Eddie Flynn 02-The Plea

by Steve Cavanagh

  No, not badly – distinctively.

  His right leg flopped out in front of him, his foot swinging. The knee and ankle joints looked as if they were held together with string. Then he sprang forward onto his left before repeating the maneuver.

  Two things stuck in my mind.

  He could’ve badly injured his right knee and ankle in the crash. I couldn’t ignore that possibility. But in the back of my mind I knew this guy was limping from an old injury, and I thought I’d seen that limp before.

  The camera zoomed in as he reached the passenger window of the Bugatti. He leaned in, as if to talk to David, his open, empty hands on the roof of the car. When he brought his head out of the car, the camera was almost framing his face. A row of oversized glistening white teeth shined for his close-up.

  I knew right then that David had been framed for murder; the car crash was no accident. The driver of the Ford pickup was a man I’d worked with many years ago. His real name wasn’t John Woodrow, and I remembered how he’d come by that limp.

  And how he’d gotten his new teeth.

  After his close-up, the pickup driver seemed to recoil from the passenger window, took a cell phone from his pocket, and called the cops. Both cars remained in situ until the police arrived two minutes later. A patrolman approached David, got him out of the car, and then he stopped and looked inside the Bugatti, as if he’d noticed something. The cop walked around the vehicle, hands empty, opened the passenger door, then ducked inside. When he came back up, he held the butt of a Ruger with pinched fingers. He spoke to Woodrow, then searched and cuffed my client. A second patrol car arrived and took the pickup driver away. David was placed in the rear of the first patrol car, which left the scene shortly after.

  I paused the video, rewound, and watched the pickup driver and the cop approach David’s car. The pickup driver’s hands never got inside the Bugatti, and the cop wasn’t wearing a jacket and I could see his hands were empty when he put his head in the passenger side of the car. A second later his hands reappeared and he held the murder weapon.

  David preempted my question.

  ‘I have no idea how that gun got into my car,’ he said.

  ‘Is it possible that someone planted it there?’

  ‘I doubt it. The car’s security system is state-of-the-art, and besides, I put my bag on the passenger seat. If there had been a gun in the passenger footwell, I’d have noticed it.’

  I nodded. If I was right, then the gun had to have been planted in David’s car. It didn’t look like either the cop or the pickup driver could’ve planted it. How did they get it from David’s apartment to the car in the first place?

  ‘The accident was a setup. The driver is a guy named Perry Lake. He’s a hit driver,’ I said.

  ‘A what?’ said David.

  ‘He sets up accidents,’ I said.

  I’d worked with Perry Lake for a few months, a lifetime ago. Perry used to race. He was a talented NASCAR driver, until his coke habit got him dropped and a DUI put the final bullet into his career. A man of Perry’s skills can always find work, though. With his penchant for narcotics, it was always going to be the illegal, top-paying kind of jobs. He was a getaway driver for a crew that operated out of Atlantic City for a couple of years, then a chauffeur for a high-end pimp that worked girls on the Upper East Side, and then finally he worked for me as a hit driver. Perry set up car accidents to defraud insurance companies with fake personal injury cases. He made a lot of money, too. Then he slept with the wrong kind of woman – the kind that has a possessive, psychotic husband who left him with the limp and a lot of dental work.

  ‘Bottom line, David, somebody paid Perry to swallow enough liquor to put him way over the limit and then slam his car into yours at that intersection, at that precise time on that precise day – so that the cops would find that gun.’

  David said nothing. He stared stupidly at the TV, and let his mouth fall open.

  ‘That’s what I think, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Why set up a fake accident when the cops were going to come looking for you anyway, as soon as Clara’s body was found?’ I said.

  ‘You’re right. It doesn’t make sense,’ said David.

  I rubbed my chin, twirled my pen around my fingers.

  ‘Holly, can I use your bedroom? I need a little time alone to think this out,’ I said.

  ‘Sure,’ she said. ‘Just don’t take too long. We’ve only got an hour before court.’

  I took in David’s outfit again, checked the bags.

  ‘David, you’re going to need a suit.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  It takes a lot of care, skill, and planning to set up a car accident. When I was running the con, I took a week to scout the route for the accident. I spent hours timing the traffic lights, measuring the distances between intersections, monitoring the traffic flow at different times. Once I had my preferred location on the target’s daily route, I would tail the target for another two weeks. I liked to hit them during the day, usually as they were making their commute to work. That was the most predictable route, the one least likely to change, the one where the accident would cause the most inconvenience. But then there were the professionals, guys like Perry Lake and Arthur Podolske – who could just feel their way into it. Guys like that are few and far between. If you wanted a professional driver to stage an accident and make it look real, there was a very short list of candidates. An even shorter list in New York, and I knew them all. The accident was a setup but I still had no clue why it had happened.

  Why go to all that trouble? Why do it then, when the cops don’t even know David’s girlfriend has been murdered?

  The pen my daughter has given to me, the one that had ‘Dad’ engraved on the side, whispered through my fingers, tumbling in a never-ending sequence that brought it through each finger, around my thumb, and then back again.

  It helped me think.

  I had the entire prosecution file spread out on the bed: witness statements, crime scene photos, Dr Porter’s GSR report, the photos of the car wreck – Perry’s busted Ford and David’s Bugatti with the front tire all but torn off and the air bags hanging limp from the console, like punctured cartoon ghosts. I even laid out the copies of the security logs, the fingerprint analysis, which had come back negative on the weapon and the arrest report for David. Every piece of evidence, every document, all separated, all laid out neatly on the sheets.

  Walking around the bed, pen sliding over my hand, I felt close to something. Some part of this didn’t add up. It was right there in front of me, but I couldn’t see it.

  Without knocking, the Lizard opened the bedroom door and said, ‘We gotta split in five if we’re gonna make the courthouse.’

  As he slipped on a short leather jacket, he noticed the file – separated and spread out in neat columns on the bed.

  ‘Find anything?’ he said.

  ‘Not yet, but I’m close. I’d be better if you left me alone to think.’

  He chuckled, and from his jacket pocket he removed a pair of leather driving gloves and proceeded to slip them on.

  ‘Well, you’re doing the right thing spreading it all out. Helps to order the mind. The Lizard likes to do this with his weapons – take them apart, piece by piece, and lay them out in an exploded view. Clean ’em, make ’em gleam. Then put ’em all back … Hey, what’re you staring at?’

  I must’ve been wild-eyed. I was looking at the Lizard’s gloves. Something about them, something about what he’d just said – it gave me an idea.

  I called out, ‘David, bring me your laptop right now.’

  What I was looking for appeared on the sixth page of my Internet search. A mention in an obscure French forensic science journal. Whatever search engine David used offered me a pretty good translation of the web page. I had to pay for the article. Within a minute I had it downloaded and translated. The article had been presented at a forensics conference run by Interpol last year.

  It was there. It w
as possible.

  It was brilliant.

  ‘David, whoever set you up is one smart son of a bitch. I never would’ve looked for it if the Lizard hadn’t given me the idea.’

  ‘The Lizard gave you an idea?’ said the Lizard.

  My gaze moved from the photo of the totaled Bugatti to the Lizard’s gloved hands.

  ‘You can be very motivational, but I need a little favor. I need to borrow your gloves.’

  PART TWO

  THE PAYOFF

  CHAPTER FORTY

  27 hours until the shot

  Getting back inside the courthouse took a lot of thought and planning from the Lizard. We drove there in two separate cars. I was in the back of an overgrown sedan, driven by Frankie, another of Jimmy the Hat’s associates who worked with the Lizard when he needed backup. The leather-clad steering wheel all but disappeared from view, engulfed in Frankie’s enormous, calloused hands. Hands that beat dollars out of diamond-tough guys that owed Jimmy.

  We drove past the front of the courthouse. From the sidewalk, up the steps, all the way to the entrance, it was like a media convention. You would be forgiven for thinking that the president was due to arrive. Far too many bodies. All it would take would be somebody waiting in the crowd with a .38 and David wouldn’t even make it up the first step. In among the crowd, I saw a couple of suits, and in the center of that expensive group was the tall figure of Gerry Sinton, waiting outside to escort his client past the world’s media.

  ‘As expected, it’s packed,’ I said.

  We circled around, pulled up a couple of blocks before the courthouse. Waiting for the Lizard’s van to appear in the rearview mirror, I thought about the hundred and twenty-five feet of people between the sidewalk and the courthouse entrance. How many shooters could the firm have in that crowd? I’d given the photos of the firm’s security team to the Lizard to study. I’d studied their faces, too – and so had David. If we saw any of them, we ran. A blue Ford Transit van appeared in our rearview mirror, slowed. Frankie pulled out into traffic, and the Transit fell in behind us.

  The sedan parked alongside the curb, just behind the media trucks with their satellites beaming from the roof. I got out, my files slung over my shoulder in a laptop bag. I wanted my hands free, just in case.

  I found Gerry Sinton warding off the handful of reporters who’d recognized him as David’s lawyer and were crowding him hungrily. He saw me, made his way down the steps, pushing his way through the TV crews. The reporters in the know sensed they were about to get their shot – they followed Sinton down the steps, toward the sidewalk.

  He acknowledged me with a nod.

  The Transit pulled up and stopped behind the sedan. Sinton came alongside me, the reporters and cameras on his heels. His voice quivered as he fought to hold down his rage.

  ‘Where’s David? He never made it to the hotel,’ he said.

  ‘Let’s get him inside, and then we can talk. Here he comes now,’ I replied.

  Frankie got out of the sedan and opened the rear passenger door. Gerry craned over my shoulder to see a pair of red Nikes hit the pavement, and a hunched figure, covered in a white bedsheet, all but fell out of the car and ran toward us.

  Gerry grabbed the sheet, guided his hands around his client, and led him toward the now exploding sea of cameras, lights, and voices. Ignoring the reporters, I checked the hangers-on. Didn’t see anybody from the firm’s security crew. A few members of the public joined the throng of reporters, not really knowing what was going on, but simply overwhelmed with the energy in the air and desperate to catch a glimpse of the accused beneath the sheet. As Gerry plowed through the reporters, his right hand thrust in front of him like a linebacker from the seventies, I let myself drift away just before the media completely enclosed Gerry and his client.

  Another scan of the area – no potential shooters. I nodded to Frankie, who stood on the hood of the car, watching.

  The rear door of the Lizard’s Transit popped open and I saw the small figure of a young man in an ill-fitting suit. He closed the van door and began to walk briskly toward the courthouse entrance. I moved with him and watched Holly coming behind, tossing the keys to the van at Frankie before she broke into her run.

  That’s when I heard the shot.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  ‘Go!’ I yelled, and David turned away from the sound of gunfire. Holly grabbed him by the arm, and together they bolted for the entrance. Their path was clear.

  I spun around to see bodies tumbling down the staircase as people scrambled to get clear, to get away, before they were caught in the cross fire. A big guy in a fawn overcoat, still talking into his microphone shouldered me out of his way, and I had to bump past a couple of female anchors to get a view.

  Gerry Sinton was lying head down on the concrete. He ran his hands over his stomach, chest, legs, making sure he hadn’t caught a stray bullet. The white sheet flew off the head of the Lizard, and with it, he discarded the spent firecracker. Before Gerry could get a good look at him, the Lizard took off. Frankie made a circular motion above his head with his fist. He was going to park and then he’d be coming back. The crowd of reporters caught their breath, cameras steadied, and the screaming became commentary.

  As I reached the top steps, I saw David and Holly safely beyond the security check, inside the courthouse.

  Holly was holding David’s hand.

  I made my apologies as I weaved through the group of reporters that had gathered outside the entrance. A hand gripped my arm, and I turned.

  The man with The Scream tattoo on his throat had taken hold of me. I couldn’t move. It wasn’t his grip that held me; it was his eyes. His pupils and irises were not dark brown; they were black. Totally black. Each eye looked like a perfect pearl of onyx resting in a saucer of milk. And below that face, the pale man screamed on his throat.

  I caught the stink of cigarettes from him when he released his grip and held up his open hands, fingers spread wide. While his skin was dark, his palms were purest white. I noticed more droplets and splashes of white coloring on his fingers and wrists. The skin in these areas was smooth: no wrinkles or lines on his palms or fingers. Everything had been scalded clean, flat, and unmarked. His touch wouldn’t even leave a fingerprint.

  The man was so unusual, so striking, that for a moment I didn’t see that he was hiding something in the pinch between his thumb and index finger.

  ‘Tell your client to keep his mouth shut, cabron,’ said the man in a thick Spanish accent.

  He backed away and spread his right thumb away from his index finger.

  I heard the cracking of thin glass. Pushing through the crowd, he trod down the steps. I heard something hissing and looked down. Fragments of glass, no bigger than a spoonful, and surrounding them an amber liquid bubbled as it ate through the concrete.

  He’d been holding a small vial of acid. I shivered and scanned the steps. He’d gone.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  The courtroom of Judge Knox was filling up rapidly with the still-shaky members of the media. I slowed a little, to make sure David and Holly were right behind me. I’d already decided not to tell David about the warning; he was only just holding it together. I laid out my papers on the defense table and took the seat on the right with David to my left. When he arrived, Gerry would have to take the corner seat.

  The rear doors of the court opened, a hundred feet behind us. The prosecution were arriving. Zader hovered at the rear of the pack of assistant district attorneys who hauled evidence boxes and folders into court. District Attorney Zader typed on his iPhone with his thumb.

  As he passed me, he leaned down and said, ‘I just posted this on Reeler.’

  The official reel of the New York District Attorney’s Office held a new message:

  ‘THE EVIDENCE WE ARE ABOUT TO PRESENT IN THE PRELIMINARY HEARING IN THE CASE OF DAVID CHILD WILL SHOCK THE NATION. FOLLOW US AS WE LOAD REELS LIVE FROM THE HEARING. #JUSTICEFORCLARA’

  ‘This is going to be
public and messy,’ said Zader, unable to keep the excitement from his voice.

  I saw a box with an ‘R’ below the DA’s Reeler post with a number below it. The number was rolling up every half a second – 257, 583, 1,009. This was the number of times the message had been relayed through Reeler, Facebook, and Twitter.

  ‘Public and messy,’ he said again, slowly.

  He strode back to his ADAs and waved to a few of the more influential TV anchors who’d taken their prime seats in the front row of the gallery.

  ‘Can he do that?’ asked David.

  ‘Pretty much. He’s not giving away any details about the case. He’s just raising his profile. You’re a pretty big fish – he wants to gut you in public. This is the kind of case that could launch his political career. If he wants to be mayor, or governor, he needs the face time on TV. I think he’s enjoying the fact that he’s using Reeler to destroy you. I guess he finds some irony in that. You’re gonna have to face the fact that you’re his meal ticket. This isn’t about Clara. This is about him, and that sickens me.’

  Gerry Sinton took his seat at the end of the defense table without a word. I hadn’t heard his approach; for a big man, he walked softly. Sending a warning with a vial of acid wasn’t beyond Gerry. He’d worked his way up the chain from the back alleys to the boardroom. Dell had told me as much. I thought about reaching across, gripping Gerry’s silk tie, and ringing his head off the mahogany a couple of times. I thought better of it when Judge Knox came into the room, took his seat at the bench, and called the case.