double life, similar to the “Craigslist Killer.” They presented her as a woman veiled in a respectable and personable professional front, who secretly perused the streets of Austin after hours looking for lone men to target for acts of sex and violence.
Absurd.
But once the seed was planted in the minds of the doe-eyed jury, convincing them otherwise proved difficult.

“There’s no supporting evidence to tie you to the murder of anyone other than Jamar. I had the accusation stricken from the court’s record. Not only is that homicide a separate charge, those allegations are purely circumstantial.”

Her shoulders slumped. “But the prosecution’s speculation left quite an impact in the courtroom.” Not only did the slander ignite curiosity in the jurors’ golf-ball-sized eyes, the media clung to the accusations. A local newspaper labeled Alexa a “Female Physician Femme Fatale.” The questions and comments from friends and family that followed the allegations were heart wrenching. She shuddered.

Appleby raised an eyebrow and pushed forward. “Your character witnesses have helped. I don’t think the jury is convinced you set out that night with the intent to slay anyone
.”

Yes. The character witnesses. The friends and family who took the stand on my behalf, and the stress of the media spotlight that severed the ties between us
. Her eyebrows rumpled in frustration.
They gave their testimonies. Then they disappeared from the courtroom.
Her stomach churned thinking of the row that would be left empty behind her today. Could she blame them? The trial was dreadful. Even her Texas-native parents stopped going to the courthouse after receiving death threats that her mother couldn’t handle. Alexa would skip her own trial if it were possible. Yet, she did blame them.

He continued, “I think murder is off the plate.” His words jarred her back to reality. “There are still charges of manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide to deal with.”

“Yes. We still have those.” Sarcasm seeped from her pores
. Why must there be so many different words for kill?
Much of the publicity the trial generated revolved around the definition of homicide in the Texas legal system, with variations spanning from capital murder to forms of imperfect self-defense, with or without adequate provocation. She frowned at the ugly words she heard so regularly and wondered how such terms came about.

Alexa rolled her shoulders in tight circles in an attempt to break the mounting tension. Although Appleby touted good news, she still feared the jury’s critique of her character.
I’ve seen enough scowls in that pulpit to know that the saints think I’m a sinner.
Her eyes flashed at Appleby.

“I’m relying on you to create
a shadow of a doubt
in the jurors’ minds. Convince them it wasn’t unnecessary force.” It had seemed like a daunting task for so long, but Appleby had made serious ground recently.

“Relax. It’ll all be over soon enough.” His lips pressed into a tight line, and he turned his glance to the window.

Walking into the courtroom, Alexa’s eyes scanned the audience. Her eyes glided across a haggard middle-aged woman with stringy black and gray hairs. She recognized this woman as the mother of Jamar’s youngest child. According to Appleby, Jamar had fathered two children with different mothers. One child was ten years old and shuffled between the mother and other family members. The older child was an adult son serving time in prison. Jamar also had a soft criminal record, in and out of jail since he was twenty. He had two counts of rape against him — but the most recent was over a decade ago. He had a few arrests for various drug charges, and one count of child molestation. Jamar had lived alone and never married. The woman didn’t seem to notice Alexa walk in.

Alexa bit the inside of her lip as she took her seat in the front. She stole a glance at the jury, trying not to stare; she yearned to know their thoughts. Appleby had warned her not to make too much eye contact with them. He wanted the facts to speak for themselves. He was afraid they would be distracted by her looks and develop their own preconceived notions about her character. She had involuntarily made so many mistakes throughout the process. She turned away from the jury and considered adding “too much eye-contact” to her list of faults.

She went over the list of errors she had created in her mind.
That scandalous outfit that led both the bouncer and the police to think me a prostitute — bad idea.
She winced.
Don’t forget the cocktails that left my blood alcohol level at point oh-six,
not far below the legal driving limit of point oh-eight.
She rolled her eyes to herself as the voice in her head mocked the legal limit.
I’m a whore and a lush. Check.
Next? Oh, yes. Too deliberate with the knife when I turned on Jamar.
According to the prosecution and Detective Marcum, a victim is typically much more precarious with their counter attack, stabbing away haphazardly without thought or recourse. They deemed her use of the knife “an unjustified use of force” in comparison to the superficial cut Jamar had made on her thigh.
Finally, the first words the bouncer heard from her were, “Turn off the music.”
The grimaces on the juror’s faces revealed their dismay. She didn’t sound like a victim to them, and Alexa didn’t know how to convey innocence. She behaved defensively and sometimes defiantly; Appleby kept her off the stand whenever possible.