Courting Trouble

by Lisa Scottoline

  Nothing can prepare criminal attorney Bennie Rosato for her new client, Alice Connolly, accused of murdering her lover, a highly decorated police detective. Connolly, who bears an uncanny physical resemblance to Bennie, tells the astonished lawyer, “Pleased to meet you. I’m your twin.” But Bennie grew up an only child. She doesn’t have a twin.

  Or does she?

  Bennie takes the case and plunges into the mystery of the murder, as well as the secret of her own identity. Not until the verdict is in will she finally learn the truth.

  Philadelphia Inquirer: “A superior piece of writing . . .. A gripping, multileveled story peopled by compelling characters.”

  Cleveland Plain Dealer: “Scottoline has been called ‘the female John Grisham,’ but she’s a better storyteller.”

  Chapter One

  Bennie Rosato shuddered when she caught sight of the place. The building stretched three city blocks and stood eight stories tall. It lacked conventional windows; instead slits of bulletproof glass scored its black brick façade. Spiked guard towers anchored its corners and a double row of cyclone fencing topped with razor wire encircled its perimeter, attesting to its maximum security status. Exiled to the industrial outskirts of the city, Philadelphia’s Central Corrections housed murders, sociopaths, and rapist. At least when they weren’t on parole.

  Bennie pulled into a parking space in the half-empty visitor’s lot, climbed out of her Ford Expedition, and walked down the sidewalk in June’s humidity, wrestling with her reluctance. She’d stopped practicing criminal law and promised herself she’d never see the prison again until the telephone call from a woman inmate who was awaiting trial. The woman had been charged with the shooting murder of her boyfriend, a detective with the Philadelphia police, but claimed a group of uniforms had framed her. Bennie specialized in prosecuting police misconduct, so she’d slid a fresh legal pad into her briefcase and had driven to interview the inmate.

  THE OPPORTUNITY TO CHANGE, read a metal plaque over the door, and Bennie managed not to laugh. The prison had been designed with the belief that vocational training would covert heroin dealers to keypunch operators and since nobody had any better ideas, still operated on the assumption. Bennie opened the heavy gray door, an inexplicably large dent buckling its middle, and went inside. She was immediately assaulted by stifling air, thick with sweat, disinfectant, and a cacophony of rapid-fire Spanish, street English, and languages Bennie didn’t recognize. Whenever she entered the prison, Bennie felt as if she were walking into another world, and the sight evoked in her a familiar dismay.

  The waiting room, packed with inmates’ families, looked more like day care than prison. Infants in arms rattled plastic keys in primary colors, babies crawled from lap to lap, and a toddler practiced his first steps in the aisle, grabbing a plastic sandal for support as he staggered past. Bennie knew the statistics: seventy-five percent of women inmates are mothers. The average prison term for a woman lasts a childhood. No matter, whether Bennie’s clients had been brought here by circumstance or corruption, she could never forget that their children were the ultimate victims, ignored at our peril. She couldn’t fix it no matter how hard she tried and she couldn’t stop trying, so she had finally turned away.

  Bennie so pressed the thought and threaded her way to the front desk while the crowd socialized. Two older women, one white and one black, exchanged recipes written on index cards. Hispanic and white teenagers huddled together, a bouquet of backward baseball caps laughing over photos of a trip to Hershey Park. Two Vietnamese boys shared the sports section with a white kid across the aisle. Unless prison procedures had changed, these families would be the Monday group, visiting inmates with last names A through F, and over time they’d become friends. Bennie used to think their friendliness a form of denial until she realized it was profoundly human, like the camaraderie she’d experienced in hospital waiting rooms, in the worst of circumstances.

  The guards at front desk, a woman and a man, were on the telephone. Female and male guards worked at the prison because both sexes were incarcerated here, in separate wings. Behind the desk was a panel of smoked glass that looked opaque but concealed the prison’s large, modern control center. Security monitors glowed faintly through the glass, their chalky gray screens ever-changing. A profile moved in front of a lighted screen like a cloud in front of the moon.

  Bennie waited patiently for a guard, which cut against her grain. Since she questioned authority for a living, but she had learned not to challenge prison guards. They performed daily under conditions at least as threatening as those facing cops, but were acutely aware they earned far less and weren’t the subject of any cool TV shows. No kid grew up wanting to be a prison guard.

  While Bennie waited, a little boy with bells on his shoelaces toddled over and stared up at her. She was used to the reaction even though she wasn’t conventionally pretty; Bennie stood six feet tall, strong and sturdy. Her broad shoulders were emphasized by the padding of her yellow linen suit, and wavy hair the color of pale honey spilled loose to her back. Her features were more honest than beautiful, but big blondes generally caught the eye, approving or no. Bennie smiled at the child to show she wasn’t a banana.

  “You an attorney?” asked the female guard, hanging up the phone. She was an African-American woman in a jet-black uniform and pinned to her heavy breast had been badge of gold electroplate. The guard’s hair had been combed back into a tiny bun from which stiff hairs sprung like a pinwheel, and her short sleeves were rolled up, macho-style.

  “Yeah, I’m a lawyer,” Bennie answered. “I used to have an ID card, but I’ll be damned if I can find it.”

  “I’ll look it up. Gimme your driver’s license. Fill out the request slip. Sign the OV book, for official visitors,” the guard said, on auto-pilot, and pushed a yellow clip ID across the counter.

  Bennie produced her license, scribbled a request slip, and signed the log book. “I’m here to see Alice Connolly. Unit D, Cell 53.”

  “What’s in the briefcase?”

  “Legal papers.”

  “Put your purse in the lockers. No cell phones, cameras, or recording devices. Take a seat. We’ll call you when they bring her down to the interview room.”

  “Thanks.” Bennie hunted for a chair and spotted one in front of the closed window for the cashier and clothing exchange. The families had left the seat vacant because it was the equivalent of a table by the front door in a busy restaurant; when it opened, the exchange would be mobbed with families dropping off personal items, such as plastic rosaries the inmates liked to wear and do-rags necessary for gang identification. And the inmates always welcomed extra cash; for what, Bennie didn’t want to speculate. She wedged into the seat next to a stocky grandmother, who smiled when she spotted Bennie’s briefcase. A prison waiting room is the only place where a lawyer is a welcome sight.

  “You’re up, Rosato,” called the guard.

  Bennie rose and went through the metal detector to the other side of the front desk. She set her briefcase down on the gritty tile floor and raised her arms while the female guard ran a professionally intrusive hand down her arms and sides. “Tell me I’m the only one,” Bennie said, and the guard half-smiled.

  “Go on up, girl.”

  “Fine, but next time I expect dinner.” Bennie picked up her briefcase as a male guard unlocked another gray metal door, double-thick. Attorneys signed a “no-hostage waiver” to get an initial ID; a misnomer, it meant that their release would not be negotiated if they were taken hostage. Once she passed through the door, Bennie would be locked in with a general population of violent inmates packing knives, straight-edge razors, garrotes, shanks, forks twisted into spikes, and possibly a blowtorch or two. Bennie’s only weapons were a canvas briefcase and a Bic ballpoint. Anybody who believes the pen is mightier than the sword hasn’t been inside a maximum security prison.

  Bennie crossed the threshold with a nonchalance that fooled no one and walked down a narrow gray corridor, as stifl
ing as the waiting room but mercifully quiet. The only sounds were echoes of faraway shouting and the clatter of her pumps down the hall. She hit a battered button and rode the empty cab to the third floor. On the landing was a smoked glass window that obscured the guard sitting behind, who accepted the request slip Bennie passed through a slot. “Room 34,” said the guard’s muffled voice, and the door to Bennie’s right unlocked with a mechanical ca-thunk and opened a crack.

  She walked through the door to another gray corridor, this one with a set of doors on the left, each leading to a gray cubicle. Inmates entered the cubicles from doors off a secured hallway on the other side, and all the doors locked automatically when they closed. Each cubicle, about four feet by six, contained two chairs facing each other and a beige wall phone for calling the guard. Only a Formica counter divided felon from lawyer. Though it had never bothered Bennie before, it felt oddly inadequate today. She walked to the end of the corridor, opened the door to Room 34, and did a double-take when she saw the inmate

  “Are you Alice Connolly?” she asked.

  “Yes,” the inmate answered, with a cocky smile. “Surprised?”

  Bennie eyed the prisoner up and down, her gaze ending its bewildered journey at the Connolly’s face. The inmate looked like a prettier, albeit streetwise, version of Bennie herself, though her hair was a brassy, fraudulent red and had been scissored into crude layers. She had Bennie’s broad cheekbones and full lips, but wore enough makeup to enhance those features. She looked as tall as Bennie but was model-thin, so her orange jumpsuit seemed almost fashionably baggy. Her eyes—round, blue and wide-set—matched Bennie’s exactly, rendering the lawyer momentarily speechless.

  Connolly extended a hand over the counter. “Pleased to meet you. I’m your twin,” she said.

  Bennie stared at the inmate, stunned. It wasn’t possible. She didn’t have a twin. She didn’t even have a sister. Her briefcase slipped from her fingers and fell to the floor with a heavy thwap.

  Copyright © 1999 by Lisa Scottoline. All rights reserved.

  Moment of Truth

  “Jack Newlin had no choice but to frame himself for murder.”

  When attorney Newlin discovers his wife dead in their elegant home, he’s convinced he knows who killed her — and is equally determined to hide the truth. He decides to take the rap, and to seal his fate he hires the most inexperienced lawyer he can find, a reluctant rookie by the name of Mary DiNunzio, from the hot Philadelphia firm of Rosato & Associates.

  But hiring Mary may turn out to be his biggest mistake. Mary doubts Jack’s confession, and her ethics and instincts tell her she can’t defend a man who wants to convict himself. Smarter, gutsier, and more persistent than she has any right to be, Mary sets out to prove what really happened — because, as any lawyer knows, a case is never as simple as it seems. And nothing is ever certain until the final moment of truth.

  USA Today: “An edgy tale, full of surprises.”

  New York Post: “A carefully crafted tale of immorality, dark secrets, and family values gone awry . . .. Scottoline [keeps this] . . . page-turner moving to a chilling end.”

  Chapter One

  Jack Newlin had no choice but to frame himself for murder. Once he had set his course, his only fear was that he wouldn’t get away with it. That he wasn’t a good enough liar, even for a lawyer.

  The detectives led Jack in handcuffs into a small, windowless room at the Roundhouse, Philadelphia’s police administration building. Bolted to the floor at the center of the room was a straight-backed steel chair, which reminded Jack of the electric chair. He looked away.

  The walls of the room were a dingy gray and marred by scuff marks as high as wainscoting. A typewriter table topped with a black Smith-Corona stood against the side wall, and in front of the table sat two old wooden chairs. One of the chairs groaned when the heavyset detective, who had introduced himself as Stan Kovich, seated himself and planted his feet wide. “Siddown, Mr. Newlin,” Detective Kovich said, gesturing to a wooden chair across from him.

  “Thank you.” Jack took a seat, noting that the detective had bypassed the steel chair, evidently reserved for murderers who weren’t wealthy. Special treatment never suited Jack. A bookkeeper’s son, he had worked his way through school to become an estates lawyer who earned seven figures, but even his large partnership draw remained a pittance in comparison to his wife’s family money. He had always wished the Buxton money away, but now he was glad of it. Money was a good motive for murder.

  “You want a soda? A Coke or somethin’?” Kovich asked. The detective wore a short-sleeved white shirt, light for wintertime, and his bullish neck spread his collar open. His shoulders hunched, powerful but gone to fat, and khaki-colored Sansabelts strained to cover his thighs. A bumpy, working-class nose dominated his face and he had cheekbones so fleshy they pressed against the rims of his glasses, large gold-rimmed aviators. Their bifocal window magnified his eyes, which were earth brown and addressed Jack without apparent judgment.

  “No, thanks. Nothing to drink.” He made deliberate eye contact with Detective Kovich, who was closer and seemed friendlier than the other detective. Propped against the wall on a thin Italian loafer, he was black and hadn’t said anything except to introduce himself. Hovering over six feet tall, rangy and slim, he had a face as narrow as his body, a small, thin mouth, and a nose a shade too long in proportion to high cheekbones. Dark, almost-onyx eyes sat high on his face, like judges atop a dais.

  “Let’s start by you telling me something about yourself, Mr. Newlin.” Kovich smiled, showing teeth stained by coffee. “By the way, just for the record, this interview is being videotaped.” He waved vaguely behind the smudgy mirror on the wall, but Jack didn’t look, steeling himself to be convincing in his false confession.

  “Well, I’m forty-three. I’m a partner at Tribe & Wright, heading the estates and trusts department. I attended the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Yale, and Girard before that.”

  Kovich nodded. “Wow. Impressive.”

  “Thank you,” Jack said. He was proudest of Girard, a boarding high school established by the trust of Stephen Girard for fatherless boys. Girard was a Philadelphia institution. He never could have made it to Yale or any other university otherwise.

  “Where you from?”

  “North Philly. Torresdale.”

  “Your people still up there?”

  “No. My father died a long time ago and my mother passed away last year, from lung cancer.”

  “I know how that goes. I lost my mother two years ago. It’s no picnic.”

  “I’m sorry,” Jack said. No picnic. It was such a rich understatement, his mouth felt bitter. His mother, gone. His father, so long ago. Now Honor. He cleared his throat. “Maybe we should move on.”

  “Sure, sure.” Kovich nodded quickly. “So, you’re a lawyer at the Tribe law firm. Pretty big outfit, right? I read somethin’ about them in the paper, how much they bring in a year. They’re printin’ money.”

  “Don’t believe everything you read. Reporters have to sell newspapers.”

  “Tell me about it.” Kovich laughed, a harsh guttural noise that burst from his throat. He turned to the other detective, still standing against the wall. “Right, Mick?” he asked.

  The detective, who had introduced himself as Reginald Brinkley, not Mick, only nodded in response, and the pursing of his lips told Jack he didn’t welcome the attention. Brinkley, also middle-aged, wore a well-tailored brown sportcoat with a maroon silk tie, still tight despite the late hour and affixed to his white shirt with a gold-toned tie bar. His gaze chilled the room and the uptilt to his chin was distinctly resentful. Jack didn’t know what he had done to provoke the detective and only hoped it worked against him.

  “So, Mr. Newlin,” Kovich was saying, “hey, can I call you Jack?”

  “Of course.”

  “You got any other family, Jack? Kids?”

  “One.”

  “Oh yeah?” Kovich’s tone brighte
ned. “What flavor?”

  “A girl. A daughter.”

  “How old?”

  “Sixteen.”

  “I got a sixteen-year-old!” Kovich grinned, showing his bad teeth. “It’s a trip, ain’t it? Teenagers. You got just the one?”

  “Yes.”

  “Me, I got a thirteen-year-old, too. Also a girl. Houseful of blow dryers. My wife says when they’re not in the bathroom, they’re in the chat rooms. Yours like that, on the computer?”

  Jack cleared his throat again. “I don’t mean to be impolite, but is there a reason for this small talk?” He didn’t want to go there and it seemed like something a murderer would say.

  “Well, uh, next-of-kin notification is our job. Standard procedure, Jack.”

  He tensed up. He should have thought of that. The police would be the ones to tell Paige. “My daughter lives on her own. I’d hate for her to hear this kind of news from the police. Can’t I tell her myself?”

  “Sixteen, she’s on her own already?”

  “She’s legally emancipated, with a promising career.”

  “Legally emancipated, what’s ‘at?”

  “My wife and I filed papers, I drafted them myself, essentially saying that she’s legally an adult. She lives on her own and earns her own money. She’s a model, and, in any event, I really would prefer to be the one to tell her about . . .her mother.” He paused. “I could call her after we talk. I mean, I do want to make a full confession, right now.”

  Kovich’s lips parted slightly, and behind him, Brinkley’s eyes narrowed.

  Jack’s mouth went dry at their reaction. Maybe he’d gone too fast. “I mean, I feel awful, just awful. A horrible thing happened tonight. I can’t believe what I’ve done. I want to get it off my chest.”

  Kovich nodded encouragingly. “You mean you want to make a statement?”