The Witness Read Online Free PDF Page A

not going to assume I can prevent it from happening.”
    “Matching the application information will help me out, thanks.”
    He turned on the cassette recorder and noted down date and time and witness information for the record. He’d thought about what he most needed from her, knowing the odds were still strong that this might be the only evidence they had to present to a grand jury if she disappeared on him, and made a decision. “I want you to talk through what you did and saw today from about noon on until I met up with you at your home. I want you to stop there and then tell me everything you can remember about Paula Grant and her ex. Things Paula said, the date you first met him, what you know about the situation between them.”
    She closed her eyes and let out a deep breath, then nodded and began. “I took my lunch break today just before 2 p.m., ate at the food court, and then returned to work.”
    Luke started typing, appreciating her steady pace.
    “I rearranged the ring display, helped three new customers who bought earrings, a necklace, and a ring, respectively, and wrote up two repair orders for a longtime customer. Shortly before four Jim asked me to take the day’s cash deposit to the bank; the branch office in the mall is near The Limited clothing store. I left the bank about 4:15—the time is on the deposit receipt—and walked back to the jewelry store.” She hesitated and reached for her soda. She took a long drink. “I saw him when I came around the candy display out in the center mall aisle.” She went on in the same steady voice, and Luke kept with her, not pausing to correct the typos or the punctuation.
    It took her more than five minutes to get the narrative out, and when she again paused he clicked off the recorder, rose, and went to get a washcloth from the towel rack. He brought it back cold and wet.
    She pressed it against her eyes.
    “We can take a break before you finish.” He was leading her back through rough terrain, and he knew the cost it was taking to keep her composure. There was a brutal rawness to remembering blood and death, and that reality was only hours in her past.
    She shook her head. “Thanks, but no. Let me get this done. You need the words, and I’m going to be better just getting them out and having it over.”
    Courage, but maybe a little too brave, he thought as she pushed back the tears and the reaction and didn’t let herself grieve. He waited until he thought she’d gotten a few deep breaths and taken at least the first steps back from the roughest memories.
    He set a new section in the file, then clicked on the recorder again. “Okay.”
    “I first met Paula’s ex on August ninth. I remember the date because we were taking inventory, and her ex shoved a display being put together and sent rings flying.”
    Her voice was husky now, but her words were solid and flowing. Luke typed, and as the story unfolded he knew the signs of what had happened today were in the history. He wished someone in his office had put it together before the explosion.
    Her words came to an end. He watched, concerned, as she twisted the cold rag around her hand and then back off, the motion just a place marker for the fact that mentally she was remembering more than what she was saying. She was feeling the events of today now as she spoke of them, really feeling them for the first time, he thought, for her emotions had been too numb for that before. They were friends who had died, and nothing he said could touch that pain.
    He shut off the recorder and returned it to his briefcase. He turned back to the start of her narrative and read for content and corrections, giving her time. “Did you notice shoes?”
    She blinked back at him for a moment, then nodded. “Black tennis shoes.”
    Luke printed the document. Her statement ran six pages. He handed it to Amy. “Read it through, note any changes you want to make, and I’ll print a revised copy for you to sign.”
    “Okay.”