Lisa Scottoline - Mistaken Identity

Bennie’s head snapped around as the guard unlocked the door on the inmate’s side of the no-contact room and let Connolly in. Then he closed the soundproof door and stood directly outside it. Inmates weren’t left unguarded for no-contact visits and especially not tonight. Bennie faced Connolly, who plunked down in her chair, her cuffed wrists slipping between her legs. She looked sleepy and less attractive than before, since her makeup had worn off. Or maybe because Bennie knew the truth about her.

“Now what?” Connolly said. The metal grate under the window drained the humanity from her tone, though Bennie was becoming convinced she had none anyway.

“Busy night up here, isn’t it?”

“Shit, yeah. Sirens. Assholes everywhere. Lockdown. They keep waking us up. I can’t get any rest.”

“The only ones who can are Valencia Mendoza and Leonia Page.”

Connolly blinked. “This is true.”

“That’s a good start. Let’s talk about what’s true.” Bennie sat down and glared through the plastic at Connolly. “You killed Valencia.”

“No.”

“You killed Leonia.”

“No.”

“Tell the truth.”

“I have.”

“I’m sick of your lying,” Bennie said through clenched teeth, and Connolly grinned crookedly.

“Nobody’s sicker than me.”

It took Bennie aback momentarily. “I found out Valencia was dealing for you and told you that the last time I saw you.”

“I’m not a dealer.”

“Yes, you are. You and Della Porta were in it together. I found your nest egg tonight. Half a million bucks under your living room floor. You killed Valencia to shut her up.”

Connolly’s head flopped to the side and she covered her eyes with her cuffed hands, but when she moved her hands to the side, she was grinning. “Peekaboo.”

“This isn’t a game. I asked you a question. You killed Valencia, didn’t you? And you killed Della Porta, too.”

“No,” Connolly said. “I didn’t kill Anthony, I told you that.”

“I don’t believe a word you say, not after this. You’re a liar, you’re a cheat. You sell drugs for money and you murder without remorse. You just stabbed two people to death and you’re pissed because we’re keeping you up.”

“I didn’t kill Anthony, I swear.”

“Fuck you.”

“Fuck you back,” Connolly said evenly, then rose and pressed her face to the bulletproof glass. Her eyes loomed cold and furious, though her expression had hardly changed. “Get up. Stand up.”

“Why?”

“You want the truth, stand the fuck up.”

Bennie stood up and leaned close to the glass, almost eye-to-eye with the inmate who looked exactly like her. With their matching haircuts, tense and exhausted expressions, and lack of makeup, they could have been a single woman leaning close to a mirror. None of this was lost on Bennie, who fought to maintain emotional control.

“Fine,” Connolly said, “I lied before. I sold coke and rock for a living. Lyman Bullock, who I fucked silly, laundered the money and socked it where nobody will ever find it, for a very healthy cut. I had a good organization, with good workers, the boxers’ wives. I ran those girls like you run yours. Better. ”

Bennie struggled to contain her thoughts, in tumult.

“I capped Valencia and that black bitch. You have to, doing what I do. It’s a cost of doing business.” Connolly’s gaze bored into Bennie. “But the truth is, I did not kill Anthony.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You should. That went down the way I told you. The cops did it, I swear to God. That’s the truth.”

“The cops? Why?”

“Money, of course. We started out in business with them, Anthony did, but I could see we could do better without them. They were deadweight, and we didn’t need them for distribution, we had the girls. So we went solo and started cuttin’ in on their action. We were gettin’ bigger and bigger, and they musta got wind of it. I think they killed Anthony because of it and set me up for the murder. Anthony always said they had friends in high places, but I have no way to prove it. That’s where you come in.”

“You expect me to prove it,” Bennie said, her mouth dry as bone.

“You’re goddamn right I do. You have to prove those shits did it. I didn’t kill Anthony, they did. It goes all the way to the top. The D.A., the judge. They’re all in on it. They have to be.”

Bennie’s head throbbed dully. That much of it rang true, after the way Judge Guthrie had acted in his office. But could it be true? Could Connolly be guilty of everything but Della Porta’s murder?

“Now you’re my lawyer, you can’t get out, and you have to prove me innocent.”

“Innocent is the last word I’d use.”

“Whatever. And while I’m spilling my guts, everything I told you about Winslow was true, except I made up that blood syndrome and the dream shit.” Connolly’s hands pressed against the glass. Her manacled wrists made her fingers look like the jointed legs of a wolf spider. “Fact is, I don’t know if I’m your twin and I don’t care. I don’t need a sister, I don’t need anybody. As soon as you get me off, I’m outta your life. Got it, sis ?”

“Don’t ever call me that,” Bennie snapped, and withdrew from the divider.

Bennie spent the night driving around the city in the dark, with the dog asleep in the back. She didn’t know where she was headed; she had nowhere to go. She didn’t want to go home and she couldn’t bring herself to return to Connolly’s apartment. She didn’t belong anywhere anymore. She had lost herself.

At dawn she drove home and slipped into bed beside a deeply snoring Grady. The sound used to make Bennie smile, but tonight nothing could do that. She didn’t sleep, just lay there, and finally got up to work in her home office, since it was Saturday. Then she showered, dressed, and avoided her lover’s inquiries until it was time to go and bury her mother.

Bennie’s shoulders sagged in the smooth oak pew as she sat through the Mass at the Catholic church in her mother’s old neighborhood. The church was shabby and small; though neat and well kept, with brown marble arches and walls the color of cantaloupe. Red votive candles flickered in stepped rows to the right of the altar, before a statue of the Virgin Mary, which Hattie prayed to before the Mass began. Bennie didn’t bother, on the assumption that her previous prayers had been ignored. The facts spoke for themselves, as lawyers say.

Her mother’s casket remained in the aisle, draped in a white cloth, dignified except for the steel gurney peeking from under the cover. Bennie avoided looking to the left, and still couldn’t completely comprehend that her mother was gone, entertaining a child’s doubt that her mother was in fact in the coffin. Then she remembered: They’d held a brief service at the funeral home, where Bennie had said a final good-bye and lightly rubbed her mother’s hand. She hadn’t even minded that the hand felt cold, even hard, because it was the last time. Then she held Hattie when the funeral director asked them to leave the room, and Bennie knew that they were going to close the casket then and seal her mother inside. So of course her mother was in there. Of course.

Bennie chased the thoughts from her head as the Mass began, with heavy organ music and a lone tenor who sang “Ave Maria.” She had always regarded “Ave Maria” as the Church’s trump card at funerals, but resisted tears by concentrating on the goings-on at the altar. Two young girls were assisting at the ceremony, which Bennie noted as a political matter, and she chose not to focus on the words of the old priest. At the end of the Mass, the priest stepped from the altar, his white robes swaying, swinging a large ball of incense that trailed dark and pungent smoke. The smoke filled her nose and brought tears brimming to her eyes, as the priest said something about how her mother was surrendering her body and spirit to Jesus Christ. Bennie knew her mother had surrendered her body and spirit to something quite different, a long time ago, with no choice in the matter. And it wasn’t anything half as benevolent as Jesus Christ.