Premeditated Murder (22 page)

Which was pretty understandable. Cops had better things to do than make work for themselves. Why make an easy case a hard one? There're six dead students in an apartment, and Cal sitting in the hallway, waiting for them with a confession and the murder weapon. Do the math. “So we don't even know how these women were connected to the four guys?”

“Right. All we know is that they all went to school together. I think one of the newspapers said that the women lived in a different apartment, but I didn't really pay much attention. Didn't the tapes say something about the women?”

“Yeah,” Terry said. “Or sisters. Let me see.” He looked back at the transcripts until he found the right passage. “Here we go. One guy says that they created beautiful things that the men used for their holy work. Hmmm.”

“Maybe if we see where the women used to live, we can find out what that means,” Zack said. “What do you think?”

“I think I got about zero other ideas,” Terry said. “So let's check out the ladies. Praise God.”

JUDGE COTTONWOOD DIDN'T WANT TO PICK UP the phone. He knew it was Harold Baumgartner on the other end, and he knew what it was about.

It was The Phone Call.

Cottonwood exhaled deeply and picked up the phone. “Harold. How are you?”

“I'm well, Richard. How's the hip holding up?”

“Oh, you know the drill. Some good days, some bad.” He steeled himself for the inevitable. “What can I do for you today?”

“No matter how many times I make this phone call, I never seem to know how to start it. So I'll just get right to the point, I guess. In a couple of months, you'll be celebrating your seventieth birthday, and, as you know, that means that sometime before then, you'll need to step down from the bench.”

Judge Cottonwood imagined that many who received this call looked forward to it. Lots of people enjoyed retiring by the time they turned seventy. And for Massachusetts judges, the pension was quite generous, and it didn't prevent you from taking on other work if you wanted it. He personally knew several former judges who had returned to private practice, or had become involved in mediation or arbitration. Many also taught classes at the local law schools.

But for Richard, being a judge was all he'd wanted to do. It had become his entire life, starting twenty-six years ago. Despite the arthritis and the bad eye, retirement for him was little more than a death sentence. Which is why he hadn't thought about it seriously, or planned for it in any way, even though the rational part of him knew of its inevitable arrival.

“How about the Thompkins case?” Richard said. “Will I have enough time to do that trial before I go?”

“As far as I'm concerned, that shouldn't be any problem,” Harold responded. “According to my records, you'll need to stop work on or before July twenty-second. I've got a pretrial on that case scheduled for the week after next, and I think we'll be picking a trial date then. I was thinking mid to late June. From what I can tell, I think it's going to go one to two weeks. I know you've been cleaning up your calendar. How does that look for you?”

Richard took a quick look at his appointment book. “I've only got a couple of trials set for later this month, and June is wide open. I'm not scheduling anything else except the Thompkins case, so even if one of the May trials goes into June, I should be fine.”

“Terrific,” Harold said. “So what are your plans after you retire?” he asked. “I've got to start thinking about that myself. I'll be the one getting this call in about four more years.”

“Oh, I don't know,” Richard said, opening the top drawer of his desk and looking at the bottle of Percocet. “I was thinking maybe of just relaxing for a while.”

Maybe a very long while.

Detroit, Michigan

WAITRESSING ON FRIDAY NIGHTS WAS HARD work but good money, so it was tough when a local power failure forced the owners to close early that night. Lena had plenty of savings, but she could always use more, so she hated to give up the opportunity to earn a couple hours' more tips. But she had to admit she'd welcome the extra sleep.

As she rode the bus on the way home she checked her cell phone's voice mailbox. The only message was from her mother—something about vacation plans that she and Daddy had for the next several weeks. They were going to rent an RV and drive around some of the national parks in Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico.

Lena shook her head as she got off the bus and began to walk the few remaining blocks home. Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. To them, a vacation. To her, a never-ending
National Geographic
special with bad cell phone coverage.

The message Lena was hoping to receive would have been from Captain Pisani. She'd started calling the captain the minute that Sergeant Kanteros had warned her away from the case.

It didn't take any experience at all to recognize that Sergeant Kanteros's message was as good as a note from heaven saying “Lena, you are finally on to something.” Now she just had to hang on and find out what.

Of course, that was still the big problem. Lena had no idea why anyone cared about her questions. After all, what had she uncovered? A discrepancy between a little girl's memory and a police officer's report? An altered transcript of a phone call in an attempt to hide an unsuccessful burglary? As far as Lena could figure, there was no motive for any of it.

Luckily, the electricity was working where Lena lived. She opened up the door to her building and headed up the stairs to her apartment. And speaking of motive, why didn't the thieves take the rare coins that were all over Mr. LeClerq's den? Why did they take computer CDs instead? Even if they had been startled by Mr. LeClerq, they'd had time to at least grab something valuable on their way out. None of it made any sense.

It was after Lena had taken about three steps into her apartment that she realized something was wrong. She stopped dead, terrified.

She could hear somebody moving around in her bedroom.

And then she heard a man's voice say, “Did you just hear something?”

Before she could turn to run, she heard footsteps in the bedroom, heading for the door toward her. She wouldn't have time to make it out of the apartment before he emerged. She spun frantically, saw the bathroom door was open, and ducked inside. Stepping into the tub, she hid behind the shower curtain as she heard somebody come out of her bedroom into the living room and walk toward the apartment door. The man's voice spoke again. “Lena?”

Her heart was pounding so hard she was certain whoever was out there would hear it. Luckily, if he looked into the bathroom, at least the shower curtain would hide her, unless he actually came into the room and pulled the curtain back all the way. Then she looked up at the mirror over the sink, and shit! The way the tub, the mirror, and the open door were positioned, depending on where he was in the living room, if the man looked through the open door into the bathroom, he could see her reflection in the mirror!

Another voice came from the bedroom. “She's still at work, Jack. Remember we checked the schedule on the counter.”

Whoever was in the living room opened the apartment door and then, a few seconds later, closed it. As he returned to the bedroom, Lena got a quick glimpse of him. He was wearing a very dark rain slicker. “FBI” was stenciled in giant yellow letters on the back. And he was holding a gun in his hand, which he slid back into a holster.

Oh my God. Had he been planning to shoot her?

“You almost done?” Jack asked, now out of sight.

“Yeah,” the man in the bedroom said. “I just gotta put a little into the closet.”

A little what? Lena's chest started to hurt. Her heart was hammering. Was she having a heart attack? No. She was holding her breath. And she was still wearing her winter coat and a hat. She was way too hot. Her armpits felt damp.

“Well, hurry up. I wanna be long gone by the time the cops come in and bust her.”

Trying to breathe soundlessly, Lena opened her mouth wide and let the air out slowly. She was cowering in her own bathtub, listening to the FBI describe how she was going to be arrested. She was sweating so much that she felt streams of perspiration running down her legs.

She started to shiver uncontrollably. Would they hear her? What would they do to her if they found her? Would they shoot her? Lena had always imagined that if she were going to die a violent death, she would go down fighting. Would they just walk into her bathroom and blow her away?

“All set,” announced the bedroom man. “Let's go.” And then the sounds of footsteps approached again from the bedroom. Lena was shaking. She didn't look into the mirror, fearing that the terror that was buzzing through her body would give her away.

“You sure this'll do it?” asked Jack as they reached the door.

“Shit, it better,” said the other man. “This place is littered with so much stuff that even uniforms won't be able to fuck it up.”

Then the apartment door opened, and a few seconds later, it closed.

For several moments, Lena just listened to the silence, still trying to breathe without making any noise. A part of her feared a trap, but sooner or later, she knew, she was going to have to move. Holding her breath again, she stepped out from behind the shower curtain, out of the tub, and tiptoed out of the bathroom into the living room. They were gone. Thank God.

And then Lena saw it.

All over her coffee table. On top of all of the other junk that she'd left there. A Baggie half filled with pot, a couple of roaches, and some matches. Another Baggie, spilling white powder out onto the floor. And another, sticking out from under one of the cushions on the couch.

She ran into her bedroom. More drugs. A scale. White powder spilled on her dresser.

Jesus. This would take forever to clean up. If she could even find it all.

And then she remembered what the men had said. The cops were coming to bust her. And even the uniforms won't be able to fuck it up.

Then she heard a siren.

Lena grabbed her laptop and ran.

SIXTEEN

DEFENDANT'S MOTION IN LIMINE
RE: VICTIMS' BACKGROUNDS

     Now comes the defendant in the above-captioned matter and hereby moves this honorable court in limine for leave to introduce evidence of the background of the victims. Specifically, the defendant seeks leave to introduce evidence that such individuals: 1) were members of a group of terrorists; 2) had each wrongfully killed innocent persons in incidents prior to and unrelated to the case at bar; and 3) were planning, at the time of their deaths, future wrongful killings of innocent persons …

     As grounds therefor, the defendant states the following:

     1. In August 1998, the defendant's wife and five-year-old son were killed in a terrorist attack in Kenya …

(Trial Paper Number 24)

May 3—John's Crossing, Saskatchewan

WITH GOD'S HELP, THIS WOULD BE THE BEGINNING of the end of the world.

The small plane had been serviced, fueled, and loaded with the cargo. It waited for El Amin in the cornfield near the border.

The infidels made such big noises about homeland security and protecting themselves, but they shared thousands of miles of border with Canada, and they did almost nothing to monitor crossings by air. Flying small planes over the corn and wheat fields of Saskatchewan and Manitoba wasn't necessarily the fastest way to transport explosives into the United States, but he had several weeks remaining before he needed his cargo to be on site in Boston. So flying this last crate of grenades into an abandoned field in northeastern Montana was hardly under any time pressure.

As he gathered speed through the field, and the plane slowly rose into the gray sky, drops of rain began to fall. El Amin was pleased. Even though the region was remote, they tried to fly only during rain, when the chance that their activities would be observed was even lower. God was smiling on them again.

God knew that the mission this July 4 was very important. Perhaps even as important as the one carried out by the martyrs on September 11. He had chosen El Amin and had kept him safe even when the infidels had sent an assassin to kill them all. He would show the infidels that there would never be peace until they were wiped from the face of the earth.

The plan was simple. This was the last flight for materials. He would land in about thirty minutes on the other side of the border and meet the car that Karim would bring to him. Although Karim had many shortcomings, he was good at buying inexpensive and inconspicuous used cars and making sure that they were reliable enough to make the four-day drive back to Boston. They would load this last crate of cargo into the trunk of the car, and then Karim would fly the plane back into Canada. At the same time, El Amin would begin his cross-country drive back to Massachusetts, staying carefully under the speed limit at all times. His trip would be uneventful.

There were only a few details to work out before the plan for this summer's attack was fully operational. Flying the plane at the correct altitude and activating and dropping the grenades was easy. What he needed to practice was taking into account the speed of the plane as he dropped the grenades, because he wanted to drop the first one precisely at the exit of the park. And he also needed to become more adept at turning the plane around quickly so that he could make several passes over the crowd of people in a short amount of time. If the first drop was accurate, the exit would become a place of chaos, and the remainder of the crowd would be trapped like sheep in a pen. Then he could make several passes over the crowd, dropping two grenades per pass. Three, with God's help. He had done enough research to know that a grenade's maximum kill radius was five to ten meters. The plan was to have each grenade explode a few meters above the ground. If the crowd was dense, over two hundred people would be in each grenade's killing zone. With God's help, the death toll would be extreme.