EMBRACE YOU Lone(liness Book Two)(19)

"What was your motivation in taking his baby?"

"I just wanted a chance to talk to him and get to know him again. That's all. I figured, 'Well, if I have the baby, he'll have to seek me out.'

My blood chills when I hear this and I clasp my arms around me, trying to restore my body's warmth.

Marcus sees this and he wraps his arm around me.

Cara looks up just then and, as she spots Marcus' arm wrapped around me, her eyebrows go down and she glowers heavily at me. Marcus, spotting this, tightens his arm around me.

The defense attorney sees Cara's glower and spins around, looking for its source. When he spots us, he turns back around, casting about for a way to get Cara to stop focusing so strongly on me. Too late!

"You bitch! You stole him from me! He was supposed to be mine! Skinny little whore! What'd you do? Focus your eyes on him and open your legs for him?" Cara launches into a shrill tirade against me.

As I hear her hatred and vitriol, I freeze once again. I push into Marcus' side, trying to get away from Cara's hatred.

Marcus' arms both tighten around me as the magistrate orders Cara to be removed from the court room. We continue to hear her spitting obscenities, screeching and ranting as the guards remove her.

Both attorneys walk to the magistrate's bench, where they confer. Cara's attorney points at Marcus and me. The prosecuting attorney looks at us as well, then appears to lay into Cara's attorney.

"I think her attorney is trying to make a case for Cara losing it because I put my arm around you", Marcus murmurs into my ear.

In answer, I wrap my arm around Marcus' back, still needing the comfort of his arm around me.

Apparently, the magistrate agrees. Cara's attorney leaves the bench, shaking his head sharply. He then calls me to the stand.

"Mrs. Hadley, I hadn't intended to call you to the stand until tomorrow, the earliest. Will you tell the court, please, what you felt when your daughter - Liz - "

"Sir! We had agreed that we would not mention the child's name during trial!" the prosecuting barrister yells.

"So we did. Sir, if you try to utter the child's name one more time, you will join your client - behind bars."

Cara's attorney glowers, but he knows the magistrate's words are serious. He gives a huge, put-upon sigh and repeats his question, this time without uttering my daughter's name.

"I was petrified. I had been seeing your client all over Saint Albans, following my family and me, focusing on and stalking my husband. We had been doing everything we could to protect our child and each other, even moving house from his flat to a temporary residence before we bought our home."

"So, when you saw her holding your baby and running?"

"I thought I would never see my child again."

"Can you see that, in my client's mind, this was the only way for her to gain access to speak to Mr. Hadley? That, very possibly, she intended no harm?"

When I hear this, it is very difficult for me to control my facial expression, let alone my reaction! I want to jump over the witness stand and bury my fingernails in that man's throat. I swallow hard and sit on top of my hands. Looking at Marcus, I see that he is equally angry and disturbed.

"Sir, she isn't answering."

"Sir, that's quite possibly because a young woman who witnesses her infant being kidnapped may have difficulty seeing into the mind and motivations of the kidnapper," says the prosecuting barrister. "I object to that question."

"I quite agree. Miss - Mrs. Hadley, you do not need to answer that question," says the magistrate.

My breath leaks out of me. I relax marginally, preparing for the next inane question.

"Sir, can I see whether my client is able to come back into court?"

"Yes. If she so much as looks at the Hadleys, she will be going back into a jail cell. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir." He goes out with the guards and returns minus Cara. "She is still very...highly upset," he reports.

In fact, Cara doesn't return to the trial until the next morning. When she walks in, she is still scowling heavily.

Marcus, sitting next to me, scoots just a little bit closer protectively, but he doesn't wrap his arm around me.

I have brought my writing pad and a pen. While Cara resumes testifying, I doodle musical notes on it as I listen.

Her testimony is a recounting of the lack of parenting she received, as she and her attorney strive to paint her as a neglected near-orphan. After she is dismissed back to the witness table, her attorney brings up the question that has been hanging so heavily over the trial - just what is her mental health diagnosis?

"Sir, my client underwent a court-ordered psychological evaluation shortly after her arrest, as is customary in such cases. In truth, I did not anticipate that she would have a diagnosis - but she does. My client has been diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, and a schizoaffective disorder. Given these diagnoses, it is eminently clear that she is not able to appreciate the solemnity of the actions she took. I will be petitioning the court for a 'not guilty' so she might be housed in a psychiatric hospital.

As I hear the multiple diagnoses, my eyes widen. This time, however, I simply freeze where I am. I don't scoot any closer to Marcus and I don't look up. However, I sense that he is looking at me, so I turn my gaze to his.