The Amendment Killer (Brooks/Lotello Thriller)

by Ronald S. Barak

  Five names remained at the top of the page, divided into two groups. Two priorities. In the lower priority were Brooks, Klein, and Lotello. He didn’t know if any of them actually had anything to do with the girl’s release. But if one did they all did. And his instincts told him they did. They’d been his nemesis dating back to the Norman case. For them, it was not if. It was when.

  This brought him to the final two. He should say the first two. Reyes and Tuttle. When troops turned on their own, that was the worst. The very worst. Treason. They had abandoned him. Worse. They had turned on him.

  He tore up the pages. But not until he first entered what he had written there on his laptop. He saved that file. He would look at it again. He would not forget.

  CHAPTER 123

  Tuesday, May 13, 1:15 am

  TUTTLE WAS SURPRISED to receive a call on his private line at this hour. He glanced at his telephone console. All it said was “Night Security Officer.”

  He punched the speaker button. “Yes?”

  “Mr. President?”

  “We’re you expecting someone else? Awfully late isn’t it? Something bad happening somewhere in the world that can’t wait until the morning?”

  “Yes, sir. Right here in Washington. Very bad, I’m afraid. Thought you’d want to know right away, sir.”

  “Too late to rethink that now, Officer. What is it?”

  “Two hours ago, sir, the White House switchboard received what was thought to be a crank call. At this time of day, standard protocol was to report the call to Mr. Reyes.”

  “To my chief of staff? This goes to him personally?”

  “Well not directly to Mr. Reyes, sir. To his after-hours security detail.”

  “And?”

  “We couldn’t raise him on his phone. So we entered Mr. Reyes’s condo unit. He was nowhere to be found. We—”

  “Hold on. Who was nowhere to be found? Mr. Reyes?”

  “No, sir. The after-hours security detail was nowhere to be found. Sorry for not being clearer.”

  “Okay. Carry on.”

  “We found him. Lying on the floor. He was dead, sir. With—”

  “Wait a minute. You’re doing it again, Officer. Found who dead? The after-hours security detail?”

  “No, sir. I’m sorry. I get flustered when, you know, when I’m speaking with the President of the United States and all. I realize I have to be clearer, sir. I won’t fail you again, sir. Anyway, we found Mr. Reyes, sir. With what appears to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound. From the looks of things, he put his weapon to the roof of his mouth, and fired.”

  “Good God. You telling me—”

  “Yes, sir. It’s quite a grizzly scene here, Mr. President.”

  “Wait. Wouldn’t his after-hours security detail have heard the shot?”

  “Missing, sir. The after-hours security detail, that is. He’s missing. Difficult to explain, isn’t it? Perhaps he left his station to find help, sir.”

  Tuttle couldn’t make sense of what he was hearing. The more the man talked, the stranger it all sounded. The stranger the man sounded. Tuttle was losing his patience. “Was there a note?”

  “Yes, sir, there was. And a rather odd one at that.”

  “Read it to me.”

  “It’s short. All it says is ‘I’m sorry. I’ve failed you again. But treason is the worst kind of disloyalty. It cannot go unpunished.’”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it, Mr. President. Do those words perhaps mean anything to you, sir? Do you have any possible idea to whom the word ‘you’ might be referring, Mr. President?”

  Tuttle paused. “No idea. This is all extremely distressing. What happens now?”

  “I’m just the evening security detail, Mr. President. I’ve alerted the Secret Service dispatch. They’ll take it from here, sir.”

  “Thank you.” Something about all this didn’t feel right to Tuttle. “By the way, please give me your name.”

  “My name? You want to know my name, sir?”

  “Yes, Officer. Isn’t that what I just said?”

  “You did, sir. Thomas, sir. My name is Thomas. Good night, Mr. President. Sleep well. And again, sir, my apologies for failing you. Again. Sir.”

  Tuttle recoiled. “Thomas? What—”

  The line went dead. Tuttle dropped the receiver, as if it was covered in something infectious. Deadly infectious. He hurried over to the window, pulled the drape aside and looked down into the garden. He didn’t think he saw anything out there. Among the shadows. But it was dark. He couldn’t be sure. He swiftly stepped away from the window, releasing the drape. Watching to make sure it fully closed.

  CHAPTER 124

  Wednesday, May 14, 8:00 am

  NISHIMURA FINISHED READING the routine interview she’d given concerning her experience televising Congress v. NoPoli. It was a far cry from what she’d expected to be reporting.

  The problem was that her exclusive had evaporated overnight. Technically, the family had never admitted anything to her. Or to anyone else. Cassie Webber was in Court for the reading of the final ruling, in which Hirschfeld himself explained away his odd remarks in Court earlier in the week.

  Kidnapping? Extortion? By whom? Cassie had merely been at home with the flu for a few days. That was the party line. And they all were sticking to it. The girl was already back in school, practicing her golf again two times a day. Hardly sounded like much of a kidnapping. NBN executives refused to let Nishimura tell her supposedly extraordinary story without corroboration she couldn’t produce.

  Timing was everything. Kessler had stopped her dead in her tracks. When Cassie was nowhere to be found. When Nishimura actually had a story. Momentarily. She remained irate with Kessler, who somehow knew just when to shut her down. For just long enough.

  Hirschfeld. The Webbers. Klein’s husband Lotello, right there at the Webber home. Klein and her partner Brooks, the two of them NoPoli board members. Along with Kessler.

  Lotello at the Webber home was the only tangible thing she had. A cop possibly working the kidnapping, but whose wife also happened to be NoPoli’s co-counsel. It smelled. The problem was that Lotello’s daughter was Cassie’s best friend. Supposedly just bringing Cassie her missing schoolwork for his daughter.

  Nishimura was furious. She knew she had a story. She just couldn’t quite piece it together. They really had closed ranks on her.

  She opened the streaming News service site on her laptop and read with interest the White House press release that Chief of Staff Manny Reyes had suffered a fatal heart attack and died in his sleep Monday evening. The coroner stated that death was instant and peaceful. President Tuttle said the nation had lost a fine public servant and he had lost a good friend.

  Awfully coincidental. Wonder if there’s possibly a story behind this story?

  CHAPTER 125

  Wednesday, May 14, 3:00 pm

  BROOKS WAS IN HIS SWEATSUIT, out for what he—but probably no one else—would characterize as an afternoon “power” walk. He tried to get one in every day, at least when all the stars were properly aligned and nothing else got in the way. On average, he managed to make three a week. Sometimes four.

  He didn’t think the name for the clothing—sweatsuit—made much sense. At least, not for him. He never managed to work up much of a sweat on his so-called power walks, but Eloise told him they were good for him nonetheless. He assumed she was referring to the power walks. Not the sweatsuits.

  Lotello had called after lunch and said he had some loose ends he wanted to go over and hoped he could stop by. Brooks told him to bring his walking shoes. Maybe even some workout clothes. And not to slow him down.

  “Your meeting, Detective. One lap through the neighborhood. What’s up?”

  Lotello fell in line, to Brooks’s immediate right. “A few unsettled matters. I was hoping to get some closure. I guess I should say ‘we’ because a few of these actually come from Madison.”

  He took out his small sized notepad and
skimmed several of the pages.

  Brooks glanced over at him without breaking stride. Oy, so much he had to make notes? To Lotello: “So much you had to make notes?”

  Lotello didn’t answer the question. Instead: “What do you think about Manny Reyes’s heart attack? A little pat? Newspaper reports say he was in good health. No prior heart issues and no heart disease in his family.”

  “My my. Aren’t we sounding a little paranoid?”

  “Well, according to Cassie, someone had fired gunshots at her kidnapper as he was driving her to the drop on Sunday. He was hit.”

  Brooks wasn’t yet sweating, but his breathing was becoming labored. Between breaths, he uttered, “And your point?”

  “You’ll recall that Cassie’s description of the kidnapper pretty well matched Thomas. Also fits the description in a missing person’s report filed with the police about a Supreme Court nightshift janitor who hasn’t shown up for work since last week, and whose contact information was falsified. Hirschfeld received multiple texts from one or more kidnappers apparently observing Hirschfeld from right there in the Courtroom. Where the public is not allowed to bring cell phones past Courthouse security. The janitor angle might explain that. Aren’t you curious about any of this?”

  “Relentlessly,” Brooks said. “Unable to sleep wondering about it all.” Pausing to take a couple more breaths, “But what does this have to do with Reyes’s death?”

  “It’s not hard to imagine that Reyes—and Tuttle—would have been anxious to rid themselves of Thomas dating back to the aftermath of the Norman trial. And the shootout involving Thomas and yours truly. Reyes was at the Courthouse last Thursday. Maybe he was on the prowl for Thomas. Maybe Thomas saw him. And struck back. Do we really know the cause of Reyes’s death?”

  Brooks winced at the reminder of the shootout in which Lotello had been seriously wounded. Another couple of breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth. “Circumstantial. But fun to speculate.” He started to pick up the pace, but then thought better of it. He quickly managed to squeeze out a few more words. “And to imagine how Tuttle might be feeling right now if the cause of Reyes’s death were not as reported.” A couple more breaths. “Anything more there in your notepad?”

  “Nishimura seems to have completely dropped her big story. Would you know anything about that?”

  Brooks stopped, bent over and put his hands on his quads. A couple more gasps of air. “Did have a little conversation with Kessler about her. No idea what he might have done. You’ll have to ask him. Sure hope he didn’t do anything untoward. First Amendment free speech and all that.”

  Without warning, Brooks was off again. Lotello followed.

  “I have known you to cut an occasional corner or two, Your Honor.”

  “C’est moi? Surely you jest. Give me three examples.”

  “How about your substitution of me in place of Lance to take delivery of Cassie on Sunday? Not altogether cricket.”

  Brooks seemed to be getting his second wind. “Pray tell why not? Authorized right there in the signed contract. Figuring out how to use that provision—and convincing Lance to allow you to sub in so the girl would see a face she recognized on delivery—was hardly cutting corners. Lance didn’t ask us to say you’d bring her to him. We didn’t represent you would. He’s no dummy. Maybe he didn’t want to ask. Plausible deniability.”

  “I was his sub-agent. Wasn’t he still responsible as the primary agent to return Cassie when the Supreme Court upheld the 28th Amendment?”

  “No. Read the ‘without recourse’ language in the document. It says he has the right to assign subcontractors to carry out his duties and that he would not be responsible for their performance, or failure to perform.”

  Brooks barely managed to finish that last sentence. Too many words. All lawyers should have to rehearse their Courtroom arguments on power walks.

  “But what if Thomas now comes after Lance?”

  “Lance told me he’d deal with that. Said his staff agreed.”

  “By the way, why do you think Thomas didn’t demand that the provision be removed? Don’t you think he would’ve spotted the language on which you and Lance relied?”

  “Apparently, he didn’t review the agreement that carefully—or at all. He would have benefitted by having a good lawyer, but I would love to have seen that conversation: ‘Hi, I’m in the middle of a kidnapping. We’re going to have a contract covering the ransom arrangements. Can you help me review and revise the contract language, please? You know, to make sure our kidnap scheme is successful.’”

  “Guess you’re right about that. But hard to think he wouldn’t have reviewed the document pretty carefully on his own.”

  “Hirschfeld told Thomas his family was going to the FBI in just a few hours. When the chips were down, Thomas wasn’t a very good poker player. Who knows, after spending some time with the girl, perhaps he really didn’t have the stomach to harm her after all. Whatever, the reason, he chose to spend what little time he had vetting Lance’s integrity rather than the contract language.” In through the nose, out through the mouth. Lower the shoulders. Engage the core. Squeeze the glutes. “I might have done the same. How important was the language to Thomas anyway? Not exactly like he could come out of the shadows to assert a contract claim.”

  Just then, Brooks emitted something in between a cough and a wheeze.

  “You okay, Judge?”

  “Fine. What else?”

  “Okay. If you’re sure you’re alright. Some ‘what ifs.’ What if Thomas had refused to go along with the arrangement, or at least the sub-contractor assignment provision?”

  More deep breaths. “We’d have been back to square one. Without the assignment provision, we could have gotten the FBI to order Lance to stand down and release Cassie. Better chance with Lance than with Thomas.”

  “And if there was no escrow at all?”

  “The family would have had to go to the FBI. Fortunately, that didn’t happen. Okay, then, Detective, we’re almost back to my place—after two laps, no less. Can’t keep this up forever. Anything else?”

  “How about your improper calls with Hirschfeld? Weren’t you cutting corners there?”

  “Some say rules are made to be broken. I prefer to say there are exceptions to every rule. Recall the doctrine of justifiable homicide from the Norman case. Where justification exists, even murder is permitted. If a burglar brandishes a knife and threatens a property owner’s family, the property owner is free to shoot and kill the burglar. Do you really think the authorities would find fault with an improper communication between judge and lawyer with a child’s life hanging in the balance?

  “Wasn’t expecting all this, Detective,” Brooks managed to slip in between gasps. “Anything more in that notepad of yours? Starting to wilt here. One more shot for you to show I cut corners. Sometimes.”

  “What about that nine to zero vote of the Justices to uphold the amendment? Did you have anything to do with that? Wouldn’t that amount to an unethical cutting of corners, unduly influencing or attempting to influence an independent judicial process?”

  “For sake of argument, let’s say I did have a conversation with a certain Chief Justice. Wasn’t it my duty as an ‘officer of the court’ to do that? To let Trotter know about a fraud being perpetrated on the Court.”

  “Even if such a hypothetical conversation was against the rules?”

  “Exceptions, Detective, exceptions. I would’ve felt more obliged—hypothetically—to protect the independence of the judicial branch of our government. Trotter could have included Esposito in any such imagined conversation if he thought it necessary. That was on our Chief Justice, not me. I am but a humble servant of the Court, struggling to do what I can.”

  “Where did that footnote in the opinion about what Hirschfeld supposedly meant when he used the words in Court about extortion and hostages come from? Did you have a hand in that?”

  “Same answer. Just as far as Trotter may hav
e permitted. I said ‘may.’”

  Open palms facing out, Lotello raised his hands in front of his face as if to deflect a blow.

  “Okay, I surrender, Your Honor. Just two more questions, and I’ll let you go inside and hit the showers. How far do you really think you can go with this officer of the court business?”

  Brooks stopped just outside his door. Hands on his quads again. Breathing deeply. “Pretty far, actually. Thomas was waging war on the judicial system of our country. To me, that was intolerable. Unacceptable. I believe it would’ve been fair for me to advocate—as we have been hypothesizing that I did—a cover-up of Hirschfeld’s understandable compromises and the closing of ranks by all nine Justices to send a loud and clear message to all who might think to unduly influence our courts.”

  “Would you have been as quick to do that if you thought the nine to zero result actually would have changed the result the Court was otherwise going to reach?”

  “That didn’t seem to be the case, but I would have done it even then because the Court, knowing the real result, could always have set aside its decision after the girl was rescued.”

  “Last question. What if no deal was reached and you believed the Court were going to uphold the 28th Amendment?”

  “Again hypothetically, I would have gone to the Chief Justice and asked him to solicit his colleagues to invalidate the 28th Amendment in order to save the girl, and then set aside the decision and take the real vote after she was safe.”

  “Do you think they would have done that?”

  “Don’t know. I would like to think so, but let’s hope we never have to find out the answer to a question like that. However, I do think the nine to zero vote suggests the answer to your question—and perhaps suggests to those who believe they can manipulate the Court that they may have a tougher time of that than expected.”

  Looking at the time on his phone, this was the longest power walk Brooks could ever recall—two laps through the neighborhood no less—yet it seemed like nothing. And he had also learned two things from the experience. First, a good distraction, such as Lotello had provided, is invaluable. Better than his headsets and music. He wasn’t even panting any longer. Second, he had gained a new appreciation for his delightfully damp sweatsuit.