No Accident

by Dan Webb

  Now we’re getting somewhere, Alex thought. Maybe Zeke’s crazy theory was right—but the details didn’t quite add up. “I thought you and Jorge had moved up in the world. Why would he pull a stunt like that, and with a company van, no less? Did he miss prison?”

  “Because they asked Jorge to do it.”

  “Who asked him to? Why?”

  “It was some workers’ comp thing. Jorge wasn’t real clear about it.”

  Alex pretended to scoff. “He kept you in the dark? Some friend.”

  “He was a bastard. He didn’t want me to steal his deal—like I gave a shit. He invited me to come along, but I was hung over that morning. I told him to cut me in, but he was only going to pay me the same measly share he paid those other losers in the van . . . Bastard . . .”

  “And you’re sure it was Luke who asked him to do it?”

  “Luke or Crash, one of those two. Jorge never told me which because he wanted to cut me out. But he boasted over and over that it went all the way to the top. He thought he was so important. Anyway, Luke, Crash—same difference.”

  Alex looked skeptically at Beto. As much as Alex wanted to believe, now that he heard Beto’s story, he wasn’t sold yet. “And so the CEO of a Fortune 500 company asked Jorge to do a penny-ante car insurance scam for him?”

  “No, it wasn’t car insurance, that was the beauty of it. It was workers’ comp. Jorge was supposed to go get hit by a car without insurance. That way someone like you”—Beto jabbed a bony finger at Alex—“wouldn’t come snooping around and asking questions afterward.”

  That answered Alex’s lingering question about why the driver of the van chose to get rear-ended by a beat-up old gardening truck—and if Howard Cummings’ sports car hadn’t hit them from behind, Alex would never have gotten involved and the scam would have actually worked. Maybe Beto wasn’t lying, after all. Alex nodded as he thought it over. “And Liberty was self-insured on the van, so there was no outside insurer on that end to deal with. Nice little plan. So the idea was Luke or Crash or whoever would split the workers’ comp payout with Jorge and the others?”

  “Exactly, man.”

  Beto still hadn’t answered the biggest question—why someone in Luke’s position would commit murder. “You realize, don’t you, that Luke is already rich? No offense, but why would he stick his neck out for a little scam like this?”

  “That’s what I told Jorge, but he wouldn’t listen. He wanted to be a big shot with the bosses.”

  “And it all would have worked out fine if it wasn’t for the explosion.”

  Beto sighed. “As soon as I heard about that, I knew it was a setup.”

  Alex’s ears perked up. “Why did you think that?”

  “Because vans don’t just explode, man. They were supposed to die.”

  That might or might not make sense, Alex thought. “Why would Luke want to kill them?”

  “Just Jorge—the others were unlucky. Jorge knew too much.” Beto leaned in and whispered hoarsely, “Jorge used to get girls for Hubbard.”

  “That doesn’t make sense, Beto. Luke Hubbard is rich and good looking, he can have any woman he wants.”

  “No, he likes them young.”

  Alex curled his lip in disgust.

  “Not children,” Beto said. “He’s not some sort of . . . pervert. Just seventeen, eighteen years old. But a guy like him can’t just go cruise around the high school in his Mercedes, you know?”

  “Big difference between seventeen and eighteen,” Alex said, even though he realized the remark was unproductive. He couldn’t help it.

  They were silent until Alex spoke again.

  “So, do you have any evidence that the accident was a setup, or did that all get blown up, too?”

  * * *

  When Beto’s black Camaro with the scratched fender pulled out of the lot at Stanley DeLay’s office, a silver SUV parked across the street pulled out after it.

  Crash was a patient man, but he was tired of trailing Beto. Pool hall, bar, girlfriends’ houses—it was the same joyless cycle day after day. Crash had only contempt for Beto. Liberty had hired Beto, even though Beto was an ex-con. Beto should have been grateful, like Crash was grateful for all Luke and Liberty had done for him. Instead, Beto had helped Lenny blackmail Luke.

  Sure, Crash thought, I betrayed Luke, too. But only once. Years ago, even though he was reminded of it almost every day. He didn’t ask Petra to flash her ass in front of his face all the time. Anyway, Crash’s betrayal was ancient history; Luke didn’t know about it—and never would.

  Crash kept a couple of cars between himself and the Camaro. He was pretty sure Beto had figured out he was being followed. It would be so easy for Crash just to make Beto go away. Crash wished he could. But he couldn’t, yet. Luke wanted to know whether anyone other than Beto was involved in Lenny’s blackmail scheme. So Crash was busy finding out.

  The cars drove for a while down broad avenues that stretched for miles and intersected at right angles with other broad avenues. At the end of one of them, they drove deep into the hills on a narrow, winding street where Crash’s large SUV was even more conspicuous. On the other side of the hills they drove out into the San Fernando Valley. There the grid of asphalt resumed, as persistent as if the streets followed lines etched in the earth’s crust and the hills were just loose dirt piled on top. Beto had never come this way before, not as long as Crash had been following him. The Camaro stopped at a burger joint, and that made Crash happy. Beto was miles from his own neighborhood and so he wouldn’t have the advantage of knowing the streets around here. This was as good a place as any to confront Beto—for information of course, with perhaps just a little physical persuasion.

  Crash watched from his car as his quarry entered the restaurant and sat in a booth facing away from the parking lot. Crash walked in and, quickly but quietly, slipped into the booth across from his target. Crash found him grinning impishly.

  It wasn’t Beto.

  “Damn it!”

  Crash brought a fist down onto the table. He wanted to throttle the smirking young man in the booth, Beto’s decoy. But he wouldn’t. He would control his anger, just like Luke had taught him—you don’t suppress your anger, you just save it up for when you really need it. Crash ran back to his car, gunned the engine and raced toward the on-ramp of a freeway that would take him back to where the real Beto had left long ago.

  28

  Beto’s requests were conventional but heartfelt—money and shelter. The poor man was terrified of this Crash person, and couldn’t safely return to the apartment where he had been staying. After a friend of Beto’s drove away in Beto’s car to mislead Crash, Alex and Del drove Beto across town and dropped him at a friend’s place.

  What Beto offered was evidence that Luke had been behind the accident.

  For that, Alex decided he could oblige Beto with a house, temporarily. It was Del’s idea, actually, to let Beto stay in Alex’s vacant house. Del was pretty sharp sometimes.

  Beto also wanted fifty thousand dollars. To Alex, it might as well have been fifty million.

  “You’re going to have to go back to Sheila,” Del said after they dropped Beto off.

  “The woman who lied to me? No way.”

  “It’s worse than that. You’re going to have to butter her up.”

  Del was right, of course. Alex was relieved that Del mentioned calling her. So now he had a reason to call her, and it would be all business. Fine. When they got back to Alex’s house, that’s what he did.

  “Alex,” she said. “I’d been hoping to hear from you.”

  Sure you have, Alex thought. “I found Beto.”

  “Beto?”

  Alex couldn’t stand her playing him for a fool. He ignored her question. “Beto confirmed there was a scam, he has evidence of who’s behind it, and he wants to sell it. Pretty great, huh? I wanted to share the exciting news.” Del was sitting across from Alex in Alex’s living room, and he looked earnestly at Alex and made a mot
ion with his hands like he was spreading butter on toast. Butter her up. Alex forced himself to calm down.

  “I see,” Sheila said. “Well, what is he offering and how much does he want?”

  Sheila’s tone was all business, like the first time they spoke, with no hint of chagrin at having lied to Alex. Alex gave her points for audacity. “Beto says he has a piece of paper from Luke—Luke or someone named Crash, he was never quite clear, I don’t think he knows. He says if the trail leads to Crash, it’ll also lead to Luke. Does that sound right to you?”

  “Probably.”

  “I knew you’d know. Anyway, a piece of paper with the license plate number of the van and the date of the accident written on it by Luke or Crash. It supposedly has fingerprints from one of them on it.”

  “Is that so . . .”

  “That’s what Jorge Ramirez told Beto. Jorge was handed the paper when he was given his instructions on what van to use.”

  “How did Beto get this slip of paper?”

  “Says he stole it from Jorge’s locker at work after the accident.”

  “Charming. That seems like pretty flimsy evidence, though.”

  “That’s what I thought at first, too,” Alex said eagerly. Del gave him a thumbs up. “But if the paper is genuine, it’s a good first step. The way I see it, we don’t need to prove that Luke murdered Jorge and the others.”

  “We don’t?” Sheila said.

  Alex enjoyed hearing genuine curiosity in her voice. Once she heard his plan, she’d front the money Beto wanted—hopefully. “We just need evidence that Luke—or someone close to Luke, if it’s Crash—sent them out to go get into an accident. That’s conspiracy right there.”

  “Interesting . . . So what does he want for this so-called evidence?”

  “Something that I can give him, and something I can’t.”

  “But that I can give, right? So what is it?”

  “Some money.”

  “How much, Alex?”

  “Fifty grand.”

  She sounded shocked. “Fifty grand! I’m surprised you have the balls to even ask me for that.”

  “Sheila, I’m committing to this project, too, OK? The other thing he wanted is a place to stay. This Crash guy is after him, and he’s afraid to go home.”

  “You’re bringing this Beto guy into your house? You really are a nut.”

  “No, no. I’m putting him up in a vacant house I have.” Alex saw Del roll his eyes.

  “Geez, I didn’t know I was teaming up with Donald Trump,” Sheila said. “Why don’t you pay him the fifty thousand yourself?”

  Alex sighed and waved Del out of the room. “Well?” Sheila said.

  “Because I’m upside down, Sheila. I’ve got no cash. I’ve got five mortgages and no job.”

  Her tone turned incredulous. “Five mortgages? What other secrets are you keeping? And after all that carrying on in the library about wanting to find the truth—you’re broke! Why should I trust you with a pile of cash?”

  “I don’t know you either. I thought you’d have a good lead for me, given that you used to work at Liberty Industries. But that Ray-bear guy didn’t know anything. It’s almost like you sent me to the least useful person to talk to.” Sheila didn’t say anything. Alex would have loved to call her out on her lie about not knowing Beto, but he kept his cool. Butter her up. “The bottom line is, we have to trust each other,” he said. “Together, we have a chance to do something big here.”

  “I’m not convinced.”

  Alex knew why she was playing coy all of a sudden—she wanted Alex to take all the risk and to keep herself—and her cash—out of harm’s way. “Sheila, you know Luke would pay to keep this quiet. And I know you want money and, hey, I don’t judge, all right?”

  “What do you want?”

  “I’ll give you time to do whatever you want with the evidence—”

  “Luke would laugh in my face if I told him about this so-called evidence.”

  “And after Luke pays you off, or whatever, then I get a chance to go to the police. That’s all. That’s not on you, and Luke can never say you went back on whatever deal you make with him.”

  “Right,” Sheila said. “That is, if the fingerprints haven’t been rubbed off the paper by now, if Beto isn’t making this whole thing up—how do you propose to find out whether his evidence is any good?”

  “I’ve thought about that, too. We give Beto a taste of his own medicine. I tell him I’ll only pay a little up front, with the rest to come once we’ve verified the evidence. I tell him that if he’s scamming us—and I’ve dealt with this guy before, there’s a good chance he is—then I’ll tell this Crash character where to find him.” Sheila was silent. Alex said, “Beto’s scared, Sheila. If we don’t move soon, he’ll skip town.”

  “Fine,” she said. “I can have some money for you in a couple of days.”

  “That’s wonderful. Thank you.”

  “I guess I should thank you for finding this guy.”

  This guy. As if she didn’t know who Beto was. Alex looked forward to seeing Sheila again just to see whether, in person, she would betray any more embarrassment over her lie than she did over the phone. “I’ll set up a meeting with Beto two days from now.”

  Sheila didn’t say anything.

  “Sheila? You said a couple of days. Two days, right?”

  “Sure, that’s fine. If my lawyer is any good, that’ll be fine.”

  29

  Brad’s adversary looked nervous. Brad watched him, hunched over counsel’s table in the courtroom, as his eyes bobbed from page to page of his notes as if searching desperately for a comma that had slipped off and crawled back to bed. The judge hadn’t entered yet. Brad approached his opponent and touched him on the shoulder.

  The man flinched but just as quickly regained his composure. He stood confidently and extended his hand. “Jacob Carter,” he said. He was Brad’s arrogant Harvard classmate, the one who silently sat through the meetings at Boswell & Baker’s offices.

  “I know,” Brad said. “Brad Pitcher. We went to law school together.”

  Jacob squinted at Brad as if trying to imagine him with eight years’ more hair. “HLS?” he said.

  “That’s the only law school I went to. Look, we have some time before the hearing begins, and there are a couple points on the wrongful termination case I’d like to go over. But does it make sense to wait for Alan?”

  “Mr. Matthews won’t be attending this hearing,” Jacob said. “Plus, I see no need to discuss that case now. Our interaction today will be confined to your motion for interim spousal support.”

  With that, Jacob maneuvered awkwardly back into his chair. Brad rested his hands on his hips. Brad knew big firm lawyers like Jacob spent more time in the library than in the courtroom. Brad decided to have a little fun with him.

  “So, Alan let you go without adult supervision on this one. Good for you. That means he either knows you’re going to win or knows you’re going to lose. Did he tell you which?”

  Jacob screwed his face into a lopsided grimace. “You sound pretty confident for a guy who’s gone oh-for-everything on this case.”

  “Have you argued before Judge Brewster before?”

  “Plenty of lawyers in my firm have.”

  “Have you argued before any judge before?”

  Jacob gave Brad a wide-eyed look as if he had been caught relieving himself behind a tree. The bailiff’s booming voice filled the courtroom.

  “All rise!”

  Brad rushed over to the table on the other side of the aisle, and both lawyers stood at attention as the judge entered. Judge Brewster was youngish, in his early forties, with lively eyes and a thick beard that was starting to go gray. He had a fleshy face, and if he had a body to match, that fact was hidden by his black robe. He genially motioned for the lawyers to sit.

  “Mr. Carter from . . . Baker & Boswell,” the judge said, consulting the briefs in front of him. “Haven’t seen you before. Nice suit. Wh
ere’d you go to law school?”

  Jacob stood up stiffly. “Harvard,” he said. “It’s Boswell & Baker,” he added softly.

  The judge rocked his head back. “Harvard . . . I’ve heard of it. Expensive. Still paying off the tuition?”

  “No, Your Honor. I was able to pay my loans off a couple years ago.”

  “With a Baker & Boswell salary, I believe it. Golden State Law—my illustrious alma mater—isn’t quite as expensive as fair Hah-vahd, but I’ve still got a few years left yet to pay off mine. I should mail in the last check, let’s see . . . just about the time I mail the first college tuition check for my oldest. How about you, Mr. Pitcher? Did you go to Harvard, too?”

  Brad rose. “I did, Your Honor. As a matter of fact, Mr. Carter and I were classmates there.” Brad quickly sat down again.

  “No kidding,” the judge said. “How about that? Now I feel outclassed in my own courtroom.”

  Brad rose and said, “You haven’t heard us speak yet, Your Honor.”

  The judge laughed. “I’ve heard you speak here before, Mr. Pitcher, and I’m glad to see you’ve lost none of your wit.”

  From there, the hearing only went further downhill for Jacob Carter. Jacob couldn’t give a reason for why Luke had fired Sheila during the divorce proceedings or for why Sheila, now unemployed, shouldn’t get alimony. At least, he couldn’t give any good reasons. His flimsy arguments annoyed the judge, and his arrogant manner offended the judge, who quickly turned from Gentle Ben to an angry bear.

  In the end, Brad had his first little victory, an interim order for Luke to pay Sheila alimony every month until the conclusion of the divorce case. And with a flourish: the judge ordered Jacob to have Luke deliver a cashier’s check to Sheila by the end of the day, or else the judge would send a sheriff’s deputy to arrest him.

  * * *

  Brad made a point of walking shoulder-to-shoulder with Jacob as they left the courtroom, though Jacob obviously wanted to get as far away as he could, as fast as he could. When they entered the corridor, Brad said, “Lesson number one for oral arguments—don’t be an asshole.”