Unintended Consequences - By Marti Green

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. The roads were clear and she made good time on Interstate 65, arriving at the prison by eleven o’clock. She’d already arranged with Warden Coates to spend the day with George, a stark departure from the usual prison practice. Despite the daily violence in the other sections of the prison, where seventy-five percent of the inmates were there for murder and where even the visiting chaplains wore protective vests, death row was relatively tranquil. As a precaution, she’d been required to sign a waiver of liability protecting the prison against any lawsuit, despite Coates’s confidence that George wouldn’t harm her.

Melanie stood by in the office and waited for a ruling from the Supreme Court. Dani had the phone number of Joe Guidry, the governor’s chief of staff, programmed into her own phone. A push of a single button would reach him.

There was no cell-phone service in George’s cell, so the warden had agreed to get her when Melanie called his office with word from the Supremes.

After Dani was processed through the visitor’s entrance, a guard escorted her to George’s jail cell. The concrete corridors had a musty odor, and her nose twitched as she held back a sneeze. She endured the expected catcalls as she walked past the cells. The roominess of the enclosures surprised her. Then she remembered Coates’s telling her that death-row inmates, who occupied their cells alone, were given more space because the rooms encompassed their entire world. No job duties, no library, no group meals. Just their cells all but a half-hour each day. She passed a cell whose walls were covered with paintings as good as some she’d seen in museums. Another cell looked like a greenhouse, with dozens of plants below a small window. At the end of the row, she heard a squeak as she passed, and looked up to see a snow-white rabbit sitting on a small table and an open cage in the corner.

“The prisoners are allowed pets?” Dani asked her escort.

“Only on death row. These men, they know they’re going to die. It helps some keep depression at bay.”

Dani passed through a security gate at the end of the row and was led down a separate corridor where inmates were placed within twenty-four hours of their execution. Unlike the other sections marked by a constant hum of blended noises, this area was eerily quiet. George looked up as he heard footsteps approach, and a hopeful smile broke out on his face when he saw Dani.

“I don’t have any news for you yet,” she told him after the cell door had closed behind her and the guard had left. “But Melanie will get word to me as soon as we hear from the Supreme Court.”

George nodded slowly. “I don’t expect much.”

“There’s still time. Executions have been stopped with just hours to go.”

George’s hands rested on his lap. He had a look of determination on his face. “I’m ready for it to be over. I did what I had to and I’m okay with that.”

She hadn’t told George about the nurse at the Mayo Clinic. She felt torn. She didn’t know how he’d react. Would it heighten his anguish to think his daughter was alive and not be able to find her? Or would it bring him peace? Dani concluded that it was wrong for her to withhold information from him.

“George, it’s possible that Angelina is alive.”

George’s shoulders shot back and his body became taut. “Have you found her?” he asked in a choked voice.

“No, not yet.”

“But she’s alive?”

“We’re not certain. But we believe she may be.”

Dani told him about the nurse at the Mayo Clinic. She described the efforts they’d made to track down Sunshine Harrington. As she spoke, George slumped into his chair as if a pin had been stuck into his body and all the air had escaped.

She put her hand on his. “I’m sorry.”

George sat upright again. “No, it’s good. It’s good. My beautiful angel is alive. It means what I did meant something. It mattered.”

They didn’t know yet if that was true, but if George did walk to his death tonight, Dani preferred that it be with the belief that Angelina had survived.


Unlike the cells she’d passed along death row, this one was bare. A bed, a small table and wooden chair, and a toilet in the corner—nothing more was needed in quarters meant to be used for less than twenty-four hours. Every now and then a guard walked by, his footsteps echoing in the hallway. Once, a chaplain appeared and asked George if he needed anything. George shook his head.

The hours passed slowly. George didn’t speak much. Dani could only imagine what his thoughts must be. Her life wouldn’t end tonight, yet she felt the same helplessness he must have felt. She tried to engage him in conversation, as if by doing so she could drag the thoughts of death from his mind.

“Do you have any family?” she asked. “Parents? Siblings?”

“My dad died about ten years ago. Heart attack. Very sudden.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“It was the stress, my being here, that did it to him. Every time he’d come visit, I could see it in his face.”

“And your mother?”

“She’s still alive.”

“Will she be here tonight? In the visitors room?”

George’s face tightened. “She came yesterday. We had a good visit. I told her don’t come tonight. I couldn’t bear my mom seeing me all strapped up like that. My folks, they understood. They knew what I did for Angelina. Never once did they doubt me.”

“They sound like good parents. Tell me about them.”

“Dad, he taught me everything I knew about cars. He could take apart any car and build it right back up like brand-new. He worked on the factory line, though. Cars were a hobby for him.”

“How about your mom?”

“A boy couldn’t have had a better mom. She would have done anything for me. I had no brothers or sisters. I’d come home from school and she’d always have something fresh baked for me. Always.” A smile crossed his face. “She wasn’t educated. Never even finished tenth grade. As soon as my dad finished high school, she ran off and married him. Mom thought everything I did was right. Never once did she use harsh words with me. It breaks my heart to see what this has done to her, but she puts on a strong show with me. Every time she visits she tells me I did what I had to do.”

“She must love you very much.”

“Yes, ma’am, she does.” George stopped talking for a moment and then said, “If you do find Angelina, will you make sure she gets to know her grandma? That would be a real good present for my mom. Not that it’ll heal her broken heart over me, but it would help. I know it would, if she has a granddaughter to love. So, will you?”

“Of course.”

“You’ve got to promise me.”

“I promise you, George.”


At 3:45, a guard came to take Dani to Coates’s office.

“Your associate is on the phone. Do you want some privacy?”

“Yes, please.”

She was afraid to pick up the phone. The odds were small that the Supreme Court would stop this travesty, and she didn’t want to hear the words she dreaded. But she couldn’t avoid it.

“Melanie, have you heard something?”

Melanie’s voice was weak, as if the elasticity had been strained out of her vocal cords. “It’s bad news. They denied a stay and they denied cert.” Certiorari was the term used when the Supreme Court agreed to decide a case.

Dani’s legs shook. She’d been through this before with other inmates. It never got easier. “I’ll call the governor’s office. There’s still hope in that corner.”

She got off the phone and dialed Joe Guidry’s number.

“Joe, the Supremes have turned us down. Governor Timmons is the last hope to stop the execution of an innocent man.”

“Look, I’ve read the stuff you’ve sent me and I agree there are doubts in this case. But she’s all about law and order. She needs something solid.”

“Give me one week. That’s all I’m asking for. One week and I’ll get you something solid.”

“Hold tight. I’ll go speak to her.”

The line was quiet for ten minutes before Joe came back. “One week and you need to produce the daughter. That’s the deal. If you don’t have Angelina Calhoun or a valid death certificate for her in one week, then she won’t do anything more for you. Understand?”

“Joe, she won’t regret this.”

“We’ll see. I’m faxing the stay over to the prison now.”

Dani hung up, elated. One more week. It was a lifetime.