by David Ellis
It was Sunday morning, October seventh. Twenty-two days until Sammy’s trial. It dawned on me, on my drive to the detention center, that the water line was reaching my nose. A reasonable person might inquire as to my fitness to handle Sammy’s murder case, under the circumstances, and now I was juggling Pete’s problem, too. It probably said something about my mental condition that I was able to make this observation with a cool detachment—an outsider looking in. I had absolutely no business being calm about things. A man I once called my best friend, my brother for all practical purposes, was facing a life sentence, and my real brother was in quite the pickle himself. I was never one to panic, to let my nerves overtake me, but that was because I refocused that adrenaline to enhance my performance. Now, I wasn’t panicking because there wasn’t any adrenaline, period.
What the hell was I doing handling Sammy’s case?
I waited in the same glass room at the detention center, drumming my fingers, alternately thinking about Sammy’s case and Pete’s. Time was, I wouldn’t have distinguished between the two people—brothers, each of them. I’d left Sammy behind, moving on to bigger and better things, and I suppose in some sense I’d left Pete behind, too.
They walked Sammy in and chained him down to the table, as always. His eyes were bloodshot, and he had a hint of a shiner. I didn’t even want to know the underlying story.
“Did they find Audrey, Koke?” he asked, measuring the words delicately. Inmates have access to newspapers, and someone must have pushed this article in front of him. I scolded myself for not coming yesterday, when the news broke, but with everything going on with Pete, I didn’t have a chance.
“Sam, they found a number of bodies buried behind that school. Bodies of young children. They think Griffin Perlini murdered those children. But they haven’t identified the victims yet.”
Sammy didn’t react, save for his lips parting. He struggled to find words. The blood drained from his face.
Neither of us spoke for a solid twenty minutes. Sammy’s a big, burly guy, and those are the ones who look particularly infantile when they lose their composure. Sammy was moving in that direction. He didn’t know how to react. He’d lost his sister decades ago. He’d hardly known her. Truth was, he probably struggled to retain a mental image of her. And he knew she was dead. Still, she’d never been found, and this news was a catalyst for emotions long suppressed.
I busied myself with my notepad, then paced around the room, anything to give the guy a modicum of space and privacy.
“Why—why now?” Sammy mumbled.
I told him how I’d visited the old neighborhood, how I’d driven past Griffin Perlini’s house on a lark, met Mrs. Perlini, and gotten the tip about the hill behind the grade school.
“We need to get DNA testing done right away to confirm it’s Audrey,” I said. “We need to hire someone on our own and get a court order. The jury needs to know what he did to your sister.”
I looked at Sammy for the first time since I’d given him the news. His eyes were still wet, but his face was set hard. He was long-accustomed to digesting difficult news with a stony front. Prisons, Sammy’s home for much of his adult life, were not places for hand-holding and group hugs. Long ago, Sammy had learned to distill his pain with anger.
“If it’s Audrey,” I told him, “we’ll make sure she has a proper burial, Sam. We’ll bury her next to your mother.”
Sammy covered his face with his hands and nodded. A rush of emotion gripped my throat. It felt like we were kids again, covering each other’s backs. It was that feeling that held me back from what I’d intended to tell Sammy—that I had to bow out as his lawyer, that I wasn’t ready to do this. On many obvious levels it was absolutely the right thing to do, but something deep within me said otherwise, that I was the only one who’d be willing to take whatever steps necessary to help my friend, that it would be obscene for me to turn my back on Sammy now, no matter how ill-equipped I was.
YOU COME UP the ramp in your sweats, your hair still wet from the fresh shower, your soiled football uniform in a bag over your shoulder. You see Pete, beaming, nodding at you with approval. You enjoy it, the way he looks up to you, and today was special—you’ve had your best game so far of your high school career. You don’t know the official stats, but Coach was saying you had over a hundred fifty yards receiving, and the two scores.
Where’s Ma? you ask Pete.
Pete’s smile vanishes. She went to see Mary, he says. It’s getting bad.
You drive Pete to the hospital, where Sammy’s mother, Mary Cutler, has returned. She’s been in and out of the hospital for over a year now, since she was diagnosed with a genetic kidney disease. She’s been in the hospital two weeks now, but apparently things have taken a turn for the worse.
It’s not good, your mother whispers, pressing her body against yours, in the hallway outside Mary’s room. It’s not good.
Out of Mary’s room walks Sammy, ashen, his eyes lifelessly following the floor. Your heart skips a beat. You haven’t seen Sammy in almost a year—God, a year. Sammy was initially sentenced to one year in the youth detention center on the drug charges, but the judge had extended his sentence when Sammy seriously injured another kid in a fight.
He looks so different, you think. His hair is tightly cropped—a requirement—replacing his previously long, red locks. He has lost a significant amount of weight, too. But there is something beyond the physical.
He sees you. His eyes run up and down you, your sweats, your jock look. Then he looks away with disinterest.
It’s just the situation, you tell yourself. His mother is dying. Cut him some slack.
Hey, you say.
Hey. He doesn’t look at you. His tone indicates he isn’t interested in conversation, not with you. He doesn’t seem interested in much of anything.
Different. Sammy was a troublemaker, sure, but not in a malicious sense. He had a tremendous heart, a real spirit. That’s it, you think to yourself. He has lost more than his long hair and fifteen pounds in that detention center.
Your mother and Pete go into Mary’s room. You find Sammy down the hall in a lounge area, sitting alone on a long couch. You stand, silent, for a long moment, waiting for any response. You take a seat next to your old friend. His head rises slightly, the barest of acknowledgments, but he doesn’t speak.
You start and stop many times. Nothing you want to say feels right. It’s never been like this before. There was never any effort.
It’s not just awkwardness you feel. There is an element of danger in Sammy’s carriage, as if he’s poised, ready at any moment to unleash something evil.
Sammy, you say, but nothing follows.
When he turns to look at you, his expression is severe, intense eyes probing you as if he’s never met you before. Different, you realize. Everything is different.
Tonight you will be flown out east, to one of a dozen schools offering you official recruiting visits as they dangle a scholarship before you. It’s become a full-time chore in your junior year, weekly visits from representatives advocating the merits of their respective universities. Heady stuff, no question. You are a celebrity. They write about you weekly in the newspapers. The teachers pretend not to cut you any slack but their reverence is unmistakable. And the girls? It’s like a buffet.
Two weeks from tonight, you will announce that you’ll be staying close to home, accepting a scholarship at State. You will dream of the ultimate—turning pro—ignoring the reverse stereotype about white kids. You will keep your grades up, chase women, but otherwise have a singular focus on the sport of football.
The following week, Mary Cutler will die. Sammy will attend the funeral, dressed in an ill-fitting suit, and then return the next day to his detention center. After the funeral, you will lose track of Sammy. He will become a memory, part of your childhood, a piece of your life you have put behind you.
23
I DROVE BACK to the office, thinking about Sammy and Pete, two people for whom,
at one time or another, I had reserved the most exclusive space in my heart. Drive and ambition, in different forms, had separated me from each of them. Shauna had probably been right about my assuming too much responsibility for the fate of others. But the facts were there, with both of them. I couldn’t feel guilty about having athletic ability or for using it to get an education, but I didn’t need to forget about a childhood bond in the process. There was nothing wrong with diving into my job and family, but it didn’t mean I had to ignore Pete’s struggles.
Still, I was left with the reality that I couldn’t change what had happened, only what would happen going forward. I was given a second chance now, with each of them.
I drafted a motion in Pete’s case for Brady discovery—asking the prosecution to turn over all evidence against Pete. Included in that information, I expected, would be the full name of, and contact information for “Mace,” the police snitch who helped the cops snare Pete. The prosecution was obligated to give me that information even without my asking, but I didn’t want to wait around until the next status hearing. I wanted it now. I wanted to see what I could do to nip this thing in the bud.
My intercom buzzed. “Smith on 4407.”
Smith. Again. I didn’t think I’d be hearing from him so soon, if ever. He’d given me explicit instructions on what I was and was not allowed to do on Sammy’s case, and I’d given him explicit instructions to shove his demands up his ass. What had he said?
When you change your mind, I’ll be in touch.
When.
I did a slow burn. Adrenaline filled my limbs. I reached for the phone tentatively, pausing a moment, doubting it, but then sure of it. It was not a coincidence that Smith was calling me the day after Pete had been arrested.
“Smith,” I hissed through clenched teeth.
“I heard your brother had a spot of bad luck.”
Pressure points, he’d said last time. Everyone has one.
I rubbed my eyes, rage filling my throat.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you. But I can help with that, Jason. I can make sure your brother never spends another night in a cell. I’ll help you if you help me.”
I was set up, Pete had told me. I hadn’t believed him, at least not in the way he’d meant it.
“If you haven’t noticed, the people I represent have the ability to make a number of things happen, or not happen,” he continued. “You were a prosecutor. You know there are plenty of ways a case can collapse. I’ll make that happen for Pete. As long as you follow directions on the Cutler matter.”
My mind was racing, trying to imagine how Smith had manufactured this case against Pete. There were many possibilities, but I couldn’t be sure of anything. And now was not the time. Listen and learn, I’d been trained. The less you say, the more they say, the more you learn.
“I laid out your assignment the other day, at your office. I’ll find you a scapegoat, an empty chair. And I’ll handle the eyewitnesses. You work on the confession and a reason Cutler was parked near the murder scene. You do your part—you stick to your role and we get Cutler off those charges—then your brother walks. If not, he’s looking at ten years, I’d suspect. I thought I was being pretty goddamn clear last time we talked, Counselor. Am I being clear now?”
I didn’t speak. I wasn’t sure I was capable of doing so.
“You forced my hand, Jason. But I can walk this back. Just do as I say. And listen, if this all works out, there’ll be a bonus on the back end. We’ll give your brother twenty-five grand for his troubles. Not too shabby for a guy who has trouble holding down a job.”
He was offering me a light at the end of the tunnel. He was playing hard, but he was trying to appear accommodating, too. He wanted me to believe that this could all turn out okay.
“Isn’t this the part where you tell me not to call the cops?” I said.
He laughed. “You wouldn’t be that stupid. We’d just let Pete go down. Who’d believe you?”
He was right. The prisons of this state were full of people who claimed they’d been set up.
I tried to play it out. I had time on my side. Pete’s case wouldn’t go to trial any time soon, not if I didn’t want it to. He had a noose around my neck, but it was a long rope.
I said, “I’ll withdraw from Sammy’s case. I’m out as his lawyer. So I’m not a problem for you. The second you get my brother’s case kicked, I withdraw.”
I wasn’t sure if I meant it. Would I drop Sammy to save Pete? More than anything, I just wanted to hear Smith’s response.
“Quit fucking around,” Smith said. “Cutler wants you. It sure as hell wasn’t my idea. His case is going to trial in three weeks with you as the lawyer. I’m doing most of the work, so I don’t see where this is going to be too hard for you. You try to withdraw and it’s your brother who suffers. No continuances. No withdrawals.”
Right. Smith had told me that, at our first meeting—I’d wanted a continuance and he’d objected. It made me valuable. It gave me leverage.
I said, “Then you do what you have to do to get Pete’s case dropped before Sammy goes to trial. That’s the deal. First Pete, then Sammy. Otherwise, I have no guarantee that you’ll step up for Pete. I’d hate for you to forget about me and my brother after you get what you want.”
Smith was silent for a long time. He probably didn’t expect a counteroffer. “No,” he said. “You do your part; then we’ll do ours.”
“No deal,” I said.
“You’re not thinking this through, Jason. Pete gets us what we want. Once we get that, we want to rid ourselves of you. The way to do that is to clear Pete, and give him some sorry-for-your-trouble cash. We’ll do that.”
There was some sense to that, I had to concede. “No deal,” I said.
“This can get worse, son. You don’t want to find out how much.”
“Neither do you.” We were fighting for control. This was, in many ways, just another negotiation. It was hard for me to tell who had more leverage. Only Smith knew that answer. For now, all I could do was trust my gut.
“No deal,” I said. “And Smith, you better sleep with the light on.”
With that, I hung up the phone. I backed away from it, like it was radioactive, my heart ricocheting against my chest. I grabbed my cell phone and made a call.
24
I SPENT THE NEXT HOUR dissecting that conversation with Smith, trying to ignore the escalating guilt I was feeling toward my little brother. He was in the soup because of me. Pete had been duped into a serious criminal charge because of my stubbornness.
But it was done. There was little I could do to reverse it. I couldn’t drop Sammy’s case. The die was cast, as Smith had said. I was counsel of record now, and any change of counsel would likely require the case to be continued. That, apparently, was unacceptable to Smith.
I had three weeks to win this case for Sammy and hope that Smith would do his part for Pete. Alternatively, I realized, I had three weeks to figure out who Smith was.
At four-thirty, I went down to the sixth floor, to the building’s conference room that any tenant can reserve, and which was obviously open on a Sunday. I had a meeting scheduled, and something told me not to have that meeting in my office. I was trying not to indulge in paranoia, but Smith clearly had someone following me, and I didn’t know the extent of his surveillance. I couldn’t rule out the possibility that he had bugged my office.
A few minutes later, Joel Lightner strolled into the conference room. Joel was the private investigator we used in Senator Almundo’s trial. There was no one better.
Lightner threw his jacket over a chair and took a seat. He was a former cop, the guy who solved the Terry Burgos murders on the southwest side with Paul Riley. He still had that sideways look a detective can shoot you, but he had obviously polished up over the years spent in the private sector. He was wearing a plaid button-down and jeans, the most casual I’d ever seen him. Then again, it was a Sunday afternoon.
“How ya been, buddy?”
Joel and I hadn’t been particularly close, having just met when I was added to the Almundo defense team. But you get to spend a decent amount of time with a guy in the heat of trial, and Joel was one of those who could command a room with his stories. Many a late night, prepping for tomorrow’s day of trial, Lightner would have us in stitches.
He’d come to Talia’s and Emily’s funeral and even called one time a month after, asking about lunch. But it didn’t happen, and we hadn’t talked since.
“Riley told me you resurfaced at your own shop. He was sorry to see you go. You didn’t have to, you know. I mean, after Almundo? You were a rock star at that firm.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Change of scenery, I guess.” There were times when I second-guessed my decision to leave Shaker, Riley. I hadn’t been around to hear the verdict in the case but I have no doubt that Paul Riley took many a victory lap through the office. How often does a public official beat the rap on federal corruption charges? But I couldn’t imagine working within those walls again. It would be a constant reminder of old failings.
I paced around the conference room, trying to find the proper introduction to the tale I had to tell.
“Try the beginning,” Lightner suggested.
“Okay.” I exhaled a long, nervous breath. “You’re never going to believe this.”
“About five years back,” he said. “We’re tailing a cheating spouse. One of my guys is working it, but he’s sick, so I cover for him. I see the guy with the woman. They’re in the kitchen of this lady’s house. I’ve got the telephoto lens and I’m snapping away. Then the guy drops down, disappears out of camera shot. I’m figuring, okay, this is something kinky, maybe he’s sucking her toes or something, because she’s just standing there shouting something at him.” He shook his head. “He wasn’t sucking her toes. He was eating dog food out of a bowl.”
I took another breath. “There are some people—a guy named Smith, not his real name—who are very interested in the outcome of a murder trial I’m handling. So interested, Joel, that they set up my brother for an arrest on gun and drug charges, and now they’re holding it over my head. They say if I don’t do what I’m told, my brother goes down. If I behave, they’ll find a way to clear him.”