Riven (47 page)

“What are you talking about?”

“People who oppose the death penalty. They know it’s coming. They’re marching outside on your behalf.”

“They’re supporting me. I blew a girl’s head off, and they’re on my side.”

“Don’t misunderstand. No one is condoning what you claim you did.”

“I’m not just claiming it. I did it.”

“Fair enough. No one in his right mind condones murder. But do you realize that the United States is the only democratic society that still executes its citizens?”

“Sure glad I live here, then.”

“Listen, Mr. Darby. Why should only the rich benefit from the courts? You know what they say about capital punishment? ‘If you have the capital, you don’t get the punishment.’”

Brady stood and shook his head. “I want the punishment, man, okay? I don’t know how else to say it.”

“You’re going to be on death row for years as it is. You might as well redeem the time by fighting for yourself. There are nearly four thousand waiting to die in this country right now and twenty-five thousand more serving life without parole.”

“How fast can I be put to death?”

“I wouldn’t answer that if I knew. It’s counter to my purpose.”

“Your purpose is to keep me alive?”

“Of course. It’s my job.”

“You’re not supposed to represent me, try to get me what I want? Because I want to die and soon. All I want to know is how soon you can get that done.”

Jackie Kent sat back and sighed. “Even if you plead guilty and don’t try for life, there are mandatory appeals of death penalty sentences at all levels.”

“Mandatory? You mean they appeal for me even if I don’t want them to?”

“Exactly.”

“How long does all that take?”

“Years.”

“No good. What’s the shortest amount of time?”

“If you don’t cooperate with the process and keep going public with your guilt and your wish to die, maybe as short as three years, the way it was back in the forties, fifties, and sixties.”

“The good old days.”

“Let me fight for you, sir. I’ve read your file.”

“Then you know what happened.”

“You made that fairly plain, yes. There’ll be no getting you cleared. But it wasn’t your car. It wasn’t your weapon. You were not in your own neighborhood. You have been a habitual drug user. You could have been high. Your relationship went sour; an argument became heated. You meant only to scare her, maybe make her think you were going to shoot yourself. The shotgun went off. You didn’t mean to do it.”

“Except none of that’s true. I was stone-cold sober. Do I regret what I did? ’Course I do. I want to die for it. But she played me for the fool, and I killed her because I wanted to.”

“Temporary insanity. A crime of passion. That fine line between love and obsession. If you couldn’t have her, no one could.” Kent looked at his watch and began refilling his briefcase. Brady wondered if he had finally convinced the man. “In case you change your mind, let me enter a plea of
nolo contendere.
That’s just Latin for not admitting anything but accepting punishment as if you were guilty. The judicial system of the county, in its gratitude for your willingness to spare it considerable time and expense, will come back insisting that you plead guilty in exchange for life without parole over a death sentence.”

“No deal. Now, I been pulling schemes and scams my whole life, and I’m done. What do I have to do to be guaranteed the death penalty as fast as I can get it?”

Jackie folded his arms. “I can’t believe you’re asking me this. I have an ethical and professional obligation to—”

“All right, I’m tired of hearing that. I know what your job is. I know you don’t need or want this case, and I’m going to ask for someone else if you won’t get me what I want.”

“Truth is, Mr. Darby, the fastest way to get what you want is to plead not guilty, make the county prove its case, and don’t cooperate in your own defense. Everybody will love the publicity, and all they have to prove is motive, which you just told me you had; method, which has your fingerprints all over it; and opportunity. Can you be placed at the scene? A no-brainer.”

“But wouldn’t any trial take longer than no trial?”

“If they’ll let you plead guilty and still sentence you to death, no. But if I go to the judge with that plea, without asking for life, he’ll find you or me unstable, and then you’ll be interviewed by batteries of shrinks trying to get a handle on your death wish.”

“Handle? There’s no handle. There’s a death sentence for murderers. And I’m a murderer.”

Jackie Kent told Brady it surprised even him, but within a week, the Heiress Murderer got what he wanted. He was sentenced to die at the Adamsville State Penitentiary, method to be determined. As his lawyer had predicted, a schedule of mandatory appeals was drawn up, despite Brady telling the judge in plain language that he opposed these, would not cooperate, and hoped they would all fail.

With cameras rolling, the judge said, “Mr. Darby, as you have pleaded guilty, there is no cause for me to lecture you regarding your thoughtless, wanton act. Do you wish to make any statement before being remanded to the penitentiary?”

Brady spoke so softly that the TV stations had to run subtitles. “No. I did it and I’d do it again.”

As Brady was loaded into a county van for transport to ASP, reporters and cameramen surrounded the Norths near the steps outside the courthouse. Jordan and Carole looked ten years older than their fifty years. She stared at the ground as her husband spoke solemnly.

“No death will be slow or painful enough for that animal. I pray he burns in hell, and my biggest regret is that I can’t kill him myself.”

54

Adamsville State Penitentiary

Dirk Blanc was in Thomas’s office celebrating with him the summary judgment throwing out Jorge’s case against him when Frank LeRoy knocked and entered.

“Hear the news, sir?” Dirk said, rising and shaking the warden’s hand.

“Yeah. Thrilled. Good job. Gettin’ tired of these frivolous wastes of time. You guys want a peek at our new celeb?”

Thomas rose. “He’s here?”

“Should be by the time we get down there.”

Like everyone else in the state, Thomas had followed the Murdered Heiress case from the beginning. People were naturally fascinated by a condemned man without an excuse, let alone one who insisted on paying the ultimate price for his crime. Pundits everywhere had proffered every reason imaginable why a young man from the wrong side of town would fall for a socialite and wind up slaughtering the very one he claimed to love.

Others wanted to blame everything and everybody but the perpetrator: poverty, drugs, culture, society, the school system, the courts.

As they left his office, Thomas grabbed his Bible off the desk. He would not be allowed to engage the new man for at least ninety days, and in fourteen years as chaplain he had learned never to take his Bible with him unless visiting a cell at a con’s request. But it seemed the thing to do this time. Maybe it was just for himself, a security blanket. Some things never became routine here, and one was the sobering experience of seeing a death row inmate processed in, even though most of the condemned men in the supermax would outlive Thomas. But not this one. If the press could be believed, he would die in three years.

“Ya gotta hand it to the kid,” Dirk said as they made their way through all the security checkpoints. “Not trying to get out from under it.”

“Yeah, no,” the warden said. “I mean, okay, most of the guys in here, even on the Row, are innocent to hear them tell it. Friends betrayed them, lawyers blew their case, the judge made up his mind before the trial, and on and on and on. But hand it to this guy? You won’t hear that from me. Vicious killer getting what he deserves, I say. And he’s no kid. He’s thirty, ya know.”

“It’s sad, that’s all I can say,” Thomas said as his ID was scanned yet again. “Two young people in the primes of their lives . . .”

“Yeah, no,” the warden said. “Her maybe. He was in the prime of nothing.”

The prison was, if anything, noisier than ever. There wasn’t a man inside who didn’t know who was coming. Everybody was talking, catcalling, hooting, hollering, or banging something. The place depressed Thomas more every time he stepped into it. God had once bestowed on him a deep burden for these men’s souls. Oh, it was still there, but now it came to him in the form of a rolling wave of melancholy and frustration. The evangelist in him wanted to call for order and begin preaching right then and there, calling men to repentance and belief. But he could not. He could talk to one man at a time, and then only at the man’s request. And to Thomas’s knowledge, not one con had come to faith under his influence.

George Andreason, the former governor and now director of the state’s Department of Corrections, waited near the intake cell. Yanno greeted him like the old friend he was. Thomas introduced to him Dirk Blanc.

“Nobody in Ad Seg I see,” Andreason said.

“Had one with a coupla days to go and another on his way,” the warden said, “but they’ll wait. Give the new man his space.”

“Good idea,” the director said. “The press are here. They stay outside the overhead door.”

Yanno nodded, and the four of them turned as one at the sound of the door opening a football field’s distance away. The press was being held back as they shot live footage of the Heiress Murderer taking one last long drag on a cigarette, both cuffed hands to his mouth. Finally he flicked the butt away.

“Hope he enjoyed that,” Andreason said. “His last forever. Think of it.”

Maybe it was the distance, but Thomas had pictured a bigger man. This guy was of average height and lean build, and as a phalanx of heavily armored corrections officers brought him toward the intake cell, Thomas noticed he was dark-complexioned for a Caucasian. Dark hair and eyes too.

The officers seemed to be aware they were part of this center of attention and appeared to want to move faster. But the condemned man, garish head to toe in his Day-Glo orange county jail uniform, was slowed by his ankle shackles and chains. He was also bound around the middle, hands cuffed in front. Thomas had seen men jog along with mincing steps when so constrained, but this man was in no hurry. And why should he be?

Thomas could not help but think of the man’s victim as the party drew near. She apparently had been no saint either, but as a father and grandfather, Thomas grieved with her family. He could not conceive of losing his beloveds, let alone in such a manner.

God, please grant me some compassion for this man in spite of everything.

Screaming, whistling, yelling seemed to come from every cell in every pod as the cavalcade passed. Some cons called out vile questions or insults. But neither the officers nor the new man so much as turned to look. Once the prisoner lifted his hands high enough to flash double obscene gestures, making the caged men shout even louder.

It appeared to Thomas that the officers were aware that the big bosses were waiting for them at the end of the line. Every uniform was crisp and clean, every boot spit-shined, every badge gleaming. Each man stood ramrod straight and bore a serious countenance. What may have started as each man putting his best foot forward for the press now took the form of showing the head of the DOC and the warden that they meant business.

The man leading the procession, the biggest and widest of the officers, stopped about ten feet in front of Thomas and the others and looked to the warden. “You handling it from here, sir?”

“Yes, thank you,” Yanno said. “Assume your positions.”

The officers formed a semicircle behind the inmate, and the warden approached him and introduced himself and Andreason. The con appeared sullen and only nodded.

“This is our intake cell, where you will spend your first twenty-four hours. Once you are inside and the door is secured, step to the meal slot so we can remove your cuffs. Then lie on your back and rest your ankles above the slot so we can remove your shackles. Then strip down to your underwear and pass your uniform out through the slot. When we come get you tomorrow for transfer to your cell, we’ll reverse the process and you’ll get your tee and khakis and slippers.”

The young man peered into the cell, scowling. “I’m sleeping here? On the floor?”

“Hey!” Yanno shouted to the officers. “What happened to the king bed and the down comforter? And remind the maid about the mint on the pillow.”

The officers laughed. The con didn’t.

Thomas was not amused.

Yanno signaled an officer in the observation booth, and the loud click of the electronic lock echoed in the hallway. The warden removed the manual security device, and the lead officer used his key on the main lock. Throughout the process of getting the man inside, unbound, and undressed, Thomas looked away, noticing that everyone else, his son-in-law included, gawked at the murderer the whole time.

When the man was on his feet again, Yanno beckoned him close and spoke softly, informing him of when he would be fed (twice while in intake) and that someone would deliver an envelope. “Normally when someone is in this cell, it’s for Administrative Segregation, and they get nothing to read. But when being processed in, you are expected to become familiar with our rules and regulations and procedures, understand?”

The man pursed his lips as if the question insulted him.

“One piece of advice,” the warden said. “Do your own time. The less you listen or talk to anyone else, the better off you’ll be. You’ll be treated the way you act. Do what you’re told, follow orders, and you’ll get along. We’re not here to judge you. That’s already been done. Our job is to keep you, and we’ve never failed at that. You follow?”

“Whatever.” The man’s eyes seemed to fall on Thomas’s Bible, then directly into Thomas’s eyes.

The chaplain couldn’t bring himself to smile, but he found himself instinctively greeting the con with a raise of his brows and a tightening of his lips.

This man certainly didn’t look thirty. In fact, for an instant, he looked like a child. His eyes were distant, his cheeks hollow, and a great cavernous emptiness seemed to reside in him. He appeared to want to say something to Thomas, but Yanno interrupted.