The Justice Game

91

“Go easy on him,” Andrew sputtered.

Rafael laughed and turned toward Andrew, who had stepped a few feet away. “Go easy on him,” Rafael repeated, mocking his coconspirator. “We’re going to kill him, genius.”

“No, we’re not,” Andrew said. “I’ve been thinking this through.”

Though it was hard for Jason to see Andrew in the shadows, his voice had a desperate edge to it. Maybe he was starting to understand the monster he had unleashed. “We don’t need to risk murder charges. I’ve got a better way.”

“There is no other way,” insisted Rafael. “Let’s get it over with.”

He turned the flashlight on Andrew, and for the first time Jason noticed that his friend was wearing plastic gloves. In his right hand, he was holding Jason’s MD-45.

“I’ve already set them up,” Andrew said, his voice trembling now, his words coming out in a torrent. “The offshore investment companies I created to short the gun companies’ stocks have Jason’s and Kelly’s fingerprints all over them. I used their BlackBerry accounts to exchange e-mails about their conspiracy. We can drug them both, let them live, dump them outside the country. Everyone will assume they gamed the system and-”

“That’s not the plan,” Rafael said matter-of-factly. “Too many loose ends.”

“They can’t come back, because the police will be looking for them. We go to the cops first-”

Rafael shook his head, determined. “That’s not the plan.”

“If these two ever come back to the country, nobody will believe-”

“Shut up.”

The room went silent as Rafael shone the flashlight directly in Lassiter’s eyes. Andrew stared back at Rafael for a long moment-his eyes blinking, the neck twitching, every feature on his face reflecting his tortured conscience. He took a step back, raised the gun, and pointed it at Rafael and his ponytailed partner, back and forth, his arms trembling.

The man with the ponytail kept his gun trained on Jason. Rafael made no move for his own gun, tucked into the waist of his jeans.

Instead, he calmly took a few steps toward Andrew. “Pull the trigger,” Rafael taunted. “Let’s see if the genius has any guts.”

Andrew stiffened his arms, his face contorted. “Stop,” he said, but Rafael took another step. Andrew took a half step back. “Stop.”

Rafael just kept coming.

Andrew closed his eyes, flinched, and squeezed the trigger.

When nothing happened, Rafael reached for his own gun and smiled. “It always amazes me how dumb you genius types can be. Or maybe I just never told you that Jason’s gun has a safety lock that’s only released by his fingerprints.”

A look of sheer terror filled Andrew’s eyes. He dropped the gun and held his hands in front of him, as if to push the larger man away. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “I can get us out of this. Nobody has to die!”

“That’s where you’re wrong.” There was a smug grin on Rafael’s face, then a flash from the barrel of his gun, and a bullet ripped through Andrew Lassiter’s eye socket. He was blown backward, landing lifelessly on the row of seats behind him, his mouth open in midscream, blood trickling from the hole in his head.

Jason gagged and felt vomit rising in his throat. He heard another muffled scream from the front row.

The man with the ponytail stared at Lassiter’s lifeless body. “What the-?” He turned on Rafael. “Are you crazy?”

This brought another smile to Rafael’s face. “Tony. How long have you known me? Eight years? Nine?” Rafael put his gun back in the waist of his jeans. “I’ve got a plan, Tony. You know I don’t like loose ends.”

“But this is nuts,” Tony protested. “Out of control.”

“Think about it,” Rafael said. “Lassiter’s plan had a big problem. When you frame somebody, it’s got to be airtight. But if these two lawyers were going to fix the case, set up offshore companies to bet on the stocks and then run off with the money, why wouldn’t they wait until a few weeks after the verdict when the spotlight on them was gone? Why would they disappear while the jury was still deliberating, guaranteeing there would be a national manhunt for them? It doesn’t make sense.”

Tony shrugged. “I don’t know. But we’ve still got the same problem.”

“Not anymore.” Rafael smiled at the brilliance of what he was about to share. “Because now we’ve got three people missing. We make it look like the lawyers and Lassiter were all in the scam together. Lassiter gets greedy, anxious, whatever… jumps the gun, so to speak, and kills both lawyers. The police find the bodies of Jason and Kelly and a gun with Lassiter’s fingerprints. The money and Lassiter disappear forever.”

Even without seeing Tony’s face, Jason could sense the big man relaxing.

“See what I’m saying?” Rafael asked.

“Maybe,” said Tony, his voice still a little unsure. “But we shoulda talked about that first.”

The next part must have been planned in advance, because the men didn’t say a word as they pulled Jason from his seat and dragged him to the front of the theater. They pushed him into a seat a few chairs down from Kelly and cuffed Jason’s right wrist to the armrest.

In the shadows, Jason exchanged a glance with Kelly. She had a look of fierce determination.

To Jason’s surprise, Rafael reached down and peeled away the duct tape holding Jason’s gag. Jason spit the gag out and looked up at Johansen.

“Tony, shine that flashlight on the big screen,” Rafael said.

Tony did as he was told, propping the flashlight on the arm of one of the theater seats.

At the same time, Rafael started unwrapping the duct tape that held Kelly to her seat, talking as he did so. “We’re going to require your cooperation, Mr. Noble, in order to make this as painless as possible for your coconspirator here. The cops know that anybody can type a message into a BlackBerry. So I need you to leave a voice mail on Ms. Starling’s phone. You’re going to tell her to meet you and Andrew Lassiter at First Landing State Park. That will be the final resting place for you and your opposing counsel.”

This time it was Jason who scoffed. “Whatever you say.” He already knew he was going to die-why cooperate with the cover-up? “What’s the worst you can do, kill me?”

This made Rafael laugh-long and hard, as if Jason had just delivered the perfect punch line. Johansen took out a switchblade and pulled Kelly from her seat, her hands cuffed behind her back, her legs taped together, the gag still in place. “I’m glad you asked,” Rafael said. He pushed Kelly facedown on the floor and knelt on her back.

“Because you’re about to see the worst I can do.”