The Rule of Law

by John Lescroart

  Beth again pulled herself in closer to the table, her voice barely above a whisper. “You told me during the last investigation that it wasn’t your husband’s gun that had killed him.”

  “Right.”

  “But he had the exact same kind of weapon that we found with him in the car.”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want to refresh me on all of that?”

  “It’s not too complicated,” Bina said. “Geoff was in Desert Storm at the same time as Ron Jameson—and, by the way, what is that guy going to have to do before people understand what an evil monster he is? Did you read about this poor girl he chased out of town so that she could get arrested and kill herself in jail? Sorry,” she cracked a small, apologetic smile. “Off point.”

  “No worries,” Beth said. “We’re pretty much in accord about him. So . . . Geoff and Ron, they were both in Desert Storm.”

  Bina nodded. “And they both picked up a couple of these guns. Who knows exactly how these things happen or how they got them home. Anyway, they did. They brought back two each. Souvenirs. Just a minute, I’ve got my notes here.” She dug into her purse and pulled out a few sheets of yellow legal pad paper on which she’d written her comments and ideas. “Here it is. The guns were all . . . this is the thing. They were all exactly the same type of gun, called a Tariq nine-millimeter. It was made over there in Iraq. Evidently, according to my brilliant analysis here, they’re basically the brother to an American-made gun, a Beretta M9.”

  “And both Geoff and Jameson brought two of them home each?”

  “Right.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, might one of them have brought only one home? Or kept three?”

  “No,” Bina said. “No chance. Right when they first got back here, after the deployment was over, sometimes they’d get together—actually, it was often the four of us—”

  “I’m sorry. The four of you?”

  “Me, Geoff, Ron, and Kate.”

  “Of course. Yes. The four of you.” The reminder of her friend Kate Jameson’s familiarity and comfort with guns sent a small shock wave running down her back. “Go on.”

  “Well, we’d all go shooting at the range some afternoons. You know, just for fun. And the guys would bring their Iraqi stuff along with their regular service weapons.”

  “And they had two of these Tariq guns each? And no more?”

  “No. It wasn’t like there was anything secret going on. We all shot all of them. Geoff had his two and Ron had his two. It wasn’t like anybody was hiding one or more of them. Plus, they talked about them. There was really never any question about who had what. Why is that such an issue?”

  “Because we’ve got a finite number of guns, four, that we’re dealing with. You had two of these last time we were at your house, in your safe. Are they still there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, two to go. Ron’s guns. One of them, he shoots Peter Ash on your boat that he’d borrowed, then throws the gun overboard into the bay, lost forever.”

  Bina whispered almost inaudibly. “Do you know that?”

  “I do. But I can’t prove it. Just bear with me, okay? All right. So we’re down to one Tariq left. This is of course the gun we found in your husband’s car. It has to have been Ron’s, because there’s no other option, but it has no fingerprints or anything else to put him together with it.”

  “But wasn’t Ron—I so remember this—wasn’t he at some deposition with, like, six other lawyers the whole night that Geoff . . . ?” She stopped and sighed again.

  “Yes, he was. No question. He has a foolproof alibi.”

  “I remember,” she repeated.

  “But Kate doesn’t,” she said.

  “Kate? No, Kate was my . . .” She stopped, her mouth all but hanging open in shock.

  “She was my friend, too,” Beth said. “One of my best friends. Have you seen her since?”

  “A few times, right after. Condolences—you know. Never since. How about you?”

  “Once. I told her I would come and arrest her someday. That kind of cooled off the friendship.”

  “So you’re saying she killed Peter, too?”

  “No. Ron killed Peter because he found out Kate had slept with him.”

  “Was that it?”

  “That was it.”

  “Fuck,” Bina said. “Unbelievable.”

  “I know. Isn’t it?”

  The pizza arrived and put the conversation on hold.

  Bina started in after she’d swallowed. “Ron told me that he’d turned both of his guns in to the city.”

  “He told me that, too,” Beth said. “But the city keeps close track of those things, and they had no record of anything like his guns in the log. I checked. And besides, it would have been only one, since he threw the other one in the bay. But there wasn’t just one gun, either. There were none. He never handed in any guns at all.”

  “So what are you going to do with all this?” Bina asked. “What’s different that you hadn’t known before I came here?”

  “The main thing is I think I see where I can cross Ron up, with him lying about getting rid of all of his guns. That could be huge. Beyond that, I wanted to make sure I had my facts straight on these guns. Next up, I’m going to get this file in front of the attorney general or the FBI or anybody else I can get to listen and make the case that Ron lied to a police officer when he told me he’d gotten rid of the guns and how he’d done it. We law enforcement types get a little snarky when we get lied to. Especially by the corrupt bastard DA. This is a couple of murders we’re talking about. I’ve got to believe somebody’s going to show an interest.”

  “If you need me again,” Bina said, “I want you to know that I’m willing to testify about any of this.”

  “That’s good to know, but be warned that it might be a while. The wheels of justice sometimes grind exceedingly slow.”

  “That’s all right,” she said. “I’ve already waited this long. I can go a little longer.”

  “That is so good to hear. And, Bina?”

  “Yes?”

  “I can’t thank you enough for agreeing to come down here and meet with me like this. I realize how brutal this is, and I’m just so sorry it took me this long to figure out how to stay under the radar and get these cases back on track. Just keep your fingers crossed that I can move it on down the line.”

  “I will.”

  “Don’t lose faith,” Beth said. “I’m going to make something happen.”

  “I know you will,” Bina said. “If only any of it could bring Geoff back.”

  31

  FINALLY, ON TUESDAY morning, the fog rolled in and the cold snap broke. By 7:30, when Chet Greene left his house out in the lower Sunset District, the temperature had climbed to a near balmy 54 degrees, shooting for a high of 62 after the marine layer burned off.

  The DA had reserved him for a morning pickup, because he was speaking at a Bar Association breakfast at the Olympic Club. But when Chet got to the Jamesons’ gorgeous home on Washington Street at 8:00 sharp, his boss didn’t come out the front door just as he drove up, as he usually did, so Chet pulled to the curb and waited.

  After ten minutes, he called Jameson’s cell phone, which rang twice before he heard the DA say hello.

  “This is Chet, sir, and I just wanted you to know I’m out front of your house whenever you’re ready.”

  “Sure. Thanks. But what’s up?”

  “I’m not sure what you mean, sir. You had an appointment, I believe with the Bar Association?”

  “No. I canceled that. I didn’t tell you?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Yeah. Well, if I went and talked to all these lawyers, all I’d hear about down there is this Valdez case and how I shouldn’t have second-guessed my cops about who killed him, so I decided I’d just blow them off. I’m tired of all that shit. I should have told you. Sorry. But since you’re here, how ab
out if I hitch a ride downtown with you?”

  “Fine. I’ll just wait out here until you’re ready.”

  “Two minutes.”

  • • •

  THE DA HAD barely settled into the backseat when he asked, “So are you having any luck with the Dockside stuff? I know what you told me about your meeting with Gina Roake, but weren’t you going to talk to some other folks about that, too?”

  Chet pulled away from the curb. “I was and I did—two of them, anyway—but I can’t say it was the most productive day of my life. One of them, Marcel Lanier, thinks Glitsky and Hardy walk on water, which is a little strange to me, hearing it from a lifetime cop, since Hardy’s a defense guy all the way. I mean, do you have any criminal defense attorney pals?”

  “I can’t say I do. But that’s really neither here nor there.”

  “No. I know.”

  “What about the other guy?”

  “Dan Cuneo, now running security at Bayshore Autotow. Completely different story. Couldn’t wait to testify for us as soon as we found something for him to talk about. Or maybe even commit some friendly little perjury if we asked him to. Hardy and Glitsky evidently got him blackballed for sexual harassment of a witness that went public in the middle of one of his trials. Ruined his career here in the PD. He’s still pretty bitter.”

  “I don’t blame him, especially if he didn’t do it. You get any feeling for that?”

  “Not really, no. These days, you know, you don’t have to do much to get slammed on that front. He might have said he liked her sweater or something, which she took to be a come-on of some kind.”

  “But he had nothing to give us?”

  “No. He wasn’t anywhere near the shoot-out. He just felt like somehow Glitsky was in it. And then Hardy’s client was down there, too—John Holiday, one of the victims—so Cuneo figured Hardy must have been involved in it, too. He had this whole scenario worked out about what he thought had probably gone down.”

  “Which was what?”

  “The short version is that Hardy negotiated a surrender of Holiday to Gerson but wanted Glitsky there to make sure it all played as it should.”

  “As opposed to . . . ?”

  “As opposed to Holiday getting himself shot trying to escape.”

  Jameson chortled. “That didn’t work out so well, did it?”

  “No, sir. But the bad news is Cuneo didn’t have any theory that fit with the other three dead guys, who all worked as Patrol Specials.”

  “Rent-a-cops. The diamond people.”

  “Essentially, yeah. But Cuneo didn’t think they were there about diamonds. His opinion was that somehow they got wind of Holiday’s surrender, when and where it was going down.”

  “How’d they learn that?”

  “Unclear. Some leak out of Homicide. Not me, I swear.”

  “Never thought it was, Chet. Go on.”

  “So theory one is that Holiday had evidence that these guys had mugged and killed David Freeman, and he was going to rat them out, so they decided they had to kill him first.”

  “And they just happened to show up at the same time as Glitsky and Hardy and Holiday and Gerson? This is getting a little thick.”

  “I know. Theory two about how these guys are involved is a little better, but not much.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “Gerson himself actually invited these Patrol Special guys along to back him up because he was afraid that Hardy and Holiday and Glitsky planned to ambush him, although Cuneo didn’t know why Gerson might have thought that.”

  “Hardy wanted to keep his client out of jail, that’s why. At the same time, Glitsky moves up to running Homicide and drops the case.”

  “Okay, maybe, except Lanier reminded me that Glitsky didn’t take over Homicide until way later. But, in any event, theory two doesn’t make sense, either, unless Gerson was dirty and tied up with these Patrol Specials, maybe even on a payroll someplace, which was unlikely, to say the least.”

  They stopped at a red light on Van Ness and both men went silent with their thoughts.

  When they started rolling again, Jameson said, “But even for this guy Cuneo, it’s all just theory anyway. He doesn’t have anything we can actually use. Any physical evidence at all.”

  “I’m afraid that’s true. But I’ve got a few more folks I thought I’d talk to as long as I’ve got your permission.”

  “Take as much time as you need. But while I’ve still got you here, is there anything at all you can think of that explains this John Holiday’s presence on the pier? I mean, we don’t have evidence that Glitsky or Hardy were there, because if we did, I’d be getting them indicted for murder right now.

  “But Holiday, no question, he was there. He died there. So did Gerson and these Patrol Specials. What was Holiday doing there? Did he have something to do with these Russian diamonds?”

  “I haven’t run across even a rumor of that. No, sir.”

  “Well, then, if not that, why was he there?”

  “All by himself, he was turning himself in to Gerson.”

  “Without his lawyer or anybody else to protect him? And out in the boondocks, where he is completely exposed? He had to have been smarter than that.” Jameson blew out in frustration. “At least Hardy must have been there, Chet. It’s the only thing that makes sense, given this Holiday character actually and in fact being there as part of the mix. And Glitsky tagged along because these guys run in a pack. Does that sing for you?”

  “Except we can’t put either Hardy or Glitsky there.”

  “Yeah,” Jameson said, his brow furrowed in frustration. “There’s that.”

  • • •

  THE HEAD OF the Crime Scene Investigation unit, Len Faro, had been living for a couple of months with the rumor that he was going to move up a rank to lieutenant. This would be a significant pay raise that would make his life better and his pension larger.

  When he got the call from one of the DA investigators, Chet Greene, wanting to talk about an old case, he said he’d be happy to, but in reality he greeted the news with mixed emotions. Greene’s boss had already interfered enough with Len’s department in the Valdez case, where he’d essentially shut down the investigation into the murder before Len had had a chance to analyze the real evidence that would or would not implicate or exclude the woman Mr. Jameson had summarily indicted while he played politics.

  Next thing Len knew, there was the “CityTalk” column, which was followed all too closely by the dismissal of Devin Juhle. That action had shocked Len to his core. He’d worked with Juhle since he’d come on in Homicide, and the man was competent, smart, honest, a straight shooter, and an all-around good guy.

  None of which had helped him keep his job when push came to shove.

  Although decisions within the police department were supposedly not subject to the whims of the district attorney, Len and many other of his fellow officers could not help but see Jameson’s fingerprints on the travesty that had gone down with Juhle. Len didn’t know all the details, but the timing was such that it all but inescapably had to do with Devin supervising the bringing in of a second suspect in the Valdez murder case. And, knowing Juhle, this was because they had something compelling on Adam McGowan.

  But because this was embarrassing to the DA, the clear message was that Juhle should have somehow kept that arrest from happening. He wasn’t being a team player. He’d let his inspectors run amok and hadn’t protected the DA’s reputation.

  Somehow.

  Never mind that Beth Tully and Ike McCaffrey—two stone-pro homicide inspectors—identified who was most probably the real killer of Hector Valdez.

  And now, just when Len Faro was getting used to the idea that this lieutenant gig might be in his future, Chet Greene was coming around to talk about some old stuff. Which meant DA stuff. Which meant politics and very probably an end run around due process.

  Shit.

  Len knew Greene slightly from his days in Homicide and didn’t have mu
ch of a feeling about him either way, which in itself was instructive. The terrifying thought briefly crossed his mind that Greene might in reality be coming by as an emissary to feel him out and maybe offer him Juhle’s former position, which would get him his raise to lieutenant’s pay, but under conditions that would range all the way from bad to awful.

  And then suddenly here was a knock on his open door and Greene, to his credit, stood waiting with an expectant expression until Faro waved him on in. “Have a seat,” he said. “I’m about to have my sixth cup of coffee and I hate to drink alone.”

  Greene broke a grin. “Isn’t six kind of a big number?”

  “It’s all relative. I was doing fifteen a day and my doctor thought it might be a good idea to cut down, so now I try to keep it under a dozen. Besides, this Keurig thing”—he pointed to a small machine set up on a file cabinet under one of the bookshelves—“it’s a miracle. Load up the cartridge, push the button, wait a half a minute, bang, you might as well be at Starbucks at a tenth the price. Did you say yes?”

  “Sure,” Chet said. “Living large.”

  “You won’t regret it.” He pushed the button. “So what can I do for you?”

  “Jameson’s got me looking at one of our old unsolved cases that’s come to his attention recently. The Dockside Massacre.”

  “Hmm.” Faro, killing a few seconds, scratched at his soul patch. “Good luck with that. I’d be glad to help you if I can, of course, but you’ve got to know that that one’s been beaten to death over the years. You might as well be trying to hook up with the Zodiac.”

  “I’ve been talking to some people already and that’s a little bit the feeling I’m getting.”

  “Why’s your boss interested now, after all this time?”

  Chet hesitated for a second before saying, “I don’t really know.”

  Len raised an eyebrow as his internal bullshit meter flew off the chart.

  “But some of it,” Chet went on, “just between you and me, he could use some good PR after the flak he’s been taking lately. He closes an old big cop-killer case and he’s a hero, at least for a while.”