James Grippando - Last to die

“Did he go away?”

“No way.” Miguel lowered his eyes and said sadly, “And it was our daughter who paid.”

Jack paused in mid-sip, putting down his tea. “Are you saying this stalker killed your daughter?”

“Can’t prove it. Especially since Sally never told anyone about him stalking her until after our daughter was killed. If she had reported him, we would have had something to go on. As it was, the guy just vanished after the murder. Cops had no trail to follow.”

“So he was never charged?”

“No one was ever charged.”

“Did they ever name any suspects?”

“No. But they did give me a polygraph. Schmucks. Can’t find the guy who did it, so they go hassle the daddy.”

Jack paused, trying to be delicate. “How did that turn out?”

“Exactly the way Sally and me knew it would. They asked me three different ways: Did you kill your daughter, did you stab your daughter, did you harm your daughter in any way? I passed with flying colors.”

“You still think it was the stalker who did it?”

“No doubt in my mind. I mean, who else? How many enemies does an innocent little girl have?”

“Do you blame Sally for the fact that he got away with it?”

“No way. I’m a cop. I’m not the kind of guy who blames the victim.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“But somehow Sally got it fixed in her head that I thought it was all her fault. Once that happened, our marriage was over. I’m sure that’s why I’m in her little game now. I was probably the first one on her list.”

“But you’re not the only one on her list.”

“No. Obviously not.”

“Why are the others on there? Any idea?”

The waitress brought their food. “Here we go,” she said, setting their plates before them. “Anything else I can get you?”

“No, thanks,” they said in unison.

The waitress left. Miguel was pouring cocktail sauce on his conch fritters. Jack was still waiting for an answer, but with the waitress’s interruption, Miguel had apparently lost track of the question. Jack asked again, “Do you know why the others are on Sally’s list?”

Miguel had a mouthful of fritters. He shrugged and said, “You’ll have to ask them.”

Jack nodded, then looked at his plate of food. But he’d suddenly lost interest in eating. “I intend to,” he said.

Jack was back in his office by three o’clock. He had a deposition after lunch, and he’d expected it to last the rest of the day, but the opposition had stormed out early when Jack refused to stop asking the witness to explain how he’d completely singed off his eyebrows if, as alleged, it was Jack’s client who’d torched his own business.

“Mr. Valentes, I’m going to keep asking this question until you tell me exactly what happened to those eyebrows.”

“What eyebrows?”

“That’s my point.”

“That’s it, Swyteck. We’re outta here!”

Miami was a living and breathing anthology of the History of Stupid Criminals.

The strong smell of Cuban coffee hit him as soon as he entered the office. Maria had his afternoon jolt of caffeine ready. She’d been his secretary for almost seven years, starting with his second day on the job as a federal prosecutor and following him into private practice. With the dust barely clear from his divorce, it was comforting to know that he was actually capable of a stable, long-term relationship of any sort with the opposite sex. He didn’t consider himself picky in the romance department, but after his marriage to Cindy Paige, he did have certain minimum requirements-sanity being chief among them. Of course, his maternal grandmother, Abuela, as he called her, would even waive the sanity test if Jack would just bring home a nice Cuban girl. Too bad Maria was married.

“How’d the depo go, Jack?” she asked as she handed him his taza of espresso.

“Same old, same old.”

She smiled and shook her head, as if all too aware that a quip like that could mean anything from utter boredom to an all-out fistfight.

Jack headed down the hall to his office, past the conference room that doubled as his library. He noticed Kelsey was busy at the table, doing a Westlaw search on the computer. She was wearing running shoes and black spandex exercise leggings that revealed just enough of the former ballerina to confirm that somewhere under that big, baggy aerobics T-shirt was one amazing body.

“Expecting clients today?” he said as he stuck his head into the room.

She checked her attire. “Sorry. I just stopped by on my way to Body and Soul.”

He assumed she wasn’t talking about some kind of new-wave religion. “Have a good workout.”

“Thanks.”

He started out the door, then stopped and came back into the room. “Actually, I have a favor to ask of you.”

“Sure. What?”

“It’s on the Sally Fenning matter. I met with her ex-husband for lunch.”

“How’d that go?”

He took a minute to bring her up to speed, telling her all about the stalker that Miguel thought was responsible for the death of their daughter. He also told her how Sally had apparently come to think that he blamed her for the whole tragedy.

“What’s your take?” asked Kelsey. “He the kind of guy who blames the victim?”

“He says he’s not. And he didn’t come across that way.”

“A good guy, or just talks a good game?”

“Not sure. I did pull his divorce file, just to see if there might be any insights.”

“And?”

“It played out just the way he said. Even though this shark Gerry Colletti was his lawyer, Miguel kept him on a pretty short leash. Sally got all the assets, Miguel took the debt. Not much of a fight there.”

“Which makes you wonder: Why is the divorce lawyer on her list of enemies?”

“Exactly,” he said. “And that’s exactly where you come in.”

Kelsey grabbed her pen and paper, as if eager for the assignment.

“Okay.”

“Put the pen down. This isn’t research.”

She smiled. “You mean I’m actually going to get to do something outside the library?”

“Maybe. Here’s the deal. I can accept the fact that Sally structured her estate in a way that would torture her ex-husband into thinking that he might someday come into big money. I don’t have children, but just from my relationship with Nate, I know that if someone blamed me for the brutal murder of my child, there would be no limit to the anger I would feel.”

“Ditto.”

“But like you said, that doesn’t explain the divorce lawyer. In fact, absolutely nothing came out during my talk with Miguel Rios that shed any light on why Sally felt the same anger toward any of the other beneficiaries.”

“You think there’s something Mr. Rios is not telling you?”

“Something he’s not telling me, or something he just doesn’t know.”

“How do we plug the hole?”

“I talked to Tatum right after lunch. The way he met Sally was through a referral from her bodyguard. Tatum says the bodyguard is willing to talk with me tonight. He moonlights as a bouncer at a club on South Beach and said he’d give me a few minutes on his break. He could be a real window into Sally’s head.”

“No doubt about it. How can I help?”

“I’d like you to come with me.”

“Wow. Real sleuthing. The kind of work any third-year law student would die for.”

“I have to confess. I feel a little guilty about asking you.”

“Why? Because you need to interview a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal, and you think he’s more likely to talk to a good-looking woman than to Jack Swyteck?”

Jack took a half-step back, surprised. “How…did you know that?”