Guilt By Degrees

19

Sunlight streamed through the living room window. I’d forgotten to pull the drapes last night. I rolled out of bed, pulled on my plushy microfleece robe, and went out to the balcony.

The air was surprisingly balmy for a December morning. It would be a great day to get some fieldwork done, but I couldn’t do it alone. One of the cardinal rules of investigation, especially for a lawyer, is never talk to a witness alone. A lawyer can’t ethically testify in his or her own case. That means if a witness takes the stand and decides not to remember what he told you during a private interview, you’ve got no way to prove that he’s lying. I opened my cell phone.

“Detective Keller, please. It’s Rachel Knight.”

After about five ominous-sounding clicks and an inordinate amount of time, a voice told me to “hold for Detective Keller, please,” and I held some more. If I’d called the Kremlin it wouldn’t have taken as long. It cheered me to know that the cops weren’t doing any better with their support staff than we were.

“What?” Bailey barked.

“Feel like a massage?” I asked.

“‘Happy endings’ included?” Bailey said, chuckling at her own joke.

“You can’t afford me,” I said. “I meant-”

“I’ll be there in ten,” she said, and then hung up.

I called Melia and told her I’d be out interviewing witnesses.

“Oh, uh…” Melia paused for so long I thought we’d been disconnected. “I think Eric wants to talk to you.”

“Okay, have him call me on my cell,” I replied.

“Uh, no. I think he wants to talk to you now.”

“Then why don’t you ask him and find out for sure?” I said.

This kind of lame exchange was vintage Melia. At least it wasn’t in person. I walked over to the dresser and pulled out a pair of black jeans-a compromise that’d let me look presentable if I had to go to the office later.

“Um…hang on.”

Seconds later, Eric’s voice came on the line. “Rachel?”

“Hi, Eric. What’s up?”

“You running on that John Doe case?”

“Yeah. I’m checking out the suspect we’ve got in custody,” I explained. “It’s pretty shaky on him from what I’ve seen so far.”

There was a beat of silence, then I heard Eric sigh. “Okay, I’ll give you today to get it sorted out. But if we have to cut this defendant loose, you’re going to have to let the case go back to a regular trial unit. This isn’t a Special Trials case, and your dance card’s already pretty full.”

Something was fishy. It wasn’t like Eric to interfere with us about the cases we picked up. It took me a second, but I got there. “Hemet’s on the warpath, isn’t he?”

“For some reason,” Eric admitted. “He got all worked up at the head deputy meeting last night. Said Special Trials deputies have been overstepping. We all knew he was talking about your John Doe case, so I told him it wouldn’t have happened if his deputy hadn’t dropped the ball-”

Go, Eric. This was one of the many reasons I loved him. “Which he took real well, I’m sure,” I said dryly.

“Not so much. He said that since I didn’t seem inclined to do anything about it, he’d talk to Summers.”

“Which he was going to do anyway, Eric. It didn’t matter what you said or did.”

“Yeah.” Eric sighed. “The feces is undoubtedly about to hit the whirling blades.”

The only question was how hard and how fast. Fred Summers, the chief deputy, was officially the second in command to our fearless and witless leader, District Attorney William Vanderhorn. But in reality Vanderhorn was more political figurehead than boss. Summers was the real force to be reckoned with. And from what I’d seen and heard, he was generally a good guy with real smarts. Why he was giving an ear to Hemet was a mystery. I wondered if Hemet had some kind of dirt on him.

“This is such petty bullshit, Eric,” I said heatedly. “It’s not as though Hemet wants this loser.”

“No,” Eric agreed. “But I don’t need to tell you how the rest of the office feels about our unit. Vanderhorn keeps us in Pampers because he knows he needs you trial monkeys to cover his ass on the heavy cases, but he’s taken some heat about cherry-picking special unit deputies-”

“Anyone who wants to call this case a cherry should be disbarred for incompetence-”

“Of course, but the specifics won’t matter. It’ll be just another time he hears about a beef with a special unit-and this one in particular.”

Because Special Trials got the most complex, high-profile cases, the deputies in that unit got all the “ink.” Some were smart enough to know this was no gift, but many who weren’t in the unit were bitterly jealous of the media attention.

Eric continued, “If Vanderhorn gets the sense that we can afford to pick up cases at random, he’ll jump on the excuse to cut the unit down. And since yours will be the neck that’s sticking out…”

I’d wind up trying meth-lab cases in Newhall for the rest of my career. “Okay. I’ll get this wrapped up by the end of business today.”

“I’m sorry, Rachel,” Eric said. “But this is for your own good-and mine. I don’t want to lose you.”

“Thanks, Eric. I understand,” I said. “And I appreciate it.”

“You know it wouldn’t happen if it were up to me. You did a good thing. We’re prosecutors. We go after the bad guy no matter who the victim is.”

Not that it mattered to petty bureaucratic asshats like Hemet. But I could tell that Eric was feeling guilty for having to give me grief about the case, so I tried to dial myself back.

“It’s okay. I get it. I’ll be in tomorrow, I promise.”

We ended the call, and I grabbed my coat and purse and flew out the door. Bailey was probably fuming by now. Fortunately, when I ran out through the lobby and reached her car, I saw that she was swaying in her seat to the rap classic “Changes” by Tupac Shakur and seemed to be in a good mood. I slid into the passenger seat. “Sorry I’m late.”

She waved me off. “It’s all good.”

“You’re white, Keller,” I said, pulling my seat belt on. “Deal with it.”

She started to say something, then stopped herself. “You okay?”

I filled her in on my conversation with Eric.

“That was fast,” she remarked.

“I take it you’ve already heard about Stoner?” I asked.

She nodded. “They made it official this morning. He’s confined to quarters until they decide what to do with him.”

“It makes me sick that a jerk like Hemet can rain crap on everyone for no good reason.”

“Well, Stoner did deck that deputy DA,” Bailey said philosophically.

“He had it coming,” I replied, wishing I’d gotten in a good kick or two myself.