The Long Fall

by Daniel Quentin Steele

  “And you and the state will have saved maybe $300,000 to a half million in the expense of a trial, appeals, all that crap. Everybody wins.”

  “Everybody except Marques Douglas.”

  Deaven gave me what was intended to be a hard look.

  “Who the fuck is Marques what’s his name and what the hell does he have to do with me?”

  Smith gave him one of those “how can you be so stupid looks” and then looked at me and dropped his eyes. He knew how it was going to go down.

  “Marques Douglas was the eight-year-old whose brains you and your brothers sprayed all over the walls of his bedroom. He was a kid that wore Spiderman pajamas and wanted to be an astronaut when he grew up.”

  Deaven looked almost human for a second but gave it up as wasted effort, shrugged and leaned back.

  “Oh. Well, the kid’s gone now. Putting me under the ground isn’t going to bring him back. And it was an accident anyway. We had no way of knowing anybody would get in the way of a bullet.”

  “So, it was just an accident, his getting killed? You didn’t plan on killing anybody?”

  “No. Somebody could get killed, but we were sending a message to those assholes what could happen if they didn’t get out of our territory.”

  “You almost sound like you believe that. But why am I surprised, Deaven? You’re the brains of your outfit. Nigel and Rashon like to play like they run things, but they couldn’t blow their noses without your direction. You pull the strings, Deaven, and you always have.”

  “So?”

  I pulled a tape recorder out of my pocket and laid it on the table, hit the play button.

  “...yeah, we knew the Browns had some rug rats in the house. At least two or three of them. That’s why we concentrated our fire on that back bedroom. That’s where we were told the kids slept.”

  “Why the hell were you gunning for kids? Why not go after the Browns. They were the ones poaching on your territory?”

  “That’s Deaven. He’s the smart one. He said with any luck we’d get one or two of the rug rats. It would be better than hitting one of the dealers. You can always replace a dealer and everybody knows it comes with the business. But you hit their kids, you take their heart out. That’s what he said, you take their heart out. And you send a message to the next crew that will make them think twice.”

  I hit the off button. Deaven had recognized his brother’s voice.

  “That mother-fucking idiot, that stupid son of bitch, my brother or not, I’m going to cut his frigging head off.”

  Smith put his hand on Deaven’s shoulder and when Deaven shot him a deadly glance just gave him one as nasty in return and said, “Cool it. Shut up for a second.”

  Then to me: “You know Nigel could have been angling for a deal by throwing his brother to the wolves. And the deal still makes sense.”

  “No. No deal. We go to trial.”

  Deaven stood up in his chair, pushing it back. He looked like he was going to lunge across the table at me until Case laid one huge mocha-colored hand the size of a baseball catcher’s mitt on his shoulder and Deaven remembered where he was.

  “We what? You can’t. Not when I’m willing to plead. Tell him Smith. You said he couldn’t turn down a deal.”

  Smith looked at me and said, “I don’t really see where you can pass it up, Maitland. You’re talking about hitting the taxpayers for maybe a half mllion, for what? For revenge against a guy who’s going to be put away and no danger for more than a generation.”

  I just shook my head.

  “I can and I will. We’re going to trial.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  “Like I said, I can and I will. I talked to my boss about it before I came down here and he’ll go along with whatever I decide. Money is not the point of this.”

  Deaven looked at me as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

  “Then why?”

  “To make absolutely certain that you die in prison, that you never get out”

  I looked at him and smiled.

  “I want to be certain that you never breath air as a free man again for the rest of your life. I want you to live a life that would drive lab rats to suicide. Your brothers are murderous thugs and I want them dead too, but if I had to choose, I’d have let them walk to get you.

  “I want you dead because you don’t deserve to live. You’re a mad dog, and mad dogs get put down. You’re a fucking monster and I think I’m going to attend your execution to make sure you die and I may drive a stake through your heart just to make doubly sure that you’re really dead.”

  He stood up and this time he would have lunged across the table at me except that Case was behind him with both huge hands on his shoulders and he froze. He knew what Case was capable of.

  Then, as if he had turned a switch inside him, he suddenly relaxed and sat back down. He looked at me and smiled. I felt a little chill run through me.

  “Okay, you got me Mr. Maitland. You’re going to convict me and I’m going to get death and I’m going to Death Row in Raiford and I’ll get three good meals a day and exercise and fresh air in the yard and my boys to watch me to make sure I don’t get shanked. I’ll watch TV and read the newspaper and time will pass. I might even get out someday if they end the death penalty.

  “Yeah, I’ll read the paper every day, especially the obit section. And someday, I’ll see an obit on your wife. And then on your son and daughter. And your parents. And any friends you’ve got. ‘Cause I got friends too, asshole. And you can’t watch your family and friends 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Sooner or later, my friends will get them because I won’t have anything to do but plan and scheme how to get at them.

  “You think you’re so damned tough. The Angel of Death. Bullshit. You’re just a punk lawyer. You’re not going to be able to stop it and I won’t because I got nothing to lose. And I’m going to leave you for last. I want to see if you’ll have the balls to off yourself once I take away everything you care for in this life. If you don’t, I’ll send someone around to finish the job. By the time I’m through, you’ll thank me.”

  He grinned again.

  “Oh, I hear your wife is a hot piece of ass. Just ‘cause I like you, before I have her killed I’ll have a couple of friends of mine visit her. One of them is a real freak...15 inches long and thick. He could have made it in porn but he’s got kind of a—sadistic streak—if you know what I mean. He likes tearing his women up. I’ll let him do some anal surgery on the bitch. I’ll have a video made and make sure you eventually get a copy.”

  Anthony Smith just stared at him as if he’d forgotten how to talk.

  Deaven smiled at me again.

  “You’re probably taping this, but who cares? You’ll never be able to prove I was actually behind any of this and even if you do, so what? They can’t execute you twice and I don’t think they’ll even do it once. So, Mr. DA, Mr. Angel of Death, how tough you feeling right now?”

  I just sat there and gave him the best poker face of my life. I didn’t want him to know that he’d shaken me, because if I’d ever read a human being, I read him as being absolutely, 100 percent truthful. And the worse part was, he didn’t need to have geniuses working for him. As he’d said, you can’t protect anyone 24-7, forever.

  I looked up at Case who stood over Deaven with an unreadable expression.

  “Case, put him in one of the special holding cells. No contact, no phone calls with anybody. Nobody except yourself or somebody you trust is to have any contact with him.”

  Case nodded and yanked Deaven to his feet. Deaven didn’t resist, just said, “You can’t keep me isolated forever. I only need five minutes with one of my own, and your family is gone.”

  I thought briefly about asking Case to twist his head off, but these cells were monitored. I couldn’t get away with murder, or ask Case to commit murder. But I was tempted.

  Smith just rubbed his hands after they’d left and tried to avoid looking me in the eye.


  “I’m sorry, Maitland, I never expected that. But he is a real psychopath. As bad as any I’ve ever been around.”

  I stared at him when he finally looked me in the eye.

  “Smith, I think you’re an honest man. So don’t take offense at this. If word of this gets out, and his friends get the message and I can’t be sure it was Deaven, I’m going to come for you. If anybody in my family is hurt, I’m going to kill you. It doesn’t matter where you run or hide. I hope you believe me.”

  He just nodded.

  “It’s okay, Maitland. If it was my family, I’d do the same. I represent these scumbags, I’m not one of them.”

  After I left I went back into my office and sat behind my desk and thought briefly about making a phone call. I knew they could get to him, even inside the jail, and I couldn’t be connected to it. But—

  It was like riding a tiger. I could call for a favor, or favors, from a very bad and powerful man who had what he considered a code of honor that compelled him to help me if I needed help. But once I used those favors, I would be in his debt. I would not own him. He’d own me. And I couldn’t live like that.

  I had some time. I’d try to think of another way. In the meantime, I had an errand to run that might make this visit to my office my last official act. Because I might be a felon myself within a few hours.

  Thursday, July 21, 2005 -- Noon

  “Thank you for working me in, Evelyn.”

  “It’s nothing, Debbie. You’ve been my patient and my friend for a long time. I’ll have those blood samples out to the lab today and we’ll have results back probably in 48 hours, at most 72. Say next Tuesday or Wednesday. Tell me again why you’re here?”

  “I...it’s hard to put into words. I’m—I’m all over the place. There are times when I feel alright and then for no reason I’ll be crying. I feel like I’m having my period every day, or PMS-ing all the time.”

  Dr. Evelyn Crider leaned back and took a deep breath. Debbie thought that one of the reasons they had probably bonded was because Crider was also stacked and a looker and more than once they had laughed as Crider talked about the impossibility of getting the husbands of patients to look her in the eye while she discussed their wives’ health. And they had mutually decided that American men, all men, were just walking penises with little brains attached for mundane things like bringing home paychecks.

  “Debbie, we’ve known each other long enough that I can be straight with you. What you’re describing is a perfectly normal reaction to what is happening in your life right now. You’re going through a divorce ending a long marriage, you just broke up with your boyfriend, your daughter is pissed with you and moved out, and your son moved out too. I don’t know any woman that wouldn’t have crying spells going through a time like that.”

  Debbie shook her head.

  “It’s more than that. I don’t know how to describe it. I know I feel bad about Bill and I splitting. And everything else hurts like hell. But....it’s like...I can’t describe it except to say I feel like the world is about to end, or that I’m going to die. It’s a....blackness...inside me. I feel like I’m on the edge of a tall building and I’m about to fall off.

  “And....I’ve started having those nightmares again.”

  Evelyn sat up straight in her chair.

  “About Clarice?”

  “Yes. If anything, they’re worse.”

  “I’m not even a psychiatrist, and I can tell you why they’re back.”

  “I know, God, I know. Her marriage and life went into the toilet and it looks like I’m following in her footsteps. I know everything will eventually turn out right, but it’s scary.”

  “Did you ever talk to Bill about them? About everything that was happening with Clarice? About the feelings you were having?”

  “No. I couldn’t. He was always involved in cases. And there was nothing he could have done. The bastard, Not that he would have done anything. Because it was something I needed, not his precious clients. The son of a bitch.”

  Evelyn sat back again and stared at her patient.

  “Do you ever listen to yourself, Debbie, when you’re talking about Bill?”

  Evelyn stared at the examining table she sat on.

  “Yes. I know...there’s something there. I’m the one leaving him. He never did anything terrible to me. I’m the one that was cheating on him. In a real way. I never touched Doug—oh, sexually anyway—until our blowup, but I was having an emotional affair. I knew it at the time, even though I couldn’t be honest with myself. And he’s the one that got crushed.

  “But still, I hate him sometimes. Jesus, Evelyn, when your marriage just rots away and it’s like a big old oak that is so eaten away that the first strong wind knocks it down, you’re not supposed to have any strong emotions left. You’re supposed to feel apathy, to feel nothing. You’re not supposed to hate the poor bastard you’re leaving behind.

  “That’s another reason why I wanted to see if my hormones might be way out of whack. Messing up my mind....?”

  “Honestly, I don’t think it’s hormones or body chemistry. There would be other signs and indications. Normally problems with hormonal chemistry don’t manifest only in psychological or emotional symptoms. They mess with your body as well, and you don’t seem to be showing any of those symptoms.”

  “So you think I’m just going crazy?”

  Evelyn reached out and grabbed Debbie’s hand.

  “I don’t think you’re going crazy. I think...something...is going on. And I think you need to talk to a true professional. Here.”

  She let go of Debbie’s hand, went to the supply closet at the side of the examining room and came back with a business card.

  Debbie looked at the name on it and shook her head.

  “No. He knows Bill and he works with Bill. I’m not going to tell him all my secrets.”

  “He’s a good man. And a friend. And a complete professional. I never told you this, but a few years ago Alan and I were going through....some problems. I went to see this man and it took a little while, but I was able to figure out what was happening between us. We managed to patch things up.

  “He’s a criminal psychiatrist...he works with the criminal system.”

  “No, he’s a psychiatrist, period. He has private patients with no connection to the courts.”

  “I don’t know...”

  “Debbie, trust me. I’ll call him and try to get him to work you in for a preliminary meeting this afternoon late. Look, you know there’s something wrong. If it’s more than just the crap of seeing 20 years of your life disintegrate, it might help to talk with a man who is good at figuring out what’s in your head.”

  Evelyn made the appointment for 3:15 p.m. As she walked out of Crider’s office, Debbie couldn’t help feeling it would be a mistake. But, maybe it wouldn’t be.

  Thursday, July 21, 2005 -- 12:15 P.M.

  I walked into the hallway where there were a row of offices. It was lunch time and most if not all of the professors were grabbing lunch. I’d checked to make sure of that. Only one was in his office, waiting for a call from the Clerk of the Court’s office about an unpaid traffic ticket, which he’d said he had no knowledge of.

  The secretary for him and two other professors sat at her desk. She was supposed to be gone to lunch. This was a complication. Carlos and Ernesto walked in behind me and stood on other side of her desk. She looked at the three of us with no alarm, at first. Then as she saw my face she reached for the telephone on her desk.

  Carlos shook his head and gently took her hand off the phone. She had started to rise but sat back down, looking from one to the other of us. I gave Carlos a glance and he just nodded at me. I walked toward the first closed door. I rapped on it with my left hand. I rapped again.

  “What is it, Carly? Carly? Is that you? I’m waiting on a call. Just come in.”

  I knocked again and a third time.

  The door opened and Doug Baker stood there looking at me for a momen
t before what he was seeing began to register and his body started to respond. He was bringing his hands up because he must have seen in my eyes what was going down. But he was too late and despite his training too slow.

  I whipped my right fist around and a second later felt a satisfying crunch as the brass knuckles encasing my fist crushed his nose. He would have screamed but all that came up was a gulp as he swallowed air. As he fell backwards I followed him, hitting him as hard as I could just under his solar plexus with the brass knuckles.

  The blow took the wind out of him and the pain must have silenced him for a second. All I could hear was his harsh breathing. He fell backwards and would have gone over his desk but I grabbed him by the shirt and rolled him, so I could get a clean shot at this kidneys. I hit him hard, twice, the way Carlos had told me.

  I was prepared to kick him in the balls from behind but he swung an elbow around and caught me on the side of the head. It dizzied me for a second and before I could shake it off he’d swung around, come off the desk and I couldn’t block a punch I saw only for a second before the world exploded around my left eye.

  Now I was the one who could have screamed if I could have gotten my head straight long enough. Red and white streamers ran across my vision and the light was dying. I closed my eye in panic. It wasn’t so bad looking through one good eye.

  Fortunately I saw the next punch coming and was able to move my head just far enough that he didn’t take my head off, just glanced off my forehead and left a ringing in my ears as I fell backwards and tried to catch myself on one of the chairs near the entrance to his office.

  He put his hand to his nose, which was a mash of blood, and muttered, “You broke my nose, you bastard.”

  Another punch caught me on the other side of my face and tore some skin off. He must have been wearing a ring, the asshole.

  I managed to get my arms up as Carlos and Ernesto had taught me and blocked his next few punches. As he drew back his right again, I managed to block with the brass knuckles catching his fist and this time he screamed.