Thriller Box Set One: The Subway-The Debt-Catastrophic

by Dustin Stevens

  Shane looked down at the card, back up to each of them. “Thanks for the heads up.”

  Murphy and Ryan stood before him for several long moments of silence, all three faces grim. The officers both nodded and slid past, leaving Shane standing in the corner, his stomach twisted in knots. He remained rooted in place, his mind running over everything he’d just learned.

  After a moment, he forced his legs to start moving again, back to where the Bentleys and Abby stood waiting, all three watching him. Before he got there, Hanson Byers crossed his path long enough to hold up a business card between his index and middle finger, his arm bent at the elbow so the card rested below Shane’s nose. He didn’t say a single word, or even look at Shane as he went, just another curious member of the public there to watch the proceedings, not a journalist trying hard to uncover a story.

  Shane accepted the card without acknowledgement, his momentum still carrying him forward as he looked down at it in his hands. On one side was the Columbus Herald logo, with Byers’ personal and office contact information. On the back were four words written in blue ink.

  Sherman’s Bar, 7 o’clock.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  There were three things that always came to mind when Shane thought of home, three things that no matter how hard Boston tried, it just couldn’t replace. The first, without fail, was his mother. The sad fact was though that his mother had been gone for a long time, a shell of her former self. He missed her every day, as any son would, but even more so in moments such as these when he could use her guidance. It had been painful for him to even list her as his supervising attorney on the case, a reminder of what was and never would be, but he’d had no choice. She was still a licensed attorney in the state, and while he knew plenty of law school classmates that he could have asked to ride shotgun, he didn’t feel right doing so.

  What had happened to Heath and Prescott only served to confirm the decision.

  The second thing he missed was Ohio Tech football. Leaves changing, crisp air pouring in after a humid summer, thousands of people filling the streets on game day, tailgates that started at sunrise and continued well after midnight, depending on the opponent. During undergrad he never missed a home game, only a small handful throughout law school. Sometimes Christine would join him, sometimes random people from class or the dorm, once in a great while he’d even go alone, it didn’t matter.

  The third thing he missed about being gone, the one thing he tried the hardest to replace in Boston, but just never could, was the Shermanator.

  Tucked away on a side street three blocks from campus, Sherman’s was a local legend that had become a national phenomenon. The place had started two decades before when brothers from Tennessee hung up their cleats for the last time with OTU, but decided they loved Columbus so much they weren’t going to leave. Instead, they called in some favors and scraped together enough money to open a corner pub, serving beer on tap and burgers off the grill, nothing more.

  Over time, the bar and its menu expanded, becoming a hidden gem that people spoke about in hushed whispers. The transformation began with the expansion of the bar, offering over one hundred different ales on tap. It took on a life of its own though when the oldest brother handed over kitchen duties to an up-and-coming chef and a new menu was born.

  People began flocking in from miles around for the burgers, ranging from the mushroom Swiss to the foie gras burger served between two doughnuts, drawing the attention of national audiences on the Food Network and Travel Channel. The single item that drew in the most though, that stood out above the others, was the Shermanator.

  Stacked high, the burger entailed two twelve-ounce hand formed patties, bacon, sautéed mushrooms and onions, ham, a fried egg, hot peppers, cheddar, provolone, and American cheeses. It was a heart attack on a bun, a monolith to all that people loved and hated about America.

  Shane made it a point to eat at least one a week for seven years.

  The moment Byers handed him the card, the first thing that entered Shane’s mind, ahead of what Byers could be wanting or what he was about to say to Abby and the Bentleys, was the Shermanator. For two solid hours it jockeyed for the prime position in his head, popping up as Shane tried to prepare his cross-examination questions for Kenny Walker the following morning, a fact that made him both hungry and ashamed.

  At a quarter to seven, Shane left the library and went to Sherman’s, arriving a few minutes early to find Byers already sitting at the bar, a half-drunk beer in front of him, watching a Celtics game on television. The smell of charred meat and fried food hung heavy in the air, bringing with it a swirl of memories.

  The walls were covered in OTU memorabilia, covering the expanse from autographed football jerseys to discarded pom-poms. Almost every other square inch of the place was decorated in either faded Polaroid’s or graffiti, added by patrons with whatever writing implement they had available.

  Shane nodded to the hostess as he walked in, he the only one in the place wearing a tie, and took a seat next to Byers at the bar. Byers was leaning forward with his elbows resting on the polished wood, his beer halfway to his mouth. He lowered his glass a few inches away from his face and glanced over at Shane, nodding once.

  “Thank you for meeting me.”

  Shane nodded in response, motioning for the bartender, a young girl in her mid-twenties with hair pulled back into a ponytail. She walked over with an expectant look on her face, sliding her gaze the length of Shane before offering a smile. “What can I get for you?”

  “I’ll have whatever he’s having,” Shane said, motioning to Byers, “and a Shermanator.”

  The girl gave a look of approval, nodded, and moved away as Shane settled in, leaning forward to match Byers’s pose. “So what’s this all about?”

  Byers paused a moment before lowering his beer, looking at Shane through the glass behind the bar. “Maybe nothing, I don’t know. Just doing a little fishing here.”

  Shane paused a moment, regarding Byers reflection, before shifting his attention up to the game where the Celtics were leading the Heat late in the third. In the background he could hear the bartender shouting out his order, the sound of beef sizzling on a grill. “Why me?”

  “You’ve been pretty fair with me so far,” Byers said. “I know working the federal court beat isn’t the most glamorous thing on the planet, most attorneys treat us like scum. You’re pretty tight lipped, which I can respect, but you seem like a decent guy.”

  “Still doesn’t answer why me,” Shane said, nodding at the bartender as she sat the beer in front of him and retreated. He picked up the glass and took down a heavy pull, a summer ale with a hint of orange.

  “Because I’m sick of working the court beat, and I think there’s a story to what’s going on with your team.”

  Shane’s hand stopped mid-drink, lowering itself to the bar as he swallowed the half sip in his mouth, tasting nothing. He put the beer back down on an old Jose Cuervo cardboard coaster and stared at Byers in the mirror, the older man doing the same.

  “What do you know about that?”

  “I know Heath Wilson’s truck blew up earlier this week and almost killed him and I know a few days later Alfred Prescott, by all accounts one of the nicest men that ever lived, was found in his driveway, his leg shattered. I also know that in both instances, some sort of message was spray painted on the ground, but CPD covered it before anybody outside the force could see it.”

  Shane’s face betrayed nothing, the lawyer in him pointing out every warning sign that this situation presented, telling him to proceed with caution. “That’s still not a whole lot.”

  “I also know that both Wilson and Prescott were working with you when this case started, and now they’re both lying in hospital beds.”

  “Hmm,” Shane said, forcing himself to take another drink of his beer, to look up and check the score of the game. “And what is it you’re looking for from me?”

  “Something, anything, that can help me here. T
his could be the story that gets me on the front page, away from staking out the courthouse every damn day.”

  Several moments passed as Shane mulled the statement before shifting his shoulders towards Byers, leaning in and dropping his voice low. “You realize that I’m in the middle of trial right now, and anything you print could get the entire thing thrown out, right?”

  Byers kept his shoulders facing forward, leaning to the side, dropping his head and voice to match Shane’s. “So there is something going on.”

  “Of course there’s something going on,” Shane snapped. “You just laid it out yourself, doesn’t take a rocket scientist to connect the dots.”

  A small grunt slid out of Byers in response, nodding his head. “If it helps, I won’t print a word until after closing on Monday.”

  Shane pushed a long exhale out through his nose, turning back to face front. He wasn’t just trying to scare Byers with what he said, there was a strong chance, even likelihood, that an article could get the case thrown out, or at least give Reed grounds for an appeal.

  At the same time, his opponents had already proven themselves to be well south of ethical.

  “How about we meet back here Monday night?” Shane said, looking at Byers through the glass. “I’ll tell you everything I know then.”

  “Monday night means nothing goes to print until Tuesday morning,” Byers countered.

  “That a problem?” Shane asked. “Is somebody else looking into this?”

  “Not that I’m aware of, doesn’t mean it’s not happening though.”

  On the screen above, the Celtics hit a three pointer, putting them up seven going into the fourth quarter. Shane watched the shot fall and took another drink from his beer, fighting to keep his demeanor even.

  “Like I said, as much as I want these bastards to go down, I can’t risk spilling my guts right now. It could kill my case and Tyler Bentley’s future.”

  Byers nodded, his gaze drifting up to the screen as well. “So it is SynTronic.”

  The words were not a question, a deduction from Shane’s prior statement. Shane’s eyes narrowed a bit as he watched the screen, his mind spinning, trying to piece together how to use this situation to his advantage.

  “I tell you what, how about I give you a piece now, something I myself just found out about, and let you spend the weekend digging. That should give you enough of a jump that once we’re done on Monday, I’ll be able to fill you in pretty quick. You can break it that night.”

  Byers remained motionless for several long moments before his head started to move up and down, a barely perceptible movement. “I can do that. You give me something now, you have my word I’ll stay mum until Monday.”

  Without looking over at him, Shane pulled Byers own card out of his shirt pocket and reached across the bar for a pencil. He pulled it up and scrawled two words across the bottom, right beneath Byers’s instructions on where to meet.

  Ute Carbone.

  Shane put the pencil back with his right hand and extended the card to Byers with his left, the logo for the Columbus Herald on top.

  Byers accepted the card and flipped it over, turning it long ways to read what Shane wrote. He made a face as he stared at the words. “What the heck is a...”

  A quick hand shot to his arm, resting across his wrist, warning him to stop. “Not out loud,” Shane whispered, “and it’s not a what, it’s a who.”

  Slow dawning crossed over Byers face, his head rocking back in a nod. “That’s who’s been...”

  “That’s what CPD is checking into, but he looks like the prime candidate at this point.”

  Byers tapped the card against the palm of his hand and nodded his thanks to Shane. He downed the last inch of his beer and placed it back onto its coaster, rising from his chair. “Forgive me for my abrupt exit, but I have some research to get to.”

  Down the bar, the bartender appeared carrying Shane’s Shermanator, tendrils of steam rising up from it. His gaze caught the sandwich right as it exited the kitchen, coming for him like something straight out of a dream he’d had many times over the previous twelve months.

  “Not a problem.”

  Byers glanced over at the sandwich coming towards them and coughed out a laugh. He waited for the bartender to slide it over in front of Shane and raised a hand to her.

  “Greta, put that and anything else he has on my tab, please.”

  Shane nodded his thanks to both of them as Byers departed. He pulled the burger over in front of him, for the first time in weeks letting his face relay to the world just how excited he was.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  For parents trying to teach their children about right and wrong, the golden rule was always to treat others as they would like to be treated. For businessmen looking to amass an empire, the golden rule was he who has the gold makes the rules.

  For lawyers cross-examining a witness, the golden rule was never ever ask a question you don’t already know the answer to.

  Despite that simple maxim that he’d heard in law school a dozen times and from his mother a hundred more, the thought kept creeping into the back of Shane’s mind. A single idea that, if it failed, would be a blow for sure, though not fatal. If it worked, the case was all but over. His every experience, every bit of training told him not to go for it, to go through his paces, ask the basic litany of questions he’d already planned on, but that little something in the back of his mind wouldn’t let it go.

  On the stand sat Kenny Walker, a former basketball player that Shane had never heard of, despite numerous efforts to try and research him. The story he offered under direct examination was that his entire career had lasted about an hour in the NBA before injuries derailed him, but even at that information should have been available online about his college career, or even his high school recruiting numbers. The dates he gave would have put him as coming out of high school in the early nineties, though based on his shaved head and smooth skin, Shane had no idea of gauging whether or not that was true.

  “Mr. Walker,” Shane said, walking into the middle of the court room in his gray suit, light blue shirt, and matching striped tie of the same two colors. “I would like to concentrate on the presentation you made to Tyler Bentley back in January.”

  Kenny bowed the top of his head a bit, the light reflecting from his shiny scalp. “I wouldn’t call it a presentation, more like a friend asking me to stop by and talk to someone.”

  “Yes,” Shane said, coming to a stop with one hand in his pocket, the other poised in front of him, “let’s start there. You say you met Mr. Sarconi at a conference in Columbus about a year before, correct?”

  “That’s right.”

  “This was a conference for?” Shane asked, motioning with his free hand.

  “It was a medical device conference,” Kenny replied. “As I told Tyler, at that point I’d had ten different operations on my knee, none of which worked. I was in my thirties and already walking with a cane, I was desperate for any kind of help.”

  Shane seized on the word, forcing himself not to smile. “So desperation brought you and Mr. Sarconi together?”

  A bright smile expanded across Kenny’s face, his head swiveling towards the jury. “Now, I didn’t say that, I said desperation took me to the conference. Pure dumb luck is what brought Mr. Sarconi and I together.”

  Shane glanced over at the jury, watching for their reaction. As expected, a few offered half smiles back, a couple more nodded.

  “Pure dumb luck? You were willing to try anything to get back on your feet, Mr. Sarconi had a new product he was looking to begin testing. That right?”

  “Yes,” Kenny said, nodding.

  Shane fell silent a moment and walked a few paces, his mind racing, registering that something was off-kilter. There was nothing wrong with what Kenny was saying, the answers were what he was expecting, the problem was in the way they were being delivered. The smooth responses, the clear diction, the animated interplay with the jury.

&
nbsp; None of those things were a condemnation on Kenny. Shane had never met the man, knew nothing of his personality. All of them though flew in the face of what he knew from a lifetime of seeing witnesses on the stand. They almost always resembled Tyler and Margie, nervous balls of nerves, raw, exposed for all to see. Or they were like Pinkering and Sarconi, uncomfortable, surly, counting seconds for it to end.

  Never were they like Kenny, a material witness that seemed to be enjoying his time on the stand, almost as if he was acting.

  The word settled into Shane’s mind, bringing along with it the golden rule of cross examination. He knew deep down, in his core, that there was no way he should ask the question that was almost daring itself to be heard. At the same time, as he watched Kenny again smile for the jury, there was no way he could ignore it.

  “Five months after meeting Mr. Sarconi, seven months prior to meeting Tyler, you got the KnightRunner implant, is that correct?”

  “Yes,” Kenny said, “almost a year ago to this day.”

  Shane bit his lip to keep from smiling. The additional information that came with memorizing a script, no need for a pause to check his memory. It was now so obvious, he couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen it at first.

  “And that would be the...eleventh surgery on your knee, correct, Mr. Walker?”

  “Yes, eleven in total.”

  “Mhmm,” Shane said, raising his off hand to his lips, appearing to be deep in thought. “And which knee would that be?”

  “My right one,” Kenny said without a moment’s pause, another polite smile on his face.

  Shane turned his back to the jury and continued to pace, his fist held to his lips, deep in contemplation. He looked up at Tyler sitting at the table, the same post he’d been at for two weeks, as intent as a sentry on guard duty. Behind him were Abby and Margie, both still hanging in for every last word of the trial, their gazes fixed on him.

  The courtroom beyond them seemed dull and quiet, a malaise two weeks in the making, the coming down off one emotional high after another. Again Shane bit his lip to keep from smiling, knowing he was about to throw the entire place into pandemonium again.