Keith Ablow - Compulsion

"I guess it's okay," I said. "I mean, if you're planning to get engaged and give it to your girl."

He smiled and spewed a thin stream of smoke up toward the silver tin ceiling. He probably thought I was kidding. "I got it off Scotty Deegan as a fee," he said. "I handled a drug case for him before Judge McClure in Federal Court. Possession, intent to distribute five hundred pounds of weed. We did good. Thirty-six months in Allenwood. Easy time. Maybe a halfway house after two years. So it was a score."

"He came to the right person," I said. I meant it. If I were in trouble, my first call would be to Carl Rossetti.

He waved his hand back and forth, admiring the stone as it caught the light. "I would never cough up the cash for something like this, but when it falls in your lap, what the hell, right?" He shrugged.

"It's a little flashy for my taste," I said. "It may even be a little flashy for your taste. And that's saying a lot."

"Sometimes you got to stretch," Rossetti said. He slapped my shoulder. "So tell me, already, what's happening in your world? You still hanging around that beautiful Brazilian from the other night?"

It seemed like more than a few nights had passed. I pictured Justine getting dressed in my apartment the morning North Anderson had rung my doorbell. "She's back in Brazil," I said. "I'd be over there myself if I hadn't gotten called into the Bishop case. You remember: the baby on Nantucket."

"Of course. The Russian kid," he said. "He's pleading insanity?"

"It doesn't look that way. He says he didn't do it."

He smiled. "What else is he gonna say? Does he have a lawyer?"

"Not that I know of," I said.

"Put in a good word for me, if you get the chance."

"Two nights ago you told me the kid was guilty, for sure."

"He's still gonna need an attorney," Rossetti said. "And I could use that kind of payday. My other clients aren't billionaires."

Mario delivered my coffee. I sipped it. Then I bummed a cigarette off Rossetti, lighted it, and inhaled as much smoke as my lungs would hold.

"Can you share anything you've learned about the case?" Rossetti asked.

Rossetti was peculiar-looking, but he was also peculiarly brilliant. I welcomed the chance to run some of what I knew about the Bishop case by him. "One of the things I dug up," I told him, "is that Darwin Bishop-the father of the suspect-has a record of domestic assault. He beat his first wife. He also violated a restraining order she took out against him."

"You're joking," Rossetti said.

"I pulled his rap sheet. It's all right there in the public record."

"Then I respectfully withdraw my previous opinion."

"On?" I asked.

"The Russian kid," Rossetti said. "I hereby rescind his conviction."

"Why?"

"Because, until further notice, the father's your man, Doc. I don't care how many cats the boy strangled, or how many times he pissed his bed."

"But why do you say that?"

Rossetti held both hands in the air, like a conductor. "As if you don't already know all this, men who beat up on women are different than the rest of us. Okay? They're unhinged. Out there. Without feelings. And anyone arrogant enough to violate an order of the court, when it could get him a year or more in jail, is different, too. He doesn't get the idea of boundaries-like, where his life stops and other people's start." He let his hands settle back to his coffee cup. "If you or I were the subject of a restraining order, we'd be twenty miles from ground zero at all times. We're not gonna screw with the justice system once it buries its teeth in us." He paused, sipped his coffee. "Add up the two charges, and what you have here is a violent crime occurring in a household where the father is a violent offender with no regard for the law. Ten to one, he did it."

"Not every domestic abuser graduates to murder," I said.

"That's why it's ten to one and not a million to one. If it was open and shut, the police wouldn't need you. The friggin' department could buy another cruiser with what you're gonna charge 'em."

"There were five people at home the night the baby was killed," I said. "Darwin Bishop and his wife Julia; their two sons, Billy and Garret; and the nanny, Claire Buckley. The D.A. is going to arrest Billy and try to prosecute him. What do you think of his chances for a conviction?"

"Pretty good, with the father's testimony," Rossetti said.

"He's not testifying," I said. "He said he'll do anything necessary to protect Billy from a jail term."

"Very noble. Watch what happens when they call him to the stand, though. My guess? He suddenly remembers something important-and very incriminating-about his son's behavior that night. He may even get all broken up about having to divulge it." He nodded to himself. "Look for tears. You won't find any. Unless the guy's even better than I think."

"I'll keep my eyes open."

"I'd put a pair in the back of your head, too," he said.

"Meaning?"

"You're playing in the big leagues now. Bishop is a billionaire. I don't think you fully understand what that implies. He has one thousand million dollars. That buys him reach you can't imagine. He's got police, politicians, and judges he can call for favors. He has powerful investor friends who rely on him to keep generating money for them. If you're a threat to him, you're a threat to them. They can come for you in a dozen different ways. You're expendable."

"I've been against the wall before," I said. Strangely, what I had in mind wasn't my having joined Trevor Lucas and the hostages he had maimed on the fifth floor of Lynn State Hospital -the case that had all but ended my work in forensics. I had my own childhood in mind-my having been held hostage on the third floor of a Lynn tenement house with a violent alcoholic. Making that connection bothered me. I had to wonder whether any of my suspiciousness of Darwin Bishop could be grounded in the ill will I felt for my father.

Rossetti blew out another long stream of smoke. "Don't get me wrong. I know you can take care of yourself, Franko. But you haven't been up against anything like Darwin Bishop. If you think you have, that's just another advantage he's got over you."

I took a deep breath. "I'll keep looking over my shoulder," I said. After a year away from forensics, just forty-eight hours back in it had put me in harm's way again. But I wasn't about to raise any white flag. "If this kid isn't guilty, he's not going away for life," I said. "I'm not going to let it happen."

"This one's important to you," Rossetti said. "Personally."

"Yes," I said.

"You want a hint where to look for the real Darwin Bishop?" Rossetti asked.

"Shoot."

" Russia. It's the Wild West over there. If this guy successfully adopted a kid out of that country, then he's connected to some very tough people."

"He built and sold two companies in Russia," I said.

"Then he's got loads of dirty laundry hanging out over there. I could put in a call to my buddy Viktor Golov. He runs an oil refinery outside St. Petersburg. He's got his finger on the pulse of business across Russia."

"I'd owe you one." I finished my coffee and put down a ten to cover Rossetti's as well. "I'll take care of us this time," I said. I turned to leave.

Rossetti caught my arm. "Thanks for the round," he said. "Just promise you'll take care of yourself." His face lost every trace of humor. "I mean it. Be careful."

I nodded. "I'll talk to you soon," I said. "Call me with anything from your friend Viktor."

I drove back over the Meridian Street bridge and took the left onto Spruce. I was planning to turn onto Winnisimmet and head home, but I knew home just meant more tossing and turning-at least I convinced myself that it did. I kept going straight, through the Chelsea Produce Market, headed for the Sir Galahad Motel and Lounge.