Defensive Wounds (23 page)

“Wow. What happened?”

“The judge sent the jury out and yelled at all of us. Me more than her. I guess he didn't care for the ‘poor innocent client' comment. Thought it was prejudicial, with all that sarcasm dripping from my voice. But it was okay for her to practically accuse me of a felony for no reason whatsoever.”

“And you're normally so easygoing,” she teased. “You weren't at the Ritz-Carlton on Tuesday night, were you?”

“No, but I'd have been happy to hand that guy the two-by-four or whatever he used on her head.”

“A chair. Would you really?”

Don leaned against the counter and rubbed some of the shine off his forehead. “No, not really. Just don't expect me to shed a lot of tears over
that
grave. So what can I do for you? And it had better not be more DNA samples.”

“No, though it does involve Marie Corrigan. I need you to cast your mind back about three years. Sixteen-year-old white girl in Westlake, found bludgeoned in a schoolmate's house, a boy, same age.” She didn't bother with the names or the exact date or address or anything like that, because details like that tended to slip out of the mind almost as quickly as they enter. Only the story remains.

“Yeah … yeah, I remember. Little girl, head beat in. I didn't really do much with that one—had no DNA. Either she wasn't raped at all or the guy must have had a vasectomy.”

“A teenage boy would hardly have a vasectomy.”

Don snorted. “Some should. But it didn't do much for the prosecution's case, as I recall.”

“Where were the parents?”

“Whose, the boy's? Out of town, I think—no, out of the country. Someplace hoity-toity, like Paris or something. I had the impression they had money.”

“Who called the cops?”

No reaction. Don checked the colored lights on the Thermocycler and straightened a stack of printouts, then said, “No idea. I can't remember another single thing about the case. Just sitting on the stand while Marie Corrigan asked if DNA had been obtained from the possible semen. She phrased the question a little differently each time, but emphasized the word ‘possible' quite consistently. She was right, of course, with a weak acid phosphatase reaction and no sperm, it could have been heavy vaginal secretions and not semen at all. After about five times, the judge finally said, ‘I think the witness has testified there was no foreign DNA found.' ”

“Were you surprised at the verdict?”

“Verdict?”

“Not guilty.”

“Oh, yeah, I remember that now. You talk to the prosecutor?”

“Yeah, but he didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. He couldn't explain the verdict but didn't complain about it either. Usually they're a little bit bitter when they think someone got away with murder.”

“Especially that prosecutor.”

A spark of hope glimmered in Theresa's soul. She knew the guy, and no way would he have been swayed by Marie Corrigan's breasts. So if his heart
still
wasn't in it, maybe he thought William really was innocent.

Don went on. “She said he was drugged, not drunk. The defendant. I guess they found no alcohol and one tiny Rohypnol metabolite in his system.”

“In
his
blood? Not hers?”

“Yeah, but because Mommy and Daddy lawyered up so fast the sample wasn't drawn for nearly forty hours, so any alcohol and almost certainly any other metabolites would have cleared his system by then. But she made a big deal about it, got an expert to say that his symptoms—which we had only his word for—were consistent with a date-rape drug. He got off. With double jeopardy attached.”

“So he could never be tried again. How did the defendant look?”

Another blank expression. A witness's time on the stand is dominated by the prosecutor, the defense attorney, and sometimes the judge. In between those interactions, eye contact needed to be made with the members of the jury. Theresa often left a courtroom with no recollection of the defendant whatsoever.

Don said, “I don't remember. I'm afraid I was too distracted by Miss Corrigan's tight little skirt.”

“Don.”

He held up his hands to fend off her irritation. “Say what you like about her as a person—but she
was
hot.”

“So's pepper spray,” Theresa snapped, and went back to work.

Frank and Angela returned to the police station, sans any incriminating evidence against Dennis Britton, not that they'd really expected the city's best defense attorney to have a bloodstained passkey to the Ritz hanging out of his toolbox. But that didn't make Frank feel any better.

He had begun to write up his report when Angela appeared at her desk, which faced his, with Neil Kelly in tow. Kelly carried two file boxes, one stacked atop the other, both heavy, judging from the thump they made when he deposited them on the corner of Frank's desk.

“He followed me back,” Angela stated, apparently in her own defense.

“From the ladies' room?”

“Need some help, mate,” Neil said. “This is Bruce Raffel's career in Cleveland. His law firm courteously slaughtered a few forests to make us copies of at least the public-record stuff. We could get it ourselves from the clerk of courts, but they had an intern who needed something to do. I got the feeling they don't like that intern much. Or us. I think my hernia came back just moving this stuff from the car.”

Even with desperate effort, Frank couldn't think of a good excuse. “What are we looking for?”

“That's the fun part.” Neil stole a chair from behind the desk of some detective lucky enough to have gone home for the day. “We have no flippin' idea.”

“Terrific.”

They read in silence for a while, tales of murder and robbery and assault, each one banal and yet unique at the same time.

“This guy might have a reason to kill Raffel,” Angela said, her nose in a crisp manila file. “He got fifteen years for armed robbery—nah, he's still in the can. Kind of makes me think Bruce wasn't quite up to Marie's level of ability.”

Neil said, “I had to testify in front of him a few times. The personality of a pit bull with none of Marie's flash. But he could pull stuff out of his ass that you wouldn't see coming.”

“He got this chick a hung jury,” Frank said.

“What'd she do?”

“Shot her husband, then tried to make it look like a burglary gone bad while she collected the insurance money.” He read on. “Hell, she's one of the Ashworths.”

“The mob?” Angela asked.

“The closest thing Cleveland has to a mob, yeah.”

“I remember that case,” Neil said, massaging his jaw. “About two years ago. She had married this street thug who couldn't handle the rigors of the family business. To make it worse, he had a roving eye, so either she got tired of that or her brothers got tired of losing money through some lousy in-law, and no one was too upset when the guy bled to death in his living room. The defendant had family and money, and the victim had neither, so the not-guilty verdict came as no surprise.”

Frank closed the file. “Then no one would be looking to avenge that particular murder.”

Neil leaned back to stretch, groaning loudly enough to rattle the grimy windows as he worked out a crick in his spine. “The trial was nothing. All the drama happened before the trial began. The defendant—Marissa—was a newly widowed babe with a lot of money. Every defense lawyer in town begged to take her case. Instead she ignores big brother's advice to use the family attorney and entrusts her future to up-and-comer Dennis Britton.”

“But—” Frank checked the name on the manila folder.

“Yes, but. She retained Britton, and all the other disappointed suitors went away. All but one. Two months later she fired Britton and opened her arms—and everything else—to Raffel.”

“I'll bet Britton didn't care for that.”

“Furious. Fur-i-ous. Not ‘fire off an e-mail' furious, but ‘get into a shouting match at the Barristers Club' furious.”

“And you just thought of this now?”

“It was two years ago. Water under the bridge in lawyer time. Raffel got her off—harped on the missing murder weapon until the jury got dizzy—and I guess Britton let the humiliation spur him on to new heights. Now he's top of the heap, and Raffel left town. He who laughs last has no motive to murder.”

“I wouldn't be too sure,” Frank said. “Britton had the hottest case, and Raffel stole it. Now he has the hottest babe. If he saw Raffel trying to steal that—”

“Maybe,” Angela said. “But we have no real reason to think Bruce and Marie reconnected at the conference. We checked her cell-phone records—no calls between them. You said no one at her office has heard her mention his name since he left town. It's kind of a stretch that Britton, who has a booming practice and a wealthy marriage to protect, would risk all that to get revenge for a professional slight.”

“There's nothing professional about one's … um, manhood,” Neil said. “He swallowed his pride once and moved on, but if he saw history repeating itself … He wouldn't be the first guy to throw away everything just to prove he's got the biggest … um …”

“Manhood,” Angela finished. “It's a possibility. It's also possible that he killed Marie during an argument but went back and killed Bruce for more practical reasons. Bruce would suspect him immediately in the murder, for one thing.”

“So did we,” Frank pointed out.

“Or maybe Marie told Bruce something. Something she knew about Britton that she would only share with an old lover.”

“So Raffel tries to put the squeeze on Britton. Raffel is lower on the totem pole now, not doing so great, and Britton has married well.”

“Maybe.” Now Angela stretched, but without the groan and leaning forward instead of back. “All we've got is maybes.”

Frank put the file aside. They all resumed reading.

“So,” Neil said to him. “Your cousin.”

“Mmm?”

“She seeing anyone?”

Frank got this question a lot. He usually lied and said yes. But Neil Kelly had spent some time with Theresa in the past two days and might already know the answer, so he hedged. “I think so.”

“Really? A cop?”

“No.” This wasn't technically a lie. Theresa saw her co-workers at the lab every day, and some were men who weren't cops. And no matter what she said, she'd be on Don Delgado like frosting on cake if it weren't for the eleven-year age difference. Women got all hung up on age.

“Who?” Neil persisted.

“None of your damn business.”

Across from him Angela gave a little shake as if suppressing a chuckle.

Frank tried to change the subject. “Didn't you find a phone number with an initial in his room?”

Neil nodded. “Our mysterious
M
is a client outside Atlanta who wanted a return phone call. DUI case. What, you don't let her date cops?”

“The last cop she dated wound up dead.”

“Did you shoot the guy?”

The guy had been Frank's former partner, and he would not banter about the man's death with a goofball like Neil Kelly. “Besides, cops' track records? How many times you been divorced?”

Neil declined to answer, which meant it had to be at least twice. Of course Frank didn't want his cousin to date cops—why the hell would he? Britton had been right on the mark with his “incestuous” comment. Frank reached for another file.

“I just think she's nice,” Neil said, with the patent innocence of a six-year-old asking about the contents of a gum machine instead of flat-out requesting a quarter. “But you're right. I should speak to her.”

“You should leave her alone,” Frank said. “Here's that robbery-murder at the ATM.”

Angela said, “I remember that one. Disgusting.”

“That the guy only got ten years?”

“That murder in the commission of a robbery is somehow not murder.”

Frank skimmed the file. “Raffel moved to Atlanta only three months after the trial ended. Maybe he felt guilty.”

Angela snorted.

“But this is the interesting part. The guy had a partner, who gave him the gun and waited on the street corner to keep an eye out for cops and witnesses. The partner pled to conspiracy, got a slap on the wrist because, of course, they'd only intended to
rob
a young mother and her children at gunpoint—the whole
killing
thing was just an oops. Said partner's counsel was none other than our Miss Corrigan.”

“Get out!” Neil exclaimed.

“It's right here on the docket. Wonder why they didn't sever the trials.”

“Because Marie and Brucie got along so well?”

“Isn't that a conflict of interest?” Angela asked.