Page 1 of Deviant Desires

PROLOGUE

BAMBI

“I-I walked in even though the little voice in my head was screaming at me to run in the opposite direction.” Every eye in the courtroom is trained on me, from the jury to the lawyers to the benches full of public attendants.

A trickle of sweat forms between my breasts. My underarms feel hot and sweaty. My mama would say that feeling this nervous means that I know I’m doing something wrong, but what other choice do I have? “I called Mateo’s name, but he didn’t respond. I checked the kitchen and he wasn’t there, but dinner was cooking on the stove so I knew he was home. When I heard noises from upstairs, I assumed he was packing.”

We’d gotten engaged a month before and he was still slowly moving into the house he’d bought for us. It was a beautiful split level in the Candlewood neighborhood with plenty of space for us to grow into. He helped me move in the first week after it closed. Though he spent every night with me, he still hadn’t finished packing all his belongings. That night we were supposed to pack up his kitchen after dinner.

“I went upstairs and the noises became more defined. There was grunting and arguing, but I couldn’t make out what was being said. The noises were coming from his bedroom and the door was cracked. When I looked inside, that’s when I saw it.” A lump forms in my throat as I stare straight ahead. I’m afraid to look at Mateo sitting behind the defendant’s desk. He wears an immaculate black suit that only makes him look more handsome. If we lock eyes, I’m afraid that I’ll crumble.

My lawyer is gentle with me. We’ve gone over these questions a hundred times, but he still has to prompt me when we get to this part. “And what did you see, Ms. Schelling?”

Every time I close my eyes, I can still see it in my mind’s eye. “I saw Mateo Valenti with his hands wrapped around a man’s throat. The man’s face was already black and blue and there was some blood trickling from his nose. Mateo’s fists also looked bloody, but I wasn’t sure whose blood it was.”

I’ll never forget the look in the man’s eyes as the life was squeezed out of him. He looked at me standing in the doorway and tried to plead with me. His mouth opened and he formed words, but the pressure of Mateo’s hands around his neck kept me from understanding them.

“Then what happened, Ms. Schelling?” My lawyer prompts me again, drawing me away from getting lost in the memories of that day.

As I blink, I hold my eyes shut a few seconds longer than normal.You can do this,I tell myself,he’ll be behind bars for the rest of his life.When I open my eyes, I can’t help but stare directly at Mateo. “Then I left the room. I ran down the stairs and left through the front door. I don’t know if Mateo heard the door slam shut or if it was the start of my car that got his attention, but as I was fumbling to pull out of the drive, he appeared at the front door. He-he looked angry, but he didn’t try to stop me.”

I called the cops as I sped away. I don’t even think I knew where I was going, I just drove as fast as I could. I barreled around curves and almost hit a parked car on the side of the street. My heart was racing as I tried to explain to the 911 dispatcher what I’d just seen. My words came out in a jumbled mess and I didn’t even realize I was crying until I pulled over by a park and saw confusion reflected at me from the couple walking by.

My lawyer takes a seat; he has no further questions. From his place behind the desk, he gives me a small thumbs up. I can barely see it behind the cloud of fear obscuring my vision.

Mateo’s lawyer is an impeccably dressed woman. She wears a stunning black pantsuit and a pair of gold heels that make her look impossibly tall. “Ms. Schelling, you said that you saw my client, Mr. Valenti, in the process of choking a man, correct?”

I nod my head yes slowly; I’m not sure where she’s going with this. “Yes, ma’am. I saw his hands wrapped around the guy’s throat.”

“But you didn’tactuallysee my client kill anyone, did you?” She crosses her arms over her chest dramatically. “By your own admission, you ran from the room when you saw what was happening.”

“I-I,” I start to stammer. My lawyer said this would happen; he warned me that the defense would try to say that I hadn’t witnessed anything at all except a scuffle among friends.Slow your heartbeat,I tell myself.You’ve got to calm down.

I take a moment for myself to breathe and look around the room. The judge is staring at me intently and I avoid his gaze the second mine lands on him. The men and women of the jury are watching me with curious looks as if they hadn’t realized from my testimony that I left the room before I witnessed someone actually die. The members of the public that came to watch the trial include Mateo’s four brothers. They look at me like I’m a pariah.

I shouldn’t have looked around.

I retrain my eyes on the wall at the back of the court before answering the lawyer’s question. “I did not see the victim die, but when the police arrived a few minutes later, they saw that Mateo Valenti had blood on his hands and outfit.”

“But they didn’t find a dead man,” the lawyer insists. “Isn’t it true that while my client was suspiciously covered in blood, they couldn’t find a body?”

The event in question had happened two months ago. The man that I saw in Mateo’s bedroom still hadn’t been found. The police had me speak to a sketch artist and they ran the victim in the newspaper for weeks. The leads they received led to nowhere. “Yes,” I mumble in response.

“No further questions, your honor.” The lawyer’s smile reminds me of a shark: too many teeth and ready to eat me alive.

I am released from the stand and sent back to the bench. I spend the rest of the day going over my testimony in my head. What could I have said differently? How could I have come off as more convincing? Should I have called the cops in the first place? I can barely make out what the remaining witnesses say because I’m so lost in my own little world of questioning whether I fucked up.

During the last three days of the trial, I sit in the audience with the public as the lawyers finish up their final remarks and make their pleas to the jury. I can’t stop staring at the back of Mateo’s head; his brothers can’t stop staring at me.

When the verdict comes back, my lawyer has me sit behind the desk with him again. My stomach is so fucked up that I had broth for breakfast and somehow it’s still churning in my gut. I feel like I’m going to throw up at any moment.

The speaker for the jury stands up and reads the verdict. “The jury has found Mateo Valentinot guiltyof first-degree murder.” Half the courtroom cheers but it’s a thunderous applause. His brothers are on their feet reaching over the divider to pat him on the back.

“Enough,” the judge bangs his gavel, “the jury isn’t finished.” He’s a crotchety old man and he hasn’t been interested in the court theatrics since the beginning. When Mateo’s lawyer started blustering wildly about the good deeds that the Valenti family has done for Manhattan, he shut her down two minutes into her diatribe. “Proceed,” he grumbles.

The speaker clears his throat and reads off the other felony charge that was brought up. “On the charge of criminal possession of a firearm, the jury has found the defendantguilty.”

I’m ambivalent about the outcome. My lawyer was certain that they’d get Mateo for murder, but to drive the point home, he charged him with possession of a firearm. When the police were searching his home for signs of a dead body, they found a cache of guns hidden in the guest bedroom closet on the top shelf. It would have extended his murder sentence, but now it’s the only thing they have on him.

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