Т Паркер - Where Serpents Lie

I hadn’t thought about the cost of my nightmare before this. Nothing is free, not even hell. I had about eighty bucks in my wallet — which was in the possession of the county. I had four hundred in a checking account, eighteen hundred in a savings account and ten grand in an IRA I couldn’t use without penalties. I had a Ford, eight years old, worth maybe nine grand on the market. I’d put thirty thousand toward the down payment on the Canyon Edge place, to match Melinda’s thirty. It was all the savings I had at the time.

“I can get it.”

“The sooner the better, Terry. I’ll send Alex from County-Wide over — you two work it out. I’m going to need five to get us through the arraignment. After that, we can talk. I’m not cheap but I am good. If you can afford someone you think is better, hire him.”

“I called you because I want you.”

“I’m proud to represent you, then.”

“When do you want the dough?”

“Tomorrow.”

“I’ll have it.”

He nodded and looked at me. It was a long, thoughtful gaze, his pale blue eyes trying to sap something out of me, but I wasn’t sure what it was. “We’ll get you out of here, sooner than later. With luck, and without Ogden, we’ll have you O-R’d and out before lunch. Until then, stay cool.”

I nodded but I didn’t say anything. It was strange, very strange, to have a friend. In fact, I’d never been so grateful to have a friend in all my life.

“Loren, I’m being framed.”

“That’s pretty obvious. We’re going to have to find out by whom. Listen, I don’t want you to say any names yet. Not here. Not now. But I do want you to tell me one thing: do you think you know who it is?”

I held his stare, then shook my head.

“All right.”

“When can I talk to the press?”

He looked at me quizzically. “Don’t, Terry. It’s going to be tough sledding, when they get hold of this one.”

“I want a conference.”

“No. And I’ll tell you why. The reporters will murder us whether you talk to them or not — and if you do, anything you say can be used against you by the media and, possibly, by the DA. There’s no confidentiality if you start making statements in public. Some defendants can get sympathy through the press, but it won’t work for us with these charges. I don’t have to tell you why. The more you show your face the more you make yourself a target. You think you can handle all the dirt they’ll dig?”

“I didn’t do it, Loren.” I never, never thought I’d see the day when I reminded myself of the sniveling men I’d arrested so many times. I looked at him, then down at the table in front of me. I could feel my mind begin to fog up, then to haze over into a stupor. I felt like a vessel taking on water. I tried to fight it off. I was not sure, for just a moment, that this was actually happening. Loren Runnels’s hard-eyed stare assured me that it was.

“Look, they’re going to dig and dig hard. Whatever privacy you think you had, you can forget. They’ll go back to your schooling. Back to your training. Your marriage, your divorce, your relationships. They’ll go back to what happened to your son. They’ll turn every stone and turn it again. You want to answer for everything you’ve ever done? We can’t look good, doing that. We can’t look good to anybody at this point, Terry, we can only look bad. You’re on the defensive. When we get you out of here we go on the offensive. That’s why you’ve got me. Use me. I’ll tell the media what they need to know, when they need to know it. Right now, you’re going to have to endure all the assumptions people might make. That’s your part of our deal here. It’s hard and I know it’s hard. But fuck ’em for now, Terry. That’s how you’ve got to think. I’ve got a good team of investigators and we can get you out of this. I know a photographic examiner who can analyze those photos — Will Fortune — he’s ex-FBI and he’s the best there is. I’ve talked to him. He’ll cost you a hundred and fifty an hour, plus a hundred an hour to travel. Your time will come. Be patient.”

“I have to say something. ”

“You are. Tomorrow you’re going to tell the world you’re not guilty.”

I was arraigned in Superior Court 8, the Honorable Lewis Sewell presiding. Sewell is generally considered to be an old-time conservative, tough on crime, efficient in his courtroom. I had testified before him several times, and always liked the economy of his proceedings. He was a prosecutor’s judge. Now I dreaded him.

The county courtrooms are large, modern and somewhat sterile. They hint of bureaucratic dispatch rather than the halls-of-justice drama you find in older, more seasoned ones. The room was jammed. The back part was irate citizens, all eager to see with their own eyes the cunning pervert once entrusted with the protection of their children. There was a bristling phalanx of reporters in the front rows, at least four sketch artists set up to capture me for their newspapers and networks. I immediately realized the wisdom of Loren’s refusing to let me talk to the media right then. Those people were there to crucify me, pure and simple, just like Donna had said. There were no cameras in Sewell’s court, for which I was profoundly grateful. I recognized people from the Times and Register, OC Weekly, KFWB and KNX radio and a rather beautiful reporter for CNB, Donna Mason. She looked up from the ranks as I was led in. Her pencil was poised over a reporter’s notebook and the look on her face was unrevealing. She looked at me without any visible trace of personal interest, which sent my guts into a free fall. But, under the circumstances, what else could she do?

I sat beside Loren in my street clothes, which he was kind enough to have sent in earlier that morning. He explained that the street clothes were a risky move: he wanted the court to see me at my nominal best, but he didn’t want Sewell to think I assumed I’d be walking into the late April sunshine of Orange County in a matter of minutes. I had shaved and combed my hair, which was still wet from the dribble of water from my protective custody faucet.

He slipped the Times and Register morning editions onto the table before me and I scanned the headlines, both quite large:

and

“This is hard to look at,” I whispered to Loren.

“That’s just the breeze,” he said. “Here’s the wind.”

He slid the papers back into his briefcase, then set down our copy of the complaint. I read through the list of witnesses to be called against me:

Joe Reilly, Director, Orange County Sheriff Department Forensic Laboratory

Karl Neelson, Deputy Director, Orange County Sheriff Department Forensic Laboratory

Margo Fixx, Assistant Director, Orange County Sheriff Department Forensic Laboratory

Lieutenant Jordan Ishmael, Orange County Sheriff Department

Deputy Alonzo Arriaga

Deputy Edward Reston

Deputy Frances White

Timothy Monaghan, Special Agent F.B.I., Washington, D.C.

Laurie Mize, Special Agent F.B.L, Washington, D.C

Alton Allen Sharpe

Caryn Lynn Sharpe

Linda Elizabeth Sharpe

Melinda Ellen Vickers

Penelope Anne Ishmael

I think my breath was short by then.

I know it was by the time I read the items listed in search warrants for my home and workplace: