Chapter 7 - The Trial and the Truth
Six months later, the green trees of spring had filled out across the city, covering the grey concrete of the courthouse district in bright, fresh leaves.
The trial of Marcus Kane took place in Department 4 of the St. Louis Circuit Court.
It lasted four days.
The defense attorney—a overworked public defender who looked as if he hadn't slept since Tuesday—tried to argue that Kane was suffering from temporary severe intoxication and extreme emotional distress caused by financial loss.
On the fifth day, the prosecution called its final witness.
Not Ethan Cole. Not Detective Miller.
They called Maya Vasquez.
The courtroom was completely silent as the eight-year-old girl walked up the steps to the witness stand. She was wearing a simple dark blue dress with a white collar, her hair tied back in a neat ponytail with a yellow ribbon.
She didn't look at Marcus Kane, who sat at the defense table in an orange jumpsuit, his arms handcuffed to a leather belt around his waist.
She sat in the large wooden chair, her bare feet dangling three inches above the floor, and looked directly at the judge—a formidable woman named Judge Evelyn Vance.
“Maya,” the prosecutor said softly, standing five feet away. “Do you remember the night of October 12th?”
“Yes, sir,” Maya said. Her voice was small, but it didn't tremble. It carried clearly across the three rows of spectator benches where Ethan, Elena, and Marcus Webb sat together.
“Can you tell the jury what happened after your mother told you to run out the back door?”
Maya looked down at her hands, which were resting neatly in her lap.
“I took Lilly,” she said. “She was crying really hard, but then she stopped crying because she was too hot. I didn't have my shoes because they were near the front door where Marcus was standing.”
“And what did you do then, Maya?”
“I walked down Broadway,” she said simply. “It was raining really big. The water was up to my knees near the gas station. I was worried Lilly’s head was getting wet, so I put my hoodie over her.”
“Why didn't you stop at the gas station?” the prosecutor asked.
“Because Marcus told Mom that if she went to the store or the doctor, he’d find us,” Maya said, her hazel eyes turning slowly to look at Kane for the first time in six months. “He said the police belonged to his friends. But I saw the big light on the hospital hill. I knew the hospital was where people go when they don't want to die.”
A woman in the third row of the jury box pulled a handkerchief from her purse and pressed it against her mouth.
The defense attorney stood up, looked at Maya’s face for three seconds, looked at the twelve jurors whose expressions ranged from cold fury to visible tears, and sat back down without asking a single question.
“No cross-examination, Your Honor,” the attorney whispered.
The jury deliberated for twenty-four minutes.
The verdict was unanimous: Guilty of Attempted First-Degree Murder, Armed Criminal Action, Child Endangerment, and Burglary.
Judge Vance didn't wait for a presentence investigation.
“Marcus Kane,” the judge said, her voice like iron striking iron. “You are a predator who targeted the very people you were sworn to protect. In twenty-five years on this bench, I have rarely seen an act of such utter cowardice contrasted with an act of such extraordinary courage as the one displayed by that seven-year-old child.”
She slammed her gavel down with a sharp BANG.
“Thirty-five years at the Jefferson City Correctional Center. Without possibility of parole.”
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As the guards pulled Kane toward the side door, he looked back over his shoulder one last time.
Maya didn't flinch. She sat next to Ethan Cole in the front row, holding a small wooden puzzle piece in her hand—the piece shaped like Montana—and watched the dark iron door close behind him forever.
