Justin Peacock

by Blind Man's Alley (v5)

  It was a little after eight o’clock, Candace having come over after work. She was still dressed for the office, while Duncan was in jeans. He’d put on a suit to go see Rafael at Rikers, but otherwise hadn’t bothered to look anything close to presentable since getting the ax.

  “Nazario’s still pissed that you quit on him?”

  “I don’t blame him for being pissed. But it’s also that he seems resigned to taking the plea. I think he’s so beaten down by the whole thing that he’s made peace with the idea of spending years in jail for something he didn’t do.”

  “I can’t blame the guy for thinking a fair shake’s not in the cards,” Candace replied. “It can’t just be a coincidence that they chose Rafael to be the fall guy. So which came first, you representing Rafael or his being set up?”

  Duncan looked away, peeling off the beer label and then rolling it up in his hand. Candace, well versed in waiting people out, sat still. “We’re off the record, right?”

  “I told you before, I’m blacklisted from writing about any of this. We’re just two guys talking.”

  Duncan fixed her with a look. “Is that what we are?” he said, Candace seeming a little caught off guard. When it became clear she wasn’t going to say anything Duncan continued. “I obviously can’t prove it,” he said. “But I’m pretty much certain they picked him because I was already his lawyer.”

  Candace nodded. “Like I said before, I figured your guilty conscience had a role in all this.”

  “I don’t feel guilty,” Duncan protested.

  “Really? Because my assumption that you did was part of why I was starting to like you.”

  Now it was Duncan’s turn to be caught off guard. “I do feel responsible,” he said. “There’s a difference.”

  “To a lawyer, maybe,” Candace said with a slight smile. “Anyway, so now what? If you can’t represent Nazario, isn’t that game-over?”

  “Not necessarily,” Duncan said. “I’ve got a potential angle to at least maybe get into the courtroom without actually representing Rafael. But that won’t do me any good without a way to exonerate him once I get there.”

  “Which you don’t have.”

  “I don’t have that, no,” Duncan said. “I need to talk to the person who came forward to you about Jeremy.”

  “You know I can’t just hand over a source.”

  “Look, I play by the rules too. How’s that working out for either of us?”

  “I’ll see if I can get her to agree to talk to you,” Candace said. “I don’t think she knows enough to help you, anyway. She doesn’t have the slightest idea who Sean Fowler is.”

  Duncan took a long swig of his beer, trying to fight down the feeling that he’d already failed, and that all he was doing now was banging his head against an unmoving wall. “If you have a better idea,” he said, “now wouldn’t be a bad time to tell me.”

  “You either need somebody on the inside to give it up or you need some sort of physical evidence, right?”

  “Actually it’s a little worse than that. Evidence of Rafael’s innocence isn’t enough at this point, since I’m not his lawyer and there’s not going to be a trial. I need to be able to show that he was framed, and by whom. But I don’t actually know who killed Fowler, and I don’t have any evidence that the Roths gave the order.”

  Candace gave Duncan an appraising look. “So have you entertained the possibility that you’ve just lost here?” she said. “You don’t have a client; you don’t have evidence. Aren’t those pretty essential things for a lawyer looking to win a case?”

  She’d read his mind, but Duncan resisted conceding it. “What can I do but keep fighting?” he said. “This is the only thing I have left to do. If I don’t try, it’s game-over just the same as it is if I try and fail.”

  Candace offered Duncan a warm smile in response, Duncan finding himself smiling back, though it had nothing to do with what he’d just said. “Can I tell you something weird?” Candace said. “I got divorced today.”

  Duncan was a little thrown by the transition. Was this her way of telling him she was officially single? Of acknowledging the attraction in the smile they’d just exchanged? “I don’t know whether to say congratulations or sorry.”

  Candace looked uncomfortable, like she might be regretting telling him. “Both. Neither. Shit, beats me.”

  “You were in court today?”

  Candace shook her head. “We weren’t contesting it, just a yearlong separation before I could claim abandonment. I got it in the mail. So anticlimactic, I suppose, in that sense.”

  “That must be strange. Though if you’ve been apart for a full year, I guess you’ve had time to get used to the idea.”

  “It’s not like it’s a surprise, except in the way that such things are when they actually happen,” Candace said, looking like she was trying to fight off a sudden bout of sadness. “So how about you? How come you’re not married?”

  Duncan suspected Candace was feeling vulnerable and trying to turn the tables. “I’ve got nothing against the idea,” he said. “It just hasn’t happened. I’ve been working at least sixty hours a week for the past seven years, so that hasn’t helped. And most of the people I meet are lawyers, and you know what they’re like. Plus I don’t come across a lot of great advertisements for the institution. How long were you even married?”

  “About six years, not counting this past one, and we were together for about three before that. So as failed relationships go, we didn’t do that terrible.”

  Duncan decided to probe further. “What ended it?”

  “I guess I did. There wasn’t a big scandal or anything. We got to the point where having a kid was the next thing, and suddenly the idea that I was in this for the next twenty years or whatever became something scary to me. Maybe we were a little too young—nobody in New York gets married in their twenties anymore. But really it was just that we had different approaches to life. Ben was such an academic—the world as it actually is just isn’t that interesting to him. To me, it’s the only thing.”

  Duncan finished his beer and put the bottle down on his coffee table before looking back over at Candace. “So why’d you just tell me?” he asked, no challenge in it, but no banter either.

  “About the divorce?” Candace asked, looking taken aback. “No reason. I hadn’t told anyone, and it seemed like something I shouldn’t go the whole day without saying out loud.”

  “I think you just wanted me to know you were on the market,” Duncan said, just playfully enough to leave himself some plausible deniability.

  “Please,” Candace said. “You don’t even have a job. I do look for a certain amount of respectability.”

  71

  DUNCAN HAD been waiting outside of the Roth Properties headquarters for over an hour before he spotted Leah Roth coming out. She was heading toward a small row of parked car-service Town Cars outside the building when Duncan intercepted her on the sidewalk.

  Leah froze upon seeing him, frightened, like she thought he was about to attack her right out on the crowded street. Duncan held up his hands, palms up. “I just need to talk to you for a minute.”

  “We don’t have anything to talk about,” Leah said, struggling to regain her composure.

  “We do. It’ll take five minutes.”

  “You had plenty of chances to talk to me. You chose instead to betray your professional obligations, as well as any obligations you may have had to me personally.”

  “I’m not here to apologize or explain or grovel. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t important. So just hear me out for five minutes.”

  Leah hesitated, but then nodded. Duncan had been relying on her wanting to know what he was up to. “I’ll listen to you for five minutes, but that’s going to be it.”

  Duncan followed Leah to a Town Car, sliding in next to her in the backseat. It felt strange to be so physically close to her: he felt a sudden flare of violence, an impulse to physically hurt her for what she’d done to him. Lea
h must have felt it: she gave Duncan a sidelong look and put her back against the inside of the car door rather than the seat.

  “In the course of my representation of you,” Duncan began, “I became aware that you were a conspirator in ongoing criminal activity. That conspiracy included future criminal conduct.”

  “The hell do you think you’re doing?” Leah interrupted, her gaze now shifted toward the car’s driver. Duncan, who was seated directly behind the man, could see only the back of his head.

  Duncan ignored the question. “Part of that future illegal conduct is an attempt to perpetuate a fraud upon a court, specifically in the prosecution of Rafael Nazario for the murder of Sean Fowler. I am therefore asking that you bring this fraud to the attention of the judge hearing that case. If you refuse to do so, I will have no choice but to do it myself.”

  The man in the driver’s seat turned while Duncan was speaking, and to Duncan’s shock he found himself looking into the eyes of Darryl Loomis. “I think you should assume our high-yellow friend here is recording this conversation,” he said to Leah, his voice soft with controlled menace.

  Ignoring Darryl, or at least seeming to, Leah permitted herself something like a laugh. Duncan found himself wondering if Darryl had already told her about his father, and whether she’d cared. “I have no involvement in a conspiracy of any kind,” she said to Duncan. “Certainly not one involving Mr. Fowler’s tragic murder by your former client. Any attempt by you to suggest otherwise would not only be slanderous, but would violate your ethical obligation as my former lawyer. It’s bad enough you’ve lost your job from your inappropriate behavior toward me, Mr. Riley; do you really want to throw your law license onto the fire?”

  Duncan was still trying to process what the hell Loomis was doing behind the wheel of the car. “I’m not recording this, or trying to get a confession out of you,” he said. “I’m simply formally requesting that you notify the court of the truth about Fowler’s murder.”

  “And what truth would that be?”

  “That Fowler was murdered because he was blackmailing your brother over the Aurora. Driscoll was part of it; Mr. Loomis here probably was too. But you were behind it, all, weren’t you, Leah?”

  Other than a tightness in her face from clenching her jaw, Duncan didn’t see much of a reaction from Leah. She was good. “I understand you’re upset, Duncan,” Leah said. “But really.”

  “I’m not letting you get away with it. If you hadn’t made an innocent man the fall guy, that would be one thing, but I’m not standing by and watching Rafael go to jail for something he didn’t do. If you won’t find a way to get him out, then I’ll go to the court and tell them everything I know.”

  Duncan spoke quietly, unable to fully keep a slight tremor out of his voice. Leah glanced up at Loomis, then back at Duncan. “Even if the judge agrees to listen to you, what proof are you going to show him? What evidence do you have?”

  “I’ve shown you all the cards you’re going to see. It was you who picked out Rafael as the fall guy; it had to be. You picked him because I was his lawyer—you had me implicated in this from the start.”

  Leah looked over at Loomis, trying not to react. “I couldn’t have less idea what you’re talking about,” she said stiffly.

  Duncan wasn’t expecting a confession. “You’ve made me the most dangerous kind of person there is: a guy with nothing to lose.”

  “You’ve got plenty more you can lose, Counselor,” Darryl growled.

  Duncan opened the car door, got out, and slammed it behind him, walking quickly away. Leah made eye contact with Darryl in the rearview mirror. “What did you make of all that?” she asked.

  “He was just fishing around for you to say something,” Darryl replied. “He was wired, I’m sure.”

  “You think the cops wired him?”

  “Nah,” Darryl said. “I think he was just freelancing, hoping to pull out a rabbit. The question is, can he really go to the judge?”

  “If he even tries I’ll have his law license.”

  “Won’t much matter to you if you’re in jail,” Darryl said. “It sounds like he knows what’s been going on.”

  “Knowing and proving are entirely different things. He has no evidence. I shouldn’t have gotten him fired, though: it meant I lost control of him. I overreacted.”

  “Even if he can’t prove anything, there’d be some serious shit if he went public on this.”

  Leah shot Darryl a look by way of the rearview mirror. “I hope you’re not suggesting anything. He’s a lawyer, he’s been talking to that reporter, he just got fired because of me—people would put it together, easy.”

  “There’s no doubt he’s a threat, though. This personal between you two?”

  Leah was a little surprised that Darryl would ask, but then again, she figured the answer was probably obvious. “Not anymore,” she said.

  72

  RAFAEL NAZARIO’S guilty plea was scheduled to be heard at two p.m. Rafael hadn’t been brought in yet when Duncan arrived at the courtroom at about a quarter to two. There were maybe ten people present, most of whom Duncan recognized: the ADAs; several reporters, including Costello from the Journal; and Rafael’s grandmother. She was sitting next to a middle-aged Hispanic woman; Duncan wondered idly if it was Rafael’s mother.

  Bream spotted Duncan and muttered something to Castelluccio, who turned around, frowning. Duncan offered a nod, which she did not return. Duncan was sure Castelluccio would like him even less soon enough.

  At five to two Robert Walker came hurrying in, walking past Duncan without appearing to notice him as he made his way to the defense’s table up front. A couple of minutes later Lily Vaughan walked in. She sat down in the back, then looked around the room, her gaze quickly alighting on Duncan. Lily hesitated before coming over to him.

  “What’re you doing here, Dunk?” she asked by way of greeting.

  “Don’t call me Dunk. And I think the better question is, what’re you doing here?”

  “You probably have a better idea as to why I’m here than I do,” Lily said.

  “I assume you’re here to see if I cause any trouble.”

  “That certainly could be,” Lily said. “Why, will you?”

  Duncan smiled. He wasn’t going to take it personally that Lily was here to spy on him. “It’s not like I have anything better to do.”

  Lily glanced around, then lowered her voice. “The fuck is going on? What’d you get up to that the Blake would fire you? What is this all about?”

  “You don’t actually want to know.”

  Lily shrugged, conceding the point. “Should I be worried? About the firm, I mean.”

  “I’m not going after Blake personally,” Duncan said. “But if he turns out to be collateral damage, don’t invite me to the pity party.”

  Lily looked away. “I guess I should tell you—I’m in.”

  It took Duncan a moment to understand. “You made partner?”

  Lily nodded, pride fighting embarrassment. “It’s not official yet, but Blake’s given me his word. The competition got a little easier, I guess.”

  Duncan was surprised Blake would make a commitment like that, since partnership was never guaranteed, even to the star associates. He looked over at Lily, who still wasn’t meeting his eyes. “You leveraged my getting fired, didn’t you? That and Karen Cleary—you made a move, got Blake to commit.”

  Lily forced herself to look at him. “I’m sorry—I know it’s not fair.”

  Duncan smiled at her, wanting her to see that he wasn’t going to harbor it. “Since when did either of us expect things to be fair?”

  “Are you okay?” Lily asked, looking at him with real concern.

  “Are you kidding? I sleep till ten a.m., go to the gym every day. This is the life.”

  “Did you know it was going to get like this? That you’d end up out on the street over whatever was happening?”

  Duncan shook his head. “Believe it or not, I wasn’t trying to cau
se trouble. I was just doing my job. That’s still all I’m doing.”

  “I’m sorry, Duncan. Is there something I can do that would help?”

  “You don’t owe me anything, Lily,” Duncan said. “I think of you fondly and I wish you well. I’m sorry that nothing much came out of that, but let’s part friends.”

  Lily looked at him sadly for a moment, then nodded. “So what’s going to happen here now?”

  “I’m kind of curious about that myself,” Duncan replied, standing as Judge Lasky entered the courtroom and took the bench.

  The court officers then brought Rafael in. The case manager read the docket number, formally beginning the proceeding.

  As soon as he had done so, Duncan stood and made his way into the well of the court, his heart pounding. “Your Honor,” he said, feeling every eye in the room on him. “Before you take this plea I need to bring some information to the court’s attention.”

  Judge Lasky peered over his glasses at Duncan. “Mr. Riley, it is my understanding you are no longer Mr. Nazario’s attorney.”

  “That’s true, Your Honor. I’m speaking now not as a lawyer for Mr. Nazario, but rather as an officer of the court. I believe the rules governing attorney conduct obligate me to come forward.”

  “Mr. Riley has no standing to be addressing the court in this proceeding,” Castelluccio said angrily.

  “Chambers,” Lasky said brusquely. “Lawyers only. That includes you, Mr. Riley.”

  AS SOON as they entered the chambers, Castelluccio continued her argument that the judge shouldn’t even listen to Duncan. Bream and Walker followed her in, with Duncan bringing up the rear. “Why don’t we hear from the one person in this room who actually knows what this is about,” Lasky said to Castelluccio as he sat at the head of the table, gesturing for the rest of them to sit.