The Law Partners (Michael Gresham Legal Thriller Series Book 3) (10 page)

W
ell color me overwhelmed
! Michael Gresham has just called me and asked me to defend him.

Who am I? My name is Harley Sturgis and I am a recovering lawyer. I'm sprawled on the leather turn-of-the-century chesterfield in my office, lying on my back, my ankle crossed over my knee, lighting one cigarette off another. My pulse is pounding and I want to open the window and scream out to the shoppers down below on Michigan Avenue, "Michael Gresham wants to hire me!"

But I can't. For one thing, the damn thing doesn't open. The builders didn't want us throwing ourselves out of the eightieth floor of the Hood Building whenever we had a run of bad luck on Fall Corn at the Commodities Exchange.

He chose me. Why would he choose me? I'm forty-two years old, tall--but not gawky!—with thick rimless glasses, bottle blond (bleached, actually), and walk with a cane, thanks to a spill I took on my Can-Am Spyder, the three-wheel motorcycle out of Canada. It's a super cool way to tear around Chicago's clogged streets when court lets out and I need to blow off some steam. Anyway, I dumped my Canny--which the company says isn't possible--and it left me with a bum hip and trick knee. I'm deciding whether I want to sue Can-Am. Probably not. There're enough bullshit products liability cases floating around that I don't actually feel the need to pile on. Besides, I make so damn much money that anything Can-Am could payout to me would feel like overkill. I don't need their money. But I do want them to examine my accident. I filmed it with my Go-Pro, which I've sent to Toronto for a once-over.

But back to Michael Gresham. I met this guy in court several years ago. Criminal court, if you weren't aware, consists of five minutes of intense back-and-forth with a judge, separated by an hour of waiting for your next case to be called. I've learned to sleep in court with my eyes open, but that day it wasn't happening. So I found myself sitting next to this sort of handsome guy secretly texting on his smart phone. Judges jump up and down and do the panty twist when they catch anyone using phones in their courtrooms, so Michael was actually hiding the phone behind the
Illinois Rules of Evidence
, a gray, humorless book about--guess what--evidence. Michael's got the book cracked open and pretends to read but he's really texting. Sitting beside him, I start enjoying the conversation he's having with some bimbo named Nancy.

MICHAEL: You were amazing last nite.

NANCY: Not bad yourself.

MICHAEL: Where did you learn that?

NANCY: I lived in Japan and worked as a geisha 4 a year. They taught us so much.

MICHAEL: Amazing. I think Im in love.

NANCY: You get what you pay for.

Pay for? He had me at "Where did you learn that?" But
pay for
? This guy's paying for sex? Naw, too good looking for that. Good looking in a sort of
don't-give-a-damn
ruggedness that more men should aspire too. More Clive Owen than Robert Redford. My two cents.

So I wrote my number on my legal pad and nudged him. I showed him my number. He didn't flinch but started thumb-typing. My own phone announced a new message had arrived. Following Michael's lead, I hid my phone behind my legal pad and appeared to be writing.

MICHAEL: What's cooking?

HARLEY: This courtroom is a drag. Wanna bust out and grab a beer?"

MICHAEL: Don't drink. But I'm up for coffee and a donut.

HARLEY: Starbucks on the corner?

MICHAEL: Gr8. Whats ur name?

HARLEY: Harley. Like the motorcycle

MICHAEL: Im Michael Gresham.

HARLEY: I know. Everyone knows you.

MICHAEL: Don't flatter me. I might fall in love with you.

HARLEY: God forbid. I have enough male admirers already.

MICHAEL: Come here often?

HARLEY: A pickup line if there ever was one.

MICHAEL: Sorry, Im rusty.

HARLEY: You married?

MICHAEL: No. Happily divorced. Don't have any money to ask anyone out. The X cleaned me out.

HARLEY: So how do you keep the cobwebs clear?

MICHAEL: Are you talking about how do I have sex? Are we there already?

HARLEY: Im bored to death. Cut to the chase with me.

MICHAEL: Ive given up on women. Just the occasional blind date that some well-meaning friend arranges. Those never go anywhere. What about u?

HARLEY: Single not looking. I make more money than everyone. Men come on for financial gain.

MICHAEL: lmao

HARLEY: Me 2

One thing led to another, court muddled on through, and by noon we both had our cases called and had met at the corner Starbucks. He beat me there and when I walked in he was devouring a sausage and egg muffin. I pulled out a chair and sat down.

"What can I get you?" he said through a mouthful of egg and meat.

"Feeling noble are we? Most guys won't wait on a lady anymore."

He smiled. "Welcome to the nineteen-fifties. Mom would kill me if I forgot my manners."

"You've got a mom? I thought lawyers like you just parachuted down from heaven."

"You flatter me."

"It's the rep, Precious. I'm impressed."

"What's that get me?"

I looked at him and smiled. "That gets you the right to bring me a venti bold, extra cream."

He stood and went up to the cash register. Nice bum. Came back with a steaming cup of Seattle's finest and we smiled at each other and officially introduced ourselves, handshakes and all.

"Don't think I'm not impressed too," he said. "Harley Sturgis is a household name. Chicago’s fastest-rising legal star."

"Really? What household would that be?"

He laughed. We were going to be friends.

But back to today.

Evidently the cops executed a search warrant on my friend. And he told me they found a gun in the trunk of his car. When he called he was waiting for charges. Expected an indictment any moment. So we agreed to meet. My office, four-thirty.

"Angelina," I buzzed my paralegal.

"Right here, Boss."

"Bring me your brief on accessory law."

"We're defending someone charged with being a criminal accessory?" Angelina asked. She sounded interested, which was a good start with Angelina, my perky twenty-five-year-old paralegal/night law school student. Minutes later the brief appeared on my screen.

I began reading. It was my guess that Michael would be charged as an accessory to the murder of Darrell Harrow since nobody would be claiming he was actually present at the shooting. Criminal accessory law is very interesting. In criminal law, contributing to or aiding in the commission of a crime can get you charged as an accessory. Accessory is one who, without being present at the commission of an offense, becomes guilty of such offense, not as a chief actor, but as a participant, as by command, advice, instigation, or concealment; either before or after the fact or commission.

Concealment. That's Michael's problem right there. Or so I was thinking.

At four-thirty sharp, Angelina showed him into my office. I called him over to my conference area, which was really nothing more than four Eames chairs arranged around a glass coffee table. Angelina took our drink orders and scurried out. (Don't feel sorry she has to fill drink orders. She would be back to briefing cases for night law school on my dime in five minutes, and probably already had been since lunch. Not a bad gig.)

"So, Michael," I start it off. "Sorry to hear about your problem. But that's the trouble with practicing criminal law. Sit in the barber's chair long enough and sooner or later someone's going to get a haircut."

He crossed his legs and settled his coffee cup and saucer on his knee.

"It's a sham; they planted the gun in my car. That's all," he said.

"But aren't they all innocent? I've never had anyone walk in here who was anything but innocent. Not counting the little old lady who was a serial shoplifter of flashlight batteries. It was just her thing and she couldn't restrain herself. The judge committed her to community service and weekly OCD counseling. It must have worked; she hasn't returned to see me. But now, Michael, here you are, telling me you're innocent too."

He shrugged. "That's because I am innocent."

"Why would they plant a gun on you, Michael?"

He looked off in the distance. Michael--I had found from dinner dates and the like--was a contemplative sort, a man who preferred to actually think before he spoke. Kind of a refreshing trait for a criminal lawyer, most of whom have a line of bullshit a mile long. Then he looked back at me.

"Actually, I believe I have been targeted. Set up, for some reason I can't understand."

"Have you rubbed someone the wrong way over at the District Attorney's office? Pissed off some heavyweight in the detective bureau?"

He set his coffee cup and saucer down on the coffee table. It was only then that I noticed his hands were shaking. He rubbed his hands together like Lady Macbeth.

"I think someone is making a case against Mira Morales and they needed a tie-in."

"What's that mean?"

"It means they want everyone to believe that Mira asked me to remove the murder weapon from the scene of the crime. That way they can indirectly prove guilty mind. Like fleeing from the police."

I had to think about that. If Michael was right, if he was part of a scheme that clever, then he was in for the fight of his life because the mastermind behind something like that would be a genius freak.

But I didn't want to just jump to such a working thesis, and I told him so.

"Let's start with the basics," I told him. "Who had access to your car?"

He again looked away. "Anyone and everyone, I guess. Marcel drives me into work almost every day and it gets parked in the basement of my building. The entire world has access to it down there."

"When was the last time you had the trunk open?"

"Danny and I took a trip to Saint Louis to watch the Cards last spring. We took two suitcases in the trunk."

"Was there some part of the trunk you couldn't see simply by opening it up?"

"I asked myself the same thing. So I popped the trunk when we go it back a half hour ago. There's a space behind the spare tire. I would never look there unless I was changing the tire."

"So the gun might have been in your trunk for quite some time and you just didn't know?"

"Possible, I guess. But why?"

I lean back in the Eames chair and begin tapping my pen on the leather arm. "Unknown. We're just talking here. Let's try not to ascribe motive to possible scenarios at this point. Motives are always ambiguous."

"Okay. One possible scenario: someone put the gun in there the night of the shooting. Another scenario: they planted it the next day. Another scenario: they planted it on me at the time of the execution of the search warrant."

"You're saying the search team might have placed it in there?"

"Hell, I don't know that it was ever even in there, for that matter. They might just be saying it was in there, for all I know. For all I really know they found it in Mira's condo, put it into evidence, tagged it, and then said they found it in my trunk. The scenarios are endless."

"True enough. I'm thinking too that maybe you put it there. Let's rule that out by logic. If you put it there, that would be the dumbest thing you've ever done, right?"

He looked at me crossly, then his demeanor relaxed. "All right, I'll play that game. Let's say I was helping Mira cover up the crime. Let's say I did remove the gun from her condo. The trunk of my own car would be the last place I would have put that gun."

"The first place being?"

"I don't know. Maybe outside the building, maybe on the sidewalk, a trash bin, or a Dumpster down the first alley."

"No, the nearby trash bins and Dumpsters would have been searched by the cops when they couldn't find her gun in her condo. You would have had second thoughts and wouldn't have put it anywhere near her building."

"Maybe I would drive home by the lake and throw it in. That wouldn't be so hard to imagine."

"Agreed. Do they have metal detectors that work under water?"

"Damned if I know. Why?"

"I don't know. Dumb question, I guess. So. We are expecting an indictment probably for being an accessory after the fact. Or maybe even conspiracy. You conspiring with Mira to complete the crime."

"The accessory angle is my guess. I'm guessing they'll be wanting to make a case against me for being an accessory to murder."

"Or maybe as an accomplice. An accessory may or may not have been at the crime scene. An accomplice was at the crime scene and aided in the commission of the crime somehow."

"Like helping hide the murder weapon."

"Exactly. And we both know these crimes are often charged as obstruction of justice nowadays."

"So there's two counts: accessory and obstruction of justice."

"Three. Don't forget conspiracy."

"Four, hell, they might even charge me with being present when the fatal shot was fired."

"Five, as long as we're speculating, they might even charge you with being the killer, the one who fired the shot."

He shook his head and clamped his hands on both knees. "This starts to run out of control with just a few minutes of plotting."

"It sure as hell does, Michael."

"So I need to retain you. How much do I need to pay you to get you onboard?"

"One-fifty. That'll get my attention."

"A hundred-fifty-thousand dollars. I'll have Marcel swing by with a check in the morning."

I looked at him and we both knew what I was going to say next. We both had said the exact same thing hundreds of times to hundreds of clients.

"Don't talk to anyone about this. Not even Danny. All right?"

"A page right out of my own playbook. All right, counselor. My lips are sealed."