The Wrong Man (13 page)

On top of that, the murder victim was a woman; she was Caucasian; and she lived on the north side. People aren’t supposed to be murdered up there. People are supposed to die violently on the south and west sides. When it happens to someone in the nice neighborhoods, especially a white woman, it’s usually headline news.

I handed Tori the sweaty bottle of water. She probably wanted to put it against her forehead as much as drink from it. Hell, she probably wanted to head for the exit.

“Cat got your tongue?” I asked, trying to shake her out of her funk.

“He… killed her?”

“He’s accused of killing her,” I said, but this cute little game of
allegedly
sounded a lot less cute when applied to a real-life case.

Tori looked away. Disgust, I think, or maybe fear. Yep, I thought, she was seriously second-guessing any interest she had in me.

I took one of the chairs in front of my desk, flipped it around, and sank in it. “This is what I do, kid.”

She took a deep breath and looked up at me.
How could you do this?
she seemed to be thinking.
How could you defend someone who killed a defenseless woman?

“Why did he kill her?” she asked.

I shrugged. “You ask me a week ago, I’d say this guy’s an Army Ranger who lost his mind when he got back from Iraq. He suffered post-traumatic stress that triggered a dormant case of schizophrenia. He killed her because he thought he was in wartime. He was out of his mind.”

That seemed to make a difference with Tori. My client was a sick war veteran, not an evil monster.

“I just got this case a few weeks ago,” I said. “It was a straight insanity
defense, the shrink was already lined up, no eyewitnesses. It was pretty much a battle of the experts.”

“And?”

“And now I think my client didn’t do it at all.”

She thought about that for a moment. Judging from our conversations to date, I had the sense that she enjoyed the mental calculations of the law, using a different part of her brain. She had to balance that against her obvious revulsion.

The truth was, I had no idea what was running through her mind.

“You think he’s innocent? And you said it’s ‘kind of’ related to that thing you took me to? That crime scene?”

“It might be. I’m not sure, but I think so, yeah.”

Tori kicked off her heels and brought her knees up on the couch. I watched her intently. It was the first time she’d removed an article of clothing in my presence. Sure, it was only a pair of shoes, but baby steps, right? Without dreams we are nothing.

I framed my hands. “What you saw on Arondale—that was Lorenzo Fowler. He was a mobster. That murder was a professional job. The guy used a semiautomatic handgun from long distance. And he sent a message with the kneecap shots. And picked up the shell casings.”

“Does that mean something—the shell casings?”

“It means he knew what he was doing. A pro picks up the shell casings to prevent a match to his gun. That was a hit, no question.”

“Okay. I’m following.”

“So now we have my client, and the murder in Franzen Park. The theory was that he had a flashback to Iraq and shot this woman from a distance of about ten feet. He shot her with a Glock, which is probably the same model used on Lorenzo.”

She watched me carefully. I don’t know if she was listening to the details or if she was reconsidering whether she wanted anything to do with me. But it helped me to articulate this out loud, to bounce it off somebody who wasn’t an invested member of the defense team.

“Two murders with a handgun used from a pretty good distance, and landing with such precision,” I said. “Kathy Rubinkowski took one between the eyes, and with Lorenzo—every shot landed perfectly, the windpipe and the kneecaps.”

“So everything was the same?” she asked.

“Well, no,” I said. “They recovered the gun and the shell casing in the Franzen Park shooting. The shell casing is how we know the approximate distance of the shot.”

“So it’s not the same.”

“Not exactly, no. He robbed her, too.”

“He robbed this woman he shot?”

“Right. They found her purse, cell phone, and necklace on my client.”

“That—sounds very different,” she said.

“I agree. Which makes me think that the murder was premeditated, and the robbery was to throw everyone off the scent. To make it look like a garden-variety robbery-homicide.”

“You think the same person shot both people? Lorenzo and this woman?”

“That’s the thought.”

Tori chewed on that for a while. So did I.

“So you’re saying the fact that these two things seem different is actually proof that they’re the same,” she said.

I laughed. It probably wasn’t what a mathematician would call linear thinking. “They’re not that different, Tori.”

“So you think you have an innocent client? A for-real innocent client?”

I sighed. “If you’d asked me a few days ago, no. But now? Yeah, I do think he’s innocent. I think if my client were halfway in control of his brain at the moment, he’d tell me that he didn’t lay a finger on the victim. I’d wager he’s never laid
eyes
on her.”

“Wow.” Tori curled her toes into the cushion of the couch. “If your client is innocent, that must be a lot of pressure on you.”

“Especially when someone reminds me of it.”

“Sorry.” She pulled a strand of hair out of her mouth. I enjoyed anything related to her mouth. Whatever women put on their lips today, it made hers shiny and full. I may have mentioned something about a dry spell.

“So—what’s the idea?” she asked. “Why would someone shoot this mobster guy and some innocent woman?”

“That’s what I have to find out.”

“Do you have any idea at all?”

“No,” I said. “Other than knowing who killed them both.”

“Oh.” She tripped over a laugh. “You know who killed them?”

If knowing the nickname, but not the identity, of the killer counted, then yes, I thought I had a reasonable idea who pulled the trigger in each case.

“Gin Rummy,” I said.

She looked at me with a blank expression. “What?”

“It’s a person. Gin Rummy. He’s a Mob hit man. Or an assassin, Lorenzo said. You know the difference between a hit man and an assassin?”

She shook her head. “Is this a riddle?”

“No,” I said. “But Gin Rummy is. Lorenzo was going to trade the identity of Gin Rummy for a get-out-of-jail-free card from the feds. And now I don’t have to wonder why Lorenzo picked me, of all people, to confess his sins and seek advice.”

“I’m not following.”

“I think Gin Rummy committed the murder in Franzen Park, the murder of Kathy Rubinkowski,” I said. “And I think Lorenzo was there, or somehow knew about it, and was prepared to testify against Gin Rummy. And now I know why Lorenzo picked me to confess his sins to and get a little advice. He came to me after I’d filed an appearance in the case. He knew I was the lawyer for the man accused of killing Kathy. So he knew that I, more than anybody, would help him talk to the feds and cut a deal. I’d want the information to exonerate my client.”

That seemed to make sense to her. “Then it sounds like you need to figure out who Gin Rummy is,” said Tori, stating the obvious. “Is there any way I can help?”

I smiled. “We are a little shorthanded,” I said.

Kathy Rubinkowski’s parents lived in the northwest suburbs in a townhouse community of mostly retirees. The community was constructed around a man-made lake. The homes were all built with the same red-brick, white-wood pattern, a Stepford-wives feel to it that gave me the willies. To a guy like me who grew up in the city, the suburbs were a nonstarter. My wife, Talia, had mentioned them once, back when she was pregnant with our daughter, and I just about went into convulsions—probably because I knew I’d be swimming against the current on that one and would probably relent one day, about the time we were on child number four or five and we were priced out of the city housing market.

I’d wanted to bring Shauna with me to this appointment because of her soft touch, but she was swamped with other cases and needed to clear them out so she could work on
Stoller
. So I dragged Lightner with me, who didn’t normally have a deft touch but could turn it on when he was on the job.

I rang the doorbell, and Lightner and I instinctively stepped back from the door, a nonthreatening posture. It was midday, and we were in full view of twenty other townhomes, but we were still two sizable guys showing up at a door.

A man’s voice came through a speaker next to the door.
“Yes?”

“Mr. Rubinkowski, it’s Jason Kolarich.”

I’d called ahead and talked my way into an appointment. Ray Rubinkowski
hadn’t been happy to hear from me, but he’d been polite enough to hear me out.

He answered the door in a plaid shirt and blue corduroys. Classic retired-dad wear, I would think, though I was hardly an expert. My father’s wardrobe these days was limited to a gray jumpsuit, courtesy of Marymount Penitentiary.

Age had weakened Rubinkowski’s voice and added ten pounds to his midsection, but he was clear-eyed and handsome. He bore some resemblance to his deceased daughter, his only child. I knew from background research that he’d been an accountant until his retirement two years ago.

He took our coats and showed us into what he called the parlor. I didn’t think people used that term anymore. His wife, Doreen, was sitting on a couch with her hands in her lap. She could just as easily have been in a dentist’s reception area awaiting a root canal. She probably would have considered that more enjoyable.

“We made coffee,” she said, the extent of her greeting.

“We’re fine,” I answered for both of us. Joel and I took a seat.

“What you said on the phone—it—was a surprise,” said Ray. “You said there were questions about how… how it happened?”

I’d been careful with my words over the phone. I didn’t want the family to call the prosecutor and tell her that the defense was changing its theory. That might be unavoidable, ultimately, but I wanted to keep as many cards as close to my vest for as long as possible.

“Mr. and Mrs. Rubinkowski,” I began.

“Ray,” he said. “And Doreen.”

He was being more generous than I’d have been, were the roles reversed. “We have questions. I’m new to the case. I just came in less than two months ago, and maybe seeing things with fresh eyes makes a difference.”

They didn’t respond to that. They seemed confused.

I asked, “Can you think of why anyone might have wanted to hurt your daughter?”

Kathy’s mother drew back, placing a hand over her heart like she was about to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. Her husband patted her knee.

“From what little information I have,” I said, “your daughter was an
ambitious young woman who was working her way through a master’s program and had a bright future. So it seems weird to me to have to ask this question, but I feel compelled to do so.”

“You’re saying this like we don’t already know who shot her,” said Ray. “Your client shot her. So why the hell would you ask us a question like that?”

By now silent tears had fallen down Doreen’s cheeks. She turned her head to look out the window, a defense mechanism, while her husband glared at me.

I shrugged. “I’m just trying to paint a picture for myself.”

“You want to smear Kathy,” he said through a clenched jaw. “Is that it? You want to make her look like someone who deserved what happened to her.”

“No, sir,” I protested. “I’m just—”

“You’re trying to get your client off,” he interrupted. “You’ll say whatever you need to say to win the case. That’s your job, isn’t it? You don’t care if what you’re saying is right or wrong. You’ll say whatever you need to say. You’ll say bad things about Kathy, if that’s what it takes. And now you want us to be a part of it?”

“Ray—”

“Are you telling us that your client didn’t kill our daughter?” Ray was growing more upset with every word. “Because that would be the first I’ve heard of
that
.”

I sighed. I could tell him the truth, that I seriously doubted that Tom Stoller shot her, but once again I had to balance a lot of considerations. If Ray Rubinkowski had something very important and relevant to tell us, then it was worth disclosing my change in defense strategy to Ray, and therefore, inevitably, to the prosecution. But if I didn’t think my odds were good, I was better off not showing my hand.

I’d hoped it wouldn’t come to this. I’d hoped that the Rubinkowskis would just answer a few of my questions and let me be on my way. In hindsight, it was foolish of me. You can’t walk into the home of bereaved parents and expect them to take a loaded question, like the one I asked, lying down.

Plus, I didn’t want to do that to them. I knew what it was like to deal with a loss like theirs. You learn the facts, gruesome and incomprehensible
facts, and you try to find a way to process them and ultimately coexist with them. Over time, the repetition, the constant replaying of the sordid information in your mind, has the effect of blunting it. On day one, you couldn’t possibly utter the words—
my wife and daughter died in a car accident; my daughter was shot by a homeless man
—but over time the wounds scar over. Then someone like me comes along and says, That horrific pain that you’ve managed to store away? Well, it’s all wrong. We have to rip open those scars. We have to reexamine everything. You have to relive this.

“No, I’m not saying that,” I answered. “We’re still pleading insanity.”

Ray and Doreen consoled each other. I waited them out. On the mantel of the fireplace was a shrine to their only child. Photos of Kathy Rubinkowski with a cap and gown at high school graduation, as a toddler sitting atop a horse, at the kitchen table, smiling into the camera with a mouthful of braces.

I looked at Lightner, who motioned toward the door. But I wasn’t ready to go yet.

“Again, Ray, Doreen, I was just trying to get a big picture here. I didn’t mean to upset you. I just have one more question, if I may.”

Finally, Ray composed himself and turned to me again. His jaw was clenched, his face reddening with frustration.