“Yet you took elaborate steps to create an alibi. Was that to cover the burglary you staged in Cranston the night after the kidnapping?”
“Objection!”
“Sustained.”
“Why,” Savannah went on undaunted, “was it necessary for you to concoct such an elaborate alibi if the plan you’d worked out with Mrs. Vandermeer was so sound?”
“Because women can be flighty,” Matty answered without pause. “I wanted to cover myself just in case.”
“You wanted to cover yourself. Yourself. What about her? What was her alibi?”
“I don’t know. That was her problem.”
“You didn’t check it out? A brilliant thief like you didn’t check it out? Or,” she said more loudly, “were you only concerned with yourself because Mrs. Vandermeer was, in fact, nothing more than a victim? Isn’t this simply one long cock-and-bull story you’ve come up with to save your hide?”
“No, it is not.”
“You’re a very clever man, Mr. Stavanovich. A master. Not many people could come up with a story like yours, particularly after the supposed mastermind of the scheme winds up brutally raped. Was that in the original plan?”
“I’ve already said that my accomplice was the violent one.”
“Your accomplice. Where is this accomplice?”
“I don’t know.”
“You didn’t want him to verify your story?”
“He would have done that.”
“But you couldn’t find him.”
“That’s right.”
“Because he knew he was in big trouble well beyond the rape—”
“Objection.”
Savannah moved on. “Strange, this accomplice business. You always work alone, Mr. Stavanovich. If, as you claim, Mrs. Vandermeer was willing, why did you need an accomplice?”
“It was simply a convenience—”
“For when Mrs. Vandermeer was tied hand and foot to the bed,” Savannah finished with a look of distaste for the jury to see. “But I do agree with you. A kidnapping takes two men—”
“Objection,” Woodward called. “The prosecutor’s opinion has no place in the cross-examination of this witness.”
The judge agreed. “Sustained,” he said.
Savannah moved on. She went through every inch of his story, questioning it, throwing doubt where she could. By the time she’d finished with him on Thursday morning, she was repulsed by his smugness and offended by his arrogance. She could only hope that the jury was as turned off as she.
After Matty’s appearance on the stand, the defense rested its case. Woodward delivered his closing argument shortly after lunch. It was relatively brief as closing arguments went and involved a simple recapping of the facts as Woodward saw them. His client, he concluded, had spoken in his own defense and, as sworn, was guilty neither of kidnapping nor of rape. Clearly, he claimed, the state had failed to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Savannah spoke for two hours, delivering one of the most impassioned arguments of her career. When she was done, the judge briefly charged the jury, then sent them off to deliberate.
The hours of deliberation were always difficult for the parties involved. For Savannah, this time, it was pure hell.
CHAPTER22
The jury deliberated until shortly after ten. During that time, Savannah remained in her office. Jared was with her. Her assistants wandered in and out, as did Anthony Alt, whose ascerbic comments only added to the stress. Paul called from time to time. Megan was at home with Will.
