He says, “Think about it.”
“Think about what?”
“The future.”
38
Cate drops down into the Corvette. On the way over, the desire to show her where I live took hold of me. I put the question to her.
“Do you want to come over to my place? I have some leftovers that we can eat. The drive is a little long, but I promise to have you home by midnight.”
“Who says you have to? Let’s do it.”
The traffic is tapering off by the time we make the interstate, and the ride is a comfortable one. I make conversation.
“What did you think of Warren Jackson?”
“It’s not nice to speak ill of the dead.”
“That bad?”
She’s silent as she considers the question—the type of quiet that rarely precedes happy talk. I give her the space.
“The man was a relic from a generation that’s dying out, thankfully. He was Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and had no discernible understanding of sexual harassment at all. Way too touchy with his hands, always drifting across the forbidden zones, kissing women on the cheeks without giving them much of a choice. He propositioned me more than once—flat out asked if I wanted to come to his hotel room at one state bar conference, thought that I might be lonely after my divorce. Not even subtle about it. I stood there shocked and told him I had no interest in his limp, wrinkled dick. He didn’t take it well.”
My laugh is louder than the roar of the car. Her mischievous smirk is barely visible by the lampposts that dot the highway.
“You told him that?”
“Hell yeah.”
“Good for you.”
“A few weeks later, he reversed one of my opinions and said a bunch of snotty things about my legal reasoning in one of the footnotes. That’s the stuff they don’t teach you in law school.”
Humans are the worst. We exit the interstate and start to navigate our way along the backroads. The darkness is thicker here.
I ask, “Who do you think is going to replace him on the Supreme Court?”
Interrogating Cate really isn’t the plan, but I see no harm in nibbling around the edges. She may possess relevant information without even realizing it.
“No clue. You’re friends with the Governor. You tell me.”
“Any interest?”
The curvy roads require all of my attention, and I keep my eyes straight ahead instead of looking at her for a reaction. After a pregnant pause, she gives me an answer.
“Sure. Until you came along, my career was the only thing going for me. Gene Davis mentioned the possibility to me a month ago, as something to consider in the future. That was before the Chief Justice’s death. No one has said anything to me since the murder. I assumed the Governor is waiting for you to do your work.”
Another meeting with Gene is scheduled first thing in the morning. Hearing his name on Cate’s lips doesn’t give me warm fuzzies inside.
She asks, “Are you feeling me out on the Governor’s behalf?”
“Any feeling I do of you will be solely on my own behalf.”
“I look forward to it.”
The levity lightens the mood. We’re close to my property now, and I want this part of the conversation over by the time we get there. But I can’t bury everything just yet. I have to ask.
“Did Gene say anything to you about the case against Hank Dalton’s company?”
I feel her stare. I steal a glance and see her questioning eyes wondering at my intentions. In an even voice, she answers, “That would be highly unethical.”
“Par for the course with Gene. He doesn’t wear integrity well.”
“Is this related to your investigation? Am I back to being a witness?”
“That may depend on your answer.”
“Then the answer is no.”
***
The Corvette eases into the garage. On cue, my wolf of a dog begins howling the scream of the damned. Cate recoils in mock horror.
“Is that Eliza?”
“The one and only.”
“Do you feed her?”
“Plenty. She misses me, that’s all. A dog psychiatrist would diagnose separation anxiety. I call it love.”
The door opens, and Eliza nearly topples me down in the bull rush. She gives Cate an equivocal look but allows her head to be petted by the interloper. Cate and I move to the back porch as Eliza runs wild and free.
Cate asks, “How much property do you own?”
“Fifty acres.”
“So peaceful here. You can smell the fresh air and actually see the stars. Feels a lot like home. Not that far from the city, either.”
“I made a bunch of hiking trails through the woods, too. Before I got pulled back into the swamp, I hiked every morning—me and Eliza, the dirt of the earth all to ourselves.”
“Is there room for anyone else?”
“We might be able to find some space.”
***
Cate and I avoid the heavier topics related to the investigation during dinner. We laugh a lot instead. After the meal, we make our way to the couch and sit opposite each other, using the arms of the sofa to support our backs, our legs entangled together somewhere in the expanse between us. Dumb looks of joy fill both our faces—a contentment that reflects the simple pleasure of being around someone who makes you happy. I’m too snake-bitten to believe that the moment will last but intend to enjoy it in the present.
She says, “I’ve thought a lot about the other night in your attic. It’s a funny thing to say, but I want to thank you for protecting my virtue. And as much as we both wanted it and even knowing how good it would’ve felt, you still put on the brakes. Not a lot of guys would’ve done that. You showed me that we can choose to do this the right way. I got home Sunday night and told myself, ‘Cate, you might have finally found yourself a good man.’”
On the inside, I chide her for her naivete. The happy joy of the moment before sinks under the weight of what I know about myself.
In the law, the crime of false pretenses is the misrepresentation of an existing fact to obtain something valuable. Wary of perpetuating a fraud, the overwhelming urge to unburden myself to her takes over.
“I’m not a good man.”
“If you believe that, then you haven’t been around enough men.”
“Get your coat. Let’s go outside.”
We head out to the firepit in my backyard. I grab a couple of blankets for good measure. When not working in the garage, I like to spend my nights here with a good fire going, Eliza at my feet, nothing around us except the stars. The arc of history is long, and if looked at through a strong enough lens, hours around a nighttime flame is the normal condition of man. I was born too late, that’s all.
I sit her in a sturdy Adirondack chair—L.L.Bean-made, the quality evident. I bought two of them when I got the place. I don’t know why I got the second chair. Hope? Optimism? A pragmatic sense of just-in-case? But now the other person is here, and she deserves to know the truth.
The flames start with a slow burn but reach the tipping point in good time. The air is crisp, the smell is burnt wood, and the breath from my mouth dances visibly in the fire’s light. I sit down and prepare to tell her my story. The heat from the pit steadies me against the gathering cold. I let her have both blankets.
Staring straight into the glow before me, I start with the moment Scott summoned me to the scene of Sara Barton’s murder. I don’t spare Cate any of the details. The reckless sex with a witness, the lying to my friends, the breaking of Ella’s heart, the suppression of evidence, the stolen property, the murderous rage—I lay all of it bare, including the horrible conclusion that left me face down in a graveyard, crying out to God.
The confession doesn’t make me feel better. Almost immediately, the finality of spoiling my cover makes me question whether I did the right thing. She now knows things about me that no one else knows. Only me and her. Things that could get me into some trouble
. The instinct of self-preservation runs strong, and the release of my deepest secrets into the wild scares me.
A void in the wake of the telling encircles the campfire. I still don’t turn to Cate, afraid to face her judgment. I just sit there waiting for a verdict. At last, she breaks the silence.
“That’s some story. I figured you were going to tell me something heavy but not that particular detour. You know, I saw the beginning of the Barton trial on television and thought you were cute.”
That last word is so incongruous to the moment that a brief pause in the conversation ensues. I finally reply, “Cute?”
“Excuse me, ruggedly handsome. I asked around about you and learned what happened to your family. I cried. After that, I consumed as much of the trial as I could, glued to my iPad. And then at the end—I couldn’t wrap my head around what happened. You were suddenly the most famous lawyer in the state. I made a vow to meet you—felt this mysterious connection between us. Except you disappeared. Then my mother told me she started attending your brother’s church, and here we are. But all that time watching you march like Sherman through Georgia in that courtroom, I never suspected any of what you just told me. So much of what we see on the surface is a mirage, isn’t it?”
“You already hitched yourself to one bad man. No reason to make the same mistake again. I felt you ought to know.”
Cate stands up, and I pull my eyes away from the fire to take her temperature. She moves toward me. Shadows cover most of her face, making her unreadable. She stands over me now, and I crane my head upward to get a better look at her. But her body blocks the fire, drowning out the light. She’s still a mystery to me.
Sitting herself in my lap, she kisses my cheek and lays her head on my chest.
“We’re all imposters, Chance, pretending to be someone we’re not. You, me, everyone. The State of Georgia has over ten million people, and every single one of us is an imposter. Take a magnifying glass to anybody, point it deep into their soul, and all of us would deserve to be thrown into jail—or Hell. You are a good man. You know why? Because you have the humility to think you’re not. That’s most of the battle.”
“And what are you hiding deep in your soul?”
She laughs and snuggles closer in my arms. I don’t dare let her go.
“I struggle with an irresistible impulse to cut up my ex-husband and his whore wife into chunks of raw meat so I can feed the pieces to hungry wolves.”
“That was heartfelt.”
“I’m also having carnal thoughts about a man I just met. I’m wondering whether he thinks the same things about me.”
“No comment.”
Her cold lips descend on mine. In an absurd hijacking of my thoughts, the movie A Christmas Story leaps to my mind—specifically the scene where the hapless Flick gets his tongue stuck to a frozen flagpole. Could the same thing happen to two humans kissing? I taste the warmth of her tongue and decide that there are worse fates. A blast of arctic chill breaks up the embrace. The fire is close to being out.
Cate returns her head to my chest and asks, “Did you ever cheat on your wife?”
“Never.”
“Then I don’t care about the rest of it.”
I hold her tighter, and we stay entwined as the embers of the dying flames fight for survival. What little light there is now comes from the quarter moon.
She observes, “You realize we met less than ten days ago.”
“Feels longer.”
“Are we that good a fit or both just desperately lonely?”
“I don’t know.”
“Me, either. But I want to find out.”
39
Gene Davis has seen better days. Despite the early hour, his tie is already loosed from his collar. A coffee stain decorates his shirt. Barbara, Scott, and I are here to pay him a visit. After we enter without knocking, Gene doesn’t even bother to object—a sign I take of his weakening resolve.
The room feels claustrophobic. Gene is the messy sort, and his office is cramped during the best of times. When Scott and I visited him before, the space was uncomfortable enough. Barbara’s presence makes the atmosphere all the more suffocating. That suits my purposes just fine. I brought Barbara along as a visual aid. Her whole being exudes fierceness, and I want Gene to have a taste. He sizes her up, unhappy about the new stranger in his midst.
“Who’s that?”
He shifts his eyes from her to me and back to her. Barbara remains standing while the rest of us sit, which is bad manners on our part but works to heighten her intimidation factor.
“Gene, meet Barbara Hsu.”
No handshakes are exchanged. Barbara stands there, arms folded, her impatience with Gene hanging over him like a sharpened hatchet. I continue with the introductions.
“Barbara is the toughest prosecutor in the metro area. Around the cell blocks, the racist inmates call her the ‘Dragon Lady’ and draw nasty pictures of her on the walls. Barbara doesn’t mind, takes it as a compliment. And she’s never lost a case, have you?”
I turn to her as if expecting an answer, but she ignores me, keeping her stare fixed on Gene sitting there in his chair. The first trickle of sweat gathers at one of his unkempt sideburns.
“Anyway, Barbara is here today because the two of you are likely to be seeing a lot of each other in the future. She’s going to be the one in the courtroom telling the jury about the many crimes of Gene Davis. Are you now getting the picture?”
Without feeling, he grumbles, “I don’t want to talk to you.”
I respond, “Don’t start the conversation out on the wrong foot. I may be the only thing standing between you and prison.”
“You’ve got nothing, or you would’ve already put the cuffs on me.”
“Express Service Today v. Holmes.”
His colorless eyes register recognition of the name of the case now before the Court of Appeals. He takes a sip of coffee, but his shaky hand has to work overtime to ensure that cup and lips meet in the right place. I continue.
“Nasty wreck involving a school bus and an EST driver. Lot of litigation. Apparently, Hank Dalton’s company got hit with a—”
I turn to Scott and ask, “How much was it?”
“Just north of $422 million.”
“Got hit with a $422 million verdict, plus a little extra change. Ring any bells?”
He shakes his head and holds his tongue.
“The case is making its way up to the Supreme Court, and that’s a problem. Everyone knows that with Warren Jackson at the helm, the court exhibited an outright hostility to the good capitalists in the business community. Translation: Hank Dalton is going to be out nearly a half billion dollars, and he needs that money to make sure Tommy gets elected governor, then president. Enter Gene Davis.”
The façade is crumbling. For a fixer, Gene displays the nerves of a jellyfish. Maybe he just can’t take a punch—ruthless when on offense but can’t handle being pushed back on his heels. Some people are like that. I proceed with my story.
“Gene is crafty and always eyeing his next angle. Two years from now, he knows he will be out of a job when the Governor’s term ends. Time to think about the future. He finds a new ally in a young politician whose star is on the ascent—Tommy Dalton. Turns out that the Dalton family has an expensive problem on its hands and maybe Gene can help. That’s how Gene ended up in Warren Jackson’s chambers trying to bribe the Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court. Does any of this sound familiar?”
“I don’t want to talk to you anymore without a lawyer present.”
“And that’s your right. But you need to be smart now—smarter than at any other point in your entire life. We have you for bribery. Case closed. We probably have you for extortion. Closer case, but I have seen Barbara in action in the courtroom and don’t like your chances on that one, either. At a minimum, you’re looking at a stay of some duration in one of Georgia’s fine correctional facilities. And unlike our friends in the federal government, Georgia doe
sn’t have any country club prisons. All we offer is hard time. Between you and me, I don’t think it would suit you well. Ever seen Deliverance? You’re kinda the Ned Beatty type.”
A pause allows me to catch my breath and gauge his reaction. The best way to describe him is glum resignation.
“To cut to the chase, Gene, you’re already caught in our net. The only way to get out of the net is if we release you because we need the net to catch a bigger fish. Tommy and Jerry understand this. They are close to signing affidavits to tie an anchor around your leg and dump you overboard. My guess is that they are refusing to take your calls or respond to your messages. They want you to sink so deep you’re never seen again.”
The heaviness of his breathing is audible in the confined room. The chest heaves, struggling under the stress of the situation and the years of bad habits with food and fitness. Politics does that to a person.
In a low voice and with eyes glued to the floor, Gene tells us, “I don’t want to ever set a single foot in a jail cell.”
And boom goes the dynamite. I notice from the corner of my eye an almost imperceptible smile creasing at the edge of Scott’s mouth. The dam has broken, and the drowning man before us now desires to be rescued. We got him.
I respond, “The more you can give us to fill our net, the less room in the net for you.”
“What if I can get you the Chief Justice’s murderer? That’s all you care about, right?”
No one moves a muscle. The shock I feel is genuine. Two weeks into the investigation, honesty compels me to admit that I still have no clue who killed Warren Jackson. Suspects, yes. Some stronger than others. But not much more than that. Now Gene stands on the brink of solving the case for me. I play it cool.
“I’m listening.”
“I give you Jackson’s murderer, I walk. That’s the deal. Take it or leave it.”
He’s starting to regain his wits about him. The man knows how to negotiate from the thousands of political horse trades he’s made over the course of his life. But I’m no stranger to negotiations, either.
Death to the Chief (Atlanta Murder Squad Book 2) Page 18