It was the same room that she was shot in when she was four years old.
She remembered a lot about that day. Mostly she remembered the pain in her leg, the searing ache of the shotgun wound. She remembered her mother’s scream, remembered hearing four gunshots, and then blacking out. She woke up in the hospital, and that was where her father told her that her mother was deceased.
That news was more painful than the gunshot wound on her leg.
The man’s face was etched into her memory; his dark features, his piercing eyes, the scar on his left cheek. The African American that broke into their house had watched her father’s car drive out of the driveway and thought the house was empty. He thought it would be an easy break and enter on an isolated property, an easy steal.
The next time she saw the man’s face was in the courtroom at his trial. Her father was furious that the man pleaded not guilty, pleaded his innocence, even though he admitted to being in the room and firing the weapon. It was an accident, the man complained. Manslaughter, he told them.
That moment was a turning point for her father; the moment that his discontent morphed into pure hatred.
Caylee often thought hatred was too soft a word for the way her father felt. It was a loathing, a revulsion, an absolute disgust for any person of color.
Her father funneled that hate into a group called the White Alliance Coalition, but it never gathered much support. The media groups came to him for sound bites on any race conflict in Chicago, but the White Alliance Coalition never had many members. It was more of a front for her father’s hatred than it was a way to motivate the masses. They held regular monthly meetings. At most, they had twenty attendees, but recently, they were struggling to get five people to voice their animosity. Most had moved on or joined other white supremacy movements; the movements that inspired action.
It had been fifteen years since she had set foot in a courthouse, fifteen years since that guilty verdict, and she hated the idea of going back. She silently sobbed through her mother’s killer’s entire trial and cried even more when the man was found guilty of her mother’s death.
Her father was due to take the stand tomorrow.
She wasn’t looking forward to that; the media coverage, the reporters at their gates, the chance that her photo might make the paper. She had to make sure that she laid low until it all blew over.
She heard her uncle’s truck rumble up the gravel driveway. Her father stormed into the house first, slamming the door behind him but coughing louder than usual. He didn’t even greet her before he went to the nebulizer machine that helped him breathe.
His time was coming, they all knew that, and it wasn’t far away now. He refused to go back to the doctors, preferring to spend his last months in the comfort of his home.
Her uncle didn’t follow him into the house.
Not long after her father started wheezing into the machine, she heard her uncle pounding the boxing bag that hung outside. It wasn’t training. The way he pounded the bag was pure aggression.
“What happened?” Caylee asked as her father turned off the machine, helped by the dose of medicine to ease his pain.
“A black guy hit Burt.” Her father grunted.
“In court?”
“What?” He walked to the fridge, pulled out a beer, and cracked it open. “No. Not in court. On the street!”
“Is Burt okay?”
“He’s fine, but that boy hit him! That stupid boy blindsided Burt. Burt wasn’t even watching when that dog hit him! What a dirty act! I should report him to the police!”
There was such anger in the house. Such hatred.
She stepped back from her father, retreating back into the living room. She didn’t like him when he was like this. It was hard to talk to either of them when they were like this.
Caylee had a decision to make.
She looked at the picture of her deceased mother sitting on the mantle and gave it a kiss before she went back to her bedroom.
This was it.
Her time.
Her time to make a change.
CHAPTER 40
There was a time for power and a time for patience. As a private investigator, Ray Jones understood that.
With his height, size, and strength, he much preferred using power to get the answers he wanted.
And that’s what he did.
Most people crumbled when intimidated by Ray Jones. He could talk the talk and walk the walk.
Getting the information he wanted wasn’t hard, nor was convincing people to turn on Chuck Johnson. Most people wanted nothing to do with the family. Jones started with Chuck’s small neighborhood, at the cheapest bar—where the seats where sticky, the lighting broken in places, and the bathrooms vandalized.
It was there he met an accountant drinking beer, avoiding his home. The one-man drinking machine was also a one-man business; he didn’t earn enough to employ a secretary. His cheap fees meant that he attracted cheap clients, and it soon became clear that the Johnson family was one of those. The man’s shirt was untucked, his pants had stains on them, and the few strands of hair that he had left were brushed over his bald patch. Even though he was alone at the bar, slumped forward on his elbows, he preferred it to going home and being told how much of a loser he was by his wife.
The more drinks Jones bought him, the more the accountant opened up.
Jones knew he could drink most people under the table, and by the fourth pint of Goose Island IPA, the man was talking freely. Jones guided the conversation to the use of passwords, and the accountant let it slip that he used one password for everything—the name of his first pet.
Within an hour of talking to a drunk man about his dogs, Jones had the password to unlock the information.
Two hours later, after he helped the man into a cab, he was at the accountant’s office in a small strip mall. There was a convenience store on one side, a used goods shop on the other. The only car in the lot looked abandoned, and the lights were turned out since it was after midnight. The accountant’s office had less security than a ghost town. Even the back door, with the lock already broken, was left open. With the knowledge of the password, Jones sat at the lone computer in the office and searched through the database’s files.
*****
Eight hours later, Jones waited at the defense table, still another hour before the court case was due to begin.
“Ray.” Hunter greeted his friend as he walked into the courtroom. “You look like you haven’t slept a wink.”
“I haven’t.”
Hunter approached cautiously. “What have you been doing?”
“I’ve been looking into the White Alliance Coalition.” There was hatred in Jones’ eyes, venom in his voice.
“Why?”
“They rubbed me the wrong way, and I’m like a cat. If I’m rubbed the wrong way, I like to get revenge.” He smiled. “And I did it.”
“You did what?”
“I found what we were looking for.” He handed Hunter a manila folder. “They have an accountant, and security wasn’t tight in the office.”
Hunter didn’t open the folder. “I can’t use this as evidence.”
“I called Mrs. Nelson this morning. She called me two days ago to talk about the case. Nice lady. Proud of her heritage, which is the same as my family. She gave me the information that confirmed everything in that file.” Ray indicated towards the folder. “Have a look at the information. Read it.”
Hunter placed his briefcase down, confused as he opened the report that was at least fifty pages long. “Is there anything incriminating?”
“Nothing that proves Amos is innocent, but page four has information that you’ll want to know.”
Hunter opened the file to page four.
And then he smiled.
CHAPTER 41
Hunter was still looking through the manila folder as the first witness of the morning walked in.
The information Jones had taken from the accountant’s of
fice was damning; it held secrets that certain people didn’t want exposed. He was thinking of a way to use them—how to get the information into the court record without using the documents that Jones had printed—when Lucas Bauer walked past him.
Lucas Bauer was the first witness for the day. That was good for Hunter—just after his second coffee kicked in. He instructed Esther to bring him a constant supply of caffeine, delivered in between witnesses, as the prosecution had Bauer, Chuck Johnson, and Reverend Darcy coming to the stand.
The day was Hunter’s Super Bowl.
Bauer’s suit was bright enough to force people to look twice at the blue color, his hair slicked back to the left, and his accessories glittering in the lights. It almost seemed appropriate for Bauer to wink at the jurors as he passed them.
Bauer had woken up next to one of the dancers from his cabaret show—after he promised her the world the night before. He promised that she would be a star, that he would be the one holding her hand as she tackled the bright lights of Vegas. She fell for him; convinced by his smooth talking, flashy displays of wealth, and conviction in his own power.
But in the morning, after he had received what he wanted, he couldn’t even remember her name.
Bauer was sworn in, and Law opened with her questions, fast and to the point.
“Thank you for talking with us today, Mr. Bauer. Can you please explain to the court your relationship with the defendant?”
“I’m the business manager for The Faith Healing Project. Amos is the main faith healer within the group. Actually, he’s the only faith healer we have in the group at the moment.”
Something didn’t feel right. Law was too confident. The smirk across her face was too broad.
“Do you have a personal relationship with Mr. Anderson?”
“I do.” Bauer turned and flashed his bright white smile to the jury. “We’re friends, and we’ve been friends for many years. I would call him one of my closest friends.”
Hunter didn’t like the angle they were taking.
“Who were you with on the night of February 1st?”
“I was with Amos. We had attended the seminar on depression together, where Amos had given a speech, as had Reverend Green. Reverend Green’s speech wasn’t much of a speech; it was almost a debate against everything that Amos had said earlier. I came to the seminar with Amos, and we left the building together as well.”
This was too rehearsed. Too clean. There was no thinking time between the questions and answers, and that could only mean that Law had spent a lot of time preparing Bauer for the testimony.
That was trouble.
Gripping his pen tightly, Hunter prepared for a new twist in the tale.
“Did you see Mr. Anderson and Reverend Green together that night?”
“Yes.”
“Where did you see them?”
“The first time I saw them together that night was backstage at the seminar when they got into a physical altercation outside the waiting room.”
“Did you break up this altercation?”
“That’s correct.”
Hunter felt the tension rise in the room. Bauer was going to make a play of his own.
“Did you see them anywhere else?”
“I did.”
“Can you please tell the court where else you saw them?”
“I saw Amos in the alley behind the Congress Hotel, where he was talking to Reverend Green. Amos asked Reverend Green to meet him in the alley after the seminar. Amos said that he wanted to have a quiet discussion with Green, away from all the cameras and the crowds, to try and smooth things over between them.”
Anderson’s mouth dropped open.
“That’s quite a revelation, Mr. Bauer,” Law replied, but she wasn’t surprised at all. “Mr. Bauer, I have a sworn police statement here, made two days after that night, that states you didn’t see Mr. Anderson and Reverend Green together after leaving the function. In the statement, you declare that you saw Amos near the alley, but that was all. Are you now changing that statement?”
“I said that to the police because I was defending my friend. I was scared for Amos, and what he did and what might happen to him. He’s my friend.”
“Do you expect us to believe the change in your statement?”
“I’m only telling the truth. I saw them in the alley together. Amos asked to meet Reverend Green there.” Bauer looked down, trying to pretend that he felt bad for what he had done. “The guilt was weighing heavily on my mind when I decided to tell the truth. It was too much of a cross to bear. I wanted to tell the truth, but I also wanted to protect my friend. In the end, after not sleeping well for a month, I decided to come forward and tell the facts about what I saw that night. I wasn’t going to lie anymore.”
Hunter threw his pen down. The disgust was clear on his face, as was the shock on Anderson’s.
Bauer wanted Anderson out of the picture—he was holding back his business plans. Bauer wanted to expand, advance the business, bring on more faith healers. He wanted to franchise across the country and across the world, but as an equal business partner, Anderson wouldn’t let that happen.
Bauer needed Anderson out of the business, and this was the perfect opportunity to make that happen.
“What did you see when you saw them together that night in the alley?”
“We had walked out of the seminar together, and Amos felt quite angry about the way that Reverend Green attacked him. I had never seen him so angry. We were walking down the street when we saw Reverend Green at the entrance to the alley. He was waiting for someone to come and pick him up. Amos went up to Reverend Green, but I told him not to go. He was so angry.” Bauer shook his head. “He asked Reverend Green to have a quiet word with him, away from the cameras, so they could sort out their differences.”
“What happened next?”
“It was dark, but I saw Reverend Green and Amos walk down the alley together. I waited at the entrance to the alley while they talked. I was checking emails on my phone while they went down the alley, so I didn’t see what happened.”
“Did you hear anything after they walked away together?”
“I heard a scream, but it sounded far away. It didn’t sound like it was close by, so I wasn’t too worried. I’ve heard screams before in the Loop, but I’ve never seen any trouble.”
“When was the next time that you saw Mr. Anderson or Reverend Green?”
“Amos came out of the alley and said he needed to catch the train home. I told him that I could give him a ride, but he said he wanted to catch the train. He seemed quite nervous, so I left it at that. I asked him how the conversation with Reverend Green went, and he avoided the question.”
“Did you see Reverend Green again that night?”
“No, I didn’t.” Bauer leaned forward to talk into the microphone. “I assumed he walked out the other end of the alley.”
“Did you check the alley?”
“No.” He shook his head.
“Do you have anything to gain by changing your testimony about Mr. Anderson?”
“I don’t.” He leaned forward. “In fact, it’s the opposite—I have everything to lose. He’s the star of my business and who knows what will happen if he’s convicted of murder,” Bauer lied. “I might lose everything.”
“Are you aware of the penalties that you may face now that you have admitted to lying to the police?”
“I am.”
“Thank you, Mr. Bauer, for your honesty. No further questions.”
As he stared at the paper in front of him, the sweat built on Hunter’s brow; it was quite the damning statement—Anderson’s business partner, his friend, was testifying against him.
Not only was Hunter fighting for the freedom of Amos Anderson, fighting against an almost impossible case, but now, he was also fighting a lying manager.
Not the way Tex Hunter had expected the morning to start, not the way he planned things to go.
But he had a secret weapon in th
e folder.
CHAPTER 42
Bauer looked supremely poised as he waited in the witness stand for the cross-examination. His hands were laid peacefully in his lap, his legs spread wide apart, and his shoulders were at ease. He felt like he was winning this game. He was invincible. Untouchable.
He had made a play, crossed his friend, and had planned to come out on top. In Vegas, it was commonplace, almost expected, to cross, double-cross, and triple-cross your friends. Using other people to get ahead was the way business was done, and Bauer was a master of convincing people to fall for his charms. It was only once he was unable to pay his debts to a casino boss, after three failed show ventures, that his life fell apart in Vegas. They took him for everything—even his pet goldfish was gone after they went through his house.
Moving back to Chicago was a new beginning, a fresh start, but a leopard doesn’t change its spots.
He had the opportunity to push Anderson out of the picture, and he took it.
After he was called to begin his cross-examination, Tex Hunter contemplated the case at his desk, thinking over the opportunity that lay before him.
“Mr. Bauer,” he began, questioning Bauer while still seated. “Can you please confirm where you were on the night of February 1st?”
Bauer had a growing smile. “Like I have stated previously, I was at the seminar on depression before I stood at the end of the alley behind the Congress Hotel, which is also where I saw Reverend Green and Amos interact. Are your ears painted on?”
“My ears function fine, Mr. Bauer,” Hunter replied. “And you state that you have nothing to gain by changing your sworn police statement?”
“That’s correct. In fact, I have everything to lose. My main income is from the Faith Healing Project.”
“Do you have any plans to expand the business and employ more faith healers?”
“Amos and I have discussed that; however, nothing has been put into action.”
Faith and Justice Page 19