Sidney Sheldon's Angel of the Dark (28 page)

Ellen Watts, pretty, clever, but in the end too inexperienced to rein in her own client. Watts had had the hardest hand to play, trying to paint an evil killer as a victim, an intelligent schemer as confused and insane, a sexually rapacious sadomasochist as a little-girl-lost. And she'd almost done it too, if only Sofia Basta's temper hadn't gotten the better of her.

To the judge's left stood the accused. Mancini looked his usual amused, evil and deranged self. Sofia Basta was equally inscrutable. Staring straight ahead, her arms at her side, the expression on her face could only be described as blank. Not nervous, not hopeful, not angry, not impatient, not despairing. Not anything. She was a blank slate, ready to have the next chapter of her appalling life written for her. This time, with a little help from the jury, Judge Federico Muñoz would be writing that chapter.

It would be her last.

To Muñoz's right, at the very front of the courtroom, three seats remained conspicuously empty. David Ishag, Matt Daley and Danny McGuire were all missing.

Damn,
thought Muñoz. Had he known, he'd have waited…fabricated some excuse to allow the three key players in the drama to be present at its denouement. But it was too late now. Finally, the judge sat down. Everyone in courtroom 306 gratefully followed suit, sinking into their
seats but still craning their necks to keep Basta and Mancini in view.

One by one the jury filed in.

 

A
T THE BARRIER THAT HAD BEEN
set up in front of the courthouse, their driver was arguing with a guard.

“What do you mean ‘no more vehicles'? This is Assistant Director Danny McGuire of Interpol. He has all-access clearance.”

“Doesn't matter,” grunted the guard. “I got orders. Once the court's in session, no more vehicles go in or out.”

Danny McGuire stepped out of the car. Bringing his face to within centimeters of the guard's, so close that he could smell the man's garlicky breath, he said, “Either you remove this barrier and let us through
right now,
or I will personally see to it that you are not only fired from this job but that you never find work anywhere in this city again. If you think I'm bullshitting you, go ahead and make us turn around. But you have precisely three seconds to make that call.

“One.

“Two…”

The guard registered the steely glint in Danny McGuire's eye and made his decision.

 

“M
R
. F
OREMAN
. H
AVE YOU REACHED YOUR
verdict?”

The heavyset black man in his midfifties nodded gravely.

“We have, Your Honor.”

“And is that verdict unanimous?”

“It is.”

 

O
UTSIDE, THE CROWD GAZED UP AT
the giant plasma screens in rapt silence. One showed the foreman standing, with the seated members of the jury behind him. All looked somber, as befitted the terrible crimes they'd been called upon to judge.

The other showed the two defendants. Standing only a few feet apart in the prisoners' box, they looked as detached from each other as two
people could possibly be. It was impossible to imagine that they had known each other since childhood, still less that they had worked together as a deadly team for a dozen years and been married for decades.

“Have you reached your verdict?”

“We have, Your Honor.”

 

D
ANNY
M
C
G
UIRE PANTED AS HE RAN
down the corridor, pushing Matt Daley's heavy wheelchair in front of him. The double doors of room 306 loomed in front of them like heaven's gates.

Or hell's.

“I'm sorry, sir,” the LAPD guard began. “Court is in session. Judge Muñoz…” He trailed off when he saw Danny's Interpol ID.

“You can go in, sir.” The guard opened the doors respectfully. “But I can't allow your friend here.”

Ignoring him, Danny pushed Matt's chair into the court. The room was so silent, and the disturbance so unexpected, that for a moment hundreds of heads swiveled in their direction. But only one gaze caught Matt Daley's eye. For the first time since the trial began, she was looking at him. Directly at him.

He mouthed to her:
“Lisa.”

She smiled.

Judge Muñoz was speaking. “On the charge murder in the first degree, relating to Andrew Jakes, how do you find the first defendant, Frances Mancini?”

“Guilty.”

The word reverberated round the room like a gunshot.

“And the second defendant, Sofia Basta?”

The foreman's next breath seemed to take an hour.

“Not guilty.”

The gasps from inside the courtroom were heard around the world. Outside on Burton Way, the crowds let out a scream so loud it was faintly audible even through the thick walls of the courthouse. Once the cameramen realized what had happened, they zoomed in on Sofia's face. But whatever reaction she may have had in the split second after the foreman spoke had been erased from her face now, replaced by her usual serene
blankness. Matt Daley closed his eyes, falling back into his chair as if he'd been punched in the gut. Even Judge Muñoz, the famous Judge Dread himself, required a moment's pause to regain his composure.

The foreman went on. “In the case of Andrew Jakes, however, we find the second defendant, Sofia Basta, guilty of voluntary manslaughter, due to diminished responsibility.”

Judge Muñoz cleared his throat. “In the case of Sir Piers Henley…”

Again, the verdict came back, like knife wounds to the judge's heart.

Guilty.

Not guilty.

Diminished responsibility.

It was the same for the other two victims. Only on the charge of the attempted homicide of David Ishag were both defendants condemned.

The sense of disbelief was palpable. Even the usually unflappable Mancini looked shocked, his olive complexion visibly draining of blood. Sir Piers Henley's brother was shaking his head, tapping at his hearing aid in wonder. Miles Baring's old girlfriends both burst loudly into tears, and more than one voice from the gallery shouted, “No!”

For his part, Danny McGuire couldn't share the outrage. Truth be told, he felt only a deep sense of peace.

Sofia Basta would remain safely behind bars. No one else would have to die at Azrael's hands, sacrificed to Frankie Mancini's twisted lust for vengeance. But the lovely Angela Jakes, as she had once been, would be spared the executioner's needle.

Not justice perhaps. But closure.

Danny McGuire was free at last.

F
OUR YEARS LATER…

I
'M SORRY, SIR.
W
ITHOUT A PASS
there is no way I can admit you.”

Perhaps surprisingly, the guard at Altacito State Hospital did look sorry. It was a tough, lonely job guarding the inmates of California's only women's psychiatric prison, and not many of ASH's underpaid staff were known for their compassion. In his midsixties, the guard looked even older, his leathery skin as cracked and parched as a dry riverbed thanks to long years spent in the punishing desert sun. But there was a kindness in his eyes when he looked at the skinny, hopeful blond man, leaning on a cane at the hospital gates as he tried to plead his case.

It wasn't the first time the guard had seen the man. Or the second. Or even the third. Every month, come visiting day, the man would show up, politely asking to be allowed to see Altacito State Hospital's most celebrated inmate. But every month the lady declined to receive visitors.

Controversially spared the death penalty at her trial, the Angel of Death, as she was still known in the tabloid press, enjoyed a relatively easy life at ASH, albeit a life conducted behind bars and under a heavy shroud of secrecy. She had her own room, with a window and views out across the manicured gardens of the facility to the Mojave Desert beyond.
Her days were structured but not arduous, with hours divided between work, exercise, recreation and psychiatric treatments, which could be anything from hypnosis to group therapy sessions.

Unfortunately, Matt Daley knew none of this. He worried constantly about Lisa—to him, she would always be Lisa—being singled out for brutality and victimization by other inmates because of her notoriety. Matt had written scores of e-mails to ASH's chief psychiatrist, begging for news on her condition. Was she eating? Was she depressed? Could they at least confirm that she had been given the letters Matt wrote her religiously every Sunday, updating her on his life and the worldwide success of his acclaimed but controversial documentary,
Azrael: Secrets and Lies
…letters to which Matt had yet to receive a single reply. Did she even know that he was trying to reach her? That one friend at least had not abandoned her in her most desperate hour?

The e-mail replies were always the same. Polite. Brief. Straightforward: Matt Daley was not family. He was not entitled to any patient information unless the patient had specifically authorized its release. Sofia Basta had not.

“I know if she saw me, she'd change her mind.” Matt told the guard for the hundredth time. “If you'd let me through to the visitors' lounge, just for a few seconds…I've come a long way.”

“I appreciate that, sir. I do. But I'm afraid you need to go back home.”

 

S
OFIA READ THE LETTER AGAIN, RUNNING
her hands lovingly across the paper, thinking of Matt's hands touching it, the way they had once touched her. It began like all the others.

“Dearest Lisa…”

Reading the name was her favorite part. The name felt good. It felt right. Whenever she read Matt Daley's letters, whenever she thought of him at all, she
was
Lisa. And Lisa was the best part of herself. She'd thought about changing her name legally after the trial.
Lisa. Lisa Daley.
It had a wonderful ring to it. But as the days and weeks passed, and the reality of her sentence sank in—they could dress it up all they liked, call her prison a “hospital” and her punishment “treatment,” but it was still life without parole—she changed her mind. What use was a new name
to her now, in here? There were no second chances, no fresh starts. This was the end.

But not for Matt. For Matt, there was a chance. A future. Who was she to destroy it by giving him hope? By making him think, even for a moment, that there could be any going back…? For Matt Daley to live, Lisa had to die. It was as simple as that.

It was so hard to hold on to the truth. To separate what was real from what was fantasy. She'd lived with lies for so long. But she had tried not to lie to Matt. When she'd told him she loved him, she meant it. Had she met him earlier, much earlier, before Frankie and the book, before Sofia Basta, before she lost the thread of who she was, things might have been so different. As it was, she would spend the rest of her days caged like an animal, surrounded by electrified fences and desert wilderness. Matt's letters meant everything to her. But she owed it to him not to reply…To let him go.

She read on.

“I don't know if you are even receiving these letters, my darling. At this point I guess I write them as much for myself as for you. But I can't stop. I won't stop, Lisa, not until you know that I love you, that I forgive you, that I will never give up on you, no matter how many times the guards turn me away.”

It touched her that he still said “the guards” rather than “you.” Darling Matt. He still wanted to absolve her of everything.

“I can't bear to think of you in that awful place. Please, my darling, if you're being mistreated, you've got to let somebody know. If not me, then your lawyers or even the governor. Even Danny McGuire might be able to help.”

Danny McGuire.
It was funny, every time she thought of Matt, she felt like Lisa, but every time she thought of Danny, she was Angela Jakes. Poor Angela. So beautiful, so young. She was the first one to be violated, the first one to suffer. By the time she became Tracey, and Irina, and even Lisa, she was stronger, hardened by the litany of horrors, numb to the pain. But Danny McGuire had known her at the beginning, when she was still vulnerable, still raw. He had known Angela, and in his own way, Sofia suspected, he had loved her. Reading his name in Matt's distinctive, cursive handwriting, she almost felt nostalgic.

Perhaps she should send Matt some sort of message, anonymously, just to let him know she was okay. Apart from the obvious hardship of losing her freedom, the routine at ASH suited Sofia well. Half her life had been spent in institutions, and the other half on the run, not just from the police but from her own demons. At ASH, her days were pleasantly predictable. She found the hospital routine a comfort.

As for being picked on by the other patients…if anything, the opposite was true. In the outside world, women tended to be too envious of great beauties to appreciate them aesthetically. But here at ASH, with no men to compete for other than the smattering of male guards, and little enough beauty in any form, Sofia's beauty was a passport to popularity. Other women wanted to be around her, despite the fact that she was far from social, choosing to eat alone at mealtimes and declining all group activities from movie night to organized athletic events. But she never left her room without admiring glances. Occasionally the tone of the glances shifted from admiration to outright lust, but unlike the state prison, there weren't many bull dykes at ASH and Sofia had never felt threatened.

Nor was her beauty her only advantage. Through no effort or desire of her own, Sofia had become something of a celebrity within the hospital. Many of the other women admired her, viewing the Azrael victims as rich, dirty old men, men who had callously abandoned their children and who'd therefore gotten what was coming to them. Sofia herself was careful never to endorse this view. Flashbacks to the murders still gave her terrible nightmares, and talking about them could bring on acute anxiety attacks. The only part of the past she held on to was Matt Daley.

“He came again today.”

The male nurse's voice wrenched Sofia back to the present. Reluctantly she looked up from Matt's letter.

“You still don't want to see him, huh?”

Sofia shook her head. “I'm tired. I need to sleep.”

The male nurse left her, watching through the glass door panel as she lay down on her bunk and closed her eyes.
Could it really be possible for a woman to grow more beautiful with each day?

The nurse's name was Carlos Hernandez, and he was one of only a handful of males on the psychiatric staff at ASH. His buddies in Fresno had teased Carlos about landing his “dream job.” “Welcome to Altacito,”
they mocked, “population two thousand. One thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine crazy bitches…and
you
!” But the truth was that Carlos was lonelier in this job than he had ever been in his life. Yes, he was surrounded by women, but there wasn't a single one with whom he could strike up an acquaintance, still less a friendship or relationship. The patients were obviously off-limits, and the average age of his female colleagues on the nursing staff was forty-two, with the average weight probably around 180 pounds. Not exactly rich pickings. For an institution that housed over two thousand women, it was astonishing how few of them were attractive.

Water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink.

Sofia Basta, on the other hand…she was the exception that proved the rule. An anomaly. A freak occurrence. She was older too, in her early forties, according to her birth certificate, but she looked at least a decade younger, and infinitely more desirable than any woman Carlos Hernandez had ever met, let alone dated. Her smooth skin, perfect features and lithe, slender body would have been more than enough to fuel the young nurse's fantasies. But Sofia had something beyond that, an inner calm, a sort of
goodness
that shone out of her like a light. Of course, Carlos Hernandez knew about her mental illness. Take her off her meds and she could snap at any moment, change back into a confused and highly dangerous psychopath, capable of murder. But to talk to her, it was so hard to believe. Sofia seemed like the sanest, loveliest, most gentle creature on earth.

Through the glass he saw her shoulders shaking. It was against the rules, but he couldn't help himself. Slipping back into the room, he sat down on her bed.

“Don't cry,” he said kindly. “You don't have to see anyone you don't want to see. A lot of patients here find outside contact hard.”

Sofia turned over and looked at him with those delicious liquid-chocolate eyes. Carlos's stomach flipped like a pancake.

“Does it get easier? As time goes on?”

It didn't get easier. It got more oppressive and stifling by the day, the hour, the minute. Carlos Hernandez had seen the toll that a life in an institution took on a human being. The hopelessness, the despair, knowing you would never get out, that this was your world till you drew your
last breath. It was bleak. But he couldn't bring himself to say as much to Sofia Basta.

“Sure it does.”

“I would see him,” Sofia blurted out, “if I were ever going to get out of here. If I had any future, anything to offer him. But since I don't, it seems cruel. He has to forget me.”

“Try to get some rest,” said Carlos, pulling the blanket up around her and gently stroking her hair before leaving the room. He glanced up and down the corridor, checking if anyone had seen him, but he was safe. D wing was deserted, as it always was on visiting days.

Carlos Hernandez had never met Matt Daley. But he knew one thing about him already: he would never “forget” Sofia.

Sofia was unforgettable.

 

M
ATT
D
ALEY DROVE TOWARD THE INTERSTATE,
his new customized Range Rover the only car on the road. Barren desert stretched around him in all directions, an ocean of emptiness and dust.
Like my life. Desolate.

The world thought that Matt Daley had turned his life around. And on the surface, he had. After years of grueling physical therapy, he'd learned to walk again, against all the odds, and now only used a cane for support. Rarely was his name mentioned in public these days without the epithet
survivor
thrown in somewhere. His documentary on the Azrael case, produced lovingly on a shoestring budget because Matt had refused to cede editorial control, had received wide critical attention, if not exactly acclaim. Matt made no secret of the fact that he was an apologist for Sofia Basta, pinning the blame for the Azrael killings firmly and exclusively on Frankie Mancini's shoulders. Despite the fact that the jurors at the trial had effectively done the same, this stuck in many people's craw, including HLN's Nancy Grace. Grace had wanted Sofia's head on a platter from the day of her arrest. Ironically, it was the Fox anchor's vitriolic condemnation of
Azrael: Truth and Lies
that
had
ensured it a far wider audience than Matt could otherwise have hoped for. Distributed throughout Asia and the Indian subcontinent, as well as in Europe and the United States, the film was a resounding commercial hit. Matt Daley was more than a survivor. He was a rich man, a winner, a success.

None of it mattered.

He hadn't expected Lisa to see him today. After four years he was resigned to her rejection. But he'd hoped.

Hope would be the death of him.

He pulled onto the freeway. Now that he was alone, tears coursed freely down his cheeks as he once again gave way to the pain. Sometimes he fought it. Told himself sternly that he had to do something, to take his depression by the horns and wrestle it down and defeat it. But most of the time he knew.

One day it would get to be too much. One day he would drive toward the edge of a cliff and simply keep on driving. Lay down his burden. Be free.

One day…