The Eleventh Victim (11 page)

E
IGHT THIRTY SHARP, MATT LEONARD WALKED BRISKLY INTO THE
darkened bar at Atlanta’s Piedmont Driving Club.

He immediately spotted Sims Regard, sitting on a burgundy leather barstool. Regard, the first lieutenant for Floyd Moye Eugene, hadn’t yet spotted him. Leonard paused—only for a split second—to steel himself.

Had an acquaintance been watching, they might have noted that Maltin’s move was utterly out of character. As the name partner in the criminal defense law firm known simply as “the Leonard Firm”—and, coincidentally, the baby brother to the chairman of the powerful Senate Revenue Apportionments Committee—Matt Leonard was one of the most sought-after criminal defense lawyers in the South.

This deal, however, was in the big leagues.

He’d never had anything to do with Eugene—in fact he had studiously avoided him over the years.

The two of them were about to reverse a trend that had lasted for decades, and its effects would reverberate all the way down the state to the tip of the Georgia Coast.

Regard spotted him. “Matt.”

“Sims.”

They shook hands.

Leonard ordered a scotch, then got right down to business, speaking in a low voice though the bar was nearly empty.

“Look, I get it. It’s up on appeal now and it looks pretty grim for the defense. How can Carter deliver? He’s just one out of nine. Plus, this calls for an outright reversal, with prejudice, so Cruise walks and the State can’t re-try him.”

Regard took a pull off his drink before speaking. “Simple rotation. Carter was assigned to write the opinion months ago. That
little snot of a law clerk told us right over the phone about the assignment. Otherwise, we’d have targeted one of the other judges.”

Leonard nodded.

“It’ll go down like this,” Regard went on. “The four knee-jerk liberals on the bench dissent on principle to every death penalty that’s put before them. They’ll join the new majority. All we needed was the one swing vote. It’s simple. The vote will now be five to four for reversal instead of five to four to affirm the conviction. The four weak sisters on the bench are always looking for a way to reverse a death case. They don’t care if he walks. Both the guilty verdict and the death penalty sentence will be reversed on appeal. It’s up to Carter to find a reason.”

There was a long pause and neither spoke.

“You understand, right, Leonard? Carter’s a piece of cake, he’s already on board. What about your end?”

Leonard was slow to speak, twisting his ring, running his fingertips nervously over the three rubies in the family crest before answering. “My contact says the Committee meets to change the wording in the Georgia code tomorrow morning, seven o’clock. No press will show because the time and date were changed for the meeting, and notice won’t be published in the main foyer until eight a.m., as usual…an hour later. Topic’s not identified, it’s listed under ‘supplemental.’ The Committee vote will be over before notice is even posted.”

Leonard downed a gulp of the scotch placed in front of him and waited for the bartender to fade away before going on. “Two of five on the Committee are still back home, but three are still in Atlanta, and that gives us a quorum. They’re with us on this. They’re investors in the high-rise, which helps. The code change comes out of Committee and goes straight to the full Assembly by noon. It’s tacked on to a big insurance bill that everybody wants…you know, voter pressure. The insurance bill is set to pass by eighty-eight percent at two tomorrow afternoon. That’s eighty-eight percent already
locked in
. Could be even more by the time it’s done.”

He paused and took another sip.

“It’s a blip on the screen. It’ll mean nothing to anybody voting on the insurance bill.” Leonard looked over each of his shoulders before finishing. “Even if they bother to read it, which they won’t, even then, they won’t get what it means. The wording just re-defines ‘tree’ as any growth two feet or over, not twenty. By summer, condos will be less than a football field from the first sea oat on the beach…directly on the sand, get it? Asking price twelve million apiece.”

Buried deep in Georgia law, Leonard found the old Georgia code reading that no structure could be erected within fifty yards of the first tree closest to beach and marsh. The word “tree” was defined as any natural, living plant growth twenty feet or over.

Naturally, the old regulation destroyed any possibility of ocean or marsh-front condos and high-rises. Nothing but grass or sea oats grew anywhere near the crystal-white sand, and certainly none topping twenty feet.

The two men wordlessly clinked their glasses.

This was good, Matt thought. It was damned good. The Cruise reversal was the only way his firm would ever get their state and federal funding back. They needed the money, desperately.

Environmentalists just assumed the beaches were protected. Every time developers tried to plant a resort, golf course, or even a simple mini-mart on St. Simons Island, the granolas went berserk. The Island remained pure while the rest of the Georgia and Florida coasts were littered with motels, snake farms, even paper mills pumping tons of smelly goo into the air and ocean.

Not so on pristine St. Simons.

But for nearly fifteen years now, Floyd Moye Eugene had slowly and surreptitiously bought up huge sweeps of Island beach. He had never used his own name—that would have been too obvious—but rather the names of a dozen fake shell corporations that had no function whatsoever created specifically for this purpose, and a few in his wife’s name. Next to an environmental trust, he now reigned as the single largest private landowner on the Island.

But the land could never be developed…until now.

Matt Leonard downed the rest of his drink.

“Listen,” he told Sims, after sipping from his glass, “Carter’s got to come through on the damned reversal.”

“He will.”

“The firm needs it. Cruise’s was the first Penalty case we’ve ever lost, and the hit was big. We lost all our federal funding on the Death Penalty Project…a couple of million…and we’ve seen a complete drain of death cases since the conviction. Plus, it made us look bad…made
me
look bad.”

“I know, I know…don’t worry.”

Just thinking about it now, two years later, Leonard’s face burned at the memory. It was the worst beating he’d ever taken in a public courtroom. Hailey Dean had gotten his client so worked up after she’d cross-examined the defense’s chief alibi witness Cruise refused to take the stand.

No, instead, what did he do? Cruise wolfed down his evening sedative right there in the courtroom. The little shit had saved it in a sweat sock.

Leonard shook his head, stuck in the dark memory.

That was the first year in fifteen that a Leonard Brother didn’t rule the state as president of the Georgia Bar Association. Referrals dried up, and his own client denounced him openly at sentencing. He’d shared headlines with Hailey Dean for seven weeks while the case was tried. They always painted her the hero and him the shit. Halfway through her closing argument, two jurors started crying into napkins, and the rest acted disgusted every time he tried to break her rhythm by objecting. The press loved it.

Regard snapped him out of it. “I’d love another drink, Matt, but I’ve got business across town.”

Before he could speak, Regard slid off his barstool, walked out of the bar, and disappeared into the night.

Matt Leonard sat still, alone, second drink melting down.

All he could think was Dean. Hailey Dean.

T
HE PHONE WAS RINGING JUST AS HAILEY STEPPED INTO HER
apartment. She dropped her bags inside the door and made a run for it.

It was probably Dana, trying to change her mind to come back downtown. She was headed for a new club when Hailey left her, whining about having to go alone.

But when Hailey picked up the phone and checked caller ID, she saw it wasn’t Dana at all.

“Mother!” she said into the receiver, glad she hadn’t missed the call.

“Honey, you’re there!” Elizabeth Dean sounded pleased on the other end. “I was expecting to get your answering machine. I’m so glad you’re not out running. It’s so dangerous, you out at all hours in New York City.”

Hailey wanted to remind her mother that it was dangerous down in Atlanta, too. Maybe worse…But she knew that would go nowhere.

“That’s why I joined the gym. So you won’t worry! How’s Daddy?”

“I’m fine. Your daddy’s fine…tired…you know.”

Yes, she knew. Mac Dean had been battling heart disease for years. It worried them all. And her mother had her own problems but still took care of her father non-stop.

“When are you planning on coming down to see us?”

“I don’t know, I hadn’t thought about it. We were just together up here at Christmas…it hasn’t been a month! It was so nice having you here with me. I keep thinking about it…I miss you so much.”

“It feels like a lot longer than that.”

Hailey stopped short. Her mother was right. It did. “Come back and see me again. I’ll buy the tickets.”

The answer was prompt—and predictable. “Oh, we couldn’t let you do that.”

Of course, they
could
—but they wouldn’t.

It wasn’t just about pride. Hailey knew that her parents still held out hope that she’d “get over this,” as they put it, and come back home to Georgia.

“Anyway, it’s not the tickets, Hailey. You know your father hates to fly. And I can’t leave him alone here, not even for a few days,” she added, lest Hailey suggest it.

And she had been about to. It was on the tip of her tongue.

“You haven’t been back home to visit in so long. I miss you, sugar.”

“I miss you, too. I’ll try, I promise. When things slow down.”

The truth was, she didn’t want to go back home and back to all the memories. It could trigger a depression Hailey couldn’t afford.

They talked a little longer, about people Hailey used to know and places she used to visit. She missed them so terribly—sometimes her chest ached she wanted to be back home again so much. But all she had left there were her parents. They were the only link to her old life. She’d deliberately lost touch with everyone but Fincher and now he was in Iraq.

Just before they hung up, her mother said, “Oh, Hailey, by the way, they’ve been writing about that man…the last one you put on death row.”

“Cruise?”

He wasn’t the only one she’d sent to death row, but he was by far the most prominent—and the most cunning.

“Yes. He’s trying to appeal. Like they all do. The Court won’t let him out, though, will they?”

“They won’t.”

“I hope not. Good night, sweet girl. Sweet dreams.”

The phone clicked off. Sweet dreams. She wished.

C
.
C. PARKED THE CADDY, SLIPPED THE KEYS OUT OF THE IGNITION
, and weaved through parked cars to cross the asphalt parking lot of the Pink Fuzzy. Stepping into the club’s heavily air-conditioned, darkened fantasy universe, his nerves immediately calmed down and the pain of public service magically began to ebb away.

Making his way to the bar, he ordered a bourbon and found a prime seat just in time to catch a floor show featuring the most exquisite woman he had ever seen in his life.

Her dark hair fell down her back in waves, and if those curves weren’t natural, there was a plastic surgeon out there that rivaled Michelangelo.

Sitting there, C.C. was mesmerized by her stunningly choreographed routine, set to music that simply chanted the same question over and over on the loudspeaker: “Who let the dogs out?
Who, who, who, who?
”

Or were they saying “woof”?

Whichever. On each “who” or “woof,” she bent over and poked her fanny right out at the audience and directly at eye level. Her G-string, which she shed provocatively near the end of the song, was appropriately decorated with a spotted-Dalmatian motif on the front. Despite the limited lyrics, she performed like a buck-naked prima ballerina on opening night at Lincoln Center.

When she was finished, C.C. nearly fell off his bar stool applauding.

The girl launched into her next routine, to “You Can Keep Your Hat On.” It ended with a crowd-pleasing coup de grâce, a Chinese split that brought down the house. He watched her leave the stage and disappear down the steps.

She had to rake in at least a deuce and a quarter per song, C.C. decided. Inquisitive at heart, C.C. wound his way to the back of the club to find her. Two twenty-five wasn’t cheap. He wondered how much he had left in his wallet.

There, he discovered for the very first time, a super exclusive lounge area sequestered from the rest of the bar called the “Pinkie Suite.”

It cost a cool thousand to get in, but once you paid up, they’d hand you a Cuban stogie, a pull of bourbon straight up with open bar from then on, and let the good times roll. No questions asked.

The best part: Select clientele could take the entertainer of their choice into private, pink-velvet-curtained booths for some special one-on-one time with your own Pink Fuzzy.

C.C. was in. No question about it.

And there she was: This time up close and personal in the Pinkie Suite.

Cigar and bourbon in hand, he made his way over. She was seated demurely on a bar stool, having a go at the salted peanuts placed out for free on the bar, her legs modestly crossed over a standard Pinkie G-string now replacing the Dalmatian.

“Your routine was a thing of beauty. I take it you’re a trained…what?…ballerina?” C.C. asked, sidling onto the stool beside hers.

She looked him up, down, and over. No answer. Just a sip on her drink and another grab at the peanuts. She obviously did not know who he was.

“So how are you tonight? Has anyone told you you’re gorgeous?”

“Fine. And yes.”

“I liked your act. It was very creative.”

“Thanks.”

“Who does your choreography?”

“I made it up myself.”

Impressed, he nodded. “You’re quite a talent. Ever think of doing something to ‘Freebird’?”

“Nope.”

“Well, you should.”

Her eyes narrowed at him. “I’m an artist. I need to be moved by the dancer’s muse in order to create a routine.”

“So? ‘Freebird’ doesn’t move your muse?”

“It’s passé.”

“It’s classic.”

“I don’t think so.”

She glared. Obviously, he’d stirred up her creative dander.
Oops
.

“I’m just sayin’…I’m dyin’ to see you do something to ‘Freebird.’ That’s all.”

She shook her head. Not a chance. Obviously, the muse frowned on “Freebird.”

“The music’s all wrong. Where would I work in the Chinese split? It’s my trademark.”

“That, I don’t know.” C.C. edged his stool closer. “How about you and me go continue this conversation in one of those booths?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Do you know who I am, honey?”

She shook her head as though she didn’t care, but he could tell she was interested in finding out.

She leaned forward a little as he took out his wallet and flashed his gold-plated judge’s badge at her.

“You’re a cop?” She drew back a little.

“No! I’m a judge.”

“Really?”

“You bet. How about you come with me to my ‘private chambers’?” Again, he nodded at the curtained booths.

She shrugged. “Why not.”

A half hour in the Pinkie Suite with Tina, and C.C. was in love.

Damn, they didn’t have anything like this in Dooley County.

After the last floor show, C.C. trailed Tina across town through empty streets to a two-bedroom apartment she shared with Lola, one of the other dancers at the Pink Fuzzy.

“You know what I’ve been thinkin’, C.C.?” she said as they walked up to the door. He stayed a few steps behind her, admiring the view illuminated in the arc of the headlights of a beat-up Camry parked at the curb

He was afraid to ask, but he did. “What’s that?”

“I need some collagen for my lips.”

Damn! She was a beautiful girl, and discreet.

But Lord, he had a feeling this was gonna cost him. He might have to actually go back to working for a living, but the thought of his old law practice situated on the little square in downtown Dooley County made his stomach hurt.

“I think you’re perfect just like you are,” he said, trying to dissuade talk of more plastic surgery.

“Home, sweet home,” she said with a smile, and led him over the threshold.

C.C. stepped into the apartment’s tiny foyer and let out a bloodcurdling scream when he was met with the sight of a bloody corpse just inside the front door.

The judge continued to scream bloody murder as he took off running for the Caddy.

“C.C.! Wait!” Tina called, chasing him down the brick walk in her stilettos. “It’s not real! Shut up the screaming and get back in here!”

C.C. skidded to a halt, turning back. “Not real? What the hell is it?”

“It’s Lola’s Christ!”

Lola’s Christ? What the hell did that mean?

C.C. slowly climbed the steps again and peered inside.

C.C. was raised Baptist and was only familiar with airbrushed pictures of Christ wherein He was beautiful, clean-shaven, fair-skinned, and blue-eyed…usually walking on water or holding His hands out lovingly to the Universe, with the morning sky emblazoned behind Him. Not all bloody and mangy-looking.

Lola’s Christ was a mangled-looking, life-size figure hanging by His hands and feet on the nastiest-looking cross C.C. had ever laid
eyes on. It was incredibly realistic. The thing had to be six by four feet at the wingspan, with shiny red acrylic blood flowing down the forehead, hands, and feet. Sharpened thorns were jammed into His whitened forehead, and Christ’s eyes looked mournfully to the heavens, clearly in a lot of pain.

“What is that doing here?”

“Lola collects religious memorabilia,” Tina informed him as she closed and locked the door behind them. “She was going to be a nun.”

“But she became a stripper instead?”

Tina nodded. “Nuns don’t get paid very well.”

According to Tina, Lola deeply identified with Saint Anne of Glycerine, who had been the wife of a very wealthy eighteenth-century Catholic businessman, and mother to his seven children. One afternoon at Mass, Anne had been moved by a vision of Christ to strip off all her clothes before a monastery full of monks and, on the spot, take on a vow of paupership.

“Stripped naked like that, of course the monks thought she was a saint,” Tina solemnly told C.C.

“Of course.”

As she explained it, Lola connected spiritually to Saint Anne. While Anne stripped during Mass in exchange for paupership, Lola stripped at the Fuzzy on the half-hour in exchange for all the tips she could cram into her garter belt. Lola attributed her success to St. Anne and claimed she kept a vision of the saint in her mind’s eye every night during the floor show.

It seemed to make perfect sense to Tina.

Still rattled by the bloodied corpse in the hallway, it took C.C. a full twenty minutes stretched out on the living room sofa, two bourbons, and a dose of Tina’s special talents before he could get himself back together.

“Want to see the rest of the place?” Tina invited.

“Does it lead to your bedroom?”

From what he could see, Lola was a strange one. The apartment was completely covered in shrines to dead saints and especially to
Lola’s favorite, the Virgin Mary. Two large ceramic figurines of the Holy Mother guarded not only Lola’s bedroom, from a table situated outside her door, but also protected the fridge. Both looked deeply saddened by the state of affairs in the bedroom and the kitchen, so, as Tina explained, Lola routinely left the two Mother Mary figurines tidbits of candy, cookies, and juice to cheer them up.

“It’s the Mother Mary’s fault we have roaches,” she told C.C.

It was 4 a.m. when C.C.’s head hit the pillow in Tina’s bedroom. The last thing he remembered was looking up at the gauzy canopy over her bed—all pink, of course. The whole room looked like the inside of the magic bottle on
I Dream of Jeannie
. Now
that
was a classic. What a show. He loved Jeannie and the inside of her bottle. Tina’s choice of decor was brilliant.

Genius, in fact. Why couldn’t Betty ever think up something like this…a bedroom just like the inside of Barbara Eden’s magic bottle?