Joel Goldman - Deadlocked

"Some guy named Mickey. I told him it was important and he gave me your cell phone number. Hey, you aren't mad I called you on your cell, are you?"

Mason smiled for the first time in days. "Not a bit. I'm glad you did. I'm on my way."

Mary was alive. Nick was out of ICU. And Mickey Shanahan was back. Three solid hits, even if none of them was out of the park. He was behind, but at least he had some base runners. It was enough that he was willing to wait to ask Claire about Judith Bartholow's mother.

He still didn't know where Mary was, whether she was okay or why she had disappeared. Nick was out of the ICU but, judging from the weakness in his voice, still at the beginning of a long road back. Mickey could have just dropped by for his paycheck and would be gone before Mason saw him, or he might be back for good. If he was, Abby might not be far behind. Mason decided to find out.

Mickey answered on the second ring. "Lou Mason and Associates," he said.

"Since when do I have any associates?" Mason asked, not able to keep the pleasure from his voice.

"From what I've been reading, boss, I wouldn't be too picky. You should be grateful somebody wants to associate with you at all."

"I am grateful, Mickey. Are you back or just passing through?"

"Back, if you've got room for me."

"Room I've got," Mason said. "Cash paying clients whose fees pay your salary-well, that's another story."

"Don't worry about it, boss. I'd rather you owe me than cheat me out of it."

"What about Abby? I don't suppose she…" Mason said, unable to finish the question, feeling Mickey's answer in the sigh on the other end of the call.

"Sorry, Lou," Mickey said. "The primary is in ten days and things are pretty crazy. They can always find someone else to get coffee. Abby is tough to replace."

"That I know," Mason said, Mickey not arguing. "Listen, the kid who called you is our client, Nick Byrnes. I'm on the way to the hospital to see him. Stick around the office. I'll be there in an hour or so."

Mason rounded the corner on the sixth floor of the hospital, and headed down the corridor for the general surgery patients. He swept past the nurses' station, building up a head of steam for Samantha Greer. Mickey's return had pumped him up. It wasn't only that Mickey would help. It was that Mickey had given up something important to come back. Though Mason had had good reasons to let Mary's and Nick's case slide the last few days, he was determined to come back to them.

It was the right thing to do and, he realized, it was the one thing he could do to help his own case without getting too much in Dixon Smith's way. There was another side benefit. Working Mary's and Nick's case would give him cover for checking up on his lawyer.

Samantha was waiting for Mason outside Nick's door. She was wearing bone-colored slacks and a matching short-sleeve jacket over a black top. Her hair was pulled back and her makeup was thin. She was all cop, the butt of her gun sticking out from the shoulder rig under her jacket. Her partner, Al Kolatch, was sitting in a chair, leaning back against the wall, tapping his feet on the floor.

"Over here," she said to Mason, pointing to an empty room across the hall, taking Mason by the arm, not giving him any chance to argue.

She closed the door, waiting for the slow moving hinge to seal them in. There were two beds, both stripped, a bulletin board above each, a forgotten get-well card pinned to one. Mason crossed the room to the window that looked north from the hospital. Samantha stood behind him.

Traffic on I-435 streaked past beneath them, glass and distance muting any sound. Treetops stretched beyond the highway, shading subdivisions. Thick white clouds with towering superstructures promising thunder and lightning hung on the horizon. Kansas City's summer weather had a predictable pattern. Heat and humidity built up to the breaking point, erupting in violence, cooled by rain that stoked the process for another round. The same could be said for this case, the cycle stretching back fifteen years to the night Graham and Elizabeth Byrnes were murdered.

"This is complete bullshit. You know that," Mason finally said, forcing his voice to a low, hospital quiet octave.

"You don't know what you're talking about," Samantha told him.

"Never a bad bet, but not this time," Mason said, ratcheting up to street volume. "Whitney King shoots my client, and then graciously promises that he won't press charges against Nick. You and Ortiz aren't satisfied with that. No. You've got to jump on Nick the minute he's out of intensive care so you can turn him into a witness against me. I can't believe you were ever on my side. Ever!"

Samantha, arms folded over her chest, listened to Mason rant, chewing her lower lip. "Are you finished?" she asked.

Mason threw up his hands. "Yeah. I'm finished and so are you and your partner. You're not talking to my client."

"I don't want to talk to him," she said.

Mason looked at her, hands on his hips, squinting as if he wasn't certain who she was. "You don't want to talk to him," he repeated, Samantha nodding. "Then want do you want to do?"

"Protect him."

"From whom?" Mason asked.

"Whitney King."

Mason narrowed his eyes and jammed his hands into his pants pocket. He studied Samantha, looking for signs that she was casting bait, reeling him in. She was wearing a cop's dead flat stare. Mason knew the look. It didn't mean she wasn't bluffing, but it meant he was rolling for high stakes if he took the chance she was.

"What happened?" he asked.

"We got a tip," she said, barely moving her mouth.

"Not good enough," Mason said.

"We don't need your permission to put a guard on your client," she reminded Mason.

"True enough," he conceded. "But if his life really is in danger, he's got a right to know the details. He doesn't have to talk to you, but you've got to talk to him, which means you've got to talk to me. Now would be a good time to start."

Samantha heaved a sigh, hands on her hips. "Okay," she said. "We got an anonymous threat on the TIPS Hotline. The caller didn't stay on long enough for a trace. The voice is disguised, probably using an electronic device you can get

from a hundred Web sites."

"Male or female?" Mason asked.

"Couldn't tell for sure. Best guess is male."

"What did he say?"

"Kept it short and simple," she said, consulting a notepad she pulled from her inside jacket pocket. "The exact quote is 'Be careful. The Byrnes boy is next and last.' Not too original, but it makes the point."

"You must get the whack jobs leaving you messages on that phone line. What makes this a credible threat?"

"We do get all kinds of whack jobs," Samantha said. "It's not unusual in high-profile cases like this for us to get a raft of death threats and confessions. After a while, we can even recognize some of the callers' voices, they call in so often. But this message is different."

"Why?" Mason asked.

"It's the part about being the next and the last. Like killing Nick would be related to the murders of his parents and the jurors."

"What makes you think King made the call after he gave his cousin's speech today?"

"What cousin are you talking about?" she asked.

"You know," Mason said. "Rodney King, the hero of the LA police brutality riots. After the cops beat the crap out of him and he sued the city for a bazillion bucks, he said can't we all just get along? That was Whitney's pitch this morning after he testified to the grand jury. He said he forgave Nick and was ready to move on."

"That's your problem, Lou. You believe everything you hear."

"Which makes you my opposite since you haven't believed anything I've told you in this case, including that King is guilty and I'm innocent."