Clear.
I put my gun away. I felt a little silly wielding it, but better safe than sorry. This is why I practiced at the gun range, every month since my father gave me the gun. If the situation called for it, I knew how to handle my weapon. “You got no business owning a gun if you can’t use it properly,” he’d said. I’d just never needed to use it, and I hoped I never did.
I made a mental note to remind Jack to tell me anytime Snowflake wouldn’t be here, so I could skip the whole heart failure thing. I walked normally down the hall to my work area as the booming in my ears subsided to a thumping and then to nothing. When I got to my desk, my cell phone rang, its harsh sound making me jump. It wasn’t my normal ringtone.
“Geez!” I fumbled in my purse for it. Another note to self: change the annoying ringtone. As I answered I saw the caller was UNKNOWN. “Hello?”
Someone cleared his throat, at least I thought it was a he from the sound of it, but honestly, I didn’t have much to go on.
“Hello??”
The call dropped. Greg again? Surely not. The kids were safe on the Wrong Turn Ranch with Mickey and Laura. To be sure, I texted Laura: How are things going?
Her reply was almost instantaneous: We’re having fun! Been out riding with them, and now they’re exploring on their own.
Okay, so probably not the kids. My phone made another unfamiliar noise. I fumbled with it and saw that I had four voice mails. Scratch “change ringtone.” I needed to reset all my notifications and sounds. I hadn’t known I had messages. I played them, one by one. Two calls last week from an 806 number. That was probably the kids. Two calls today from an unknown number, one of which I had just experienced. Weird.
I put my purse away under the desk and booted up my computer. The background screen loaded Betsy’s sweet face and a pang shot through my heart. It was time to tell Mother I was moving out. That wasn’t a conversation I looked forward to having, although she’d understand why. I pulled up the network and clicked on the folder for Elizabet “Betsy” Perez and opened the draft complaint.
The office phone rang.
“Williams and Associates, Emily speaking.”
“Emily, give me Jack.”
I recognized the voice, but no way was I giving this woman the satisfaction of admitting it. In my slowest Amarillo accent, I said, “May I ask who’s calling?”
A withering sigh rattled the phone line. “Assistant District Attorney Melinda Stafford. You may remember me. Now give me Jack.”
I hadn’t talked to my childhood nemesis Melinda since I socked her in the jaw for telling me my miscarriage of Rich’s baby was “for the best.” She had threatened to sue me, but Jack had paid her off, and had a little too much fun doing it. Melinda was one of the ADAs, so I had to play nice, though. At least a little bit.
“I’m sorry, Jack isn’t available at the moment. May I take a message or assist you in any way?” The words and saccharin-sweet tone puckered my mouth.
“You can tell him to get control of his client, for one thing.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Perhaps if you give me a client name and a brief description of the incident I can relay it to him?”
“Cut the crap, Emily. Alan Freeman was up here demanding to meet with me so he could make a plea bargain.” She huffed. “He chose to work with your firm, so I’m not about to meet with him without Jack present. I had the receptionist send him packing.”
I paused, long enough that I could have written a message, if I were so inclined. I wasn’t. “Got it. Anything else?”
“Yeah. Tell him if he wants to get a plea bargain done, I’m off for the Christmas holidays as of six p.m. sharp today. Otherwise, he’s gonna get his ass kicked in court after the New Year.” She hung up.
“Merry frickin’ Christmas to you, too, Melinda.” I slammed the phone down in the cradle, and enjoyed it.
Jack was going to want to know this, stat. I picked the phone back up and pushed speed dial for his mobile. It went to voice mail. I ended the call and sent him a text message instead: Call me ASAP. Alan went to Stafford asking for a plea bargain?? She’s off for holidays after 6 today.
What in God’s name had gotten into Alan? When we’d talked to him the week before, he seemed antsy about having his fate still up in the air. He hadn’t mentioned second thoughts, though. His case wasn’t rock solid, but neither was the city’s, and they had the burden of proving his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Assaulting Wu and resisting arrest were serious charges, and we trusted a jury of Freeman’s peers to treat them as such, especially in the wake of Ferguson: Freeman was black, Wu was a half-white Asian, and they told two completely different stories, with no witnesses to the alleged assault. Freeman had no priors, and he was no thug. I had faith the jury wouldn’t swallow Wu’s version of events. Freeman had faith, too, as far as I’d known up until five minutes ago.
With difficulty, I wrenched my attention back to the complaint for Betsy. The beginning of a case really didn’t reveal anything shocking or sexy. We were alleging wrongful death, that PCDC had caused Sofia’s by not providing adequate supervision to prevent her murder by other inmates, and that their violent actions were foreseeable. The upfront process was formulaic and had to do with establishing the county’s responsibility. Honestly, I’d never worked on one of these cases before and neither had Jack, so I spent a lot of time researching forms online. I had to keep reminding myself how important this lawsuit was to Betsy’s future to keep myself awake long enough to finish the draft.
I worked steadily for all of two minutes when the door whispered open. Without Snowflake to alert me to company and because I was concentrating on what I was doing, the visitor didn’t even register in my consciousness until Alan Freeman was standing right in front of my desk.
“Emily, is Jack here?”
“Oh!” Alan had dressed to the nines today. He wore a black suit and shiny cobalt blue tie over a white shirt. His scalp shined. I’d never seen him like this, and it took me a moment to answer. “Alan, wow, you look sharp. Jack’s not here, but the ADA called and spoke to me.”
He looked up and then down furtively, but he said nothing.
“Let’s go sit in Jack’s office. I’ll get you something to drink. Water? Soft drink? Coffee or tea?”
“Water. Thank you.”
I grabbed my cell phone, a pen, and a yellow pad, and Alan followed me down the long wainscoted hall with its Western paintings, past the kitchen on the right, and down to Jack’s office on the left. Really, it was Clyde’s office first, but Jack had inherited it with the practice and it was magnificent. Richly stained built-ins dominated the farthest wall. His desk consumed most of the central space, and a conference table and leather chairs on rollers sat nearest the door. Behind it was a real Remington painting, a huge splurge by Clyde back in the day. I put Alan at the near side of the table. He could enjoy the long wall of windows or the facing wall of photographs, art, and diplomas from there.
“I’ll be right back with your water.”
“Thanks.”
As I walked to the kitchen, I typed Jack another frantic message: Alan here. Looking for you. Help. Jack hadn’t answered my earlier message, but it had only been twenty minutes since I sent it. I wouldn’t panic yet.
I grabbed two glass tumblers from the cabinet and filled them with ice cubes and filtered water from the door of the refrigerator. I would have to talk to Alan, see what I could do to steady him, and stall like crazy until I heard from Jack. I walked back into the office.
Alan was standing at Jack’s wall of fame, looking at an arresting black-and-white photograph of an old, abandoned mine. Above its entrance hung a lopsided sign: SACRAMENTO SILVER MINE. The photo even had a name: Old Dreams at the Wrong Turn Ranch. I knew it by heart. It was the one Jack had mentioned when we visited the cemetery with the kids on Saturday. It was a beautiful piece, but I preferred the charcoal drawing beside it of a little girl and a spotted pony. The artist? Jack
. The subject? His daughter.
Alan heard me and returned to his seat. He had placed coasters from the holder in the center of the table in front of his chair and one across from him where I’d left my pen and yellow pad. I set the glasses on the coasters, and sunk into buttery leather.
“The ADA said you tried to meet with her about a plea deal,” I said.
“Yeah.” He looked down.
“So, tell me what’s going on.”
He shook his head. “I can’t do this.”
“Can’t do what?”
“The trial.”
“I don’t understand. You didn’t seem to have reservations before. Have you and Jack talked about you taking a deal?”
“No. Well, at the beginning.”
“So, has something changed?”
He looked up at me. A single tear glistened in the corner of one of his eyes.
I put my hand over his. “What is it?”
His voice broke. “I can’t do this to my wife and daughters.”
“I know you’re worried about them. But if you plead guilty, you’ll be a convicted felon. That will impact them forever.”
“I know. But if I don’t it will be much worse.”
I licked my lips. I wished Jack would hurry up and get here. “What was the plea offer before, do you remember?”
“If I’d plead guilty to assault, they’d drop the aggravated part, and I’d do two years and be eligible for parole in six months.”
“So you want to be in prison for six months—or more? You think that will be better for your family?”
I heard the sound of the front door. Jack. I jumped to my feet.
A deep voice bellowed down the hall. “Anybody in here?”
Not Jack. But a voice that sounded familiar. Across from me, Alan’s face had frozen in a look of terror. I walked over to Alan and put my hands on his shoulders.
I whispered, “What is it?”
He didn’t answer, and I gave him a little shake.
He croaked out, “I need to go,” and jumped to his feet.
***
Samson’s uniformed bulk filled the doorway to Jack’s office, and, worse, Burrows appeared behind him.
I took a step toward them, between the two officers and our rattled client. “If you gentlemen can take a seat in the lobby, someone will be with you in a moment.”
Burrows ignored my words and pushed around Samson and inside, taking a visual inventory as he did. “I thought I heard voices. Where’s Mr. Holden?”
Alan sunk back into his chair.
I didn’t back up. “Sir, we’re in the middle of a private meeting. I will see you in the lobby in a moment.”
He lowered his voice. “I asked you where Jack Holden is.”
He frightened me, but I was determined not to show it. “He’s not here right now. I’m going to—”
From the doorway, Samson said, “Well, hello, Freeman.”
Alan was looking down again. “Officer Samson.”
I ignored the pleasantries. “Unless the two of you have an official reason to be in Jack’s office, like a warrant to serve, I am telling you in front of a witness that you are not invited to be in here and need to go to our lobby.”
“Not a problem. We’ll wait out there.” Samson held his hands up and gestured with his head for Burrows to follow him. To Alan, he said, “See you around, Freeman.”
Burrows joined him and the two men walked out.
“I’ll be right back, Alan.” I hurried after them. “Jack may be awhile. May I help you with something, Officers?”
Samson entered the lobby and Burrows walked over to my desk. Between the two of them, they blocked access to both my desk and the exit. Burrows blatantly read my computer screen, shuffled my papers, then grabbed one of my business cards from their holder.
I jabbed at the off button on my monitor. “If you don’t need something, then I need to ask you to leave, for the privacy of our clients and their information.”
Burrows slapped my card against the thumb of his left hand several times then made a show of reading it.
Samson said, “We came by to see if you or your boss have heard from those two teenage runaways.”
“What?”
Samson crossed his arms. “I spoke to you last Wednesday night about the two teenagers that had run away from their group home, Greg Easley and the Arab girl. I’m following up. Have they called you or come by? It sounded like you developed a rapport with them. And I hear you have a thing for strays.”
“No.” My head spun. Could he know they had, somehow? Surely not.
“And you’d tell me if they had?”
“Actually I’d call Byron first. They aren’t accused of any crime that I’ve been made aware of. He’s their caseworker. But I haven’t had my phone, so if they contacted me on it, I wouldn’t have known.”
Burrows pocketed my card and cut in. “So sorry to hear that. But you’ve got it back now, right?” He didn’t wait for me to answer. “I don’t know what kind of magic you’re expecting to happen by filing a complaint against Samson and me, though.” He pantomimed magic hands in front of his chest, his fingers doing a poof and his hands moving away from each other, down, and around back to his waist.
Samson laughed, a short bark.
“I think filing a complaint against you will do a lot of things. It already made my phone reappear.”
Burrows stepped closer to me. “Maybe other things will start reappearing now, too.”
Burrows turned and the two men took their sweet time walking out.
***
Five minutes later Jack crashed in through the office door. “Sorry. I was Christmas shopping. Left my phone in the car.”
“Please tell me you have Snowflake.”
He mumbled something.
“What?”
“She’s fine.”
“Does that mean you have her?”
He mumbled again.
“Jack, where’s the dog?”
“At a doggie daycare and spa, okay? It was her Christmas present.”
Laughter burbled from deep inside me. “That’s . . . unexpected.”
He growled. “How’d it go with Alan?”
“Not great at first, then Burrows and Samson showed up, and it got much worse.”
“What?”
“Yeah, they asked for you, but never really said what they wanted with you. They asked me questions about Greg and Farrah and left.”
“Hmm.”
“Alan seems adamant on that plea deal. Says he can’t do this to his wife and kids.”
“Huh.”
“Are you even listening to me?”
“Thinking.”
My leg started to bounce. “Okayyyyy.” When he still didn’t speak, I sighed and started working on my complaint document again.
“How’d you leave it with Alan?”
“I didn’t. He’s in your office, waiting for you.”
He glanced at the wall clock. “It’s already four o’clock. You said Melinda leaves at six?” I nodded and he continued. “We have to do something.”
“Yet only one of us has a license to practice law.”
“Come with me?”
I sighed and followed him down the long hall.
Jack and Alan shook hands. Within moments of joining him at the conference table in Jack’s office, we picked up the conversation pretty much where I’d left it with Alan, with his insistence that a plea bargain was the right thing to do for his family.
“There has to be a better reason than that for me to participate in putting you in jail before Christmas.” Jack leaned back in his chair, his arms crossed.
Alan hung his head. “There’s no better reason than a man’s family.”
“If you’re dead set on it, take the holiday with them, and we’ll do it after.”
He shook his head without looking up. “My mind is made up, but I understand if you can’t do this for me. I can fire you, if you need me to, so I can
work directly with the DA’s office.”
“I still don’t understand,” I blurted. “How does this make things better for your family?”
Alan looked up at me with the saddest eyes I’d ever seen. “You don’t have to understand. I need y’all’s help is all.”
Jack leaned toward him, elbows and forearms on the table. “You understand, if we make this deal, you could be put in jail tomorrow?”
“I expected as much.”
“Two days before Christmas.”
“So my calendar tells me.”
Jack frowned, but he picked up his phone. Fifteen minutes later, he had convinced ADA Stafford to honor the original plea offer. He looked pale when he hung up. “She’ll meet us in court tomorrow morning.”
“But her vacation—” I said.
“She said her flight doesn’t leave until noon.”
Alan shook our hands and thanked us profusely as he left. He seemed relieved, like an enormous weight had been taken off him. Not me, though. I was shaken and confused. Today had just about leveled me. I went back to my desk to try to work, but my brain was fried and my heart too heavy. I checked the time. Nearly five.
I hit intercom on the office phone. “Jack, do you mind if I leave a little early? I’m wiped.”
“Okay.”
Objection! I wanted to shout. Nonresponsive! But I wasn’t up for it. I grabbed my handbag and slipped out.
Chapter Nineteen
The jingling bell on the door announced my arrival at ABC Half-Price Resale. A tall, slim black woman stood behind the counter ringing up a customer, a short woman with graying pin curls and French-roast skin tone, decked out in red and green sweats with flashing lights on the Christmas tree across her chest.
The customer turned and called out to a skeletal old man sitting in a folding chair near where I stood by the front door. “Herbert? I told you we’d find it cheaper here. Twenty-two ninety-five.”
The man beside me grunted. His skin was so loose it looked like wrinkled fabric.
I went straight to the toys, looking for Betsy’s horse, figuring someone had probably snapped it up by then. It was a fine toy. But no, it was there, still perfect. I grabbed the box and pulled it to my chest. To hell with the Hodges and their rules. I’d find a way to give it to her.
Earth to Emily Page 14