Never Giving Up (Never #3)(76)

I am so glad everything went smoothly. I miss you both too. Trial is, uh, interesting. I was on the stand and then they called a recess. Defense is trying to question my memory of his face.



I knew Porter would be upset by my update, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it from across the city. A response from him was almost immediate.

Give ’em hell, Babe. Mattie and I will be waiting for you this evening. And by the way, she told me she didn’t like the bottle. Hated it. Only drank it in protest.



I laughed out loud at his message, but my heart swelled in my chest at his words as well. He knew exactly what was most upsetting about this day and also knew exactly how to make it easier for me. I responded with a smile on my face.

I love you. Give Mattie some snuggles for me.



I’ll try, but she keeps telling me that I’m not as comfortable to lay on as you are. She’s pretty mouthy. ;)



Oh, and I love you too. Always.



Time passed too quickly and we found ourselves back in the courtroom and I was, once again, called to the stand to continue my testimony. The judge reminded me that I was still under oath, to which I gave her an understanding nod and a quiet, “Yes, Your Honor.” The defense lawyer made his way towards me again, slowly, not making eye contact, reminding me of a snake in tall grass, slithering his way towards his prey. He tried to throw me off, intimidate me, but I wasn’t having any of it. I could see him, plain as day, and refused to be anything but confident in that moment.

“Mrs. Masters, before the recess we were talking about your miraculous memory returning just in the nick of time to I.D. a random man in a line up.”

“But he wasn’t random. That was the man who was arrested and found to have a gun on him which matched the type of gun that shot me. That’s not a coincidence.”

“Your honor, this witness is not qualified to offer testimony as to what my client had on him when he was arrested or not. Please let her previous statement be stricken from the record.”

“Sustained,” the judge said. “Jury,” she said, turning to address the group of people sitting to our left, “you will not allow the witness’ previous statement alter or influence your final decision. It has been stricken from the record.” The jurors all nodded and turned their faces back towards me.

“Mrs. Masters, let’s try this again. Just tell me about how you saw Mr. Ramie in a line up, and identified him, if you couldn’t remember his face.”

I took a deep breath in and tried to sort out my thoughts before I spoke them aloud. “Up until the line-up at the police station, whenever I pictured the person who shot me, I could see everything except his face. His height, his build, his clothing. The only thing missing was the face.” I took in another breath, letting it out slowly, looking to Kalli for a little strength. She gave me a small and tight smile, obviously nervous for me. “When I went in for the line up, I even told the detective I didn’t remember anything. I assured him I wouldn’t be of any help, but Detective Dillard insisted I try. I went in the room and I started at the beginning, looking at each man, trying to make desperately sure that I wasn’t passing up the man who had shot a gun at me.”

I finally looked the defense lawyer right in his eyes. “The first five men looked like strangers. I had no recognition of any of them. Nothing. But when I started looking at number six, everything started coming together, like a fog was lifting.”

“A fog?” The lawyer smirked at me.

“Have you ever had amnesia?”

My question caught him off guard and he stumbled through a response, “Um, no.”

“Then you have no idea what it feels like to have a memory return to you. It is an all-of-a-sudden occurrence. There’s nothing slow and gradual about it. It’s like having the answer to a question or the name of a song on the tip of your tongue. It seems like it’s just right there, but it isn’t, and it either comes or it goes. But when it does come, it’s like a balloon popping. All at once and deafeningly loud. The memory screams at you to be remembered.” My eyes roamed over to Jason Ramie and our glares met one another. He didn’t look remorseful or contrite. He looked angry and annoyed. “Jason Ramie is the man who shot me and the fact that my memory returned when I saw his face is neither a coincidence nor a fallacy.” I paused, looking back at the lawyer standing in front of me, his face painted with a look of shock, much like I might have just told him to kiss my ass. He looked baffled and disoriented as he tried to think of what to say next. “But I will let Dr. Bronson tell you about the medical side of amnesia, seeing as how I am not a medical professional.”

The smile on my face probably looked bitchy. I most likely looked like the cat that ate the canary. But I felt wonderful. I’d finally gotten my chance to tell this small and secluded room of people what Jason Ramie had done to me. I’d looked him in the eye and told him that I knew who he was and what he’d done.

The rest of the trial dragged on. I might have been biased, but Mr. Donaldson was, in my opinion, a much better lawyer than Jason Ramie’s. The prosecution pressed on after my testimony. Mr. Donaldson did a superb job of bringing witnesses to the stand that painted a picture of Jason Ramie’s guilt. The jury heard about how the bullet pulled from my shoulder matched a bullet that had been shot out of the gun found on his person at his arrest. Detective Dillard did a wonderful job of talking about each gun’s “fingerprint” and how the two bullets each had the same “fingerprint” on them and so they were both fired from the same gun—Jason Ramie’s.