by Noel Obiora
“Those men who came inside told him you were with him and he thought you were just going to a movie with me.”
“Good, then I don’t need to tell him anything.”
“Go back with him,” Neda said. Amy looked at her and sighed.
At Neda’s car, they hugged again.
“I really had fun. We should hang out in places like this more often,” Neda said.
“What on Earth did you tell them to get us past that line?” Amy asked.
“I told them we are with the State Department and we were scouting locations to bring some African dignitaries visiting LA,” Neda said with a big grin.
“No! You really have a State Department ID?”
Neda grinned and brought out her identity card for the district attorney’s office. They both laughed. Amy recalled Neda showing her ID but thought she was just confirming her age, and the man at the gate had waived them through before Amy could bring out her ID.
“Hey, don’t make a big deal about Thomas coming here. He’ll think there’s more to it.”
Amy smiled but did not give Neda’s suggestion much thought until she got in the car with Thomas. Looking at Thomas’s expectant gaze, she sensed a confidence he had that she was going to react a certain way and decided to heed Neda’s advice.
12
20/20
When Amy got to her office on Friday morning, Melissa was sitting in front of her desk with a stack of papers and a pen, apparently doing her work while waiting for Amy.
“Did you know about this listening device that was found at the victim’s house in Kate’s case?” Melissa asked, standing up.
“What listening device?”
“You didn’t review the evidence list you gave the defendant?”
“I did, but I don’t recall seeing any listening device.”
“There were tiny microphones, the size of almonds, mentioned in one of the police officers’ reports, but not anywhere else. I guess they weren’t on the evidence list.”
Amy opened her mouth to say something but was not sure what to say and took a deep breath instead. “Kate didn’t tell you?” Melissa asked.
“We didn’t really talk about what was collected at the scene.”
Melissa continued to look at her rather distrustfully. “I see…well, the public defender called Gil about hiding evidence and Gil was not happy. They are filing a motion next week.”
“What did Gil say?”
“He gave Kate an earful before she left for court this morning. This is unlike her. Usually she takes initiative and runs a tight ship.”
“Should I go and see her in Pasadena?”
“No, she called a meeting with the officers in the case this afternoon. Don’t make any lunch plans—by the way, the meeting is at noon. Kate will be coming back to the office from Pasadena for it,” Melissa said and left, closing the door behind her. Shortly after she walked out, she opened the door abruptly and came back into the office. “Good timing. I was going to write you up if you got here a minute after nine a.m.,” Melissa said and closed the door behind her a second time.
“I can be here earlier if you want me to,” Amy said to an empty room. Then she sat down dejectedly and wondered how she missed the listening device.
A legal secretary came in to give Amy another message Kate left for her before going to court. It was a phone slip of a call from a radio station that had asked for Kate.
“What do they want?” Amy asked.
“They want to talk about the Jackson case.”
“What kind of station is this?” Amy asked.
“Hip-hop, R&B.”
Amy wondered whether the hip-hop station would be for Goldie or for Paul. She had never listened to Goldie’s sample disc that Helen gave her. After a while, she returned to the secretary.
“Can you call them and make sure they won’t put me on the air or record me while I’m talking to them, because I’m not authorized to say anything on the record.”
The radio station told the secretary that the morning DJ was trying to get the district attorney’s opinion on “why there was always a witness or something left at the scene of the crime when a Black man is accused of killing a white woman, but Lyle and Eric Melendez kill their mother and father with a 12-gauge shotgun and leave blood everywhere, then go to a movie, go to bars and a wine festival afterward, and nobody saw anything.” The morning show was over when the secretary called, but they would pass on Amy’s message to the DJ the next day.
“I think they were gonna record you or put you on the air no matter what. Even if they said they won’t. I’ve heard this DJ record a lot of pranks like that.”
“I am not calling them,” Amy said and thanked her.
•••
Shortly before noon, the secretary came to get Amy. Officers Gonzalez and Fritz were in the conference room waiting for her.
“What about Kate?” Amy asked the secretary.
“She couldn’t make it.”
“Did she say how long she would be?”
“I don’t think she’s coming.”
“But Kate called the meeting.”
“I think something important came up in her case,” the secretary said.
Amy was glad to see Melissa in the conference room with the officers.
“Kate had a last-minute change of plans and asked me to step in for her,” Melissa explained as Amy entered the conference room. Amy nodded to Officer Gonzalez and introduced herself to Officer Fritz, who stood up and shook her hand.
“I figured we should start by laying everything about this case out in the open, so we don’t run into another transparency issue like this again,” Melissa said as they were all seated.
“How much has Kate told you guys?” Gonzalez asked.
“Besides what’s in the record?” Amy asked.
“Besides that,” Gonzalez said.
“Nothing,” Amy said.
“Can you guys start with telling us if there’s a whistleblower in your ranks? I want to know what else they’ll be telling the defendant’s lawyer, if they haven’t told him already,” Melissa said.
“There’s no whistleblower. But we think someone saw or heard him when he killed her,” Gonzalez said.
“Why do you think that?” Melissa asked.
“There’s another item in this case that isn’t in the complaint we filed,” Gonzalez said.
“Besides the listening device that was partially listed?” Melissa asked. Gonzalez nodded, with a tight lip.
“What’s the evidence?” Amy asked, convinced that Kate already knew.
“An electronic box that records or transmits the listening device,” Gonzalez said, and sat back in his chair, which Fritz took as a cue to lean forward and start speaking.
Fritz brought out ten-by-ten inch pictures from a file and placed them on the table. Amy examined them as he spoke.
“We found this device in her bedroom under the mattress, looks like some computer listening device with a modem,” Fritz said and pointed at the device in the picture. “We didn’t know what it was and there was no serial number or brand name, just blank. We got some experts looking at it.”
“Why was it not listed in the police report?” Melissa asked.
“I was afraid that the defendant’s lawyers would start arguing that some professional people were after Goldie. This type of sophisticated device would just put a professional killer at the heart of this case,” Gonzalez said.
“You realize that does not help your case right now—what you just said. The last thing this office needs is another big shot Black lawyer saying the LAPD left out a piece of evidence from this case. So, for fuck’s sake—please tell me you’ve got a damn good reason for why you did not include evidence that shows someone might have seen or heard this crime being committed besides wh
at’s happening in O. J.’s case?” Melissa said.
“We didn’t know who put it there, and we were sure it had nothing to do with the crime,” Fritz said.
“And how the fuck were you so sure about that when you didn’t know who put it there?” Melissa said.
“He would have taken it out if he knew about it,” Fritz said.
“Whoever put that there is afraid to come forward,” Gonzalez said.
“What would he be afraid of? Paul?” Amy asked.
“Or Paul’s father’s organization, or jail,” Gonzalez said. “Maybe he was also secretly spying on her.”
“Every door in that apartment complex opens into a courtyard where you can see every other door. Someone must have seen something, if not Paul Jackson, then the person who left the device. We think we’ll find him before the trial,” Fritz said.
“Do you have a lead on that?” Melissa asked.
“Not yet, but we think the girl next door knows something about it. That’s why we leaned heavily on her,” Fritz said.
“Rachel?” Amy asked.
“Yes, Alvarez thinks Rachel put the device there, not Goldie.”
“Why?” Amy asked.
“She was the one looking after the apartment when Goldie went to London.”
“She was pretty broken up that day. And she wanted to come in and see the dead woman’s body, but we wouldn’t let her. She kept begging us to let her come into the apartment anyway,” Fritz said.
“Look, if it comes out that there is another thing in this proceeding that we didn’t disclose, with the kind of media attention on your department and our office right now, we‘re looking at an acquittal,” Melissa said.
“That’s why I brought Fritz here to meet you. He called it from the very beginning. He said we should put everything in the report. I’m taking Alvarez off the case and putting Fritz in charge,” Gonzalez said.
“What about the listening device, what do we do about it?” Amy asked.
“I think we go forward the way the record is right now and give them the small microphones but not the electronic box,” Fritz said.
“I thought you wanted to disclose it from the beginning,” Amy said.
“I did, but we didn’t do that; now it’s not a good idea,” Fritz said.
Amy turned to Melissa, who appeared to force a smile.
“I’m going to discuss this with Kate when she gets back,” Melissa said, sounding exhausted. “Thank you, guys.”
Gonzalez and Fritz got up to leave. Fritz started to collect the pictures he had laid out on the table.
“Leave those there,” Melissa snapped. “Please,” she added calmly.
“I can’t believe Kate knew this case had serious ethical fuck-ups when she asked me to loan you to her.”
“Maybe she didn’t know at that time,” Amy said.
Melissa considered Amy for a moment.
“Whatever. To be honest with you, I’m pulling you from the case,” Melissa said.
“I really want to be on it,” Amy said. Melissa looked at Amy like she had no say in the matter. “If something else like this happens, then pull me. But Kate asked for me to be on this case for a reason. I don’t know the reason, but I want to have her back…please.”
“Suit yourself, but you report everything they ask you to do to me. Whether you tell Kate or not. And if they don’t tell you, but you decide it on your own, you report yourself to me as well.”
“I will.”
Melissa got up to leave, collecting the pictures that Fritz left on the table.
“You said Kate had an emergency, I hope it wasn’t anything serious.”
“No, old gal friend with issues flew in from New York with some emergency she needed Kate’s help on. The woman is a piece of work, I’ve met her before,” Melissa said.
Amy sat in the conference room for a little while after Melissa left. She wondered what Melissa would tell Kate about the meeting and decided to stay out of a fight between the two of them.
•••
The public defender’s motion seeking to examine and inspect the listening device found at Goldie Silberberg’s apartment was on Amy’s desk when she returned to the office. Judge Pollazo had set the hearing for Monday, upon the request of the public defender to expedite the hearing. Amy went to work, preparing her office’s response the rest of the day and the weekend.
13
Truth or Truce
On their drive back from the nightclub, Thomas again explained that he had only come to confirm that Amy told Alana she was going to Cool Jo’s Café in jest. He fully expected that his scouts, as he called them, would not see Amy at Cool Jo’s Café, and he was just as surprised as they were to see her there. Contrite and remorseful, he was also firm that he had done nothing wrong. The only thing he said that was vaguely accusatory was when he asked Amy when he would meet Kenneth Brown, calling him by his name in full. “It’s only fair, if I fly all the way here to watch him spend Thursday night with my gal. I should meet him,” he said and chuckled. At that point Amy asked if she could be dropped off at her apartment instead of going to the Ritz, and Thomas did not object. The next day, Alana called and Amy could not quite explain why she was angry that Thomas came to Cool Jo’s Café. It was Alana she was angry with but took it out on Thomas. “Did it have anything to do with whomever you were seeing there?” Alana had asked.
“You would think that of your daughter, wouldn’t you, mother?” Amy asked.
“Of course not, I’m trying to help you explore your subconscious motivation.”
“Please don’t,” Amy said. She explained that she had not lied to Thomas about going to Cool Jo’s Café, not deliberately. The idea to go to Cool Jo’s Café occurred to her while she was speaking with Alana after she left Thomas’s hotel, and she left it up to Neda to decide if they would go. Had Alana not involved herself unnecessarily, Thomas would not have seen her in such bad light. She would simply have told him that she and Neda had had a change of plans when they met. This was not just something she made up to tell Alana, but something she told herself as well when she realized that what paternalism she had accused Thomas of was misplaced. She decided to make it up to him with dinner at her apartment. Then suddenly Alana said, “Thomas thinks you should ask to be taken off of this case.”
Amy was not sure she heard Alana properly.
“Thomas thinks I should be taken off what case?”
“That Jackson case you said that woman assigned to you. He said you can ask to be reassigned and it wouldn’t be a big deal.”
“How does he know that? How does he know the name of the case?”
“He said your friend told him the man accused in the case you were assigned owns the nightclub.”
“But I never told her the name of the case.”
“It is not that hard to find out the name of the man who owns the club. What I am trying to say is this case is not worth all the trouble it has brought you in the short time you have been on this new job. Why not get rid of it?”
“And you discussed that with Thomas?”
“Not really; he mused about it, and I listened silently, but I want you to know I agree with him.”
“What exactly did he say?”
“He said he found you in an area of Los Angeles where people stood in lines to be searched for weapons before they went into a nightclub. He couldn’t imagine mixing with that crowd during the day when they are sober, much less at night and while they are getting drunk.”
“That would explain why he’s never taken me dancing at least,” Amy said.
“There are many decent places to go dancing that are not like that…”
“In LA, mother, they all check you before you go into any nightclub.”
Saying this to Alana gave Amy pause. She wondered if Alana rather than Thomas had com
e up with the angle about mixing with the crowd during the day. It sounded much like what Alana would say. Thomas would know it was routine in any nightclub. Thus, as was common with her, enlisting Amy’s friends with or without their consent and employing any artifice she could get her hands on, Alana was back trying to direct Amy’s life. Amy decided she would not get into an argument with her about it, but wait to see what Thomas had to say about the matter. She hung up the phone with Alana and sat down to collect herself. Moments when she got into arguments she never could win with Alana, or when she could not tell Alana exactly what she felt for fear of getting into such an argument, consumed her with self-loathing. She must patiently wait out these moments to regain normalcy. Recently, she found strength in dismissing Alana without arguing with her and doing exactly the thing that Alana demanded she not do, but that, too, was not without self-loathing. The condition was just far less than before. She did not have to wait it out too long.
Food as the perfect foil for the evening brought relief. She would use it to show maturity and composure and calmly explain her frustrations about the nightclub, but once Thomas arrived, these considerations no longer mattered. She made a quip about her food not being intended to meet his Michelin-star restaurant tastes, and he showed genuine surprise that it in fact did. It was the first time she had made anything other than snacks for him, which made it their most intimate dining. She cursed herself silently but did not really mind it. Soon she was her usual self with him. She thought of what Alana had said about the Jackson case and decided to set some ground rules around her involvement in the case and this relationship with Thomas. Perhaps, she was testing him as well, but she had not thought of it in that way. He asked what was on her mind, and she told him she would need a break from surprise visits until she could settle into this case. Her new boss was “being an ass she could not afford to slip up on.” Rather than tell her to ask to be reassigned, Thomas consoled her.
After dinner, she curled into a yoga pose on one end of the sofa, muted the volume on the television, and turned on the music he liked, Coltrane. He urged her to come into his arms, but she had something urgent to say to him, she said.