“You didn’t have any right to do that.” Then she calmed and gave a hurt smile. “Why’d you do that? They hate me. They lied to you, whatever they said. They’re jealous of me. I was on my own from day one. I made a success of my life. They’re losers.”

Brynn’s research had revealed that this was a woman whose background appeared normal and stable but whose personality was not. She’d grown up in a middle-class family in Madison, Wisconsin. Her parents still lived there, mother fifty-seven, father ten years older. According to them, they’d tried hard but had thrown up their hands at what Michelle’s mother called the “vindictive little thing.” Her father called her “dangerous.”

The couple, horrified at what their daughter was accused of, though not completely surprised, explained how Michelle had made a career out of jumping from man to man-and in two cases a woman-living off them, then picking fights and scaring the hell out of her lovers with her enraged, vengeful behavior; ultimately they were grateful to see her go. Then she’d be onto someone else-but only if she had that someone else all lined up ahead of time. She’d been arrested for assault twice-attacking boyfriends who’d dumped her. She’d stalked several men and had three restraining orders in force.

Michelle now said, “You can’t trust anything my family says. I was abused, you know.”

“There’s no record of that.”

“How’s there going to be a record? You think my father would admit it? And they threw out my complaint. My father and the local police chief, they were in on it together. All I could do was get away. I had to fend for myself. It was hard for me, so hard. Nobody ever helped me.”

“It’ll be easier,” Brynn continued, deflecting the woman’s sob story, “if you cooperate. There’re still a few things we’d like to know.”

“I wasn’t going to hurt you,” she whined. “I just wanted to talk.”

“You pretended to be the hotel clerk. You changed your voice to sound Hispanic.”

“Because you wouldn’t understand. Nobody understands me. If I’d been me, somebody would have arrested me and I’d never have the chance to explain. I need you to understand, Brynn. It’s important to me.”

“You had a weapon.”

“Those men at the house…they tried to kill me! I was scared. I’ve been the victim of attacks before. My father, a couple of boyfriends. I have restraining orders out.”

She’d filed complaints against several lovers for domestic assault but the magistrates had rejected them when the police determined that the men had solid alibis, and concluded that Michelle had filed out of spite.

“You have three orders against you.”

She smiled. “That’s how the system works. They believe the abuser. They don’t believe the victim.”

“Let’s talk about the night of April seventeenth.”

“Oh, I can explain that.”

“Go ahead.”

“I was scheduled to have a meeting with Steven Feldman, the caseworker. I suspected Brad had been abused by one of his teachers.”

“Okay. Was this reported anywhere?”

“That’s what I was going to meet with Mr. Feldman about. I took the afternoon off work and went to see him but there was a problem with the buses and by the time I got to his office he’d left for the night. I knew it was important and I found out he was going to his place in Lake Mondac. He told me to come see him anytime to talk about Brad. He gave me his address. So I asked this guy I knew, Hart, to drive me up there. That was my mistake.” She shook her head.

“What’s his full name?”

“That’s it. He only goes by Hart. Anyway, he brought his friend along, Compton Lewis. Disgusting…gross. I should’ve said no right there. But I really wanted to see Steve. So we all drove up to the house together. I was going to talk to Steven and then we were going to leave. But as we’re driving up there, they start getting weirder and weirder. They’re like, ‘Bet there’s some nice shit in these houses.’ And, ‘Gotta be some rich people here.’ Next thing I know they see the Mercedes and they pull out guns, and I’m like, shit, oh, no. They go inside and start shooting. I tried to stop them. I grabbed this gun-”

“That compact Glock in your possession was stolen from a gun show a half mile from where you lived with Sam Rolfe.”

“It was their gun!” Michelle raised her hands to her face, crying or pretending to.

“Would you like some coffee? A soda?”

Some crackers for your low blood sugar…like the one’s you scattered behind to lead Hart and his partner after us? Brynn kept a completely neutral face.

Michelle looked up. Eyes red, face dry. It reminded Brynn of how she’d looked throughout much of that April night.

I’m an actress…

Brother, what I bought into.

Michelle continued, “I was devastated. I couldn’t breathe I felt so terrible. Here it was, my fault. I’d brought those men up there. I can’t tell you how bad I felt… I panicked. Sure, I lied a little. But who wouldn’t? I was scared. And then I see you in the wilderness. Sure, I had the gun. But I didn’t know who you were. Maybe you were with them. You had your uniform on. But you could have been part of it. I didn’t know what was going on. I was just scared. I had to lie. My life has always been about survival.

“And what I feel worst about-I couldn’t believe I did it: at your house. I had a panic attack. I was so scared… It was post-traumatic stress. I’ve always suffered from that. I thought Hart was in the house. You scared me. The gun went off. It was an accident! I’ll live with that forever. Hurting your mother by accident.”

Brynn crossed her legs and looked at the waifish, beautiful woman, whose eyes now filled with tears.

An Academy Award performance…

“The evidence and witnesses tell a little different story, Michelle.” And she gave the woman a synopsis of how they’d come to learn her identity and what they knew of her plan. The ballistics, the ash in the fireplace, Steven Feldman’s phone records, the reports of her children being abused.

“I talked to Social Services myself, Michelle. Steven Feldman’s supervisor. And to the witnesses and to your son’s teacher. Brad regularly had bruises on his arms and legs. Your daughter, Tory, had marks too.”

“Oh, they have an accident or two. You take a child into the emergency room and right away you’re an abusive parent. I’ve never beaten him… Oh, what a politically correct world this is,” she snapped. “Everybody swats their kids. Don’t you?”

“No.”

“Well, you should.” She was smiling cruelly. “Maybe you wouldn’t be having so much trouble with Joey, like you were telling me. And you let him get away with it. My son won’t get run over by a car or break his neck skateboarding… Children need direction. They don’t respect you if you’re not firm. And they want to respect their parents.”

Brynn now said, “Michelle, let me run through the case that we’ve got against you.” She rattled off summaries of expert testimony, witness statements and forensic evidence. It was overwhelming.

The woman began to cry. “It’s not my fault! It isn’t!”

Brynn reached over and shut off the camera.

The woman looked up cautiously. She dried her eyes.

“Michelle,” Brynn said softly, “here’s the situation. You heard the case against you. You will be convicted. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind about that. If you don’t cooperate you’ll go into a ten-by-four cell, solitary confinement, forever. But if you do cooperate you’ll stay out of a super-prison, probably go to medium security. You may have the chance to see life outside before you’re too old to appreciate it.”

“Can I see my children? I’ll agree if I can see my children.”

“No,” Brynn said firmly. “That’s not in their interest.”

This troubled Michelle for a moment but then she asked brightly, “A nicer cell? I’ll get a nicer cell?”

“Yes.”

“And all I have to do is confess?”