State's Evidence: A Beverly Mendoza Legal Thriller by R. Barri Flowers Read Free Book Online Page B

Sipping
the coffee, he eyed the attractive new widow and began respectfully
with, “I want to say how sorry everyone is at the police department
about Judge Crawford’s death. He was a good man and a good judge
for law and order.” At least as far as anyone knew.
    “Thank you. I appreciate that,” Maxine said
with genuine emotion, lifting her cup expertly. “Sheldon only tried
to do his best as a husband and criminal court judge. Why someone
would do this to him...and me...”
    O’Dell almost wished he could comfort her in
some way. But what could he do or say to someone who had seen what
she had, and been sexually assaulted as well?
    “We want to get the man who did this to Judge
Crawford—and you ,” he stressed.
    Maxine sipped the coffee. “I’ll do whatever I
can to help,” she said with a swallow. “It all happened so fast.
I’m just not sure—”
    The judge’s murder didn’t happen fast enough,
since he had enough time to get out of bed before the gunman
finished him off. And from what O’Dell understood, the perpetrator
took his own sweet time in sexually assaulting the lady in more
ways than one.
    “How about if we go over a description of the
perpetrator first?” O’Dell took out his notepad, glancing over the
information from her initial statement. “How old would you say the
assailant was?”
    Maxine swallowed pensively. “Maybe in his
early thirties.”
    “Race...ethnicity?”
    “He was Hispanic, but not black.”
    O’Dell looked at her. He was happy that it
wasn’t an African-American who had committed these violent crimes,
otherwise they would both be even more uncomfortable under the
circumstances.
    “What about height and weight?”
    Maxine considered this before responding
with, “Short, maybe five-ten, and not overweight, but
muscular.”
    O’Dell saw that her depiction of the person
pretty much corresponded to what she’d said before, which was a
good step in the right direction.
    “I’ll let you look at some pictures,” he
said. “These are men who have been sent to prison by your husband
and, unfortunately, recently released. Maybe you’ll see someone who
looks familiar.”
    He handed her the catalog of mug shots. Some
of the pictures were in fact of ex-cons who were never in
Crawford’s courtroom, but had a history of violent crimes,
including rape and sodomy.
    Maxine gazed at the mug shots nervously,
though trying hard to keep her cool. She could feel the intensity
of the detective’s glare and, for an instant it was as though she
were being violated again. But she knew that he, like her, was
under a great deal of pressure to capture the man who murdered
Sheldon. She felt her attack in most people’s minds was, no doubt,
second nature.
    Sheldon was in many ways the lucky one. He
had lived a reasonably long and distinguished life for the most
part, and she loved him for it. Even if he didn’t always live up to
his lofty image by some standards. But who could nowadays with all
the pressures and temptations?
    Now Sheldon was gone and presumably at peace
somewhere.
    Whereas for some unknown reason Maxine had
been spared death, forcing her to live with being brutally violated
and humiliated at gunpoint and facing the possibility of being
infected with HIV and any number of sexually transmitted diseases.
These were things she had been careful to protect herself from. Now
they could strike her at any time. Anywhere.
    People would look at her funny. Judge her by
something that happened beyond her control.
    Her life would never be the same again. That
man had seen to that.
    Maxine wiped at tears that had formed at the
corners of her eyes and tried to focus on the photographs. Most
looked unfamiliar. Others looked like men she may have seen
before.
    The face of the man who attacked her was
indelible in her mind, though he was somewhat of a blur at the
moment. Would she recognize him in mug shot pictures when his face
may have been younger, thinner, or wider? His hair a