Presumed Guilty (10 page)

She heard a key in the front door. She jumped up from the desk and nearly ran to the foyer.
Jared was standing there, head slightly down, with a seriouslooking Cara behind him.
“I’ll let you take it from here, Mom,” Cara said.

Cara entered the sunlight of her apartment and went immediately to the window. This was her favorite place to kneel before God and pray.

Prayer, she’d come to believe, was her particular duty, a calling. She’d been called the hard way, but that was fine with her.
When she was ten, the neuromuscular disease she had trouble pronouncing threatened to take away all the things she loved most — running, playing, keeping up with the boys. She took treatments and therapy for three years before the doctors said the disorder would stay with her for life.
That’s when she really started praying. Before, she prayed in obedience to her parents and Sunday school teachers. Now it was from a scared heart.
Alone in her room, she had underlined passages in her Bible about prayer. She especially loved something Jesus said in Luke. “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
She asked. For a whole year she asked, clinging to the promises. And she was healed.
Now, almost fifteen years later, she still prayed the promises, even when the answers weren’t what she expected or God seemed silent.
She didn’t care that some of her friends teased her about it. One, Susan Farmer, called her “praying Cara,” which was a riff on the Stephen King novel
Carrie.
Cara looked it up.

Tommy Erbter, age five, was biking up the other side of the street. He was a small, intense-looking boy on a twenty-inch Schwinn with bright red training wheels. He was humming “Scooby Doo, where are you?” under his breath. He saw Carrie, brightened, and stuck out his tongue.

Even though Susan only meant it in fun, it did strike Cara that she must have seemed as odd as Carrie White to those who didn’t believe in God.

For Carrie, of course, the ultimate answer came in the form of murderous, telekinetic powers. For Cara Hamilton, the answers came from God.

Her apartment was on the third floor of a security building in Encino. A place she could call home and feel safe in. She still displayed her love of sports in the décor. Posters of some of her favorite athletes, like Serena Williams and Annika Sorenstam, were framed on the wall. A small case held some of her tennis trophies.

She vaguely recalled that a tournament she wanted to attend was coming up, but just as quickly the thought left her.
She had Jared on her mind now.
She’d been in prayer for her father and mother, and now her burden shifted to her little brother. This was a spiritual battle for his soul.
At the window she knelt and closed her eyes. She was going to stay on the front lines for Jared until the enemy’s power was broken.

After getting Jared’s truck from police impound, Dallas suggested they grab a Papa John’s pizza. The two of them, just like old times. Before the storm-tossed seas of his teen years, Jared had been open and demonstrative with affection for his mother. Some of the best times they had were when Ron was on the road and Cara was in her room, talking to friends on the phone.

There would be eating and talking, a giant pepperoni pizza with extra cheese between them, sometimes watching a British mystery on television. Jared especially loved Miss Marple and liked to sit on the sofa next to Dallas, watching the intrepid Jane solve the latest to-do in her village.

Here they were again, under quite different circumstances. Dallas knew beyond question now that Jared was on a dark slide that had to be stopped. She had no idea how, except by prayer and by keeping him close.

They brought the pizza to the table out back, where once upon a time the four of them dined during the summer months. When they were settled, Dallas said, “Would you say a blessing for the food?”

She prayed out loud for the food, adding a silent prayer for Jared at the end.
“You doing okay, Mom?”
Dallas nodded. “I’ve got a little bit of callus developing, I think. I hope.”
“We all do, maybe.”
“Why don’t you go see your dad? I know he’d love — ”
“How is he?”
“Scared.”
“They going to let him out?”
“No bail yet. Jeff’s going to ask for a new hearing.”
“Funny, isn’t it?”
“Funny?”
“Him in there and me out here. Shouldn’t be that way.”
“Shouldn’t be that way for either of you.”
“Maybe I’ll be in soon enough.”
“Don’t talk that way, Jared.”
He took a bite of pizza but didn’t look like he tasted it. They ate in silence for a while.
Jared said, “Try not to worry about me, Mom.”
“How can I do that? I’ve always worried about you. You’re my son, that’s what I do for a living.”
“I bet you don’t worry about Cara.”
“I do. Just in a different way.”
“Yeah, she’s normal. And she doesn’t get drunk. She’s the good one.”
“Jared, don’t say that.”
“Why not? Didn’t you and Dad always tell me to be honest? Isn’t that what a Christian is supposed to be, totally honest? Confess the old sins. Well, I’ve got a trunkful.”
“Good.”
“What?”
“It’s good that you’ve got a trunkful, and that you told me about it, and now you can go to church and talk to God about it.”
“Why do I have to go to church to talk to God?”
“Do you talk to God?”
“No.”
“Then come to church and just listen for a while.”
“I’ve been listening all my life. Do you know I hear Dad in my sleep sometimes? I hear his voice. He’s usually telling me something that I don’t want to hear. So I make myself wake up. I’ve lost a lot of sleep that way.”
Dallas looked at the pizza box, grease stains on the bottom.
God, help me reach him. Give me the words to say.
“Got an idea,” Dallas said.
“What?”
“Remember the way we used to watch mysteries on TV?”
“Sure.”
“See if one’s on.”
Inside, Jared turned on the TV while Dallas brought in the dishes. When she got to the family room, it was no mystery on TV.
Jared was looking at the Hank Dunaway show.
Dunaway was the hottest interview show going on cable news, sometimes featuring a celebrity or newsmaker, other times a panel discussing current events.
This night, the guest host was that blond woman, the former prosecutor who always assumed the worst about any current case. Dallas always thought she was a little too zealous, a little too show biz. And truth seemed to be the real victim whenever she clamped her jaws on a case.
“Tonight,” she droned, “the Ron Hamilton murder trial. Our panel of experts will analyze what will go on in court tomorrow, and what we can expect in the months ahead. All that and more on
Hank Dunaway Tonight
.”
“You want me to turn it off?” Jared said.
“No. We might as well see what everybody’s saying.”
The blond looked at the camera with her liquid sincerity and in her superior tone explained what “everyone” already knew. Ron was guilty. The pretrial motions were just smoke and mirrors. Then she handed it off to a guest, some lawyer in Florida, a guy with hundred-dollar hair.
“No surprises,” he said. “Jefferson Waite will make a motion to suppress, and it will be denied. Then Ron Hamilton will be ordered to stand trial. Remember, the threshold at a preliminary hearing is very low, so it doesn’t take much to convince a judge to bind a defendant over.”
“But the evidence is overwhelming,” the blond insisted. “I mean, you have the DNA, the sexual contact, the lying to police.”
“We don’t know that he lied,” hair boy said. “We know that he didn’t volunteer everything.”
“That’s a lie in my book, and a pretty stupid one. It was bound to be exposed.”
“Turn it off,” Dallas said.
Jared clicked the remote and the tube withdrew into blessed silence.
“See if you can find a DVD or something.” Dallas’s phone chimed. She recognized the number. Karen, Ron’s agent.
“Oh, my dear sweet Dallas, how are you? I just watched the Dunaway show.”
Dallas leaned against the kitchen wall. “Some fun.”
“You doing okay?”
“Hanging in there. The way those circus guys used to hang by their teeth way up in the air.”
Karen chuckled. “Tell me about it. I’ve had days where my clients were all . . .” There was a pause, and Karen said, “I’m sorry. There’s no comparison to what you’re going through.”
This time there was a longer pause, and Dallas knew there was more to this call than an expression of concern.
“Dallas, I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news regarding the contract.”
Dallas closed her eyes. Her mental wheels turned and locked in place. It made sense and seemed so inevitable. “Canceled, I suppose.”
“Withdrawn, actually, since the contract never went out. I’m just sick about it.”
“So the publishers have assumed his guilt, have they? What wonderful people.”
“I know it doesn’t help, but if you see it from their perspective, they — ”
“Why should I? Are they sitting around seeing it from my perspective?”
“You have every right to be hurt.”
“Thank you for that permission.”
Silence. Then Dallas added, “Karen, I’m sorry. It’s just that this is another — ”
“You don’t have to say it, Dallas. I understand completely. I’m not going to give up fighting for this project. And if there’s anything I can do, anything, I want you to call me.”
“Sure.”
Dallas clicked off. And threw her cell phone across the room.

“The councilman’s schedule is just packed, Mrs. Hamilton,” he said. Thoms was a bushy-haired grad-student type, with wirerimmed glasses framing ambitious eyes. “But I know he wants to talk to you.”

“No time like the present,” Dallas said. “I won’t be ten minutes.” “I wish I could, but — ”
“Just ask him.” Dallas made it sound like
tell him
. “And remind

him that the reporters want to talk to me in the worst way, and I don’t want to have to say anything negative about anybody.” Thoms’s forehead made little rows. “Let me see what I can do.”
Predictably, Thoms could do what was expedient, and a few minutes later Dallas was in the office of Councilman Bernie Halstrom.
Dallas knew his history. Bernie was elected to the city council in the late nineties after a twenty-year career with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. He was fifty-two, married, with two successful sons. One of them was a Wall Street lawyer. The other was a graduate of the famous USC film school and was slowly climbing the Hollywood ladder.
Bernie greeted Dallas with his usual gregariousness. “Dallas, I’m so glad you came over.” He took her hands in both of his and held them warmly. “I’ve been thinking about you and Ron almost nonstop.”
Dallas wanted to say,
Then why aren’t you supporting him?
Instead, she said, “Thanks,” with little enthusiasm.
“Been meaning to come to Hillside soon for services,” Bernie said. He was a true Los Angeles politician who did not practice any single religion but walked among them all. Voters, after all, were in synagogues and mosques as well as churches and cathedrals.
“I’m sure this whole thing is going to be straightened out. Jeff Waite’s a great lawyer.” He offered Dallas a chair, then took the one next to it.
She started to feel a little foolish. What was she to expect from a man who had more than just the Hamilton family problems to worry about?
“Bernie, I’m sorry for imposing on you like this.”
“Nothing of it. I’m happy to have this chance to talk to you.” “It’s just that this has become such a high-profile case now.”
“Tell me about it.” Bernie shook his head. “It’s something you can’t control. It’s arbitrary what the media decides to clamp down on. If it wasn’t Ron, it’d be somebody else. I’ve been there, believe me.”
Bernie became a huge target three or four years ago when a female aide in his office accused him of sexual harassment. It was front-page news in the
Times
for about a week. As usual, the
Times
took the side of the accuser, slanting all their coverage against the councilman. They even brought up a fifteen-year-old accusation from his time on the police force, one that had been summarily dismissed by an administrative proceeding.
The
Times
never questioned the female aide’s story. When a
Daily News
reporter discovered she had a lurid past and had lied on her official employment documents, the
Times
waited two days before making a tepid admission that the case against Halstrom was going nowhere.
“One of the things you have to do,” Bernie said, “is hang onto your faith that the truth will come out eventually. I know Ron couldn’t have done what they say. Murder, I mean.”
Bernie cleared his throat. What was left unsaid, Dallas realized, was that the other part, Ron’s adultery,
was
something he had done.
Quickly, Halstrom added, “Ron is as decent a guy as I know. We’re all human around here. Even me.” He laughed. “We make mistakes. But that’s all they are, mistakes. Sins, you would say. Isn’t God in the forgiving business?”
Dallas half smiled. That’s exactly what Ron used to say. And then she realized why Bernie was so good at what he did. He knew, really knew, about the people he worked with. He knew enough to quote one of Ron’s own expressions.
“You’re right,” Dallas said, even as she wondered if she could forgive Ron. That hadn’t happened yet. “I was just hoping that maybe you’d keep up the pressure on the porn regulations you and Ron were working on.”
Bernie’s district included Chatsworth, which was by all accounts the center of the pornography business in the United States. Dallas had never understood how it could be allowed to prosper like a legitimate enterprise. Nor had Ron.
When Ron’s book became so popular, it was Bernie who called on him with the idea of hammering out a new set of regulations for the city that would severely limit, if not eliminate, the manufacturing of pornography in Los Angeles.
It was admittedly an uphill battle. So little had been done over the years. Politicians had shown all the backbone of soufflé against the porn that enveloped neighborhoods and polluted souls.
“Believe me, Dallas,” Bernie said, “I’m as determined as ever. This setback is not going to stop me from trying to put the brakes on the porn business.”
“It’s flesh trade, not business.” She thought a moment. “What do you know about this guy Vic Lu?”
He blinked. “How did you come across that name?”
“I read about him on the Internet. He’s apparently one of the bigwigs in pornography around here. He was the one who discovered Melinda Perry and put her in his movies.”
Bernie scratched underneath his chin. “Yes. LookyLu Productions. Nice double meaning there, huh? Cute. But he’s well known around here. He’s one of the more successful adult-film producers.”
“You mean pornography, don’t you? Calling these
adult films
seems too respectable.”
“Agreed.”
“Let me just ask you, Bernie. Straight out. I’ve never really gotten a square answer on this. How can the law allow sex acts to be filmed and sold? I mean, prostitution is illegal. Why isn’t this?”
With a bemused smile, Bernie said, “The courts have given this some strange thought. They have held there is a distinction between people being paid to have sex as actors, but not as individuals in a free exchange.”
Incredulous, Dallas asked, “What on earth is the difference?”
“You’ve got me. Lawyers pretend to understand this stuff.” “Incredible.”
Bernie nodded. “What it all comes down to, Dallas, is that we have the kind of society we want. If enough people want porn, they’re going to get it. The courts have not been helpful. Over the years they’ve allowed more and more stuff to be produced, protected by the First Amendment. I doubt our founding fathers would be pleased.”
“Give me a flamethrower and some addresses,” Dallas said. “I’ll take it out of the hands of the courts.”
“I believe you would. Heck, I might even join you. Until flamethrowers become legal, though, rest assured, I’ll keep pushing for tighter controls. And, Dallas, try to get some rest. You can’t carry all this on your own.”