The Big Exit (14 page)

Lyons lifts the top corner of the sheet, exposing McGregor’s right
side. “Well, like you said, he has this little snake here. But what’s kind of interesting is that I looked at it with a magnifying
glass and there’s actually a word in the snake and some numbers. You gotta look closely.”

He takes out a lighted magnifying glass and shows him what he means.

Madden reads aloud the characters, carefully enunciating each letter and number. “S … E … D … I …” When he’s finished, he
puts them together. “Sedition 1918,” he says quizzically, lifting an eyebrow. It rings a bell but he doesn’t know from where.

“Sound familiar?” Lyons asks.

“Yeah.”

“I looked it up. There was something called the Sedition Act of 1918. During the First World War. Woodrow Wilson was president.”

“What the hell is that about?”

“Did the wife say anything about the word?”

“No, just the snake,” Madden says.

“I mean, it’s possible she didn’t even see it. You really have to look.”

“Sedition 1918,” he repeats again.

With that, Lyons slides the gurney back into its refrigeration unit. After they leave the autopsy room, Madden asks how long
it will take to process and analyze the items from Forman’s apartment along with other crime-scene evidence.

“I’ve got a few folks coming in any minute to help out. I can’t promise anything, but I know you want this stuff expedited
as quickly as possible.” Contrary to what the TV dramas show, crime labs work at a slow, deliberate pace. DNA evidence takes
weeks to process. “We should have some preliminary toxicology results late today and we’ll just bang on all this stuff hard.
I’m going to go home in a little bit, take a shower, and head back down to the crime scene for another look-see in the light.”

Lyons locks the evidence bags in a locker, then walks Madden out.

“What is it, Hank?” Lyons asks when they get outside. He takes the remaining half of his cigarette out of his coat pocket
and lights it. “You’ve got that worried look on your face, like something isn’t right.”

“I don’t know.” He stands there, reflecting on the previous night. He pictures Richie Forman in the club singing, the words
to the one song still running in his head.

Somebody said “just forget about her.” So I gave that treatment a try
…

“The guy can sing,” he says.

“Who?”

“Richie Forman. He’s a Sinatra impersonator.”

“No shit?”

“He was good. Seems like he was doing okay for himself. Aside from the obvious, I just don’t know why he’d go ahead and do
something like this. And it just seems too neat and too messy at the same time. Does that make any sense?”

Lyons takes a drag on his cigarette. “Sure,” he says, exhaling. “But anyway I look at it, this wasn’t a random killing. Someone
was making a statement. Someone had something against this guy. You got the method of the slaying and then the whole ‘hack’
angle. It was personal.”

“But I don’t know if that’s just a red herring, you know? I mean, whoever did it left the wallet to make it look like a robbery.
Why not dash off ‘Hack’ while you’re at it?”

“Well, there’s a couple meanings to the word. Hack, as in you’re mediocre. Hack as in to write code, you know, program, which
is what Zuckerberg meant when he put the word up on the wall at the Facebook offices. A hack in a malicious sense. Identity
theft. Malware. Virus creator. Hack as in hacker, bad guy.”

“That’s three, not two,” Madden points out.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. Anyway, I’m not sure where McGregor fit in on the scale. I’ve heard him talk before. If anything,
you could argue he was mediocre. I mean, he talked a good game, but like a lot of these guys, he had a bullshit quotient.
Guy probably did a mean PowerPoint. You saw him at the trial. He was slick, right?”

“Yeah,” Madden answers, though his thoughts are elsewhere. He needs a witness. And he needs to know who the Tongans are and
if they were really working for McGregor and why.

Just then a car pulls into the lot. A petite, dark-haried woman gets out and nods a curt greeting to Lyons.

“One of yours?” Madden asks.

“That’s Sue Romero, one of my technicians. Not the cheeriest of personalities. But at least the reinforcements are starting
to roll in.”

“Look, I don’t need to say this, Greg, but you know the scrutiny level we’re looking at on this thing. You’ve got to be buttoned
down all the way on this. Batten down the hatches. You understand?”

“We always do.”

“Well, we know Colletti has had his issues. You guys didn’t look so hot for a while.”

The coroner is an elected position and Drew Colletti is going on his fourth term. But he faced vigorous challenges in the
last election after his office was hit with a sexual harassment suit and several workers were accused of looking at pornography
on their work computers.

“Come on, man,” Lyons says. “Ancient history. Just bullshit politics.”

“Well, you got that ‘chief’ in your title because of bullshit politics.”

That’s true. Colletti needed a fall guy, and the previous chief deputy had been that guy.

“Look, Hank, I’m well aware what a big deal this is. I wouldn’t have been here at the crack of fucking dawn if I didn’t. You
get any security-camera footage from the neighbors yet? There’s gotta be one camera on that block that caught something.”

“We’re working on it. Billings is going through some footage this morning.”

“You think Forman will submit to a polygraph?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t suggest it yet. The first thing we gotta do is get him to turn off the Sinatra act.”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s still doing his goddamn impersonation routine.”

“Under questioning?”

“Yeah. I mean, it fades in and out, but it’s getting a little ridiculous.”

“You think it’s a tactic?”

“I don’t know.”

Just then Madden’s phone rings. Caller ID shows the main number for the Menlo Park police station.

“Madden,” he answers.

“Billings,” Billings answers back.

“What’s up?”

“Where are you?”

“Still up at the coroner’s, talking to Lyons.”

“Forman’s attorney showed up.”

“When?” Madden asks.

“Five minutes ago,” Billings says.

“He or a she?”

“He. And you’re not going to believe who it is.”

“Who?”

“Marty Lowenstein.”

Madden falls silent. He doesn’t know any local attorneys named Marty Lowenstein. The only Marty Lowenstein he knows is the
famous Marty Lowenstein.

“Yeah, that guy,” Billings says.

“The DNA Dude?”

He looks over at Lyons, who’s in the process of pulling the cigarette toward his mouth for a final drag but suddenly freezes
with his hand is a few inches away from his lips.

Billings: “Yeah. Just flew in from LA.”

“How did he get him?”

“How the hell should I know?”

“Okay, I’m on my way back. Gotta make one stop. But I’ll be there by eleven. He talking to Forman now?”

“He just went in,” Billings says. “There’s also some kids here with cameras. Came with him.”

“What do you mean?”

“Couple of kids, one male, one female, showed up with Lowenstein. Say they’re working on a documentary.”

“You’re kidding me. I hope you kept them out.”

“Sure I did. They’re upstairs. With the guys from Channels Five and Two.”

“Shit,” Madden says. “I’m on my way. Call me with any updates.”

He hangs up and looks over at Lyons, who doesn’t seem so relaxed and nonchalant anymore.

“Did I hear you say what I think I heard you say? The DNA Dude? Marty Lowenstein?”

Madden nods.

“How the fuck did he get him?”

“I just asked Billings the same question.”

A smile creeps across Lyons’s face. “Well, shiver me timbers,” he says. “Marty fucking Lowenstein. I always wanted to meet
him.”

“Well, you may just get your chance.”

“This is awesome,” Lyons says.

Madden doesn’t think it’s awesome. In fact, he thinks it’s the farthest thing from awesome.

“Greg?”

“What?”

“You got your A game on, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that’s not going to be good enough. Add another gear.”

Lyons doesn’t take kindly to the comment.

“You find another gear, Hank. I got plenty of gears. This thing’s on you. It’s your fucking case. I’m just the support team.
Chill, man.”

“I don’t do chill, Greg.”

“I know you don’t, Hank. But don’t stress on me. I got enough stress. I’m trying to quit smoking.”

“That seems like it’s going really well.”

“It was,” he laments. “Until last night.”

“F
ORMAN, WAKE UP
.”

He’s been lying on the thin green mat, his cuffed hands resting on his stomach, staring up at the ceiling in the small room
where he’d spent the night, when the door opens. Billings, the detective, pokes his head in and tells him that his attorney
is here.

Still lying there, he turns his head to see a face he knows looks familiar but can’t place at first. He sits up on the bench.
Once vertical, he realizes who it is.

“Goddamn if it isn’t Marty Lowenstein, the DNA Dude.”

“Marty,” Marty Lowenstein says, extending a hand. “Call me Marty.”

He’s shorter than Richie had imagined. Heck, he’s practically eye to eye with the man before he even stands up from the bench.
The guy has to be like five-three, five-four, with a head, nose, and ears that seem disproportionately big for his body. He
has a mostly full head of tight, curly gray hair and is wearing a navy blue suit and a crisp white shirt, but he doesn’t have
a tie on, which gives him a hipper, more casual look, which is only accentuated by the fact that he appears to have a baseball
mitt under his arm.

“Lourdes gave me a call last night and said you were in some trouble. I happened to be in L.A. Got here as soon as I could.
Ashley picked me up at the airport.”

Richie can’t stop smiling.

“Marty fucking Lowenstein,” he says.

“Marty,” Marty says.

“Sorry. She here—Ashley?”

“Upstairs. With her boyfriend. He tells me he’s doing some sort of documentary about you.”

With the intonation of his voice, he might as well have said,
What the fuck is up with that?

“That isn’t official.”

“Well, we’ll talk about that later. You make any statements?”

He answers with a little shrug. “Nothing bad,” he says quietly.

“Nothing bad? If I had a nickel every time a client said, ‘nothing bad’ or ‘I just told them the truth’ I’d have a pile so
big I could ski down it. You know the part that goes, ‘Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law?’
Well, strike the ‘can.’ It
will
be used against you.”

Now Richie really feels stupid. If someone had told him last night he’d have Marty Lowenstein standing there next to him now,
he’d have clammed up and not said a word. But no one had told him Marty Lowenstein was coming.

“You give them an alibi?” Marty asks. “Is that what you tried to do?”

He nods. “I’d just finished performing. I was a little drunk, to be honest. I don’t think any of it’s admissible.”

Marty doesn’t respond. Instead, he looks up at the ceiling and Richie thinks he’s going to roll his eyes in disgust. But no,
he’s actually looking at the ceiling—or rather the corner of the ceiling. He does a little pirouette, his eyes examining the
walls as he does.

“What are you doing?”

“They said there were no cameras or mics in here but I never believe them,” Marty explains.

When he’s done with his inspection, he sits down next to Richie and hands him the baseball mitt, a tan Rawlings that looks
ancient and is folded so flat it might as well have been ironed. It must be at least thirty years old.

“What’s this for?” he asks.

“Just put it on. As a precaution. I know it’s a little tough with the cuffs. I want you to speak into it. Pretend I’m the
catcher and you’re the pitcher and we’re having a mound conference except we’re doing it in the dugout.”

“Where’s your mitt?”

“I don’t need one. I work barehanded.” He waits for Richie to put the glove on, then leans forward, put his elbows on his
thighs, and clasps his hands in front in a modified prayer position, and says: “So what other statements did you make?”

He tells him everything he’d said. Or at least everything he can remember saying. They go back and forth, Lowenstein quietly
and methodically firing off question after question. At first, it feels silly to have to keep covering his mouth with the
mitt whenever he speaks. But after a few minutes, he gets used to it. Is Lowenstein really concerned the cops are recording
the conversation? Maybe. But he also gets the feeling the mitt is just a prop that’s designed to help break down his inhibitions.

It’s working. But the more he talks, the worse he feels. It’s like the time he thought he’d nailed a job interview then realized
he’d totally botched it once he went over the conversation with a buddy who already worked at the firm. He kept saying, “You
said what?” Marty doesn’t do that, but the way he keeps grimacing, he may as well have done.

After he’s through, he gets the damage assessment. “Well, you hit the fast-forward button, that’s what you did,” Marty says.
“As soon as you admitted you were down there, that convinced the judge to grant the warrant. They’ve obviously got something
else. Some piece of evidence to link you to the crime. They need that to establish probable cause. But you allowed them to
move faster than they probably should have. The good and bad news is they won’t arraign until Monday morning, which means
you’re stuck here until then. I need to know exactly where you were, who you might have talked with and who might have seen
you. We’re going to need to find these people right away and try to get statements from them to corroborate what you’ve said.
I’m going to get Ashley on it. She’s as good an investigator as you’re going to get for what you can afford.”

Richie rocks back and forth a little, staring at the floor. The mitt’s still covering half his face. He can feel Marty’s eyes
on him. There’s still a lot he hasn’t told him. He wants to disappear into that mitt now.

“Rick,” he says. “Is it okay if I call you Rick?”

Richie nods.

“Look, you know everything you say to me is protected by attorney-client privilege. You know that, right?”

Another nod. Sure, he knows.

“I’ve been up since four thirty,” he explains, not making an effort to cover his mouth. “Lucky for you I’m on New York time.
But normally I don’t like to be woken up at four thirty unless it’s for a goddamn good reason. Are you a goddamn good reason?”

Before Richie can formulate an answer, he goes on: “Lourdes Hinojosa seems to think so. She told me we’ve got to find a way
to help you. Those were her words, ‘We’ve got to help him, Marty.’ And you know, it’s not like I don’t like to help people,
but at four thirty in the morning I’m not always in the most helpful mood. Then she reminds me you’re the ex-con who’s been
volunteering for us, the Sinatra impersonator who had some bad luck with that car accident. And I think to myself, Okay, I’ve
got to meet this guy. You know why? Because way back when, when Sinatra was alive, I had a dream I represented him. It was
a very vivid dream. I remember it to this day.”

“What’d he do?”

“He killed Ava Gardner. Well, that’s how it was at first. But you know how dreams go. First, he killed Ava Gardner but then
it became someone else. In the end, it wasn’t really clear who he killed. In fact, in the end, I determined he was making
it all up. He thought something had happened but it was really just a movie script he was working on. He’d come to embody
one of the characters, was into the whole method-acting thing, and was drunk half the time, which didn’t help—and doesn’t
seem to be helping you either.”

“Did he pay well?”

Marty laughs.

“Funny you should ask. No. But he played my kid’s Bar Mitzvah.”

“For real?”

“No, in the dream.”

“That’s what I meant.”

“Actually, I think that’s what precipitated the dream. I was trying to figure out who I could get to play at my kid’s Bar
Mitzvah. And there I was representing Old Blue Eyes and he said he couldn’t afford to pay me but he could come to my backyard
and sing.”

“You got any other Bar Mitzvahs coming up?”

“Kids all graduated college. But I’m sure we can work something out. You do weddings?”

“Sure.”

“Okay. I’ve got a niece getting married next September. So talk to me. What really happened yesterday? You see your ex over
there at this Café Barrone near the train station and she gives you back your ring. You’re missing about five hours after
that. You wanna clue me in as to what happened in those five hours?”

Richie takes a deep breath. He waits a moment, then puts the mitt up to his mouth.

“I’m going with the curve,” he says.

“Bring it,” Marty says.

“I slept with her.”

Marty leans in a little closer. “With who? Your ex?”

“Yeah.”

“Where, at her house?”

“No, a place called Watercourse Way in Palo Alto. It’s kind of like a spa. You can rent a room with a hot tub in it.”

“Okay. Very Cali. On the East Coast, we don’t have hot tubs. We have Jacuzzis.”

“I know. I’m from Jersey.”

Marty smiles. “Just like our pal Frank.”

“Yeah, only I’m from Teaneck.”

“Teaneck, huh? So, tough-luck Richie from Teaneck, did you tell our police friends you fucked your ex in some watery zen chamber
with flutes playing in the background a few hours before her husband was killed?”

“No.”

Marty Lowenstein nods, then falls silent a moment, seeming to mull over the revelation.

“I take it there’s more to the story.”

“Lot more,” he says into the glove.