aren’t comfortable with that. But others may argue that those instances are so rare they shouldn’t change what is just punishment for atrocious deeds.”
Dani leaned her head back into the couch and felt her eyes drift closed. She spread herself out on the couch and Doug covered her with a blanket. She was too tired to talk anymore. She was too tired for their honeymoon hour. Sleep overtook her and she welcomed it; she welcomed her escape from a world of gray.
Dani returned to the office Saturday. Waiting at the fax machine was the decision from the federal court. Two of the judges on the three-judge panel had denied the habeas petition as well as the stay. The third had dissented, agreeing that George had received ineffective assistance of counsel at his trial. The majority’s opinion was succinct: “Nothing in the record below supports defendant’s claim of ineffective assistance of counsel. Defendant has not shown that his attorney’s performance affected the outcome of his trial. Rather, defendant’s own silence concerning the whereabouts of his daughter, despite the urgings of his counsel to explain her disappearance, are likely to have played a greater role in the verdict than any act or failure to act of his attorney. Nor does the allegedly new evidence support a reopening of his case. His motion for a writ of habeas corpus is denied, as is his request for a stay of the execution.” The lone dissenter was equally succinct: “The majority’s blind eye to the possibility of executing an innocent man is tantamount to the commission of murder by the state.”
Dani couldn’t have agreed more.
Her work was finished and she was ready to leave when she got a call from Tommy.
“What are you still doing at work? Go home and play with your kid.”
“I was just about to do that. What’s up?”
“Cannon called me back. I filled him in on the fingerprint results and he was pretty skeptical.”
“But will he follow up on it?”
“He won’t go for an exhumation, not yet. But he did say he’d take a ride over to the Conklins’ and talk to them. I think I can push him some more, but we need time.”
Each time Dani heard that word—time—it felt like a sucker punch to her gut. “That’s the one thing we don’t have.”
CHAPTER
28
One Day
Dani had planned to take an early-Sunday flight to Indianapolis, drive to Michigan City the same afternoon, and be refreshed for her stay with George on Monday. When tired, her emotions rose to the surface too easily. She needed to keep them in check for George. She needed to be strong for him.
Plans go awry. She’d sat at the departure gate at LaGuardia for three hours. Weather, they’d said. Torrential downpours and gusty winds, to be more exact. Her flight hadn’t landed until nine o’clock, too late for her to drive to Michigan City. Instead, after picking up her rental car, she had called around for a hotel room near the airport, settled into the room and quickly drifted off to sleep.
The ringing of her cell phone woke her at 6:45. She didn’t mind being awakened. She’d set her alarm to go off soon anyway.
“I didn’t wake you, did I?” Tommy asked.
“No, I was up.”
“Good. I wanted to give you an update on Cannon. He went out to their house yesterday. The wife was there but not the husband. According to the wife, he’s a pharmaceutical salesman and is on the road now.”
“Did she say anything useful?”
“Well, Cannon asked if they’d ever had their daughter’s fingerprints taken. At first the wife got excited, asked if they’d found Stacy. Cannon said no, then told her about the partial of Stacy’s prints on a threatening letter. Which is pretty stupid if you ask me. Doesn’t the guy know how to run an investigation? Anyway, the strange part is that the wife said they’d never had her fingerprints taken.”
“She has to be lying.”
“Or maybe the husband did it without telling his wife.”
“Maybe. But one or both of them doesn’t want us stirring things up with Calhoun’s case.”
“Cannon is still on the fence with this. He wants to believe the partial is wrong, that it’s not a match for someone in Stacy’s family. After all, it’s not a complete match.”
“So what’s he going to do?”
“Wait for the husband to get back, then talk to him.”
It wasn’t the response Dani had hoped for, but she couldn’t do anything about it. She downed a quick breakfast and checked out of the hotel.