Tom Lowe - The 24th Letter

“The guy doesn’t forget much, especially celebrity cases. He’d like to have had O.J. slip up here in Miami like he did in Vegas. When I called Rosen, it took him about two seconds to remember you, Sean. He asked if you were the same O’Brien who…and I’m quoting here…‘had IA following him like a shadow.’ I told him you were the best detective I’d ever known.”

“Maybe your endorsement penetrated his preconceived opinion of me.”

“Don’t take it personally. Rosen is one of those prosecutors who only go to trial to win. For him, there’s no such thing as breaking even.”

“The only score that counts right now is keeping Charlie Williams alive. Did you bring a copy of the case file?”

“Yep. Right here…on top of the package you sent me.” Hamilton lifted the thick file off the chair next to him and placed it in front of O’Brien. “Don’t forget it. Took me a while to copy that.”

“Thanks, Ron. This is boiling down to a pool of hours for Charlie Williams.”

“You can’t get some court to grant a stay?”

“Governor’s out of the country. William’s attorney has had all of his petitions denied or ignored. I have nothing but gut speculation to file with any judge or court that might hear it. Since lethal injection isn’t considered by the high court to be cruel and unusual punishment, the executioner is lining them up.”

Hamilton sipped his coffee and said, “There are many on death row that deserve to be exactly where they are and meeting the fate they’re facing.”

“But Charlie Williams isn’t one of them. I just came from Lauren Miles’ office at the federal building. They’d worked a coke bust with DEA about the time of Charlie William’s trial. Feds had been investigating Alexandria Cole’s manager, Jonathan Russo, the same time I was questioning him in her death.” O’Brien looked at the case files on the table. He gestured to the file. “In there, I wrote that Russo was having dinner with a business associate, guy named Sergio Conti, the night Alexandria was killed. Now I know that his alibi was a lie. So where was he?”

“Russo’s no deacon in his local church. We know his club launders dirty money. But proving it is another thing.”

O’Brien looked out the restaurant window and watched the lights from the traffic on the Rickenbacker Causeway Bridge. “Ron, I’m going to have to play on the edge to get some answers from Russo. He’s a cruel and a narcissist, a guy who believes he’s impervious to real trouble. If I had more time, I’d investigate this differently, play it by the book and document every move. But I don’t, and I can’t. I’m starting from scratch here, and I have to take the fastest course to try and save Charlie’s life. I don’t like this kind of investigation or interrogation. So, if you can, cover me old friend, maybe between the two of us we can save Charlie. If you can’t cover me, I understand. ”

Ron stirred more sugar in his coffee. “I’ll do what I can. Miami’s become even meaner since you left. A guy like Russo takes no prisoners. If you blink, or make a mistake, Sean, we won’t ever find your body.”

The college-aged, front desk clerk asked, “Are staying with us only one night?”

O’Brien finished the registration. “Yes, one night only.”

The clerk read the card. “Mr. Snyder, would you like to leave a credit card imprint for incidentals?”

“No thanks.”

“There’s a mini bar in your room.”

“I won’t need it.”

“Yes sir. You’ll need to prepay for the one night, though.”

O’Brien opened his wallet and counted the money. “How do I get to the room?”

“Go back out front and follow the drive around to the right. Top of the steps. Room twenty-nine. Mr. Snyder, do you need assistance with your luggage?”

“No thanks. Packed light.”

The clerk nodded and dropped the registration card on the stack next to his half-eaten peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

O’Brien parked on the opposite side of the building from his room. He picked up the case file and walked to a Seven-Eleven next to the hotel. He bought a pre-packaged ham sandwich, large coffee, and a Snickers bar to take to his room. During the short walk back to the hotel, he scanned the parking lot, the shadows in the alcoves and the license plate of a new car that wasn’t there when he had left for the store. Ron Hamilton had gone home for the night. He hoped Ron would never have to admit or deny that he knew what was about to happen.

He unlocked the room door and flipped on the lights. The odor was like opening the trunk of a car with old clothes in it. The smell had the faint trace of bleach. O’Brien locked the door, placed the Glock on a nightstand next to the bed and sat at a small table to eat while he read the case file.

As he read his own words written eleven years ago, the visuals of Alexandria’s death came back in graphic detail. He remembered the interrogation he had conducted with Judy Neilson, Alexandria’s roommate. He recalled questioning her at the crime scene. The sobbing, blotches of red on her neck and face. The incoherent, disconnected sentences, the shock of finding her best friend dead from knife wounds to the chest.

It was the second time he questioned Judy Neilson that her demeanor had changed. She was controlled, unwavering in the facts as she knew them surrounding Alexandria’s life and her death. And she had the hard edge of retribution in eyes that could cry no more. The sheer horror of it had deeply affected her. O’Brien read Judy’s words and remembered her sitting in the MPD interview room, her blond hair pulled back, striking face, no make-up, and manicured hands folded in her lap, shoulders straight back. Her tone was resolute, her expression was one of controlled restraint and yet compassion for a friend who was murdered. “Alex was one of the most loving, gracious people I’ve ever known. I think she still loved Charlie, but she felt it wasn’t going to work. His ego was in the dumps. He kept coming around like a cat that finds its

way back to your doorstep at night. It was because of Alex’s big heart that she always took him in. They’d fight and make up. Eventually, he stopped coming back.

“After he was gone for most of the summer, when she had time to compare him to some of the creeps that came around, I guess Charlie was looking better. She told me she’d always have a place in her heart for Charlie…she just needed time to figure it all out. That possessive manager of hers, Jonathan Russo, he was over at the condo more than I wanted to see him. Alex swore there was nothing between them, but you could tell, he kept her on a short leash. She hated going to his club, but Alex did have her weaknesses-she was only human. She liked the celebrity scene and all the fame she was getting. Russo got her hooked on cocaine…and that’s when she started depending on him in a sick kind of way. Charlie got wind of it. Came back from North Carolina and had words with Russo. Alex told me Russo threatened to kill Charlie if he ever came in his club again. I know Charlie hated to see Alex spiraling down. Charlie did have a drinking problem, but in my heart-of-hearts, I find it hard to believe he went off the deep end like that. I know Russo had people watching the condo. Sometimes I’d see one of his goons sitting in a car and just watching. Used to give me the creeps.”

O’Brien bit into his ham sandwich and washed down the stale taste with coffee. He flipped through to the transcript of Jonathan Russo’s interrogation. He remembered Russo’s demeanor well, the slouch in the chair, the peaks of anger tapered by feigned boredom mixed with arrogance. He remembered the tanned face with a spider’s web thin scar etched on the bridge of his nose. Thick lips. Dark hair pulled back in a ponytail. A diamond stud winking in his right ear. He wore an thousand dollar olive-green Armani suite and kept a five-hundred-dollar-an-hour legal beagle at his side.