Blood Land by R. S. Guthrie Page A

was Hanson’s job to steer them.
    On the way out of the courthouse, Beulah Jorgensen stopped him.
    “Mr. Hanson,” she said.
    “I told you, Beulah. Call me J.W.”
    “I don’t care for people who use initials to refer to themselves,” she said. “And I don’t recall asking you to use the familiar with me.”
    “Understood,” Hanson said.
    “I thought it only fair to tell you that I am planning on calling your, uh, well, friend, to the stand. Ms. Steele.”
    Hanson feigned stoicism. “For?”
    “To testify as to the violent potential of Ty McIntyre. They have a history,” Jorgensen said.
    “She won’t say anything to impugn her uncle, you know,” Hanson said.
    “She’ll say whatever is the truth or I will have her jailed, sir.”
     “You do whatever you have to, ma’am,” he said.
    “She’ll be on my witness list,” Jorgensen said and exited into the fading light.
     

    The short conversation with Beulah Jorgensen squatted on his brain like a toad. Hanson sat on the edge of the hotel bed, a cable news channel humming in the background. He tried to call Wendy when he returned from the courthouse, but she either was out of range or was not answering. At around eight o’clock, she slipped through the door.
    “Where have you been?” Hanson asked.
    “I had dinner with a high school friend. I told you twice yesterday, and once today. When you were getting ready to leave for court.”
    “Right,” Hanson said. Jorgensen’s revelation that there was a history between Ty and Wendy that played well for the prosecution perplexed him. He was also annoyed that neither his client, nor his girlfriend, had found it relevant to share said history with the lawyer tasked with saving the man’s life.
    “A curmudgeonly little bird told me today that there is a ‘history’ between you and your uncle Ty,” Hanson said.
    “Of course we have history,” Wendy said. “He’s my uncle .”
    “I neglected to expand. I believe one might call it a violent history.”
    Wendy sat heavily on the bed, next to Hanson. “Oh,” she said.
    “I appreciate the candor, though I’d hoped for a less-incriminating response. Seeing that I will be trying to keep your uncle from a lethal injection starting Monday.”
    “It was a long ways back. I didn’t think it would matter,” Wendy said.
    “Jorgensen is calling you as a witness for the prosecution. To show Ty’s propensity toward violence.”
    Wendy closed her eyes and lay down on her back. “When I was sixteen, my dad and I started to disagree a lot. We had some pretty bad arguments. Uncle Ty broke one up, that’s all that happened.”
    “Wendy, if that was all that happened, Beulah Jorgensen would not be planning to call you to the stand.”
    “Ty took a swing at my dad. He missed. Gave me one hell of a shiner.”
    “Shit,” Hanson said. “Charges?”
    “It was mandatory because I was a minor. But the sheriff testified that it was an accident. My dad said that he and Ty were fighting.”
    “Which wasn’t the whole truth,” Hanson said.
    “It was enough of the truth,” Wendy said.
    “Had Ty been drinking?”
    “Ty was always drinking. So was my father.”
    “What happened in court?”
    “The attorney defending Ty asked for a trial by judge. Figured the sheriff testifying would hold more sway on another member of the justice machine. He was right. The judge threw the case out.”
    “And Beulah Jorgensen?”
    “She was just starting out in the City Attorney’s office. It was one of her first cases, I think.”
    “Perfect,” Hanson said.
    “Sorry,” Wendy said. “I really didn’t think it mattered, since he was acquitted. Pretty stupid.”
    “Hopefully it won’t matter much. She can’t go after you too hard. One, you were the victim in the previous case. A child to boot. Second, no conviction. Guessing we won’t have the sheriff’s kind remembrance of the events in question, though.”
    “Pruett wouldn’t lie,” she said.
    “He’s not my