The Only Good Lawyer - Jeremiah Healy

The Only Good Lawyer
A
John Francis Cuddy Mystery

Jeremiah Healy
1998

In memory
of
Dario J Azzone and Howard E Greene

Prologue

WOODROW WILSON GANT just loved the way his BMW 530i
held the road.

And doing fifty on a dry, snaky pavement at night was
better than hitting eighty on some straightaway Interstate in broad
daylight. He especially enjoyed this little stretch as it wound
through probably the longest section of tree-lined valley in the
whole city of Boston. Woodrow'd say to his friends, black or white,
"Hey, man, you close your fists on the wheel—that nice leather
wrap like they put around a good tennis racket—and you can feel the
power, surging from the engine right into your body."

Feel the power. That was what Woodrow remembered
after graduating law school and starting with the district attorney's
office. No more living at home with his mother and brother, and the
first African—American to prosecute a homicide case in that
suburban county's old-timey courthouse. But as a city boy at
heart—funny, Woodrow didn't mind using "boy" in that
context—he missed Boston. So, when the time came to move on from
the D.A., Woodrow joined Mr. Neely's fine little downtown firm in its
fine little office building close by the waterfront. And he felt the
power again.

Different kind of power, though, because it was a
different kind of practice. He'd had his fill of criminals and cops,
sharing office space with an asshole and his bed with a wife didn't
understand his needs. Now Woodrow Wilson Gant was single again and a
divorce lawyer—what the bar association liked to call a "domestic
relations attorney". And the power was the weight of money, not
the threat of prison. Enough money for him to live in a fancy condo
and wear fancy clothes, buy a fancy car and enjoy fancy ladies.

Just then the lady of the moment in the passenger
bucket next to him snorted. Or snored, Woodrow wasn't exactly sure
which. The big blond hair was all you could really see, what with the
shades still on so nobody'd recognize her. One reason they'd gone
back to that Vietnamese place Deborah first took him to. You're an
assistant D.A. coordinating gang prosecutions, you realize pretty
soon that witnesses of Color—A have a hell of a time identifying
defendants of Color-B. Used to be a real problem for Woodrow back in
the courtroom. Now he could use it to his advantage.

The woman made the noise again, head lolling on the
whip-lash protector, hand banging against his cellular phone in the
console between them. Drunk as a skunk, and on chardonnay, yet.
Woodrow knew it was the alcohol content and not the color of the
liquid that mattered, but you still had to wonder why white women
drink white wine if they can't hold the stuff.

The BMW entered one of the few straight portions of
the road. Even with so many curves, though, it was the shortest
distance between the restaurant and Woodrow's condo. All things
considered, he'd rather take his pleasure at her place—so he could
just leave when they were finished? But Woodrow understood better
than most why her situation at home made that more than a bit dicey.

So, enjoy the ride in your fancy car before enjoying
the ride in your fancy bed.

Woodrow had cracked the front windows a few inches
because the lady said she was feeling a little woozy leaving the
restaurant, and he didn't want her getting sick on the leather
upholstery he'd just had cleaned at the car wash that day. Woodrow
kind of liked the crisp October air flowing by his cheeks—not to
mention that nice hum of the Beemer's tires over the macadam—only
the breeze seemed to put the woman to sleep more than sober her up.

Probably best not to shoot for a doubleheader
tonight. Just once over the moon and take her downstairs afterward,
stick her ass in a cab. At least a thirty-dollar fare for the trip
back to the lady's place, but that'd be better than having to drive
her there yourself, listen to the complaining once her wine wore off.

And besides, it's only money, and once "Ms.
Barber" gets back to you, Woodrow Wilson Gant, Esquire, will be
keeping a lot more—

The sharp bang of the blowout made him jump, the
shoulder strap of his seat belt yanking his torso short like a
parachute harness. Through the open driver's window, Woodrow's left
ear registered what seemed a crumping echo of his tire's sound coming
off the hillside across the road. Wrestling the steering wheel
against the skid, he was able to bring the BMW to a shuddering,
humping stop against the grass sloping down at the right of the
pavement.

Woodrow drew in a breath, realized he needed a couple
more. Taking his hands off the wheel, he could see them shaking in
silhouette against the dull glow from the dashboard gauges. Woodrow
glanced past the woman and out her window.

Thanks be to God you weren't doing sixty. Even this
fine machine would've sent your ass into the gully down there.
Woodrow nudged the woman's left arm. "Hey?" He nudged her
again. "Hey, man, you awake?"

Just a ragged snore.

Under his breath, Woodrow said, "You got to
wonder, is a little sexual healing worth all this?"

Then, remembering how her body accommodated him, he
decided it was.

Woodrow opened the driver's side door, the BMW's
courtesy lights wrecking his night vision. As he stepped onto the
pavement, he could feel the twinge from his bad left knee and a
breeze blowing across his face from the front of the car. Except for
the courtesy and running lights, everything was midnight dark.
Raising his head and blinking, Woodrow could make out stars and a
little sliver of moon, like somebody had clipped a toenail and hung
it up in the sky. Reflexively, he reached back into the Beemer and
activated the emergency flashers, then tried to remember if he'd ever
seen any other cars, all the times he'd driven this road at night.

No, too desolate. People'd be afraid of breaking down
and getting stranded.

Slamming the driver's side door, Woodrow walked back
to his left rear tire. The pulsating glow from the flank lights was
enough to see the bad news. Flat as a pancake, must have gone over
one motherfucking piece of rubber-tearing shit. Across the dark road,
he heard a rustling sound, some kind of creature working its way down
the hillside through the brush. Woodrow looked to the left, blinking
some more, but couldn't see anything beyond thirty feet from his
lighted car. Probably just a raccoon. People wouldn't think you'd
have raccoons in a city like Boston, but with the Charles River and
other water running through it, they could survive, even thrive. In
fact, Woodrow knew personally of a lady woke up during the night with
a raccoon on her fire escape, those demon-red eyes staring in through
the bedroom window, scaring the hell out of her.

The memory of that lady's experience made Woodrow
laugh, and that calmed his mind some. Momma always counseled her sons
to look on the bright side of things. Well, it wasn't a front tire,
so he hadn't pivoted and maybe rolled into a vehicular homicide. And
Woodrow knew the spare in the trunk was solid because he'd had the
dealer check it the last time they'd rotated the tires.

Be good not to have anybody else see you with this
woman, but you sure as shit are not about to get down on your hands
and knees in this fancy suit to change a flat. And besides, what's a
guy in a towtruck gonna know about who she is? Nada, right?

So, pick up your cell phone, and call the Triple-A.

The rustling sound from across the road was getting
louder, which meant the raccoon or whatever was getting closer.
Woodrow suddenly remembered another story, one he'd read in the
newspaper. About how a lot of raccoons were carrying rabies.

Maybe it was time to get back in the Beemer, make
your call from the safety of a strong metal box.

Woodrow turned to step toward the driver's side door.
Then the breeze shifted from the front of the car to the rear, and he
got his first whiff of gasoline.

Mother-fuck-er.

Forgetting about raccoons and rabies, Woodrow moved
quickly around to the back bumper, the smell growing stronger. He
bent down, his bad knee protesting, and looked through the strobing
of his hazard lights. Something was dribbling out from near the right
wheel.

Woodrow touched a finger to the pool of liquid on the
ground, but his nose confirmed what it was before he'd brought the
finger halfway to his face.

Which made no sense, none whatsoever. How the fuck do
you get a leak in your gas tank from a flat tire? Even if whatever it
was caused the puncture kicked up from the road, how could it be
going fast enough to penetrate—

The sound of brush parting and crunching footsteps
across the road made Woodrow stand up abruptly, the knee now
screaming at him for it. His eyes must be going, too, because he
surely couldn't understand what they were telling him. A human
figure, dressed in a bulky parka, was clumping toward Woodrow and his
fine machine. Both hands were in the pockets of the coat, the hood up
and tugged low enough that it shielded the face. But there was
something familiar, too. About the walk or . . . something.

"Car trouble?" said the figure, still
approaching.

The voice placed the walk for Woodrow, but that
didn't help him understand things any better. "What are you
doing out here?"

For an answer, the figure stopped about ten feet
away, a hand sliding from one of the pockets. The hand had a shiny
leather glove on it, but in his car's flank lights, Woodrow caught a
different kind of reflection.

The glint of blued metal.

"Hey, man?"

"You betrayed me, Woodrow."

"Wait, wait. We can—"

The first shot struck just above the belt, ratcheting
Woodrow's rear end up in the air as it brought his shoulders folding
downward. Both of Woodrow's hands clasped his stomach, the blood
already running freely between the fingers and onto his pants.

Hunched, he looked up at the figure, some pain
beginning to filter through the shock of the impact. "No,
please——"

The second bullet hit Woodrow high on the left
shoulder, turning him, almost spinning him, away from the hooded
figure. Woodrow tried to make his legs work-like from the football
drills back in high school? Drive and lift and stride, but between
the bad knee and the wounds, all he could manage was a lurching
shuffle toward the grass at the right-hand side of the road.

The third bullet punched Woodrow squarely in the
back, shattering a vertebra and ripping through his heart. He dropped
like a rag doll, face first and turned toward the BMW, the upper half
of his body in the grass, the lower half still on the pavement.

A last thought crossed his brain. "My fancy car
. . . What's gonna happen to . . . ?"

The hooded figure moved quickly to the fallen man,
squatting down to watch the light of life fade from the eyes. Having
Woodrow Wilson Gant die here was consistent with the plan, but being
close enough to see that glazing effect in the pupils was also more .
. . satisfying as well.

Standing again, the hooded figure breathed three
times.

Deeply and slowly, in through the nose and out
through the mouth, to regain complete control of all body parts after
the adrenaline rush of taking another's life.

And, with luck, not even the last for this night,
either.

The figure moved very steadily to the passenger side
of the BMW. It was important that the woman not have heard the brief
exchange with Gant, not be able to remember a voice or even a speech
pattern.

If she did, the plan would have to be changed, and
she would have to be killed, too.

But no, no worry of that. The woman was dead drunk,
as she'd appeared when the vehic1e's courtesy lights had come on a
few minutes before, as she'd appeared those other times when—

The woman began to stir, though her eyes remained
closed. The hooded figure hesitated only a moment, then decided to
follow through on the original plan, just without using the
car door.

After redundantly wiping the outside of the revolver
against the parka's material, the figure slipped the weapon through
the partially open side window, allowing the gun to drop so that it
landed in the woman's lap.

At which point the hooded figure ducked down below
window level and scuttled, crablike, to the rear of the BMW. Moving
diagonally away from the woman in the passenger's seat, the figure
recrossed the road and began climbing back up the hillside.

To retrieve the rifle used
to shoot out the tire and return to the car hidden over the ridge.

* * *

Somewhere in the dream, the cute male flight
attendant stumbled, dropping an anchor right into her lap.

An anchor. Just what she needed, after all the bumps
and banging noises on this airplane already. Her first real vacation
in years, all by herself to the Caribbean without any cares, any
responsibilities. But despite paying for a first-class ticket, the
flight was bumpy and the engines were making all these banging noises
and then the attendant has to drop . . .
 
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