Hush

by Tal Bauer

  Several of the jurors nodded. Renner pretended to look contrite. He turned back to Desheriyev. “Please. Were you motivated enough to make a deal with the government that you may have lied about the involvement of my client?”

  Desheriyev shrugged. “There is nothing to lie about. He hired me. He also sabotage my escape plan. Why would I not turn on him?”

  “Allegedly.” Renner smiled indulgently. “My client, unlike yourself, has not pled guilty. He is still presumed innocent.”

  Desheriyev’s snort and eyeroll clearly said what he thought of that.

  “Mr. Desheriyev.” Tom’s voice hardened. “You will conduct yourself with more decorum than that.”

  Desheriyev, seemingly following Ballard’s lead, did not respond to him. No ‘Yes, Your Honor’ from him. Just a slight straightening, and a tiny grin.

  “Let’s switch tracks.” Renner paced away, heading for the jury box, as if he were putting a puzzle together in his mind. “You never met Vadim Kryukov face-to-face, did you?”

  “No.”

  “In fact, you still have never met him face-to-face. This is the closest you have ever been to Vadim Kryukov, is that right?” He gestured between the two men, one in the witness stand, the other wounded and bruised at the defense table.

  “Da. It is.”

  “The bag of cocaine given to you at the dead drop. Did you actually see Kryukov put it in the dead drop?”

  “No.”

  “Did you see anyone put anything in the dead drop?”

  “No.”

  “Is it possible that the cocaine was bought by some other person and added to the materials placed in the dead drop?”

  Desheriyev shrugged. “That would not make sense.”

  “I didn’t ask if it made sense. I just asked if it was possible.”

  Scowling, Desheriyev’s lip curled. “Maybe. Could be.”

  “Someone, perhaps, who wanted to frame Vadim Kryukov?”

  “Objection! This is wildly speculative.”

  Tom ground his molars together. Behind him, he heard Mike hiss, a frustrated grunt of air between his clenched teeth. Ballard was driving his disrespect home. It would be all over the media, the internet, running on every headline of the trial. A fracture in the justice system, a U.S. Attorney and a judge squaring off in the biggest case of the modern era.

  “Withdrawn.” Renner sent Tom a small smile, as if apologizing. For his own flashy approach to the trial, or Ballard’s conduct, he couldn’t tell.

  Renner squared himself in front of Desheriyev, pausing. “Mr. Desheriyev,” he said slowly. “Do you have any knowledge of any persons who may be responsible for this crime, other than my client?”

  Tom saw panic spark in Ballard’s eyes. Ballard couldn’t object, not yet. The question was carefully, perfectly worded.

  Desheriyev nodded, walking into Renner’s trap. “The CIA.”

  “Objection!” Ballard, on his feet again. “This is absolute hearsay and speculation. The witness has no direct knowledge of any participants other than the defendant!”

  “I believe that was the question that I asked.” Renner played dumbfounded well, Tom thought. “Are you answering for your witness, counselor? Would you like to take the stand?”

  Ballard turned his attention to Tom. Your Honor. This is the time to say it. Your Honor. “There is no basis in evidence for any conspirators in this case beyond Vadim Kryukov. There is no evidence, none at all, to support the defense’s wild conspiracy theory.”

  “There’s no evidence because the state failed to investigate it!” Renner flung his hand toward Ballard and Barnes. “And, because any evidence the state may have had on the CIA’s involvement was conveniently destroyed and unavailable in the discovery process! The only documents are—”

  “Your Honor!” Ballard finally broke, his voice rising above Renner. “This is outrageous!”

  “Both of you!” Tom barked, his voice bouncing off the courtroom walls, a deep bellow. “Counselors, approach the bench.”

  Silence enveloped the courtroom as they came close. Tom heard the fast inhales and exhales of the jury, the nervousness of their fingers clenching their notepads, anxious shoes shuffling against the carpet.

  “The prosecution is doing everything they can to squash legitimate evidence, Your Honor, evidence that you allowed into trial.” Renner spoke first, hissing over the maple barrier as Tom leaned in close.

  “You said yourself: evidence speaks for itself. The Russian documents you allowed into this trial have no basis to support their claims. There are no supporting facts.” Ballard growled as he argued. He was back to dropping the ‘Your Honor’, again.

  “I was attempting to ascertain your witness’s knowledge of any involvement when you trampled all over my cross-examination, counselor.”

  “Please.”

  “That’s enough.” Tom glanced between Renner and Ballard. Two firm men, powerfully motivated to prove the other not just wrong, but catastrophically wrong. This was deeper, bloodier, than a usual courtroom battle. But of course it was. The world was at stake. “Counselor.” He fixed Renner with a hard stare. “You wish to know if the witness has any direct knowledge that could corroborate the Russian documents?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.” Renner slipped into his placating voice, obsequious.

  Tom said nothing as he turned to Desheriyev. “Mr. Desheriyev. Do you have any direct knowledge of any CIA involvement with the defendant? By direct, I mean something you heard from the defendant directly or observed with your own eyes.”

  Desheriyev scowled, but shook his head. “I know what I see on the news.”

  “But no direct knowledge from the defendant?”

  He shook his head again.

  “I need a verbal answer, Mr. Desheriyev.”

  “Nyet!”

  Tom turned back to both attorneys, still huddled by the bench. “Counselor, I trust this satisfies your curiosity?”

  Renner looked like he’d taken a shot of vinegar. “Your Honor, if I could—”

  “Your question has been asked and answered, counselor. Move on to your next line of questioning.” He nodded to both Ballard and Renner, dismissing them. Ballard spun on his heel and stalked back to the prosecution table. Every federal law enforcement officer gazed at him, pride, support, brotherhood, and affection mixing together. The deputy director of the FBI leaned forward and squeezed Ballard’s shoulder as he sat back down.

  Renner took a moment to gather himself before walking back to Desheriyev. “You testified that you and your handler were careful with your communications. Changing cell phones, authentication codes, and dead drops. If you were so careful with your actions, then why would Vadim Kryukov use his personal cell phone to communicate with you via text? Doesn’t that sound careless?”

  “Objection.” Ballard sounded drained as he stood, and a sigh crept into his voice. “Calls for speculation. The witness can’t testify to what the defendant was thinking.”

  “I’ll rephrase.” Renner shook his head, seemingly shaken from the last exchange. He straightened again as Ballard sat down. Day two, and the trial was already exhausting everyone, wearing on all of their nerves. Tom felt it too, a weariness that tugged on his sanity. He could feel a migraine building behind his eyes.

  “Is it a breach in your operations security to have your handler text you from his personal cell phone?”

  “Yes.”

  “And this single text on the Thursday before the shooting is the one time that such a direct connection was made between you and Vadim Kryukov?”

  “Yes.”

  “Which means that this is the one text that can tie Vadim Kryukov to you, and forms one piece of the prosecution’s very slim evidence against my client. Doesn’t that seem strange?”

  Desheriyev blinked. “I cannot know what that man was thinking.” He practically parroted Ballard’s words, and a few chuckles rose in the gallery. Even Ballard cracked a tiny, tiny smile.

  “Are you absolutely
certain that my client sent that text message?”

  “Who else would send it? It had code. It talked about the plan.”

  “A perfect text, then, to frame someone. I’ll ask again: are you certain my client sent that text message to you?”

  “Da! Yes! It came from him!”

  “You watched him type it? Watched him send it?”

  “No—”

  “Then how are you certain?”

  Ballard stiffened again.

  “It had same code,” Desheriyev spat. “It had to be him.”

  “And never, in the history of communications, has anyone ever impersonated another, or cracked a code, or sent a message that claimed to be from one person when it was in fact from another.”

  “Objection! The defense is attacking the witness, not asking questions.”

  “Withdrawn.” Renner put his hands in his pockets, suddenly casual, as if just thinking out loud. He squinted, looking up. “Doesn’t it seem very, very strange, Mr. Desheriyev, that my client would send you a text message from his own phone, especially when you testified that you believe he was planning on burning you and making you take the fall for this crime? Doesn’t that seem… nonsensical?”

  “Objection! This was asked a minute ago and answered. The witness can’t know what was going through the defendant’s mind.”

  Renner shook his head. “Withdrawn.” He buttoned his coat, side-eyeing the jury. Tom saw several peering at him, other scribbling notes, drawing diagrams and charts trying to piece it all together. One juror had a timeline going and wore a deep frown. Renner smiled. “Pass the witness, Your Honor.”

  Ballard stepped forward. “How do you know that the cocaine given to you in the dead drop was from Mr. Kryukov?”

  “Because he said he would give to me.”

  “Along with materials related to the shooting?”

  “Yes. It would all come together.”

  “And, again, how did you know that you were speaking to Vadim Kryukov?”

  “I knew his voice. It was him. He is famous in Russian dissident circles. There are many, many videos of him online, making speeches. His voice is well known.”

  “Did anyone in the prosecution or investigative team mention Vadim Kryukov to you before your confession?”

  “No.”

  “Have you cooperated fully with the prosecution’s investigation?”

  “Yes.”

  “And why did you choose to cooperate with us?”

  Desheriyev slid another icy glare toward Kryukov. “I not go down alone for this,” he spat. “Not when this plan was not mine. Not when I was set up. I do not give a shit about President Vasiliev, but I never plan to kill him. Until he called me.” Desheriyev jerked his thumb toward Kryukov. “And now, I rot in prison. But I will not go there alone.”

  Now the jury’s gaze slid to Kryukov, appraising the silent man sitting statuesque at the defense table. He hadn’t moved, hadn’t reacted, not once. To the jury, he was an object, a phantom, a mask to throw their fears and suspicions upon. As distasteful as Desheriyev was as a human being, he was more real to them than the defendant. Tom watched the wheels turn in the jurors’ minds.

  As Tom turned, he caught Ballard’s gaze, first also appraising the jury, and then turning to appraise him.

  It wasn’t a friendly look, or a professional stare. It was the gaze of a prosecutor dead-set on turning a man inside out, on ripping his character from one end of the law to the other, and hanging his tattered soul from the beams of the courthouse.

  It was a look that said you’re next.

  Chapter 35

  Tom poured another glass of wine as he sat on the balcony off his hotel suite. He squinted over the city, as if that would help the pounding in his head. Sighing, he slouched back in the deck chair. His shirt was undone, tie gone. His undershirt was untucked from his suit pants, and his shoes were in a pile by the foot of his bed. Etta Mae snored beneath his feet. Once a day, a marshal picked her up and took her to a park, walking her around for at least an hour. She was bone-tired every evening when he got back.

  He heard his suite door click open, and then slowly close. Behind him, the sliding glass door was open, curtains twitching in the breeze. “I’m out here.”

  Footsteps. He closed his eyes. A hand landed on his head, ruffled his hair. He tried to smile.

  “Hey.” Mike’s soft voice floated past his ear, right before Mike dropped a kiss to his cheek.

  Dangerous. Marshals in the rooms on either side could possibly see them. But… Tom couldn’t work up the anxiety over it.

  Months ago, he’d have frozen in fear if anyone knew that the thing he wanted most in the world was Mike’s kiss on his cheek, and Mike’s hand held in his own. Now, all he wanted was the world to shut up and go away, and let him and Mike sit together and enjoy the evening. Maybe let the evening turn into something a lot better than the day had been. He couldn’t even summon the phantom of his old professor anymore. That cackling skeleton that had haunted him for decades had seemingly turned to dust, while he wasn’t even looking.

  Was this how acceptance happened? He just gave up caring about other people’s reactions, their raised eyebrows and sidelong stares? He stopped fussing about who thought what, and why? Was self-acceptance more about giving up everyone else’s attitudes and reactions, instead of worrying about his own?

  He’d lived with the blinding terror of coming out for twenty-five years, of having to endure the soul-stripping agony of exposing his wants, his desires, his needs to a world that assumed he was wrong, different, broken. But why did he have to correct anyone’s assumptions? People had assumed “straight” for decades, and they were wrong. There was no statute of limitations on his identity, no expiration date on his desires.

  What would it be like to come out and no longer care about everyone else? Society was still trapped in his mind like a snow globe of 1991. The haters and the baseball bats.

  Once, he hadn’t cared about the world. He wanted to fight it, live his life, turn his very existence into a form of protest. Live with Peter, loving him in that eternally optimistic way young men viewed the world. They were going to move to New York together, and Tom was going to be an attorney while Peter kept chasing his dreams. What would his life have been like if his soul hadn’t been shattered?

  Dreams crumbled in the face of hatred. His professor had torpedoed his life with Peter in a few sentences. He realized that day, that the world, and how the world viewed him, mattered.

  Had the world changed, or had he? Was the soul of a forty-six-year-old man different than that of a twenty-one-year-old man? Had he wanted too much too soon, or should he have had everything he wanted from that very first summer, have been given the life where he could love Peter and pursue his dreams?

  He couldn’t second-guess the winding path of his existence. Couldn’t get lost in what-might-have-been and if-only. He was here, now.

  And he was, for the most part, happy. Not with the trial, and his career that seemed to teeter on the edge of shambles. But with Mike, and his decision. He was counting down the days until he came out of his closet completely. For the first time in a long, long, long time, the thought of standing up and saying he was gay—that he wanted the world to know that he loved a man, this man—didn’t make his skin shrivel up off his bones.

  Tom grabbed Mike’s hand as Mike pulled the other deck chair close. He let their hands hang in the space between their chairs. Tom held out his glass of wine. Mike shook his head.

  “I went with the team taking Kryukov back to the hospital. They were perfect gentlemen.” Mike stretched and rolled his neck. “He’s back in his hospital room.”

  “Good.”

  They sat in silence, fingers laced together. Mike relaxed back in his seat, closing his eyes as Tom sipped his wine. He stroked his thumb over Mike’s palm, trying to read the future in the lines and calluses of his skin. Those hands could touch him for all the rest of his days. He’d be just fine with that.
>
  “What ever happened with your volleyball tournament? You were going to the finals.”

  Mike shook his head. “Kris is gone, and the trial happened. We forfeited.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “There’s always next season.” Mike grinned, glancing sideways to Tom. “And, I’ll have my own personal cheerleader. Right?”

  “Of course.” Tom winked. “Every single game.”

  Mike sighed. “Crazy day in court.”

  “It’s only day two.”

  “What’s going on with the U.S. Attorney? What’s Ballard’s problem?”

  If he told Mike, what would Mike do? Was the real threat not from Kryukov or the protestors, but from someone much closer? What about Ballard’s threat that morning? “He’s… convinced I’m leading the world to the apocalypse, through this trial.”

  “What?” Mike twisted, skepticism coloring his tone. “How?”

  “By being overly conciliatory to Kryukov’s defense, I am somehow empowering the Russian narrative and conspiracy theory that the CIA was responsible for the murders, and that will allow the Russians to invade. I’m, in fact, paving the route for their tanks straight up Pennsylvania Ave, all the way to the White House.” He caught Mike’s gaze. Mike stayed quiet. “Any word from Kris?”

  “Nothing.”

  Tom leaned back and gulped down a mouthful of wine.

  “I don’t think you’re being overly conciliatory to them.”

  Tom shrugged. “I’m fighting my own doubts pretty hard. I’m second-guessing my gut reactions to rulings on testimony.”

  “Who wouldn’t? Trial today was a circus maze mixed with a boxing match. I don’t ever think I’ve seen a courtroom that tense.”

  “Neither have I.” Not in the mob cases he’d prosecuted, the organized crime hits, or even the other terrorism cases he’d been a part of. “Ballard is wound up tighter that I’ve ever seen. He’s going to blow.” And he’s going to try and take me out, too.

  Mike squinted. “Has he said anything to you?”