Murder One (4 page)

The buzz in the gallery intensified. Even though the lawyers were at the bench, everyone could hear what was happening—and no one could believe it.

“No!” Dexter shouted. “That puts my whole case in the toilet!”

“I’m afraid I must agree with that evaluation,” the judge said. “What you’ve got left wouldn’t’ve gotten you past the preliminary hearing. You’re dismissed, Mr. Dexter.” She pounded her gavel. “The defendant is free to go.”

“
Nooo!
” The cry rose from the back of the courtroom, a long keening wail. “Please, no!” Ben didn’t bother looking to see who it was. He already knew.

“And let me say one thing more,” Judge Hart added, glaring down harshly at Sergeant Matthews. “I don’t want to get home and hear or read about how police do their best but those crazy liberal judges put criminals back on the street. I didn’t want to do this. But you left me absolutely no choice. When you give your press conference this afternoon, make one thing perfectly clear. You have no one to blame for this result but yourself!” Hart grabbed her gavel and slammed it down. “This court is in recess. Good-bye and good riddance!” She rose abruptly and hurried to the back door leading to her private chambers.

The courtroom dissolved into pandemonium. Everyone was talking at once, except those few still so shocked they couldn’t speak. Several reporters dashed toward the back door, eager to be the first to phone in this titanic surprise turn of events.

“Goddamn you, Kincaid,” Dexter said, grabbing him by the arm. “How can you live with yourself?”

“Get your filthy paws off me,” Ben said, shaking him loose. “Unless I’m very much mistaken, you knew exactly how those warrants were obtained. For all I know this ‘emergency warrant’ crap has been going on for years. But did you come clean about it? No. You kept your mouth shut so you could hang onto your illegally obtained evidence. You’re just as much to blame as Matthews.”

Dexter tried to reply, but Ben didn’t hang around to listen. He returned to the defense table—where his client was waiting.

Her expression was dazed and barely comprehending. “She said … the case is dismissed?”

“She did.”

“Does that mean it’s over?”

“It does.” Ben smiled. “You’re free, Keri. Free to go.”

“But—can they try me again? Drum up some new evidence?”

Ben shook his head. “Not after a dismissal for cause at trial by the judge. Double jeopardy attaches.” He laid his hand on her shoulder. “It’s over, Keri. For good.”

Wordlessly, Keri flung her arms around Ben’s neck. “Oh, my God. I can’t believe it.” She hugged him tightly. A moment later, Ben felt a drop of moisture that told him she was crying. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

Over her shoulder, Ben saw the television reporters going into action through the open courtroom doors. The female anchorwoman was apparently delivering a live bulletin. “And so, in this stunning turn of events that some are already calling the greatest miscarriage of justice in the history of the state of Oklahoma …”

Ben winced. It was starting. And it would only get worse.

“Mr. Kincaid!” another reporter shouted. “You’ve always had a reputation for high morals and integrity—until now. Care to comment?”

No, he did not. Ben steered Keri toward the back door. Given the circumstances, he felt certain Judge Hart would permit them to escape through her chambers.

He stepped around the defense table—and saw Andrea McNaughton making her way toward them. Her arms were outstretched; her fingers were curled like claws.

Ben held up his hands. “Mrs. McNaughton, please. I know you must be terribly—”

He didn’t get a chance to finish. She pivoted suddenly and hurled herself, not at him, but at Keri. She knocked Keri to the floor, making her head thud harshly against the tile, then sat astride her, pounding her head and chest with her fists. “You bitch!” Andrea cried. “You filthy murderous bitch!”

“
Bailiff!
” Ben shouted. He ran behind Andrea and tried to pull her off Keri. No use. Andrea’s blows continued to rain down on Keri, pummeling her chest with one hand, while she tried to pull Keri’s hair out with the other. A fist landed square in the center of Keri’s face. Keri screamed in pain; blood spurted everywhere. Only when the bailiff arrived were they finally able to pry Andrea away.

The bailiff pulled Andrea’s arms behind her back and snapped cuffs over her wrists. “Consider yourself in custody.”

Ben held up his hands. “Brent, she’s upset, for obvious reasons. I don’t think we want to press charges—”

“Like hell we don’t!” Keri pushed herself up off the floor, her face smeared with blood. “I want her to pay for what she did!”

“Filthy whoring bitch!” Andrea shouted, spitting in Keri’s face.

Keri wiped it away, furious. “Don’t blame me for what happened. If you’d been giving Joe what he needed, he wouldn’t’ve had to come to me!”

Andrea strained against the cuffs, craning her neck forward. “I’ll get you! I
will
get you!”

“Get her out of here!” Ben urged. The bailiff dutifully hauled Andrea toward the back. “Keri—!”

Too late. She was gone. But she couldn’t have gone far. Ben knew there would be a fleet of reporters wanting to interview her, and now, for the first time in months, she would be free to talk. Which she probably would. No matter how carefully lawyers counseled their clients, few were able to resist the siren call of fifteen seconds on TV. And after all she had been through, Keri probably had a lot she wanted to say.

And at this point, Ben didn’t much care. He didn’t want to worry about this case; he didn’t even want to think about it. All he wanted was to get home, get a shower, feed his cat, play the piano, and think about anything—anything at all—other than this miserable affair. He knew this case would never win him any praise or benefit. The only thing he could be grateful for was that it was over. That’s how he tried to comfort himself, as he snuck out of the courtroom. It was finally over.

He couldn’t know, then, how wrong he was. It wasn’t over. The nightmare was only beginning. And it would get far worse than Ben had ever dreamed possible.

“S
O WHAT’RE WE GONNA
do about it?”

Barry Dodds didn’t want to encourage him. “We’re gonna play cards, Arlen—that’s what we’re gonna do. So play already.”

A toothpick darting out from between his teeth, Arlen Matthews tossed out a few chips. “Seems to me this isn’t something we should take lying down. Seems to me we ought to do something about it.”

Mark Callery called. “Do something? Like what?”

Dodds pressed his hand against Callery’s arm. They were about the same age, but Dodds was a captain, and he knew that because of his senior rank, Callery, unlike Matthews, respected his opinion. “Don’t encourage him.”

“I just wanted to know.”

“And I’m saying, don’t ask.”

“What’s the matter with you, Barry?” Matthews asked. “Don’t we still have freedom of speech in this country? Let the boy talk.”

“No good can come of this discussion.” Dodds was a short man with the beer belly that almost seemed like a mandatory stage in almost every police officer’s career. “You boys would be better off if you just forgot about it.”

“Is that right?” Matthews obviously didn’t agree. He addressed himself to the fourth member of the group. “What do you think, Frank?”

Frank didn’t respond immediately. He was an extremely large man; down at headquarters, they called him The Hulk. Given his enormous size, his colleagues imagined that it took longer for thoughts to make the trip from his brain to his mouth, sort of like the larger dinosaurs. “Can’t say, really.”

“That’s what I like about you, Frank. You always know exactly where you stand.” Matthews obviously wasn’t satisfied. “I tell you what I think. I think this was a travesty of justice and I think we ought to do something about it.”

“Hasn’t this mess caused you enough trouble already?” Dodds was the youngest of the four and the most senior in rank, a fact which he knew caused some trouble, even if it was never directly mentioned. “The courts have spoken. You can’t take the law into your own hands. That’s not how the system works.”

Matthews was not pleased. “Don’t lecture me on the system, college boy.”

Dodds grimaced. In truth, many of the police officers, and all of the younger ones, had college degrees. But because he had a graduate degree in criminology, because he had been promoted rapidly and he spoke the Queen’s English, to Matthews he was always the “college boy.”

“I think we should just let it alone.”

“You’d feel different if it had been you up there on the witness stand.” Matthews threw down his cards—which was no great loss since he was holding a pair of twos. “You’d feel different if that attorney had made you look like a lyin’ jackass.”

Dodds, the last player still holding his cards, scooped in the pot. “He was just doing his job.”

Matthews jumped up on his feet. “Just doing his job? Just doing his job?”

“I didn’t say I liked it, okay?” Dodds had been trying to calm Matthews down all night, and frankly, he was getting sick of it. “I just said there’s no point in acting like it was some big surprise. You know what’s gonna happen when you take the stand. The defense attorney’s going to try to make you look like one of the Three Stooges. There’s nothing new about it.”

“This is different.”

“It isn’t.”

“Like hell. This time it was one of our own. It was Joe. My partner. And if you had any loyalty to Joe—”

“Don’t you dare lecture me about Joe.” Dodds had had it, all he could take. “Joe and I went to school together, all right? I’ve known him longer than any of you. I would’ve died for him, understand?
Died
for him!” He stood up to Matthews and jabbed him in the chest. “So don’t you lecture me about loyalty. Don’t you dare!”

The room fell quiet. Matthews and Dodds glared at one another, like two jungle beasts waiting to see who would make the first move. No one did.

Eventually, Frank cleared his throat. “So are we gonna play cards here?”

Matthews kept his eyes trained on Dodds. “I’m sick of cards.”

“But it was my turn to deal.”

“There ain’t gonna be any more cards, got it?” Matthews pounded the table. “It’s sick. Our buddy is dead, the lyin’ whore that killed him is running free, and we’re sitting here like a bunch of pansy-assed queers playing cards!”

Callery’s voice was quiet, and his eyes were trained on the table. “You know, Arlen, you weren’t the only one who was up on the witness stand. I testified, too. I went first. You think I enjoyed it? I didn’t. I didn’t like that lawyer prying into every little thing. I didn’t like him insinuating that we botched the investigation. But it’s over now. We have to move on.”

Matthews looked away. “It’s different for you.”

“It isn’t, Arlen.”

“It is. Goddamn it, can’t you see? It
is
.” To his companions’ shock and horror, Matthews’s small eyes began to well up. “It wasn’t your fault, okay? I was the one who screwed up. I was the one who used Judge Bolen’s crappy warrants. It’s my fault that murdering bitch is still walking the streets.”

Dodds gently placed his hand on his colleague’s shoulder. “Give yourself a break, Arlen. You couldn’t’ve known.”

“I should’ve known, damn it. It’s my job to know. I let Joe down. He was my partner. And I let him down.” Tears began to stream down his face.

Even though it was obviously the last thing on earth he wanted to do, Frank broke his silence. “Arlen … it’s none of my business, but … I think maybe you should get some help. Maybe some counseling. Central Division’s got that woman who comes in twice a week—”

Matthews’s face swelled up with rage. “I don’t want counseling, you idiot! I want the fucking little cunt who killed Joe!”

Another silence followed, this one even longer than the one before. No one knew what to say next.

“It’s this simple,” Matthews said, his chest heaving. “Are you Joe’s friend, or not? ‘Cause there’s no way any friend of Joe’s would let what happened happen and just walk away without doing anything about it.” He leaned across the table. “So what about it, Frank? Are you Joe’s friend?”

Frank took his usual eternity to reply. “You know I am, Arlen.”

“What about you, Mark?”

Callery frowned. “Joe was my first supervisor, my first day on the job. He taught me practically everything I know.”

“I’ll take that as a yes.” He turned toward Dodds. “And what about you? You claim Joe was your oldest friend. You claim you’d of died for him. Was that just talk? Or does it actually mean something? “

Dodds glared back at him, not answering.

It was Callery who broke the silence. “What did you have in mind, Arlen?”

“We’re cops, aren’t we?”

“Ye-es …”

“We’re supposed to catch the bad guys, right?”

“Yes, but—”

“So I say that’s what we do.”

“But, Arlen, the case is over. Double jeopardy has—”

“There are ways around that.”

Dodds stared at Matthews, stunned. “Arlen, stop right there. I don’t know what you’re thinking, but whatever it is—”

“What’s the matter? Haven’t got the guts for it, college boy?”

Dodds fell silent, biting back his own anger.

“I want that cheap piece of ass that killed our friend. And I want that cheap lying whore of a lawyer who got her off and made us look like fools.”

“We all do,” Callery replied. “But how are you gonna do it? There’s no way.”

“There is a way.” Calmly, almost in control of himself now, Matthews fell back into his chair. “I’ve got three words for you, boys: The Blue Squeeze.”

B
EN STOOD BESIDE THE
reception table sampling Dean Belsky’s canapés. There were a wide variety of them, but they all seemed to involve cucumbers. Ben hated cucumbers. Actually, it wasn’t so much that he hated them as it was that he didn’t understand their purpose. After all, they didn’t taste like anything. They weren’t especially good for you. They didn’t quell your appetite. What was the point? And yet, there they were, as far as the eye could see, rows and rows of sliced, diced, warm and wilty cucumbers. All in all, it was about the most unappetizing display of appetizers he’d seen in his life.