Disclaimer: If I owned Secret Window or Mort Rainey, I'd be very rich and very happy!
AN: This sounds selfish, but I'd be eternally grateful if the reviews of this story reached 50 or more, because that's what it would have been before this story was removed. Plus, reviews make me write faster (hint, hint) so I urge you to tell me what you think of this story before it's over. Enjoy!
Chapter 9: The Real Trials Begin
Amber's POV:
It was finally here, the trial that was going to decide the fate of our family. I felt sick to my stomach as I dressed in the proper attire for the occasion. Mort was looking spiffy in a black suit and tie, so I decided to dress in a long-sleeved white blouse with ruffles at the neck, and a black skirt. A broach with a black crystal oval surrounded by small diamonds was pinned at the top of the ruffles at my neck, and small black buttons were at the ends of my sleeves. Chic and professional at the same time, and very appropriate for the day.
As I tried to pin my hair up in a practical bun, Mort grabbed my hands and took them away from my head. As soon as my fingers were no longer near my head, Mort magically produced a curling iron and began to curl my normally straight hair. I didn't even know he knew how to do hair! Hearing my small surprised squeak, Mort smiled and winked at me via his reflection in the mirror. I sighed and let him do what he wanted to my hair, praying that he wouldn't kill or burn my precious locks. When he was finished, I had wavy hair, the ends curling inwards. I was impressed and smiled.
"Now you look enchantingly professional," Mort whispered, bending forward to press a kiss to my neck. "More enchanting, though, than professional; I'd better keep my eyes on the men in the court so that they don't put the moves on you."
I laughed and slapped his arm as I got up to get Lizzie dressed. I put her in a green dress with white lace, white stockings, and adorable black shoes. Even though I thought she belonged at home, Becca had offered to look after her in the courtroom, so I reluctantly agreed to let her go. Speaking of Becca, the punk-rock girl was in our living room, her hair pulled back into a severe bun, but with her multi-colored hair, it looked more interesting than it would if it were one color. Her dark blue suit went perfectly with her hair, though the combination was somewhat comically professional. Elizabeth loved it.
The ride to the courthouse was quiet, though Mort and I held hands throughout the entire ride. I knew we were both worried about what could happen in the days ahead, and we both hoped that we would win. Even though we had no idea what might happen today, or who would be testifying, I knew that my parents would use every bit of money in their possession to get witnesses to speak on their behalf. Becca, Elizabeth and I sat in the audience as Mort sat up with Shannon and Melanie. After everyone (including the jury) had taken their places, we all stood when the judge, the honorable Judge Karen Clark, took her place. As the prosecuting lawyers called their first witness, I paled when I saw who approached the stand to be sworn in. My parents had called in one of my friends from home.
Miss Kapusta smirked as she approached the witness. "Would you state your name, please?"
"My name is Jennifer Wright," the tall red-head said, her hazel eyes focusing on the attorney.
"And you were a close friend of Ms. Amber Olson, correct?"
"Yes, I was."
"When did you first meet Amber, and how long have you two been friends?"
"We met in the fourth grade, so that would be about twenty years now," Jen answered, smiling a little.
"So you would know Amber fairly well, is that correct?"
"Yes, I suppose so."
Miss Kapusta positioned herself directly in front of my former friend. "How would you describe Amber, before she disappeared?"
"Well," Jen said, looking at me briefly. "She was a really sweet person, and she was always nice to people. She was smart and fun to hang out with. Amber also liked to help others, and she always got a kick out of playing at the local senior center with the high school band."
"Did Amber ever have a boyfriend?" asked Miss Kapusta. "Any sort of relationship with a man that you knew of?"
"No, not really," Jen replied, looking a bit uneasy. "The rest of us went out on dates and talked about it, but Amber never spoke of any boyfriend. I don't think she's ever had one."
"So were you surprised when you were called upon to testify in a trial against her husband? Surprised that Amber had married at all?"
"Well, yes." Hazel eyes looked over at Mort. "She was never really popular with the guys at home, so you could say that I was extremely surprised to hear that she'd actually gotten married."
"Thank you, Ms. Wright." Miss Kapusta walked away and Shannon went up to the stand.
"Ms. Wright, you and Amber went to the same college after high school, am I right?"
"Yes."
"And did you see her at all on campus? Talk to her, or go out clubbing with her, after classes were over?"
Miss Kapusta stood up. "Objection! Relevance, Your Honor?"
"Your Honor, I am trying to establish the credibility of the friendship between Ms. Wright and Mrs. Rainey," Shannon stated.
"Overruled," said Judge Clark. "Answer the question, please."
"No, we didn't see each other much after high school," Jen replied, looking a bit uncomfortable. "I ran into her a couple times, but we didn't hang out or anything."
"So this friendship of yours somewhat faded after the two of you graduated high school." Shannon remarked. Jen remained silent. "When was the last time you actually saw and spoke with Amber, Ms. Wright?"
"Over seven years ago," Jen softly replied.
"So you hadn't seen or heard from Amber a year before she married and had a child," Shannon said, looking at the jury. "It seems like you don't know your friend as much as you thought, Miss Wright." She turned and looked at the judge. "No further questions, Your Honor."
As Jen left the stand, she gave me a somewhat jealous look before her eyes flicked over to look at my very handsome husband and my darling little girl. I resisted the urge to smirk. My parents had unwittingly called in a dud of a witness. Truth be told, Jen and I had drifted apart even before high school graduation. She'd started hanging out with the drama class and believed herself to be "above" me and the friends she'd left behind. In college, she hung out with people at least ten to twenty years older than her and often avoided me. Needless to say, this was a major mistake on my parents' behalf.
"Any other witnesses, Miss Kapusta?" the judge asked.
"Yes, Your Honor," the prosecution said. "We'd like to call Dr. Crawford up to the stand."
Crap. Hopefully this won't turn out to be bad for us. I held my breath and grabbed Mort's hand as the psychologist took the stand. She took the oath and sat down, a neutral look on her face. Would this woman ruin our family? I prayed not as my parents' other lawyer, Miss Perez, approached the stand.
"Dr. Crawford, you have recently had a psychological evaluation of Mr. and Mrs. Rainey, is that correct?" she asked, pacing back and forth.
"Yes, that's right."
"And from your brief examination of them, how would you describe Mr. Rainey's mental health?"
Dr. Crawford's calm exterior didn't change. "I would say that, besides being a bit lonely, Mr. Rainey is in fairly good mental health."
Miss Perez's eyebrows raised up an inch. "Fairly good health, you say?" she asked, obviously disbelieving of the doctor's words. "So it's normal for a man to kidnap a defenseless woman and rape her?"
"Objection! Miss Perez is bringing up unlawful and false accusations not related to the charges in question!" protested Shannon.
"Agreed," Judge Clark replied. "The jury will disregard the question. Move on Miss Perez."
The dark-eyed woman frowned in thought for a moment. "If Mr. Rainey is in such good mental health, why did he kidnap the woman then known as Amber Olson?"
"In my opinion, it was nothing but an act made by a desperately lonely man," Dr. Crawford replied, crossing her legs and folding her hands on top of them. "After his separation with his first wife, Mr. Rainey lived in isolation for well over a year, and had very little human contact. The book tour he took at the time allowed him to get out of the house and meet some people, and he eventually fell in love with Amber."
"But Mr. Rainey is a writer, and used to being isolated from people for long periods of time," Miss Perez commented. "Why would this be different, considering that he had a story to work on?"
"This isolation was primarily started in the event of his separation from his first wife, Amy," Dr. Crawford said, still not losing her cool. "The experience left him hurt and alone, so he retreated into his own world, one which was established inside his cabin. This sort of isolation was not brought on by his usual need to feed a writer's creativity, but to try and heal from an emotional trauma in life."
"I see," Miss Perez commented. "And I suppose being excluded from the Tashmore Lake community because of being accused of his first wife's murder might have helped that isolation?"
"Objection!" cried Melanie as she stood up.
"Miss Perez, if you don't stop this at once, I'll hold you in contempt!" Judge Clark snapped as she glared at my parents' lawyer. "The jury will disregard the last question!"
"I apologize, Your Honor," the dark-haired woman said. "Let me rephrase that last part. So this emotional isolation, combined with being expelled from the local town, brought almost an emotional breakdown for Mr. Rainey?"
"I didn't say that," Dr. Crawford said, frowning a tiny bit. "Mr. Rainey was not close to any sort of breakdown. He was simply lonely, and the book tour did him some good."
"And what about his sudden emotional attachment to Amber? Wouldn't you call that a sudden transfer of emotional feelings, of sorts?"
"No, not at all," the psychiatrist replied. "He met Amber at the end of the tour, not the beginning, so that would not qualify as a sudden emotional transfer to someone who could be a potential replacement wife for Amy. If he had met her at the very start of the tour and if she looked like Amy in any way, that would be the case. But Amber looks nothing like Amy, so there was no transfer of any kind."
The persecution did not look happy with that answer. "No further questions, Your Honor," Miss Perez said.
Melanie stood up and approached the psychiatrist. "Dr. Crawford, how would you describe the feelings Mr. Rainey has for his wife?"
"I would say that Mr. Rainey has very deep emotional feelings and attachments for his wife." The doctor smiled a little, and I swore I saw her look over at me and Elizabeth.
"Would you say that Mrs. Rainey has the same feelings for her husband?"
"Absolutely," answered Dr. Crawford. "Most doctors never see such a loving couple, and I feel privileged to have met and talked with them."
"Thank you." Melanie sat down, but Miss Perez stood up.
"Redirect, Your Honor," she demanded. The judge nodded and the lawyer again took her place in front of the stand. "You say that you 'talked' with them, and that Mrs. Rainey has the same feelings for her husband."
"Yes, that's correct."
"Do you know of the condition known as Stockholm Syndrome?"
"Yes, of course I do," Dr. Crawford slowly replied.
"Could you describe the condition to us, please?"
"It's when a person taken prisoner, be it male or female, falls in love with his or her captor," Dr. Crawford slowly replied.
"Interesting…and since the present Mrs. Rainey was held under her husband's influence for such a long period of time, is it possible that she might be suffering from this condition?" Miss Perez was looking extremely smug.
"I really couldn't say," Dr. Crawford replied. "Stockholm Syndrome doesn't always affect people who are taken prisoner, so it is hard to say if Mrs. Rainey suffers from this condition. Countless people over the centuries have been taken prisoner and it is safe to say that not all of them have fallen in love with those who have captured them."
Miss Perez frowned. "Thank you, Doctor," she said before returning to her seat.
"Miss McKnight, Miss Black, do you have any more questions for the witness?" asked Judge Clark.
Shannon stood up. "Not at this time, Your Honor," she replied.
"Then the court will recess until tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 p.m.," the judge remarked. She tapped the gavel and the day was over.
I let out a relieved breath and turned to look at my daughter. Elizabeth, who had been amazingly quiet during the whole thing, looked at me, a huge amount of questions in her eyes. I smiled at her and opened my arms to her. She immediately leapt into my arms, snuggling her face into my breast, her arms wrapping themselves around my neck. I could tell she was worried about Mort, so I kissed her forehead and rubbed her back in an attempt to calm her down and cheer her up.
"It's alright, sweetheart," I whispered to her. Elizabeth looked up at me, her brown eyes misty with tears. "What do you say we go home and have some ice cream, hmm?"
"With cherries on top?" asked Lizzie, her expression turning hopeful.
"Absolutely," Mort replied, rubbing Elizabeth's back. "Come on, let's go home."
An Hour Later: Mort's POV:
After everyone had satisfied their sweet tooth, Mort tucked Elizabeth down for a nap while Becca, Kaitlyn, and Mike helped to clean up the dishes and the mess that Elizabeth had made while eating her ice cream. He had just tucked the blanket up to his daughter's chin when she decided to speak.
"Daddy, are you going to jail?" she asked, tears swelling up in her wide eyes.
Mort froze and tried to remain calm so as not cry in front of his little girl. "Well, it's kind of hard to explain to you, sweetie," he softly replied, his fingers running through Lizzie's long, wavy brown hair. "You see, Grandpa and Grandma want Mommy and you to go live with them, but Mommy said no. They think that if Daddy goes to jail, Mommy will go with them and take you with her."
Elizabeth set her chin stubbornly. "I don't wanna go live with Grandpa and Grandma," she said. "I wanna stay with you and Mommy, and Uncle Mike and Auntie Lyn." She paused for a moment. "And Aunt Becca, too!" she added.
Mort sighed. "I know you do, honey, but that all depends on whether the judge decides to let Daddy stay free or not," he said, running a finger over her forehead, combing a stray lock of hair out of her face. "But I promise that Mommy and I will do everything we can to keep us all together, okay?" Elizabeth nodded. "Good, now go to sleep. When you wake up, we'll have dinner and watch Sleeping Beauty. How does that sound?"
Elizabeth blinked sleepily at him. "Okay, Daddy," she whispered as her eyes drifted shut.
Once sure that she was asleep, Mort stood up and closed the door behind him. Walking into the living room, he saw that his wife was alone and that the others had left. They were probably making sure that, if worse came to worse, the Raineys should have as much time together as possible. As he took a seat on the couch, he saw Amber going through the family picture album.
"What are you looking at?" he whispered, wrapping an arm around her.
She didn't even jump in surprise. "Oh, just looking at photos of when Lizzie was a baby."
"Why?" he asked, puzzled as to why she was doing such a thing.
Amber sighed and leaned against his shoulder. "No reason," she said, looking at a picture of Mort holding a year-old Elizabeth, bouncing her on his knee as the baby laughed at him.
Mort grabbed the album from her and closed it, placing it out of her reach. He knew that she was tormenting herself by engraving their family moments into her brain, preparing for the dark future where he went to prison and had to miss out on their daughter's future. The last thing he wanted was for her to lose hope during this time in their life.
"Don't do this, sweetness," he said, forcing her to look at him. "Don't hurt yourself like this."
"But I can't help it!" she softly cried, tears welling up in her eyes. "Oh, Mort, I'm not sure how much more of this I can take! Why can't they leave us alone? Why can't we just be happy?"
Mort automatically pulled her into a tight embrace as she cried, stroking her back and her hair, giving her all of the comfort he could. The truth was, even he didn't know how much he could take of this nightmare. So, to keep himself together, he held his beloved wife close to his chest and to his heart until she fell asleep. Once sure she was asleep, he moved so that he was on his back and she lay on his chest, her head over his heart, which was her favorite place sleep when he held her.
With both ladies (i.e.: his wife and daughter) asleep, Mort let his mind roam at will. How could they get out of this? At present, they were winning, but how long could that go on? They had no one on their side that could testify on their behalf. Mike was Amber's younger brother and people would say that he could be "easily impressed upon" by his sister. Kaitlyn was his girlfriend, and would be on his "side," as would Becca, who was Kaitlyn's friend and would only know about things second- or third-hand. Still, there had to be someone out there who would be able to help them…there had to be someone who would help put things to right.
'Because everything depends on it,' Mort thought as he, too, drifted into dreams.
AN: I hope the courtroom stuff was convincing. Let me know if it lacked anything or if it sucked!
