David Rosenfelt: Bury the Lead

That’s not it. “Carrie just walked the fuck out the door!” he screams.

Carrie is a seven-year-old Brittany spaniel, blind in one eye and as sweet as they come. Willie has just colorfully told me that she’s been adopted, and he goes on to say that her new parents are an elderly couple who are going to take her to live with them on their boat.

I’ve learned that there are few feelings better than rescuing a dog facing certain, anonymous death in an animal shelter and then sending that dog off to a happy life. It immediately cheers me up, and not even Willie’s question a few moments later can fully detract from that.

“You want some coffee?” he asks. “We’ve got Colombian roast, vanilla nut, cinnamon, hazelnut, and three kinds of decaf. I ordered one of those machines that make lattes, but it’s not here yet.” He pronounces “lattes” to rhyme with “fatties.”

For some reason, I don’t feel like coffee, so I leave for the airport to pick up Laurie, even though I’ll probably get there two hours early. My mood is not improved by the fact that I pass two hundred and thirty-seven Starbucks on the way, give or take a couple of hundred.

For years, Newark Airport stood as a monumental tribute to the arrogance of New Yorkers. It has always had great access by highways, ample parking, and not that much air traffic, so planes generally run on time. By comparison, the highways feeding JFK Airport are so jammed that it’s almost faster to walk, parking is a total pain, the terminals look like they were positioned by blindfolded dart throwers, and the planes are always late. Yet for a very long time, many upscale Manhattanites wouldn’t dream of taking off from or landing in Newark. The mere suggestion of it drew frowns, as if they were afraid they’d get cow dung on their shoes when they left the terminal. These attitudes have changed somewhat, but if you see somebody check the bottom of their shoes when they reach their car, you can still bet they’re heading toward Manhattan.

Being from New Jersey, I’m used to cow dung, so I don’t even look down as I walk to the terminal. Once I get there, boredom sets in, since the tightened security makes it impossible to get to restaurants or newspaper stands or even chairs, for that matter. All of those things are in that glorious land beyond security.

About twenty minutes before Laurie’s flight is scheduled to arrive, my cell phone rings. I think it might be her, calling to say she’s landed early and wondering where I’m waiting.

Instead, it’s Vince. “Where are you?”

“Newark Airport.”

“How fast can you get to Eastside Park?” he asks.

“I hope that’s a rhetorical question.”

“What?”

“How does a week from Tuesday sound?”

“Andy, I need you down here. There’s been another murder.”

I’m very sorry to hear that, of course, but there’s no way I’m leaving this airport alone. “Vince, I’m a lawyer. I don’t go to crime scenes. I hold up photographs of them in court.”

“Andy . . .”

It’s time to be firm. “I’ll have to read about it in the paper, Vince. Laurie is coming in, and-”

He cuts me off. “The victim is Linda Padilla.”

I’m outta here.

• • • • •

I’M OUT OF THE AIRPORT in five minutes, leaving Laurie to fend for herself. If Linda Padilla has been murdered, then this case is going to explode. And if Cummings is still in the middle of things, then as his lawyer, I have to make sure it doesn’t explode in his face.

Four years ago Linda Padilla was a middle-level bureaucrat working in the State Housing Administration. Having grown up in low-income housing herself, she was aware of the rather large need for improvement in most of these developments.

What she had not been aware of was a conspiracy among some of those above her to embezzle money meant for housing construction. When she discovered it, she feared that it would be swept under the rug, so she went public with the revelations. People went to jail, others turned state’s evidence, and she became an instant media star.

Superstar whistle-blowers don’t remain in bureaucracies long, and Padilla left to start a watchdog operation. Emboldened by her actions and aware of her reputation, others in different areas of government and the private sector started coming to her with their tales of official and executive wrongdoing. Padilla eagerly and effectively presented them to the world. It wasn’t long before people in power were, if not cowering, at least fearful of becoming her next target.

Padilla took advantage of her fame to become very wealthy. She was a highly sought-after figure on the lecture circuit, and the word was, she could command more than fifty thousand dollars per speech. She also wrote a best-selling book on her exploits; she had reinvented herself as a cottage industry and made a fortune in the process.

Three months ago Padilla announced her candidacy for governor in next year’s election. The public responded almost instantly, and poll after poll showed that she had the very real potential to turn the state’s political landscape upside down.

But Vince’s words make all that moot, and her murder is likely to initiate a media earthquake. I listen to the radio on the way there, and the news is sketchy at this point. All that is known is that Linda Padilla has been killed, and there is speculation that she is in fact the latest victim of the serial killer that has been stalking the area.

It takes me almost twenty minutes to get to Eastside Park and another ten minutes to work my way close to the crime scene. If I were a looter anywhere else in New Jersey, I’d be salivating, since there’s no doubt that every cop in the state is here in Eastside Park. There are so many car lights and floodlights that it seems like daytime, though it’s approaching nine P.M.

Since in the eyes of the police I have no standing in this case, I’m limited as to how close I can get. I’m trying to maneuver around that problem by finding cops I recognize when I see Vince pointing to me and talking to an officer. The officer nods and comes over to get me, bringing me inside the barricades. As I walk toward Vince, I look around but don’t see Daniel Cummings.

Vince grabs me by the arm. “Come on.”

He starts taking me toward the crime scene, which means we have to navigate through what seems to be five million people.

“Where’s Cummings?” I ask.

“With the state police.”

“Was he contacted by the killer?”

He laughs a short laugh. “Yeah. You might say that.”

A few moments later I understand his cryptic comment. Cummings is leaning back on a chair as a paramedic bandages his head. It appears the bandage is protecting a wound on the left side of his temple.

The medic finishes and nods silently to Captain Millen, the state cop who ran the press conference and who is in charge of what is rapidly becoming a train wreck of a case. Millen walks over to Cummings and starts talking to him.

“So, Mr. Cummings, you feeling okay?” I can tell his concern lacks something in the sincerity department, since he does not wait for a response. “Tell me everything that happened tonight. Leave out nothing.”

Cummings frowns his displeasure at this. “Captain, I already told the story to the officer. Can’t you-”

“No, I want to hear it from you.”

“Captain Millen, my name is Andy Carpenter,” I say, my voice deep and powerful so as to convey my authority. “I’m representing Mr. Cummings.”

“Good for you.” He doesn’t seem to be cowed.

“My client is obviously injured.”

“And Linda Padilla is obviously dead. So stop interrupting or I’ll have you obviously removed.”