William Lashner - Fatal Flaw

“I’ll make a call to my contact in Nevada. Have him ask Cutlip some tougher questions.”

“And what will that get you? You might shake him up a bit, but if he suspects he’s a suspect, you won’t get very far. He’s a tough old bird. He’ll clam up, shed crocodile tears over his niece, claim ill health, deny everything. I know, I’ve seen him do it. Better to leave him alone.”

“Then maybe I’ll ask my contact to give Bobo a roust.”

“Bobo killed her. It seems clear now, doesn’t it?”

Breger merely looked away.

“He killed her. And I’ll tell you something else: He’s the mystery man in black rushing out of the house. He was inside looking for something, and when the Forensic Unit technician showed up, he rushed out and beat her all to hell. With his hands scratched up like they were, you couldn’t see the bruises from the beating. But he’s the one.”

“It’s possible.”

“So what are you going to do about it?”

“I told you.”

“What about you convincing Jefferson to drop the case?”

He shook his head.

“You’ll at least tell him what you heard.”

“Jefferson wants evidence or nothing. What I heard is not evidence.”

“What more do you need?”

“Facts, maybe. Proof. If my guy grabs a confession out of Bobo, I’ll talk to Jefferson, but I can’t without that. You’ve raised a lot of questions, but there still aren’t many answers, including the big one. Cutlip may be a murderer, he may have killed Jesse Sterrett fifteen years ago out of jealousy or hate, but why would he send Bobo off to kill Hailey? Why would he want her dead?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“Maybe when you find an answer we can do some business. But I’ll tell you flat-out, Carl, without a confession Jefferson is going to stay on after your boy to the end, that’s just the way he is. And the way the trial is going now, it looks like he’s going to get him.”

“I’ve been making some headway.”

“Some,” he said. “But not enough to overcome the fingerprints. Not enough to overcome the motive. Not enough to overcome the fact that only your client was in that house. And it doesn’t help you blaming some mystery lover for the crime if you think Cutlip did it.”

“A lawyer’s got to lawyer.”

“That’s the problem with you guys. A surgeon’s going to cut, a hunter’s going to shoot, a lawyer’s going to lie. I’ll make the call to my contact. If Bobo says something interesting, I’ll give it to Jefferson, who has to give it to you under Brady . That’s all I can do.”

“And if Bobo gives you nothing?”

“Then start gathering character witnesses for the sentencing phase, because you’ll need them.”

“You’ll tell me what happens in Vegas?”

“I’ll tell you.”

I stood in the cemetery, thinking things through. I thought of the trial, what had happened already, what still needed to be proved. I was at a loss. What could I do? How I could raise the level of doubt?

“Detective,” I said finally, “I might need a favor.”

He didn’t say anything, he just stood there with his shoulders hunched as if waiting for the weight of the world to drop down upon him.

“There might come a moment when Troy Jefferson gets sputteringly angry at something I do, and he’s going to come to you for some additional proof.”

“Same old same old.”

“When he does, this time I want you to whisper something in his ear.”

“Go ahead.”

“Just one word.”

“Go ahead.”

“Will you do it?”

“I’ll consider it, maybe, depending on the word. And in exchange.”

“In exchange for what?”

“Your phone logs.”

“Don’t do that. Don’t go there.”

“That’s the deal.”

“I’m asking for one little thing, one word in his ear, just one word.”

“I understand what you’re asking. And it is not any little thing.”

“The logs aren’t even mine to give up. It’s up to the client.”

“Talk to him. Tell him that’s the deal.”

“You don’t know what you’re asking.”

“Let’s go, we’ve got ourselves a plane to catch.”

“You have no idea what you are asking.”

“Oh, I have an idea,” he said. “I have plenty of an idea. Yes I do.”

And I believed then that he did.

“AND YOUthink this bastard, Hailey’s Uncle Larry, actually killed her?” asked Guy as the two of us sat alone in the gray lawyer-client conference room in the county jail. I had just told him everything I’d learned in Pierce, the whole ugly story.

“I think he sent his lackey, Bobo, to kill her, yes.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“Any idea?”

“Maybe she threatened to take away the money he needed for his luxury nursing home. Or maybe he was sick of his luxury nursing home and wanted the insurance money for a new stake. Who knows? It could be anything. But he did it.”

“What can we do about it?”

“I don’t know. There’s a chance maybe this Bobo will turn against him. There’s a cop in Nevada that’s going to get him alone in a room and ask some tough questions.”

“And if that gets us nothing?”

I didn’t say anything. I kept perfectly still and waited.

“What do we do, Victor? What do I do?”

I waited some more, and then I said, “I have an idea, but it’s risky.”

“What is it? Tell me.”

“If it doesn’t work, it will blow up in our faces.”

“Go ahead, Victor. What is it?”

I leaned forward and clasped my hands on the table and told him what I would have to do and then what Breger would have to do and then what Jefferson would have to do and then what I would have to do.

“Jesus. That’s all you could think of, that risky Rube Goldberg contraption of a defense?”

“It is, yes. And the thing is, the trial’s gone pretty well for us so far. Our gambit with the headphones worked out great. I think the possibility that someone else might have entered that house and killed Hailey has come alive for the jury. I think we have a pretty decent chance of winning this thing outright, without the risk. We’ve created a suspect, the other lover, and I think we’ve created enough of a hole in the prosecution’s case for the jury to find both opportunity and motive. Our argument at the end of this case will be as strong as I could have hoped.”

“Are you guaranteeing an acquittal?”

“No, I can’t guarantee a thing, you know that, but we have a decent chance.”

“I don’t want to hear about chances. I need to get out of here.”

“But there’s something else. You know how they keep asking for my phone records and I keep refusing and the judge keeps upholding my refusal based on attorney-client privilege?”

“Yes.”

“Well, the whole plan only works if Breger does his part, and Breger will only do his part if we offer up, in exchange, my phone records.”

“So?”

I stood, walked to the narrow window to look upon another wall. This is why I had come alone, why I had left Beth at the office to work up some motions. “Guy, they want to know about the phone call you made to me on the night of the murder.”

Guy stared at me for a moment, thinking of that night, that horrible night, thinking of what he had done when he stepped out of the tub. “Oh,” he said.

“They have questions about that call that haven’t been resolved by your own phone logs.”

“Oh, I see.”

“I haven’t asked you this yet, but it’s time. Why hasn’t the phone call you made to me shown up on your phone records?”

“I was flustered. I was scared. I… I couldn’t remember your number.”