A Midnight Clear

by Libby Howard

  Chapter 12

  “Here’s our plan.” Justine rubbed her hands together. “I hope you don’t mind, but I enlisted Jorge in our caper.”

  My eyes grew wide, because I certainly hadn’t told Judge Beck that Justine and I were planning to break into an office in a prominent law firm.

  She waved her hand. “Oh, I didn’t tell him that part. I just said I needed a reason to go to SMS&C today, and that I wanted a reason for them to have us upstairs waiting for a while unattended.”

  That didn’t allay my fears one bit. “And he didn’t ask why?”

  She grinned. “Jorge has learned never to ask why. The plan is this: we’re going to SMS&C to pick up some files Jorge requested from Trent Elliott. Trent has meetings until four, so he’s expecting a courier then.”

  I shook my head, not understanding.

  “We’re showing up at noon, when Trent is in his meetings and the files won’t be ready. Everyone will panic and they’ll stick us in a conference room while they try to figure out what files I’m there to get. It will give us time to do our investigative work.”

  “But your husband is a district court judge. Not to be rude or anything, but unless Trent Elliott has clients that might involve misdemeanors, traffic court, civil cases, or domestic violence, I can’t see his staff getting into a panic over not having files ready. They’ll just tell us to come back at four, or that they’ll courier them over later.”

  “Trent does handle the occasional civil case as well as landlord/tenant disputes with large apartment complexes, but that’s not why people jump when Jorge picks up the phone.” Justine’s smile was downright impish. “His family has money. He went to Harvard Law. He clerked with a supreme court justice. He knows people, and one phone call can put a stumbling block in someone’s career. Not that he’d do it, but they don’t know that.”

  I blinked at her in surprise, immediately wondering why her husband’s name wasn’t on the list of candidates for the appellate court opening.

  Justine laughed. “I know what you’re thinking. He doesn’t want it. He loves working at the county level, deciding cases first-hand. He loves his job and has absolutely no interest in climbing the judicial or political ladder. It’s not like he needs the money, and what he lacks in ambition, his sister more than makes up for.”

  Hers was a better plan than any I’d come up with. Worst case scenario, we end up spending the afternoon doing a courier job for Judge Sanchez. Best case scenario, we find evidence in the office adjacent to the bathroom that might help the police find the real murderer.

  Actually, worst case scenario we get caught snooping in an office that we broke into and get thrown out, although from what Justine had just said about her husband’s connections, I doubted that would happen. We’d just end up with a babysitter while they found the files, and we’d find it near impossible to attempt our caper again.

  So we better make this work.

  We got into Justine’s zippy little sports car and headed into the capital. I had a strong sense of déjà vu as we passed in front of the eight-story building and parked in the lot in a spot marked for guests and clients.

  “This is the most excitement I’ve had in five years,” Justine whispered as we entered the building. “And that includes the time Jorge agreed to take Salsa lessons with me.”

  I couldn’t imagine the couple burning up the dance floor with their sexy moves, but what did I know? We opened the doors to the office building and entered the atrium which seemed absolutely enormous without a hundred people crammed into it. Our shoes clacked on the marble floor, echoing around the cavernous room. A security guard watched us as we approached the receptionist desk and wrote our names in the visitor’s log.

  “I’ll need to see identification and know who it is you’re visiting.” The receptionist’s crimson lips widened in a smile, but she was clearly assessing us and making a quick judgement about how much bowing and scraping she’d need to do.

  The pair of us fumbled in our purses for our licenses. Justine got hers out first.

  “Justine Sanchez to see Trent Elliott.” Justine’s voice was cool with a disinterested superiority. “I’m picking up some files for my husband, Judge Sanchez.”

  The magic words made the receptionist up the wattage on the smile. She gave Justine’s license the barest glance, then handed it back before looking at mine. I considered dropping Judge Beck’s name, but decided against it, figuring “landlady” wouldn’t garner the same respect as “spouse”.

  “We were on our way to lunch when Jorge called,” Justine added. “Kay was kind enough to agree to this detour. Hopefully it won’t take long.”

  “Of course, of course.” The receptionist handed me back my license, her head bobbing so vigorously it looked as if it might fall off her neck. She picked up her phone and dialed, her fingers beginning to tap nervously on the desk. With an apologetic glance, she dialed another number.

  “Martha,” she hissed. “Where’s Mr. Elliott? I’ve got Judge Sanchez’s wife down here to pick up some files.”

  I didn’t hear was the response was, but the receptionist looked close to panic. Justine looked at her watch and sighed, shaking her head with an expression of mild disgust.

  “Okay. Okay. I’ll do that. Lunch. They were headed to lunch. Yes.” The receptionist hung up the phone, her wide smile strained. “It seems Mr. Elliott is still in his eleven o’clock meeting. His assistant, Martha Wicks, would like to provide you both with some prosecco and antipasto while she locates the files for you.” She fumbled for a pair of visitor’s passes. “Please take the elevator behind the stairs to the second floor, then take the first hallway to your right to the conference room. Martha will meet you there with refreshments while you wait. I promise it won’t be long.”

  We took the visitors’ passes, and Justine sighed once more. “I was hoping he would just bring the files down to us. This is so inconvenient.”

  I nodded sympathetically. “The club will hold our reservations. I don’t mind waiting a bit, Justine. I know how important your husband’s work is.”

  Hopefully that wasn’t too over-the-top. I wasn’t used to hobnobbing with the rich and politically powerful. Yes, Eli had been a surgeon, and we’d been on our way to probably more wealth than any of these judges, but we hadn’t had political clout, and we’d never run in these country club circles either. Even if Eli hadn’t been in the accident that changed both our lives, I doubt we ever would have run in the country club circles. Eli was too busy with his career and social climbing wasn’t his thing. Mine either, although I was getting a kick out of this whole charade.

  Justine and I headed for the elevator, chatting about the weather and some charity event that I wasn’t sure was a real thing or not. As soon as we got into the elevator, Justine began to giggle.

  “Not bad for the daughter of a Filipino seamstress and a Mexican convenience store owner, huh?”

  “Seriously?” I chuckled. “My dad was a cop and Mom was a homemaker.”

  She smiled, as if the memories were fond ones. “They met in New York City, and we lived there until I was seventeen. Five of us in an efficiency in Queens the size of a closet. The few nights when my father wasn’t working, he’d cook and the whole floor would be filled with the most amazing smells. Summer evenings we’d open the windows and I’d fall asleep to the sound of the sirens and traffic. Don’t get me wrong, small town living has some perks, but I miss the city with all the hustle and bustle. And I truly miss Dad’s cooking.”

  The elevator opened onto the second floor and I had no time to ask her about whether her parents were still alive or still in New York. Justine the judge’s wife was back, and we walked down the hallway as if we owned the place, halting long before the conference room where, no doubt, Martha was frantically getting food and bubbly together while trying to reach her boss.

  I slowed a step by the restroom but kept going. Office first, because it would be a whole lot easier explaining us being in a r
estroom than in a private office.

  Justine pulled two metal pieces from her pocket and with a quick poke and twist, the door was open.

  “I don’t want to know who taught you that,” I murmured.

  “Learned myself.” She ducked inside the office then motioned for me to follow, softly closing the door behind us. “Jerk of a landlord up in Queens was always changing the locks if we were a day late on rent. Totally illegal, but bullies like that don’t care. Everyone in my family can pick a cheap door lock in less than a second. I’ve got no idea how to do the expensive electric ones, but these interior office door locks are stupidly simple.”

  It was a good skill to have. I made a mental note to invite Justine to our Friday night happy hour on the porch events, and to introduce her to Daisy and the others. She’d absolutely fit in with my friends.

  The office was spacious with a huge window overlooking the street, a giant mahogany desk complete with a cushy executive chair and gold-plated desk accessories. Three bookshelves were on the wall that adjoined the restroom, and what I assumed was a closet door on the opposite wall along with six tall filing cabinets. The room was painted a light gray with several framed abstract prints strategically placed on the walls. The floor was that expensive vinyl that looks like oak, a gray and white checked area rug under where the guest chairs sat.

  On a hunch I went to the desk, pulling a pair of surgical gloves out of my purse and using them to keep any of my fingerprints from getting on the desk drawers as I pulled them open.

  “Looks like I’m not the only one with a larcenous past,” Justine joked.

  “I learned everything I know from episodes of CSI.” As I pulled out one of the bottom drawers, I motioned to Justine. “Check this out.”

  She looked over my shoulder at the brand-new white shirts in the drawer. “Oh, they all do that. Sometimes they work through the night and just freshen up for the next day, or they’ll need to put a new shirt on because they dribbled mustard down their front during lunch. Jorge has some stashed at work. I’ll bet there’s a few suits in the closet as well.”

  I shut the drawer and went to the closet, using my gloves once more to turn the handle. Sure enough, inside were two suits—one charcoal and the other black, and a pair of men’s dress shoes. I scanned the black pants for any blood stains and couldn’t see any in the dim light of the closet. What I did find was a dry cleaning tag attached to the jacket, but not the pants.

  There were plenty of innocent reasons a man might get his jacket dry cleaned but not his pants on the same suit. There was also one not-so-innocent reason. Someone trying to save money might decide the pants might not require cleaning, but Trent Elliott wasn’t the sort who would need to be worrying over a few extra dollars. For a man who wore suits every day, grabbing the set made more sense than leaving the pants behind.

  I frowned, thinking for a moment. What would I do if I were the killer? Assuming I removed my jacket downstairs, followed Rhett Reynolds upstairs and caught him snooping… Blood would be on my shirt and pants, and probably my shoes. I’d pop into my office, change pants and shirt, hope the bow tie wasn’t blood-splattered, then put on my clean jacket once I was back downstairs. If I didn’t have shoe-shine products in my office, I could use my bloody pants to wipe my shoes off, or even change to a pair I had in the closet, then rejoin the party.

  Of course, that all depended on having a way to get into my office without tracking blood through the hallway carpet.

  Making a beeline to the wall the office shared with the bathroom, I began to examine the bookshelves, hoping one would swing out just like a secret entrance on Scooby Doo, and reveal a door to the bathroom. That’s when I saw something that made the hair rise on my neck.

  “Look at this,” I whispered to Justine as I knelt down and pulled out my cell phone. There, at the edge of a bookcase, was a bit of red, on the floor. It was barely noticeable, and if I hadn’t been examining the bookshelves for secret passageways, I never would have noticed it.

  “Is it blood?” Justine frowned. “Maybe we should call the police.”

  “Check out the scuff marks and indentations on the floor,” I went on. “This bookshelf wasn’t always here. I’d say it was about a foot to the left. And these books are all clean, the shelf dusted where the other shelves aren’t.”

  None of them were obviously dirty. It was the faint sort of dust that builds up over a couple of weeks when the cleaning service only does the bare minimum. This shelf had more books on it than the others, and there were spots on the other bookcases where it looked like books had recently been removed.

  I tried to be careful as I hurriedly removed books from the one bookcase and put them into the others. Then I scooted it aside to reveal where the drywall ended and a door began.”

  “Bingo,” I said in a hushed voice.

  “We’re taking too long,” Justine mentioned softly. “That Martha is going to come hunt us down in five, so hurry it up, girl.”

  I ran my fingers down the edge of the door but didn’t find a doorknob. Of course, they would have removed it when they converted the restroom from private to office use. I thought it was funny that they hadn’t bothered to drywall over the door, but I guess a budget was a budget.

  “I think that mirror is on the other side of this,” I commented. “Does it swing out or in? I’m guessing it opens into the restroom, otherwise Judge Reynolds wouldn’t have been able to get in the office without pushing the bookshelf over.”

  Rhett Reynolds was no slacker, but he didn’t look like he’d be able to push a heavy wood bookcase, even one without a whole lot of books on it, aside. Or would he? I grabbed the edge of the bookcase and tugged, surprised at how easily it moved. Was it on casters? Or maybe it wasn’t solid wood after all?

  Moving the bookcase revealed a hole where the doorknob had once been. I reached through and felt something hard on the other side. The mirror, I was guessing.

  “Hurry up!”

  For the first time I was hearing a bit of fear in Justine’s voice. I pushed the bookcase back, rushing to replace the books that had been there.

  “Let’s go,” I told Justine. I needed to think about this, and time was not on our side. Hopefully I could work through my mental gyrations while we ate antipasto and drank prosecco, because I wasn’t sure we’d get another opportunity to examine this office.

  We raced for the door, Justine pausing to carefully peek out before giving me the sign that the coast was clear. She clicked the lock on the door before shutting it, and we fast-walked our way down the hall, trying to control our panting as we got to the conference room.

  I got the impression that we were five seconds from Martha coming to search for us. For a woman who’d had no advance warning at all, she’d put together a nice spread. Food was laid out on little blue dishes. Tiny plates with tiny silverware and tiny napkins embossed with the law firm’s initials were neatly placed in front of two chairs. Bubbly sat open in a silver container filled with ice, a monogrammed cloth around the neck of the bottle. Martha let out a relieved breath and gave us a nervous smile, moving to pour the prosecco.

  “I can’t believe we ran into John in the hallway,” Justine announced. “What a surprise that was.”

  “He’s really aged since I saw him last,” I replied. I was catching onto this whole thing. It was like doing improv in theater class back in college.

  Justine shrugged. “Well, that’s to be expected, dear.” She turned to Martha with a smile. “Is this for us? How very nice of you. I hope you can locate those files of Trent’s soon, though. We’ve got reservations at the club. I hate to be more than half an hour late. It’s so rude, you know.”

  I turned a laugh into a cough, and snatched up a glass of prosecco, taking a quick sip. Martha entreated us to enjoy the food and drink, then practically ran out the door. Justine and I took our seats and helped ourselves. It was almost ten minutes on the dot when Martha came dashing in, two files in her arms.

  “Mr.
Elliott apologizes that he wasn’t here to give these to you himself. He says he misunderstood Judge Sanchez and didn’t believe they would be picked up until later this afternoon. Again, our sincerest apologies for making you wait.”

  “Oh, no bother at all.” Justine stood and took the files from her, sliding them into her designer tote. “We enjoyed your hospitality here, Martha. I’ll make sure I tell my husband how helpful you were, and how you went out of your way to make sure we didn’t miss our lunch.”

  The woman practically glowed, her shoulders relaxing with relief. And then she put a total hitch in our plan by kindly escorting us from the conference room and down the hall. I exchanged a quick glance with Justine, then headed for the restroom.

  “Think I should probably stop off here before we head to lunch,” I announced as I pushed the door open.

  “Oh, good idea.” Justine hesitated in the doorway. “Thank you again, Martha. We’ll just freshen up a bit, then leave our badges with the receptionist. Have a lovely day!”

  The door shut as a conflicted expression settled on Martha’s face. Poor woman. Hospitality and policy probably dictated that she escort us out, but following us into the restroom and hanging around while we took care of biological and cosmetic matters would be rude and seem as if she didn’t trust us.

  Luckily Martha didn’t follow us in. I waited a few moments as Justine ran some water in the sink and flushed the commode for effect, then I peeked out into the hallway.

  No Martha.

  “Here,” I pulled more surgical gloves out of my purse and handed a pair to Justine.

  “How many of these do you have?” she exclaimed, eyeing my bag as if it a magical device.

  “Boxes,” I told her. “My husband was a surgeon and he used to bring them home all the time. They were handy for when we were redecorating the house—painting or staining furniture. Eli always liked to wear them when he was cleaning chicken or patting out hamburgers and joke about how the kitchen was just another surgical suite.”

  She tilted her head. “Husband? I just assumed you and Nathaniel…”