Critical Conditions

Thirty-seven

I had the tape. Now what?

No scenario crossed my mind that would help me do anything productive with it. As far as I knew, only Merritt, Brad, and I knew the tape existed. I had Merritt’s permission to share the fact of the tape with Cozy. That didn’t mean I could show it to him. What good would it do for him to see it, anyway?

For some reason-I would have to indulge in unwelcome self-analysis to discover exactly why-the sight of Dead Ed’s butt caused me to think about his daughter, Sunny.

She feared her father more than she respected him. She honored him much more than she loved him. What she didn’t do was cross him.

Without a clue as to the nature of the character she was pursuing, Merritt had crossed him.

I scratched below the surface of my memories of my afternoon at the ranchette in Summit County with Sunny Hasan. I didn’t know what I was trying to remember, but felt certain I would recognize it when I found it.

I thought long and hard about erasing the videocassette. Or burning it in the fireplace. Never had I held an object in my hand that was more worthy of destruction. But I didn’t. As obscene as the tape was, it might turn out to be a key to Merritt’s legal salvation. And I would do nothing to put that at risk.

Reluctantly, I switched off the VCR and tuned in to the ten o’clock news. The lead story on Channel 7 was, no surprise, “Chaney’s Hope.” I watched tape of the jet landing in Seattle. I watched tape of an ambulance delivering Chaney to the University of Washington Medical Center. I watched tape of Brenda Strait as she expressed gratitude to everyone for their prayers.

Chaney had been granted a seat at a medical craps table. At least she would get a chance to roll the dice.

If Mitchell Crest didn’t change his mind about arresting her, my plan was to discharge Merritt the next day so she could fly to Seattle to be with her family.

I couldn’t figure out why I didn’t feel better about things.

I decided to blame it all on Dead Ed’s butt.

I contemplated the vodka bottle while Emily whined at the front door. Leaving the spirits behind, I took her out on the lane for her late-night ablutions.

Since we live at the end of a dirt road, it’s difficult to sneak up on us by car, especially at night. Emily and I both listened carefully as a vehicle climbed the winding incline toward the house. Headlight beams danced in the dry grasses on the hillsides. Emily recognized Sam’s car before I did. She greeted him with joy. I was more restrained.

He climbed out, crouched down, and scratched her behind her ears. To me, he said, “Good, you’re up. Doing anything?”

“Getting ready for bed. Why do I get the feeling you have other ideas?”

He smiled in a way that would have worried me if I were a suspect he was cornering. “I tracked down Andrew, like you suggested. He’s waiting for us.”

I was a little suspicious. “Why would Andrew be waiting for us?”

“Actually, he’s just sitting and waiting for somebody to make his night interesting. He doesn’t know it’s going to be us.”

“Should you be doing this, Sam?”

He ignored me, nodded at Emily. “Has she done her thing?”

“Yeah.”

“Put her inside. Let’s go, we shouldn’t dawdle. Andrew might get lucky. That would really screw things up.”

We took Sam’s police department Ford. He steered us west, toward town, and said, “When was the last time you were at The Broker?”

“I don’t know. Probably hasn’t been long enough. That’s where Andrew is?”

“His hangout, apparently, since he’s been separated. Lucy’s babysitting him for the moment.”

“He’s trying to hit on Lucy? This should be fun to watch.”

“For his sake, boy, I hope he doesn’t try. She told me she’s keeping her distance.”

The Broker is a restaurant and bar on the southeastern side of town that comes equipped with a conveniently attached motel. Historically, it’s been an attractive gathering spot for Boulder’s romantically dispossessed. Dozens of my newly separated patients have put in time warming seats in The Broker’s lounge. I’d even visited once in the wake of my own divorce. The scene was not inspiring.

“Andrew doesn’t expect us?”

“We didn’t make an appointment, if that’s what you mean.”

Lucy met us in the motel lobby wearing a little black dress that renewed my faith in little black dresses. She said hello, nodded toward the lounge, and said, “He’s still inside at the bar. Hasn’t moved.”

“Still alone?” Sam said.

“Yeah. He’s watching TV, drinking Wild Turkey, neat.”

Sam asked, “Why aren’t you in there with him?”

She shuddered. “Let’s just say it’s safer out here. You ready?”

“You bet. Where do you want us?”

“Parking lot by the turnpike. You’ll see my car. Give me five minutes to encourage him to go for a walk with me.” She started toward the bar and stopped after two strides, facing Sam. “This is mine, Sam. You interfere, I swear, I’m history. We’re doing this my way.”

Sam held up his hands in protest, as though he were the most trustworthy man on the planet. I thought his act would have gone over better with an audience other than Lucy and me.

Lucy joined us in the parking lot in two minutes, tops. I didn’t know what she said to Andrew to get him to leave the bar with her, but I supposed that a little innuendo from someone as interesting as Lucy would have gone a long way to mobilize someone as lonely as Andrew. I guessed that the little black dress was an inducement, too.

Andrew looked as terrified as near-drunk men can when Lucy pointed to us and said, “These are the friends I told you I wanted you to meet, Andrew.” He paled and spun back to her. I think he was expecting to be mugged.

Lucy was holding her badge at about the level of her neckline. Andrew couldn’t miss it. For a split second, I thought I saw relief on his face. His eyes softened, his shoulders dropped; he was perceiving Lucy as protector.

But more rational thoughts quickly crowded into his whiskey-fogged awareness and he said, “Oh shit,” under his breath. He didn’t slur.

She said, “Andrew? I’m Detective Tanner of the Boulder Police Department.”

She didn’t introduce us. Sam and I said nothing. Nobody had told me to shut up. I just knew.

Lucy said, “Andrew? You want to tell me about your brother-in-law? Edward Robilio?”

Andrew checked out Sam, checked out the asphalt, checked out the sky. He checked out Sam again. He said, “I think I want a lawyer. I have a right to an attorney, don’t I?”

Lucy was nonplussed. She shrugged and said, “Sure, whatever. I guess we’ll just have to go get you one,” and guided him into the front seat of her red Volvo. Sam and I slid into the back and listened as Lucy used her portable phone to ask for instructions from somebody. My suspicion was that the call was a ruse. When she finished with the conversation, she faced Sam and said, “We’re supposed to sit tight for a few minutes. He’ll get back to us.” To Andrew, she added, “I can’t transport you in this. We need to wait for a patrol car to, you know, take us to…a more appropriate place for…interrogation.”

“I have to go…to the police station?”

“That’s where you can call your lawyer. We have a room there for you. You know, a holding, um, cell.”

The word “cell” seemed to have its desired effect on Andrew. The next few minutes were bizarre. Lucy fixed her lipstick in the rearview mirror. Sam kept humming the same two bars of “You’re Nobody Till Somebody Loves You.” Without moving his head, Andrew tried to get a fix on what everyone was doing. But no one in the car said a word until Andrew belched an aromatic little bourbon cloud and asked, “Am I under arrest?”

Lucy didn’t answer him. In a husky, patronizing tone more suited for the cocktail lounge than for interrogation, she said, “You know, you’ve asked for a lawyer. We really shouldn’t talk.”

After another minute of listening to Sam’s persistent humming, Andrew said, “What if I changed my mind? I mean about the lawyer?”

Lucy smiled. “Well, you do that, then we can talk. Clear this right up.”

I thought I saw Andrew check on Sam in the outside mirror before he said, “Well, what, what is it that you want to know?”

Lucy said, “How about we start with your visit to your brother-in-law’s house on Friday afternoon? Start there.”

Andrew seemed to be considering his next move. I watched Sam. He had stopped humming, and his muscles had tensed. I figured he was anticipating Andrew trying to bolt out of the car.

Andrew pressed hard on both of his temples. “Oh God. You know I was there, huh? Damn it. Well, it’s not what you think. It isn’t. I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill him.” After a pause of about three seconds, he added, “Not really.”

Not really?

Lucy said, “Just a moment, Andrew,” and gave the sweetest rendition of Miranda I figured I would ever hear. She pulled out a small tape recorder, started it, and dictated an introduction. She faced Andrew and said, “Now tell me all about it.”

“I’ve been planning to call you guys-I have, really. I mean if that girl was arrested, I would have called. I would have, really.”

He was pathetic. I almost felt sorry for him.

“Here’s what happened. This is the absolute truth. Okay? Okay? You believe me?”

Lucy smiled. A perfect touch with Andrew. For him, it was as though he were confessing an indiscretion to his date.

“Ed called me Friday afternoon and told me to come right over. I mean, he summoned me, the ass. I’m getting a divorce-Abby, my wife, and his wife, Beth, are sisters-and I figured he just wanted to play patriarch and put pressure on me about the divorce and the custody and everything. I was tempted not to go, but I finally decided I would drive over and listen to him and then tell the prick to butt out. Okay?”

Lucy said, “I’m with you so far.”

“He said the doorbell wasn’t working, that he’d leave the front door open, that I should just come in. He’d be downstairs in his office.”

“The ‘he’ you’re talking about is your brother-in-law, Edward Robilio?”

“Yes, that’s right. Ed Robilio. I go in. I go downstairs. I call his name. Nothing. I go into his office and he’s sitting there in his leather chair, uh-I don’t know any other way to put it-he’s, well, he’s…half dead. He has a hole in his chest, there’s blood all over him, there’s a gun on the floor. Immediately I think there’s been a burglary, that he’s been shot. But I know he’s not dead. His eyes are following me and his breathing sounds like bad plumbing.

“It’s like he knows what I’m thinking. He manages to say, ‘No nine-one-one.’ But his breathing is awful, he can barely talk. I can’t understand him and I say, ‘What?’

“He says, ‘I did this. No nine-one-one.’

“I didn’t get it. Finally he’s able to say, ‘Suicide.’

“And he begs me to finish him off. He’s too badly injured to get to the gun. Wants me to do it for him. I want to call an ambulance. He says no. I mean, he’s like begging me.”

Lucy goads him. She says, “Your big shot brother-in-law is begging you?”

“That was a first, let me tell you. I didn’t know what to do. I almost left, but I was afraid the jerk would live, survive, you know, and blame it on me. I mean, the shooting. So I…I picked up his gun and I aimed it and I, I couldn’t do it. I put the gun back down and started to walk away. Behind me, I hear this awful gurgle, then clear as a bell, he says, ‘Please.’

“I couldn’t leave him like that. I went back over, and I picked up the pistol again. I held it out like this-” he stretched his arm and turned his head as though he were holding a soiled diaper “-and I closed my eyes and I counted to five and I pulled the trigger. I didn’t even look at him again. I turned my back and I listened for a minute-a full minute, I counted to sixty-to make sure he wasn’t gurgling anymore. I wiped the gun with my handkerchief and dropped it back down in the blood by the chair. And I left the same way I came in.

“That’s the truth.”

Five minutes later, Sam and I climbed out of Lucy’s car and walked back over to his Ford. We watched a patrol car arrive and two officers move a handcuffed Andrew into the backseat for a ride over to Thirty-third Street. Lucy stayed in the Volvo. I assumed that she was going to go home first, that she’d want to slip out of her little black dress before arriving at the police department to finish booking Andrew.

The cruiser pulled away.

Sam asked rhetorically, “You see this coming? I think I’ve seen it all and then, you know, I get bushwhacked. Who’d have thought that Ed was too vain to kill himself with a nice reliable head shot? Remember the coroner thought the bullet might have done some spinal cord damage? Well, apparently the coroner was right.”

“You believe Andrew?”

“Except for the part about his concern about Merritt, I’m tempted to. You?”

“I guess. So when Robilio called Andrew to come over, it wasn’t because he wanted to discuss the divorce but because he wanted Andrew to be the one to discover his body? He didn’t want his wife to find him?”

“Yeah, I imagine that was it. Kind of hostile to Andrew, don’t you think? I mean, the way I look at it, Andrew had three choices, right? He could have left Ed to die. Some would argue that that would have been hostile. He could have called an ambulance. Some would argue that, given the circumstances, that would have been hostile. Or Andrew could pick up the gun and shoot his brother-in-law to death while he’s claiming he’s really as benevolent as Saint Francis. I say, no matter what you’re thinking, you shoot somebody you think is an asshole in the face, that’s kind of hostile.”