Law and Vengeance

by Mike Papantonio

  Gina looked away from the water and saw Bryan and Peter enter the restaurant at the same time. Neither was smiling, which she took as a bad sign. She stood up and waved them over to the table.

  Great food and great service tends to smooth over most things, and the Blue Planet delivered on both. The wine hadn’t hurt either. Gina and Peter were both working on their third glass, but when she tried to pour another glass for Bryan he declined.

  “I think I’ve had my limit,” he said. “Last night my coworkers decided dinner wasn’t enough, and all of us ended up at Snooki’s.”

  “Where you had a drink or two,” said Gina.

  “Or three or four,” Bryan admitted. “My coworkers seemed to think I needed some drinking practice if I hoped to fit in Oz.”

  “Hobnobbing doesn’t hurt in Spanish Trace either,” said Peter. “In fact, I’ve been meeting a lot of potential clients in the local drinking establishments.”

  “What clients are you talking about?” asked Bryan.

  “That’s what I wanted to talk to my sister about,” said Peter to Gina. “I’ve been thinking about opening a wealth management office in Spanish Trace.”

  Like the protective big sister she was, Gina pretended to be happy for her brother, smiling and saying, “Oh, Peter.”

  Bryan was less agreeable. As far as he was concerned, Peter had stayed in town too long already. “What about your business in Connecticut? And didn’t Gina tell me a few months ago that your wife was pregnant?”

  “Thank you for being so circumspect,” said Peter to Gina, “in not spreading my sad tale.” Then he turned to Bryan and said, “I had a business and I had a wife, until my business partner and my wife decided to make a more perfect union together with each other. After I was ruled out as being the biological father of my wife’s imminent baby, I put spouse, home, and business in the rearview mirror.”

  “Sorry,” said Bryan. “I didn’t know.”

  “It’s all for the best,” said Peter. “And Spanish Trace looks like the perfect place to start over. There’s certainly no shortage of old people with money here. I’ve been looking for potential office sites.”

  “I’ve seen some good business rentals available,” said Bryan.

  “But you didn’t go the rental route yourself, did you?” asked Peter.

  “No, I didn’t. We bought and built.”

  “That must have cost a fortune. You built in the high-rent district.”

  “It wasn’t cheap,” Bryan admitted.

  “I should say. You must be in debt up to your eyeballs.”

  “Maybe not quite that high,” said Bryan, clearly looking uncomfortable with the subject matter.

  He was glad when Peter suddenly seemed distracted. “Look at the time,” he said, and then reached for his cell phone. “Geez,” said Peter, “I forgot to charge my cell. Can I borrow yours for just a minute, Bryan? I promised a potential client that I’d get back to him.”

  “No problem,” said Bryan, handing Peter his phone.

  “I’ll make my call out on the balcony,” he said, excusing himself from the table.

  As he walked away, Bryan extended a hand to Gina and said, “Alone, at last.”

  Gina took his hand into hers, but their alone time didn’t last. The maître d’ came hurrying toward their table. “Dr. Penn, we have a caller from Australia on the line asking for you.”

  “How did the caller know you were here?” asked Gina.

  “Probably my work. They knew we were dining here and must have told the caller,” Bryan said, getting to his feet leaving Gina alone at the table until Peter rejoined her.

  “What gives?” her brother asked. “I saw Bryan take off.”

  “Someone from Australia called the restaurant looking for Bryan.”

  “Maybe it’s the same person who just emailed him,” said Peter, handing over Bryan’s phone to his sister.

  Like many people, Bryan had his phone synced to his email. Gina could see that someone had sent Bryan an email with the subject matter: Emergency message from the Land Down Under!

  “I better open this in case it’s something Bryan needs to know about now,” said Gina.

  She clicked onto the link and a picture appeared along with a message. When she’d been growing up, Gina had heard such pictures referred to as, “beaver shots.” There was a written message that came with the graphic picture that read: If you need a work testimonial, Doc, I can vouch that you took great care of my down under. And I will swear by your bedside manner. The text was signed, T.

  “What is it?” asked Peter.

  Gina shook her head. She didn’t know what to say. The wonderful meal that only a moment before had warmed her stomach, now felt like lead. She was tempted to toss the phone on the table, but Pandora’s box, not to mention T’s, had already been opened. Gina clicked on a link to a video file that had come with the text. The first thing she heard was the music to Jethro Tull’s song “Bungle in the Jungle.” Bryan’s television show opened with the same music, but not with the footage she was seeing. A familiar looking woman was naked and positioned with her hands and knees on a bed. The camera followed the contours of the woman’s body, pausing to take in her curves. Then the camera pulled back to show a smiling Bryan, as he approached the woman from behind.

  Without warning, Gina’s food came out. She tried to contain her vomit but her revulsion brought up more than just her food; it brought back the terrible memories of her youth.

  Red-faced and utterly humiliated, she grabbed a napkin and wiped at her lips. “I’m so sorry,” she said, her words directed at the diners around her.

  She handed Peter her credit card and said, “Pay. Give a big tip to whoever cleans up. And tell Bryan to get his own ride to the airport.”

  Head lowered, eyes averted, and her mortification absolute, Gina limped her way out of the restaurant.

  25

  GUNS DON’T KILL

  Gina knew that Bryan had warned her, in his own way—when she’d been in Chicago he had told her, “Don’t make me wait too long.” He’d been pushing for intimacy for the last month, but she had put him off. Gina had her reasons for needing a time-out: she hadn’t felt pretty with her body bruised and covered with scabs, and her leg in a cast.

  And she needed time to recover from Angus’s death. His murder had unsettled her; plotting revenge and making love were too contradictory for her to reconcile, and she had known better than to try.

  Gradually, though, she’d been healing. Her libido had been coming around. But he hadn’t been willing to wait.

  Scott, one of Bennie’s security team, walked her to the car. Gina was glad a bodyguard had been stationed outside the restaurant. That made it much easier to explain what she wanted done.

  “Tonight,” Gina said, “instead of patrolling my house I want you stationed at the security gate. There is a good chance my former boyfriend Bryan might try and get in. He knows the entry code, and with it he might try to illegally enter. If you see him, he needs to be told that he no longer has access rights and will be arrested if he trespasses.”

  “I’m going to need to run this by Bennie,” Scott said.

  “Yes, please do that,” Gina said, “but don’t call him for five minutes. From my car I’ll get hold of Bennie and tell him what I want done.”

  Gina was a little less tight-lipped providing Bennie with information, but not much. She told him that she and Bryan were no longer a couple, and that he was no longer an approved visitor at either her home or work. Bennie promised Gina that he would contact the rest of her security detail with the news.

  “Bryan will be leaving for Australia in the morning,” said Gina, “and should be there for the next two weeks. I imagine by the time he returns we’ll both have put this behind us.” She hoped Bennie believed that lie.

  Step by methodic step, Gina tried to eliminate Bryan from her life. She blocked all his numbers from having access to her cell phone. Then she worked the controls of her laptop
to reroute any email from Bryan to go directly to her spam box and at work she would have I.T. do the same thing; hopefully all his future emails would go directly to trash.

  Bryan’s emails weren’t the only things of his going to trash; Gina went through her house and removed all mementos that might remind her of him. It was a painful cleansing. It was also, Gina told herself, a necessary exorcism. While ridding herself of her demons, Gina suddenly remembered where she had seen the “other” woman. “T” was a bartender at Snooki’s. The timing of her email suddenly made sense; Bryan had ended up at Snooki’s the night before. By the sound of it, he’d closed the bar. But that was apparently only the beginning of his night out. Bryan must have gone to her home. What was T’s name? Tammy, Gina remembered. The bartender was an extremely attractive brunette. Bryan had apparently thought so as well.

  Peter came home about an hour after Gina and saw how she had spent her time ridding herself of any reminders of Bryan. For once, their roles were reversed. In the past it had always fallen to Gina to comfort him.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I feel your pain and know it hurts like hell.”

  “It was about time I moved on anyway,” said Gina. “Bryan was a fling that I held on to for too long.”

  “I told Bryan you had gotten sick when he came back to the table. And, of course, he couldn’t help but see that you had been sick. I told him that you wouldn’t be available to drive him to the airport in the morning.”

  “I’m sure that’s no big deal to him. In fact, I know just the person he should ask.”

  “He wanted to come over and see you tonight, but I discouraged him.”

  “If he had come over,” said Gina, “an armed guard would have discouraged him.”

  “Anyway, he said he’d call.”

  Good luck in getting me on the line, thought Gina.

  “When I was talking with him,” said Peter, “I don’t think he had any idea what happened.”

  “As soon as he tries to call me,” said Gina, “he’ll see her call. And then he’ll add two and two together, which adds up to around a thirty-eight double D.”

  “I’m here for you,” said Peter. “It’s like old times.”

  “Yeah,” said Gina, “it’s just like the good old days.”

  She couldn’t contain the bitterness in her voice.

  Gina took some of the heavy duty medication that had been prescribed to her after the crash. It was just enough to knock her out.

  She awoke at nine, three hours later than when she usually got up. By now, Gina knew Bryan was on his way to Australia. She was glad that for the next two weeks he was going to be ten thousand miles away from her. That wasn’t far enough, she thought, but at least it was a start.

  Gina called work to say she would be coming in late. The medication and the hangover from the breakup had left Gina feeling groggy. She knew her detractors liked to refer to her as an “iron maiden,” as if feelings were something foreign to her. Gina wished they were right. But even when she was hurting, she did have an iron will. That would see her through the early, difficult days of the breakup.

  Work would help as well, just as schoolwork had. Growing up, Gina had never settled for anything less than an “A.” Studying saved her from having to interact with her parents. Work would save her from thoughts of Bryan. Or at least that was her plan.

  There was a part of her, though, that knew she had pushed him away, right up until the night before last. If Gina had gone to Bryan’s hooroo celebration, he probably wouldn’t have strayed. She had yet to meet a male saint. Her reluctance to be with him after the accident couldn’t have been easy for him to accept, especially after the way they had connected on so many levels. Gina remembered the last night the two of them had made love at Bryan’s place; it had occurred just a few days before the car crash.

  He had invited her to his house for a home-cooked dinner, and over the course of the evening they had gotten progressively sillier. They ate in his backyard where he had a picnic table. Whether by neglect, or by design, Bryan’s backyard really did look like a jungle. It was overgrown with foliage that included birds of paradise, fan palms, and banana trees. In that green setting, he had serenaded her with his harmonica, playing “That’s Amore.” Gina supposed he had learned that song in honor of her Italian heritage.

  Whatever the reason, his up-tempo playing had awakened all the special needs animals that were living in cages in his backyard. Gina had never heard “That’s Amore” played to the accompaniment of grunts and whines and howls and growls. Probably no one had ever heard such a chorus. And what was loudest was her laughter. How she had laughed. Gina would miss that.

  And she would miss Dr. Doolittle. But he was dead to her now.

  Gina looked up to see who was knocking at her door. Carol smiled at her and asked, “Got a minute?”

  “For you,” Gina replied, “of course.”

  As Carol took a seat, Gina considered telling her about Bryan, but then she became resolute about not opening that door. At work Gina was determined to remain dry-eyed, and the only way that would be possible was not to talk about him.

  “I know you’ve been waiting to hear about our timeline investigation of Ron Thursby and Tom Lutz,” Carol said. “From what we can determine, though, neither of those men could have been in Florida at the time of Angus’s death. It would appear that neither left Chicago during the dates in question.”

  “You’re sure of this?”

  “Ninety-nine percent sure,” said Carol. “It isn’t as if we have access to their desk calendars. But we do have witnesses that put them in Chicago, and there’s no record of them being on any airline manifests at any airports near Spanish Trace around the time of his death.”

  “Our whistle-blower believes Thursby meant him serious harm.”

  “He’s probably right,” said Carol. “Thursby’s jacket is full of charges of excessive force. Everyone knows he’s juiced on steroids, which makes him highly unstable.”

  Gina remembered her encounter with the man and how she had willed herself to not be intimidated by him. It was a miracle she’d managed not to shake.

  “Lutz is even more dangerous than Thursby, though,” said Carol. “He’s smart. He knows where the bodies are buried. Angus was right to direct you to Bull’s-eye. Bit by bit we’re learning about a lot of bad things that went on behind those doors. Unfortunately, the goings-on seem to be mostly sealed by a police confessional. All we have so far are rumors of business deals being conducted through the use of blow and prostitutes the same rumors say the shooting hall is a front for illegal weapons and drug trafficking.”

  “How do we connect Arbalest with that?” asked Gina.

  “Angus’s file shows that he was interested in an Arbalest lobbyist named Kendrick Strahan. For several years, Strahan has been chummy with Lutz. Strahan claims that during that time he regularly paid cash to rent out the Bull’s-eye meeting room. While some of those gatherings appear to be legit, we suspect most of the rental payments went into Lutz’s pocket. In return for that bribe money, Lutz helped Strahan push Arbalest products to the Chicago Police Department, as well as the police departments of other cities throughout the Midwest.”

  “You can get me a report documenting this?” asked Gina.

  “We’re working on that now,” said Carol, “but before we dot our i’s and cross our t’s I wanted to give you this heads-up.”

  “I appreciate it,” said Gina. “And while you’re here, I’m wondering if you can tell me why Officer Thursby was chasing down my whistle-blower.”

  “Lutz might have decided it was in his best interests to put an end to your Arbalest case by ridding himself of Diaz.”

  “If at first you don’t succeed,” said Gina, “try, try again.” Then she explained, “I am wondering if it was Lutz who put the hit on Angus.”

  “I don’t have any information telling me that,” said Carol. “All I can say is that Lutz is dirty, even though he has managed to shield hi
mself from any incriminating charges.”

  “Thank you,” said Gina, “and please thank your team.”

  “I’ll do that. How is your Arbalest case going?”

  “We’re waiting on a judge to tell us if she’s dismissed our case or if it’s going forward.”

  “That must not be easy.”

  “It’s torture,” Gina said. “I am sure we answered every point of the defendant’s motion to dismiss, and by the merits of our arguments we showed why the case should proceed. But in the end it comes down to what the judge decides. And of course every day I have to wait is another day I second-guess myself. Should I have been slower in responding to their motion? Should I have beefed up our arguments? Should I be worried about some bias the judge might have? Could I have done something to better position ourselves in this action?”

  “Don’t beat yourself up too much,” said Carol, before she excused herself.

  That seemed like good advice, Gina thought. But she also knew it was advice she would find impossible to follow.

  The only thing that seemed to help Gina avoid self-recrimination was work and workouts. Being hospitalized and then having to wear a cast had gotten in the way of her fitness. Now she punished herself to get back into shape. The cast was no longer an excuse to not do cardio. She limped along in the treadmill, rode the recumbent bicycle, rowed on the rower, and even did the elliptical. Anger drove her. She wanted to be ready for the courtroom. She wanted to be ready to do what was needed to Angus’s murderer. And she wanted to regain her smoking body for life after Bryan.

  No one interrupted Gina during her punishing workouts in the Bergman-Deketomis gym. But even Gina’s sweaty, stern face wasn’t enough to stop Cara from breaching her sanctuary. The young associate came barging into Gina’s private space waving a piece of paper, causing Gina to reluctantly interrupt her routine.

  Cara couldn’t contain the excitement in her voice. “This just arrived from Judge Sanders,” she said, and then read the two words Gina had been waiting for: “Motion Denied.”