The Last Trial (McMurtrie and Drake Legal Thrillers Book 3)

by Robert Bailey

  “It’s all my fault,” Wilma repeated, and she rapped her knuckles on the glass. “You remember that, and don’t you ever forget it. This is all my fault.”

  “Momma, you need to tell the Professor everything you did the night of the murder,” Laurie Ann said. “He can help us.”

  When Wilma didn’t say anything, it was Laurie Ann who hit the glass, tapping it several times with her index finger until her mother met her gaze. “Momma, please . . . he can help.”

  Wilma placed her palm against the barrier.

  Laurie Ann thought back to the trip to Boone’s Hill, Tennessee, after her father’s death. How her mother had put her hand against the car window while she was pumping gas and waited until Laurie Ann, who was sitting in the back seat on the same side as the nozzle, stuck her own palm on the glass opposite. We’re gonna be OK, Laurie Ann had thought at the time. Momma is strong, and we’re gonna be OK. Wishing without hope that she could conjure up the same vibe today, Laurie Ann pressed her palm to the glass and looked into her mother’s bloodshot eyes. “Please, Momma. Please tell him.”

  Wilma shook her head. “You know I can’t.”

  Once her daughter had left the jail, Wilma Newton lay on her cot in the holding cell and scrutinized the ceiling. She thought through their conversation again, wishing for all the world that she could do what Laurie Ann said. That she could tell McMurtrie everything; that he could somehow help her find a way out of this mess.

  But as visions of the night of May 8, 2012 played in her mind, along with the videotapes that the prosecutor had showed at the hearing, she knew it was no use.

  Finally, she began to cry, as what she had first told McMurtrie during his initial visit to the jail rang true in her heart.

  Ain’t nobody can help me.

  58

  For six weeks, Tom’s life returned to some semblance of normal. With Rick back in the fold, the firm functioned like old times, with the two splitting duties on their civil files. Tom drove to Huntsville and caught the end of Jackson’s Little League regular season and all-star tournament, and he spent a weekend taking care of some housekeeping matters on the farm in Hazel Green. The case of The State of Alabama v. Wilma Newton would be dormant until the grand jury issued its indictment, and Tom enjoyed the breather. His back pain had even gotten a little better, though it never entirely went away.

  For his part, Bo returned to Pulaski while making regular telephone check-ins with Rel Jennings in Jasper and Greg Zorn in Gulf Shores. Zorn had bought a one-bedroom condo near Ono Island and, until he could lease some office space, was practicing law out of his car like the guy in The Lincoln Lawyer. Though Zorn answered Bo’s calls—he said it wouldn’t be right to ignore a man who, along with Rick Drake, had saved his life—he adamantly refused to go to the authorities with what he knew about Bully Calhoun and Jack Willistone’s life insurance policy, and he said he’d plead the Fifth Amendment if subpoenaed to testify. The bottom line was that Greg Zorn would not be a witness for the defense at trial. Bo had informed Wade of what Zorn had told him, and the detective had been lukewarm about the intel, saying that unless Zorn came forward himself or Bo found a copy of the change form, there was no use pursuing it.

  Rel remained as jittery as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. He said that Alvie hadn’t seen Bully’s enforcer in a while and was beginning to think that maybe the worst was behind him, but Rel wasn’t as optimistic.

  “Feels like the calm before the storm to me.”

  59

  The storm began on Friday, July 27, 2012.

  Greg Zorn arose that morning to his alarm ringing at 6:00 a.m. and, after slipping on athletic shorts, tennis shoes, and a T-shirt, drove two miles up Perdido Key Boulevard to a public beach area a few hundred yards past the Caribe Resort. As was his habit since buying the condo, Zorn ran a couple miles along the coast, past the Flora-Bama Lounge and the Florida state line. He walked most of the way back and, before leaving the beach, stripped off his shirt and shoes and took a dip in the ocean.

  He never made it out of the water.

  Zorn was shot in the head with a sniper rifle, and his corpse washed out with the tide. The body wasn’t found until a week later, and no suspects were arrested after his death was ruled a homicide. A rumor leaked that Zorn was a meth head, murdered in a drug deal gone wrong.

  Bo Haynes didn’t buy it. As he paid his condolences to Zorn’s ex-wife and sons after the funeral service at the First Baptist Church of Orange Beach, he knew who had killed Zorn. He had seen her with his own eyes in the shadowy parking lot of the Pink Pony Pub.

  The storm came to Jasper a week later. Alvie Jennings came home after basketball practice to mow the yard. When he arrived, he noticed that the garage door was up, which might’ve put him on notice that something was wrong, as LaShell typically kept it down when she ran an errand.

  But Alvie was distracted from a bad practice and stressed from watching his rearview mirror all the way home, wondering if Bully’s enforcer was following him. Since Zorn’s death, Rel was also checking in every six hours, and it was driving him crazy. LaShell’s car wasn’t in the garage, and Alvie figured his wife had just forgotten to push the button when she left for work that morning.

  He never thought twice about starting the lawn mower. It never crossed his mind that someone might jimmy the garage door open while his wife was at work and his kid was at school and then plant a bomb inside the starter of his Toro model.

  LaShell had just pulled in the driveway as Alvie was positioning the push mower in the grass to start it. When she got out of her car, he whistled at her pregnant frame and she rolled her eyes at him. Alvie gassed up the mower and checked the oil. Everything looked good. Then he pulled the cord. Nothing happened.

  “I keep telling you that you need to get a new one,” LaShell said as she walked out of his view and into the garage.

  But LaByron watched his father. “Will you let me mow some today, Daddy?”

  “Yeah, son,” Alvie said, pulling back on the cord a second time with no luck. After the third unsuccessful try, he let out an exasperated scream and kicked the side of the machine.

  “Can I try?” LaByron asked.

  “Not now, son,” Alvie said, grasping the cord again. “I’ll let you mow the backyard once I get it going, OK?”

  “OK, Daddy.”

  Alvie smiled and pulled the cord back. The last thought of his life was of shooting a few hoops with his son after the yard work was done.

  The explosion tore Alvie Jennings’s arms from his body. A trace of flame reached the house and, by the time the fire department arrived, the garage and kitchen had already been destroyed.

  The firefighters found a pregnant LaShell Jennings in the first stages of shock, sitting on the curb holding tight to her six-year-old son, whose bloodcurdling screams could be heard over the blaring of the sirens.

  In the woods behind the house, Manny watched the explosion and resulting blaze with satisfaction. The plan to sit tight and wait until Zorn and Jennings let their guards down had worked to perfection. After allowing herself a few seconds to enjoy the success of the mission, she walked down the embankment to where Pasco and Escobar waited in their car.

  Once the vehicle was rolling down Highway 78, she called Bully, who answered on the first ring.

  “Well?”

  “The threats have been removed.”

  60

  Alvie Jennings’s funeral took place on August 15. Bo didn’t go because the family forbade it. Rel actually warned Bo that if he didn’t respect their wishes, they’d bury Bo in a box right next to his brother.

  So Bo went to the Sheriff’s Office instead. After demanding an audience with Wade Richey, he launched into a diatribe as soon as the detective appeared. When he finally ran out of breath, Wade spoke in a calm voice. “Bo, I’m sorry about your friend, I really am, but I don’t see any connection between Alvie Jennings’s death and the trial of Wilma Newton.”

  “I jus
t told you the connection. Alvie was Bully Calhoun’s driver. After he and Bully dropped Jack Willistone off at his house on the day Jack was released from prison, Bully stopped and talked for over an hour with Jack’s lawyer, Greg Zorn. Zorn told me that Jack had wanted to change the beneficiary on his life insurance policy to his son, Danny, and that he’d sent the change form to Zorn to send to the insurance company.”

  “But Zorn never sent it in; he gave it to Bully. You’ve told me this story before, Bo, and I can’t do anything with it unless Zorn and Jennings were to come in and give statements, or if you could produce the copy of the change form you say Zorn kept somewhere.”

  “That’s not possible anymore, Wade.”

  “That’s not my problem,” Wade said.

  Bo eventually stormed away, throwing one last stone before he left. “I never thought I’d see the day that you and Powell cared more about winning a trial than doing the right thing.”

  A few hours later, at 4:30 p.m., the last of the storm arrived when Frankie rushed into the conference room holding a piece of paper.

  “What is that?” Tom asked. Across the table, Bo held his face in his hands and didn’t look up.

  “The grand jury just indicted Wilma Newton for capital murder,” she said, her voice clipped and anxious. “This is the order for the arraignment. It’s set for August 27.”

  “Who’s the judge?” Tom asked, holding his breath.

  Frankie hesitated long enough for Tom to know that the news wasn’t good. Then she spat it out. “Poe,” she said, her eyes traveling to the bottom of the page. “The Honorable Braxton Poe.”

  PART FIVE

  61

  On the last Thursday in October, four days before the trial of Wilma Newton was set to begin, Tom met Dr. Bill Davis at the Walk of Champions in front of Bryant-Denny Stadium. It was 6:00 p.m., and, with the days growing shorter, almost pitch dark. The path leading to the stadium, however, was well lit. Tom found his longtime physician and friend sitting on a concrete bench across from the statue of Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant.

  Tom knew that the reason for this meeting couldn’t be good. He had undergone his latest bladder scope ten days earlier and, while in Bill’s office, had finally gotten his lumbar and cervical spine x-rayed. For good measure, Bill had thrown in an X-ray of his chest. Three days later, the doctor had asked Tom to go to the radiology center for a CT scan of his chest as well as a bone scan. When Tom had inquired about all the tests, Bill had said that he needed to know for sure what might be going on.

  Tom felt his heart rate flutter as he took a seat next to Bill and gazed up at the statue of his mentor.

  “Why’d you pick this place?” Tom asked, glancing at his friend. Bill Davis had a ruddy complexion and his once-carrot-top hair had thinned to a few gray patches on the sides. He had his arms folded and was looking down at the ground.

  “I don’t exactly know,” he said. “It’s just . . . I’ve known you for a long time, Tom, and I wanted to go somewhere that you would feel good. I know this is a special place for you. And . . .” His voice caught for just a second. “I guess I was hoping for a little inspiration myself.”

  Tom looked to his left at the stadium, where he had played on numerous fall Saturdays in the early ’60s. Back then, Bryant-Denny only had around forty thousand seats. It was nothing like the hundred-thousand-plus-seat Death Star it was now. Tom gazed up to the top, where the red national championship flags flew all the way around the enclosure. Then, feeling the cool fall wind on his cheek, he moved his line of vision down to the plaques on the ground, which identified the players and coaches on each of the Crimson Tide’s title-winning teams. He normally stopped at least for a second at the 1961 monument, but he’d been too distracted tonight to do so. Farther in the distance he saw the fraternity houses that lined University Drive. Though he couldn’t see them in the dark, he knew that over the top of the houses and a mile to the west and north were the bulk of the faculty buildings that made up the University of Alabama. A person could drive a half mile through the campus and eventually dead end at Jack Warner Parkway.

  Just beyond Jack Warner was the Black Warrior River.

  “How bad?” Tom asked. When Bill didn’t immediately answer, Tom added, “Look, I know you’re about to tell me the cancer has come back, so just spit it out. How bad? Is the mass bigger than it was last time? Can you get it out? I’m a big boy, Bill.”

  “I know, Tom.” Bill looked up from the ground and met Tom’s eyes. “Your bladder is clean. There’s been no recurrence.”

  “Well, that’s good, right?”

  “Yes.” The doctor’s voice was hollow.

  “What’s the problem then?”

  Bill stood and walked over to the statue of Coach Bryant and leaned against it. He gave a quick jerk of his head. “I don’t even know why I ordered a chest X-ray. The pain was mostly in your lower back, but when the X-rays didn’t show anything obvious, I threw the chest scan in, thinking it couldn’t hurt to take a look.”

  “What did you see?”

  Bill pursed his lips and turned toward Tom. When he spoke, it was in the trained voice of a physician who had been forced to deliver bad news on so many occasions that he could remove emotion and just give the facts. “You have a mass in your right lung. It’s about four centimeters long and three centimeters wide. The CT scan shows numerous spots throughout your chest cavity and lower back consistent with metastatic lesions. I entered an order an hour ago for a referral to an oncologist named Trey Maples in Huntsville. I know you have family in that area, and I thought you’d want to go through treatment close to home. Trey is the best in North Alabama, if not the whole state. I suspect he’ll order a biopsy of the mass just to be sure and also a PET scan to see how active the lesions are.”

  Tom felt numb. Both of his legs had fallen asleep as he stared up at Bill Davis. “Can you get all of what you just said down where the goats can eat it?”

  “Trey will have to make the definitive diagnosis.”

  “Cut the bullshit, Bill,” Tom said, feeling anger rise in his throat.

  Bill walked slowly back to the bench and placed his hands on his knees. He looked Tom directly in the eye. “You have lung cancer that’s spread to the bone.”

  Tom bit his lip, not quite believing what he had just heard. “How is that possible if my bladder is clean?”

  “Lung cancer normally doesn’t come from the bladder. I suspect this is a new formation that you’ve had festering for a while with no symptoms. Probably stems from the cigarette smoking we all did back in the ’60s and ’70s. You didn’t realize anything was wrong until your back started hurting.”

  “I thought you were going to tell me that I had a bulging disc,” Tom said, speaking through clenched teeth.

  “Me too,” Bill said, plopping down on the bench next to him. “I’d give anything if that were the case.”

  Tom stood and shook the sleep out of his legs. He limped toward the statue of Coach Bryant and turned back to Bill.

  The physician had tears in his eyes. He had delivered the news, and now it was OK to be human again. “I’m sorry, old boy.”

  “How long do I have?”

  Bill wiped his eyes and sighed. “With treatment these days, folks are really doing well. Some folks live up to five years.”

  “What’s the average?” Tom asked.

  “Six months. A year if you’re lucky.”

  “Even with treatment?”

  Bill walked over to the statue. For almost a minute, he didn’t speak. When he finally did, his voice shook with emotion and frustration. “What the cancer movement desperately needs is a man like this fella here.” He ran his fingers along the concrete game plan that Coach Bryant held in his hand. “Somebody that understands what it takes to win. Someone with judgment who will use the millions of dollars donated to all the various cancer organizations for something besides Hail Mary miracle drugs.” His lips trembled. “If you had received mandatory chest X-rays since you t
urned fifty, Tom, we would have found the mass in your lung before it spread and you’d be on your way to living to eighty. But doctors don’t make money on chest X-rays. They aren’t sexy. It’s like the dive play on the goal line. Who wants to see the fullback get the ball behind the left tackle? It’s just a meat-and-potatoes football play, but you know what?”

  Tom didn’t say anything.

  “It scores touchdowns. This fella”—he pointed at the statue, his index finger shaking—“understood that. It ain’t about Hail Marys and miracles. It’s about winning. And we’re losing the fight against cancer, Tom.”

  Tom grabbed his friend by both his forearms. “I appreciate the sentiment, but you didn’t answer my question. How long do I have with treatment?”

  Tom could feel his friend’s helplessness when he finally resumed talking. “Since the mass has spread to the bone, surgery is not an option, so it’s incurable. Trey may tell you different, but there’s no guarantee that you’ll live a day longer with chemo and all the newest miracle drugs than you would if you did nothing at all.”

  “Six months then,” Tom said.

  Tom could hear Bill’s teeth grind. “That’s the national average,” he said. “But you’re gonna top that. I know it.” He beat his fist into his chest. “I know it right here. Where it counts.”

  Tom didn’t reply. The numbness and shock were beginning to wear off. He’d never seen Bill Davis so shook up. “How is that?” Tom asked.

  “Because you’re the toughest cuss I’ve ever been around.” Bill’s lip quivered and he pointed back at the statue. “And because you played for that hard-ass son of a bitch.” He waved his arm wildly toward the red flags flying high over the stadium. When his words came again, they sounded like the growl of a wounded and dangerous animal.