John Katzenbach - The Wrong Man

Her instinct was to hire her own lawyer, but she held off on this for the moment. Instead, she took the entirety of the home-equity line of credit that she had on the house she shared with Hope and deposited that amount back into the client account, zeroing it out, while at the same time putting herself, and her unwary partner, into significant debt. It would take some months, she thought, to earn the income to undo the financial damage that had taken place, but, she hoped, at least for the interim she was safe.

She drafted a letter to the state bar association carefully. It outlined some of the transactions and said that they were performed by an unknown party, but that she had restored the client account out of her own funds and, in concert with the bank, rendered it safe from another electronic assault. She hoped that this letter would forestall any action by a prosecutor, or state bar investigation, at least until she determined who had done this to her. She thought of requesting information about who had complained to the bar association, but, she knew, until they had decided to pursue the matter themselves, they weren’t going to tell her how the complaint had arrived at their offices. So she was destined to be kept in the dark for some time to come.

Sally had never really thought of herself as a particularly tough-minded lawyer. Her strongest suit was mediation, getting opposing sides to agree. She hated those moments where compromise was no longer a possibility.

But when she wheeled around in her office chair, staring at the printed-out piles of paper transactions that littered her desktop, she felt nothing but despair. Whoever had done this, she thought, must truly hate me.

That posed a question that she was reluctant to ask, because no one manages to have a viable legal practice, especially handling the dissolutions of marriages, custody cases, and small-time criminal actions, without making some enemies. Most merely bluster and complain. Some take additional steps.

But who? she asked herself.

It had been many months since someone had angrily threatened her, at least in any sort of credible way. The thought that there might be someone out in the world with the patience and the ability to plan an attack against her made her bite down hard on her bottom lip.

Sally leaned back, swiveling about, and realized that she was going to have to tell Hope about what had happened. She was unsure about doing this. There had been so much tension between them, and now, suddenly, they were in significant financial stress.

It did occur to her to call the police, because, after all, a robbery had taken place.

But this went against the grain for her, as it would many attorneys. And until she knew more or had a better picture of who had done this and why this had happened, she really didn’t want a detective crawling all over a case file.

Sort it out, she told herself. Sort it out by yourself.

Sally grabbed her briefcase, stuffed as many papers into it as she could, and abruptly rose, moving rapidly out the door, grabbing her overcoat as she went. The offices had emptied out, and she locked up, then moved quickly through the stairwell and out to the street. For an instant, the cold air seemed to confuse her, and she lifted her hand to her forehead as if she were suddenly dizzy. In that second she could not even remember where she had parked her car. The world swirled around her, and she inhaled sharply once, almost as if she were having a panic attack. Her fists balled up and she felt a sudden jab of pain. Her heart was racing in her chest, her temples throbbing, and she seized a nearby wall to steady herself.

Sally told herself to be orderly, to be organized. Get control, she insisted.

Her car was where it always was, in the parking garage. She buttoned her coat and slowed her breathing to normal, feeling the pressure in her chest and in the pit of her stomach diminish. But as she regained control over all the sensations that had threatened to overcome her, she felt suddenly as if she were no longer alone. She spun about, but the sidewalk was empty, save for the few students crawling in and out of a nearby coffee shop. The traffic on the main street of town was moving along normally. A bus whooshed its air brakes as it settled into the stop across the street in front of an old theater. Everything she could see was as it should be. Everything was in place, settled and normal.

Only nothing was.

She took another deep breath and moved off steadily toward the garage. A part of her wanted to run, and it was all she could do to keep from breaking into a trot, as the evening darkness slid over her and wan light from streetlights and storefronts carved out small sanctuaries against the growing night.

“You know, even with this so-called release, and a signed one at that, I’m a little uncomfortable speaking of things told to me in confidence.”

“That’s your prerogative,” I said, filled with false generosity. “I completely understand your position.” In my words, I was trying to install the exact opposite suggestion.

“Do you?” he asked.

The psychologist was a small, impish sort, with curly hair streaked with gray that swirled haphazardly around his collar as if attached to odd and conflicted ideas hidden inside his scalp. He wore glasses that gave him a slightly buglike appearance, and he had a curious mannerism. He would finish speaking an idea, then wave his hand in the air to punctuate the words.

“After all,” he continued, “I’m not sure that the impact that Michael O’Connell had on these people has yet been fully realized.”

“How do you mean?” I asked.

He sighed. “I think one way you can consider this is to think of him entering their lives in much the same way as an auto accident, perhaps one caused by a drunk driver. A moment of loss, a moment of fear, a moment of conflict, however you want to see it. But the residue lasts for years, perhaps even forever. Lives changed. Ashes and agony for a very long time. That’s what you’re looking at, in this case.”

“But-”

“I just don’t know if I can speak about it,” he said abruptly. “Some things said in this office need to be sacrosanct, even if I support your telling the story. Although I’m not sure that I do. Haven’t really thought it through. And I sure as hell would hate to say one thing or another and then suddenly get a subpoena from some authorities, or have to open my door to a couple of Columbo-type detectives in ill-fitting suits, and playing a whole helluva lot dumber than they really are. Sorry.”

I sighed, not really knowing whether to be frustrated or respectful. He gave a wide smile and shrugged.

“Well,” I said, “so that my trip here isn’t an entire waste, can you at least explain to me some of the ins and outs of O’Connell’s obsessive love with Ashley?”

The psychologist snorted, suddenly angry. “Love. Love! My God, what had it to do with that word? There is one thing you need to know about the psychological makeup of a Michael O’Connell. It is about possession. ”

“Yes,” I said, “I suppose I can see that. But what did he get? It wasn’t about money. It wasn’t about desire. It wasn’t passion. And yet, in a way, it seems, from what I know so far, that it was about all those things.”

He leaned back in his chair, then rocked forward abruptly.

“You’re being far too literal,” he said. “A bank robbery says something concrete. Perhaps even the drug deal, or shooting the late-night clerk at the convenience store. Serial killing and repetitive rapes. Those sorts of crimes are far more easily defined. This was not. Michael O’Connell’s proclaimed love was a crime about identity. And thus, became something far greater, far more profound. Far more devastating.”