Guilty as Sin

by Tami Hoag

  “I'll talk with his secretary myself,” Mitch said, steering her toward the door. “See if he had any late-night appointments scheduled. I wouldn't expect a killer to leave his name, but we might be able to narrow down the time frame. We could even get lucky and find ourselves a witness. He didn't mention anyone to you, did he, Ellen?”

  “No. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary, either. My mind was on the case. But humor me and check to see what Todd Childs and Christopher Priest were doing last night, will you?”

  “They're on my list.”

  “And Paul Kirkwood,” Wilhelm said.

  Mitch's jaw tightened.

  “We can't ignore him, Mitch,” Ellen murmured with apology in her eyes.

  “Yeah, I know,” he said with crackling sarcasm. “He is from the BCA.”

  “She meant Kirkwood,” Marty grumbled.

  Ellen checked her watch as she stepped into the hall. “I've got to get out of here. I've got a meeting at ten, and if I don't shower and change out of these clothes, Judge Grabko is liable to hold me in contempt.”

  She looked up at Mitch with gratitude. “Thanks for listening to me, Chief. I'm afraid if it had been left up to Agent Wilhelm and our esteemed coroner, Denny would be on an embalming table this afternoon.”

  “I think Wilhelm got a little more than he bargained for with this field post. He comes here in the middle of a kidnapping. Before his first week is up there's another, and now a potential homicide. Before this thing is over, he's going to wish he could give the job back to Megan.”

  “How's she doing?”

  He glanced away, his jaw tightening. “As well as can be expected. Unfortunately, no one is expecting much—except Megan herself. She's too damn stubborn for her own good.”

  “She's a fighter.”

  “Yeah. I'm just worried about what happens if she can't win this fight.”

  The cruelty of Wright's game just kept spreading outward like an ink stain, blacking out Megan's career, Josh's innocence, Dustin Holloman's future, Denny Enberg's life. It had touched Ellen's own life as simply and easily as a phone call.

  The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers. . . .

  “We'll get a trace on your home phone,” Mitch said, backing down the hall as someone called to him from Denny's office. “I'll talk to you later.”

  Ellen nodded and waved him off. For a moment she was all alone, halfway between the death scene and the mourners. She would have to stop on her way out and offer her condolences to Denny's wife, then fight her way through the media mob to get to her car.

  All she wanted was a nice, quiet, well-ordered life . . . like Dennis Enberg . . . like the Kirkwoods and the Hollomans.

  Suddenly she needed to breathe air that didn't stink of death, to let the cold air clear her head. She turned right, went down the short hall, and let herself out on the back side of the building.

  A stiff wind slapped her face. She opened her mouth and gulped it in. Leaning back against the building, she let herself mourn for the loss of a life and the loss of something less tangible—peace and safety, the sense of immunity people here had wrapped around themselves like a warm woolen blanket.

  She had left Minneapolis, but she hadn't run from it, no matter what Tony Costello believed. She had chosen to go, had chosen this town and the life she led here. If she had to fight for it, she would fight with everything she had.

  Ellen took a final deep breath and walked back inside to face a colleague's widow and the voyeurs who would report this latest tragedy to the world.

  CHAPTER 15

  Gorman Grabko had an extensive collection of bow ties. As a second-year law student he had been impressed with the idea that every memorable man created his own image. That year he had begun wearing bow ties. He had been wearing them for thirty-three years. Always discreet and tasteful. Never the clip-on variety.

  Today he had chosen a dignified gray-on-gray stripe that complemented the steel color in the close-cropped salt-and-pepper beard he wore to hide the ancient craters of rampant teenage acne. The hair on the sides of his square head was darker, with flags of silver at the temples. There was no hair on top of his head. Baldness had been a distinguishing trait of the Grabko men for centuries. He wore it as proudly as his judge's robes and the dark Brooks Brothers suit beneath them.

  Grabko was well aware there were judges in the rural districts who paid little attention to style. He had accepted it as his mission to uphold standards. He had degrees from Northwestern, had taught at Drake Law, was a patron of the arts, and aspired to someday sit on the state supreme court.

  He hoped that day would not be too far in the future, though it was difficult for a judge to distinguish himself in a place like Park County. For the most part, crimes here were petty, trials simple, the attorneys uninspired. The chance to hear a case the likes of The State versus Dr. Garrett Wright was a rare occasion. Gorman Grabko had prepared himself accordingly.

  He sat behind his immaculate desk with the air of a benevolent monarch, smiling warmly at Anthony Costello.

  “Mr. Costello, it's a pleasure and an honor,” he said. “It isn't every day we get an attorney of your reputation in the Park County courthouse—is it, Ellen?”

  Ellen made a small motion with her lips. No one could have called it a smile. She wanted to tell Grabko he should be thankful—but, then, that wasn't the comment he wanted to hear. The question was rhetorical, at any rate. The judge continued without waiting for her opinion, essentially shutting her out of their little male-bonding ritual. Or maybe it was less a guy thing than it was a celebrity thing. She could have got a better handle on it if Cameron had been there, but he had a competency hearing in Judge Witt's courtroom that morning, and so she was on her own.

  “You're a Purdue man, I'm told,” Grabko said.

  Costello grinned. “I hope as a Northwestern alumnus, you won't hold that against me.”

  Grabko beamed, obviously flattered that Costello knew anything about him. “Both fine Big Ten schools. You've certainly done yours proud. You've made quite a name for yourself. I keep abreast of the goings-on in the metropolitan courts,” Grabko said importantly, as if he had been appointed to do so by some higher power and wasn't motivated by simple envy.

  “I keep busy.”

  Ellen struggled not to gag on Costello's false modesty. “Dr. Wright was lucky you could squeeze him in between murder trials.”

  “Yes, things do get hectic in the Cities.” Costello cut her a look. “But, then, you knew all about that once upon a time, didn't you, Ellen? It's understandable it could become overwhelming for some people.”

  He made it sound as if she had cracked under the pressure and been shuttled out to the country to live in shame and secret. Grabko put his head a little on one side and looked at her with a glimmer of suspicion. Ellen narrowed her eyes at Costello.

  “‘Sickening' is a better word, though some people don't seem to mind wading through sewage. But we shouldn't take up Judge Grabko's time reminiscing,” she said with a saccharine smile. “He has a very full schedule.”

  “I'm concerned about the timetable with your just arriving on the case, Mr. Costello,” Grabko said. “Can I assume you'll want the omnibus hearing postponed?”

  “No, Your Honor. The defense will be fully ready to proceed. Eager to proceed, in fact. Every day these charges hang over Dr. Wright's head is another day his character is unnecessarily blackened.”

  Costello hit Grabko full-beam with his game face—tough, direct, intense. “Your Honor, my first duty to my client is to rectify the injustice done him earlier in the week when the late Judge Franken set bail well beyond his reach.”

  “The man was apprehended running from the scene of a crime,” Ellen jumped in.

  “Allegedly.”

  “He brutally beat an agent of the BCA—”

  “Allegedly.”

  “And did his best to escape. He's an obvious flight risk—”

  Costello stood abruptly, taking G
rabko's gaze with him. He walked toward the windows where milky light drained in through fat venetian blinds.

  “Dr. Wright is entitled to the presumption of innocence,” he said. “He is, in fact, an innocent man. Under the statutes of this state he is entitled to a reasonable bail. Half a million dollars in cash is hardly reasonable.”

  Grabko stroked his beard.

  “Neither is kidnapping an eight-year-old child or torturing a woman—”

  Costello wheeled around. “Oh, come on, Ellen. You can't possibly believe Garrett Wright did any of that. He's a respected professor—”

  “I know exactly what Garrett Wright is, Mr. Costello.” Ellen came to her feet, advancing toward him with her hands planted on the hips of her narrow tobacco-brown skirt. “He is a man who stands accused of multiple felonies and did his best to elude capture.”

  “I don't argue that the assailant fled the scene. I argue that my client was not the assailant.”

  “Funny, then, how he was the one taken into custody.”

  “He was, obviously, the man captured, but he was not the perpetrator of the crimes.”

  “The evidence suggests otherwise.”

  “We'll see about that, counselor,” Costello said calmly. “If it goes that far.”

  Ellen crossed her arms and stood there as Tony slid back into his chair and crossed his legs, carefully straightening the jacket of his pin-striped suit to avoid wrinkles. He looked too cool, like a cardsharp with an ace up his sleeve. She weighed the idea of calling his bluff. Her silence lasted long enough to force his hand.

  He looked at Grabko. “Your Honor, I'm going to state right up front, we plan to file a motion to dismiss on the grounds of unlawful arrest. The Fourth Amendment prohibits police, absent exigent circumstances or consent, from making a warrantless entry into a suspect's home in order to make a felony arrest—Payton versus New York.”

  “Oh, please,” Ellen sneered, positioning herself at the side of Grabko's desk. “The man was fleeing arrest, armed and dangerous—you don't consider those exigent circumstances? The situation meets all criteria.” She ticked them off one by one on her fingers. “A grave offense was involved, the suspect was believed to be armed, there was obvious likelihood of escape; not only was there reason to believe he was on the premises, Mitch Holt virtually followed him through the door!”

  “Virtually, but not actually.” Costello directed his attention to the judge, choosing not to waste his energy or his argument on Ellen. It was Grabko he needed to sway. “The truth of the situation is that the suspect Chief Holt was pursuing was wearing a ski mask. He never saw the man's face, had no reason to assume the man he was chasing was Dr. Wright. By his own admission, Chief Holt lost sight of his suspect numerous times during the chase, including just before he burst into Dr. Wright's garage.

  “It is our contention that Chief Holt in fact lost sight of his suspect for too long a period of time to continue pursuit into Dr. Wright's garage without benefit of a warrant.”

  Ellen made no effort to contain the sarcastic laugh. “That is the most preposterous load of—”

  “Ellen, that's enough,” Judge Grabko said firmly.

  She pressed her lips together and took her seat.

  “The decision will be mine to make,” Grabko said. “File your paperwork, Mr. Costello. Your argument has merit. It's worth consideration.”

  “But, Your Honor—”

  “You'll get your chance, Ms. North,” Grabko said, jotting a note to himself. “It sounds to me as if the arrest skirts some boundaries. Convince me otherwise. At any rate, it's an issue for the omnibus hearing, and I believe we're here to discuss the matter of bail.”

  With one point scored, Costello drew in a refreshing breath and leaned forward, his you're-my-pal look firmly in place. “Your Honor, considering Dr. Wright's ties to the community, his lack of a record, and what can only be called flimsy evidence against him, we request bail be reduced.”

  Grabko turned to Ellen, eyebrows raised.

  “I believe Judge Franken was more than fair and reasonable, considering the weight of the charges.”

  The judge sat back and swiveled in his chair, tugging at a white spot in his beard. “Wouldn't you say, Ellen,” he began in his law-professor voice, “that bail in the amount of half a million dollars, cash, is, for all intents and purposes, denial of bail?”

  Ellen said nothing. Of course it was denial of bail. She thought of Josh Kirkwood, who had barely spoken a word since his return. She thought of Megan, battered, broken, haunted, her career likely ended by Garrett Wright's vicious brutality. She thought of Dennis, the smell of his death sneaking down the back of her throat. She thought of Wright himself, imagined she could feel his gaze probing into her as she had that day in the interview room.

  “It seems extreme to me,” the judge went on. “I'm familiar with Dr. Wright's reputation and with his juvenile-offenders program, and from what I know of the man, I have difficulty seeing him as a flight risk at this point.”

  “But, Your Honor, that's just the point, don't you see?” she pleaded. “The college professor isn't the man we're dealing with here. We're dealing with a side of Garrett Wright that might be capable of anything. The man is evil.”

  Costello rolled his eyes. “Isn't that a little melodramatic, Ellen?”

  “You wouldn't think so if you'd been in your predecessor's office this morning.”

  He had the gall to let amusement tint his surprise. “You're blaming my client for Enberg's death? That would be quite a trick, considering he was in jail at the time.”

  Grabko frowned at her and brushed a thumb along his jaw. “One hundred thousand dollars, cash or bond.”

  “Mr. Brooks, what angle are you planning to take on this story?”

  Jay frowned at the reporters that had clustered around him. They had gathered in the courtroom to catch the latest twist of the case. Anthony Costello was going to ask for bail to be reduced. But the stars of the show had yet to come onstage, and the press had grown as restless as toddlers in church. One group was circled around Paul Kirkwood, who had positioned himself in the first row behind the prosecution bench. With a writer's ability to eavesdrop and carry on a conversation at the same time, Jay picked up the gist of Paul's statement—justice, victim's rights, the American way.

  “I don't know that there'll be a book,” Jay said, shaking his head. “I'm just here as an observer. Y'all are the ones working this case.”

  He might as well have told them he had come to declare himself dictator and absolute ruler of the state of Minnesota. They heard what they wanted to hear and ignored the rest.

  “Will you be working with the family, or are you interested in Dr. Wright's story?”

  “No comment, fellas.” He flashed them a grin. “Now, listen, y'all got me talking like a lawyer. That's more work than I want to do.”

  Their eyes lit up like Christmas bulbs, and he knew he had made a grave mistake. A blond with a microphone leaned toward him.

  “As a former defense attorney, Mr. Brooks, what is your opinion of the firing of Dennis Enberg, who allegedly committed suicide early this morning, and the arrival of his replacement, Anthony Costello?”

  A man had blown his head clean off, and Blondie slid it into the scheme of things as if it were just another point of minor interest in her story. The idea disgusted him. The disgust amused him in a twisted sort of way. Ellen would have said he was no better than this woman, with her hunger for a story. He had come here for what was, on the surface, the same reason. In truth, he had deeper reasons, but they may in fact have been worse.

  Self-loathing twisted his mouth into a bitter smile. “Ma'am, I haven't been an attorney in a very long time,” he said. “And, hell, if I'd been any good at it, I'd probably still be doing it, wouldn't I? I can't see where my opinion on any of this is worth a hill of beans.”

  “And yet you don't hesitate to take sides in your books.” She refused to be brushed off with “Aw, shucks” and a famou
s grin. “Your critics—prominent defense attorneys among them—say you have a sharp eye for the law and that your analysis of trials is akin to laser surgery.”

  At the front of the courtroom the door to the judge's chambers swung open, and instantly the attention of everyone in the room swung forward. Ellen emerged first, looking furious. Jay could tell she was fighting to keep her expression blank, but her whole body looked as tight as a clenched fist, and her eyes glittered with the same kind of fire she had directed at him a time or two.

  Costello strolled out behind her, relaxed, confident. He looked directly at the members of the press. The conquering hero. The champion for the common man—provided the common man could come up with the bucks.

  The judge, the Honorable Gorman Grabko, climbed to his perch and seated himself. Prim was the first adjective that came to mind. He looked like the kind of man who would use shoe trees and wax his bald spot. Hallway scuttlebutt indicated he was a stickler for form and that he tended to lean toward the defense, holding the prosecution to a higher standard. By the look of things, Ellen had fallen short.

  A side door opened and Garrett Wright was led in by a pair of deputies and seated at the defense table.

  It was over in a matter of minutes. The skirmish had been fought in chambers, as most of them were. This show was for the record and for the spectators who had gathered to watch the drama unfold.

  Costello formally stated his request. Ellen argued against it. Grabko's mind was made up.

  “Bail is set in the amount of one hundred thousand dollars, cash or bond,” the judge announced.

  “This is an outrage!” Paul Kirkwood shouted, leaping up from his seat. His face flushed the color of dried blood, and a vein stood out prominently in the side of his neck. “That animal stole my son and you're letting him out!”

  A beefy deputy rushed up the aisle and grabbed hold of him. Paul put a shoulder into him and staggered him back a step toward the defense side of the room.