Robert Ellis - The Dead Room

“Derek Campos is a classic example of being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Nash said.

There were a series of family snapshots included in the file, and Nash laid a photograph of Campos with his wife and young daughter on top. They were at a picnic, enjoying a summer afternoon in the park.

“An elderly woman had been raped and bludgeoned to death in Mount Airy,” Nash said. “Campos was a landscaper, working in the churchyard across the street. The police saw him weeding the flower beds and thought he might be a witness. But Derek Campos had grown up in North Philadelphia and had a natural fear of the police. He was a simple, uneducated man with a low IQ. After speaking with him, detectives asked for hair and blood samples. Campos was nervous. He didn’t know any better and agreed. Within twenty-four hours, the lab claimed they had a match.”

Teddy only had a sense of the case from what he’d seen on television at lunch yesterday, and Nash’s findings and a transcript from the press conference printed in the paper today. Campos had been executed before the use of DNA analysis became routine and could have saved him.

“It was the forensic scientist that clinched it for the jury,” Nash said. “Vera Handover. Her testimony, her assurance and confidence that Campos was guilty. Now we know that everything she said at the time was a result of bad science. Lousy detective work. A prosecutor without any talent working his way to the top. Derek Campos died for no other reason that on the day the body was found, someone looked out the window and saw him working in a flower bed.”

Teddy could hear the deep-seated anger in Nash’s voice. The contempt for everyone involved. He guessed at that moment that there was no way Nash would agree to help. He gave the photograph of the Campos family a last look, the wife and daughter, and stepped away from the table. Nash closed the file and placed it on his desk.

“This is how I’m spending my time,” Nash said. “The focus of my workshop. Looking for what’s slipped through the cracks. Lending a hand to the forgotten. So what makes you think I’d have any interest in getting involved in the Holmes case?”

“Alan Andrews,” Teddy said without hesitation or much hope. “It’s a chance to keep your story in the papers. A chance to keep what he did to Derek Campos alive.”

Nash smiled. “You mean the use of my name gets you and Barnett off the hook. That’s why you’re really here, isn’t it? You need to think about what you’re offering, Teddy. It’s not enough.”

Nash had seen through him as if he was wrapped in cellophane. Nash didn’t have any interest in holding their hand, or prepping the ground for negotiations with the district attorney. He wasn’t going to budge, and that piercing look in his eyes was back. Teddy felt like an animal caught in the headlights of an approaching car. As he glanced away, his eyes skidded off the lithograph of the empty prison cell, then dropped to the floor, his nightmare surfacing again. Free At Last . The cell was empty because his father was dead. He could see the guards grabbing his father’s feet and dragging the body away. They’d left his blanket behind. Teddy tried to get a grip on himself.

“A few words of advice,” Nash said.

Teddy leaned against the jury table, watching the man strike his lighter and toke on the cigar again.

“I don’t think your plan to avoid a trial will work,” Nash said. “Andrews’s motives are obvious. He’s a political animal, and thus his motivations in life are transparent. In the end, you’ll have just as much trouble with ADA Carolyn Powell. She’ll be the brains behind the duo while Andrews takes all the credit. But make no mistake about it. The crime they allege Holmes committed is egregious. And the pressure on them to prosecute will be substantial, particularly because the girl came from a family of means. To put it more bluntly, Teddy, I believe they’ll want your client’s head on a stick and nothing less will suffice.”

Nash was beaming. Teddy didn’t find the pep talk all that reassuring. He wondered how Barnett would take the news and hoped he had a plan B in mind.

“How much do you know about your client?” Nash asked.

“He worked for the post office,” he said. “We’re just getting started.”

“Did you know that five years before Oscar Holmes became a mailman he was a butcher?”

Teddy shook his head, his stomach beginning to churn.

“No, I didn’t.”

Nash flashed another smile and sat down on the corner of his desk.

“That’s right,” he said. “Holmes was a butcher, Teddy. He worked at a shop just off South Street for years. I saw it on the news before you arrived. He loved his job and was good at it. Apparently, he was handy with a knife.”

Burying the news of Holmes’s life as a semi-retired butcher in a mental file labeled worst-case scenarios , Teddy made it back to Center City in less than fifteen minutes. By the time he entered his office, all he could think about was Holmes’s head on a stick. Nash was an obvious genius. But even Teddy had been able to foresee that the case would come down to a long trial, and getting the death penalty off the table just wasn’t in the cards.

He picked up the phone and dialed Barnett’s office. Jackie said he was at lunch with Stokes and that they’d be a while. Teddy knew what that meant. Barnett was filling Stokes in on their new client. After the shock dissipated, Stokes would worry about the firm’s reputation. They were probably drawing up a public relations plan. It might take hours before Teddy could reach Barnett to tell him that Nash had refused and they were on their own.

Jill walked through the door with her lunch and sat down before the computer. Cottage cheese and a salad with low-cal dressing and slices of canned fruit. Lunch looked more healthy than appetizing today.

“What are you working on?” Teddy asked.

“I finished early,” she said. “I’m hiding out and trying to get some studying in for the bar. Did you check your messages?”

Teddy found them on the desk, recognized Jill’s handwriting and picked them up. Of the three, two could wait but one was marked urgent.

“Who’s Dawn Bingle?” he asked.

Jill shrugged. “She called a few minutes ago. It sounded like she knew you.”

“What did she want?”

“I think it’s got something to do with that personal injury case. I asked if she’d like to speak with Brooke, but she refused. She said it was important and that she’d only talk to you.”

“Where’s her number?”

“She didn’t leave one. She said she’d call back later.”

The woman’s name didn’t register. Teddy shrugged it off, pulling the murder book out of his briefcase and sitting down at his desk. There was no real need to take a second look, but he did it anyway, reading through the preliminary reports until he came to the photo of his client, Oscar Holmes. When the phone rang, he picked it up and could hear a woman’s voice mixed with digital noise from a cell phone. The woman spoke through the breaks in the signal, introducing herself as Dawn Bingle and apologizing for her phone.

“I’m in my car,” she said. “But we need to talk.”

“Brooke Jones is handling the case now.”

“She’s a bitch,” the woman said. “I saw her yesterday in court.”

Teddy didn’t recognize Bingle’s voice through the breakup, but guessed that she was in her late thirties. “What’s this about?”

“I work for Capital Insurance Life. I’ve got evidence that proves what my company did to your client is a matter of corporate policy.”

Teddy closed the murder book and pushed it aside. “What kind of evidence?”