Dark Lady by Richard North Patterson

she asked simply, “Do you have the search warrant papers?” Slowly, Jackson nodded, and drew a file from his drawer. She read the papers quickly. “According to the arresting officer,” she said, “Brett’s hair was wet.”
    “So if she was wet, and yet had blood on her, it suggests that she went swimming. Just as she said.” She looked up at Jackson. “There’s no sign that James was swimming, right?” Jackson studied her. “Not as I understand it.”
    “Because I recognize the curly hair he describes here as the family curse—I got it whenever we went swimming, remember? And if Brett went swimming alone, someone else would have had time to kill him. Just as she said.” She paused a moment. “Tell me, Jackson, what was her intoxication level?”
    “Point one six.”
    “Impressive.” Jackson tilted his head. “Are you saying that cuts against premeditation?”
    “I’m saying that it cuts against your case.” Caroline sat straighter now. “You may not like her story, but it explains everything—the blood, the fingerprints, the skin under her nails, even his failure to ejaculate. And there’s not a hole in it. Everything that happened could have happened just the way she says it did.” Caroline paused for emphasis. “She’s either telling the truth or she’s an intuitive criminal genius, who not only can plan and carry out the grisly murder of
    a young man half again her size and twice her strength but can invent the most complex account, covering physical evidence even a criminologist could only guess at, within hours of slashing her boyfriend’s throat. All while drunk and stoned. If it weren’t for the moral and legal circumstances, I’d be terribly proud of her.” Jackson’s eyes opened slightly. His look became wary, yet intent; something about it suggested more than professional pride, perhaps the desire that the woman sitting in front of him never humiliate him again. “Within eight hours.” His voice was clipped now. “More than time enough to sober up.” “I really doubt that.” How to say this, Caroline wondered, without being patronizing? “Sorry if I gave my jury argument.”
    “No, it was interesting. And informative. So why do you doubt it?”
    “Because drugs are a huge problem in San Francisco, and I was a public defender there. Which means that a lot of my clients were screwed up on drugs and alcohol. Of necessity, I began to take an amateur interest in pharmacology. For one thing, Jackson, the dope these kids smoke now isn’t like the pot we tried.” A raised eyebrow. “No?”
    “No. Today’s pot has fifteen percent THC content, three to five times that of our wonder years. If Brett was an amateur doper—and I believe she was—one joint could do things to her that you and I wouldn’t even recognize. “Second, if she drank the wine first—which I also believe—the dope would have had an additive effect. The intoxication is seriously intensified: you get black holes in the memory, some of which never get filled, and there’s a kind of surreal dream state, where the images are more like a slide show than real life. So that you doubt your own experience.” Caroline paused, then added succinctly, “And an experience this terrible is one that you would very much wish to doubt.”
    Jackson looked at her skeptically. “And a single joint would account for all that.”
    “It could account for a lot of things. That she at first tried to administer CPR. That she later had trouble remembering—or believing—that this terrible thing had really happened. And the nausea and vomiting are a typical example of the additive effect, which—like the perceptual problems—are also intensified by orgasm. As you may also recall from your youth.” Suddenly, Jackson looked wary, as if unsure how to answer. What are you doing? his expression said. Then a shrug, the barest hint of a smile. “I didn’t know what it was. Maybe the earth moving.” What were the rules for