The Attorney (22 page)

"Fine," says Ryan. "She carried drugs. Let's assume it was for him.

There's still no evidence he was ever involved with Suade. Or that he even knew about her." Ryan has just made a critical mistake. I can read it in Peltro's face. If Ontaveroz exists. If he and Jessica dealt drugs, it's a short skip to the news articles about the Mexican's violent past.

If he was looking for Jessica, he might find Suade.

"Are you saying, Mr. Ryan, that there's no evidence Suade helped Jessica Hale disappear?" says the judge.

"We don't know that. Your Honor." Ryan now sees the problem he's created for himself, a little too late. He starts to backpedal.

If Suade didn't help Jessica disappear, where's Jonah's motive for murder?

"Then what are all these accusations regarding Mr. Hale doing in Suade's press release?" says the judge. "Are you saying Suade didn't have a dog in this fight?"

"No. Obviously she had some connection," says Ryan.

"They can't have it both ways, Your Honor," I cut in on him.

"If Jessica had a history of drugs, and she did, we must be allowed to explore that history." The judge is now nodding in agreement.

"They're looking to take a field trip into the irrelevant," says Ryan.

"Where's the evidence?"

"So what do you want?" Peltro's looking at me. Ignoring Ryan.

"An opportunity to identify the witnesses we need as the trial progresses," I tell him.

"Your Honor!" Ryan's voice rises a complete octave. "What they want is to see our case, then dream up a defense that fits." Sounds fair to me, but I don't say this to Peltro.

"All we're asking is a little latitude, Your Honor." Peltro looks at me, then at Ryan. He thinks for a moment.

"How do you intend to deal with this in your opening?" he asks me.

"You mean Ontaveroz?"

"Yes"

"I'd like to mention him." I'd like to do more than that, put some clothes on him, show his picture, trot him out in front of the jury. Who do you want to convict: behind door number one, my client, grandpa in suspenders and a cardigan, or door number two, king of a major drug cartel?

"You'd like to mention him by name?"

"I would, Your Honor."

"How can he do that ... ?" Ryan sputters.

"I don't think so," says the judge. "What do we do if you can't produce evidence during the trial? How do we erase the thought from the jury's mind?" he says.

In actuality, this would do more damage to us than the prosecution.

It's a risk mentioning Ontaveroz in my opening statement unless I can close with him in my argument. Jurors have a tendency to remember such failures, and to punish for them.

"I don't think I can allow you to mention the man unless there's some evidentiary nexus," says Peltro. "Something linking him in some way to the victim."

"You expect me to put him at the scene?"

"That would be fair," says Ryan. Now he's smiling.

"Do I have to put the gun in his hand, too?" I'm looking over at the prosecutor, who makes a gesture with his hands, like suit yourself.

"I don't know that I'd require that much," says Peltro, "but some reasonable basis to believe this man Ontaveroz was pursuing Jessica Hale. Perhaps some evidence that he knew or at least could be aware that Suade might have information. Obviously, the better your evidence, the more persuasive it'll be to the jury," he says. "But I won't be letting you argue Ontaveroz at close unless you have some basis in the evidence.

Do we understand each other?"

"What about the witness list?" I ask him.

"I'll give you some latitude. Your final witness list will be due when you open your case in chief for the defense, but only in this one area,"

he says.

"Your Honor!" Ryan is now sensing his punishment for not having listened to the judge earlier.

"Your other witnesses. You gotta disclose those under the rules," he says. "Do you understand?"

"I do, Your Honor." Its the best I'm likely to get.

"You can prepare the order. My clerk will provide the minutes by way of transcript. Any questions?" Ryan doesn't like it. "Your Honor, he should at least be required to give us some clue as to his witnesses. Is he gonna produce Ontaveroz?"

"Not unless I got my gun under my robes," says Peltro. "We're off the record." I'm packing up my briefcase, leaning toward Harry, trying to make sense of what we won and lost.

"Mr. Madriani." I turn to look up at the judge as he says my name.

"You owe me some doughnuts."

chapter seventeen.

"i haven't asked you a lot of Questions about what's going on," says Susan. "I know you're busy. But I also know there's something happening you're not telling me about." We're having coffee this morning, bagels and some fruit.

I have papers from work spread out in front of me on Susan's kitchen table, trying to avoid the questions I knew were coming.

"Earth to Paul," she says.

I'm forced to look up. "Yes?"

"I know you're busy."

"Sorry." I stack the papers, turn them over on the table facedown.

"You're always busy," she says.

"I know. When this is over, we'll have more time. I promise."

"Tell it to your daughter," says Susan.

"Is there something wrong?"

"Nothing, except for the fact that she's been living here now for almost a month and she doesn't know why. Neither do I."

"I'm sorry to impose."

"It's not an imposition," she says. "But there is something wrong, isn't there?" "Has Sarah asked?"

"Not in so many words. You come over. You sleep at the house a few nights a week. The rest of the time you disappear. We don't see you. The child is beginning to wonder where home is."

"I know. You've been great," I tell her.

"And I don't mind," she says. "I'd just like to know what's going on."

For a moment, I think she suspects I'm seeing someone else.

"It's just that I'm buried. Burning the candle at both ends."

"You've tried cases before. You've never been like this." I take a deep breath, sip some coffee, pick up a bagel and start to break it. Her hand comes across the table to stop me: no more distractions, eyes staring through me like two lasers.

I put the bagel back in the basket.

"The day I called you. Asked you to take Sarah."

"Yes."

"The night before, I was followed by some people in a car. I can't be sure who they were. But I have reason to believe that it would be better, at least for the time being, if Sarah stayed here."

"These people are dangerous?"

"I don't know, but I couldn't afford to take the chance, leaving Sarah in the house when I'm gone so much of the time."

"Are these the same people who trashed your office?"

"I don't know for sure. But there's a chance."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want you to worry." I have mentioned Ontaveroz to her once or twice, but as a vague theory of defense only. Now I give her the rest of the story.

She listens, looks at me across the table as I fill in the details.

"If they know where my law office is, they probably know where I live.

It's why I didn't want Sarah at the house." She looks off into the distance, an anxious expression on her face. "I understand." I can read her mind.

"I've been very careful about coming over here," I tell her. "I take a cab from the office to the sheriff's station downtown. I figure if they are tracking me, they're not likely to follow me in there, There's a detective. Not a friend exactly. But he came by the office that morning after the burglary. He lets me go out the back way.

Harry picks me up at a spot a couple of blocks away. Brings me over here. Picks me up the next morning, takes me to the office."

"You told me your car was in the shop."

"White lie," I tell her. "Lena's in the driveway at the house.

Hasn't been started in a week. Probably has a dead battery by now.

I'm gonna rent a car this afternoon--something they won't recognize--and keep it away from the office and the house."

"You think they're still following you?"

"I don't know. If so, they've gotten better, because I haven't seen them."

"You told your detective friend about this man, Ontaveroz?"

"The detective is no friend. He's the man who arrested Jonah.

But yes, I told him. Though I doubt it'll show up in any of their reports.

If it does, it'll be carefully couched. The cops don't want to be put on the stand having to admit they're investigating the man because he was following me, or because he's a suspect in the breakin at my office.

That might lend credence to our theory on Suade.

Unless I miss my bet, they think that's why I told them. Lawyer tricks.

Force it into their reports, then use it at trial."

"And of course, you're not that devious," she says.

"Honest. You think I would go to all this trouble coming over here? Let Lena languish in the driveway and take a cab?"

"Looking at your car, it's a possibility," she says. "But I know you're telling the truth, because you wouldn't do this to Sarah.

"You think Ontaveroz could actually have killed Suade?"

"It's certainly possible. More plausible than Jonah's having done it.

Ontaveroz has a violent past. He's killed before. If you believe the news articles and the federal agents I talked to at the restaurant."

"Any lead on them? The federal agents?" I shake my head. "Vanished. I've called Murphy. Pounded on him to find them. He's come up empty. Says they do that. Disappear for months. According to Murph, they're probably undercover down in Mexico someplace."

"While this man Ontaveroz is looking for Jonah's daughter," says Susan.

"And likely to find his granddaughter," I add.

"You don't think they'd hurt her, do you?"

"I don't think they care who gets in their way. It's why I've taken such precautions for Sarah," I tell her. "I haven't been sleeping all that well at night."

"And you haven't told Jonah?" she says.

"How can I? The old man's locked up, already going crazy. I can't make it worse. What he doesn't know ..." I tell her.

"Sooner or later, he's going to have to know your theory of defense.

You don't want him sitting at the table in the courtroom with his mouth hanging open when you casually mention the Mexican drug dealer who wants to kill his daughter."

"The court may solve that one for me," I tell her. "The judge may not let me get into it at all unless I can come up with witnesses or official records putting Jessica and Ontaveroz together." Susan stares down into her cup of coffee slowly cooling on the table. "One thing's for sure. You're not going back to your house," she says. "Not until this is over."

"I'm gonna run out of underwear pretty quick."

"You can go around in the buff," she says. "At least you'll be alive.

And besides, I like men who wear nothing underneath."

"Yeah, but you're kinky," I tell her.

She laughs. "You ever get the urge to just run away?" she says.

"Some desert island."

"All the time."

"Me, too. Lately it's been getting stronger," she says. "I've got a meeting Tuesday morning with the board of supervisors. Executive session." This means it's behind closed doors, away from the press and public.

"The papers haven't picked it up yet. The board's calling it a personnel matter," she tells me.

I sit silent, looking at her across the table. Short dark hair, fiery Latin eyes, a face like Isabella Rossellini's. Apart from her two daughters, the only thing Susan cares about in life is her job, and now that is in jeopardy.

"It doesn't have anything to do with the gun, Suade's pistol?" I ask.

She shakes her head vigorously. "Not directly," she says. "They're claiming there was an internal report containing evidence that some of my investigators were using improper tactics when questioning children.

That we deep-sixed the report to keep it away from defense attorneys in some cases." I look at her.

"There was no report," she says. "Ordinarily I'd have cover. The prosecutor's office wouldn't let them beat me up. But I think they know where the information on Suade's handgun came from."

"I didn't tell them."

"I know. Process of elimination," she says. "And I think Brower probably found out. He knows he's crossed me. The man is not stupid.

He knows it's do or die. He either gets me, or I get him."

"Can't you talk to him?"

"About what? When you have disloyalty in a small office, there's nothing to talk about. He knows that. There're only two ways for Mr. Brower to go. Either up or out."

"You think he's after your job?"

"I wouldn't put it past him."

"I'm sorry to have put you in this situation."

"You didn't," she says. "The die was cast a long time ago." When I look at her for an explanation she just shakes her head, gets up from the table, doesn't want to get into it, nothing to talk about.

"What are you going to do about Jonah's granddaughter?" she asks.

"What can I do? Keep trying to find her. I've got Murphy looking."

"Do you think he'll be able to get a lead?"

"Maybe through the two federal agents. They're looking for Jessica. They know she's in trouble with Ontaveroz. I'm hoping that'll lead to something. In the meantime, I've got a case to try.

Which leads me to another question," I tell her. "What do you know about Brad Davidson? The presiding judge."

"Former," she says. "Former PJ. He was removed on Friday afternoon."

This surprises me. Susan can tell by the look on my face as she turns back toward the table.

"You hadn't heard?" I shake my head.

"They'll announce it publicly on Monday," she says. "The judges voted behind closed doors, secret ballot, so they could all tell him how much they supported him. I'm told that, technically, he'll resign. He'll remain on the bench," she says. "The question is, for how long. He'll definitely draw opposition in the next election.

Somebody from the prosecutor's office, no doubt. You don't involve the county in a twenty-million-dollar lawsuit and escape un scathed," says Susan. She speaks like a woman about to find out.