Contempt: A Legal Thriller

by Michael Cordell

  A stadium-sized parking lot stretched out in front of the prison: city traffic was a good half-mile away, but the sight of free people driving wherever they damn well chose stirred desire in him. He scanned the area past the reporters’ camera flashes and waving hands, ignoring the barrage of questions designed to provoke him. He only looked forward, and for only one face.

  His breath caught when he spotted Hannah next to her car about thirty yards away. He stopped abruptly, as if he’d run into an invisible barrier. She was an apparition, an image of hope, as her white dress and auburn hair were bright in the sun. She looked like everything Forsman wasn’t. She was leaning against her car but stood straight when their eyes met, at first clasping her hands in front of her, then letting them hang by her side, and finally holding them pressed together in front of her mouth as if saying a prayer.

  Her ’82 Honda Civic was a hodgepodge of clashing colors: the right rear door was midnight blue, the hood black, and the rest of the body a faded yellow, except for a belt of rust along the chassis. It was a car that would have been equally at home in a prison lot or a demolition derby. When he’d been shipped off to Forsman five years ago, she had been driving a brand-new pearl-colored Saab.

  Thane regained his momentum and walked toward her. When he finally got close enough for her to hear him, he nodded his head back toward the reporters and all of their cameras.

  “I don’t want to do this in front of them.”

  She glanced toward the reporters, then nodded and went around the car, sliding her slim frame behind the steering wheel. Thane pulled on the locked passenger door; Hannah fumbled as she tried unlocking the door, accidentally lowering one of the back windows first, then finally managing to let him into the car.

  She put her hand on the key, but instead of turning it, she simply stared straight ahead.

  “I was afraid I’d never see you again,” she said, her voice cracking.

  “I’m sorry I stopped seeing you,” he finally said. “But when I thought there was no chance of ever getting out, I just wanted you to—”

  She turned quickly to face him. “Don’t apologize. You never have to apologize to me for anything. You did nothing wrong.” She wiped the back of her sleeve across her eyes. “You did nothing wrong.” She caught her breath, holding it tight.

  “I know all of this is very sudden,” he finally said. “And I’ll understand if you want to take things slow. I can find another place to stay for now if you’d like.”

  She shook her head, although her silence made him wonder if she had considered this option as well.

  “Are you sure? I don’t even know where you are in your life,” he continued. “I just don’t want to make this difficult for you.” He looked away, gazing out the passenger window, his ghostlike reflection in the glass staring back at him, trying to figure out who he was.

  “It shouldn’t be difficult,” she said.

  “It shouldn’t. But it’s been a long time.”

  “Would you rather be alone?” she asked.

  “I’ve been alone for five years.”

  “Then let’s go home.”

  He nodded, feeling as though he was already halfway there.

  She turned the key and the tired engine coughed its way to life. The reporters raced toward their news vans, breaking down tripods and equipment as they scurried across the parking lot to follow. Hannah’s car approached the final barricade leading off the prison grounds and the guard raised the bar, allowing her to depart without slowing down. The bar then lowered, and the reporters found themselves in a traffic jam as the uniformed guard conducted a methodical review of the first vehicle. Apparently, the prison preferred the press not talk to their inmates, which was just fine by Thane.

  Driving south on the 110, Hannah merged into an exit lane five miles from their turnoff, toward an unfamiliar and rather menacing section of town. Thane’s mouth tightened. She’d had to move.

  Hannah glanced over at him. “It’s fine.”

  She drove through a part of the city that wasn’t yet lost to violent crime, but Thane could tell it was nearing the tipping point. Every fifth or sixth house looked either abandoned or condemned, and there were more pawn shops than convenience stores.

  They pulled up to an eight-story brick apartment building, an indistinct square with windows, a front door, and an exterior that could have been designed by a five-year-old.

  “Don’t be disappointed when you see it,” Hannah said. “It’s a little small, and old, but it has a lot of character.”

  Thane hesitated, then got out of the car, following her through the building’s front entrance. After Forsman, living under a bridge would have been an upgrade for him, but it cut him to the core to see where Hannah had landed.

  After Hannah pushed the button for the elevator, the door only opened part way, forcing them to slip into the car sideways. The ride to the sixth floor was slow, the rancorous hum of the motor and the grinding gears making conversation difficult even if Thane had been able to think of something to say. He had been conditioned by years of self-imposed silence, and now he felt as though his command of language had abandoned him.

  They stepped onto Hannah’s floor and entered her apartment. Thane couldn’t help frowning.

  He looked at the tiny kitchen, where every flat surface was covered with robin’s egg linoleum. He walked over and glanced out the kitchen window that led to a rusted fire escape platform, trash dumpsters in the alley directly below.

  Her living room was dark, partly because the shades were still drawn, perhaps an effort to repel the squalor outside. But her place would have appeared dingy even with open windows on the sunniest of days. The once-emerald blue sofa had obviously seen other living rooms in its day—possibly even the dump. A pale red reading chair, peppered with beer stains and cigarette burns from years and families gone by, sat angled next to the sofa.

  But surveying the living room more closely, he noticed familiar touches: a teacup on the floor next to the reading chair, a bowl of green apples on the lopsided coffee table, a Cherokee throw pillow on the sofa. Plywood shelves stained a dark green and stacked on cinder blocks resided unevenly in the corner of the room. One thing that hadn’t changed: a wide array of Hannah’s favorite books stood on the top shelf, arranged alphabetically as they had been in the old house.

  But the most noticeably absent items were photographs. The mantel over the sealed-up fireplace and the scarred coffee table each displayed a few personal items––a round rock, a ceramic tile from Paris, a tiny metal bird––but no pictures. This was Hannah’s world where no one else was allowed inside, even in celluloid.

  Yet here Thane stood.

  “It looks like you,” he said.

  “Old and worse for wear?”

  “No. Warm and inviting. Safe.”

  She smiled slightly but looked as though she could cry. “I picked up some things for you at the drugstore,” she said. “Toothbrush, stuff like that. I also got you a couple pairs of pants and shirts. I wasn’t sure if you were the same size, since I hadn’t—anyway, I didn’t get you much. I’m sorry, but when I moved here, I gave away your clothes. It wasn’t that I had given up. I just . . .”

  She halted for a moment. “Are you hungry? I could fix you something.”

  “What I want most right now is to wash Forsman prison off me. But after that, something to eat would be good.”

  “The bathroom is down the hall on the left.”

  As he walked past, he lightly touched her shoulder, uncertain of his right to make closer contact yet. When he got halfway down the hall, she called out.

  “Thane? Welcome home.”

  He turned toward her and tried to speak, but he could only offer a half-nod. He had imagined hearing those words hundreds of times while lying on his prison cot, playing them over in his mind like a favorite record. She couldn’t have
said anything more beautiful. He wanted to respond, but instead he turned and went into the bathroom.

  He switched on the light and shut the door, studying the doorknob’s lock as if it were an alien artifact. Slowly pushing the button until it clicked, he continued staring at the door. A room that he himself could secure. The concept was still strange in his mind.

  How long would it be before he no longer noticed things like this?

  A bath towel and washcloth were on the seat of the toilet for him, another reminder of the civility of the world he had re-entered. He picked up the towel and held it to his face, breathing in deeply. The softness of the cotton and the allure of its lemon scent reminded him of his wife and a gentler existence.

  He turned on the shower, removed his clothes, and stepped into water that was actually hot. It took him a moment to realize he could shut his eyes without fear, although he still didn’t totally close the shower curtain, leaving a two-inch gap so he could glance out into the room if need be. He stood motionless, content to hide within the water’s warmth and security for as long as he could.

  Hannah prepared pasta and a salad, and Thane limited himself to one glass of wine, although he poured a generous glass. They talked some during dinner, often lapsing into a silence that would have seemed unusual in their earlier life. They frequently looked at each other and sometimes smiled, strain and comfort mixing together.

  As the evening grew dark, the atmosphere turned uneasy as neither one appeared comfortable suggesting it was time to go to bed. They sat at the table long after the food and drink was gone. Thane assumed Hannah was struggling like he was, trying to think of the right thing to say.

  Eventually they both rose, Thane following her cue, and took their plates to the sink, where they gazed at each other intermittently, carrying on a broken but intimate conversation with their eyes. Hannah then stepped forward and put her arms around Thane’s waist, softly resting her head against his shoulder. He wrapped his arms around her, and neither one could let go.

  All of the awkwardness and hesitancy of their reunion dissipated in this embrace. It was as though they had each been trying to find words to bring them together, but there was no language that could convey their feelings for each other. It was only through touch and the warmth of flesh that he could find a starting point upon which to begin building. After holding each other for several intense minutes, they finally stepped back, turned off the lights, and headed to the bedroom.

  Hannah changed into an elegant silk nightgown that embraced her curves, wrapping her like an exquisite gift. They spent their first night together holding each other, offering an endless series of tender kisses, each one opening up Thane’s heart a little more. Hannah spoke in whispers, words of love and loss, fear and gratitude. Her words came easily now in the dark, and as she spoke, Thane stroked her gently. His last five years had been spent in a world of metal and concrete and rock; embracing something so soft and warm seemed utterly foreign to him.

  She eventually fell asleep, but Thane found it difficult to surrender to the night, even without blazing fluorescent lights and clanging prison sounds. He simply wasn’t ready to let go of his first night of freedom. It had taken him too long to get here to simply roll over and close his eyes.

  There would be plenty of time for them to pull their lives back together. Plenty of time to get to know each other again. But that thought stoked fear: he wasn’t the same man she’d met fifteen years ago. Once she saw who he was now, would she turn away from him?

  His insides tightened. He knew one thing for certain: he would do everything in his power to get them back to where they were before his conviction. But he didn’t want to think about it now. All he wanted, in this quiet, content moment, was to lie in that room, listening to the sound of his wife’s tranquil breathing.

  CHAPTER

  SIX

  Thane and Hannah meandered along the beach, close enough to the Santa Monica Pier to hear a Michael Buble song playing from a restaurant while the ocean waves tried their best to hush him. Walking arm-in-arm, they tightroped along the water’s edge, navigating by moonlight in the night’s gloom.

  They hadn’t gone out much in the month since his release, although recently they were venturing out a bit more, realizing they couldn’t stay secluded in their apartment forever, tempting though that was. Without acknowledging it, they gravitated toward places shrouded in darkness, such as the beach at night. After one uncomfortable experience in a movie theater, when an entire row of people got up and moved once Thane walked in, they started slipping in after the previews began.

  They ambled along the beach, animatedly debating the merits of the movie they had just seen.

  “You are so wrong!” Hannah said.

  “Oh come on—that part was totally unbelievable,” Thane said.

  “It was a children’s fantasy, not a documentary.” She shook her head and laughed.

  “Still, give me a break. When that monkey ran over and grabbed the key to the lock—”

  “It was a movie! When you watched Harry Potter, did you grumble when the kids rode flying brooms?” She lowered her voice, impersonating a muttering Thane. “I know I never had a broom that could do that.”

  As Thane laughed, Hannah stopped walking and gazed at him warmly.

  “What?” he said.

  “That’s the first time you’ve laughed in a month.”

  He smiled. “I’ve been waiting for you to say something funny.”

  She punched his arm. “Uh-huh. Nevertheless, it’s nice to hear.”

  They leaned against each other as they faced the ocean, looking up at the night sky. Gazing out over the dark water, Thane could make out the stars that were usually blanketed by smog. A light coastal breeze whispered across their faces, and the steady stroking of the waves made conversation softer.

  “Beautiful night,” Hannah sighed.

  “You have no idea,” Thane said.

  He paused for a moment, gazing upward. “One of the things I missed most in prison was seeing the stars. We weren’t allowed outside at night. Some people say the night sky makes them feel insignificant, but try never seeing it. Then you’ll know what insignificance feels like.”

  Hannah turned towards him. “That must have been hard,” she said.

  “Everything was hard.”

  He stared up at the stars a moment longer. “Sorry. I’m really not standing here just feeling sorry for myself.”

  “I wouldn’t blame you if you were. Maybe it would help if you talked about it more often.”

  “Maybe,” he said, as he put his arm around her, turning them back toward the pier, “but not tonight. It’s too perfect of an evening. Come on, let’s get something to eat.”

  They strolled to a small diner a couple of blocks off the beach, the old-fashioned kind with a neon sign, a Formica counter, and one row of booths covered with cherry red Naugahyde running alongside the window. A booth at the far end was just opening up, so they made their way past the customers sitting at the counter and slid in.

  In the next booth over, a big man in a tight leather vest narrowed his eyes at Thane as they took their seats. He looked like a human Humvee, with a broad red face and lamppost arms that stretched the sleeves of his Harley-Davidson T-shirt. A nightclub bouncer, Thane thought, or a drug dealer.

  Or maybe an ex-con, like him.

  A middle-aged, heavyset waitress with flame-red hair walked over to Thane and Hannah’s booth. “What can I get you two? Afraid it’s too late for the special.”

  The big man next to them leaned out of his booth and called to the waitress. “Yo, Miss.”

  The waitress glanced at him. He had enough food to feed a family of four in front of him, along with a full bottle of beer. “Just a sec, hon,” she said, turning her attention back to Thane and Hannah. “But everything on the menu’s special anyway, that’s what
I always say.”

  The man’s voice bellowed this time: “I want my check now. I ain’t sitting next to a murderer.”

  The diner fell silent except for the sound of dishes clanking in the back, although it was only a moment before that, too, went quiet. Hannah turned around and looked over the top of the booth at the man behind her. “Hey screw you, you ignorant—”

  Thane reached over and touched her arm, turning her back around toward him. “Let it go,” he said as he slid from the booth. “Come on. To be honest, I don’t really want to eat next to him either.”

  Hannah looked at Thane, then slid out of the booth as well, continuing to glare. “You’re lucky I didn’t want to get my hands dirty,” the man said as they passed. “Otherwise I’d break you in half.” Hannah and Thane kept moving.

  The man once again leaned out of his booth. “That’s right—take your bitch and run away.”

  Thane stopped cold, his pulse suddenly pounding in his temples. Before he knew it, he was striding back towards the big man, who was now standing, holding his beer bottle by the neck, primed for a fight. As Thane approached, the man raised the bottle to swing, but Thane struck first, driving his right fist into the man’s trachea faster than a striking snake.

  The man staggered back against the booth and fell onto the seat, gasping for air as he lay on his back. The bottle of beer tipped over onto his chest, its contents spilling out all over his T-shirt. Thane reached into the booth and yanked the muscleman up by his ponytail until he was sitting upright.

  “I didn’t kill anybody, you dumb son of a bitch—but don’t think I don’t know how,” Thane growled. He grabbed the steak knife off the table and pressed the point of it against the other man’s throat as he gasped for air.

  Hannah grabbed Thane’s arm and tried pulling him away, but she wasn’t strong enough to budge him. Thane leaned closer to the trembling man. “I don’t give a damn what you think of me,” Thane said, “but you speak to my wife like that again, and I swear to God I’ll gut you.”