The Nominee

by Alan P Woodruff

  White’s frustration was so out of character that Harris couldn’t help but chuckle.

  “Don’t laugh,” White said. “The next time we need someone to cover an emergency hearing, I’m sending you.”

  “Oh, no,” Harris said, leaning away in mock terror. “Anything but that.”

  White picked up the stack of messages on his desk — a sign he was through with the topic of Judge Carlin — and began thumbing through them. “So, what do you have?” he asked, glancing at Horse as he finished sorting the pink slips.

  “Graham was right about his kid.” There was a hint of sadness in Horse’s voice.

  White leaned back in his desk chair. “You sound disappointed.”

  “Maybe I am. I was hoping to find something we could work with.”

  “Or some redeeming quality we could report to Graham,” White said.

  “Maybe that too. Graham’s a good man. It must be tough on him having to deal with his son’s problems.”

  White nodded a silent agreement. “So, what do you have?”

  “Shephard’s had trouble wherever he’s been. Before I went down to Matlacha, I ran a check on him. He’s been picked up a couple of times for vagrancy and public intoxication.”

  “Drugs?”

  “Maybe. He’d always finished off whatever he was using, or gotten rid of it before he was picked up. He spent a weekend in the Marathon slammer on a pot charge, but they kicked him and dropped the charges.”

  “David told me about that. Anything else?”

  “Like what?”

  “Jobs?”

  “Nothing long term. Some bartending. And, for a while, he worked on the crew of charter fishing boats.”

  White narrowed his eyes at the mention of the boat.

  “Legitimate, as far as I can tell. But it’s not uncommon for the boat captains to run a little contraband. There could be something there… but it wasn’t obvious.”

  “Check it out,” White said.

  Harris made a note on the case file ‘to do” list.

  “Any history of violence?” Harris asked Horse.

  “Not that I found yet.”

  “Did you come up with anything in Matlacha?”

  “Very little,” Horse said. “I started with a visit to a bar that caters to the least upstanding of the locals.”

  “Anything?”

  “Met one of the local bikers. He didn’t have much use for Shepard or Jackson. Thought they were both morons and was glad to have them out of town.”

  “Why?”

  “Probably has his own business going.”

  “Competition?”

  “Don’t think so. My guess is that the bikers deal in weed. The last thing they need is federal storm troopers messing with their cozy little lifestyle.”

  “So Shepard and Jackson were operating on their own.”

  “I didn’t say that. I’m not sure they were dealing anything. I don’t know if they were doing anything drug-related in Matlacha — except hiding out and getting stoned.”

  “That’s not much.”

  “No,” Horse agreed. “But my biker buddy said someone showed up occasionally in a blue Porsche with a Dade county plate. Then Shepard and Jackson would disappear for a while, and come back loaded with cash.”

  “What do you think?”

  “It sounds like they could be couriers.”

  “Then why were they still holding two kilos of uncut cocaine when they were busted?”

  “Maybe they weren’t able to complete a delivery.”

  “Or maybe they decided to go into business for themselves with someone else’s inventory.”

  Horse rubbed his chin and looked at White. “Then they’re playing a dangerous game. Ripping a dealer off for two kilos of coke tends to shorten life expectancy.”

  “You’re right. Even Shepard and Jackson can’t be that stupid. So the only logical conclusion is that they got busted before they were able to finish doing their jobs.”

  “Either that or they were being set-up.”

  “But no dealer is going to invest that much in a set-up when a fraction of that amount would have the same result.”

  “There is one other possibility. What if they were being set-up by some law enforcement agency. They could be using drugs that had already been confiscated — knowing that they’d get them back after the raid.”

  “That explains everything we know.”

  “But it doesn’t answer the most important question. What agency would have any reason for setting up a couple of stoned, overgrown delinquents?”

  White made a snorting sound. “Anything else?”

  “I checked out the house where they got arrested. Not much more than a glorified shack stuck back into the mangroves. The landlord said they had the place for three months and always paid their rent on time… in hundred-dollar bills.”

  White made a note on his legal pad and continued. “Any nearby boat docks?”

  “If you can call it that. There was a trail through the mangroves to a thirty-foot pier. There were a couple of rotting lines hanging from the cleats, but no sign of recent use.”

  “So, you don’t think they’re running anything by boat?”

  “Not with anything they kept at their shack. And I don’t think they’d keep a boat at the city marina.”

  “Can we rule out off-shore pick-ups?”

  Horse shrugged. “Doesn’t seem likely. What did you get from our client?”

  “Not much. He claims he didn’t do anything, but I didn’t expect him to say anything else. He did say one interesting thing, though.”

  Horse and Harris waited.

  “He said the deputies went straight to Jackson’s room and found the drugs.”

  “So they already knew where to look.”

  “Seems like it. But I’m not even sure there was anything to be found. No one actually saw the deputies find the stuff.”

  “Do you think it was planted during the search?”

  “It could have been.”

  “Did David say anything useful?” Harris asked, his pen poised over his pad.

  “It’s too soon to know what’s useful and what isn’t. Getting a straight answer from him was damn near impossible. I’ve had more productive conversations with Sherlock.”

  White stood and went to the mini-refrigerator behind his desk, retrieved a Diet Pepsi and, with a look toward Horse and Harris and a glance toward the fridge, asked the other if they wanted anything. They didn’t. He popped the top and took a swallow before continuing. “It was almost as if he was trying to follow a script, but I wasn’t asking the questions he was expecting.”

  “Maybe he and Jackson agreed to a common story just in case they got caught.”

  “It’s possible. Find out who’s representing Jackson. I want to talk to him.”

  Harris made another note on his “to-do” list.

  “One thing is certain. Shepard’s scared.”

  “When did we ever represent a first-timer who wasn’t scared shitless.”

  “Never happens. But Shepard isn’t exactly a first-timer.”

  “Maybe not. But a couple of days in the local slammer isn’t the same as five to ten years in a state or federal prison. The person I met hadn’t even started thinking about doing prison time. He wanted me to get him out for some other reason. He was afraid of something that could happen to him in jail.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. He kept saying that I had to get him out of there. But he made a point of saying that he wasn’t going to cut a deal.”

  “Had you asked him about a deal?”

  “No. He just spit it out.”

  “Any idea what he meant?”

  “Not yet.” White rubbed his eyes as if the act would squeeze some useful thought into his consciousness. “What do you think, Harry?”

  “I can’t say anything without meeting him, but I don’t think they stole the coke.”

  White leaned back with his atte
ntion focused on Harris.

  “Lou Hamilton thinks it was a set-up.” As he spoke, Harris continued to study the police report. “There’s no mention of weapons of any kind.”

  “Two kilos of coke and no weapons. That is odd.”

  “That’s what I think,” Harris said. “Also, Lou said the authorities got an anonymous tip telling them where to look, and what they were likely to find.”

  “That’s consistent with what David said about the search.”

  “But there was something curious about the tip.” Harris thumbed the edges of his legal pad before continuing. “According to Lou, the tip was received by Paul Parker and passed on to the Sheriff.”

  “Why would someone call Parker instead of the Sheriff?”

  Harris shrugged.

  “What do you think it means?”

  “Maybe something. Maybe nothing.”

  “I can always count on you to narrow things down, Harry.”

  Harris chuckled. “Do you want to crack wise or hear what else I think?”

  White laughed. “Sorry. Go on.”

  “If it is a set-up, it isn’t just about Shepard and Jackson. The way I figure it, two kilos of coke is too valuable to be planted if all you want to do is get someone busted. An arrest could have been orchestrated with a couple of grams. Whoever planted the drugs had something else, something bigger, in mind.”

  “Like what?”

  “It beats the hell out of me. But it could explain David’s comment about not making a deal.”

  “How’s that?”

  Harris studied his notes before responding. “Did you tell David that his father had retained you?”

  “No. I wasn’t sure how much he knew about Graham.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I said I’d been retained by someone who was concerned about him.”

  Harris’s lips curled into the self-satisfied smile of a man who has just discovered the secret to understanding women. “So…” Harris hesitated before continuing. “For all he knew, you could have been retained by whoever he was working for.”

  White slapped the table. “Of course! Why didn’t I think of that? And he wanted to assure his employer that he wasn’t going to talk. But why?”

  9.

  The sweet fragrance of blue spruce filled the apartment when White stepped off the elevator from his office. Leslie was seated cross-legged on the floor in front of the fireplace, admiring her Christmas tree. “What do you think?”

  White surveyed the fourteen-foot tree Leslie had special ordered from a grower in Vermont. “It’s a little smaller than I expected,” he said with a smile.

  Leslie grinned innocently. “I didn’t want to overdo it.”

  Christmas was Leslie’s special time, and each year Leslie’s decorations become more lavish. The seasonal scenes she created on the deck facing the river were legendary. Every year the deck was featured in one or more local newspapers and brought a nightly flotilla of boats.

  “What are you going to do for decorations?”

  “I think I’ll manage,” Leslie said, tilting her head to indicate a dozen boxes of assorted sizes piled against the wall. Every year she celebrated Christmas with new ornaments and a different theme.

  “What are we doing this year?” After five years, White had finally learned to stay out of the way.

  “This year we’re going retro. I found a place that carries all kinds of old-style ornaments. The whole tree will be covered with bubbling lights.”

  White smiled and shook his head.

  “What?” Leslie demanded happily.

  White laughed. “You and Christmas.”

  “Just you wait,” Leslie said, returning to the arrangement of the Christmas tree skirt she spent the past year painstakingly embroidering. Each year she embroidered a new tree skirt, which was later sold at a charity auction on New Year’s Eve. Last year, her tree skirt had enriched the local drug treatment center by a thousand dollars.

  “I’m sure it’ll be beautiful.”

  “You bet your ass.”

  White wandered to the breakfast bar. “Would you like something to drink?”

  “Some white wine would be nice.” Leslie stood and crossed the room. White smiled at the sight of her breasts bouncing freely beneath her thin silk pullover. “Like what you see, sailor?” she asked as she slid onto a stool by the bar.

  Sherlock followed her and sat at her regular post at the end of the breakfast bar from which she could watch both White and Leslie. Food could come from anywhere. It paid to be prepared.

  White opened a bottle of chilled white wine and poured a glass for Leslie before opening a can of Diet Pepsi for himself.

  Leslie sipped her wine. “What was your day like?”

  “I went to see Graham’s son at the county lockup.”

  Leslie waited.

  “I don’t know,” he said in response to her unasked question. “He wasn’t very willing to talk at first… but he came around when I threatened to walk out and leave his fate in the hands of a public defender.”

  “So he’s not entirely stupid.”

  “Not entirely,” White agreed. “But he’s not in touch with the reality of his situation either.”

  “How so?”

  “Old story. What’s he doing in jail? He didn’t do it.”

  “Did he? Do it, I mean.”

  White shrugged. “Too soon to tell. He’s involved, but I have a feeling there’s a lot more to this than a simple drug bust.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. Right now, it’s just a feeling, but Harry agrees.”

  Leslie took another sip of wine before responding. “Harry has good instincts about that sort of thing.”

  #

  Graham Brochette answered his private line on the second ring. “I hoped I’d hear from you today, Lucius,” Brochette began without preamble. “Sometimes I hate caller identification. Doesn’t anyone say ‘hello’ anymore,” White thought as Brochette continued. “Do you have anything yet?”

  “Not much. Just some background.”

  “Have you seen David?”

  “I went over to the jail this morning.”

  “How is he?”

  “As well as can be expected. He’s anxious to get out.”

  “That’s hardly a surprise.”

  Something in his voice, something that White knew but couldn’t define, caught White’s attention. “He’s afraid.”

  Brochette waited longer than expected before responding. “Afraid of what?”

  “Afraid of being in jail.”

  “Oh?”

  White waited, certain that Brochette knew something he wasn’t saying. He also knew he couldn’t force Brochette to reveal anything he wasn’t ready to discuss.

  Brochette broke the silence. “But they denied him bail at his arraignment.”

  “Is that what he told you?”

  “I told you, I didn’t talk to him. That’s what his mother said when she told me he’d been arrested. Isn’t that right?”

  “Not exactly. The state’s attorney asked for two-hundred-fifty-thousand. I asked for a new bail hearing, and we got lucky. The judge had a cancellation on his calendar, and Paul Parker agreed to an expedited hearing tomorrow morning.”

  “That’s great,” Brochette said. Relief permeated his voice. “I’ll put up whatever bond is necessary.”

  “There may be more to it.”

  Anxiety returned to Brochette’s voice. “What’s the problem?”

  “David doesn’t have any ties to the community, and he’s facing serious jail time. He’s an obvious flight risk.”

  “Can you get him released into my custody?”

  “Maybe,” White said. “But that would mean disclosing your relationship to David. Admitting you have an illegitimate son won’t exactly help your nomination.”

  Brochette paused as if the problem hadn’t occurred to him. “I… appreciate your concern.”

  “It could
get messy if anyone wanted to block your nomination.”

  “I… know.”

  “Before we commit to disclosing anything, we need to figure out a few things.” For ten minutes, Brochette listened somberly as White summarized his interview with Shepard and Harris’ theory that the drugs had been planted as part of a set-up.

  After a long pause Brochette concluded, “Harry is probably right.”

  “Probably,” White agreed.

  “We have to get him out of jail.” Brochette’s tone made it clear that he was now speaking as an attorney rather than just as a concerned father.

  White paused, considering what to say next. What does he know that he isn’t telling me? White had represented lawyers before, and it was never easy. They all thought they knew everything and questioned every decision. Worse yet, Brochette was a prosecutor who clearly did know criminal law. But his experience was in federal court. Although customs and practices in federal and state court are similar, experience in one isn’t always applicable to the other. White needed to establish the right relationship with Brochette early in the case.

  “If you want me to represent David, you’ll have to accept the fact that I decide what is and isn’t important.”

  As he waited for a response, White could imagine what Brochette was thinking. United States Attorneys are accustomed to being the final authority in their cases.

  “Okay,” Brochette finally agreed. “But he could be in real danger.”

  “What danger could he be in as long as he’s in jail? If someone is out to hurt him, jail would be the safest place for him.”

  “I know, but he’s…” Brochette suddenly stopped. “Never mind.”

  “He’s what, Graham?”

  “It’s nothing. Just promise me you’ll get David out of jail.”

  “That may not be possible.”

  “Why not?”

  “He’s charged with a major felony. The courts take these kinds of drug charges seriously down here.”

  “I am a United States Attorney. Surely you can convince the judge to release him into my custody?”

  “Except you aren’t a parent. Only his mother is, and I doubt if the judge will release him to the custody of a parent who lives outside the jurisdiction.”

  “But I am his father.”

  “Only right now nobody but you and his mother know that.”