“Did you send it?” Flan had asked me when the story first broke. He was standing next to me as I lay flat on my hospital bed.
“How could I have sent it?” I rasped. “I’ve been here the entire time.”
“But Scott hasn’t.”
“If I had Scott send it, I could be disbarred. I received that video in connection with my representation of the governor.”
“Okay, so you didn’t send it,” Flan said, nodding. “But whoever did send it turned out to be a kingmaker. And I think they did the right thing. I think Hawaii’s gonna be a better place with Wade Omphrey gone.”
John Biel seemed sincere enough. He promised during his campaign to fight for better education for Hawaii’s keiki, a more genuine equality for all races and ethnicities and orientations, and for the legalization of marijuana. And if he didn’t follow through, I vowed I would stand high up on the courthouse steps one day and call him on it. Because I’m best when I’m behind a microphone. Hell, while standing behind a bevy of microphones, I may even be immortal.
Maybe they should lower the drip on my morphine.
Miles Flanagan survived Election Day, too. So Flan would get to hear his father rant about Flan’s ex-wife, Victoria, for one hour, six days a week, for as long as it took Miles to die. Miles assured Flan he wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Iryna wasn’t going anywhere either. Not if Flan had anything to do with it.
Of course, plenty were dead, too: Oksana Sutin and Iryna’s friend Hannah, two beautiful young women who had merely tried to make better lives for themselves by putting their trust in dangerous men; Gavin Dengler; Tam and friends. In one way or another, they were all victims of Orlando Masonet. Or Thomas Sean Duran, or whatever the hell you wanted to call him.
Whoever he was, the scourge known as Orlando Masonet was now behind bars on enough charges to fill a phonebook. Lok Sun, too, was being held at the Federal Detention Center, as Special Agent Slauson and AUSA William F. Boyd meticulously built their case.
Tragically, after learning he was under investigation, Detective Ray Irvine took his own life with a single shot to the side of the head from his own service revolver. He left behind an ex-wife and a twelve-year-old son on the Big Island.
The man who’d tried to shoot Scott and hit me was dead, too. Shot and killed by Detective John Tatupu in the ensuing chaos in front of the courthouse. His name was Frankie “the Flash” Bianchi, so called because he was so fucking fast. But apparently not fast enough.
I’d always known John Tatupu was all right.
Even if he didn’t feel the same way about me.
* * *
“I’m being released today,” I told Scott over the phone.
“I’ll be there to pick you up and take you back to Ko Olina.”
“Not so fast. We’ve got one more job to do.”
CHAPTER 66
“It was originally Jansen’s idea,” I said to Turi in the darkness. “So I can’t take all the credit. If you remember, this was how he and Boyd planned on taking down Masonet.”
We stood on the runway of a small, rarely used airfield in front of a jet owned by the rap star M.C. WMD. While I was still at the Queen’s Medical Center, I’d called in a favor from Milt Cashman. When Milt heard the plan, he said, “Kev, you’re fucking crazier than I am. I like that in a lawyer. Give me ten minutes to call Mr. Fucking M.C. WMD and you’ve got yourself a jet.”
“We all cool inside,” WMD called from the plane. “Whenever y’all motherfuckers are ready, let’s jetty.”
“Hey, WMD,” I said over the roar of the idling engines, “you ever been shot?”
“Nah, man,” he said, revealing a mouthful of gold teeth.
“You ever been stabbed?”
WMD removed his sunglasses. “Nope.”
“Ever been arrested?”
“Nah, but there was this one time, man, I came real close. Hey, whatchu getting at?”
“And you call yourself a gangster,” I said, smiling.
WMD shook his head while smiling back at me. “Not Guilty Milty told me alls about you, Corvelli. A lawyer out there doing gangsta shit. But lemme tell you something, Counselor. Doing gangsta shit don’t make you a gangsta.”
“No? What does?”
He pulled out a wad of green the size of his head and said, “M-O-N-E-Y, money.”
I thanked him again for the favor, then turned back to Turi.
“How ’bout you, brah?” Turi said. “You gonna be awright?”
“Oh, yeah.”
Mindy, with Ema held tightly in her arms, said, “We could never thank you enough, Kevin.”
“It’s the other way around,” I said. “Now go get on that plane before M.C. WMD changes that platinum heart of his.”
When Turi and I were alone, we shared a brief hug. No more bear hugs, not for me. My chest was all stapled up and couldn’t take it.
“Mistah C, before I leave, I wanna clear the air, yeah?”
A cold dread suddenly crawled up my spine. What Slauson had begun to tell me outside Tam’s bar had been tugging at me ever since the verdict.
In that moment, I was sure Turi was going to tell me that the five large the cops had found on him was cash he’d picked up before entering Pearl City. That it was advance payment from Masonet for the hit on Kanoa Bristol.
My lips parted but I couldn’t speak. I wanted to hit rewind, to say goodbye and put Turi on the plane without ever having to hear him say he wanted to clear the air.
But it was too late.
Was Bristol the dirty cop who’d decided to come clean and back Tatupu’s allegations? Had I risked a good man’s life to save that of an assassin?
I thought about Dana Bristol and her two children. About Ray Irvine and his ex-wife and son. I thought about the hole in my own chest.
If I’d been deceived, it was by my own strategy. I had put the words in Turi’s mouth. I was the one who’d suggested to him that Bristol was going to put a hit on him that fateful night in Pearl City.
I stared over Turi’s shoulder at the plane. I had the power to stop this right now with a single phone call. Turi could still do twenty-five to life on the federal drug and racketeering charges if he remained in Hawaii. Why should I put my ass on the line for someone who lied to me? For someone who killed in cold blood.
Sometimes life just grabs you by the throat, I thought. Grabs you by the throat and chokes you and leaves you for dead on the floor.
I searched Turi’s wide, watering eyes and decided. I wouldn’t turn back now. Whether he’d lied to me or told the truth, Turi Ahina had once saved my life. And when it came right down to it, all I’d really done during the trial was my job. I’d fulfilled my duty. I’d won an acquittal. That was all I was ever supposed to do.
“I was scared,” Turi said finally. “I didn’t wanna tell you during the trial ’cause I didn’t wanna seem soft. But now I wanna clear the air. I was scared, Mistah C.”
I immediately felt my chest deflate and realized I’d been holding my breath. “That all?” I said above the sound of the engines.
Turi cleared his face of tears and managed one of the legendary smiles I would forever remember him for. “That’s all, Mistah C.”
I nodded. “For a moment there I was scared, too.”
“Well, I guess this is it, Mistah C,” Turi said as he backed into the darkness. “So say goodnight to the bad guy. Unless you wanna come, too. I’m sure WMD’s got an extra seat.”
It was tempting, of course. Running always is. But if I’d come to any realization at all during my mend in that Honolulu hospital bed, it was that I was through running. Hawaii was, and would always be, my home.
When I shook my head, the big guy acknowledged me with a grin, turned, and started his way up the ladder into the airplane, shrinking from my sight.
“Aloha,” I said softly.
When he finally disappeared into the jet, I knew I would never see my friend Turi Ahina again.
ACKNOWLE
DGMENTS
Last Lawyer Standing is being released during one of the most exciting periods of my life, largely because of a select group of people. To those who continue to be invaluable to my writing and career, thank you.
Special thanks to my brilliant editors, Kelley Ragland and Matt Martz, and everyone else at St. Martin’s Press, including, but not limited to, my publisher Andrew Martin, Hector DeJean, and Elizabeth Lacks.
I am deeply indebted to my literary agent, the extraordinary Robin Rue of Writers House, and her indispensible assistant Beth Miller.
Thanks also to those who, over the past year, have been incredibly generous with their time, advice, and support, including Vincent Antoniello, Stefanie Pintoff, Joel Price, Todd Ritter, David Rosenfelt, and Norb Vonnegut.
For her endless patience, understanding, love, and generosity, mahalo to my magnificent wife, Jill. And for brightening each day and night, thanks to my prodigious son, Jack Douglas, and my beautiful newborn daughter, Maya Kailani. Hawaii’s my home, but it’s you who make these islands my paradise.
Finally, to Dottie Morefield, who kindly joined (and rooted for) me at last year’s unforgettable Shamus Awards banquet, I offer my endless gratitude. I may not have left with the award for Best First Novel, but I did leave with a wonderful new friendship, which I hope will last a lifetime.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Last Lawyer Standing is a work of fiction that depicts a very different Hawaii from the one I know and love. When I began work on this novel, I didn’t know who would be serving as Hawaii’s governor when this book was released. Needless to say, the governor depicted in Last Lawyer Standing is a figment of my imagination and not based, in whole or in part, on any actual Hawaii governor, past or present.
Likewise, the Honolulu Police Department depicted in this novel is not the same department that protects and serves my island home. The mention of the Kenneth Kamakana case against the City and the County of Honolulu is mentioned solely to add authenticity to the story.
Honolulu’s Chinatown is a lively place that boasts one of the greatest cultural experiences in the Hawaiian Islands. It is in no way, shape, or form the dark and frightening place depicted in Last Lawyer Standing.
In crafting this novel, I attempted to remain as true as possible to the laws and geography of the state of Hawaii. But I did bend both when I felt that it better suited the story. As a lawyer and a novelist I’ve learned that on occasion the truth must take a backseat to getting a point across.
ALSO BY DOUGLAS CORLEONE
Night on Fire
One Man’s Paradise
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DOUGLAS CORLEONE is a former New York City defense attorney and winner of the Minotaur Books/Mystery Writers of America First Crime Novel Competition. He now lives in the Hawaiian Islands with his wife and two children. This is his third novel.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
LAST LAWYER STANDING. Copyright © 2012 by Douglas Corleone. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.minotaurbooks.com
Cover design by David Baldeosingh Rotstein
Cover illustration by Steve Gardner/Pixelworks Studios/www.shootpw.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Corleone, Douglas.
Last lawyer standing / Douglas Corleone. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-0-312-55228-2 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-01487-0 (e-book)
1. Defense (Criminal procedure)—Fiction. 2. Hawaii—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3603.0763L37 2012
813'.6—dc23
2012014697
e-ISBN 9781250014870
First Edition: August 2012
Last Lawyer Standing Page 24