When the tablet had powered up, I found the Braggi file right there on the desktop. Cyn had organized the materials into sub-files—arrest report, crime scene, witness statements, catalog of physical evidence, autopsy. I thought about what Lindsey had said, clicked on “crime scene,” then clicked on “photos.”
The hotel room was a suite, not a suite like you find in a Las Vegas hotel but a two-bedroom unit like you find at a midwestern Marriott. The body was in the main room. The first few pictures were from a distance, showing the body’s placement in the room. As the focus grew closer, it became clear that both arms had joints where they shouldn’t.
I played football with a guy named Zach Stevenson. Tough a middle linebacker as you’d ever find. One game, he dislocated his ring finger and as he ran off the field, half the team couldn’t even look at it because the sight of that finger sticking straight out to the side gives you a visceral scraping in your spine that doesn’t go away as long as the finger is out of joint. I swear the whole team felt relief after the trainer popped Zach’s finger back in.
The victim’s arms were like that, popped out and bent in a way that made cringing unavoidable. Only they were never popped back in. They just sat there on the screen, broken and wrong.
As the focus of the pictures came in closer, an oblong red object filled the screen. It took me a moment to realize it was the victim’s head. The face was a bloody mass that, like Lindsey had said, was unrecognizable. I thought I could pick out an eye socket and I definitely saw broken teeth behind a ruin of lips, but I swear I couldn’t find his nose, which must have been pushed up into his skull. Side photos showed indentations where a nose and jaw should have been. The wreckage was so bad, so brutal, that it didn’t look like a person—it looked like a special effect from a bad movie.
The photos panned back out then to capture blood spatters. On the wall, on the chairs, on the table, and pooled on the floor after the body had been removed. It seemed to me that there was too much of it and that there were more smears than spatters, like the body had been slammed around the room.
Lindsey was right. The level of violence here was going to be a problem. A big problem.
I clicked to the next set of photos.
A syringe.
A rubber tube and a spoon.
A clear bag of powder with a heavy glob of blood on it.
I found that I had to shut the tablet so I did. I realized that my breathing was ragged so I exhaled, slowly, then took a drink of beer.
I saw the hole in the kitchen wall for the first time in days, right there between the phone jack and the pantry. I didn’t much feel like fixing it but I didn’t really feel like seeing it either so I got up, left the house, and went to the Railcar.
I Ubered home about five hours later and fell asleep on the couch watching SportsCenter
5
The next day, Saturday, I met Christian on the Ohio side of Carrefour at the house where Hank Braggi would be staying (meaning confined to) until he stood trial. It was a little unusual for someone who didn’t have a permanent residence here to be released but Christian had convinced the Court that there were two million reasons why Hank would stay put. Cade Brickson and an ankle monitor made it two million and two.
Christian had parked his Mercedes in the street and got out as I pulled up. I was admittedly feeling a little on the rough side but his blue-gray suit and open-collared white shirt was so neat and finely pressed that I wondered if he’d slept on a hanger. We shook hands, walked up to the door, and knocked. Cade Brickson answered.
Cade blocked all view beyond the doorway. He was six foot four but stacked with muscle in a way that made him look stocky, with thick arms and legs and traps that sat like baseballs on his shoulders. He looked exactly like what he was—the most fearsome heavyweight wrestler Carrefour North had ever produced and his training since then had only made him more dangerous. By all accounts, he was the best bail bondsman in Carrefour and, if the rumors were true, a bounty hunter as well. His dark brown eyes that regarded us both with calm interest.
“Morning, Cade,” I said.
“Shep,” said Cade.
“Hank’s staying with you?” That was unusual.
Christian Dane stepped around me and offered Cade his hand. “Mr. Brickson has been offered a sizeable bonus to make sure that Mr. Braggi appears at trial.”
Cade shook it. “Sizeable enough that I want to keep eyes on him 24/7.” He looked at Christian. “You want to see him?”
“Please.”
Cade led us back to the kitchen where Hank Braggi sat at the table. Somehow, Hank looked even bigger in ordinary furniture than he did in the cinderblock interview room and it immediately made me think that you would need someone Cade’s size to even slow Hank down. Hank was eating some eggs, which, to be honest, smelled delicious on my jumpy stomach.
Hank smiled when he saw us. “Well, if it isn’t the firm of Fancy Pants and Friend. You boys have breakfast yet?”
“We need to talk about what happened,” said Christian.
“I’ll be in the front room,” said Cade, and left.
“You still need to eat,” said Hank. He pushed back from the table and went into the kitchen.
It was the first time I’d seen Hank standing up. He was huge.
“Thanks for getting me out,” Hank said as he pulled a carton of eggs out of the refrigerator. “Small spaces aren’t my thing.”
Hank did seem entirely different now than the man I’d met in the jail. The hair was still wild and the eyes still glittering blue but now that glitter seemed good-natured rather than frenzied as he cracked one egg after another into a glass bowl.
“We’re here to try to keep you from going back,” said Christian. “So tell us why you killed Dillon Chase.”
“Because he deserved it,” said Hank and began to whisk the eggs with swift flicks.
“That’s not much of a defense, Mr. Braggi.”
“Then you're not much of a lawyer,” said Hank. “And quit calling me ‘Mr. Braggi.’ I’m no jumped up twit in a suit. Er, no offense. Braggi is what my friends call me, seeing as how I have a gift with the language. Or Hank.”
Christian re-crossed his legs. “Mr. Braggi, if we're going to go to trial, we need a defense. And ‘he deserved it’ isn’t a defense.”
“Isn’t self-defense a defense?”
“Yes,” said Christian. “That's not the same as saying he deserved it.”
“Well, it was self-defense then.”
“Did he attack you?”
Hank pointed the dripping whisk at Christian. “See now, I would've thought that a fancy pants lawyer from Minneapolis would’ve bothered to read my file on the flight before he came in to see me.” Hank’s blue eyes narrowed. “So that means that you’re a lazy ass or that you're trying to see if I'm going to lie to you and I’m not sure I care for either of those.” He poured the eggs into a pan, causing a spatter and sizzle as they hit the heat, then dumped in what looked like chopped peppers and ham.
“Who said I was from Minneapolis?” said Christian.
“You said you were from my father.”
Christian was silent.
“Pretty easy to figure out who he hired. Now are you lazy or a liar?”
“Neither. If Mr. Shepherd and I are going to defend you, we need to hear what happened in your own words. Did the victim attack you?”
“He was no victim.”
“Did the dead man attack you?”
“You know he didn't.”
“Did he strike you in any way?
“Nope.”
“Threaten you with a weapon? Draw a knife on you? Point a gun?”
Hank took a spatula and began scraping the bottom of the pan to keep the eggs from burning. “Not even his finger.”
“So how was it self-defense?”
Hank’s eyes lost their mirth. “I saw what he was doing to Lizzy. That was enough.”
“I don't know that it was, Mr. Braggi.”
/> “Well, it's going to have to be because that's what happened.”
I held up a hand. “Mr. Braggi—”
“Braggi.”
I compromised. “Hank, I’ve only seen the pictures. We’re going to have an uphill battle saying Mr. Chase deserved that. Tell us what happened so we can defend it.”
Hank appeared to be contemplating the cook on his eggs more than listening to us as he ran the spatula in around the edge of the pan but eventually he said, “Pretty simple really. We played at the University here. Good show. Lizzy sounded great, cracked it out for a full two-hour set. When we were done, we knew we had the day off the next day, so we all got pretty lit.”
He arranged three plates next to the stove and scraped out three helpings of eggs. He brought them over, slapped forks and hot sauce in the middle of the table, and sat down. The smell of the eggs was more than my shaky stomach could resist and I’m not ashamed to say that I started to eat.
“Where?” said Christian.
“At the hotel. We had a bunch of suites and there were all sorts of people there. Lizzy had a crowd around her, like she always does, and Jared was following her around, like he always does, as if standing next to her on stage while he plays the guitar all night isn’t enough.”
“Jared?” I asked.
“Jared Smoke. Lead guitarist, boyfriend, shit-stick. Name tells you all you need to know about him—makes one up and pairs Jared with Smoke. Might as well have gone with Mort Reaper. Anyway, he’s always hanging around Lizzy, which I can’t fault because I wouldn’t let Lizzy out of my sight either if I were him, but that night he had some other folks with him that I wasn't crazy about. So anyway, they all vanish and go back to her suite and I decide that I don't really like the look of those new folks much. So I go up to the room and I knock on the door and I hear music but no one answers. I knock again. Nothing. So I try the door and it's open, so I walk in and I see Lizzy, drunk as the moon is full, sitting in a chair with her head lolled back. Now we’ve all been there on more than one occasion so that's not something that I would worry about except one of these strange guys is kneeling down in front of her and Jared's nowhere to be found. So I say ‘Hey,’ and this little rat-shit starts and looks at me and when he turns, I can see that he's got Lizzy's arm tied off and there’s a needle sticking in it. So I stopped him.”
My fork stopped halfway to my mouth and then I set it down as it turned out that I wasn’t hungry after all. I stared at the eggs a moment longer then, when I realized Hank had stopped talking, looked up at him.
Hank gave me a look of glittering, unrepentant menace. There was a joy to it, an exultation.
“You killed him,” said Christian.
Hank shrugged and shoveled a mouthful of eggs past his wild beard. “Like I said, I stopped him.”
Christian was sitting back in his chair, legs crossed, hands relaxed in his lap, eggs untouched. “You didn't tell him to stop,” said Christian.
“No, I stopped him.”
“You beat him to death.”
Hank kept eating. “Seemed more efficient.”
“You fractured his skull.”
Hank winked at me. “Didn't want him getting up.”
“You broke his arms.”
“See now a man with broken arms isn't going to be able to inject a beautiful young woman with heroin, is he?”
I gripped the edge of the table. Christian and Hank didn’t seem to notice as Christian continued. “There’s evidence that you slammed the body against the walls and onto the floor.”
Hank nodded. “That's quicker than breaking all those ribs one by one.”
Christian flicked an invisible piece of lint off the crease of his pants. “So you shattered a man’s skull, broke his arms and ribs, and beat his face until his own mother wouldn’t recognize him. And it's self-defense?”
Hank leaned forward, his glittering blue eyes focused and intent. “He won’t do it again, will he?”
Christian nodded. “Did Jared see him inject her?”
I consciously slowed my breath.
“Try to inject her.” Hank leaned back and shrugged. “You’re the Fancy Pants lawyer. Find out.”
Christian shifted slightly. “So Mr. Shepherd, what do you think of Mr. Braggi’s self-defense argument?”
I gathered myself and saw that Christian was assessing me as coolly as he had been assessing Hank a moment before. That pissed me off so I picked up the fork again and took a few bites, ignoring him, before I said, “I think proportionality is going to be a problem.”
Hank grinned. “His face was a bit lopsided.”
Christian sniffed. “That's not what he means, Mr. Braggi. He means that you, in defending Ms. Saint, can only use that amount of force which she could use to defend herself.”
“Well, she couldn't use any seeing as how she was unconscious. That's my point.”
Christians face didn't twitch. “Mr. Shepherd is saying that you went too far.”
Hank looked back at me and pointed. “Do you think I went too far?”
I kept a lid on what I thought and said, “It doesn't matter what I think. It matters what the jury thinks.”
“And what's a jury going to think, Counselor?”
I thought about the misshapen mass of blood, bone, and teeth that I’d seen in the pictures the night before. “I think we’re going to have a hard time showing that Ms. Saint would have done what you did.”
“Of course she wouldn't have. That's what I'm for.”
I didn’t think bludgeoning was part of the sound engineer’s job description. “It’s going to be a tough sell.”
“So sell it. I assume that's why Fancy Pants get paid what they do. We done here?”
“It appears so,” said Christian and stood.
“We should talk about the deal,” I said.
“Not interested,” said Hank.
“They’re offering second-degree murder.”
“So?”
“So they charged you with aggravated murder.”
“I’m a bit aggravated about it myself.”
“So if we lose, you can be executed. Ohio still has the death penalty.”
Hank grinned. “Good.”
“With the deal, you could be out in twenty.”
“Days?”
“Of course not. Years.”
“No way.”
“Hank, this deal isn't going to stay on the table.”
“Good. I won't have to turn it down again.”
I looked at Christian who seemed utterly unconcerned with Hank's position. “Christian?”
“He said he's not interested, Mr. Shepherd.”
“But if we lose…”
Hank turned to Christian. “You’re being paid to win, right?”
“I’m being paid to try the case,” said Christian.
“Same thing,” said Hank and looked out the window. “It’s a beautiful day and I’ve spent enough time inside. You can join me if you want, but I’m going to the backyard.”
I wanted to keep working on Hank but Christian shook his head. “We have work to do, Mr. Braggi. We’ll talk soon.” He shook Hank’s hand, then I did the same. I’m not small but Hank’s hand positively engulfed mine. It was not at all hard to imagine it snapping bone. Then Hank nodded to me and left.
Cade met us at the front door. “Let me know when the next court date is,” he said. “I’ll have him there. Oh, and I’m billing you for the food. He won’t stop.”
“Of course, Mr. Brickson,” said Christian. “Don’t skimp.”
I nodded, we all shook hands, and Christian and I left.
As we went to our cars, Christian and I agreed that this was going to be a tough case, that we’d spend the rest of the weekend looking at the file, and then strategize Monday. I drove home, thinking about the case and what Hank had told us about what he’d done.
When I arrived at home, I decided that I’d get some yardwork done before diving back into the file.
Th
e thing about mowing the lawn is that it occupies one half of your brain and lets the other half roam. I barely noticed the grass as I pushed the mower back and forth. All I could picture was Hank coming on the scene of a man injecting Lizzy Saint with her helpless to prevent it. The depth of that evil was boundless and I can’t say that anyone would have blamed Hank for beating the man to within an inch of his life. The problem was just how far past that finish line he’d gone.
I gripped the lawnmower handle, hard, and felt the sweat pour off in the heat as I walked back and forth. I kept gnawing at it, picturing it, as I worked. The beating. The broken bones.
The heroin.
I thought about someone injecting Lizzy Saint without her knowing it and the good fortune, for her, that Hank was there to stop it. I thought about the divine intervention or the random chance that had brought Hank down like an avenging angel to destroy the man who was trying to shoot a ravenous monster into Lizzy’s life and send it creeping through her veins. I thought about what would have happened to her if there hadn’t been anyone there looking out for her.
After I finished mowing, I trimmed, and after I trimmed, I decided the boxwood bushes were getting unruly. Of course, you can’t get a precise cut with an electric trimmer no matter what those Home Depot ads say so I used the hand-shears and worked my way around the house.
Lethal Defense Page 3