Chapter 356 - Stolen Identity (1)
Holding her breath, Bree shot a glance at Dawn who appeared nonchalant. Her gaze drafted over Daryn and her lawyers and all of them were equally blasé.
Geoffrey continued. "What do you think, Ms. Bree?"
"A— About what?" she stuttered.
"About the woman who died. Who could she be?" he asked.
Bree snapped back. "How would I know? Why do you keep asking me this again and again?"
"Are you sure you don't know?" asked Geoffrey standing with his arms crossed across his chest and narrowed eyes. His eyes pierced hers.
"Yes, I am sure that I don't know!" she replied angrily.
Geoffrey nodded. Then he walked to the judge and said, "I would like to cross examine Ms. Erika Trey."
"Okay," said the judge. He gestured to the clerk to bring the girl online to talk. She was supposed to speak from the hospital ward itself.
"It isn't right to get her to testify," Bree interjected. "She is too unwell!"
"You will not speak unless you are asked to," the judge admonished her.
Bree became quiet. She looked at her lawyer. Her face was ashen and she gulped. Her hands started trembling and she closed her fists in her lap so that she could stop trembling.
The clerk connected them to Erika Trey in the hospital. He explained to her how things would work. The girl's face was wrapped with bandages. Only her brown eyes and nose were visible. "Will you be able to talk?" asked the clerk.
"Yes," she nodded. Geoffrey's team of paralegals along with the police was present in the hospital along with her. She was lying on her bed inside her cabin, while they were standing on the outside, watching her through a glass window. Only a nurse was allowed to go in so that she didn't catch infection.
"Good morning, Ms. Erika!" Geoffrey greeted her with a smile.
"Morning…" she replied feebly.
"I will be questioning you now!"
"Yes…"
"When was the last time you called your sister?" he asked.
"About a few days before the accident."
"Ah!" said Geoffrey. "Why haven't you talked to her for a month? Don't you think you should?"
"I don't want her to worry much… She has a child to look after…"
"Didn't you ask her to come and take money from you when you talked to her the last time?" came Geoffrey's next question.
The girl in the hospital licked her lips. "I— I did," she
"Did she come?"
"N— no…"
"Ms. Erika, is that your sister?" he pointed towards the back of the courtroom where a woman was sitting. She was wearing blue jeans and black shirt. The clerk zoomed the camera towards her for Erika to see clearly.
"Y— yes," she stuttered.
The woman got up. Kirk whipped his head back to see her.
"She came in just a few minutes back and she informed someone in my legal team that she wasn't allowed to meet you and that it was Ms. Bree who had instructed the hospital staff to not let you meet her," Geoffrey said in one breath. "So my question is that did you ask Ms. Bree to not let your sister meet you? And if that is the case, then why?"
Erika blinked her eyes. She looked flustered. Slowly she answered, "B— because I didn't want her to see m— me in th— this condition."
"Oh!" Geoffrey nodded. Then he quipped. "The color of your eyes is pretty!"
Kirk was getting impatient. "Will you stop it Geoffrey? My client is getting perturbed!"
Geoffrey put his hands up. "Yes, I am sorry." He took in a deep breath and continued, "Did you know the dead woman?"
"No, I don't know who she was."
"What were you doing in the kitchen?"
"I saw this woman going in the kitchen and I went after her to ask as to who she was, but by the time I could do that, the explosion occurred and I was thrown out of the kitchen."
"And Bree came to rescue you?"
"Yes, she did. But there were others also who were affected, so I started helping her."
"So you saw the woman who went in?"
"No, I didn't see her face. I only saw her back…" said Erika and she started to cry softly. The nurse gave her a tissue paper to wipe her tears.
"So you claim that you don't know the woman and that you had gone to the kitchen to ask who she was but because of the explosion, you couldn't even see her and instead ended up getting injured?"
"Yes…" said Erika, dabbing her eyes.
Geoffrey pointed at the papers in Bree's hands. "That is the autopsy report of the woman who was found dead. The same is available with the police who are standing on the outside. Would you like to see it?"
"Yes," she said quietly.
A man gave the report to the nurse who brought it inside for her to read.
Geoffrey continued. "As I said, since the body was charred beyond recognition, the only thing that the forensic analysts could do was to do jaw and skull sampling. The results of which are already written there." He clasped his hand and walked to Bree. He rested his hand on the railing of the witness box and said, "Your sister said that she was very upset with the way you were behaving with her. You haven't talked to her ever since the accident, you are not allowing her to meet you and you are allowing Bree to guide you despite the fact that you hated Bree because she never behaved properly with you. That raised my suspicions." He raked his fingers through his hair. "So we got your blood samples with the permission of the court from the hospital, which you are also well-aware of and we gave them to the forensics for a DNA match."
Bree looked like she would faint. "This is preposterous! Why are you giving her so much stress?"
"Shut up!" the judge said. "If you speak again I will put you in jail for the contempt of court!"
Bree bit her tongue.
"Should I continue?" asked Geoffrey.
Kirk had narrowed his eyes. He was sitting in his place with confusion running across his mind.
"Yes, you may," said the judge.
"I don't want to talk," Erika said feebly from her bed. "I am feeling horrible." She started sobbing.
"Oh! Trust me, this will get over fast!" said Geoffrey. He picked up another document and gave it to the judge. "Your Honor, this is a report of the DNA test. The two samples do not match."
Kirk's mouth fell to the ground and so did judge's. Bree's mouth became dry like a desert. Her skin lined with goose bumps.
Geoffrey turned to look at the girl in the camera. "The DNA of the woman whose body was charred matched with the lady who is sitting at the back. This proves that the girl who died in the explosion was Erika Trey!"
"What are you saying?" Kirk got up, clearly agitated as hell.
"I am saying the truth, Kirk," he grated.
Kirk looked at Bree who was looking as if she had seen a ghost. The judge's eyes became wide. "Then who is the girl in the hospital?"
Geoffrey was on the roll. "The girl over there," he pointed at the camera, "is not Erika." He looked at her. Her brown eyes had gone wide. "Erika died in the explosion and this one is an imposter who is trying to take advantage of the situation and extract money from my client Ms. Silver."
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