by Adam Mitzner
“I’d like that,” she said.
She looked like a woman with something on her mind. Her brow was furrowed, her lips pursed.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Yeah, I was just debating whether to raise something with you.”
“Now I think you have to.”
She didn’t, however. At least not right away. Instead it looked like she was running through what she wanted to say, a dry run, just to see if she should say it out loud.
“Okay, just remember, you asked. I know we haven’t been seeing each other for that long, but when I was making my mad dash across town, I was thinking that maybe we should figure out a way to stop all this back-and-forth. Over the last few weeks I’ve been here twenty-four/seven anyway, and today when I said that I’m going home for an hour, you got all ‘No, stay here and go to the DA’s office naked’ on me, so I was thinking maybe I could bring some of my stuff here. I’m not saying we should get married, or even that I’m moving in. I’ll keep my place, so there’ll be no pressure, but—”
“That sounds like an excellent idea,” I said with an ear-to-ear smile.
52
The alarm went off the next morning at six forty-five. As was our usual routine, Nina took the first shower, opting for the additional time to get ready over sleep. By the time I got out of the shower, Nina was already dressed.
“I’m not going to dry my hair,” she said with a laugh, “not for Lisa Kaplan.”
I reached into my closet and hesitated before pulling out the same charcoal-gray Brioni suit that I wore to visit L.D. that first time. The suit I wore to bury my wife and daughter, and to do my opening in the Macy trial, as well as L.D.’s.
It fit looser than it had back when I visited L.D. Even with the daily grind of trial, I was taking better care of myself. Not consuming at least three scotches a day probably had something to do with it.
I spied Nina watching me from the reflection in the mirror as I smoothed the hair out of my face. Her smile was broad, and her eyes shimmered. It’s a silly word to use, but I thought she seemed proud of me.
And that’s when I decided that I wasn’t proud of myself.
I undid my tie and unbuttoned the top of my collar.
“What’s wrong?” Nina asked.
I took a deep breath. “We’re not going down there.”
“What do you mean?”
I had thought about teasing it out, just to see whether Nina would lie to me. But I needed to get this over with.
“If we go to the DA’s office today,” I said, looking her square in the eyes, “you’re going to be arrested, Nina. The Nuts thing, it was a setup. Not of you so much as Matt Brooks, but I couldn’t set him up without also setting you up.”
“I don’t understand, Dan. What are you saying?”
She didn’t sound confused. Cold comfort, but at least it was something. She understood and just wanted me to explain the steps more clearly.
“You told Brooks that L.D. was going to testify,” I said, “and that’s why L.D. was killed. And then, last night, you told Brooks that Nuts had evidence against him, full knowing that he was going to end up just like L.D.”
She didn’t betray any emotion. No head-shake denial, but no slumped shoulders of admission either.
“Is he dead?”
“If you mean Nuts, no. He’s fine. He was nowhere near his home last night. He’s been under heavy police protection since I called Kaplan yesterday. Kaplan texted me this morning that Brooks hired some guy to do it, and they arrested him at Nuts’s apartment last night. Kaplan didn’t say whether the gunman had already given up Brooks, but I don’t think he’s going to hold out too long when they start mentioning the death penalty. Murder for hire and all that.”
“And you’re supposed to bring me to Kaplan?”
“I made it part of the deal. I told Kaplan that I didn’t want cops coming to my house and I’d surrender you this morning. For your sake, I hope you didn’t call Brooks from your home or cell.”
She didn’t respond, but instead stared at the floor. It was as if her head had become instantly heavy, unable to look anywhere but down.
“So long as you didn’t,” I said, “you should be fine. Without me, there’s no link between you and him.”
“Thank you,” she said, and stepped toward me.
She would have kissed me if I’d let her. Probably would have done more than that.
“Don’t,” I said in a stern enough voice that she must have feared there was a possibility I’d change my mind. “I don’t have it all figured out yet,” I continued, “but I got far enough along to realize that Matt Brooks is the married guy you were seeing.”
She still showed me nothing. It was like looking at a corpse.
“How’d you meet?” I asked.
She continued to stare at me. Through me, almost.
“Nina, come on. I need to know. You saw me get dressed. I’m not wearing a wire. It’s just you and me.”
Her face screwed more tightly. I could almost hear her teeth grinding.
“I’m about to give you a very significant gift here, Nina. It’s called freedom. The least you can do to repay me is fill in the blanks.”
“If I’m paying something, then it’s not a gift,” Nina said with a sad smile.
I knew she was trying to lighten the moment, but she was right. This wasn’t a gift. We were negotiating.
“Okay, then consider it a bargain,” I said, “but I need to know everything.”
In my mind, she was now someone else entirely. Not my lover or even my law partner.
Someone already much more my past than my future.
“We met at Martin Quinn,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “About a year ago. There was some fund-raiser I went to, and he was there. It’s not what you think, though.”
I smiled, meaning it sarcastically, as if to say, Oh, of course not. There was no doubt in my mind that it was exactly like I thought.
“Tell me why it isn’t what I think,” I said.
She wasn’t going to say anything, that much I knew. Not until I had told her what I knew.
“Let me make it easy for you. I’ll tell you what I think, and then you can just say yes or no. The way I figure it, you fell hard with Brooks and, like you told me, you just had no willpower when it came to what he asked you to do. When L.D. cut Marcus Jackson loose, you came in to pick up the slack. You told Brooks that you knew me, and you could get me to take the case. I bet you worked L.D., too, telling him about Darrius Macy so he’d want to hire me. And then you fed Brooks information about our defense. That’s how he was always one step ahead of us with the witnesses. And I guess that sleeping with me, that was . . . well, whatever it was, it worked. You got me to lose my judgment when it came to you.”
Midway through what amounted to my closing argument, she had begun to cry. Not sobs, but enough tears to have an effect on me.
For a moment I felt sorry for her, but then my resolve stiffened. Murderers shouldn’t cry, I told myself. Even if you were just aiding and abetting, crying should still be a right that you lose, like voting privileges for felons.
“Were you really so far gone, Nina? So much in love with the man that you were willing to help him commit three murders? And even when you knew he was also screwing around with Roxanne? Is that how lost you became?”
“Like I said, it wasn’t like that,” she said, choking through tears. “Things ended between Matt and me before Roxanne was killed, and I didn’t know that there was anything between them until much later. I wanted to marry him, and he said he wanted that too, but we had to wait until after the IPO. He was worried that if he asked Chiara for a divorce, she would scuttle the deal, but apparently there was something in their pre-nup that gave him more control over a public company than a private one. He promised me that right after the IPO, we’d be together for real. I told him that I was tired of being strung along, and he should just call me when he was ready, and we’d see
if that’s what I wanted then too. Then a month or so later, Roxanne was murdered, and a few weeks after that, Matt called. I swear, I had no idea that he’d killed Roxanne. I still don’t know if he did. He told me that he thought L.D. killed her. He said that after we broke up he was devastated, and he started seeing Roxanne on the rebound. He said it was only a few times, and he’d ended it before she died. But he was afraid L.D. knew about his affair with Roxanne and would use it to pin the murder on him. He said that all he wanted me to do was to stay close to L.D., so I could keep an eye out for him.”
“And when L.D. decided he was going to testify . . . you set up the hit,” I said.
“No! I didn’t know that was going to happen. I swear it. I told Matt that L.D. was going to testify, but I wouldn’t have said anything if I’d thought Matt was going to have him killed.”
“Bullshit. If that were true, you would have come clean after L.D. was killed. At the very least, you wouldn’t have arranged for Brooks to kill Nuts, too.”
Her eyes dropped to the floor. She was crying in spurts now, while still trying to defend herself in between sobs.
“You don’t understand, Dan . . . you really don’t. After L.D. died . . . Matt called me and said we were in this together. He said that if he got caught, he’d take me down with him. And he could have. I mean, y-you believe that I was in on L.D.’s murder, right? Who wouldn’t? So he told me that I needed to tell him if anything else was hap-happening. When you came home saying that Nuts was going to give up Matt, I . . .”
“You told Brooks, even though you knew that he’d kill Nuts.”
“I told him, yeah, but I didn’t think he was going to kill Nuts. You have to believe me. I thought he was going to pay him off, like he did with that housekeeper, or that they’d just steal whatever evidence Nuts had. I didn’t think Brooks would have him killed. I swear, I didn’t. But think about it from my perspective. What choice did I have?”
“I think you know the answer to that,” I said coldly. “You should go, Nina. Right now. Find someplace without an extradition treaty with the U.S. I hear Venezuela is the place of choice for fugitives these days.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Me? I’m going to start over. Again.”
53
As soon as Nina left, I boxed up the few personal items that mattered to me—which amounted almost entirely to family photos—and took them to the storage place around the corner. It was the same one that held all of Sarah’s and Alexa’s items that I couldn’t eliminate from my life.
“How long are you going to need to store this stuff?” the guy behind the desk asked me.
“I don’t know. At least six months, but maybe longer,” I said.
The bank visit came next. I was able to do the entire transaction with a teller I’d never met before and would never see again. All it took was a single form, identifying the routing number of the receiving bank.
Years before, on the advice of the tax partner at Taylor Beckett, I’d set up an offshore account. I never saw the need to keep funds there, and so I’d only maintained the minimum balance. But by the time I’d left my local bank branch, I’d arranged for enough funds to be at my disposal that I’d be able to live well for a very long time without having any contact with the United States.
Next, I called my sister. I told her that I needed to clear my head a little bit, after the trial and everything, so I might be off the grid for a little while, but that she shouldn’t worry. She offered a rueful laugh before saying that she was already worried about me.
My last call was to Mercedes.
“I’m going to be out of pocket for a little while,” I said, “and while I’m away you’re going to hear some things about me and my partner, Nina Harrington, and about L.D. I wanted to make sure that you knew the truth. L.D. did not kill Roxanne. I’m sure of that. And he loved Brianna. Of that I’m also certain. One of the last things he said to me was that the truth should matter more than anything else. When she’s old enough, please make sure that Brianna understands that’s how her father felt. That at the end, he wanted the truth to come out, and he was unwilling to save himself if it meant living a lie anymore.”
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“It’s better if you don’t know,” I said. “Just like I think it’s better that you do know what I just told you.”
As soon as the call ended, I threw my phone in the trash. Then I jumped in a cab and headed straight to JFK.
After a maze of flights—Mexico City to Rio; Rio to São Paulo; São Paulo back to Mexico City—I ended up in St. Martin, on the French side.
• • •
My hasty vacation to St. Martin was not a criminal act, at least not as far as I know. Of course, the fact that I didn’t tell anyone of my plans, and haven’t contacted anyone since I’ve gotten here, not to mention my circuitous travel route, all suggest that I’d rather not test that hypothesis.
I didn’t spend a lot of time in my selection process. The weather in St. Martin is warm, the living expenses are low, and most people speak English. Of course, I could have ended up in dozens of other places that fit the same description.
I’d visited St. Martin with Sarah, almost fifteen years ago. It was before we were married, and we stayed at a five-star resort. I don’t recall too much about the trip, other than that Sarah was particularly fond of the hotel’s fish tacos, and I bought a silver box from the gift shop, which sat atop my night table in the apartment Sarah and I shared, as well as the place in Tribeca. Ironically, the silver box is where I kept my passport.
Reflecting that my stay this time would be open-ended, I eschewed a hotel and rented a small, one-bedroom cottage about a hundred yards from the beach.
The silver box sits in its rightful place next to my bed, my passport inside.
It is there that I’ve begun again the long process of starting over.
• • •
Matt Brooks’s arrest was front-page news all over the world.
The district attorney held a flashy press conference in which Lisa Kaplan stood right behind him. The DA explained that Brooks hired a contract killer to murder a witness who had damaging evidence that linked Brooks to other crimes, and to prevent his wife from finding out about his affair with Roxanne. The name of that witness was being withheld for security purposes, and the DA said that the witness himself was safely in the witness protection program.
The case against Brooks would be based almost entirely on the testimony of the hired gun, a guy named Romanow, who some press outlets were reporting had a connection to the Russian mob. Romanow had a long rap sheet and no obvious connection to Brooks. From what I could discern about the evidence, I figured that Brooks had a better than fifty-fifty shot at acquittal.
Benjamin Ethan is still representing him. He’s been a near nonstop media presence, telling any news outlet that will listen that Brooks is innocent, and champing at the bit to have his day in court. The lawyer in me knows Ethan is posturing. Brooks hasn’t invoked his speedy-trial rights, and the flurry of procedural motions that Ethan’s filed reveals that he’s trying his best to stall Brooks’s day of reckoning. Perhaps he hopes that Romanow will end up on the losing end of a prison fight.
L.D.’s murder remains unsolved. As Judge Pielmeier predicted, the investigation of who actually put the shiv in L.D. ended without an arrest. Not that it mattered much, given that L.D.’s killer, like Nuts’s would-be assassin, was almost certainly a hired gun anyway, and one who was already in prison to boot. And while there has been press speculation that Brooks was behind it, none of the media or enterprising bloggers have come up with any proof to support that charge, but I have no doubts that Brooks ordered the hit. There have also been the press reports that the DA is considering reopening the investigation into Roxanne’s murder, and that Brooks was required to provide a sample of his pubic hair. The results of that test have not been made public, but I’d bet my life that they were a perfect match for the on
es in Roxanne’s bed.
Brooks was right about how damaging it would be for him if news of the affair became public. Shortly after the DA’s press conference, Chiara filed for divorce and Capital Punishment’s IPO was shelved. Although the divorce proceedings are just beginning, it’s a safe bet that Chiara’s settlement will be one for the record books.
There hasn’t been any public disclosure of L.D.’s true identity, his sexual orientation, or his relationship with Nuts. If Matt Brooks goes to trial, which I consider almost a certainty given that I can’t envision him agreeing to a plea that includes the lengthy prison term that the DA’s office will undoubtedly demand, the whole story will come out. But just like I told Mercedes, I think L.D. would have been pleased that, in the end, the public will learn who he really was and what he was really all about.
Mercedes hired a lawyer to file suit against Capital Punishment. The lawsuit was brought in the name of L.D.’s estate, noting that any recovery was to be held in trust for L.D.’s only living heir, his daughter Brianna. The complaint sought more than $4 million in royalties, and the case settled right before Brooks was scheduled to give a sworn deposition. Although the settlement terms were confidential, my guess is that L.D.’s estate got every penny it was owed, and then some.
As for the last player in this drama, as I suspected, Nina was never charged.
The DA’s office initially described Nina as a “person of interest,” but in the weeks following Brooks’s arrest, her name appeared less and less frequently in the press. I run a Google search now once a week, and it’s been a while since there’s been a hit.
Without my testimony, the DA won’t be able to make a case against Nina. Nuts never did have any evidence of Brooks’s affair with Roxanne, which meant that no one else could have tipped off Brooks except either Nina or me. By making myself unavailable, I’ve destroyed the prosecution’s case against Nina because she can now plausibly claim she knew nothing about Nuts’s connection to L.D., or my claim that he had evidence against Brooks, without fear of contradiction. Nuts might tell Kaplan I told him Nina knew about my visit, but that’s not admissible, and even if it were, it doesn’t prove that I told Nina that Nuts had incriminating evidence against Brooks.