David Ellis - The Wrong Man

“The hell it is. Bring him in on Friday.”

She made a face. “Judge Nash barred him from testifying.”

“He struck the insanity defense,” I clarified. “He didn’t say anything about Dr. Sofian Baraniq testifying or not testifying.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, J. How does Dr. Baraniq help us?”

I had an idea about that. But there was no need to get bogged down now. “Let’s talk about that later. Let’s move on. Bradley,” I said.

“I have subpoenas prepared for the Department of Agriculture, SK Tool and Supply, Summerset Farms, Stanley Keane personally… Let’s see, you already served Randall Manning and GHI in person. You want me to send the other subpoenas out?”

“Not yet,” I said. “The minute we serve them, we have to show the prosecution. I don’t want to tip my hand just yet.” In fact, it occurred to me that I might momentarily forget that I served Randall Manning with that subpoena. For the time being, it might slip my mind to tell the prosecution.

“And what about Judge Nash?” Shauna asked. “You haven’t disclosed any of this, and you’re way past the discovery order cutoff. Isn’t he going to deny all of this?”

I sighed and tossed the football in the air. “I already have that problem, whether I disclose it now or a week from now. But I’ve laid a pretty good record here, I think. He fucked me on the insanity defense and fucked me on the fitness argument, and then when I said I was now being stripped of my defense on the eve of trial and needed additional time to prepare, he fucked me again. He’s a stubborn old goat, but he’s not stupid. If he doesn’t give me a little slack on what I can show the jury, he runs a real risk of being reversed on appeal.”

“But you can’t bank on that. With Judge Nash, you said you never-”

“I know I can’t bank on it, Shauna. I’ve got a ruling from that piece of shit sticking out of my ass right now. You think I don’t know that?”

“Hey, easy.” Shauna raised her hands.

“What other choice do I have, Shauna? We follow the leads and hope we come up with something that’s compelling enough that Judge Nash can’t possibly say no. I’m out of backup plans here, okay? This is the only hope we have.”

“Okay, everybody, let’s turn it down.” Lightner patted the air with his hands. “Deep breaths, everyone.”

“And what value have you added, Lightner?” I asked.

“I’m trying to find the mysterious Gin Rummy, pal. Someone not even the esteemed FBI can-”

“Some fucking hotshot P. I. you are. You couldn’t track a bleeding elephant through the snow. You couldn’t find a Jew in Israel. You couldn’t locate oil in Saudi-”

Bradley John burst into laughter. So I turned on him next.

“And what about you, Bradley? Other than having two first names and listening to Panic! at the Disco on your iPad and having Justin Bieber’s haircut? You got anything else for me, sport?”

He raised his hands and tried unsuccessfully to suppress a smile. “We exchanged motions in limine today,” he said.

“Great. That’s great! And remind me again what we filed, Kid Rock. A motion to have our asses kicked at trial? A motion for a mattress to be placed in the courtroom so that when the judge is finished slapping me around for discovery violations, I have a soft landing?”

Bradley ticked off his fingers. “Motion to exclude witnesses, motion-”

“I know what motions we filed, Hip-Hop. I was filing pretrial motions when you were feeling up Betty Lou in the bathroom at junior prom. Get me draft responses to the prosecution’s motions by Saturday.”

I picked up the document that Ray Rubinkowski had given me, with the handwritten scratch on the back: AN NM??

“Last I checked, you were supposed to figure out who AN and NM were.”

Bradley, who was only now losing his smirk, flipped back a page in the notebook in front of him. “There’s no lawyer at Bruce McCabe’s law firm with either set of initials, so it’s not someone Kathy Rubinkowski worked with. None of the companies listed in the answers to interrogatories Kathy was drafting have those initials. None of the companies listed on the Agriculture Department’s database have those initials. I even tried to find a staff directory for LabelTek to see if they have anyone with those initials. I’m still looking. I won’t stop.”

“Um, excuse me.” Shauna raised her hand like a polite schoolgirl. “I think what you’ve been meaning to say is that you know how hard all of us are working and you appreciate it, and you know that we share your frustration.”

I tossed the football in the air. “That’s what I meant,” I sighed. “It may have come out different.”

“A little different, yeah.”

“Okay, listen, everybody,” I said. “You all need some rest. Get some tonight. Have a nice turkey day. Clear your mind, eat a lot of food, watch football, and come back Friday bright and early and ready for the final stretch.”

Bradley and Lightner headed out, neither of them real pleased with me at the moment. Shauna came over and lightly punched my arm. “Sure you don’t want to stop by tomorrow?” she asked. “We eat at three. My parents will be happy to grill you on why I’m not married yet.”

I stretched my arms. “I’m good,” I said. “Sorry about just now.”

She waved me off. “You could use a day off, too, Counselor. Clear your head. You’re not going to be alone tomorrow, are you?”

“No, no. I’m fine.”

Shauna cast a glance at Tori. She probably figured that Tori was going to be the one keeping me company tomorrow. I couldn’t tell how Shauna felt about that. The two of them had only recently met, had hardly said more than two sentences to each other. Shauna wasn’t really the catty type, but she was protective when it came to me.

She forced a smile and said, “Have a happy Thanksgiving, Tori.”

Tori replied likewise. It wasn’t the most affectionate exchange I’d ever seen. The Alaskan tundra produced more warmth.

Then Shauna left, and it was just Tori, smirking at me from the corner.

“I’m just glad you didn’t go off on me, too,” she said.

“Don’t tempt me.” I ran my fingers through my hair. “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

I drove Tori to her apartment. I wasn’t good company. I was off-balance. I’d never felt so out of control in my time as a lawyer. I had to climb a hill to climb another hill so I could use a telescope to locate my chances at an acquittal for Tom Stoller.

“Can I make a suggestion?” she said to me as I drove.

“Sure.”

“I’m not trying to tell you how to do your job.”

“It sounds like you’re about to.”

“Well, that’s what I mean. I can shut up if you want. If you told me how to teach differential equations to a class of grad students, I’d be annoyed. So I’d understand-”

“Tori, just tell me. Every time you’ve said something, it’s helped.”

She was quiet for a moment. I think she appreciated that comment.

“Okay,” she said. “Well, did it ever occur to you that maybe you’re casting too wide a net?”

I pulled up to a red light and turned to her. “What do you have in mind?”

She shifted in her seat to face me. “You think there’s something dirty with this guy at Global Harvest and these other companies. And you’re finding this out late in the game, so you’re stretched thin, and you have Shauna and Bradley doing Internet searches and making phone calls and things like that to learn more about these companies. Which is fine, except wouldn’t your private investigator be better at that?”

“Sure, but he’s busy on other stuff.”