by A. L. DeNova
He assembled files, and maintained index card vaults of secrets and indiscretions. He kept the box in nightstand. Reviewing it prior to bedtime, made his sleep easy. Knowledge of another’s embarrassing past was useful. Some might call it extortion.
First of all, there were the defense lawyers, then there were the Ivy Leaguers, and he saved his special venomous retribution and put downs for the girls who refused to flirt with him.
He loved the DOJ. The Department of Justice. He had such a wonderfully secure job without any adult supervision and he had complete latitude to prosecute and settle cases. Dozens of years, or millions of dollars. Ultimatums were the sweet elixir that made life worth living, in the legal maxims composed by Border Crimes Chief Lucerne. This had been a busy few years for Lucerne prosecuting the border. He had been with the office for years, and things were getting busier in all areas. Illegal Alien apprehensions in the San Diego Border Patrol Area rose from 100,000 in 1973 to 250,000 by 1976. In 1986, San Diego Border Patrol Area recorded its highest number of apprehensions for illegal aliens in in its history for one year, 628,000. These big numbers meant more cases, more prosecutors and more resources for Lucerne to deal out as he chose.
Lucerne fixed his gaze at Customs Special Agent Sanchez, completely ignoring Gemma. He stuck his large and fleshy hand out with a gruff “I’m Larry Lucerne, Gemma’s Supervisor.”
He continued, “I think we spoke on the phone a few times, you know authorizing the additional costs on obtaining some expert witnesses, and so forth.” “Right,” Jacobo said, sizing the guy up for himself. “Has the jury spoken?” Lucerne asked Agent Sanchez again, still ignoring the presence of the subordinate attorney. Silence filled the room, and that was the answer.
The lack of an answer was not wasted on Lucerne, who made up with animal instinct what he lacked in intellect and industry. “Gemma, what is the verdict?” he said. Jo answered, “Not Guilty.” Always quick to the put-down, Lucerne said “Well, you’re going to have a late one tonight, writing your failure memorandum to the United States Attorney.”
Jo did not rise to the bait. She was mad at herself. In this office, she felt like a prisoner of war but Lucerne’s comedy routine was just getting started. “It’s not every day a Federal Prosecutor manages to let a crook of the hook, who smuggled 2,000 kilos of cocaine. Nice job Germa,” Lucerne said intentionally mispronouncing her name.
This was enough for Jo. Unsteady in her pumps, she walked to the door. Over her shoulder, she called, “I will get you that memo.” Jacobo was fast to follow her out the office door.
Back in Jo’s office. Jacobo broke the silence, “Do you have any tequila in one of those drawers? For the record, Jo you did a good job.” Jo sat at her desk, and said nothing as she stacked the papers from the trial.
A tall, bespectacled man in a rumpled grey suit stepped into the office. “Hi Dylan, I’d like you to meet Special Agent Jacobo Sanchez,” Jo said introducing the two men. “Good to meet you, wish it could be under happier circumstances, I’m Dylan Deaver, I have the office next to Jo’s.” Dylan coughed and placed his hand on Jo’s shoulder. “Jo, this is the sign I told you to look for. It’s time to write the next chapter in the Book of Jo.”
“Dylan, I caught a bad break it was the dynamic duo of Heidi and McJustice.” Dylan walked towards the door. “Sorry about the verdict but remember what I told you, change can only come from the top. Get out of here and go out and become a million-dollar litigator. Don’t come back until you have the juice to break this broken system.”
“Look, tomorrow there will be another load and we’ll convict another asshole, OK?” Jacobo put on his sunglasses, and stood in the entryway to her office. He removed his tie and his suit jacket. He was ready again to get back to the street and the chase. He would try tomorrow to cut the head off the snake.
Jo closed her office door and kicked over her meticulously prepared trial exhibits. She walked to her floor to ceiling office window with a birds’ eye view of downtown San Diego. She looked down on the tourists enjoying the delicious sun.
The scenic view did not mitigate her mood. She had failed. That not guilty was not going to pass away soon. Her stray thoughts of the day led back to what she had seen in the courthouse, right before leaving. “Carmen,” she said aloud. And then again, “That was Carmen, or was it?”
Jo walked back to the large window, and then walked back to her large desk and pulled out her set of binoculars she kept in her office drawer. Jo could transform anonymous pedestrians five floors below on the street to known personalities. This was a big, very small town, especially downtown. As a prosecutor, and a very single lesbian, she liked to keep tabs on people. Who lunched, kissed, or dated.
Through the binoculars she saw a slim woman with long hair being pulled by two men with short dark hair. She zeroed in on the lady as they walked up a street, adjacent to Heidi’s office. “It’s her,” Jo said in disbelief. She looked back again and it was clear. Spread across her prosecutor’s office was the tumbled contents of the crime, photos, legal briefs, transcripts, and federal codes. But there was something else being committed right now, not many feet as the crow flies, right in front of her. She had tried using her intellect. Now she just had to move.
Moving with the speed and coordination of a college athlete, Jo picked up the debris of her failed prosecution and threw it back in the cardboard box, a jumble.
With her back against the office door, she removed her heels and pulled on jeans, and sneakers. She ripped a yellow legal sheet and in very large letters wrote:
“GONE SURFING”
She taped the note to her computer keyboard. She grabbed her wallet government and car keys, focused on now what she really wanted, and ran down the exit.
She might never go back to that office, but she would find Carmen, now. Right now. She had just seen her. Jo walked down towards Heidi’s office, on instinct.
Jo ran up the three flights of stairs to Heidi’s suite. Catching her breath on the landing, Jo waived at the attractive young receptionist in the office space and dashed towards attorney’s office, not pausing to ask permission. “Hey” was the receptionist’s only attempt at decorum and order.
Jo had not been in this building before, so she searched for Heidi’s name on each name plate on the hallway. She paused and heard the sound of Heidi’s unmistakable soprano. Jo stood before the office, when Heidi opened the door.
“Hi counselor,” Jo managed.
“Madam prosecutor,” Heidi piped out.
“Sorry to barge in here,” Jo apologized.
“Well, you don’t have a warrant, copper,” Heidi laughed.
Jo stayed the course, not smiling back, quiet and intense. “Heidi, I don’t have a lot of time here. After the trial were there were some men who stopped by your office, two especially hefty, well-dressed guys from south of the border, with a very pretty woman, long dark hair?”
Heidi said, “I couldn’t say.”
Jo put her hand on the door knob, and whispered,” Heidi, this is not a case, there will not be charges against your client. This is my life, my connections. Please, I am asking you as a person, as a woman, just tell me, if you know.”
Heidi paused, and put her hand on the top of Jo’s hand.
“Come in Jo, close the door, and lock it,” Heidi said. She stalled for a few moments, and then walked over to the coffee pot and poured a cup of coffee into a mug emblazoned in blue with Columbia Law Review. Heidi extended the dark beverage to Jo.
“Oh, you went to law school?” Jo said, instead of thank you.
“Jo, listen, I’m a defense attorney.”
“Oh!” Jo replied.
“I can’t tell you, of all people, about who comes and visits me. Of course, you are curious, staring down from your office, looking at my entrance. I have a responsibility to my clients. You know Jo, attorney-client privilege, they covered that at your law school, didn’t they?”
“Heidi, it’s not about the case, it’s per
sonal, it’s about a woman, her name is Carmen Cortez- I think, I think that’s her name.”
With the mention of the name, Heidi raised a plucked eye brow. “Carmen Cortez?” Heidi asked.
“That’s right, Heidi. I know she came to your office. She’s not a witness. She’s just a human being, a beautiful woman, I am interested in her, socially, and also romantically. On a girl to girl level.” Heidi did not respond. “Heidi, please, I am asking you, please tell if you know, where did she go?”
Heidi’s ubiquitous smile was gone. Her eyes watered, and she bit her lip. In a quiet monotone, Heidi said,“Jo, I can’t help you. You’ve always been square with me, been good with providing exculpatory evidence. I’m a professional, this is business, my business, and I’m a lawyer first.”
The federal prosecutor rose in her running shoes, and squeezed out of the leather chair.
Jo gave voice to her inside thought, to her fear based upon all she had learned in the last few years, and the hundreds of cases she had personally touched at the United States Attorney’s Office. “Heidi, I just hope, you didn’t put a financial arrangement in front and before Carmen’s very life.”
Heidi pursed her lips, and said nothing.
Jo went to the entrance and pulled the knob, with Heidi following. Jo turned suddenly, to speak. “Heidi, as always, thank you for your professional courtesy. Please keep in mind, it is always reciprocal.” And Jo, flew out the door, seething.
Heidi locked her office door and then sat at her desk.
With her Montblanc pen, she wrote her to do list for the next day. At the top of her yellow legal pad she wrote:
Contact Carmen Sophia Ruiz de Quintana aka Carmen Cortez.
* * *
Jo now knew. She learned what she had tried not to even think, or guess at. What Heidi didn’t say and wouldn’t tell was the answer and the fulfillment of all of her initial doubt. Carmen had been to Heidi’s law office. Carmen was part of the organization, the drug organization, Jo surmised.
Jo reviewed all that she had seen. The case, Garuda, the weird, intimidating posse in McJustice’s courtroom sitting at the back, the rush to put the case on, and finally the acquittal. This was all connected. Jo shook her head, and said aloud: “Carmen is the linchpin.” Jo wished she could talk to Jacobo about this, to stack it all up, with the elements of proof and charts, together they could make sense of it all. He was driving somewhere now, or at his kid’s baseball game.
Jo did what she did when she could do nothing. She walked to her car and drove home. As she turned the key to her home, the gals were hanging out watching the daytime soap operas, eating Rosie’s unsurpassed salsa and chips and swigging beer with a slice of lime. “What’s the party?” Jo asked. Rosie said, “It’s surfing time.”
32
Dangerous Sushi
Jo climbed into Rosie’s van. She just wanted to feel and taste the good in San Diego, and her smiling friends. She was numbed by the Not Guilty verdict. She didn’t want to think about this bad guy on the loose, his creepy cartel friends, the War on Drugs, or her venomous boss. She shut her eyes to switch scenes. To gulp down her feelings, with the sensation of the smooth, Mexican beer. She opened up the window on the freeway to feel the hope of the summer afternoon.
“Judges!” spat out Jo, somewhere between a complaint and a curse. “They are just peons with powerful friends.” Rosie parked. Jo hopped out and hooted- “I will race you to the sand with a surf board. “You are so on!”
“Beat you- screamed Rosie over the roar of the waves.
Jo’s reply was suffocated by the power of the roiling white cap. Soon, Jo was astride her bouncing board beyond the breakers, waiting for the big one.
The AWOL prosecutor pulled out to position herself perfectly like the adept swimmer that she was. She caught the wave in the moment as it crested in a pause of perfection and power. She had thought she could conquer justice and Carmen. And in a breath, the wave smashed the surf board and Jo onto the wet sand.
The serendipity of a perfect ride buoyed Jo’s spirits. She jogged up to her board, finding the hope of triumph and absolution in the salty Pacific. She wiped the sea off her face with a towel. The not guilty verdict stung more. She smiled, feeling only the constancy of the moon as it reigned over the ocean, a consolation after McJustice. She was an adroit swimmer and this brought comfort. So, Jo swam beyond the breakers waiting for Carmen to come or maybe just another perfect wave.
“Hey. Pussy!” Jo turned to see Rosie laughing, her pink, burned face, matching her hair color of the day. Jo snapped out of her focus on the wave pattern.
“What did you say?”
“I wanted to make sure that I got your attention.”
“No Matter.”
“Want to hit Cuervo’s in a few?”
“How about Dangerous Sushi” instead?
Jo jogged up the wet sand, and toweled off her thick short hair. It was a soul filling view, the ocean at sunset, the waves, the horizon reaching West endlessly and then there was Rosie. Whenever she saw Rosie’s face, she visualized Baby Dumbo - the flying elephant of Disney fame. Rosie’s sticky layer of naïveté and humor stood out. Big personality, fit Rosie. She was a woman ravenous for food and love.
“Hey Rosie,” Jo said. “This afternoon’s surfing adventure was exactly what I needed after….” Rosie did not hold back. “Oh, don’t I know Jo. After your not guilty, the cartel goon on the loose and your tanked record as an Assistant US Attorney.” Jo looked at her roommate and nodded. Rosie put her arm on Jo’s shoulder. She then slapped Jo on her black wetsuit rump. “Better idea, toss me a beer and we’ll get some pussy at Dangerous Sushi,” Jo said.
“Hey Lady, don’t be messing with my job! As a serious chef- I follow the Sandwich rule- I never get my meat or Sushi where I get my bread,” Rosie said.
“I want to celebrate. They haven’t fired me yet, it may be my last night as an employee- because I might be making history: A federal employee who managed to get herself fired,” Jo said.
“Jo, you are a riot, but before you get yourself fired, you need to cough up this month, and next month’s rent, so I can find myself a new and fully employed Lesbian roommate.” Jo chuckled in response.
Rosie stopped smiling, and touched Jo’s shoulder. “Listen Miss Lawyer, I never joke about money. Love, surfing, lesbian love- but never money, because money don’t buy ya love but listen when I tell you sista girlfriend it buys me freedom.” Rosie paused swept back her pink crew cut and continued:
“Like no kidding - I want $2,000 cash from you tomorrow half for this month and the other $1,000 for next month when your unemployed ass is going to ask for some special Catholic dispensation, but I say I got to live, and I am on track to buying my own restaurant and your war on drugs is not going to fry my dreams of restaurant freedom. Capisce?”
Jo nodded in agreement. “Rosie, my stomach is doing the talking tonight, the sushi and sake is on me, let’s celebrate!”
Jo ran to the van, and was in street clothes, revving the anemic engine, by the time Rosie caught up.
“Let’s move it chef, or should I call you jefe? I got sushi to meet and swallow!” Jo tossed Rosie a worn beach towel. Rosie grabbed the towel, and ripped off her wet suit in the parking lot. Buck naked for a moment, she used the parking lot as her dressing room.
Rosie lifted her pink hairdo with an afro comb, threw out her arms in best Broadway style confiding to Jo: “Let’s hit the town.” Jo screeched to a stop. Rosie leapt in, the car pulling away with passenger door still open.
“Next stop, sushi” Jo declared, and floored the gas pedal, screeching south out of the beach parking lot and onto the Pacific Coast Highway towards succulent raw fish.
Windows open, the freeway blow dried their wet hair. Jo screeched to a halt in front of Dangerous Sushi in a faded red zone. Rosie tugged at her pink crew cut and jumped out of the hemorrhaging van. She landed on a cracked, uneven segment of sidewalk. She used her surfing skills to stabilize her hea
vy Doc Martens brogans as they slid her heavy torso towards the bar door.
She dug her heels back and extended her arms, and by a few inches, she missed careening smack into a slim woman blocking the entrance to Dangerous Sushi.
Rosie took a moment to check her shoelaces, looked up for a moment as she tightened the double knot. She inhaled loudly and blew out oxygen through her mouth. “Car- men?” Carmen gestured with her head at the well-groomed Mexican man who held her tightly on the upper arm.
“Ay, Rosalina,” Carmen exclaimed
* * *
“No Dicks are allowed in this Bar- Señor whatever your name unless you are gay.” Rosie said in a menacing way with a big smile. “Confused? Well, so am I” added Rosie, not giving JC a millisecond to respond to the lethal attack on his machismo.
JC eyed the fat dyke with disgust. In another setting, he might have slapped her hard across the face, or directly in the face with a tightened fist, like the man she so pathetically tried to ape. Instead he just laughed in ridicule and disgust, for in reality, she was beneath contempt to him.
She had no use except to serve.
JC responded wordlessly, pulling Carmen tightly to him and then tugging her away from the door. As he did this, the rest of the syndicate stepped up.
Rosie, utterly unaware of JC aside from his maleness acted fast. She waded into the roiling breakers of roaming lesbians. Rosie shouted out to a throng of beer regulars of her teammates from the Rugby “Red Tide” as were pouring pitchers of Budweiser into Frosty Mugs. Taller than a head, Rosie elbowed her way to the sticky bar top. The spike headed baby Butch bar back handed her a chilled mug. Wordlessly, a pierced and tattooed barmaid filled Rosie’s mug to the top, skillfully limiting the foam. Rosie read the purple ink declaring “girls rule!” on the barmaid’s back. These words were visible in the gap between her spaghetti-strapped tank t-shirt. “girl’s rule!” Rosie softly repeated the declaration aloud, each time a bit louder. Repetition of this phrase inspired Rosie to action.