David Ellis - The Last Alibi

There is something wrong with me, but that something is nothing. There is nothing inside me. I watch one foot move in front of the other every day. I hear my voice arguing to a judge or jurors or reassuring a client. But it’s all nothing, isn’t it? The clients will go to prison, and even if I walk them, even if I find some way to win, they’ll be back, and sooner or later they’ll find a prison cell like metal drawn to a magnet. Everyone’s chasing after something, everyone wants something from somebody else, but not me.

There is a tiny earthquake in my stomach. My lips, my mouth, my throat, are dried up, sticky and itchy. I drink from a bottle of water but it doesn’t help. I pop an Altoid and chew it up, then slug some more water. Then I jump to the site for our online newspaper, the Herald , to hear about the latest stupid thing that Mayor Champion has done, when I’m greeted with this breaking-news headline:

BREAKING: THIRD WOMAN STABBED ON NORTH SIDE

I pop up in bed and click the link. The stabbing just happened. They don’t know the victim or too many details. Police responded to a call in the 4200 block of North Riverwood Avenue, a woman bleeding out from a stab wound.

I don’t have James Drinker’s contact information with me at home, on a Friday night that is technically Saturday morning. I may have brought home my notes from our two meetings. I don’t remember. These days I-Well, I don’t remember, anyway.

Twenty minutes later, I’m drifting again, the slow downhill nod toward sleep. Tomorrow, I think, tomorrow I’ll call James, a warmth spreading over me, while James Drinker sticks a knife into a woman, pulls it out, and winks at me.

Shauna

Saturday, June 8

I dial Jason’s cell at a quarter past eight. It’s early. He might be sleeping. Before the knee problem, he’d have already completed a twelve-mile run or something crazy, whatever that competitive itch he has that he always needs to scratch.

“Hey,” he says.

“Hey.” I cradle my cell in my shoulder as I scoop butter with a knife. Granola and toast for this working girl. Long day ahead at the office, prepping for the Arangold trial. Jason better not fuck me on this trial. Rory Arangold’s already been asking about Jason. He’s going to be there, right? He’s going to cross-examine their expert?

“You watching the news?” Jason asks.

He knows I am. I’m a creature of habit.

The woman who was stabbed last night in her apartment is Holly Frazier, a young, attractive woman in the photo they put up over the anchorman’s shoulder. A grad student at St. Margaret’s. Midtwenties, looks like.

“What the fuck?” Jason mumbles. “What is it this time? Is she, what, James Drinker’s dog walker or something? His study buddy?”

“Ask him,” I say. “Let’s see if this is another coincidence.”

“I fucking will. Is this asshole playing me, Shauna?”

The notion is out there, of course. “But why would he?” I ask. “You’re his lawyer. Everything he says to you is in confidence. I mean, I hate to say it, but it’s possible he’s telling you the truth, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know. I guess.” He mumbles a few more curse words under his breath. “He said he couldn’t think of anyone who’d do this to him, who’d want to taunt him. Fuck with him.”

“So what?” I say. “It could be anybody. He cut somebody off in an intersection, somebody who turned out to be a sociopath, and he’s paying for it now.”

“C’mon, kid.”

“I mean, yeah, it’s far-fetched, but people are strange, Jase. They just are. Just because he can’t think of anybody who’d want to do him harm doesn’t mean there isn’t somebody.”

I know what Jason’s thinking. I know him better than he knows himself. He’s thinking about three dead women and wondering if there will be more. And wondering if his client, James Drinker, is the one killing them.

And wondering if that means he has to turn him in.

“Hey, sport,” I say. “I hate to be the voice of reason, but you can only turn him in for something you know he’s going to do. Not for something he already did.”

“Right, I know. I know. I can only turn him in if I know he’s going to commit a crime in the future, la-de-da-de-da.”

“That’s not la-de-da-de-da, kiddo. That’s your oath. And you don’t know that he’s killed anybody .”

“I got that part, Shauna. I’m clear on that.”

Snippy, snippy. So it’s Moody Jason this morning. Jason doesn’t like rules. He doesn’t like lines on the road and curbs and stop signs. He likes a fair result, but he doesn’t really care if he has to drive over a few front lawns to get there.

“Listen, Jase, if-”

“Hang on.”

“-you think about it-”

“Shauna, hold up. My other line’s ringing,” Jason says. “Ten bucks says I know who it is.”

“Monday morning, you start on Arangold ,” I say to him, but he’s already hung up.

Jason

Saturday, June 8

No caller ID on the other end. I kill the call with Shauna and answer before my voice mail snatches away the second caller.

“It’s James, James Drinker,” he says in a rushed voice. He has my cell phone number from the card I gave him. A defense lawyer has to give out his cell number. He needs to be reachable whenever. “I didn’t kill that girl on the news,” he says. “I don’t even know her.”

“Holly Frazier,” I say to him.

“Right. I don’t know her. Did they-They didn’t say she was stabbed multiple times, did they? They just said she was stabbed. So maybe it’s not the same guy.”

“James,” I say, “were you like Macaulay Culkin again last night?”

He lets out a loud, anxious breath, like he’s about to swallow his phone. “I was home by myself last night. But this time I went online and searched some news sites. And-and I called my mother from my landline. I–I’m doing this now, I’m making a record every time I’m home at night by myself. So I can prove I didn’t go out and kill anybody. That’s smart, right? It’s freakin’ crazy that I have to do that, but it’s smart, isn’t it?”

Outside my open window, a couple is pushing a stroller, enjoying a lazy Saturday morning. The air still has a hint of that morning cool, but it’s going to be oven-hot today.

“That’s smart, James. Very. Do you think you could supply me with that information?”

“Supply you with what?”

“That proof you were home last night. The phone call with your mother.”

“Why do you need that?”

“So I have it at the ready, in case the police start looking at you. While it’s fresh in our minds.”

“How do I prove to you that I called my mother? You mean phone records?”

“Yes, that’s what I mean. Or let me talk to your mother.”

“You want me to tell my mother that she needs to talk to a lawyer I hired so we can confirm that I didn’t murder somebody? Are you kidding me? It would kill her. She’s in a nursing home. It would kill her.”

“Well, then-”

“And why am I proving this to you , Jason? You’re supposed to be the one on my side.”

“I am on your side. I am. But I need the information to protect you.”

“You don’t believe me. You think I murdered that woman, don’t you?”

The truth is, I’m not sure I do think that. People get stabbed all the time in this city. This could be a domestic incident with an obvious suspect, a boyfriend or something. Jesus, am I getting soft? Did my time off unscrew the part of my brain that reminds me that I’m a defense lawyer, that I’m this guy’s warrior, that I’m the one person who holds steady against the tide of the full weight of the government and says, I’ll stand up for you ?