Supreme Justice (18 page)

“Dana, I don’t know who killed John. I can only guess. The only thing I know for certain is that it wasn’t me.”

“
Exposed
is going to put as much pressure as we can on the Supreme Court so it will send your case back for a new trial and give you a chance to prove that.”

“If they don’t, I want to die as soon as possible.”

“Don’t give up hope.”

The determination that had suffused Sarah’s features faded away, and she looked tired.

“I don’t have any hope, Dana. All I have are days that stretch on and on and are always the same. Do you have any idea what it’s like to sit in a small cell all day with nothing to keep you occupied but your thoughts? I had a life. I’ve stood on mountaintops that pierced the clouds. I’ve skydived through space, floating like an eagle. Now I see the sky once a day for a half hour. Now all I have is the strong possibility that I will die for something I did not do.”

During the return trip to Portland, Dana couldn’t stop thinking about Sarah Woodruff. Everything about her was impressive: her self-possession in the face of so much adversity, the way she’d survived her childhood and made something of herself when it would have been so easy to give up, and the way she’d confronted Dana when most people would have tried to curry favor. Dana knew the danger in drawing conclusions about guilt or innocence. She had not been in Sarah’s condo on the night Finley was murdered, but she couldn’t help but feel that had she been, she would have seen Finley leave the condo alive.

Whether Sarah was guilty or innocent, Dana found it hard to believe that a jury would convict if it was in possession of all of the facts. There would have to be a reasonable doubt in the mind of a fair juror who learned about the
China Sea
and the drug dealers who were found murdered in the forest. She hoped that
Exposed
could raise a big enough stink to sway public opinion, and she prayed that her investigation would help take Sarah Woodruff off death row.

Dana could not believe that Monte Pike was the chief criminal deputy in the district attorney’s office of a major metropolitan city. He looked more like a junior-high student than a law-school graduate; none of his clothes matched, and his hair was going in all sorts of directions, like the panicky participants in the running of the bulls. If Pike told her that he was blind and had dressed without help, Dana would have accepted the explanation. Dana also knew that the way Pike looked was deceiving. Mary Garrett had told her about the attorney’s Harvard degree and his reputation as a brilliant, fair, but hard-nosed adversary.

“Thanks for seeing me, Mr. Pike.”

“Hey, it’s not often I get to meet a celebrity. Nice work on Farrington. It takes guts to go up against the president.”

“I didn’t have much choice.”

“Still, most people would have crawled in a hole and shoveled dirt over themselves in your situation. So, what can I do for you?”

“As I told your secretary, I do some reporting for
Exposed
now, and the
Woodruff
case is my current assignment.”

Pike smiled. “I’m not surprised. It’s got conspiracies and CIA assassins, not to mention Mexican drug lords and ghost ships. And, like your paper’s other favorite subjects—the Abominable Snowman, ETs, and the Loch Ness monster—Woodruff’s defense is a complete work of fiction.”

“You’re saying that the
China Sea
, those five dead men, and the hashish never existed?”

Pike laughed. “The ship and the dead men are probably real. As to the hashish . . .” Pike shrugged. “We’ll never know for sure. No, it’s the defense that’s a work of fiction. Sarah Woodruff shot John Finley to death and dumped him in the park. Ninjas and Mexican hit men had nothing to do with it. That’s all part of Mary Garrett’s cleverly constructed smoke screen.”

“You sound like you’re pretty sure of yourself.”

“And you’re probably thinking that I’m one of these cocksure prosecutors who decides who the bad guy is, then picks and chooses the evidence, discarding anything that doesn’t fit his theory, but I’m not. Mary and I had this talk the first time she told me what Oswald had seen. I took a tough stand with her, but I double-checked every bit of evidence in the case as soon as she left my office.

“I take my position very seriously. I never, ever want to convict an innocent person. I just don’t think that Sarah Woodruff fits into that category. And if you want to know why, read my closing statement at her trial. I never try to win by being the more theatrical attorney. I teach, Miss Cutler. My trials are seminars about a particular incident, in which I explain to the jury why they can convict with a clear conscience. Believe me, if you uncover evidence that changes my mind about Woodruff’s guilt, I’ll be in the judge’s chambers that day asking for a stay of execution.”

Dana had seen many people make self-serving statements, but she could see that Pike was sincere.

“I did read your closing argument. In fact, I read the transcript of Miss Woodruff’s trial before I flew here. But I came to a different conclusion about the evidence you excluded. I think the jury was the proper body to decide its relevance. This whole business with the
China Sea
smells like a rogue operation, and people who conduct that kind of business would not hesitate to kill John Finley if they thought he was a threat.”

“I guess we have to agree to disagree. Besides, I didn’t invoke the state-secrets privilege, even if I agreed with its use. The feds did that.”

Dana saw she wasn’t going to get any more out of Pike, so she changed the subject.

“I understand that Max Dietz, the prosecutor who brought Miss Woodruff to trial the first time, has vanished.”

Pike stopped smiling. “He has.”

“Is there any new information about what happened to him?”

“His car was recovered from the airport, but it didn’t yield any clues that told us what happened to him. Some people think he hopped a plane for parts unknown because he was depressed, but I don’t buy that. None of his bank accounts were touched, and there’s been no action on his credit cards, so what is he living on?”

“What about the quarter of a million dollars Finley was supposed to have had?”

“Yeah, I’ve heard that rumor. The problem is that no one has ever seen that money. I doubt that it ever existed. And if it did exist, the kidnappers or the people who rescued Finley have it, not Max Dietz.”

“Where was Dietz last seen?

“In his office. He asked his secretary for a handful of subpoenas. She brought them to him. A little later, he left. His secretary said that he seemed excited.”

“Do you know why he wanted the subpoenas?”

“No.”

“Were there any clues to Dietz’s disappearance in his house or office?”

“None we figured out.”

“What happened to his belongings?”

“They’re stored in a warehouse where we keep evidence in open cases.”

“Any chance I could see them?”

“Why, do you think they have anything to do with Woodruff?”

“I’m just curious.”

“You know he was off the case by then.”

“That’s what I understood.”

“So it’s not likely his disappearance has anything to do with your story.”

“I guess not.” Dana stood up. “Thanks for seeing me.”

“My pleasure. And I wasn’t kidding. If you come up with anything that clears Woodruff, let me know. Sending someone to death row is an awesome responsibility. I’d have a hard time living with myself if I were responsible for an innocent person’s execution.”

As soon as Dana walked out of the Multnomah County Courthouse, she checked the to-do list she’d written on the back page of her notebook. She had talked to everyone she wanted to question, and only one task remained.

Dana was scheduled to take a red-eye out of Portland International, but she had several hours before she had to be at the airport. Dana packed and checked out. Then she talked to the concierge. He told her that it would take forty-five minutes to drive to Shelby. She set her GPS for the address of the warehouse and headed out Highway 30 toward Astoria. The highway ran along the Columbia River and gave Dana a continuous view of the green and tan bluffs of Washington State on the far bank.

During the drive, Dana reviewed everything she’d learned during her stay in Oregon. By the time she pulled into the warehouse parking lot, she had concluded that the only new information she’d picked up concerned Max Dietz’s disappearance and the deaths of Jerry Swanson and Tom Oswald. The disappearance and the deaths were suspicious, but no facts connected them to the
China Sea
. More important, nothing she’d learned showed a connection between Justice Price and the
China Sea
.

The sun was starting to set, and Dana shivered when she got out of her car. No ship was moored at the pier, but Dana walked to the water’s edge anyway and tried to imagine what the scene was like on the night of the murders.

The discomfort caused by the wind made Dana cut short her reverie, and she walked back toward the warehouse. It looked deserted, but she circled it anyway. On the side opposite the spot where she had parked her car, she found a door with a heavy padlock.

Dana decided that there was nothing more she could accomplish, so she headed back to her car. As she turned the corner, she discovered a black SUV parked sideways in the lot and a large man leaning against her rental. After her escape from the basement where she’d been held captive, Dana never went anywhere without a weapon. The Beretta that nestled in a holster in the small of her back brought her great comfort. She slipped it out before stopping far enough from the man so she could shoot him if he became a threat.

“It gets cold out here,” the man said. Dana thought she heard a trace of a Scandinavian accent.

“Why are you leaning on my car?” she asked.

The man smiled. “I heard you were tough.”

“Look, jerkoff, I don’t have time for your routine. You may think you’re cool, but I just find you annoying. If you know anything about me, you know that I have no problem killing if I feel threatened. So tell me what this is all about, or fuck off.”

The man straightened up. All traces of amusement disappeared from his features, and his stare was as cold and cruel as Dana’s.

“Tell Patrick Gorman that there is no story here.”

Dana didn’t respond.

“Your boyfriend, Jake Teeny, is in Sierra Leone. That’s a dangerous place.”

Dana cocked the gun. “Watch your mouth.”

“That was simply an observation. And here’s another one. It would be difficult for
Exposed
to print a story about the
China Sea
if its building was vaporized.”

“Who are you?”

The man smiled. Then he turned without answering Dana’s question and got into the SUV. Dana let him. As soon as he was out of sight, she leaned against her car. The mention of Jake Teeny had shaken her. Dana had lost all fear of death while she was a captive. That had enabled her to do anything, regardless of the risk. Falling in love had changed her. She still had no fear where her personal safety was concerned, but the idea that Jake might be hurt because of something she did filled her with dread and made her vulnerable, something she hated.

Dana started the car and drove onto the highway. It was ironic. The man had threatened her so she would kill the story about the
China Sea
, but his threats had made her realize that someone still thought that the incident could turn into a very big story. The question Dana had to answer was how much she was willing to risk to uncover it.

“Pat, it’s Dana.”

“Where are you?” Gorman asked.

“I’m on my way to the airport in Portland to catch my flight back to D.C.”

“Do you by any chance have the scoop of the century packed in with your sexy lingerie?” the editor asked.

“I’m not carrying either of those items, you pervert.”

“Do you have
anything
for me?”

“What I’m working on is too big to discuss without proof, and I wasn’t able to get any hard evidence.”

“We don’ need no steenking evidence to print our stories,” Gorman said in an atrocious Mexican accent.

Dana laughed.

“If you don’t have a story for me, why are you calling?”

“You’ve got contacts with deep knowledge about the intelligence community, right?”

“Why do you ask?” Gorman said with all traces of humor gone.

“I was threatened by someone while I was conducting my investigation, and I want to know how seriously I should take the threat.”

“What’s the intelligence agency?”

“I’m guessing CIA, but it may be Homeland Security.”

“Let me make a call. I’ll get back to you.”

“Thanks, Pat. If this wasn’t important, I wouldn’t ask.”

“I know, Dana. That’s the reason I’m willing to burn a favor for you.”

2012

Ginny assumed that her workload would lessen now that she was part of the team preparing Audrey Stewart for her congressional hearing, but she soon learned that this was a false assumption. She staggered through her front door at ten o’clock to the sound of an urgent conversation coming from her living room. One of the speakers was a woman, and the voice sounded familiar. While Ginny was propping her attaché case against the wall in the entryway, the name “Millard Price” drifted toward her from the other room. She strained to hear the conversation as she took off her coat. She could detect the urgency in Brad’s voice, but not what he was saying. Then she heard the woman say, “You’ve got to tell Justice Moss that this is way too dangerous for you to stay involved.”

“What’s too dangerous?” Ginny asked as she walked into the living room and saw Dana Cutler with Brad.

They looked like startled deer caught in the headlights of a Mack truck.

“What’s up?” Ginny asked suspiciously when neither Brad nor Dana answered her question.

“I didn’t hear you come in,” Brad said.

“Maybe that’s a good thing,” Ginny answered. “What are you two discussing?”

“Business, honey,” Brad answered, “and it’s confidential.”

“Not if you’re doing something dangerous. I live here, too. And if it concerns Millard Price, I may be able to help. He was a partner at Rankin Lusk before he went on the Court.”

“Please forget anything you may have heard,” Brad begged her.

Ginny stared daggers at her fiancé. “This has something to do with the attack on Justice Moss, doesn’t it?”

“Why would you think that?” Brad asked with a nervous laugh.

“Because,
dear
, I am not stupid. I distinctly heard your co-conspirator tell you that you should tell your boss that whatever you are doing is dangerous, and the attack on Justice Moss is the only dangerous thing that’s happened at the Court since you started working there.”

“We are working on something that involves the Court, and it’s something Brad can’t discuss,” Dana said. “And I just learned something that made it clear that amateurs should not be involved.”

“Is this something serious enough to require police involvement?” Ginny asked.

Dana nodded. Ginny looked frightened. “You follow her advice, Brad.”

Brad looked like he wanted to say something, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

“I mean it,” Ginny said. “You were almost killed in the garage. I love you, and I can’t stand the thought that your life might be at risk.”

Brad’s shoulders sagged and he sighed. “All right. You win. I’ll tell Justice Moss that she should talk to Keith Evans.”

“You’re doing the right thing,” Dana assured Brad.

Ginny looked relieved, and Dana looked at her watch.

“It’s late,” Dana said. “I should be going.” She stood up. “It was good seeing you again, Ginny. When Jake gets back, we should get together.”

“I’d like that. Maybe we could meet for lunch before that.”

“You’re on. I’ll call you.”

Brad followed Dana into the entryway and locked the door behind her.

“Are you going to tell me what you’re involved in?” Ginny asked when they were alone.

“I really can’t. It does involve Court business, and I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone but Dana.”

“So you can tell her, but you can’t tell the woman you’re going to spend your life with?”

“It’s not like that. Dana is being paid to investigate a . . . a problem. This was a business conversation between a client and her employer.”

“You’re paying her?”

“I can’t answer that, and please drop this, OK? How would you feel if I asked you to reveal confidential communications between you and a client or demanded that you tell me what you and a partner discussed in a business meeting?”

Ginny could see that Brad was upset, and she knew he was right. She took his hands in hers and looked into his eyes.

“I’m worried because I love you so much, and I’d die if anything happened to you.”

Brad took her in his arms. If he had to choose between a billion dollars and hugging Ginny, he knew where his heart would lead him.

In his dream, Brad was on the deck of the
China Sea
, and the ship had been converted into a strip club. Brad was sitting at a table covered with a white tablecloth and lit by a candle, watching naked, busty women with large derrieres cavort on a raised stage. Millard Price was sitting next to him, and he was wearing a sombrero and a serape. A near-naked woman perched on Price’s lap. The judge was drunk, and he laughed as he stuffed hundred-dollar bills into her G-string. Then the woman turned toward Brad and thrust her breasts in his face.

“Do you want a private dance?” she asked, seconds before Brad shot up in bed and stared into the darkness.

“What’s wrong?” Ginny mumbled.

“Nothing,” he said, but the tension in his voice told her otherwise. “I’ve got to make a call.”

“It’s three in the morning,” Ginny said, fully awake now.

“I know.”

Brad grabbed his cell phone and left the bedroom. Ginny was pissed off by the secrecy. She debated staying in bed but decided that she needed to know what Brad was involved in, so she crept to the bedroom door and opened it a crack.

“I know it’s late, Dana, but this can’t wait,” Brad whispered in the mistaken belief that Ginny could not hear him. “The shell corporation that was used to purchase the
China Sea
was named TA Enterprises. Remember Mary Garrett told you that Sarah Woodruff asked John Finley what TA meant and he joked that it meant tits and ass? Well, that’s not it. You read Price’s bio, right? He went to Dartmouth with Masterson, and they were the stars of the championship football team. Do you remember their nickname? They were the Two Amigos! TA.

“When the incident on the
China Sea
took place, Dennis Masterson was the head of the CIA, and Millard Price was a senior partner at Rankin Lusk and one of Masterson’s closest friends. Smuggling hashish was an illegal operation that the CIA wouldn’t be able to get the Congress to sanction, so Masterson hired Finley, an independent contractor, to be the front man, and he also went outside the Agency and asked his best friend, Millard Price, to set up the shell company that was used to buy the ship and fund the operation. The company was called TA Enterprises because one ‘amigo’ asked the other ‘amigo’ to set it up. Proving that won’t be easy, but it does give us something to look into.”

Dana said something.

“OK, it gives Keith Evans something to look into, but if he can show Price set up the company, he’ll have a connection between Price and the
China Sea
, and we’ll know for certain why Price wants to kill the cert petition in
Woodruff
.”

Ginny listened until it was clear that the phone call was over. She crept back into bed and pulled the covers over her head. Now she knew why Brad and Dana were being secretive. They suspected that a sitting Supreme Court justice was involved in drug smuggling. It wasn’t much of a stretch for Ginny to conclude that Brad and Dana also suspected that Millard Price had something to do with the attack on Justice Moss.

Ginny decided that something must have happened recently that made Dana believe that Brad should back off. People who would try to kill a Supreme Court justice would think nothing of killing a lowly clerk, so Dana’s advice was sound. But Brad seemed convinced that they could show Price was involved with the murder attempt if they could prove he set up this TA Enterprises company. Ginny had an idea how that could be accomplished, and she didn’t think there would be any risk to her or Brad.