William Bernhardt: Primary Justice

Primary Justice

A Ben Kincaid Novel of Suspense (Book One)

William Bernhardt

A MysteriousPress.com

Open Road Integrated Media

Ebook

for my parents

“Among the virtues, some are primary and some are subordinate to these. The following are primary: wisdom, courage, justice.”

Zeno the Stoic

(c. 335-263 B.C.)

“It is the curse, as well as the fascination of the law, that lawyers get to know more than is good for them about their fellow human beings.”

John Mortimer, 1979

Prologue

“ONCE AGAIN,” THE MAN said, pulling the little girl along by the leash tied to his wrist and hers. “Tell me your name.”

“I don’t remember,” the girl said.

“Where do you live?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Are you from Tulsa?”

“I don’t remember.” The girl answered emotionlessly, like an automaton.

“Slower. Speak more hesitantly. It must seem as though you’re trying to remember. Who are your parents?”

“I don’t remember.”

The two emerged from the bottom of the gray stone stairwell and walked into the sunken parking garage. The rising sun was just visible in the high windows on the east side of the garage. The red corona was just beginning to filter across the skyline and cast an orange halo around the rooftops and skyscrapers of downtown Tulsa. Sunlight barely survived the passage through the dirty glass windows of the garage, though, and since the garage had little lighting of its own, the two figures remained enveloped in gray.

The two moved in concert, past an elevator shaft, across a double aisle of parked cars, toward a black sedan. The little girl, who appeared to be seven, perhaps eight, was dressed in a simple white pinafore over a blue dress, which accentuated the vivid blue of her eyes. Her face seemed unnaturally white, as if she had spent her entire life shielded from the sun. Her long black hair was pulled behind her head and tied in a French braid.

As they came near the sedan, the girl began to drag her heels. The leash connecting the two drew taut. The man turned and looked at her. He frowned but said nothing. He yanked firmly on the leash and pulled her toward him.

At that instant, a woman ran screaming out of the stairwell. She was wearing only a tattered blue bathrobe that flapped open as she ran. Her dark, unwashed hair hung limply from her head. She was barefoot. She was followed closely by another woman, an older, heavy-set woman wearing a white uniform. The large woman was also running, doing her best to catch up to the woman in the bathrobe.

The first woman ran across the garage, whimpering, her arms stretched forward. She looked frantically in all directions, then saw the man and the girl bound to him. She raced toward them. The heavyset woman could not keep pace.

The man stepped forward and pushed the little girl behind him. The woman ran without stopping and collided violently into his body, throwing the man back against the sedan. They wrestled for a moment, arms gyrating wildly, and the woman cut the man’s face with her fingernails. Angered, the man grabbed both her wrists and twisted them painfully behind her back.

The little girl began to cry. “Stop it!” she pleaded. “Stop it! You’re hurting her!” She kicked the man in the soft part of his right shin.

The man’s face was transfigured with rage. Clenching his teeth, he placed both of the woman’s wrists into his left hand and, with his right, he clutched the little girl by the neck and slammed her against the side of the sedan. The girl blinked rapidly and fell down in a limp heap on the gray stone floor.

At last the heavy-set woman caught up with them. While the man twisted both of his captive’s wrists behind her back, the other woman wrapped a thick, leather belt around her chest and upper arms. She pulled the leather belt tight. Reaching into her skirt pocket, she withdrew a syringe and, almost without looking at it, she pushed the air bubble through the tip and jabbed the needle into the struggling woman’s right arm. Almost instantaneously, the woman in the bathrobe relaxed. Her whole body seemed to weaken and become limp.

The man and the uniformed woman exchanged a quick, penetrating look. This won’t happen again , she told him, without speaking. Ever. She took hold of the leather belt and pushed the other woman toward the stairwell.

The man bent down next to the little girl’s body. He pulled open one of her eyelids, then placed his two forefingers against her neck. Fine.

Sunlight was beginning to penetrate the dirty windowpanes of the garage, and he realized that he was behind schedule. He had intended to be far away from here long before the sun rose. He opened the car door, bundled the girl into his arms, and spread her across the backseat of the sedan. He untied the leash and tossed it on the floor; then he closed the back door. Glancing quickly at his watch, he slid into the driver’s seat, started the engine, and hurriedly drove out of the parking garage.

PART ONE

A Bumblebee and Reverie

1

BENJAMIN KINCAID GLANCED AT his watch.

It was 9:05. Well, the recruiting coordinator had warned him that orientation might start late. Ben’s stomach growled—rather loudly. The other young lawyers looked up. Ben looked away, as if he had heard the rumbling noise somewhere on his far left. Should’ve gotten up early enough to fix breakfast, he thought. Professionals always eat breakfast. Strong body, strong mind, and all that. But he hadn’t risen until the third blast of the snooze alarm; he couldn’t risk being late on the first day of work, so he had to do without.

He drummed his fingers on a tabletop. A gnawing sensation, unrelated to hunger, was eating away at the pit of his stomach. He felt uneasy, and he didn’t know why.

He surveyed the room. The new class of associates at Raven, Tucker & Tubb were sitting in the office lobby, discreetly appraising one another. Six of them were men; two were women. The men wore suits that came in two colors: blue or gray, with the occasional daring leap to blue-gray or perhaps blue with a gray pinstripe. Every shirt was stiff, button-down, and white. The women were dressed in complex pseudo-suits with scarf ties and high-collar blouses; the kind of suit, Ben supposed, that didn’t threaten male colleagues, probably because women don’t look very good in them.

There was no conversation. Each young lawyer watched and waited.

Ben glanced at the thin, toothy young man in the gray suit sitting next to him.

“You suppose they’ve forgotten about us?” the man asked.

Ben smiled faintly. “I doubt it. They’re just busy. This is a very busy law firm.” What a pompous thing to say, Ben thought, immediately embarrassed by his third-rate small talk. As if he knew anything about the work load at Raven, Tucker & Tubb.

“That’s a fact,” the young man agreed. He had a drawn, pasty-white face, close-cropped brown hair, and a wispy beard covering a bad complexion. Every whisker was working overtime to create the illusion of a full beard. “Productivity is up by an average of eighteen percent, with variances for different departments. Litigation is up almost twenty-five percent; environmental, of course, is in the sewer. Gross revenues are up half a million dollars over the previous fiscal year. Given the current economic slump in the Southwest, that’s an extremely impressive financial performance.”

Ben stared at him. “How do you know these things?”

“Oh, I’ve done my research. I had numerous offers of employment, you know. I was in a position to be selective.” Ben was relieved to find his brief moment of pomposity completely eclipsed. “I see. By the way, my name is Ben Kincaid.”