Waking Hours Read Online Free
DWI last night on the Cross-County Expressway,” Stuart said. “Blood alcohol one point eight.”
Double the legal limit. He didn’t have to spell out the implications.
Dani’s boss was frequently called upon as an expert witness for the state in prosecutions. With a Driving While Intoxicated arrest on his record, the DA couldn’t possibly put him on the stand, because anything he might say would be permanently impugned. That was what Foley had meant by maybe .
“That’s awful,” Dani said. Her boss was in the middle of a nasty divorce, with two teenage daughters caught in the crossfire. It was no excuse, but she felt sorry for him. “He’s been under a lot of stress lately.”
“Who hasn’t? Life goes on. I’m stopping at Starbucks,” Stuart said. “The usual?”
“Venti vanilla soy latte,” she said. “Full strength.”
“You got it.”
As she spoke, she drove past her office at Ralston-Foley Behavioral Consulting, a large old Victorian house on East Salem’s Main Street, on the square opposite a row of boutiques and antique stores. The town always felt more like New England than New York to her, with its broad green commons with a gazebo in the middle, a white steepled church on one side of the square, a row of shops and stores including a hardware store where the wooden floor still squeaked, and a quaint old brick library opposite the church. From her desk she could look out the window and see children playing on the green, young moms with babies in strollers, and sometimes nannies from Germany or France chatting on park benches by the swing sets while their charges played.
Sam was too arthritic to sit in court but maintained his practice from the Main Street offices—he’d be available to give Dani advice, but to a great extent, she was on her own, sink or swim. So far she had assisted John with evaluations and competencies, but he was still grooming her to testify. An experienced defense attorney could make mincemeat out of an inexperienced forensic psychiatrist if she didn’t know what she was doing. She hoped she wasn’t in over her head.
She flashed to the image from her dream, her father in his cheesy multi-pocketed safari vest, holding a stone. Why a stone? She wished she could call him up and tell him about her self-doubts and hear him say, “You’re gonna knock it out of the park, kiddo.”
Dani drove south on the Sawmill Parkway, a road built in the thirties to handle a third of the traffic it handled today. When she hit a traffic jam, she threw up her hands in dismay. Today of all days to be late. She was a mile north of the Chappaqua exit and knew all the back roads, but first she had to get to the exit, and the cars weren’t moving.
While she waited, she used her phone to log onto the Internet. She went to Google and typed in “Tommy Gunderson.”
There were hundreds of thousands of references to the famous ex-football player. He’d been homecoming king their senior year of high school, and she, much to her own surprise, had been voted queen. She clicked on a link to a YouTube video, tagged as “FATAL HIT.” While she waited for the video to download, she remembered what she could of his career, a path that had taken him from East Salem High School to All-American at Stanford to the heights of stardom, a Super Bowl ring with MVP honors and a contract that was the highest ever paid to a linebacker.
She clicked Play and saw Tommy, positioned twenty yards behind the line of scrimmage, deep for a linebacker, protecting against the long pass just before the two-minute warning in the conference championship game. Tommy pointing, calling out defensive signals, reading the offensive formation. A long count, hoping to draw the defense off side, then the snap. A gifted young receiver named Dwight Sykes slicing across the field at full speed, looking to his quarterback for the ball. Tommy reading the quarterback’s eyes. Tommy launching himself over a blocker to hit Sykes a
Double the legal limit. He didn’t have to spell out the implications.
Dani’s boss was frequently called upon as an expert witness for the state in prosecutions. With a Driving While Intoxicated arrest on his record, the DA couldn’t possibly put him on the stand, because anything he might say would be permanently impugned. That was what Foley had meant by maybe .
“That’s awful,” Dani said. Her boss was in the middle of a nasty divorce, with two teenage daughters caught in the crossfire. It was no excuse, but she felt sorry for him. “He’s been under a lot of stress lately.”
“Who hasn’t? Life goes on. I’m stopping at Starbucks,” Stuart said. “The usual?”
“Venti vanilla soy latte,” she said. “Full strength.”
“You got it.”
As she spoke, she drove past her office at Ralston-Foley Behavioral Consulting, a large old Victorian house on East Salem’s Main Street, on the square opposite a row of boutiques and antique stores. The town always felt more like New England than New York to her, with its broad green commons with a gazebo in the middle, a white steepled church on one side of the square, a row of shops and stores including a hardware store where the wooden floor still squeaked, and a quaint old brick library opposite the church. From her desk she could look out the window and see children playing on the green, young moms with babies in strollers, and sometimes nannies from Germany or France chatting on park benches by the swing sets while their charges played.
Sam was too arthritic to sit in court but maintained his practice from the Main Street offices—he’d be available to give Dani advice, but to a great extent, she was on her own, sink or swim. So far she had assisted John with evaluations and competencies, but he was still grooming her to testify. An experienced defense attorney could make mincemeat out of an inexperienced forensic psychiatrist if she didn’t know what she was doing. She hoped she wasn’t in over her head.
She flashed to the image from her dream, her father in his cheesy multi-pocketed safari vest, holding a stone. Why a stone? She wished she could call him up and tell him about her self-doubts and hear him say, “You’re gonna knock it out of the park, kiddo.”
Dani drove south on the Sawmill Parkway, a road built in the thirties to handle a third of the traffic it handled today. When she hit a traffic jam, she threw up her hands in dismay. Today of all days to be late. She was a mile north of the Chappaqua exit and knew all the back roads, but first she had to get to the exit, and the cars weren’t moving.
While she waited, she used her phone to log onto the Internet. She went to Google and typed in “Tommy Gunderson.”
There were hundreds of thousands of references to the famous ex-football player. He’d been homecoming king their senior year of high school, and she, much to her own surprise, had been voted queen. She clicked on a link to a YouTube video, tagged as “FATAL HIT.” While she waited for the video to download, she remembered what she could of his career, a path that had taken him from East Salem High School to All-American at Stanford to the heights of stardom, a Super Bowl ring with MVP honors and a contract that was the highest ever paid to a linebacker.
She clicked Play and saw Tommy, positioned twenty yards behind the line of scrimmage, deep for a linebacker, protecting against the long pass just before the two-minute warning in the conference championship game. Tommy pointing, calling out defensive signals, reading the offensive formation. A long count, hoping to draw the defense off side, then the snap. A gifted young receiver named Dwight Sykes slicing across the field at full speed, looking to his quarterback for the ball. Tommy reading the quarterback’s eyes. Tommy launching himself over a blocker to hit Sykes a
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