Secret Prey

I’ve got a serious question.’’
    She stopped with the Iliad : ‘‘Which is?’’
    ‘‘If a woman is routinely beaten by her husband, is it likely that she might betray him behind his back, while defending him when he was around?’’
    ‘‘Of course—wouldn’t you if you were in her shoes?’’
    ‘‘No.’’
    ‘‘No, you probably wouldn’t. You’d probably go after him with a baseball bat . . . But yes, a woman might do that.’’
    ‘‘I’m not talking about some kind of pro forma defense. I’m talking about really believing in the defense. But at the same time, betraying him to the police anonymously, then denying it even to the police.’’
    ‘‘This isn’t a theoretical question.’’
    ‘‘No.’’
    ‘‘Then you’re dealing with a badly abused woman who needs treatment—if it’s not too late for treatment. Some people, if they’re abused badly enough, will identify with and even love their abusers, while another side of their personality is desperately trying to get out of the relationship. Just to use a kind of layman’s terminology, you could say you have a condition of . . . mmm . . . stress-induced multiple-personality disorder. The part of her personality that sincerely defends her husband may not even know that the other part of her personality is betraying him.’’
    ‘‘Shit . . . Excuse me,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘So even if I broke her out from her husband in, say, a murder case, she could be impeached as being nuts.’’
    ‘‘ ‘Nuts’ is not accepted terminology, Lucas,’’ she said.
    ‘‘But she could be impeached . . .’’
    ‘‘Worse than that. If she were required to testify in the presence of her husband, she might flip over and start defending him—lying—because he so dominates her personality.’’
    ‘‘All right.’’
    ‘‘Will I be meeting this woman?’’
    ‘‘Probably not, Elle. I’ll tell you about it next time we talk. Right now, I’m running.’’
    ‘‘Take care.’’
    ‘‘You too.’’
    BONE LIVED IN A HIGH-SECURITY BUILDING MUCH like O’Dell’s, and not more than a five-minute walk away. Lucas dumped the Porsche in a no-parking zone outside the glass front doors, and when a security guard came to the doors, flashed his ID and was admitted to the lobby.
    ‘‘I need to talk to James T. Bone,’’ Lucas said.
    ‘‘Don’t know if Mr. Bone is in. He often goes out at night,’’ the guard said, moving behind the security console.
    ‘‘Ring him and let it ring about fifty times,’’ Lucas said.
    The guard did that, and after a few seconds, said into the phone, ‘‘Mr. Bone, this is William downstairs. I’m sorry to bother you, but there’s a police officer here asking to see you . . . Yes, Deputy Chief Davenport, and he says it’s urgent. Yes sir.’’
    He hung up the phone: ‘‘Mr. Bone is on fourteen,’’ he said. ‘‘Take the elevator on the right.’’
    BONE WAS WAITING IN THE HALLWAY OUTSIDE HIS apartment door: as Lucas got off the elevator, he realized that this hallway also had only two doors, as had O’Dell’s. Something ticked at the back of his mind, but the thought was gone as Bone stepped out and said, ‘‘What’s going on?’’
    Bone was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, but was barefoot.
    ‘‘You alone?’’
    ‘‘No, actually, I have a friend here . . . Come on in. What happened?’’
    Lucas stepped inside. A woman, about Bone’s age, was sitting on the couch.
    ‘‘This is Marcia Kresge, Dan Kresge’s wife. We were just talking strategy.’’
    ‘‘Was Wilson McDonald here an hour ago?’’ Lucas asked.
    Bone looked at his watch: ‘‘Well, more than an hour. He left here probably at ten-thirty or ten forty-five.’’
    ‘‘Ten-thirty. Have you been here ever since?’’
    ‘‘Yes . . . Marcia got here about . . .’’
    ‘‘About eleven-twenty,’’ said Kresge.
    ‘‘So what happened to McDonald?’’ Bone demanded.
    ‘‘Did you make a deal with McDonald?’’ Lucas asked, ignoring the question.
    Bone looked at Kresge, then back at Lucas: ‘‘No. What’s he done?’’
    ‘‘So you’re out of the job. Because he made a deal with Susan O’Dell.’’
    ‘‘Oh, no, I’m not out of it at all.’’ Bone shook his head. ‘‘Wilson thinks he can deliver several votes to Susan. He doesn’t know it, but he can’t. Well, maybe one. The rest are still up for grabs. Now what the hell happened?’’
    Lucas looked at Kresge, then back at Bone,