by Chad Zunker
He answered with a gruff, “What!”
“Shep, this you?”
David thought he recognized the voice but couldn’t immediately place it. The guy called him Shep. The Camp? It wasn’t Benny’s voice. “Yeah, it’s me. Who is this?”
“It’s Doc, from the Camp. You remember me?”
David pushed himself up a little on the bed. His head was fuzzy. Doc was calling him? “Yeah, sure, Doc. What . . . why’re you calling at this hour?”
He heard Doc exhale deeply. “It’s Benny. He’s . . . uh . . . he’s dead, man. Benny is dead.”
Doc’s words hit him like a hard slap across the face. David suddenly felt alert.
“Wait . . . what? Benny?”
“Someone shot him dead tonight,” Doc said, the emotion clear in his shaky voice. “We don’t know what all happened. But Benny is dead, and Larue is in police custody.”
David swung his feet to the carpet, turned on his nightstand lamp. Benny was dead? Larue was in police custody? His mind was swirling. “Larue shot Benny?”
“I don’t know,” Doc declared. “That’s what the cops are saying. But we can’t find out any more information from them. No one will talk to us. But it doesn’t make any sense. Larue missed his shift today. He had kitchen duty at the Camp and never showed up for it, so we were all out searching for him. I guess Benny found him first, and then something really bad happened. We can’t believe it. We’re all in shock.”
“Where are you, Doc?”
“Outside the Travis County Jail, where they’re holding Larue.”
“Stay put. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
Hanging up, David sat there for a moment. Benny was dead? It couldn’t be true. There had to be another explanation. Rushing to his closet, he threw on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.
David found the boys huddled closely together on the sidewalk right outside the downtown county jail. Doc, Curly, Shifty, Elvis, and several others were all there. Everyone was clearly distraught. There were a lot of red eyes and looks of disbelief. But they were glad to see David, as if he were somehow in a position to straighten out this whole thing for them. However, if Benny was dead, what could he really do?
“Thanks for coming,” Doc said.
“Tell me exactly what happened.”
Curly stepped forward. “I heard the police cars, so I ran over to Sixth Street. A big group of people had started to gather on the sidewalk. They were all saying some homeless guy had been shot in the alley by a street kid. That’s when I saw the cops shoving Larue in the back of a police car. Larue saw me, too, and started yelling over to me that Benny was dead. But that’s all he got out before they slammed the door shut and raced off with him.”
David turned back to Doc. “Could Larue have done it?”
Doc shook his head. “No way. Benny was like a father to him.”
Shifty stepped forward. “Can you do something, Shep? You’re a lawyer, right?”
“Not that kind of lawyer.”
“Well, you’re the only damn lawyer we got!” Elvis blurted out.
“Take it easy, Elvis,” Doc said, before turning back to David. “We’re all a bit on edge.”
David felt all their eyes on him, pleading for him to do something.
“Anyone know Larue’s full name?” David asked.
Doc knew it and gave him the kid’s legal name.
Sighing, David said, “Okay, let me see what I can do.”
Walking into the county jail, David immediately felt out of place. First, he was a corporate attorney, not a criminal attorney. Second, he was wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt, not one of his power suits. Would anyone even take him seriously? Still, the boys outside really needed him. After passing through a security checkpoint, David walked up to the front counter of the jail and signed in with a female deputy who seemed to be operating on autopilot. After showing her his State Bar card, he said he was there to see his client: Lawrence Luther James. She punched a few buttons on her computer and instructed him to have a seat.
David sat in the small lobby, feeling uneasy. There were uniformed officers and other police authorities coming in and out. The lobby was stuffed with what he imagined were mostly family members or friends of those who’d been tossed into jail tonight. Maybe a couple of lawyers, too, he thought, as he spotted two guys in cheap suits with scuffed briefcases. They probably had clients locked up on drunk-and-disorderly charges. He doubted either of them was there waiting to see a client who’d just been arrested on potential murder charges.
What the hell had he gotten himself into?
After he’d waited for nearly fifteen minutes, a secured door opened to his right, and another uniformed deputy called out the name of his client. David popped up, hurried over to the door. Without saying much, the deputy led him down a long hallway and then opened a door to a room with several private booths—the same thing he’d seen in movies, where attorneys sit down to talk to clients through a clear protective partition.
“Number four,” the deputy said, shutting the door behind him.
The other booths were currently empty. David walked over to number four, sat in a stiff metal chair, wondered how this was all supposed to work. No one was sitting on the other side of the partition. David took a second to try to gather his thoughts, figure out what he was even going to say to Larue. He felt overwhelmed by the moment. Benny was dead? Seconds later, a door on the other side opened, and a deputy led Larue over to David’s private booth. Larue was already wearing the standard black-and-gray-striped county jail jumpsuit. The kid looked like he was limping badly. His eyes were also swollen. Although clearly distraught, Larue seemed relieved to see a familiar face sitting across the partition from him.
David picked up the private booth phone; Larue did the same.
“What you doing here, Shep?” Larue asked.
“I’m here for you. Doc called me.”
“I didn’t do it, man. I keep telling ’em that. No one will believe me. I’m innocent!”
“Slow down,” David urged him. “Just tell me what happened.”
“I was hanging out in the alley behind Pete’s tonight. I do it a couple of times a week. Listening to the piano battle going on through the crack in the back door. Suddenly, I hear something up the alley. A man’s voice. I peek out from behind a stack of boxes. That’s when I see Benny standing there and another man approaching him from behind. Benny turns around to look at the guy, and then this dude pulls out a gun and just shoots him straight up. But they weren’t loud gunshots. The gun had one of them silencer things on it. Benny drops and doesn’t move again. This dude starts looking around, so I push myself all the way behind the boxes to hide. Then the guy bolts. I freak out and run over to Benny, trying to shake him awake. But Benny ain’t moving. Then another dude comes out the back of Pete’s, sees me on top of Benny. I got blood all over my hands. The guy yells about calling the cops. I panicked, Shep. It looks bad, a black kid like me and a dead old white dude. So I tried to run. But I heard a bad pop in my knee and fell. The same knee I jacked up two years ago playing ball. I kept trying to run, but the pain was so damn bad, I could hardly make it out of the alley. By then, it was too late. Cops were on top of me, shoving my face into the concrete.”
David was stunned. Someone had shot Benny? He could still see remnants of the dried-up blood on Larue’s big hands. Benny’s dried-up blood. Damn.
“How do you even know what a silencer is, Larue?”
“Used to play that Hitman shooter video game all the dang time. The gun in this dude’s hand looked and sounded just like the gun from that game.”
David wasn’t sure what to make of that claim. A gun with a silencer? That seemed ridiculous. No wonder the cops didn’t believe him. He could only think that Larue had an overactive imagination. Still, that didn’t mean the kid deserved to be locked up. David thought about the serious wad of cash Benny had been carrying around in his sock.
“Listen, I need you to think real
ly hard about this, Larue. Did the guy take anything off Benny after shooting him like that?”
Larue seemed adamant. “He didn’t take a dang thing. Dude just shot Benny straight up without saying another word to him. Then the dude stood over Benny, like making sure he was dead and all, before he ran his ass out of there.”
“Could it have been a robbery that got interrupted?”
“Nah, man. The dude had plenty of time if he really wanted to steal something from Benny. He wasn’t robbing him, man. Just killing him.”
“You get a good look at the guy?”
“Yeah, man. About your height and build. Black leather jacket.”
“What about his age?”
“Dude, I don’t know. Older than you. But not too old.”
“What else, Larue? He have an accent or anything?”
“No. Talked normal.”
“Hair color? Beard?”
“No beard. Short white hair.”
That comment sent a cold chill down David’s spine. “White hair?”
“Yeah, Shep.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah. Buzz cut. Like an army dude.”
David felt his heart pounding in his chest. Black jacket? Buzz-cut white hair? “You told all of this to the police?”
“Yeah, man. I told ’em everything. They ain’t having none of it. They just keep threatening me, saying my only chance is to tell ’em where I ditched the gun.” Larue cursed, his eyes growing wet. “Man, I did this to Benny, Shep. I forgot about my kitchen shift tonight. Just slipped my dang mind. Benny was prolly looking for me, to see if I was okay.” Larue was getting more distraught. “Benny was prolly in that alley because of me. And now he’s dead, man. I can’t believe it. He’s dead.”
“You can’t blame yourself,” David said, trying to settle the kid down. “It won’t bring Benny back.”
“What am I gonna do? They got my ass locked up. I ain’t got nobody.”
David swallowed. “You got me, okay? I’m going to work on getting you out of here.”
“Dang, man, thank you!”
“Don’t thank me yet. I haven’t done anything.” David wondered what the hell Marty Lyons was going to say if he found out David was representing a homeless street kid who was about to be charged with murder. “Are you badly hurt, Larue?”
“Yeah, man, my knee hurts like hell, and they ain’t giving me a dang thing for it.”
“I’ll get that fixed ASAP.”
“Seriously, I owe you, Shep.”
“You don’t owe me anything. Listen, I owe you. I was a complete ass to you on the sidewalk outside of my building the other day. You deserved better from me. I’m sorry.”
“Nah, man. You get me out of this, all is forgiven. I swear.”
TWENTY-SIX
The Travis County Medical Examiner’s Office was on Springdale Road. David explained to the morgue attendant that he was the attorney for a victim who’d likely been brought in a few hours ago—Benjamin Dugan, a sixtysomething man with a gray beard. Benny had given him his legal name at the office the other night in order for David to establish the offshore numbered account. David had set up the account the following day with a bank in the Caymans, although it would become active only after an initial deposit. Based on his first experience with Benny while inside his condo, David wasn’t sure if the old man ever carried any real identification on him. As expected, the attendant didn’t have anyone by the name of Benjamin Dugan officially listed in the system. But he confirmed they had an unidentified older man brought in tonight who matched David’s description.
David was led into a cold and antiseptic room. There were metal slots all along one wall where he supposed dead bodies were stored. There were two bodies already out on tables, both of them covered in white sheets. The attendant walked David over to the second table, where he pulled the sheet down off the face, as if it were no big deal. David had found himself hoping that he somehow wouldn’t see Benny’s face beneath the sheet—that this might all still be some huge mistake—but that faint hope was immediately dashed. It was Benny.
David felt short of breath at the sight of his friend lying there.
“This your client?”
David nodded. “It’s him.”
“That’s good. That’ll help us. He had no identification on him. We need you to fill out some paperwork to better help us process the body, if you don’t mind.”
“Sure. What happens next?”
“We contact the family and release him to their preferred funeral home.”
“He has a daughter. But you probably won’t be able to find her.”
“Then he’ll be released to a facility that handles unclaimed and unidentified bodies for the county, where he’ll be cremated and buried in a county cemetery with others like him.”
“Can you release him to his attorney?”
“Probably, if there’s no family available.”
“I don’t want him buried in a cemetery with other unclaimed bodies, okay? I’ll take care of the funeral home and burial myself.”
“Suit yourself.”
“What about personal effects?” David asked.
“If there’s no family, we’ll release them to you. You can pick them up tomorrow around noon.”
“Okay, thanks.”
“You want a few minutes alone with him?”
David nodded. The attendant wandered off, leaving David alone in the cold room. He stared down at the face of his friend. Although Benny’s eyes were closed, he looked really peaceful. He didn’t look like a man who had been probably frightened before getting shot. This moment felt surreal—the old man had just been inside his office a few nights ago, munching on Chinese food, and talking about all his dreams. Now he was lying on a cold table with bullet holes in his chest. David kept expecting Benny to open his eyes, give him that perfect stain-toothed smile, hop up off that gurney, and say, “Come on, Shep, let’s go get some blueberry cobbler!” But the old man never moved.
Benny was gone. David couldn’t believe it.
For a moment, he thought about Larue’s story and the white-haired man. It had to be the same guy whom he’d seen with Lyons. Probably the same guy who’d been outside Nick’s house that night. All his fears about Nick came rushing back to the surface. Who the hell was this guy? And why would he shoot and kill an old homeless man? It didn’t make any sense at all. But it scared the hell out of him.
David hadn’t prayed too often since his mom had died. It had always been too much of a struggle. But considering how Benny had been such an openly God-fearing man, he felt it appropriate to fumble through something now, in this quiet moment. Benny deserved that from him. He put his hand on the old man’s cold shoulder, bowed his head, and with wet eyes, asked God to take Benny to a much better place. That sweet village in the sky. The eternal home for dry bones.
TWENTY-SEVEN
David knocked on the door of the small duplex.
He felt uneasy standing there, at three thirty in the morning, but he couldn’t stand the thought of returning to his lonely condo. He needed to talk to someone tonight. Not just any someone—he needed to talk to the right someone. He knocked again, more firmly. He finally saw a light flicker on in the window next to the front door. Seconds later, he heard locks being unfastened, and then Jen’s tired and confused face was staring at him through the door crack. Her hair was a disheveled mess, and she wore a gray T-shirt and black pajama pants.
“David? What’re you doing here?”
“Benny is dead.”
Her eyes widened. She quickly pulled open the door. “What happened?”
“He was killed on the streets tonight.”
“No!” Jen exclaimed. “How?”
He shook his head. “It’s a long story. Can I come in?”
“Of course!”
She led him into a tiny living room with a red sofa and a brown swivel chair. It was the exact opposite of Melissa’s home, where everything matched perfectly.
The walls were nearly barren. She invited him to sit on the sofa, and then she sat in the swivel chair with her knees to her chest.
“What happened, David?”
“Someone shot him in an alley on Sixth Street.”
Jen put her hand to her mouth. “Why?”
David told her about Larue and his visit with the kid in the county jail a few hours ago. He left out the potential connection of the white-haired man to everything he’d discovered at the firm. There was no reason to add fuel to the drama tonight.
“Poor Benny,” Jen said.
“I’m still shocked. I can’t shake it.”
“Are you going to be Larue’s lawyer?”
“Yes, the kid has no other help. The boys can’t help him.”
“That’s really good of you.”
“Maybe or maybe not. We’ll see. But for damn sure, I won’t let the kid go down without a fight, I can promise you that. I owe Larue. And I owe Benny at least that much.”
“I just can’t believe it,” Jen said, shaking her head. “Benny was a true hero out there on the streets. It’s so tragic. He’s going to be missed by so many.”
They both sat there in silence for a long moment. David stood, not wanting to overstay his welcome. He already felt a little better after sharing the heartache with Jen.
“I guess I should probably get going,” he said.
“Uh, no, sir, you’re not going anywhere!”
He looked over at Jen, who frowned at him.
“David, you can’t come over here in the middle of the night, tell me that Benny was shot and killed by some crazy guy with a gun, and then just bolt out the door. Are you kidding me? I’ll stare at the ceiling the rest of the night, completely freaked out. I’m not sure if you noticed, but I don’t exactly live in the nicest part of town.”