...And Never Let HerGo

o’clock?”
    “That is correct.”
    “Where did you park your car?”
    “In the garage—and on that point,” Tom added, “my garage was so narrow that if I pulled in, it was impossible for somebody on the passenger seat to get out, so Anne Marie would get out. . . . I pulled in and she walked in after me.”
    Tom recalled that it was very cool in the great room because his air conditioner had been on all day. “We watched
ER.”
    “Did anyone change their clothing—?” Oteri began to ask.
    “Actually, Anne Marie took off her panty hose just for the sake of being more comfortable. . . . She did not bother changing into any other clothes. . . . I just took off my suit coat and tie. We both took off our shoes.”
    “Where were you situated while you were watching
ER?
Who was where?”
    The courtroom was hushed, waiting to hear what would come next. Tom’s answers were growing more lengthy and complex, and it took a careful ear to extract the kernel of an answer to the question that Oteri had asked from all the words, words, words.
    “I typically would sit in the daddy chair—the recliner. And Annie would stretch out as best she could on the love seat. It was a love seat—it was not a sofa. It was not a sleeper couch as some people have said. It was not—it was big enough for her to lie down on but only with her knees pulled up. . . . Now, during the course of the TV show, at one point I went off and sat on the couch with her and she might lay her head on my shoulder or something like that. And we definitely did do that. It was pretty much how it was going at the end of the show.”
    “And you watched the entire show with her?”
    “Yes. Although Anne Marie—as Anne Marie always did—well, most of the time did—Anne Marie often falls asleep in front of the television and never sees the end of an eleven o’clock show because she wakes up so early in the morning. At one point Anne Marie fellasleep and I didn’t wake her up. So I saw the entire show and she did not. I did wake her up for the end.”
    Tom’s words flew together, but haltingly and repetitiously. It almost seemed as if he was viewing another scene in his head, one he was hesitant to describe.
    “Could you move without waking her up? Could you get up or down without waking her?” Oteri asked.
    “Yes. Yes.”
    “The show ends at eleven o’clock. After the show ends, what did you do?”
    “Well, I heard the phone ringing sometime during the show. I didn’t bother answering. I suspected it was Debby because I had told Debby I would probably see her later that evening. And it was not at all unusual for Debby to come over, say eleven o’clock at night, and spend the night, especially during the summer, when her kids were out of school. I remember how the show ended but at the end of the show, I got up to use the powder room, so I checked my voice mail, and sure enough, there was a message from Debby.”
    “Were you concerned she would come over?” Oteri asked.
    “No. Because I think—I mean, what I figured was that, you know, Anne Marie and I might, you know, hang out to the end of the news. Then I might take her home. Sometimes we would both fall asleep. There were literally times when she would wake up at one-thirty, two o’clock in the morning, and we were both sound asleep, and she would come over and kick me and say, ‘Come on, Capano, you got to drive me home.’ Sometimes she did spend the night.” Tom blinked at Oteri and asked, “Where was I?”
    “Talking about the phone call. You went into—”
    “As I suspected, it was a call from Debby, and I did call her back from the study.” Tom seemed back on track now. “And we had a brief and pleasant conversation. She started on her normal Tatnall subject, which was always a red flag before my eyes. And she said, ‘Can I come over now?’ And I said, ‘Not right now, you know. I’ve got company. It will have to be later,’ or something like that. And I just hung up.”
    Tom said it was about eleven then. He said he’d gone back to the great room to be sure that Anne Marie hadn’t fallen asleep again. “We had both sort of stretched out on the love seat, talking. . . . I knew we both had the next day off . . . and she really did tell me she might be going to the beach with Kim or going to the outlets and [we were] talking about my potential golf game. I figured I’d be taking her home—probably by the end of the news, or she might decideto stay as long as