Page 43

Theo

The sun isn’t up yet when I quietly get out of bed on a Tuesday morning, trying not to wake Mackenzie. She’s curled up under the blankets, breathing softly, and I stop for a moment just to look at her.

The last two weeks have been hard—long days, big feelings, and stressful moments in court. Mackenzie and I have been at my place when Levi stays with his dad. Otherwise, we spend the evenings together at her place, and then I come home after saying goodnight to Levi. It adds a layer of logistics, but being with Mackenzie reminds me of what’s really important and what’s good in the world, despite all that doesn’t make sense.

Finally, today is the day for closing arguments. Somehow, we’ve made it this far—together. Now, there’s a light at the end of this long, painful tunnel. But I’m nervous. I don’t know what we’ll do if they decide Crystal is innocent. The thought keeps me up at night. All the trouble she’ll cause. All the drama we’re so ready to leave behind.

I shower and get dressed without making noise, pulling on the gray suit I’ve been wearing a lot lately. In the kitchen, I start the coffee. I’m not even done when I hear soft footsteps. Mackenzie comes up behind me and wraps her arms around my waist, resting her head on my back.

“Morning,” she says, her voice still sleepy.

I turn and kiss her forehead. “Morning. Are you ready for today?”

She nods, but I can see worry in her eyes.

We leave at seven. This drive through the quiet streets of San Francisco feels like part of our routine now. We talk about little things—her coffee order, something funny Levi said, an intern messing up. It sounds simple, but what we really mean is we’re in this together.

When we get to the courthouse, I feel my nerves rachet up. Austin, Rhys, and Mason are waiting outside the courtroom, and we walk in together, with Mackenzie right in front of us. Just being near her helps me.

Gina, Justin’s mother, is seated near the front of the courtroom with her husband, Graham. She sits up tall, clearly trying to be brave, but it’s obvious she’s distraught. Crystal’s parents, Will and Chrissy Brown, are next to her. They never got the chance to meet Justin, but they’ve been devoted to Gina as they’ve shared her sorrow. And I suppose she’s shared theirs. That’s hard to fathom.

I give the Browns a small nod. We’re not on different sides. We’ve all lost during this ordeal. And now, I suspect we all want the same thing. We’re all ready for this chapter to close and for whatever comes next.

The courtroom is quiet, but you can feel how tense it is. People whisper to each other. Reporters have their pens ready. Everyone’s waiting.

I look over at Mackenzie and lace my fingers with hers. It’s the only thing that feels sure right now. And then we wait. Unlike other days, when we’ve started promptly at nine, today the time drags on. The clock moves closer to eleven, and the waiting feels like forever. Something is going on in the judge’s chambers, but we don’t know what. The prosecution and Crystal’s lawyers are not in their seats either.

Gina leans toward me and speaks quietly, glancing at my hand, linked with Mackenzie’s. “Have you two changed the nature of your relationship?”

“Yes,” I confirm, rubbing my thumb over Mackenzie’s hand. “Mackenzie relented. I’ve been chasing her for years, and I finally caught her.”

Mackenzie blushes, and I love it. She smiles at me and despite everything going on around us, I’ve never been so happy.

Gina smiles, but it’s a little sad too. “Justin would’ve liked that,” she says. “He always said you had a thing for Mackenzie. He thought you’d figure it out one day.”

Emotion rushes through me, and I swallow, trying to keep it together. But before I can respond, something shifts at the front of the room.

“Please rise for Judge Baron Childs,” the bailiff says.

Everyone stands. The benches creak and shoes shuffle. The judge walks in and sits down with a small nod.

“Thank you for your patience,” he says, pausing so the lawyers can find their places. “We’ve managed the last details. Now, we can move forward.” He looks toward the side door. “Bring in the jury.”

After a moment, the door opens and twelve people walk in—eight women, four men. They come from different backgrounds, but now, they have one big job. They need to decide what happens next.

I watch them, hoping to see something—anything. But their faces reveal nothing.

Mackenzie squeezes my hand. Finally, I breathe.

We did everything we could. Today the district attorney and the defense will lay out their cases one last time and send the jury off to determine whether Crystal is guilty.

This is the end of a chapter that changed all of us.

Judge Childs speaks again. “Ms. Chow, your closing argument, please.”

Daisy rises and turns toward the jury. “Thank you for being here,” she says. “You’ve listened to weeks of testimony, looked at a lot of technical paperwork, and heard some hard things. Now, we’re at the most important part of this case.”

She stops for a moment so her words can sink in.

“This trial didn’t go the way we thought it would. The person we’re talking about—the defendant—isn’t here. Not because she couldn’t be, but because she chose not to come. That says something. Sometimes, not saying anything can be louder than words.”

I watch the jurors. A few nod a little. Some look like they’re thinking hard.

“Crystal met Justin in college,” Daisy says. “They had fun together. Then she moved west because Justin suggested it, and because she’d failed out of her math program at Georgia Tech.”

That’s news to me. I glance at Austin, and he looks just as surprised. I wonder who testified to that?

“She didn’t start EnergiFusion with the others,” Daisy explains. “She became Justin’s girlfriend and worked her way in. Over time, she began to say the founding team—Austin, Rhys, Theo, and Justin—was a boys’ club. And maybe they were sometimes rough or immature.”

That part stings a little. It’s not easy to hear.

“Mr. Reed once called her the Yoko Ono of the company,” Daisy adds. My face feels hot. It was just a dumb joke. I never thought it would come up in closing arguments.

“But here’s what matters,” Daisy says. “She stayed. Over and over again, she chose to stay.”

Mackenzie squeezes my hand. Her calm eyes help me stay grounded as emotions rise.

“Despite whatever she disagreed with, Crystal stayed, and instead, she worked to break apart the very thing Justin and his friends had built,” Daisy says. “Justin believed in EnergiFusion. He believed in the people who helped him build it. He never stopped trusting his dream—or them.”

I look at Gina. Her face shows pride, but also deep sadness.

“The defense wants you to think Crystal Capriotti deserved what she stole, that the company owed her something,” Daisy says, turning back to the jury. “But remember this. When EnergiFusion was just an idea, she lived with Justin, Theo, Rhys, and Austin for free. She got paid while the others ate cheap noodles and used credit cards to survive.”

That truth hits deep. I see Mackenzie nod. She remembers those early days—tight money, long hours, and a dream we all believed in.

“They appreciated the work Crystal did,” Daisy continues, “and she got something in return. They each took some of their shares and gave her seven and a quarter percent of EnergiFusion. That’s a good amount. Fair, even. Today that’s worth several billion dollars. But for Crystal, it wasn’t enough. She held a grudge.”

The courtroom is full of whispers, but everything goes quiet as Daisy Chow walks to the front. She moves like she belongs there—strong, calm, and ready. I hold my breath, waiting for her to remind the jury who Crystal really is.

“Let’s start at the beginning. Four new college grads with an idea that’s potentially world changing.” Her eyes steady on the jury. “Dr. Richard Allen believed in EnergiFusion,” Daisy goes on. “He was their academic advisor. He brought in investors to back these dreams. But not just for these guys. He did it for many of his graduating students. Yet when the company took off, he decided he wanted a piece of it, just for doing his job. And to get back at them when they declined, he posted their plans on the dark web.”

Daisy takes a moment to drink from her glass of water.

“Crystal had spoken to Dr. Allen. She knew what he’d done. And when the time came to list the people who had access to EnergiFusion’s original plans as they sought to discover the leak, Dr. Allen’s name was missing. And do you know why? Because Crystal Capriotti made sure it was.”

The jury is leaning forward now, caught up in the story Daisy’s telling.

“Control,” she says, letting the word linger. “Crystal decided who got to see EnergiFusion’s most important information. She held the key to their future. Because they trusted her.”

The room is silent except for the low hum of the air conditioning.

“Maloney Chemical. We’ve talked about them for the last six weeks, and you met their former CEO, Stan Richards.”

The name makes my stomach turn.

“Crystal made a deal with him in secret,” Daisy says. “She sent EnergiFusion battery plans to a company in China, and Stan sent sodium-ion. That company made batteries that seemed identical, right down to the name. And then Crystal sold these counterfeits from the home she shared with Justin. They looked just like EnergiFusion’s EV batteries but weren’t—and they were dangerous.”

My hands curl into fists. I can’t help it. I see the same anger on Rhys’s face. And Austin’s too.

“Those fakes,” Daisy says, “caused numerous accidents and incidents, and that led to lawsuits.”

I shift in my seat, feeling tense. I remember the flood of lawsuits. I remember the fear every time a letter from a law office arrived. Each one felt like it was trying to crush us.

“Those lawsuits?” Daisy says. “They were lies. Lies that made lawyers rich and nearly broke EnergiFusion. Each lawsuit was like a nail in their coffin. And Crystal was the one hammering them in.”

I nod. We spent days reading reports, trying to find problems in batteries we knew were safe. But the truth is, Crystal had planted those problems. She set the trap, and then kicked the door shut behind us.

“Somehow, they fixed it. EnergiFusion survived. They were able to prove the batteries were counterfeit, but they still didn’t know where they’d come from. Crystal Capriotti hadn’t just deceived her husband and his partners. She fooled everyone—EnergiFusion’s investor, business partners, even their competitors.”

I can see the jury putting the puzzle pieces together.

“Beyond that, she shared EnergiFusion’s secrets,” Daisy continues. “Things no one outside the company should have known—plans, strategies, everything they’d worked hard to create. She gave it all away for her own gain and just to be spiteful. She messed with their shipments. The sodium-ion they needed wasn’t delivered. Instead, Crystal’s side hustle—the counterfeit EnergiFusion batteries—got those deliveries.”

I shut my eyes for a second. I remember those days. Everything was chaos. Phones ringing nonstop, team members panicking, and no answers.

“She’d have you believe this was all Stan Richards’s doing,” Daisy notes. “But he sat here and told you his truth. He’s not innocent, but he was manipulated by her, and you know what? It didn’t work.”

The jurors don’t move. Their eyes follow Daisy.

“Crystal was angry. But she didn’t stop there,” Daisy says. She looks right at one of the jurors, who gives a small nod. “She continued working to make EnergiFusion fall apart from the inside. Crystal Capriotti broke into EnergiFusion’s security system. She got into the heart of the company. She stole private information and tried to post it on the dark web, for dangerous groups who would use it for their own gain. But her attempts were foiled by the EnergiFusion’s security team.”

I remember that as well—the panic, the shock. It felt like someone had broken into our home.

“She covered her tracks to make it look like someone else was behind everything,” Daisy says. “But she made the mess. With no regard for anyone.”

The courtroom is completely silent now.

“On the outside, Crystal Capriotti mourned her missing husband. But all the while she was doing her best to break EnergiFusion apart,” Daisy says. “She tried to stir up problems between the other founders—Theo, Rhys, and Austin. She also met with two board members—Gil Collins and Wade Williams—behind their backs. She told them lies. Said she was being pushed out. And they believed her.”

“Just think about it,” Daisy says, and her voice rises a little. “Crystal tried to turn friends into enemies. She made people who cared about each other doubt everything. And, as the forensic accountant testified, that’s after she’d made off with more than a billion dollars of the company’s money. That’s not just someone trying to win. That’s someone who wants to ruin those she’d decided were her enemies. But it didn’t work. At least not in the way she wanted. The walls were closing in.”

I look over at Rhys. He seems calm, but then I notice his hands. They’re shaking. He’s holding it together, but barely. Austin doesn’t look much better.

“Crystal, with the help of Kerrie Bailey, a renowned hacker, created fake voicemails and emails that appeared to have come from Justin,” Daisy says. “She used them to create confusion, to sow distrust among the founders and their supporters, and she used them to cover the fact that Justin was already dead.”

No one moves. No one speaks.

“We’ve seen over and over how far Crystal Capriotti was willing to go. But now, we’ve come to the worst part of all and the reason Crystal is on trial today.”

“Justin also trusted Crystal,” Daisy says, her voice soft. “And she betrayed him in the worst way possible. Justin’s death wasn’t some accident. It was the final piece of Crystal’s plan. She wanted power so badly, she killed the man she’d once said she loved. With flowers from their own garden.”

I close my eyes. This is hard to listen to. We were all so blind.

Daisy returns to the front of the courtroom. Her hand hovers over a group of photos—green leaves, bright flowers.

“This is an oleander bush,” Daisy says. “Justin Capriotti had contacted a divorce attorney. He suspected—or maybe he knew—that Crystal had stolen from the company, and he wanted out of their marriage. He wanted to get away from the lies. Yet even then, he protected her. He didn’t out her to his friends and co-founders. But what did she do? She used poison from this plant in her own backyard to kill him.”

A chill runs through me. I picture Crystal picking the leaves, letting the milky sap drip into his green yuck of a smoothie, something she gave to him every day.

“She tainted the smoothies she made for him, which over time made his behavior more and more erratic. Yet he still figured out what she’d done and asked her to return the money. But that was not part of Crystal’s plan. She wanted EnergiFusion to suffer. She wanted Justin to suffer. And she finally dosed him with enough oleandrin to kill him. The poison caused swelling and bleeding around Justin’s heart,” Chow says. “It hurt. And it was done on purpose.”

No one moves. The only sound is Gina’s soft crying. I can’t imagine what Justin went through—the pain, the betrayal of someone he once loved—and he kept all of it to himself.

“Crystal Capriotti planned all of this,” she says. “Every day, she slipped a drop or two of oleander sap into Justin’s smoothie—just enough to make him cranky, irritable, and forgetful. While he unraveled, she made a billion dollars of the company’s money vanish. And when Justin confronted her and demanded she return it, she took things a step further. She gave him a lethal dose of oleandrin, stashed his body in a freezer, and figured she could pin the theft on him, knowing he’d never be able to defend himself. Then she tried to take over the company, and when that didn’t work, she decided to destroy it. She showed reckless disregard for EnergiFusion and its employees, including those who were part of her personal life. She hurt everyone around her. She killed a man she was supposed to love. All for greed. All for control.”

“Members of the jury,” Daisy says, looking at each person in turn. “Crystal created a web of lies. She even pretended her house had been broken into. But it was just a trick to make everyone look the other way and give her more freedom.”

I shake my head. We were so worried about her, and it was a scam.

“Then she went into hiding. She ran, left the country. She hid behind other borders, thinking the law wouldn’t catch up with her.”

Daisy displays another photo. “Justin Capriotti’s body was found in a storage unit. In a freezer. Crystal told the police by video call that Justin had rented it, and she’d never been there or seen it.” She sighs. “Yet her fingerprints were found on the freezer and throughout the unit where the body was hidden. How can you leave fingerprints on something you didn’t know about and never saw?”

Mackenzie’s hand laces with mine for support.

“Crystal Capriotti is not here today,” Daisy concludes. “She ran away, eventually to Romania to escape this trial and everything she’s done. But that won’t be for long. An Interpol red notice has gone out. Police all over the world are looking for her.”

“Why would an innocent person do all of this?” she asks. “Crystal Capriotti knows she’s guilty. She knows the harm she’s caused. She knows that if she returns to this country, she’ll be arrested right away.”

“Her actions speak louder than anything else,” Daisy says. “Crystal Capriotti has shown us the truth. She has lied for years, but through the evidence and her actions, she’s admitted her guilt.”

Then Daisy stops, preparing for the big finish.

“Justice can’t be stopped just because someone refuses to face it,” she says. “It rises above lies and tricks. It speaks for the people who can’t speak anymore. Thank you for doing your work, for making this important decision, as the jurors assigned to this case. Thank you for carrying out the duties of justice.”

Daisy sits down, and I look at the jury one more time. Twelve strangers now holding something that matters so much. For Justin. For all that’s been lost. I can only hope they see the truth.

After a moment, Judge Baron Childs tells us we’re dismissed for lunch.