Reluctant Witness (49 page)

“That’s why Jared wore a cast for the last
month of his life? He faked that broken arm?”

“He did indeed,” Rocky sighed. “This guy is a
consummate con man.”

“At least this time around, you won’t have to
worry about being a major witness,” Jeff smiled at me.

“I won’t?” I looked at Jeff, surprised. “But
if Jared’s alive and I was his fiancée....”

“You won’t because you don’t have any
first-hand knowledge of what happened and hearsay isn’t acceptable
in court.”

“We made sure you had no idea what was going
on,” Tom grinned. “If the Justice Department wants you to testify,
there really isn’t much you can say, is there? You didn’t actually
witness Jared murdering the man in your condo, any more than you
actually participated in his money-laundering scheme.”

“But he hired people to kill me,” I pointed
out. “He threatened me, stalked me, and his girlfriend even used my
identity.”

“Yes, and it was all recorded, Marigold. The
evidence speaks for itself. More importantly, we have a slew of
present and former law enforcement agents as witnesses.”

“If I’m not a major witness in the case, does
that mean I will still have to testify?” I looked at Jeff and the
others, hopeful my nightmare was really over. After so many years
of living under the radar, the thought of being so publicly exposed
was terrifying.

“We’re going to fight tooth and nail to make
sure you won’t have to testify in open court. And we have a secret
weapon for our negotiations. Her name is Deirdre. As a Cornwall
wife, she’s a disaster; but as a defense attorney, she’s
unbeatable.”

“So, when it’s over, I guess that means I’ll
get a new identity.” The thought of going back into the witness
protection program made my heart sink. I had so loved my time with
the Cornwalls and their friends. How could I say goodbye now? And
yet, what other choice was there, especially if Jared was such a
fiend? Wouldn’t his friends try to track me down for revenge?

“You, my dearest, are not going back into
witness protection, not after what you’ve been through.” Jeff was
adamant.

“But....”

“No ifs, ands, or buts. No. We’re going to
make sure there is no need. You see, Marigold, your father’s work
in genetically modifying the opium poppy has now been duplicated by
so many others, it’s no longer classified. We aren’t even convinced
there’s still a bounty on his head.”

“Really? Does that mean I won’t have to hide
anymore? I can live my life under my real name?”

“We’re going to take it slow, kid.” Terry
leaned forward, his face earnest. “You’ve spent your entire adult
life in hiding, and it’s going to take us some time to make sure
that we can safely bring you back out into the world. You’ll have
to be patient a while longer, but I know you can do it.”

“Will I get to see my dad again?”

The others all glanced at each other and then
at me. It was obvious they were keeping another secret, but I
didn’t think it was necessarily a bad one. After all, they had
proven they had my back through thick and thin.

“You never know, Marigold,” Tom replied. “We
can’t really promise you anything, but sometimes things work out
eventually.”

Nancy gave me a big smile. “Your life is
about to change for the better, Marigold, and it couldn’t happen to
a nicer girl.”

Jeff’s face was unreadable as I studied him,
his emotions cloaked behind a benign smile. I had come to recognize
this as a strategy he employed whenever he was keeping a secret
from me. For a writer, as a TV producer, he was a little too good
at all of this intrigue, a little too skilled at making things
happen behind the scenes. Was there something I should know about
this man I adored, some hidden history in his past?

After dinner, Rocky drove Jeff back to
Atlanta. They insisted it was imperative that we put some distance
between Jeff, the best-selling author and producer, and me, the
victim of a major crime, so as to not attract the attention of a
zealous press.

“Rule number one, Marigold. Never trust the
paparazzi to keep anything a secret.” Jeff told me. “And rule
number two is to never turn your back on them. They’re looking to
make money, and they’ll do whatever they have to do to make that
happen. It’s not about the truth; it’s about entertainment.”

“The woman they really want is Leesa, your
doppelganger,” Rocky announced. “We need the facts to trickle out
in the right way, so that everyone looks for her and understands
you’re not really all that important in the scheme of things. The
only reason Jared Spears picked you was because you bore a striking
resemblance to his girlfriend. Once they realize you’re not handy,
they’ll concentrate on finding Leesa. That’s why we’re going to
hide you for a while.”

As Jeff and Rocky departed for the ride back
to Atlanta, the rest of us played “Switch”. Terry, Nancy, and I
vacated our penthouse to make it look like we left Cinnamon Beach.
We took over the one Tom had used to monitor Kornbloom’s activities
and spent the next several days cooped up inside those walls,
tucked out of sight. If the dog had to go, we just snuck Coop out
the back door of the building and stuck to the cluster of shrubs.
Once a day, we all ventured out for an afternoon road trip or
excursion. Anything else we needed, Tom provided. He moved back
into the penthouse condo down the hall. When the press came
knocking on his door, asking questions of neighbors, he had his
story down pat.

Thanks to Jeff and Lincoln’s reminder to
Deirdre that her client was caught on surveillance cameras trying
to snatch Kary at the Atlanta airport at her request, she had the
good sense to volunteer to represent me in my dealings with the
Department of Justice. A few days after Jared was captured, I was
summoned to the federal building for an official meeting about the
case. The U. S. attorney informed us that he expected me to be his
star witness, providing the testimony that would put Jared behind
bars for the rest of his life. Manny Lewis even had a carrot to
dangle before me. In exchange for my testimony, the Department of
Justice was poised to override the objections of the United States
Marshals Service -- I would be allowed to go back into the witness
protection program.

“That’s not going to happen, I’m afraid,” my
lawyer informed the group gathered in the conference room.

“Say what?” Manny Lewis’s triumphant smile
crumpled into a disbelieving frown. “Why not?”

“There is no good purpose in having Ms.
Flowers testify at Jared’s trial, since she didn’t actually witness
any of the more egregious crimes with which he is charged. Ms.
Flowers did nothing to bring this upon herself or the United States
Marshals Service. She cooperated fully with her handlers and
informed them of her activities. Her previous status as a protected
witness had nothing to do with what Jared Spears and I will not put
my client’s life in greater jeopardy because you’re looking for a
conviction.”

“But....” the U. S. attorney sputtered.

“But nothing!” Deirdre retorted. “This whole
case has been an absolute debacle!”

By the time she was done laying out the
foundation for the civil lawsuit she was preparing on my behalf,
they were scared witless that she would wreak havoc with their case
and make the marshals seem like the bad guys.

“Thanks to all of the professional efforts by
Ms. Flowers’ unofficial security team to document her experience at
the hands of Jared Spears, you have significant evidence to utilize
for your prosecution. It’s a slam-dunk case for the federal
government. Leesa Braun, not my client, was complicit in Jared
Spears’ criminal activities. She was the woman who stole my
client’s identity. That’s the person you should be focusing upon,
not the woman known as Margot Floyd, not the woman known as
Marigold Flowers,” Deirdre haughtily informed the group of
assembled lawyers and federal agents. “Furthermore, the marshals
deliberately risked my client’s life by violating witness security
protocols and running an unofficial investigation. As a result, my
client suffered irreparable harm and nearly lost her life on more
than one occasion.”

“Excuse me?” one of the assistant U. S.
attorneys piped in, amused. She snickered, gazing around at her
colleagues before turning back to Deirdre. “At the risk of
suggesting you’re playing to a lawyer’s sense of the dramatic, how
exactly do you figure she suffered harm? She lived to tell the
tale, didn’t she?”

Chapter Forty
Four

Deirdre poured herself a paper cup of water
from the carafe in the center on the table. She took a long sip,
placed the cup in front of herself, and then pointed an icy glare
at the speaker. “My client nearly drowned because she had been
locked in the trunk of a dead hit woman’s car that was run off the
road by a second hired killer and sent into the water. She went
into shock from hypothermia.”

“Surely you can’t blame the marshals for
that,” the woman responded. “They weren’t with your client when she
was kidnapped.”

“They should have been. Their failure to
follow regulations caused the situation.” Deirdre mustered all the
disdain she could find the smug thirty-something lawyer with the
tight ponytail. “They knew my client was in grave danger at the
Gilded Nest and failed to warn her.”

That comment set off one of the WitSec
representatives, just as Deirdre had probably hoped it would. I
watched as a rather large vein at his temple pulsed madly.

“Are you kidding me?”He was positively
apoplectic as he tried to rise up from his chair. Another marshal
urged him to sit down.

“We had a marshal down! It was a confused
mess!” Shaun’s replacement sputtered. “What did you expect us to
do?”

“Your job. My client was innocent, and if
your people had properly followed procedures, they would have found
what her unofficial security team found, that she is a good and
honorable woman who should have been treated far better than she
was!”

“What a crock of....”

Deirdre held up a hand and silenced him. “The
fact remains that Ms. Flowers should have been transferred to a new
witness protection team in New York State when she was relocated.
If she had been, it is likely that new team would have uncovered
the plot to set her up and prevented the harm that was done to her
and even to your own marshals. You people need to take
responsibility for your actions.”

“Give me a break!” the marshal growled,
exasperated. “How was she harmed? She looks fine to me!”

“She was shot and required extensive
reconstructive surgery.”

“Shot? Hirsh, why am I just hearing about
this now?” the United States Attorney impatiently demanded of the
ponytailed woman. She cringed, turning to a male colleague for a
whispered conversation before responding.

“We...we know nothing about any shooting,
boss,” Hirsh confessed.

“Here are the hospital records,” said my
attorney, slapping a thick folder down on the table with great
emphasis. “She should not have to pay for injuries that occurred
due to the negligence of her WitSec handlers.”

A prosecutor, sitting at Hirsh’s elbow,
flipped open the file. I watched the color drain from his face as
he saw the documents before him. “Oh, crap!”

“Let me see, Dorfman.” Hirsh waited as he
slid the file across the table to her. She read a couple of
paragraphs before her eyes grew wide, alarmed by what she saw. “Oh,
damn!”

The marshals were still clinging to the story
that I had voluntarily quit the program, offering as evidence an
email sent from my hacked computer. For all intents and purposes,
once I was terminated from the program, what happened to me was of
no further interest to the United States Marshals Service. No one
on the team had bothered to document the incident at the Gilded
Nest, let alone my ear injury. There was no paperwork filed, no
incident report written, no follow-up interview conducted; more
breaches of federal protocols.

“Let me see the report on the incident, Bob,”
Manny Lewis instructed the marshal closest to him.

“It’s not available,” was the tersely worded
reply.

“Make it available.”

“I can’t, sir.” Bob tried to bluster his way
out of the equation without much success.

“Can’t or won’t?” Manny Lewis turned to face
the man sitting in the hot seat and it seemed pretty obvious he
wasn’t going to drop the matter.

“Can’t. It was never...er, written,” Bob
finally acknowledged.

“That’s ridiculous.” The U. S. attorney was
appalled. “That’s not how the system works.”

“And yet,” Deirdre interrupted, taking back
control of the conversation, “it’s what happened. Rather punitive,
don’t you think? Hardly due process as guaranteed under the
Constitution, is it? No trial by judge or jury. No oversight. No
case review. No nothing. Just a kick out the door because your
people decided my client was guilty of wrongdoing. And instead of
sharing their concerns with the FBI that she was involved in
criminal activity, so these alleged crimes could be properly
investigated and prosecuted, they took matters into their own hands
and screwed up royally. They even failed to tell the United States
Marshals Service what they were doing, in order to avoid scrutiny.
Was it merely a matter of the boss retiring and not wanting to end
his career on a black note or a vendetta to teach my client a
lesson about messing with the marshals? The reason why doesn’t much
matter. It happened, and as a result, my client was harmed. She
might have drowned in the trunk of that car. She might have
suffered a heart attack or died of hypothermia. And if the bullet
that struck her had been an inch closer, her brains would have been
scrambled all over Windham, New York. Real harm, ladies and
gentlemen.”